Provence - To Die For

by Jessica Fletcher

  “Madame, I understand you wished to speak with me.” She walked to where I was sitting and stopped behind the chair opposite mine.

  I stood and extended my hand. “Yes. I’m Jessica Fletcher,” I said.

  She shook my hand tentatively, transferring the handkerchief to the other hand.

  “And how may I help you, Madame Fletcher?”

  “Won’t you sit for a moment? I won’t keep you long.”

  Reluctantly, she sat down. She rested her hands in her lap, the handkerchief held loosely between them.

  “I’m looking for your nephew,” I said, “and someone in Paris told me he was visiting you.”

  “And what would you want with my nephew?”

  “Just to speak with him.”

  “Are you a reporter?” She started to rise from her seat.

  “I promise you I’m not.”

  She sat again, but stayed on the edge of the chair. “Does he know you?”

  “We’ve met before. Yes.”

  “And why do you wish to speak with him?”

  “I don’t know if you’re aware of what occurred in Avignon last week.”

  “You mean the murder of Emil Bertrand?”

  “Yes.”

  “Of course I know about Emil. All France knows about Emil. It has been on the television, in the newspapers. They have arrested his lover. She killed him.”

  I realized I’d been out of touch with the news media since I’d come to France. Martine didn’t have a television, and although she did have a radio, I hadn’t thought to turn it on. “They arrested her, it’s true,” I said, “but I’m not sure she killed him.”

  “And what would René know about this?”

  “He was in Bertrand’s class that morning.”

  She seemed shaken by that revelation. “That doesn’t mean anything.”

  “I’m not accusing him,” I said quickly. “I’d just like to talk with him and see if there was anything he noticed that could be helpful in the investigation.”

  “What do you have to do with the investigation? You are American, are you not?”

  “I’m giving the police a little assistance in the matter,” I said. It wasn’t exactly a lie. I was giving the police assistance, or at least I would be when I had useful information for them. That they didn’t want me to assist them was irrelevant right now.

  “He has spoken to the police already,” she said. “And they know all about it.”

  “All about it?”

  “Yes, of course. He had to tell them. If he didn’t, they could have found out later. And then there would have been trouble.”

  “True.”

  “They promised not to release it to the newspapers. We would have no peace if they did. That’s not the kind of publicity one wants.”

  “Certainly not.” What was she getting at?

  “And they might have made him a suspect,” she said. “I advised him to let the police know right away.”

  “Why do you think he would have been a suspect?” I asked. I noticed that her hands no longer lay quietly in her lap. She’d begun twisting the handkerchief.

  “Well, of course he would have been a suspect. It’s obvious.”

  “Not to me.”

  “There was bad blood for years.”

  “Why was there bad blood?”

  “Why? Because until recently, Emil never acknowledged him.”

  “Acknowledged him,” I echoed.

  Her voice grew bitter. “For all the years of René’s growing up, Emil never acknowledged him. His only son.”

  “His son!” I tried to keep the surprise out of my voice, but wasn’t completely successful.

  “Of course he’s Emil’s son. Didn’t you know? Isn’t that why you’re here?”

  Chapter Seventeen

  “He looks a lot like him,” I said, realizing as I spoke that it was true. Emil Bertrand and René Bonassé shared the same vivid blue eyes. They both had ebony hair, although Emil’s had been shot through with gray. The son had cut his hair in the close-cropped style his father favored, but whether that was a deliberate imitation or simply a coincidental preference I didn’t know. René was also the same height as Emil, with the same broad chest and muscular arms. He would have had the strength to kill; did he have the desire?

  “Why does René use your last name and not Bertrand?” I asked Jeanne Bonassé.

  “Emil abandoned him when René was a small boy,” she said. “My husband and I raised him. For a child, it is much easier if he has the same last name as his parents.”

  “What happened to his mother?”

  “My sister was not a strong person. When her husband left, she could no longer cope with the responsibilities.”

  “She left as well?”

  “Non.” There was a long pause before she said, “She took her own life.”

  “How awful. I’m so sorry. It must be distressing for you to speak about it.”

  She sighed. “It was a long time ago. The hurt, it never goes away, but for me the pain is not so intense anymore. For René it still lingers.”

  “I’m sure it must,” I said.

  “His maman would have been so proud of him.” She blinked back tears. “He could have stayed right here, joined us in the restaurant We would have been happy if he did—he is our only child. But he dreams of a bigger stage. He goes away to school. He works hard. Et voilà! Success, it comes to him. He is in charge of his own department.”

  The banker, Bertrand had called him. I visualized the sober young man with his starched shirts and stiff comportment, and easily imagined him a corporate executive in a boardroom. Where I couldn’t picture him was behind a stove.

  “Is he still in Les Baux?”

  “Oh, yes, he will stay till after the funeral, and perhaps longer. After all, there is the matter of his inheritance.”

  “Of course,” I said. “Where can I find him now?”

  “He is up at the Château,” she said. “He goes every day. I think it comforts him to wander among the old ruins. His mother, too, was very fond of the place, and used to bring him there as a child. I guess that’s why ...” She trailed off, her eyes seeing a picture denied to me.

  I stood. “Thank you for speaking with me, Madame Bonassé.”

  “Je vous en prie. You’re welcome,” she said. “But you must promise not to let the newspapers know René’s secret. It will come out soon enough, I’m sure. For now, he needs time to mourn in private.”

  “They won’t learn it from me,” I assured her.

  While I had been inside, the temperature had dropped and the wind had begun to kick up. I buttoned my coat, pulled my scarf over my head, and trudged up to the entrance to the Citadelle de la Ville Morte, Citadel of the Dead City. A few hardy souls passed me on their way downhill, their cheeks red from the blustery weather.

  I paid the entrance fee, declined to take a handheld electronic tour guide, and stepped out of the shelter of the small exhibit introducing the site onto a broad plateau. To my left was a little chapel. I could hear music from a slide show that played inside. A rocky plain sprawled before me, reaching a hundred yards out to an iron railing that marked the edge of the cliff. Dropped into the barren field, at wide intervals, were medieval engines of war, siege machines, crouching like huge insects, their wooden skeletons stark against the leaden sky.

  Not another soul braved the coming storm to stand at the railing and gaze south across the valley floor to mountains miles away. No awestruck child gaped at the catapult or its sister weapons. I was alone with the wind. It swirled around me, whipping my coat against my legs, blowing up my sleeves, tearing my scarf off, threatening to carry me away, along with everything else that challenged its rule. I put my back to the tempest, pulled the scarf tight, and stuck close to the crumbling ruins, following the path to the remains of chambers that once housed the lords of Les Baux and their vassals.

  I rounded a corner where the remnants of walls offered a respite from the squall. Tiny
compartments, like pigeonholes, were cut into the stone. I stared, fascinated. Was this an ancient larder? What had the feudal inhabitants stored in these little containers? I wandered from room to room, my imagination conjuring the lives of these long-ago residents in the castle they had carved from the rocky escarpment.

  Reminding myself that I was not here to play tourist, I searched for René Bonassé among the small number of visitors I encountered as I explored the ruins. He wasn’t there; nor were the Thomases. And it was starting to rain.

  Following the path along a towering wall, I came upon a stairway cut into the rock, leading to the top. Modem civilization had provided an iron banister, which ran down one side of the flight. The stairs themselves had been gouged out by centuries of rainwater cascading down, leaving a notch in the middle of each steep step. I grasped the iron rail and ascended slowly, pulling with my arms as I climbed up, keeping my feet on the edges of the wet stone away from the jagged centers. At the top I battled the wind and the slippery boulders underfoot to grab a bar on the parapet. A lone figure, buffeted by the gale, stood at the other end of the wall. I fumbled in my bag for a pair of sunglasses to shield my eyes from the wind, and squinted, straining to see the figure more clearly. Was that René? It looked like him, but the walk to where he braced himself against the parapet would be hazardous. Should I wait till he returned?

  Patience has never been one of my virtues, nor prudence, truth to tell, which I’ve demonstrated on any number of occasions. But I hoped I wasn’t foolish into the bargain. I didn’t want to twist an ankle skidding on the slick stones or get caught by the wind and knocked over the low barrier to tumble down the wall and the mountain on which it was perched. I held on to the bar and waited, hoping René would tire of the pounding the wind and rain were giving his body, and make his way back toward the stairs. Eventually there was a pause in the storm, and I saw him push away from the rail. I edged forward as he started back, timing my pace so that I blocked his progress at the narrowest point of the battlement.

  He raised his eyes and started when he recognized me. “Madame Fletcher. What are you doing here?”

  “I could make up a story and tell you I’m merely visiting the tourist attractions,” I said, “but I really came here to speak with you.”

  He didn’t respond. He tucked the ends of his scarf into the front of his jacket, and shoved his ungloved hands into his pockets.

  “I’ve spoken with your aunt,” I said, “and I know.” I waited, hoping the same strategy that had drawn out information from Madame Bonassé would work on her nephew. But he was not easily led.

  “What do you think you know?” he said.

  “I know you’re Emil Bertrand’s son.”

  “Biologically perhaps, but not in any other sense.”

  “Why did he acknowledge you after all these years?”

  He snorted. “Who knows? Maybe he was feeling the approach of death.” His bitter smile never reached his eyes. “Maybe his ego required a successor, one related by blood instead of talent.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He wasn’t interested in me as a child, but the idea of that child as an adult, that had possibilities.” He leaned against the iron railing, his arms crossed in front of him, his back to the steep drop. “As if I wanted any attention from him,” he muttered under his breath.

  “What did he want from you?”

  “I never figured that out.” He dropped his head and stared at the ground.

  I let the silence grow, hoping his need to sort out his feelings would spur him to continue.

  He sighed and frowned, his lips compressed in a thin line. Eventually he raised his eyes. They were angry and hard. “He wanted me to join him in business. Can you believe him?”

  “You mean his restaurant?”

  “And whatever else he planned to pursue. Obviously someone didn’t like that idea.”

  “You think one of his business partners—”

  “Of course, there was a price,” he spat out. “Emil Bertrand never did anything without a price. He asks favors and then makes demands.” He pushed off the railing and began pacing in the narrow space. The wind picked up and blew the end of his scarf into the air.

  “What was the price?”

  “The price?” He looked confused.

  “You said he never did anything without a price.”

  “The price was too much.” He raised his fists. “He wanted me to change my name.”

  “Change your name to Bertrand?”

  “I told him he could burn in hell before I’d do that,” he shouted to the leaden sky. “The bastard. I imagine that’s where he is right now.” His voice dropped to a growl. “It gives me great pleasure to think of him there, after the hell he put my mother through.” He drew his lips back over his teeth like a wolf contemplating its prey.

  “Did you turn down his offer to join the business?”

  “Why should I turn him down? Let him pay. Let him pay for what he did. Let him pay with his life.” He turned on me, his eyes flaming. He grabbed my shoulders and shook me.

  I dropped my handbag and tried to wrest myself from his grasp.

  “Do you know what a monster he was? She killed herself because of him. She threw herself off this wall.” The wind began to howl. He pushed me ahead of him, dragging me to the railing. “Look! Look down there,” he yelled, thrusting my shoulder out over the railing. I tried to twist away, but he was too strong. “That’s where they found her body, all broken.” The railing was biting into my hip. He gripped my shoulders and forced me to lean out beyond the iron bar. “Look! This was the last thing she saw.” The wind rode up the wall and blew into my face, taking my cries and carrying them away. “You think anyone can survive that plunge?” I could barely see, but the view was not one I wanted anyway. “Look! It was days till they could recover her body.” The vertical drop of the wall was extended by a steep slide of sharp rocks, bare brush, and torn tree trunks. “Look!” he screamed. My right foot was off the ground, and half my body hung over the precipice. “Look!”

  “Oh, Jessica, that’s where you are,” Jill called out from the top of the stairs.

  Abruptly René pulled me back and gave me a shove in Jill’s direction. He shouted a curse and stomped past me. Jill ducked out of his way, and he ran down the stairs, taking the last five in a single leap.

  “Are you all right?”

  I shuddered. “I think so,” I said, straightening my coat and picking up my bag from where I’d dropped it. My ears rang with the force of the wind, and my scarf and hair were wet. I looked around for my sunglasses. Hadn’t I had them on? They must have fallen off when René Bonassé, né Bertrand, forced me to look over the wall.

  “I’m all right,” I said, “but I’m ready to get in out of the storm.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  The Brasserie St. Marc was busy but Jill, Craig, and I found an empty table among the ones set up outside the restaurant. The village could have been in another part of the country, so different was its weather from the wind and rainstorm we’d encountered only two hours to the south in Les Baux. The late-afternoon temperature was mild, the wind calm, and a setting sun was peeking out from behind streaky clouds. Only the blare of sirens down on the main road marred the tranquil atmosphere. I thought of Mallory, but she would be far away by now, wouldn’t she?

  The waiter set down his tray on a stand, and placed three large bowls of fish broth on our table along with three bowls of garlicky mayonnaise, a platter of fish that had been cooked in the broth, and a basket of toasted slices of baguette.

  “This bouillabaisse is famous around here,” I said, passing Jill the basket of bread. “According to Marcel, people come from all the local villages when the chef is making it. We’re lucky there was any left over from lunch.”

  “Smells wonderful,” Craig said, leaning over his bowl and inhaling deeply. “Whose idea was this anyway?”

  Jill and I laughed. “Yours,” we said together.
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  “How is it?” I asked after Craig had dipped in his spoon and taken his first taste.

  “Brilliant!” he said. “I hope you appreciate my genius for finding great food in France.” He looked at his wife.

  “You haven’t steered us wrong once,” she replied. “Of course, it’s almost impossible to get a bad meal in Provence, unless you have the misfortune of going into one of those American ‘fast-food’ establishments that shall remain nameless. Begging your pardon, Jessica, if you’re fond of them.”

  “I much prefer this,” I said honestly.

  “Have to remember the name of this place,” Craig said as he smeared the garlic mayonnaise on a slice of the toast. “It’s worth a detour if they’re making bouillabaisse.” He dropped the toast into his soup. “Did you get what you needed?” he asked me.

  “No. The bakery is closed,” I said. “I was hoping a fax had come in for me. The baker is letting me use her fax machine; I’m expecting some papers from the States. But the shop was locked. I slid a note under the door, and I’ll call her tomorrow.”

  We had stopped at the bakery on the way back to Martine‘s, but we’d never made it to the farmhouse after Craig had spied the blackboard hanging in front of the brasserie with the words AUJOURD’HUI, BOUILLABAISSE—Today, bouillabaisse—printed large in chalk. It was just as well. It would have been late if we’d waited for dinner until we were back in Avignon.

  The Thomases had urged me to return with them to the hotel, at least for a few days or until the authorities had found Mallory, if they were able to find her. It hadn’t taken much convincing on their parts. I wasn’t worried about staying alone, which had been their chief concern. I didn’t think I was in any danger from Mallory. But I’d already decided it would be much more convenient to be in the city for any number of reasons, not the least of which was my plan to return to the real estate office of P. Franc and M. Poutine. And I thought it was time Captain LeClerq and I had a heart-to-heart.

  When the waiter brought a tray of selections for the cheese course, Jill took out a small leather journal and began making notes. “Provence is chèvre country,” she said, referring to the white goat’s-milk cheese that is popular the world over. “The native cheeses are mostly made from goat’s milk or a combination of milk from goats and cows, sometimes even sheep,” she added. “My goodness, what is all that noise about?”