by Serena Kent
At the mairie, she was ushered quickly by Nicole into the inner sanctum. Laurent was standing in front of his desk with the chief of police and Clémence.
The mayor flashed her one of his most devastating smiles. “Ah, Mme Keet, Penny, I am glad you are here. Now we can start.”
“Start what?” Penelope was still reeling from the after-effects of his greeting.
“Monsieur le chef de police has some new information for us. I think you will find it very interesting. Come through to the meeting room.”
They all sat at one end of a long table. Nicole brought in coffee and lingered, obviously hoping to hear the latest at first hand.
“Thank you, Nicole,” said the mayor.
The door closed, and the chief of police began.
“I wanted to update you on our progress since we arrested Didier Picaud, and also Jean-Luc Malpas. Although Didier’s confession to you gave us new information, and there is enough evidence to charge him with a number of crimes, including attempted abduction, we were still unable to find proof of his part in Avore’s murder.”
Penelope frowned as she remembered back to her brief incarceration. “He told me it was an accident, monsieur.”
“Yes, and he is sticking to that story. However, we have been examining Manuel Avore’s house and we believe he is lying.”
“Really?”
“We have taken forensic samples from the house, and they tell a different story.”
Penelope listened carefully as the chief continued.
“In the kitchen of the Avore house, we found traces of blood in the mortar cracks between the floor tiles. The blood was that of Manuel Avore. Normally this would not be conclusive—he was living there, after all. But then we discovered something else. Something very interesting.”
He puffed out his chest.
Penelope was getting impatient. “And this something else was . . .”
“We discovered some flecks of blood that did not belong to Avore.”
“Do you know whose they were?”
“Well, madame, this is the strange thing. They did not belong to anyone . . .” The chief of police smiled, as if at a happy memory. Penelope felt her temper begin to fray. Did the man do this on purpose?
“Blood but no donor?” she asked.
Was this what she’d been summoned to hear? The mayor and Clémence were listening respectfully, but she was unimpressed.
“Patience, madame, I am about to explain. The blood did not belong to anyone . . . human. They belonged to a very special animal.”
The glimmerings of a snigger on his ridiculous face only served to infuriate Penelope further.
“As I say, a special animal. A . . . rabbit. Your rabbit.”
Penelope was lost. “But I don’t have a rabbit!”
“The rabbit whose blood you found on the axe, under the faulty head. In Avore’s house, it was on flakes of varnish from the axe shaft that we think must have been dislodged—microscopic! Very, very leettle!”
She managed to stop herself from retorting that she knew perfectly well what microscopic meant. In fact, that she probably understood forensic pathology better than he did.
“These flakes that carried the blood of the rabbit fell like the dust when the axe was used to attack Manuel Avore.”
“And conclusively place the axe in Avore’s house, along with his own blood, at the time of death!” Penelope couldn’t restrain herself this time.
“Exactly,” said Reyssens. “He was killed by being hit on the front and the side of the head by the blunt side of the axe. Probably so that there would not be any blood to clean up. But the blade must have caught Avore’s hand when he raised it to defend himself, and caused him to bleed.”
“His hand . . .” Penelope pictured the body bag and the limp hand. “It was gashed. I saw it.”
“So it was not an accident, as Didier told Penny,” said Clémence. “The axe! We always knew it.”
“No, that was a lie,” Reyssens reiterated, as if he was pleased to be able to lord it over one of them. “The perpetrators were very careful to make a plan and to cover their own traces. They tried to confuse the time of death. They took the axe that had been used to kill rabbits. They cleaned the axe head and the blunt side used to kill Avore. Then, before they put it in M. Charpet’s shed, they used it to kill another rabbit, cleaned the axe again—but not perfectly, to make sure to leave a few traces of the blood of this last rabbit. Our more detailed tests show that it has been on the axe for approximately the same time that Avore is dead.
“But they did not clean the traces of the axe’s previous rabbit victim under the faulty head. We have charged both men with the murder of Manuel Avore. They will spend a long time in prison.”
Penelope sat back in amazement. The blood on the axe had been material to the case after all. Her instincts had been proved right. “So Manuel Avore was killed in his own kitchen. But where was Mariette, his wife—was there no danger that she would come home and interrupt them? Oh!”
She clapped her hand to her mouth. “The day I arrived was a Wednesday. Mariette Avore was in the Bibliobus in the square. She was out all day, driving the mobile library!”
“That’s right!” said the mayor. “She must have been.”
“But why was Manuel killed now—why not long before?” asked Penelope, glad of a chance to ask the question that had been bothering her.
“Didier Picaud has provided a very full account,” said Reyssens. “He has hardly stopped talking, in fact. By the way, he was the intruder who broke into your house. He was eliminated from the inquiry on the grounds that his fingerprints were already legitimately inside.
“Anyway, it seems that when Manuel Avore was released from prison, he started drinking immediately. He told various locals in a bar down in Apt that he had some very interesting information about the Malpas family, but not what that was. He liked the power of knowing he was a threat to them.
“Bad news travels fast. The Malpas men were ready for trouble, even before they saw Avore in the village. When they did, Avore taunted Jean-Luc and Didier that he knew that they had murdered Michel Cailloux, and he was considering what to do about it.
“He told them that his information had come from an old thief he had met in prison. This man had known Michel Cailloux well; Cailloux had told him he was selling the house he’d won as soon as possible, and that he’d double-crossed the Malpases. It wasn’t safe for him to be anywhere near St Merlot, and he’d feared for his life. Cailloux told his friend, who told Avore when he met him in jail that he’d used the house a couple of times for high-stakes card games.
“Cailloux then had to leave quickly, after threats from the Malpases. It seemed he had moved to a different region, perhaps under a different name. In any case, his friend never heard from him again.”
“Which would explain—sorry,” said Penelope.
“No, go on,” said Reyssens with heavy forebearance.
“The newspaper cutting I found in the card table. The unhappiest jackpot winner in the world. Cailloux didn’t want the publicity, and he certainly didn’t want to be identified as a ‘St Merlot resident,’ which might lead to questions about how he came to be the owner of a house there. All he wanted was a quick sale, and out.”
“But the Casino de Salon always names the winner of its big Easter poker competition,” said the mayor. “It’s good publicity for them. Cailloux shouldn’t have won if he didn’t want to be in the newspaper.”
“Maybe he couldn’t help himself,” said Penelope. “He always had to win, maybe even when he’d agreed not to. He was addicted to his winning streak.”
“Or cheating streak,” said Reyssens. “Anyway, Manuel Avore was now out of prison, and talking. Jean-Luc and Didier knew they had to act quickly.”
“But they had to wait for the next Wednesday or Thursday, when Mariette Avore would be out all day driving the mobile library!” cried Penelope. “That Wednesday was the earliest they could get rid of A
vore—the day I moved in. But they didn’t think it all through properly. They didn’t have time. Perhaps”—she turned to Reyssens—“you could ask Didier how the ace of spades got into Cailloux’s dead hand. Did they break into the house and take it from the card table, or was the marked card already being carried by Cailloux? It has to be one or the other. I’m sure if you flatter him, he will keep talking.”
The chief of police exhaled through his wet, red lips. “It seems that maybe I should have taken more seriously your understanding of murder, Mme Keet.” He didn’t actually apologise for making fun of her, but he was the type who never would.
Penelope smiled graciously. “Perhaps les amateurs have something to offer, after all.”
She was going to enjoy telling Camrose that.
34
IT WAS A SATURDAY IN late September. The day dawned bright and clear over the Luberon. At eight o’clock in the morning the air was crisp with the first intimations of autumn.
Penelope dived into her swimming pool, relishing the delicious tingle of the cold water.
M. Charpet and his lad had finished restoring order to the chaos of the garden. The swimming pool looked splendid. At each of the four corners stood a brand-new cypress tree next to a large terra-cotta urn. Penelope had particularly enjoyed searching through the multitudes of reclamation yards to find those. In a moment of reckless daftness she had also acquired a fibreglass panda, surprisingly similar to the one she’d seen at the brocante, but for half the price; it gazed ruminatively out from the thicket of bamboo in the garden. It was really quite lifelike, she thought, and it confirmed a certain English eccentricity that was no bad thing. The locals already thought she was mad for continuing to swim in her unheated pool, but she found the cool freshness of the water just glorious.
Forty lengths of breaststroke and front crawl, and she was invigorated. She dried herself off quickly and pulled on her dressing gown before wandering back to the house.
This was going to be a day of treats, she had decided. A day for a two-croissant breakfast. She hardly ever ate them these days, and her figure was definitely benefitting. Balancing a cup of fragrant coffee and a plate, she wandered out onto the terrace, still in her dressing gown. Yes, it would be a day of treats at her dream house in Provence.
By nine thirty, it was miraculously warm again, one of those days when it might still be summer. She would play her cello for an hour or two later. Now the interruptions had ceased, she had finally been able to give herself over to her music. Sometimes she played outside, thrilling to the progress she was making and the increasingly assured richness of the notes she released into the air, floating off towards the blue hills.
She felt safe and among friends here now. Later on, she was having dinner with Laurent Millais. At his house, no less—her curiosity was in overdrive, and she was looking forward to seeing it. He had promised champagne to raise a toast to new beginnings.
Didier Picaud and Jean-Luc Malpas were in the Avignon jail, awaiting trial for the murders of Manuel Avore and Michel Cailloux, and the harassment and attempted kidnap of an Englishwoman. As part of some complex plea bargaining, Jean-Luc had admitted forcing entry to M. Louchard’s gun cupboard and breaking into Le Chant d’Eau to get the symbolic ace of spades—simulating a gangland calling card—on the night they killed Cailloux in April 2010, not long after he appeared in the newspaper. Didier had admitted that he had fired the shots at her. He swore that he had never aimed to injure her, and Penelope desperately wanted to believe that. According to the mayor, the chief of police was finally doing a reasonable job, and there was every sign that justice would be done.
The village was a happier place, too. The murders seemed to have brought everyone together. Any minor quarrels were being settled over a game of pétanque or in the bar.
“You have been a force for good at St Merlot!” the mayor told her when he issued his invitation. “Though it was very unpleasant for you, I know.”
“It’s over now,” she said.
The following week, builders and decorators were scheduled to start repairing, replastering, and repainting. Le Chant d’Eau would be watertight and cosy by the time winter came.
The second buttery, flaky croissant was raised to her lips when she heard the sound of a vehicle arriving. Acutely aware of the suburban English style of her dressing gown, Penelope was about to withdraw discreetly when a taxi screeched to a stop on the track. Stones rattled.
As the dust cloud subsided, a voluptuous figure in shocking pink emerged from a passenger door, hollering, “Surprise!”
“Frankie!”
“Hello, darling!”
“What the hell is that?” Frankie left the taxi driver staggering under the weight of an enormous suitcase. “That dressing gown is disgusting, Pen—it’s got to go!”
Penelope bustled up to her friend. “And why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”
“Clémence phoned me and told me about the celebration dinner at the mayor’s house, and I just had to come! You don’t mind, do you?” Frankie gave her a big hug. “I couldn’t bear to miss the party, and I want to hear all about everything face to face.”
“No, of course, I don’t mind, but—” Penelope stared as another huge suitcase appeared from the boot of the taxi.
“Just a short stay, darling.”
Penelope did not know whether to be pleased or exasperated. So much for her quiet day of self-indulgence and pampering before her big night with Laurent. Not that it wasn’t always fun to have Frankie around. They sat out on the terrace gossiping, and Penelope spared no detail of her mini-abduction by the young man who had apparently been so keen to be her friend and speak English.
“Got that one wrong, didn’t we, Pen, eh? Nasty business.”
“I feel sick that I fell for it.”
“You were only being nice, Pen. Thinking the best of people.”
“Still feel stupid. That knife he was holding . . . still makes me shudder.”
“When’s the trial?”
“In a few months’ time.”
“You going to go to court?”
“I don’t know yet. I might be needed as a witness.”
“They can’t be pleading not guilty!”
“I’m trying to put it all out of my mind. But have to say it was very satisfying when Laurent made the chief of police come to the mairie to tell us in person about the final pieces of evidence against them in the Avore case. He’s an odd character, though—Reyssens, I mean.”
A car beeped as it came down the track, heading for the Louchard farm.
Penelope waved, and then turned to Frankie. “It’s nice to know that Pierre’s not too far away. He’s a nice man. That was another thing. Didier tried to make me suspicious of lovely M. Louchard.”
“They’ve stopped. They’re getting out.”
Penelope resolved to stay off the plum brandy if that became an issue. She wanted to be on top form for the evening to come.
Pierre Louchard and Mariette Avore bounded through the garden gate, holding hands.
“Ah, bonjour, bonjour! Mme Frankie!” said Louchard. Everyone kissed everyone else three times.
“It seems a good moment to tell you all that we are getting married! At our age there is no point waiting when we know each other so well, and we should have wed when we were nineteen!”
Mariette beamed.
Cheers and congratulations erupted. Everyone kissed everyone else three times more.
The sound of churning grit on the track, followed by a squeal of brakes, announced yet another visitor. Clémence arrived, bearing gifts from Apt market—white nectarines and olive oil. “Bonjour, Penny! Bonjour, Frankie! Une bonne surprise, n’est-ce pas?”
* * *
NATURALLY, FRANKIE wanted to go out for lunch. Clémence suggested that they try out a new restaurant in Saignon, ensured that Frankie was salivating at the prospect of a slap-up meal, and then left them to it.
Bet she’s eating an apple for lunc
h and going to the hairdressers this afternoon, thought Penelope. There was no getting away from it, she did feel a bit put out that what she had thought was dinner à deux with the mayor had somehow metamorphosed into a dinner party. But perhaps she had misunderstood. Too much wishful thinking.
The restaurant in Saignon was very good, and it was always a pleasure to visit the village, with its main street that looked like the perfect location for a French film set in the 1950s. Penelope stuck to Perrier and just had a light main course, while Frankie drank rosé and worked her way through the three-course menu.
“I did get up at an unearthly hour to get on a plane this morning, Pen!”
“You carry on, Frankie. I’m keeping to the Frenchwoman Diet.”
“I must say, you’re looking good on it, too.”
“I think we should both have a siesta when we get back. Here, have the rest of the carafe.”
The wine did knock Frankie out for a few hours—long enough for Penelope to relax in the garden, have another swim, and do everything else she had planned to do at leisure, like painting her nails and taking her time washing and styling her hair. It hardly mattered now. Laurent wouldn’t pay her any more attention than any of the other guests. Not that he ever would have done, she reminded herself. It was just as well Frankie and Clémence and whoever else was going to be there. They had stopped her from making a complete fool of herself.
At seven o’clock, Penelope put on a slinky deep-violet dress that flattered her curves, and grinned at her reflection in the mirror.
Through the open window she could hear Frankie outside, chatting nineteen to the dozen with Johnny on her mobile.
“It’s all coming together, the house is going to be amazing, and you wouldn’t believe the change in Pen since she left Esher. . . . She looks years younger. . . . Yes, really . . .”
* * *
“ARE YOU driving, Pen?”
“I booked a cab. I know it’s hardly any distance, but better safe than sorry. I don’t want to drink and drive.”