Chef Maurice and the Wrath of Grapes (Chef Maurice Culinary Mysteries Book 2)

by J. A. Lang

  “Très ’Ollywood,” commented Chef Maurice.

  The wet loofah and half-empty bottle of expensive bubble bath suggested that Paloni had wasted no time in availing himself of the amenities on offer.

  “What kind of gentleman wears red silk boxers?” demanded Arthur, recoiling from the suitcase that PC Alistair had just popped open. “And carries around signed photographs of himself,” he added, as PC Alistair used a pen to push aside the offending undergarments, revealing a stack of prints beneath.

  “There was once a lady in the restaurant, she expressed herself as a fan of your restaurant column. She even carried a picture of you in her wallet,” said Chef Maurice, rummaging through the wardrobe.

  “What? Where’d she get a picture of me?”

  “She cut it from the newspaper, I think.”

  “But they haven’t changed that photo for decades!”

  “Oui. I told the lady she would be most disappointed if she should meet you now.”

  A worrying thought crept across Arthur’s mind. “You didn’t tell Meryl about this, did you? She gets jealous over the smallest of things,” he said, nevertheless with a smidgen of pride regarding his status as an evidently much-coveted male.

  “Oui, of course I tell her. But do not worry, she found it to be most amusing.”

  “Hmph,” said Arthur, manly pride somewhat deflated.

  They also found various letters and financial papers relating to Paloni’s wine venture, the Basking Buffalo winery. There were several iterations of the agenda for the upcoming shareholders’ meeting in two weeks’ time. In the latest, Sir William’s listing as the after-dinner speaker had been crossed out. With some force.

  “Interesting,” murmured Arthur. The accompanying Annual Report also bore further scrutiny, littered as it was with telling phrases such as ‘rising to the inevitable challenges’, ‘longer-term site potential’ and ‘much appreciated continuing support of our shareholders’. All was not well at Basking Buffalo.

  “Cash flow troubles, if you read between the lines,” said Arthur, handing the report to Chef Maurice, who flipped through, looking at the glossy pictures.

  “And we know that Sir William was an investor.”

  “Or so Paloni told us,” said Arthur, thinking about the crossed-out agenda.

  The guest rooms dealt with, PC Alistair led the way up to the attic rooms, where Gilles and Mrs Bates had their living quarters.

  Mrs Bates’ rooms were functional and spotlessly clean, bare of personal memorabilia apart from a half-eaten box of milk chocolates and a small shelf of well-thumbed paperbacks featuring smouldering-looking young men wearing top hats and waistcoats, and frilly ladies in horse-drawn carriages.

  Gilles’s quarters consisted of two rooms: a living room and a smaller bedroom. The former afforded him a small fireplace, an armchair and a desk, while the latter housed a single bed and a wardrobe almost entirely filled with white shirts, pressed black trousers, and a row of identical tailcoats. A stool and shoeshine kit were neatly arranged in one corner.

  PC Alistair set about peering behind furniture and riffling through the drawers, with the desperate enthusiasm of one who has failed to find anything suitably incriminating to report back to one’s superiors.

  Thankfully for the young policeman, Chef Maurice’s excavations under the bed revealed a strange metal suitcase, about the size of two briefcases put together. He laid it on the bed and reached for the fastenings.

  “Wait, it might be a bomb,” said Arthur.

  “Bah, who will sleep with a bomb under their bed?” said Chef Maurice and snapped open the locks. “Voilà!”

  Two very old, and most likely highly valuable, bottles of wine stared back up at them, nestled quietly in the black velvet interior. A small thermometer monitored their temperature, and the whole case hummed gently as the thermostat kicked into action.

  “A 1918 Cheval Blanc and 1945 Mouton,” said Arthur. “Not a butler’s usual bedtime drink, I should think.”

  It appeared to be time for another little chat with Gilles.

  Chapter 8

  In the kitchens of Le Cochon Rouge, the big clock over the prep station ticked its way past two o’clock in the morning. Chef Maurice stood at the stove, stirring a pot of thick hot chocolate.

  They’d returned to find Alf fast asleep on the floor, arms and legs wrapped firmly around a sack of potatoes. Patrick had loaded the commis chef into a handy wheelbarrow, spuds and all, covered him with a blanket and headed down into Beakley to deliver Alf to his lodgings.

  “So, you believe the explanation of Monsieur Gilles?” said Chef Maurice, thumping three full mugs down on the table.

  PC Lucy shrugged. “I don’t have any reason not to.”

  “Bah! ‘Taking wines for a valuation’? Why does the company not come to the Hall? Non, I tell you, Monsieur Gilles, he keeps the truth hidden. I have many suspicions.”

  “You always have suspicions,” said Arthur, who was leaning back in his chair, eyes closed.

  “And is it not true that, very often, it is the butler who did it?”

  “Only in the movies, Maurice.”

  “And anyway,” said PC Lucy, “you told me Gilles was in the dining room the whole time with you and Arthur. He can’t be the murderer.”

  “Hmph,” said Chef Maurice, miffed at having provided the dubious bottle-borrowing butler with such a cast-iron alibi.

  “Well, it wasn’t me or Maurice. And unless dear old Mrs Bates had finally had enough of making mini Yorkshire puds—”

  “Non, non, she is too short. Sir William, he was hit on the head, n’est-ce pas?”

  PC Lucy nodded. “Pretty hard, too.”

  “All right, so unless Mrs Bates carried a stool down into the cellar with her, we’re left with our five guests,” said Arthur.

  “Plus we still don’t have an explanation for how the cellar door came to be locked in the first place,” said PC Lucy, “with the key left in Sir William’s pocket.”

  “And do not forget, too, the man in black who made an attack on Patrick,” said Chef Maurice.

  “In all fairness, it sounded more like he was simply trying to get away from you, Maurice,” said Arthur. “Patrick was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

  “Hmph, still, a man appearing at the Hall on the same night as a murder must be considered most suspicious, I think.”

  “We know it can’t have been him, though,” said PC Lucy. “Patrick and I followed him all the way over there, and he’d been in the restaurant the whole afternoon, according to Alf.”

  “And he only ordered one dish,” sniffed Chef Maurice, studying the order tickets.

  “At least he paid his bill. And he tipped,” Arthur pointed out. They’d found the money earlier on the table, in crisp twenty-pound notes.

  “Who treks across the middle of nowhere with a gun in a briefcase, runs away when we try to stop him, and still pays for his dinner?” said PC Lucy, who was looking quite frazzled by the night’s events.

  “Oui, a most polite criminal, it seems.”

  The front door banged as Patrick came in, wheelbarrow hefted in one hand. (Chef Maurice could be very particular when it came to the dining room floor.)

  “Sleeping like the dead,” he reported. “But don’t worry, chef, I set him five alarm clocks. And hid two of them. He’ll be here tomorrow morning, all right.”

  Chef Maurice nodded in satisfaction. He had firm views on punctuality, as long as they didn’t apply to him, of course.

  “Today morning, in fact,” said Arthur, looking up at the clock and stretching his arms. “I’d better be getting on home.”

  “Me too,” said PC Lucy, standing up. “I have a feeling tomorrow’s going to be a busy day.”

  “I’ll walk you home,” said Patrick quickly.

  Chef Maurice, left alone in the kitchens, ran the tap over the empty hot chocolate pan, and stared out of the window into the dark night. Moonlight picked out tendrils of frost as they
crept around the edges of the panes.

  First thing tomorrow, he decided, he would pay a return visit to Bourne Hall. There were still far too many unanswered questions for his liking. But first, a good night’s sleep was in order.

  He glanced out of the window again. It was definitely hot-water bottle weather.

  Except that Chef Maurice’s own hot-water bottle was of a rather unique construction, complete with a special lining that allowed it to be filled with any beverage of his choice.

  That way, if he got thirsty in the middle of the night, there’d be a nice hot drink ready to keep him company.

  Tonight, he plumped for the spiced mulled cider.

  Thus amply provisioned, he slipped the rubber bottle into its fluffy cover, and mounted the stairs to bed.

  The snow had turned the village green into a giant square of frosted icing—that was, apart from the faux Vauxhall Astra and the recent appearance of a line of snowmen doing the conga.

  Patrick stamped his feet as PC Lucy patted her pockets for her keys.

  “You don’t have to wait for me, you know,” she said.

  “I know.” He drew a deep breath, the icy air stinging his tongue. “Um, do you have plans for Sunday dinner? I’m pretty sure I can get the evening shift off.”

  “Oh.” She looked rather startled. “I’m afraid I can’t. I’m meeting a friend for dinner.”

  Patrick felt his stomach tighten. Had there been a slight hesitation in her voice? “In Beakley?”

  “No, um, over in Cowton. But how about the Tuesday evening after? We could go see the Christmas lights go on in Endleby. No naked men, I promise you.”

  She smiled, and tiptoed up to kiss him on the lips.

  “I’m not sure I can make the same promise,” he said, wrapping his arms around her waist and attempting what he hoped was a roguish grin.

  PC Lucy rolled her eyes and swatted his arm. “Nice try. You go get some sleep.” She brushed her lips past his again, then disappeared inside.

  Patrick trudged back past the green. Surely Alf must have been mistaken. After all, there were surely dozens, even hundreds, of blonde women living in Cowton. Statistically, at least a few of them had to bear a passing resemblance to PC Lucy.

  But then, if it wasn’t a mistake . . .

  He walked on.

  What he needed now was a way to be sure.

  The next morning at Le Cochon Rouge, any plans for sleuthing had to be put temporarily on hold, after a distraught telephone call from a table of twelve, whose Christmas lunch at another restaurant had just been cancelled due to a night-time break-in.

  “C’est terrible!” announced Chef Maurice to the rest of the kitchen, after he put the phone down. “The thieves, they stole every turkey! And ten kilos of Camembert! It is incroyable what these people will steal.”

  “Speaking of turkeys, chef,” said Patrick, as he pulled out more trays to prep the extra ingredients for their sudden lunchtime additions, “we still don’t have a main dish sorted for the Elmore Society Christmas Dinner next Monday. You said you were going to arrange something?”

  Chef Maurice tapped his nose. “Do not worry. It is under my control.”

  The next few hours were spent devising and preparing an impromptu five-course lunch for their beleaguered new guests. A dill-and-beetroot-cured salmon fillet was fetched from the walk-in, its firm flesh ready for slicing, and a dozen confit duck legs were dug out of a big tub of solid seasoned fat.

  Alf, with dark rings under his eyes and the shattered nerves of someone operating on a quadruple dose of strong black coffee, was set to work breaking up a pile of thick chocolate squares and zesting a box of oranges for the chocolate-and-orange fondants.

  Situation now under control, Chef Maurice poured another shot of espresso into Alf’s mug, then headed into Beakley towards the Wordington-Smythe cottage.

  Like many men in possession of a good fortune, Arthur had long succeeded in fulfilling his want for a wife. Meryl, however, as a woman in possession of a man of good fortune, was still working her way through her list of wants, but the latest had resulted in the purchase of a four-by-four bewheeled monstrosity, suitable for navigating Arctic tundra, dense jungles and, as it turned out, snowy Cotswold villages.

  “It’s not like we live in the middle of the Highlands,” grumbled Arthur, as he pulled out of his drive with Chef Maurice in the passenger seat. “Still, I suppose it does have its uses,” he said, as they crunched their way past a neighbour sat in his two-seater, pounding the steering wheel, wheels spinning ineffectually against the snow.

  Chef Maurice, who was busy fiddling with all the heated-seat controls, nodded and gave the dashboard a little pat.

  “It is a good car. Meryl has fine taste. See, there is even a space for my coffee,” he said, pointing to the extra-large thermos in the holder beside him.

  Gilles opened the front door just as they pulled up.

  “Good morning, sirs,” he said, though his face belied the fact that this was anything but a good morning.

  “We are here to see Monsieur and Madame Lafoute, Monsieur Paloni, Monsieur Resnick and Lady Margaret.”

  “I’m afraid, sir, that Lady Margaret already left first thing this morning, and Mr Resnick departed an hour ago to return to London.”

  “Sign of a guilty conscience, no doubt,” muttered Arthur.

  “But the other two gentlemen are currently taking lunch in the Morning Room, if you would care to join them. I understand Mrs Lafoute is still feeling the effects of yesterday’s events and has chosen to remain in her room. Do not alarm yourself, I instructed Mrs Bates to take her up a tray,” he added, correctly interpreting Chef Maurice’s look of concern.

  In the Morning Room, the drapes had been pulled back to let cold white light into the high-ceilinged room. The two male guests were sitting in awkward silence over plates of hot-smoked salmon served with a leek-and-potato soup. Paloni in particular looked relieved at the sight of the new visitors.

  “Morning, fellas! I would say good morning, but that’d be a darn lie, of course. Come and dig in. That lady Mrs Bates thinks we’ve got four stomachs each, the amount she’s gone and cooked.”

  “And how is Madame Ariane?” said Chef Maurice to Bertie.

  “Not the best, I’m afraid,” said Bertie, who looked rather worse for wear himself. “But definitely better now, compared to last night. She got herself quite worked up, hardly slept all night. Only dropped off around eight this morning.”

  “She’s one of those sensitive types,” said Paloni, waving his fork. “See it a lot with actresses. Perfectly poised, most of the time, and then one little thing sets them off—”

  “I think Uncle William being murdered is more than ‘one little thing’,” said Bertie stiffly.

  “’Course, ’course, didn’t mean it like that,” said Paloni, throwing Chef Maurice one of those ‘the English, aren’t they a funny lot’ looks.

  “How long are you both staying here?” asked Arthur, helping himself to a cup of tea while Chef Maurice tackled the chafing dish of hot-smoked salmon.

  “My driver’s on his way down,” said Paloni. “Traffic getting out of London was a killer, at least that’s what he tells me, but he should be here soon. I’m giving these folks a ride back too, if the lady can manage it, of course.”

  “The police, have they come again?” asked Chef Maurice.

  Bertie shook his head.

  “They took down all our details last night. Passports, hotels, all that jazz,” said Paloni, looking offended.

  “They obviously think it was one of us,” said Bertie, in matter-of-fact tones.

  “Well, I’ll be contacting my embassy if any more of those cops turn up, trying to make out I had anything to do with it. Couldn’t find the guy that did it, so now they’re trying to pin it on one of us. I mean, we were all upstairs. What do they think we are, the Invisible Man? You saw me”—he turned to Bertie—“didn’t ya, coming out of my room?”

  Bertie nodd
ed, though a tad reluctantly.

  “And I saw you just about to run down those stairs. And your lady and that wine fella, they must have come down not a minute after us.”

  “But, Lady Margaret, she was not upstairs,” Chef Maurice pointed out, causing Paloni to let out a great guffaw.

  “Now you’re really scraping the barrel, my friend, if you’re telling me that pipe cleaner of a woman had anything to do with it! I mean, she could hardly keep her eyes open—”

  He stopped, with a guilty look, as Gilles glided into the room and addressed him.

  “Sir, your car from London has arrived.”

  “Right about time, too,” said Paloni, jumping up. “Enjoy your lunch,” he said, nodding at Chef Maurice and Arthur, and hightailed out of the room.

  Bertie folded his napkin on his plate and stood up. “I better go and make sure Ariane is ready.” He shook their hands solemnly. “I’m sorry we didn’t have a chance to meet under better circumstances.”

  “Likewise,” said Arthur.

  “Can I get you gentlemen anything else?” said Gilles, watching Chef Maurice upturn the remains of the lemon hollandaise over his plate.

  “Oui. I would be most interested if you will recount for me the events of yesterday. Not the evening, which we all know, but from the morning. How was the tempérament of Sir William? Did anything happen that was not usual?”

  Gilles pursed his lips, but replied, “Nothing unusual that I recall. Sir William rose at eight, as was his routine, and took breakfast here in the Morning Room. He then spent the rest of the day attending to various private matters in his study, though he took lunch in the dining room with Mr and Mrs Lafoute and Mr Paloni, who arrived at around midday from London.”

  “At what time did the other guests arrive?”

  “Lady Margaret arrived just after three, I believe, and Mr Resnick not long after her.”

  “Did Sir William come out to greet his guests?”

  “Yes. He came out and spoke briefly with Lady Margaret. And he spoke to Mr Resnick for quite some time in his study.”