“Yes, I was really sorry to learn it.” As he did whenever the mayor entered his office, Bruno stood up. His instinct was to go over and embrace the old man who had been the nearest he’d ever had to a father. “I will keep the information to myself.”
“It’s her wish.” The mayor put a hand to his brow, then smoothed his fingertips over his temple as if trying to soothe a headache. “She does not want her final days filled with a stream of weeping visitors. Nor does Cécile want people to see her as she is now.”
“I understand.” He felt helpless, wanting to do something to show his sympathy and concern but with no idea what might be best. Bruno wondered how long this trial would last, not just for the mayor but for the sweet and loyal woman who was dying in the same self-effacing way that she had lived. How little we can really do for one another at the time when it’s most needed, he thought.
“It must be difficult for you, returning from the hospital to an empty house. Would it help if you moved into my spare room?”
“Thank you, Bruno, but no. Jacqueline has taken on the task of seeing that I’m properly fed, and I think it’s right to sleep in the room that Cécile and I shared for nearly four decades. It will be forty years next February, but she won’t live to see it.”
9
Like Valentoux himself, the theater director’s silk shirt looked the worse for wear when Bruno met him at the gendarmerie and took him across the street to the Bar des Amateurs. He seemed bemused when Bruno asked what he’d like to drink. Valentoux shook himself out of his daze and ordered a beer, then pulled out a cigarette pack that was empty. They sat at a table outside, the sunshine dappled by the leaves of the plane trees that lined the street.
“What will you do now?” Bruno asked.
“Buy cigarettes, take a shower and see if the drama festival still wants a director who’s suspected of murder. Then I’d better head back to the gîte where Francis died. I won’t be able to sleep a wink, but it’s the only place I have to stay.”
“You can’t go there. It’s been sealed off as a crime scene.”
“Merde. I’m in no shape to drive back to Paris. Can I take my car, or have they sealed that too?”
“You’re free. You can pick up your car whenever you want. I was going to suggest you follow me back to my place, take a shower there and change, and you can have the spare room until you decide what to do.” Bruno turned and called to the barman to bring him a pack of Marlboros and some matches.
“I didn’t know you smoked,” said Valentoux. “That’s a very kind offer—why are you doing this?”
“I don’t smoke. They’re for you,” Bruno said. “You’ve spent all night and half the day in a jail cell and interrogation rooms. You’re out of cigarettes. I don’t think you killed Fullerton, and neither does the chief of detectives. If any evidence to the contrary turns up, we’ll know where to find you. Will there really be a problem with your job at the drama festival?”
Valentoux shrugged, pulled out his mobile phone and said, “I have three messages from them asking me to call right away. This job’s supposed to last me all summer, and I turned down other opportunities to do it.”
“Phone them. If there’s a problem, I’ll speak to them.”
Valentoux called, exchanged a few sentences and then said, “There’s a policeman here who wants to talk to you.” Bruno took the phone, and Valentoux whispered, “Festival director.”
“Chief of Police Courrèges on the line, Monsieur le Directeur. I understand you have some concerns about Monsieur Valentoux.”
“The news reports have been troubling, but I understand Yves has now been released,” the director said.
“He was never arrested, simply helping us to understand what happened. He was the one who found the body of his friend. He is completely free, and I know of no suspicions attached to him, whatever the media might be saying.”
“I’ve been asked to cancel his contract.”
“Excuse me, I thought you were the festival director,” said Bruno, putting some frost into his voice. “Are you not in charge? Should I speak to somebody else?”
“I’m the director, but there’s the board chairman, the mayor, the sponsors…”
“And there’s a contract. If you cancel it, you’ll have a lawsuit on your hands, and I’d have to testify that I had formally informed you that Monsieur Valentoux has been released with the thanks of the police for his assistance and without any shadow on his name. We don’t want any unpleasant accusations of discrimination.”
Bruno spoke over the protests that came from the director. “I suggest you give me your e-mail address, and I’ll send you a message within the hour confirming what I have said, and I’ll put a hard copy in the mail tonight. That should suffice for your sponsors and your board.”
The director seemed to be mollified. “Okay,” said Bruno. “I’ll send those off to you and confirm to Monsieur Valentoux that his contract stands and he is free to come and see you tomorrow, if you wish. Thank you for your time and bonne journée.” He handed the phone back, took a long pull of his cold beer and watched Valentoux light a cigarette with shaking hands.
“Why are you doing this?”
“You’ve had a rough time. No need to make it worse,” Bruno said. “Stay here, have another beer. I’ll send off the e-mail and letter and pick you up back here in thirty minutes. Okay?”
As he walked back up the main street toward his office in the mairie, Bruno tried calling the house where Yvonne, Murcoing’s sister, was staying and where she was supposed to be on sick leave. Again there was no reply. He called Annette to thank her for her intervention and explained that Valentoux had been released and that he’d be at the drama festival as planned.
“They’ve assigned Bernard Ardouin to the case, so you’re in good hands,” Annette said. “I told him that Valentoux had enough of a reputation in cultural circles to get the Paris newspapers interested. I also told him to make sure to talk to you about the case.”
“You’ll destroy your reputation,” he said, smiling as he spoke. He liked Annette, a keenly competitive rally driver who had once scared the life out of him by putting him in the passenger seat for a hair-raising drive around a forest track.
“What reputation? Anyway, if Valentoux is out and in the clear, I’d love to meet him.”
“In that case, come and have dinner at my place tonight. He’ll be there. Are you still a vegetarian?”
“In principle, but as you know it’s almost impossible to live in Sarlat and not eat a little duck.”
“Duck it shall be,” he said. “We’ll see you about seven-thirty. I have to exercise my horse first.”
He hung up and climbed the old stone steps of the mairie to his office, where he sent off his e-mail and letter to the drama festival director and called Dougal at Delightful Dordogne to ask who else lived in the staff house with Murcoing’s sister. He was given three names and cell-phone numbers. Two of the girls had been in his tennis classes when they were schoolgirls. He called the one he’d liked most, Monique.
“I’m trying to find Yvonne Murcoing,” he said, after the usual pleasantries. “She’s supposed to be at the house, but there’s no reply.”
“We haven’t seen her for a couple of days,” Monique replied. “She left a note on the kitchen table saying there’d been a death in the family and she’d been called away. I’ve got her cell number if that helps.”
It was the same number that Bruno had been trying without success. “Have you met her brother?” he asked.
“Paul? Yes. He drops by from time to time, usually just to pick her up. They seem to be pretty close. She has a photo of him by her bed. We had a couple of takeout pizzas here together, watched a DVD he brought. I went to bed after a bit. The film was too arty for me, something Swedish in black and white, with lots of moody silences.”
“Did you see him recently?”
“Not for a few days, but I’ve been out a lot. Should I ask the other girls?”
>
“Yes, please. Do you know if Yvonne has a car?”
“She drives one of those little Toyotas, I don’t know what they’re called. It’s gray-silver, and it’s not here now. I know she gets it serviced at Lespinasse’s garage. He should have the registration number.”
On the way back to the bar to pick up Valentoux, Bruno stopped at the butcher’s and bought a kilo of aiguillettes of duck. These were long, thin strips of the finest meat that was left after the magret, the breast, had been removed. They were too often ignored or left on the carcass to thicken a stock, but Bruno loved them and planned to make them for dinner that evening. He had potatoes and the first of the strawberries under glass frames in his garden, lettuces, a lot of radishes and some early zucchini. Stéphane had dropped off some cheeses with the ham he’d been curing in salt since the ritual slaughter of a pig at the start of the year. That was all Bruno needed.
There was no sign of Valentoux at the table outside the bar, but Bruno looked inside and saw him standing at the counter, a large glass of what looked like whisky in his hand as he thumbed through the bar’s copy of Sud Ouest.
“I see what the festival director meant,” he said, closing the paper with its front-page headline on the murder of Fullerton. “It’s only just hitting me that I’ll never see him again.”
“Let’s get going,” said Bruno, and led the way to the gendarmerie’s parking lot so that Valentoux could follow him home. Once back at his house, Bruno showed his guest around and grinned as Valentoux enthused over the view and the vegetable garden.
“What a wonderful place to live,” Valentoux said as he turned back toward the house. “It’s like something from a film set, hearing a cockerel crowing beside a picturesque house in the country.”
“More comfortable than jail,” Bruno said lightly, but inwardly pleased by the Parisian’s reaction to his home. He gave Valentoux a towel, showed him the shower and guest room and suggested he get some sleep after his night in jail.
In the kitchen, Bruno filled a bowl with hot water. He poured a half glass of red wine into a flat-bottom dish, added salt and pepper and a crushed garlic clove and rolled the duck aiguillettes in the wine. Then he took a large jar of old-fashioned mustard, thick with seeds, and put three heaped tablespoons into the emptied warm bowl. He added an equivalent amount of chestnut honey from a jar he’d been given by Hervé, a beekeeper who sold his wares in the St. Denis market. He mixed the mustard and honey together, added the wine and the duck and turned the aiguillettes until each one was well coated. He covered the dish with plastic film and put it in the fridge.
Out in the garden with his basket, he dug up a couple of his potato plants, picked radishes, strawberries and zucchini, as well as some spring onions. He took the strawberries and the onions into his chicken coop and plucked them there, leaving the green stalks for the chickens to fuss over. Back in his kitchen, he washed the vegetables, leaving them in the sink as he checked that he had sufficient flour and yeast to make beignets. He peeled and sliced the zucchini, added salt and laid it in a colander to drain. Then he added two eggs and a cup of milk to his flour and yeast, whipped the mixture into a cream and put it in the fridge to rest. He was just washing up when a clean-shaven Valentoux entered the kitchen wearing a silk dressing gown and carrying the bottle of champagne that had been in his plastic bag at the crime scene.
“I needed that shower,” he said. “Bruno, I’d like to give you the champagne.”
“Put it in the fridge, and we can drink it tonight. I have some friends coming for dinner, including a fan of yours who saw some of your plays in Paris. The other guests and I will arrive smelling of horses, since we have to exercise them. The guests are due at seven-thirty, and we’ll eat about eight or so. I’m heading out, but I’ll be back after I take care of the horses.”
“I love riding. I had to learn for a film I was in, a costume drama about Catherine de Médicis. I’d really like to take it up again, but not today. I’ll get some sleep, if that’s okay. You’re being very kind.”
“I hope you like dogs. Better prepare yourself to meet a very affectionate and even more inquisitive young basset hound puppy. He’s called Balzac, and I’m supposed to be training him. I’ll bring him back from the stable where he likes to spend his days.”
“Balzac’s a great name for a dog.”
Bruno dried his hands, picked up his cap and headed for his van. His first stop was Lespinasse’s garage, where the owner scooted out from beneath an old Citroën he was restoring to look up the registration number of Yvonne’s car.
“Is there a problem?” Lespinasse asked. A plump, jolly man who could still play a decent game of rugby, he wiped his hands clean with grease from a large open jar and then with a paper towel before turning to his files.
“No, it’s her brother I’m looking for, and I thought she might be able to help me track him down. You know their grandfather died?”
“Old Murcoing? Yes, I knew him from when he had me up at the farm trying to fix his old tractor. It was a Porsche, so he said it should run forever. I bet you didn’t know Porsche used to make tractors. Here’s her registration number, a Toyota Yaris.”
Bruno wrote it down, told Lespinasse that there would be a military funeral for the old man and made his way to the gendarmerie just down the street to ask Sergeant Jules to put Yvonne’s car on the watch list.
“The magistrate was looking for you,” said Jules. “I gave him your number but he had to get back to Sarlat. Nothing urgent, he said. He’ll be back tomorrow.”
“How’s the new boss?” Bruno asked.
“Anybody would be an improvement on Capitaine Duroc, but she’s only just arrived. Too soon to tell, but she’s very polite. She’s still got the officers’ school polish on her.”
“You’ll rub that off soon, Jules,” Bruno said. “Anything else?”
“Philippe Delaron was asking about that Englishman whose house was burgled. He said he’d looked him up on Google, and he thought there might be a story in it. Apparently the Englishman’s a milord or something important. Delaron was holding back. You know what he’s like when he’s after a story.”
Bruno made a mental note to do his own Google search and headed for the house where Monique lived, to see if Yvonne Murcoing might by chance have returned. The place was empty. It had been a long shot, but not a big detour from the route to Pamela’s house. His spirits lifted and his mood mellowed as he drove up the familiar lane to the house where his puppy and his horse and Pamela all awaited. He was looking forward to an oasis of affection and calm after a long and frustrating day.
What greeted him was controlled chaos. A plumber’s van and a large truck were parked in the courtyard, and there was the unmistakable whiff of a problem with the septic tank. Pamela, in overalls and rubber boots, was cleaning out her kitchen.
“Don’t come near me, I stink,” she called, blowing him a kiss. “Antonio says he’s almost done.”
Bruno nodded at Marcel, standing by the truck that was known locally as the honey wagon. Marcel had a steady business installing and emptying septic tanks all over the region. Somehow he managed to shed the aroma of his trade in the evenings when he’d spend his time at Ivan’s bistro and the Bar des Amateurs, coated in the pungent smell of the cheap cigars he smoked constantly.
A new gust of fumes drove Bruno to the stable to be greeted by Balzac trying to scramble up on his legs while Hector gave a welcoming whinny. Bess and Victoria, Pamela’s two mares, gazed at him incuriously and then went back to staring at the wooden planks of their stalls. He changed into his riding clothes, despite Balzac’s best attentions, gave Hector his customary apple and saddled all the horses. He hadn’t seen Fabiola’s car, but he assumed she’d join them.
Pamela came into the stable dressed for riding and her still damp hair pinned back. She could change faster than any woman Bruno had ever known. She reached for her riding hat and kissed him. “We had a plumbing disaster this afternoon, but Antonio fixed the b
locked loo and persuaded Marcel to come and pump everything out.”
“And somebody was just enthusing to me about the delights of life in the country. You’ll meet him at dinner, that drama festival guy I was telling you about last night.”
“It’s okay for him to wax lyrical. He lives in Paris where they have sewers, and on days like this I wish I did too. Fabiola called to say she’s on her way. She was held up by a broken bone she had to set at one of the campgrounds. We spent half the morning moving her stuff across.”
“Across to where?”
“Didn’t I tell you? She’s moving into the spare room in my house for the summer so I can rent out her gîte. Lucky you, you’ll be sharing the bathroom with two women. With the rental I’ll be able to install a second bathroom upstairs, at the end of the landing.”
“Do I get to scrub Fabiola’s back too?” He grinned and hugged her from behind.
“Don’t even think about it.”
10
Bruno returned home to find that Valentoux had explored his way around the kitchen and dining room. He had set the table and gathered wildflowers from the field behind the black-currant bushes. They filled the vase he had placed on the outdoor table, where Bruno’s champagne flutes were gleaming. Balzac had raced ahead and was already making friends with their guest. A few moments later he spotted Pamela and Fabiola coming up the drive bearing bottles of wine. Balzac tore himself from Valentoux to greet them and then darted back to Valentoux again.
“You look a lot better than you did yesterday,” Fabiola told Valentoux. “At one point I thought of declaring you in shock, but you seemed to be pretty lucid in answering Bruno’s questions. My sympathies on the loss of your friend.”
“I want to hear what you have planned for the theater festival,” said Pamela. “But maybe we’d better wait until Annette joins us.”
Bruno was pouring the champagne when Annette arrived in her small blue Peugeot with the wide tires for rally driving, sending Balzac into another frenzy of welcome.
The Resistance Man Page 9