by Sandi Scott
Patty was wearing a bathrobe and a towel on her head with a gray-green facial mask smeared over her face. “I woke up feeling like I had the flu or a hangover,” she explained, pouring Ashley a cup of coffee in an I-love-NY mug.
“And that meant you needed a facial?”
“That meant I needed to be babied. And living the way I do, there’s nobody to do that but me. Tell me the truth, Ashley, am I fired?”
Ashley gaped at her. “Fired? Why would you be fired?”
“I don’t know. Given the week that I am having, I figured that would make a good cherry on top.”
“No, not as far as I know. Did you call Chef Lemaire?”
“I left a message this morning to tell him I wouldn’t be in, that was all.”
Ashley shook her head. “I haven’t heard anything like that.”
Patty nibbled at one of the brownies then sighed with satisfaction. “Brownies, real honest to goodness brownies. You wouldn’t think it would be so hard for the French to make decent brownies.”
“Too simple?”
“They must be, and what’s this? Is that really peanut butter cookies? Where ever did you find peanut butter?”
Ashley told her, saying that she would give her some as soon as the market owner got more. She had used up almost her entire supply, baking cookies. They sat and sipped their coffee and nibbled on their treats.
Finally, Ashley broke their companionable silence, “So tell me, what happened with M. Babin?”
“Well, I didn’t kill him,” Patty said, somewhat testily.
“I believe you,” Ashley said. “No, I mean before that. When you went out to talk to him.”
Patty gave her a big sigh. “You don’t want to hear that sordid tale.”
“Yes, I do.”
“I went over there and, of course, he recognized me. I talked to him for a while and made him an offer on the cart. Up until that point, he was being very polite, you know that kind of stuffy politeness that you both know is really just his way of saying, ‘I’m so much better than you are, that I can stand and talk to you without being the least bit insulting.’ But as soon as I made the offer, he started ...”
She made a face and sipped her coffee. “Then, he started getting ugly. I think the nicest thing he called me, in the calmest tone of voice you can imagine, was foufou, and it got a lot worse than that. M. Babin even told me that the only way I would ever get a man was if someone married me out of pity
“But you know what else? I learned something while I was at the police station. M. Babin was murdered while he was checking his food cart in his garage, underneath his apartment, but the cart wasn’t robbed.”
Ashley shook her head. “I’m so sorry. I completely forgot to tell you.”
“What?”
“I’ve learned a lot since yesterday morning, quite a lot actually.” She told Patty everything she could remember, backtracking to clarify points here and there, struggling to keep a straight face as she told her about Belle’s owner being found.
“Oh, no! You mean that your dog is about to be taken away from you?”
“Probably as soon as I check my messages,” Ashley said, realizing she had been restraining herself from checking her phone for hours for just that reason.
Patty shook her head. “Life is ironic. You do something good for someone, and it comes back on you almost like fate is trying to hold us down—me with my cart, and you with trying to be helpful.”
“Don’t say that,” Ashley said. “It’s just a string of bad luck, that’s all.”
“A string? More like a spiderweb.” Patty gave a big sigh and put down her coffee cup. “Tomorrow, I’ll go back to the restaurant and see if Chef Lemaire still wants me, then I’ll teach you how to make the frites. You’ve been on that crêpe griddle long enough.” And despite Ashley’s joking protests that she was a baker and no frites-maker, she could tell from Patty’s expression that she wasn’t going to have much of a choice in the matter. Patty needed a project to keep her mind off her troubles. And, like it or not, this time her project was Ashley.
PATTY REFUSED TO KEEP the rest of the desserts in her apartment with a very New York-sounding, “Whadaya tryin’ to do, make me faaat?” Ashley was tempted to take them back to the restaurant but decided against it. Chef Lemaire had made his feelings about the peanut butter cookies clear. She could have fed one or two to Belle, but she didn’t like feeding Belle food with extra salt and sugar in it. She needed to find someone to take cookies, but she didn’t want them to hang around the apartment all day and night either.
Sighing, Ashley stopped on the street, noticing the time was past two o’clock. She couldn’t put off checking her phone for messages any longer just in case Belle’s owner contacted her. She checked, no messages. She checked the battery level, still good. The market owner must have lost her phone number. She walked down to his store and was greeted with a friendly, “Salut!”
“Any news?”
He shook his head. “Nothing, mademoiselle. I will make sure you find out as soon as I do. You are done with your work early, yes?”
Ashley explained about not being able to sleep and offered him “an American treat.” He looked suspiciously at the cookies but accepted a brownie and said the texture reminded him of a cake that his grandmother, who was Tunisian, would bake, but that it was orange and almond cake, not chocolate. She asked for the recipe and was dragged into the back of the shop where a woman was obviously cursing at a computer.
In exchange for installing an anti-virus program and rebooting the computer, “A miracle!” the owner declared, she was given the recipe for the cake. It was basically an almond cake soaked in orange juice. Ashley jotted down the recipe for the brownies, apologizing for writing the measurements in ounces and cups instead of metric measurements.
The afternoon was getting late, so she walked home, checked on Belle, and took a shower. She wanted to be ready to go out in case Patty called. Also, she didn’t have much to eat in the apartment right now, and she didn’t feel like hanging around. She wanted to go out dancing – but then again, she didn’t. She wanted to find a new café to eat at, but she couldn’t stand to scroll through the listings displayed on her phone. Ashley needed something to do to keep her mind occupied, something that didn’t involve baking more treats.
Well, she did have an excuse in that she should take Belle out for a walk, but that wouldn’t take long. They could take another long walk, but the last two long walks she had taken lately had been weird. And she was still tired from not sleeping the night before. Maybe she would just lay back on the bed and watch some Poirot for a minute ...
ASHLEY WOKE UP IN THE dark with her heart hammering in her throat. Belle was lying on the bed with her, pressed against one leg, and her laptop had slid over to her other side. Her mouth felt fuzzy and her eyes seemed half-crossed.
Sitting up she wondered, What time is it? Belle lifted her head, Too early to get up! The dog’s expression made her feelings clear as she flopped back down on her side, snuggling closer still to Ashley’s leg.
Why did I wake up so suddenly? Ashley stopped to listen. She couldn’t hear any noises coming from inside the apartment, other than Belle sighing against her leg, and outside she could hear the noises of Paris as usual. Maybe it had been a bright light that had woken her, she hadn’t closed the drapes before she’d fallen asleep.
She got up and looked outside the French doors. The back courtyards of her block were quiet and still. Unsettled, Ashley went out, stood on the balcony and looked over. Below her, she could see the little row of garden homes, all very private. The alley that wound through the center of the block for deliveries and emergencies was blocked from her sight by the rooftops of the garden homes, she thought she heard someone moving around down there, but their footsteps didn’t seem to be especially loud or threatening.
Her first thought was that it was Serge. She was still afraid that someday he would show up and do something to her, so she looked ov
er at his boxes for the millionth time. They hadn’t moved or been touched. One of them had a little piece of dog hair on it, Ashley pulled the hair away and blew it off her fingers into the air. Next, she checked the doors and her laptop and so on down the list that had become her routine. She was beginning to get used to feeling slightly paranoid.
By the time she was sure that her apartment was secure, Belle was up too, nuzzling her hand softly. Ashley put on a jacket and snapped on the dog’s leash. Even in the middle of the night, Belle wouldn’t say no to a bathroom break.
Suddenly, her phone rang with a number she didn’t recognize.
“Hello?”
“Er, hello?” an American voice said. “Are you Mademoiselle Adams? The woman who rescued my dog?”
Oh, no. Her heart sank. “Yes, that’s me,” she said, trying to sound cheerful.
“Hi. My name’s Scott Jones. I’m an American here on business from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. A while ago, my wife and I and our two children, Tina and Doug, were out strolling with our dog, Goldie, and she slipped her leash and ran away from us. We haven’t seen her since.”
“I’m sending you a photo of her just to make sure, I’d hate to disturb you if I’ve got the wrong dog.” His voice trailed off as her phone chimed. She’d just received a text message with an attachment.
Blinking back tears, she checked the photo. It was Belle, all right, or rather, Goldie. “That’s her,” Ashley confirmed, holding back her tears.
The man sighed with relief. “Oh, thank God. You don’t know how happy my kids are going to be. Would you, I know it’s late, but would you meet me somewhere, so I can pick her up right away?”
“Of course,” Ashley said. She jotted down the address he gave her, which was for a restaurant called Le Goûter off Rue Froidevaux near the Montparnasse Cemetery. She’d been to the cemetery a couple of times, walking between the giant old tombs felt like trying to work your way through a maze, though, so she tended to avoid it, even with Belle. With a heavy heart, she put on her shoes. Belle gave her a questioning look, but all that disappeared when Ashley opened the door of the apartment. Belle was ready to go without a second thought.
The two of them took the walk to the restaurant as slowly as possible, with Ashley constantly stopping to pet Belle or to use a tissue. She could only delay for so long. Nearly ten at night, the cafés were still going strong with lots of people sitting outside and drinking beer or wine or coffee. The evening was lovely with the warm lights of the city all around her, the pleasant murmur of conversation, and the buzz of traffic trying to reassure her that this was all for the best. One’s memories of Paris should be bittersweet, non?
Ashley arrived at the restaurant before Mr. Jones did. He had described himself as a man with dishwater blond hair, and he had promised to carry a bright pink diaper bag that she could easily recognize. She asked for one of the outside tables where she could sit with Belle to wait, and then ordered a coffee to drink. She didn’t want to start drinking alcohol, if she did, her defenses were just going to fail completely, making it easier to break down and cry, and Mr. Jones didn’t need any drama. He was getting his family’s dog back and he didn’t need to know her sorrow at giving Belle up.
She sipped her coffee slowly and watched the wind move through the trees surrounding the cemetery across the street. Soon, the coffee was gone. She checked her phone, Mr. Jones hadn’t sent her any texts or anything.
This was odd. Ashley texted him to see if something had come up. After another thirty minutes with no response, she started to walk home. She would have called, but she didn’t want to disturb his family, just in case something was wrong. She crossed her fingers and started to walk back toward home. She was hungry, but she couldn’t convince herself that she needed to stick around at the restaurant a second longer.
CHAPTER 11
On the way back, a big Gergovie & Co truck passed Ashley, and she saw Jan Hamelin’s narrow face in the driver’s seat. The truck turned off into an alleyway on the opposite side of the street with inches to spare on either side of the mirrors and disappeared into the shadows.
Ashley waited until the street was clear enough to cross then dashed over to the mouth of the alleyway. The taillights of the truck had vanished. She started walking down the alley with Belle eagerly sniffing around the edges of the street.
What was Jan doing here at night? Late deliveries? Once might be an accident, but two times was starting to look like coincidence. A third time, and she might start to think he was up to something.
A few homeless people were watching her, looking at her suspiciously. Well, a woman walking alone this late at night was odd. Ashley sped up, looking around for the truck. Had he parked it somewhere? Was it hidden in a garage? She was going to feel perfectly ridiculous if Jan’s distribution company, Gergovie & Co, was located around here, and he was doing something perfectly legitimate.
At that moment, she saw a pair of red taillights flare to life in front of her and heard the growl of an engine. The truck had pulled into a small niche off the side of the alley and was backing out. A man in an apron stood at the top of a set of concrete steps with his arms crossed over his stomach, watching over the scene. In fact, he was staring at Ashley with a dark and vicious look. She gave a little friendly wave.
“Get out of here,” he snarled.
He didn’t seem to be offended by the homeless people in the alley, just her. “Okay,” she said. “Sorry!” The truck pulled out in front of her then started making its way further down the alley. Ashley decided to follow it.
“I said, beat it!” the man in the apron said. “Go on! Go back the way you came before I come down there and show you what it means to go walking down someone else’s alley! Go!” Ashley turned around and fled. Whatever was going on with Jan and his truck, the man in the apron wanted to keep her from finding out.
THE NEXT MORNING, THE crêpe cart, M. Babin’s crêpe cart, was back by the front of the restaurant as if nothing had happened. Ashley, who was trying to enter through the front door of the restaurant, had frozen in place, mouth gaping. Already, the first few customers were trickling in. Oscar Metais was working the griddles though, of course, not his boss. She couldn’t just let that slide. Standing in line, she waited for a chance to speak to him.
“What type of crêpe would you like, mademoiselle?”
“Monsieur Metais, it’s me, Mademoiselle Adams, from L’Oiseau Bleu. What are you doing here?”
Oscar lifted an eyebrow. He still had dark circles under his eyes but an oddly cheerful smile on his face. “I am selling crêpes. The police released the cart from the investigation—they had taken all the fingerprints they could ever hope to find and left me to clean it all up. I even had to screw the griddles back onto their bases. Everything had been taken apart. And now? My bills will not pay themselves. I must work.”
“But ...”
“But you thought you were rid of me, didn’t you?”
“Well, yes,” she admitted.
“It’s sad, but you can tell the restaurateurs not to worry too much. The cart will only be here until Monsieur Babin’s brother finds someone who wants to buy it, then it will be sold. Perhaps Chef Lemaire and his friends would like to buy it, to keep someone like me from setting up his cart in front of their restaurant?” He added slyly, continuing without waiting for Ashley’s response, “But now I must go back to my paying customers, who wish to buy crêpes from me this morning. I don’t like to make them wait.”
Still reeling, Ashley went inside the restaurant. Malik had unlocked the front door; he and Patty were already deep in conversation in the back of the house. Malik was giving Patty the rundown of deliveries, specials, and other updates from the two days of work that she’d missed.
“And Jan came right in the middle of lunch service ...”
“Jan,” Patty said dismissively. “I swear he must be drunk half the time. What was he thinking, to interrupt lunch with a delivery? Selfish. Oh, hello, ma chère. I’m
glad to see you. How did things go with Belle yesterday? Did you hear from the owner?”
Ashley told her about the missed appointment, adding that she hadn’t heard anything from Mr. Jones that night or this morning, either.
“So, you’re just going to pretend you didn’t hear anything and ignore it?” Patty said.
“Pretty much. Although I’m going to the market later to see if the grocer has heard anything. He’s my source of news on Rue Daguerre.” Malik confirmed that the owner was a nosy gossip, but a good man, very trustworthy. “But something else happened last night,” Ashley said. “I saw Jan Hamelin’s truck turn into an alley at almost eleven last night.”
“What was he doing?” Patty asked.
“I have no idea. He pulled up behind some sort of shop then turned off his engine and lights. I followed him into the alley ...” Malik interrupted her at this, to tell her that she shouldn’t be wandering around alleys at night, with or without Belle. “... and a man in an apron chased me off,” Ashley concluded.
“Hmm,” Patty said. “That does sound suspicious. I wonder if he’s selling alcohol to an underground club or something illegal where he’d have to do it after dark.”
“I’ve seen him around the neighborhood after dark twice now,” Ashley said and described the other time she’d seen the truck. Admittedly, not that dramatic. But there was something wrong about the theory that Jan was selling alcohol illicitly to an illegal club. After a moment of thought, she did put a finger on it. “I don’t think that it was a club,” Ashley said, “because the truck was parked the wrong way around and I didn’t hear any bottles rattling.”
“So?” Malik asked.
“So, he wasn’t unloading alcohol. Which is heavy and goes clink,” Patty said. “Yeah, I see your point. But what else could he have been doing?”