by Michelle Wan
“What dog food?” asked Jacqueline, startled.
Mara also served up an entirely successful version of her mother’s recipe for oven-browned creamed potatoes. Gratin dauphinois sans tears, she confided to Julian. Loulou provided a selection of cheeses. Dessert was Betul’s mulhallebi.
“So what do you think, Paul?” Julian asked as the bistro owner dug into the sweet, pistachio-sprinkled pudding.
Paul swallowed. “Not bad,” he said. “Still doesn’t beat a crème brûlée. But I guess the customers will get used to it.”
“The customers—?” Julian looked bewildered.
“Lokum,” Mado laughed. “Paul’s done a deal with Monsieur and Madame Ismet. They’re supplying us with a whole line of Turkish foods.”
“Paul?” Julian turned to his friend in astonishment. “I thought you said—”
The bistro owner cut him off. “Their stuff ’s not bad. Not to my taste, mind, but we’re giving it a try. Mado needs to take things easier.” He pulled a folded menu from his jacket pocket, smoothed it open, pushed it in front of Julian, and pointed to the newly worded script.
“‘International Cuisine’?” Julian read and marveled. “You’re billing yourself as offering international cuisine?”
“Why not?” said Paul, assuming an offended air. “You got something against foreigners?”
EPILOGUE
“Are you sure you want to do this, Julian?” Mara asked as they walked down the rutted road that led to the forest at the side of Mara’s land. The dogs galloped ahead of them. It was getting on for the middle of May, and the sweetness of robinias had replaced the lilacs on the breeze. “We’d have the Gaillards’ property, but all of this, the woods and the fields below, would still be open for whatever Montfort-Izawa wants to put on it.”
“We can’t shut out the world, Mara.” He stood looking up at the trees, the cloudless blue sky above them. “But since Donny and Luca are two of the moving forces behind Montfort-Izawa, and since neither of them will be thinking much about golf at the moment, I’d say we’re safe. For a while, at least.”
“But your cottage. You’d have to sell your cottage.” Her voice rang with hope and an after-peal of mourning. Hope for them together, for the bigger thing his decision seemed to suggest. Mourning for what she knew he would lose.
My cottage, he thought. My retreat, my own little haven where I can leave my socks and books lying about, my dishes unwashed. The wildflower garden that he had built up lovingly over the years. The chimney that never drew well, the roof that leaked. The poky back rooms that offered more damp than cheer. But his own thing, his safety net, his private space.
There came a time when one had to make big decisions, and this was one of them. Julian turned to face her.
“You know, when Luca crashed into my van, I thought I’d lost you.” His voice caught in his throat. “I don’t think I could have stood it.”
“Oh, Julian,” Mara whispered.
He took a deep breath. “So. I’m going in with you on the viager. But I have two conditions.”
“Name them!”
“One, starting tomorrow you help me do a serious search for my orchid. I’m not talking about an occasional tramp through the fields. I mean a thorough, methodical scan of every possible habitat until we find it. It will mean days of rough walking, rain or shine, for the next three weeks. And the same thing next spring, and the one after, and after that until we find it. You’ll get scratched and muddy. Your feet will hurt, your back will ache. You will end up hating me. Don’t agree until you’ve thought this through.”
“Done,” she said without hesitation. “And two?”
He gave her a long, searching look.
“What?” she said, her heart beginning to beat very fast.
He grinned, drew her close, kissed her, and whispered three words in her ear: “Dump Madame Audebert.”
“Dump—?”
>Patsy, Mara fired a message into the ether, you’re not going to believe this!<
NOTE ON THE AUTHOR
MICHELLE WAN was born in Kunming, China. She and her husband, a tropical horticulturalist, travel regularly to the Dordogne to photograph and chart wild orchids. She is the author of two previous novels in the “Death in the Dordogne” series, Deadly Slipper and The Orchid Shroud, and is working on a fourth. Wan lives in Guelph, Ontario.
Copyright © 2008 Michelle Wan
Anchor Canada Edition 2009
All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication, reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, or stored in a retrieval system without the prior written consent of the publisher—or in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, license from the Canadian Copyright Licensing agency—is an infringement of the copyright law.
Anchor Canada and colophon are trademarks
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Wan, Michelle
A twist of orchids / Michelle Wan.
eISBN: 978-0-385-67343-3
I. Title.
PS8645.A53T85 2009 C813′.6 C2008-906977-3
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published in Canada by Anchor Canada a division of Random House of Canada
Visit Random House of Canada Limited’s website: www.randomhouse.ca
v3.0
Table of Contents
Cover
Other Books By This Author
Title Page
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Author’s Note
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Epilogue
About the Author
Copyright