Charlie Gilchrist Mystery: Book 2
The Dragonfly Brooch
Estella McQueen
© Estella McQueen 2019
Estella McQueen has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in 2019 by Endeavour Media Ltd.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
About the author
Chapter One
The first thing that struck him was the intense smell of lavender.
The taxi halted at the roadside, its engine idling while the driver stretched in his seat and patted his shirt pocket as if checking for his Gitanes. He was balding on top, chin unshaven, his sleeves rolled as far as his biceps.
Charlie Gilchrist pulled the crumpled printout from his rucksack and re-read the instructions his brother had given him. Somewhere on the outskirts of St Rémy was a vineyard with a farmhouse and gite nearby, but all he could see beyond the scrubby hedges were rows and rows of purple lavender. ‘Ici?’
The driver’s face was a picture of disinterest. ‘Oui. Ici.’ He pointed towards a narrow dusty track. ‘Tout droit!’
A few cars passed in either direction but there was no one else about. Charlie got out and pushed his sunglasses up his nose. The path was dusty and crumbly underfoot. A dog turd lay in a curl on the ground next to his feet. He tried standing on tiptoe but the hedges were too high.
Nevertheless the driver was insistent and so Charlie paid the fare and the taxi drove off in a cloud burst of dust and grit. It was early evening and the warm air beat down on the back of his neck. Cicadas were pulsating in the grass. A small wooden sign on a pole in the gap in the hedge painted in faded blue and gold read: “Les Fruits de Provence”.
The path led away from the vineyard and towards a collection of stone buildings. A second sign, battered and faded, with the paint-crumbled letters just about decipherable, told him he was in the right place: Mas Daria.
Charlie went through a gap in the hedge into a garden filled with lavender bushes, sunflowers and big straggly daisy-shaped plants. Across the way neat, ordered rows of vegetables were being gently watered with a sprinkler system. The farmhouse had pink roof tiles and green-shuttered windows and a dovecote at one end, while at ground level the main front door was decorated on either side by randomly placed terracotta flower pots. In a gravelly area underneath a lone plane tree there was a small circular metal table accompanied by a pair of slightly bent iron-work chairs.
‘Très beau,’ he murmured to himself.
Incorporated somewhere within the low stone buildings was his accommodation for the next week. He knocked at the front door. It was answered promptly, although not without a degree of effort. The wood was warped at the bottom and he was about to give it a helpful push when it shuddered open to reveal a middle-aged woman in a short-sleeved, green cotton dress and a pinafore apron. Her silver blonde hair was pulled into a sleek chignon at the back of her neck and she was wearing a Versace scarf. ‘Oh, ah, bonsoir! Hello hello!’ she said, hastening out towards him. ‘Monsieur Gil… Christ?’
The surname sounded exotic when spoken in a French accent. ‘Oui, c’est moi.’
‘Bon! Enchanté! Je suis Valérie!’ she added, pointing to herself and rattling the pearls on her bracelet. She kissed him rapidly on both cheeks, and then leaving the farmhouse door open bustled him across to a wooden staircase at the side of the building, chattering volubly the entire time.
‘Pouvez vous parler moins vite, Valérie?’ he asked. Her accent was regional, but if she slowed down a little, he’d be able to follow exactly what she was saying. As it was, not a chance.
‘Excusez moi!’ Valérie exclaimed. She could only speak French, she apologised. ‘My English,’ she said, ‘terrible!’
From her apron pocket she produced a large metal key tied with a bright red cord and at the top of the staircase she unlocked the door to the gite. Immediately the temperature dropped as the heat from outside gave way to the cool air of the stone-walled interior. He followed her in, not quite sure what to expect.
The main room itself was picture book perfect, from the ticking clock on the mantelpiece to the dried flowers hanging from the overhead beams and the Biot glassware on the shelves. A leather two-seater sofa, cracked and worn at the seams, was situated near the fireplace, but there was no television, and at first glance, nowhere to plug in any devices. Underfoot the cool floor tiles were broken up by a pair of very thin rugs.
The kitchen was equipped with the basics – a sink, a cooker, a refrigerator and a single cupboard doubling up as pantry and storage unit. Valérie briefly demonstrated their contents – an assortment of mismatched crockery and pans – while a drawer underneath the sink unit contained a few random utensils. A collection of jars, bottles and tins were set out on the window ledge behind the sink, along with salt and pepper mills and a small bowl of lump sugar.
He must be tired and hungry, thought Valérie. Pointing him to a kitchen chair she proceeded to set out a suspiciously rustic-looking pudding in the centre of the square dining table and poured two glasses of cloudy lemonade from a large pitcher. She took a giant knife from the knife block and sheared through several layers of choux pastry, littering the wooden table surface with large papery flakes as she did so. Presented with a generous slice and a delicate silver fork to eat it with, Charlie took the first bite.
It was incredibly sweet – his eyes watered on contact – and incredibly dense. The many layers of pastry compressed together to make a papery soggy clump in the middle of his mouth, but somehow he managed to make the requisite ‘Mmm … mmm …’ noises as the thick cream filling oozed its way around his cheeks. Meanwhile Valérie rummaged in a drawer in the sideboard and produced a map of the area and some paperwork. She pointed at a stylised picture of a bull on the front of a leaflet. She was trying to describe some sort of event. ‘Le Festival,’ she said. She began to jabber something about him doing a little bit of shopping in Avignon or Nice, n’est ce pas? Food? Or presents – cadeaux – for a pretty girlfriend. Non?
Finally she pressed the key into Charlie’s hand, wished him ‘bonnes vacances’, and issued instructions to contact her if he needed anything. ‘Là? D’accord?’ She pointed vaguely downstairs towards the main farmhouse, and then left him to it. Abandoning the pudding, he picked up his rucksack and went into the bedroom. It was furnished with a high queen-size bed complete with iron bedstead and bolster, a smaller, much lower, fold-out bed tucked under the window and a battered chest of drawers. On the wall was a van Gogh self portrait – a tormented profusion of swirling blue and red paint strokes from which the artist’s jutting cheekbones, gaunt jaw line, shock of red hair and piercing eyes, disturbed the aura of the otherwise tranquil room. He wasn’t sure if he could live with the intensity of the gaze, but for the moment he left Vincent where he was.
Apa
rt from a lavender-oil burner on the window ledge, the only other decorative items in the room were a washbowl and jug perched on top of the chest of drawers. Custard yellow and decorated in pale pink indeterminate flowers, the glaze was fissured all over and there was a rime of dirt clinging to the surface. The lip of the jug was chipped and a dark patch of dust had collected at the bottom.
Through the window he could see clear open countryside, mountains in the distance, vineyards crawling up the hillsides. The sunlight caught the rim of the washbowl and the colours in the sunset melted and merged in front of his eyes. A dislocation occurred whereby the past became the present, the present became the past …
A young man is getting ready for bed. With braces dangling he rolls up the sleeves of his shirt and undoes his collar button. He fills the bowl with water from the jug and washes hands, arms and face. Hastily drying himself on a blue striped towel, he goes across to the bed. He picks up a book but abandons it almost straight away. He shuffles a pack of cards, lights a cigarette, gets to his feet, paces about, goes as far as the window, returns to the bed. There is a tense hunch to his shoulders; he jumps at the slightest sound. He can’t settle. He is waiting for something, someone, and there is nowhere else he can go …
Charlie opened his eyes. A discordant vibrating sound was interfering with his concentration. A pink glow suffused the walls of the room – but the noise was coming from the phone in his pocket. He fished it out and saw from the caller ID that it was his brother Andy. ‘Well, I’m here,’ he said as soon as they’d exchanged greetings. ‘Now what?’
‘You wait for the client to get in touch with you,’ Andy replied. ‘She’s in Avignon at the moment.’
‘What’s she doing there?’
‘I don’t know! She’ll send you an email in a day or so.’
Then what?’
‘You see if you can help her.’
‘And if I can’t?’
‘Failure as a concept is verboten,’ said Andy. ‘You won’t fail, not if you’re embedded; not if you’ve built up a relationship with her.’
‘Embedded? Like a war reporter?’
‘Exactly! I’m thinking Don McCullin in the jungle armed with nothing but three Nikon cameras and twenty rolls of film. Of course, he did go a little bit mad after a while … Anyway, speak soon, mon frère. Au revoir!’
‘That’s it?’ said Charlie. ‘That’s all I get?’
It seemed a very back to front way of doing things, and what Don McCullin had to do with it was anyone’s guess, but those were his instructions.
Back in the kitchen Charlie noticed that Valérie had left him a petite baguette in the bread bin, but it had been there all day and was no longer at its best. Nevertheless he ripped off a section of bread and dipped it into a saucer of olive oil.
The young man he’d seen pacing about the bedroom was now sitting next to him at the table, dangling a half-smoked cigarette from his lips and agitatedly dealing out the cards for a game of Patience …
You and me both, thought Charlie.
Chapter Two
The bright light of the morning woke Charlie early. In the kitchen a fly was making itself at home on the pudding which he’d forgotten to cover up last night. After coffee and a lukewarm shower he checked his phone for messages. Then he remembered he should have asked Valérie for the wi-fi password.
It was only nine o’clock and the heat was already intense. He trotted down the wooden staircase and across to Valérie’s front door, shielding his eyes from the glare. Picking a way through the terracotta pots, he knocked smartly against the peeling green paint and waited. Apart from the roar of a motorbike from the main road and the cicadas in the brush, there was no sign of life. Maybe Valérie was in the back, having breakfast. He banged louder. No reply. He tentatively made his way around towards the rear of the house, where he could see corrugated iron shelters and an old dog kennel.
‘Allo!’ he called, ‘Valérie?’
There was a clatter from beyond, the squeak of a garden gate, and the tramping of boots in the dust. A young woman emerged from the plot of land at the rear, wearing a grubby battered straw hat, a crumpled linen shirt with loosely rolled cuffs and a pair of dusty – and very skimpy – denim shorts. She waved at him and ambled over, boot laces half undone and trailing underfoot. Her eyebrows, he noticed, were very pronounced – two swoops of a gull’s wing in fact – and her irises were a deep chocolatey brown.
‘My name’s Charlie,’ he said in French. ‘I’m staying upstairs in the gite. I wonder if you could tell me where Valérie is?’
The woman paused and then replied in English. ‘She’s not here, she’s popped into town.’
Her accent wasn’t French. ‘Are you staying here, too?’ He’d thought his was the only apartment on site, but perhaps there was more accommodation to the rear.
‘Oh, I’m here for the duration.’ There was a strange inflection to her words as if he’d implied he disapproved of her presence. Which he didn’t. Why should he?
Hang on. Wait a minute. Charlie frowned. ‘Are you – Australian?’
One of her gull wing eyebrows arched sharply aloft. ‘Well spotted.’
‘Thank you, Miss …?’
‘Kennedy,’ she said. ‘Davina Kennedy. Pleased to meet you.’ Her eyeliner was already slightly smudged from the heat.
‘Charlie Gilchrist. Likewise. So where would I find Valérie?’
‘She’s the housekeeper,’ said Davina, ‘she doesn’t live in.’
‘Oh, my mistake. I assumed this was her property. I thought she owned the place …’
‘Nope,’ said Davina. ‘That responsibility lies with me.’
He must have looked baffled because she went on with some amusement. ‘Australians can own property overseas surely?’
‘Sorry,’ he said, recollecting himself. ‘It’s none of my business.’
‘No worries. Valérie takes the bookings, she sorts out the bed linen, she welcomes the guests, she speaks your genuine French; it’s reasonable that you should think she owns the place.’ There was an attractive huskiness to her voice, along with a precise enunciation – as if she thought he was deaf – that made him want to pay attention to everything she said. ‘Anyway what is it I can do for you?’
‘I’m after the wi-fi password,’ he said, ‘that’s all.’
‘Oh sure. It’s written down somewhere. Come on in. I’ve got some coffee on.’
So saying Davina gave the battered green door a hefty shove and led him inside the farmhouse.
Unlike the sparse interior of the gite upstairs Davina’s abode was fully kitted out. Through a furniture-cluttered reception room, she took him into a modest kitchen crammed to bursting with an eclectic collection of metal pans, colanders, tea sets and decorated bowls, all displayed on doily-covered shelves or piled high on scrubbed wooden work surfaces. A coffee grinder sat on the sink unit, a jam jar of faded lavender drooped over the kitchen taps while Provençal-patterned curtains were bunched loosely at the windows. The terracotta tiles on the floor were lumpy and uneven and he had to sidle past an old clothes horse to get to the table. ‘How rustically picturesque,’ he said. ‘So, is it the vineyard you own or the lavender farm?’
‘Neither. The vineyard belongs to the chateau down the road and the lavender fields belong to a Monsieur Lagarde. I was visiting the region when I noticed the house was for sale. It’s funny,’ Davina went on, ‘but when I bought the place I had this distinct feeling that I needed to keep its original charm intact. I’ve hardly changed a stick of furniture. It’s like something from one of those home decor magazines.’
‘Or a film set,’ Charlie offered.
‘Yes,’ she said in surprise, ‘that’s right … Have you ever worked in the film industry?’
‘Me, no.’
‘Only you seem very aware of your surroundings.’
‘Do I? I’m a historian,’ he said. ‘Sort of.’ No harm in revealing that.
‘Have a seat,’ said Da
vina. On the sturdy kitchen table was a neat pile of chocolate bars. ‘I’m not that greedy, honest,’ she said. ‘The company gives them to me for free. Help yourself.’
He picked up one of the bars and read the label: “Chocolat fourré crème confiseur à l’arôme de fraise.” Oh, you work for a chocolate manufacturer?’
‘Kind of.’ She poured him a cup of coffee and offered him a croissant. ‘So, what are your plans while you’re here?’
‘Well I’m waiting for a client to get in touch,’ he said. ‘I don’t know where and when we’re supposed to be meeting. She’s somewhere in Avignon. That’s why I need to get online.’
‘Avignon,’ she quoted grandly, ‘is where the most serious occupation of the land is the search for pleasure.’ How’re you fixed for provisions? If it’s a big shop you want, there’s a supermarket on the edge of town otherwise you can always pick up your bread and cheese in one of the little grocery stores hereabouts. There’s a good one five minutes away, if not the supermarket’s about a twenty-minute walk. I can give you a lift if you like. As for eateries there’s a nice little café down the road – not quite the real Provençal experience of course, bit soulless, but if you’re gasping … You might want to try Les Alpilles bistro,’ she added. ‘Then there’s always the Petit Duc brasserie, but you’ll probably find something good on the Boulevard Mirabeau or even the Avenue de la Libération …’ The French words sounded odd in her Aussie accent. ‘Sorry,’ she grinned. ‘Came over all A Town like Alice, there, didn’t I?’ She regarded him intently. ‘Well listen, if there’s anything you need in the meantime … just give me a shout … This afternoon for instance. What you got planned?’
Nothing – unless he could get online.
‘Right,’ she said. ‘Be ready outside in half an hour. That’ll give you enough time to put your sturdy walkers on, slap on your sunscreen, find yourself a hat.’
‘Why,’ he said, ‘where are you taking me?’
And then a phone began to ring somewhere in the depths of the building. Davina turned around distractedly, ‘Oh, gimme a sec, would ya. Won’t be a tic. Wait for me under the tree.’
The Dragonfly Brooch Page 1