Death in Provence

by Serena Kent

  “How so?”

  “Well, I’ve been doing a few numbers, and with a bit of renovation, some of that ‘buttering,’ and a lick of paint, I reckon you’d have three gîtes to sell or rent. And if the prices in the estates agents’ windows are anything to go by, that would net you all your money back and more, and you would retain the main house.”

  “I thought we’d had this conversation.”

  “So we did, but I know you take a while to warm up to good ideas. How did everything go?”

  “All right, I suppose. Now, what do you fancy doing for the rest of the day?”

  Two hours and another three (“Quite small, really”) carafes of beautifully chilled rosé later, along with justice done to the set lunch menu, Frankie had it all worked out. Penelope, on the other hand, was beginning to get quite confused. The renovation plans had been concentrated into one mighty chart. Expected timelines and delivery schedules blurred in Penelope’s brain.

  Penelope gazed over at the cobbled, tree-lined place de la Bouquerie, where a statue on a tall, slim column rose from a fountain. A knot of people stood chatting outside a restaurant called Chez Mon Cousin Alphonse.

  “You could have it all done in three months, with the right contractors, Pen. Johnny and I have got some fantastic Polish teams, solid workmen and very reliable. I can easily—”

  “I’m going to use French builders. A local firm.”

  “Are you mad, Pen? Half your money will go on three-hour lunch breaks and flash strikes.”

  “Don’t care. I want to live here, Frankie, to feel part of it all. If I bring in foreign builders when there’s so much unemployment here, how will that look to people I want to be friends with?”

  “I never had you down as a holier-than-thou Guardian reader, Pen. Crikey.”

  “That’s the kind of petty, simplistic thinking that made me want to leave Surrey in the first place. I just want to do the right thing.”

  They argued a bit more in an amiable kind of way, and were finding common ground on the matter of builders when the tic-tacking of heels that meant business stopped at their table. It was Clémence again. Did the woman never use a phone? She had come to tell Penelope that the documents were at last in order with the water company and EDF, and that M. Charpet would check that supplies of both were flowing later that afternoon.

  “Have you got time for a coffee?” Frankie asked her.

  The Frenchwoman took in Frankie’s silver lamé and failed to suppress a momentary look of horror.

  “Sit down and tell me what you think of these plans. And we may need some recommendations for decent local builders,” went on Frankie obliviously. She asked a passing waiter for three coffees.

  Steamrollered, the estate agent sat down.

  “What’s the French for mañana? Renovation! However . . . we plough on,” said Frankie. She pushed a page of drawings across the table towards Clémence.

  The estate agent cleared her throat. “I do not know whether you will want to stay at Le Chant d’Eau and renovate it after this unfortunate incident. This may be difficult for you.”

  “Eh?” Penelope gulped. “Well, it might be a bit weird at first,” she admitted. “But I hadn’t really moved in. To be quite honest, it feels as if it happened before my time. Everyone knows that old houses have seen their share of deaths. Is there anything so very different about this one? Apart from the suspected foul play, of course.”

  “Foul play?” said Clémence. “I do not think this is a game.”

  “Tricherie, acte criminel,” Frankie translated.

  “Exactly! Why would a woman on her own want to stay in such a place?”

  Penelope thought she had explained, but had another go. In spite of the circumstances, she still felt a pang of excitement at the thought of restoring the farm to its former glory.

  But it didn’t seem as if Clémence Valencourt was listening. She was suddenly preoccupied, just as she had been earlier. Penelope followed the estate agent’s gaze over the dribbling river. A red sports car had drawn up at the side of the road, hazard lights flashing. It looked a lot like the Ferrari she kept seeing. Getting out of the passenger side was the mayor. He raised a hand as the car moved off, then sauntered past the painted doorway of a shop selling candied fruits.

  “Excuse me. I must go,” said Clémence, and she clickety-clacked off at a pace.

  “That was weird,” said Penelope. “First she was determined that I was going to buy the house, and now it’s almost as if she wants to put me off it.”

  “Perhaps she wants a quick resale. That would be very sneaky, though.”

  “And why doesn’t she just call or text me to say that the utilities should be on stream soon, instead of turning up all the time? And have you noticed how she’s alternatively super helpful—and then bloody rude? It’s weird,” repeated Penelope.

  “Don’t get stressed. You always repeat things when you’re stressed,” said Frankie. “And now I’m doing it. Perhaps we should have a drink.”

  “We really should not. We’ve had quite enough.”

  They spent the afternoon walking around Apt, trying new perfumes at the Senteurs et Provence shop, discovering the museum and the labyrinth of underground excavations of the Roman town of Apta Julia, which began under the cathedral and spread out below the present-day pavements. More practically, Penelope ordered two beds for next-day delivery, some linens and towels, a fridge, and a washing machine.

  “That’s enough white goods,” said Frankie. “Now for the pink. Where’s that wine shop?”

  11

  LE CHANT D’EAU CRUMBLED BEGUILINGLY as ever in the sunshine the next morning, quietly reviving Penelope’s Provençal dream. She was relieved to note that they seemed to be alone there for once.

  “Right. The moment of truth.” In the kitchen, Penelope pressed a light switch. Nothing happened. She opened the tap over the sink. It coughed twice, then the pipes juddered and the water gushed out. “Hurray!”

  “Halfway there,” said Frankie.

  A comprehensive stock of food and wine for a picnic lunch was soon unpacked, and then Frankie walked her round the farmhouse again, expanding on where she should start the renovations and what she should expect to pay. She was in her element.

  “A centime more, and you put whoever you go with on to me, Pen. I’ll talk the talk with them and get you the best deal.”

  The overgrown garden seemed more manageable somehow in the bracing company of her old friend. Penelope went down to look at the drained pool, relieved that she really didn’t feel too bad about it. Almost OK, actually. She stared at the old brown cypresses standing guard and wondered if they would come back to life with some dedicated watering. She eyed up the best spots for some comfortable loungers and a sunshade.

  “With all the rainwater it had collected, I’m assuming there are no leaks in the concrete.”

  “Fair assumption,” concurred Frankie. “No obvious cracks that I can see. It may be that you’re in luck and all it needs is a good clean and service. I don’t mind making the calls to find a pool company for you, if you want. Let’s see how much we can get done and then we’ll feel we deserve a slap-up dinner this evening.”

  Frankie took out her mobile, found a spot with a decent signal, and began looking up companies on the Internet.

  A noise from the track made them both jump. It was followed by a squeal of brakes.

  Mme Valencourt skittered across the garden.

  “Back again,” muttered Penelope. “Who knew French estate agents worked so hard?”

  This time, the after-sales service involved bringing over a man in blue serge, the ubiquitous clothing of the French paysan. “Mme Kite, may I introduce your neighbour, M. Pierre Louchard?”

  “Enchantée, M. Louchard,” said Penelope, her annoyance superseded by delight in the old-fashioned courtesies of social interaction in France.

  M. Louchard was a tall man who could have been handsome in his earlier days, before the sun and the far
ming had taken their toll. Now he walked with a slight limp and hunched shoulders, and his shaven head gave him the appearance of a large bird of prey hovering in the door.

  “M. Louchard is a farmer,” said Clémence, rather unnecessarily.

  Frankie was formally introduced, and the farmer shook each woman’s hand in turn, without a trace of a smile. From a large bag, he produced a bottle of wine and a jar of honey. “Pour vous, madame.”

  “Merci beaucoup, M. Louchard.” She turned to Mme Valencourt. “I would offer you both coffee, but as we haven’t really got the kitchen sorted yet . . .”

  “That is not a problem, madame. M. Louchard would like to offer you coffee at his farm. It’s only a few hundred meters farther down the lane.”

  M. Louchard stood there scowling. And his scowl only deepened after Mme Valencourt seemed to prompt him with a sotto voce aside.

  Mme Valencourt turned back to Penelope. “You must accept!” she whispered.

  “What about my deliveries?”

  “I will leave my portable phone number on your door, and if anyone arrives, they will call me.”

  Unable to see a way out, Penelope nodded. “C’est très gentil, monsieur.”

  They began to walk down towards the farm.

  Frankie whispered out of the corner of her mouth. “Don’t know what your agent is up to. He was desperate to get away.”

  In silence, they went through the gate and into Louchard’s farmyard. It had an air of slight neglect, with one exception. In an open garage was a gleaming blue tractor, polished to within an inch of its life.

  Louchard showed them to some dusty seats at the front of his house, mumbled something, and disappeared indoors.

  “He does not want to see us, Clémence. Why did you make him?” Penelope was half embarrassed and half irritated.

  “Because that is what you do with a new neighbour, even if you dislike foreigners. Do not worry about Pierre. He is shy and does not like change. And he can get angry sometimes, but underneath he is a good man.”

  Frankie plopped down into one of the chairs, raising a large cloud of dust. “Let the games commence!”

  A few minutes later, the farmer emerged bearing a tray with coffee cups, glasses, and a bottle filled with a deep purple liquid. He poured four glasses. “Prunier.”

  “Plum liqueur,” whispered Frankie.

  “Santé,” said Louchard.

  “Santé,” they responded, and then Penelope closed her eyes and knocked the glass back in one. The liquid burned its way down her throat and growled menacingly in her stomach.

  They placed their glasses back on the table. They were refilled.

  Conversation was halting, due mainly to the fact that Louchard’s answer to any question inclined to the monosyllabic. Mme Valencourt tried valiantly to initiate discussion, but like streams in an arid land, sentences would meander slowly and then drain away.

  The only positive that Penelope took from this awkward meeting was the drink. The plum brandy, his own recipe from his own trees, seemed to warm up the spirits in a most delightful way as they threw even more of it down their throats. Mme Valencourt’s mood in particular was markedly improved. There was even a touch of a thaw in the farmer’s demeanour, but his countenance darkened once more when Frankie brought up the subject of their late neighbour.

  “Avore!” M. Louchard’s knuckles whitened as he gripped his glass. There was a stream of unintelligible French, which Penelope suspected would not have been acceptable in polite company.

  Frankie turned to Penelope. “Our friend here didn’t like Manuel Avore very much either.”

  Another torrent of Gallic invective.

  Penelope opened her mouth to follow that intriguing lead, but Mme Valencourt attempted to calm M. Louchard down with questions about his lavender crop, and then swerved back to the subject of her favourite mayor, confiding that she was en route to a meeting with him.

  “We will speak about your electricity. Le Chant d’Eau is definitely connected now, but sometimes in the country the wires get eaten by the wild animals.”

  “Naturally,” said Penelope, rolling her eyes. She giggled at a sudden vision of bears and wolves nibbling at the cables. “Les petits animaux, I hope?”

  “Loirs,” said the estate agent. “Like écureuils—squirrels with big eyes.”

  “Loirs!” The farmer raised his arms, and mimed holding a rifle. “Bang, bang!” he shouted, followed by something unintelligible.

  They drank another round of plum brandy.

  “Au trésor du Chant d’Eau!” Louchard raised his empty glass.

  “Quoi?” said Penelope, rather less than elegantly. “Le trésor—treasure?”

  “Oui, madame.”

  The liquor was definitely warming up the spirits.

  Frankie was onto the treasure business in a flash. The two of them were soon yapping away like a pair of terriers. Mme Valencourt maintained a heard-it-all-before dignity.

  “This is great, Pen. The village gossip is that this place has buried treasure—not that anyone really believes it, or anything has been found. Tell you what, I’ll buy you a metal detector for your next birthday!”

  Penelope was starting to think they had better eat something to mop up the alcohol. The overindulgent picnic they had bought would easily stretch to the four of them. Perhaps she should pop back and fetch it. But M. Louchard rose with some effort from his chair, and announced that it was time for them to leave. Another handshake each, and they were dismissed.

  The women set off down the track.

  “So, it seems that no one in the village cares much for M. Avore,” ventured Penelope.

  “He was always drrrrunk, from the morning onward,” said the estate agent, apparently oblivious to their own current state. She was rolling her r’s with vigorous emphasis. “People in the village tried to help him, but they could not. Avorrrrre would not listen to rrrreason. He drrrrank and he drrrrank, and in that state, a man reveals his black heart. And Avorrrre, he had a very black heart. He was ’orrrrrible to many people. They said he beats his wife. No one in the village likes him, but what can one do? Hélas!”

  What Penelope wanted to say as they walked back was, So let me get this right, Clémence. You knew when you sold me this house that I was going to have to deal with a psychopath on one side and a man who hates foreigners on the other? But she held her tongue. While Clémence was flushed with plum brandy, it was an opportunity to get the answers to a few pressing questions, such as why she was always turning up unexpectedly, what the issues with the house were exactly, whether Manuel Avore could have had anything to do with the fatal accident that killed the previous owners, and what kind of hold she had over this Louchard character.

  But the unmistakable sound of a large vehicle on the unmade track announced the arrival of the first of the deliveries.

  By the time Penelope had dealt with the fridge and the washing machine, Mme Valencourt was preparing to leave.

  “May I use your bathroom first?”

  The estate agent emerged ten minutes later with her hair just so and makeup beautifully reapplied.

  “I hope she’s all right to drive,” said Penelope as they watched the Mini Cooper roar down the track. “I bet she didn’t have a proper breakfast this morning, and then she golloped down all that plum brandy. I’m not surprised it went to her head.”

  “French women don’t eat croissants,” said Frankie. “If they do crack over at breakfast, they won’t even contemplate eating until dinner.”

  Penelope sucked in her stomach.

  “At least she’s not going far,” said Frankie. “Only to the mairie to see Laurent Millais, and she’s hoping they’ll have lunch at his house, and she can sleep it off afterwards, if you know what I mean.”

  “What do you mean, Frankie? Clémence and the mayor?”

  “Uh-huh. They’ve been having an affair for months, but she thinks he might be getting cold feet.”

  “No! How on earth do you know th
at?”

  “She blurted it all out. She’s crazy about him, but it’s all going off the boil. Crikey, that plum brandy is like a truth serum. She’s been fretting for days—and you know what, Pen, I think that may well be the reason she’s always turning up, getting involved in all this business. It’s an excuse to keep coming back to St Merlot and old dreamboat at the mairie.”

  Penelope gave a low whistle. “Well, that would make sense. And why she was in a tense mood when we went up there yesterday morning with the axe. Why she charged off when we saw him in Apt yesterday.”

  “Where’s M. Valencourt in all this? Did you meet him when you stayed the night at her house?”

  “No, he wasn’t there.”

  “Talking of food,” said Frankie.

  They went inside to load up on fresh baguettes, creamy Camembert, ham, pâté, salami, tomatoes, celeriac mayonnaise salad, grapes, melons, nectarines, and a large raspberry tart.

  “Just a light lunch.” Penelope winked.

  “Pity the fridge hasn’t been on long enough to get the rosé cool,” said Frankie.

  “We really don’t need any,” said Penelope. “I don’t know what it is about France, but every time I think I’m going to have a sensible dry day—or even just a meal—someone comes along and waves a bottle at me.”

  “Just the holiday mood, Pen.”

  “Sorry, I don’t mean to spoil your fun. You have some if you want it.”

  In the end they shared a big bottle of Perrier that was still cold from the supermarket, and Penelope felt much better.

  “So what’s happening about Avore and the axe, then?” asked Frankie as she helped herself to a massive chunk of baguette.

  “Your guess is as good as mine.”

  “No doubt my estate agent will acquire some information this afternoon behind the mayor’s shutters,” said Penelope, with a giggle. How exciting and lovely it must be, she thought, to be as slim as Clémence Valencourt and have a gorgeous French lover. She bypassed the bread and cut herself several slices of melon. “He is very attractive, isn’t he? The mayor.”