by Michael Bond
The blush deepened. ‘Jealousy is one thing, but I couldn’t marry a man with a beard.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse looked at his watch. It was almost ten o’clock. The day before, after the ambulance and the police and everyone else had been and gone he’d retired to his room and slept as he couldn’t remember ever having slept before, deeply and solidly and satisfyingly. Now he felt refreshed and hungry.
‘Could you conquer your dislike of beards long enough to order me some croissants and a brioche or two?’ he enquired. ‘I’ll be down in about thirty minutes.’
Apart from food, a bath was what he needed most of all. Considering his insistence on having a room with a bath he’d made precious little use of it since he’d arrived. Now he would make up for it. A good, deep, long bath, followed by a leisurely breakfast. Fresh orange juice, rolls, coffee, croissants, brioche, confiture … as he stood up he caught sight of his reflection in a mirror … and a shave. The face poking out of the top of the dressing gown definitely needed a shave.
‘I’ll see if I can find Justine. I think she is avoiding me – and with good reason. She knows my feelings about people who try to sell “their story” to the newspapers. I have told her – if she does then we are finished.’
‘I couldn’t marry a man with a beard.’ Monsieur Pamplemousse repeated the words to himself as he slowly climbed the stairs to his room, and as he did so he gave an inward sigh of compassion for all the people in the world who were prepared to sacrifice years of possible happiness because they lacked the ability to discuss even the simplest facts of life. It was all a matter of communication.
Tante Louise was more than ready to take up the cudgels on behalf of someone else whose privacy she thought was being invaded, but she couldn’t do it on her own behalf for fear of being thought rude, a violator of another’s privacy herself. He’d been about to offer her a more up-to-date photograph. He had thirty very good likenesses, but unfortunately all with beards. It would have been rubbing salt into the wound.
As for the boulanger himself – whoever said no man is an island was talking nonsense. All men were islands; some allowed in more tourists than others.
Pommes Frites jumped to his feet as Monsieur Pamplemousse entered the room. Fully recovered from his ordeal in the storm, he wagged his tail with pleasure as he followed his master across to the balcony.
Outside the clearing up operations were well under way. Shopkeepers were putting sodden mats on the pavement to dry, washing floors and wringing their mops as if trying to squeeze out the memory of both the storm and its solitary casualty. A van was parked alongside the Sanisette and two men were poring over a circuit diagram, scratching their heads as they tried to restore it to working order. Others were dismantling the scaffolding tower, coiling up camera cables into neat figures of eight as they went. The rest of the media seemed to have disappeared. Put to flight by Pommes Frites, routed by the storm, they were probably miles away by now, devoting their minds and talents to other things. There was nothing so dead as yesterday’s story.
The sky had cleared and the sun was shining, but the temperature had gone down. In the fields opposite the goats were drying out, their beards damp-looking and tousled. Like the sunflowers surrounding them they were battered but unbowed. He wondered idly what they were thinking about as they munched their way through the morning. It was hard to tell with goats; unlike Pommes Frites, who from his behaviour had sensed that it was nearly time to move on.
Pommes Frites, in fact, was beginning to show distinct signs of being difficult again. The moment he heard the bath water running he started scratching on the outer door, looking imploringly over his shoulder, as if willing his master to take him out for a walk instead. Monsieur Pamplemousse pretended not to notice. Turning to face the bathroom mirror, he studiously attended to the lathering of his face.
As he pulled his jaw to one side to assist the passage of the blade a long drawn out howl came from the other room. Pommes Frites was bringing his big guns into action. Well, two could play at that game. The second lathering was accompanied by ‘O Sole Mio’. Their voices blended well. The bathroom added a certain mellifluousness to the notes as they echoed round the walls. It was quite pleasing. Perhaps they should team up. He could see the posters. Pamplemousse and his singing dog, Pommes Frites – in concert!
Pommes Frites clearly didn’t agree. He peered round the bathroom door hardly able to believe his ears. Had he been less busy on the task in hand Monsieur Pamplemousse might well have noticed that he was wearing the doleful expression of one steeling himself for the performance of a distasteful task. It was the kind of expression a dentist might don as he uttered the classic phrase ‘This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you’, knowing full well that the reverse was true.
Turning off the bath tap, Monsieur Pamplemousse reached down and tested the temperature of the water. It was even more tepid than usual. No doubt the rapid cooling of the ground by the deluge of rain and hail had something to do with it. The boiler was probably working overtime trying to catch up.
As he rose to his feet again he became aware that Pommes Frites was regarding him in a very odd way indeed. If he hadn’t known him better he might well have been forgiven for thinking that he was poised for some kind of attack. There was something about the way he was standing, back legs splayed slightly apart, body tensed and drawn back, arched like a tightly coiled spring awaiting the moment of release. He dismissed the thought instantly as being unworthy between friends. If the truth be known Pommes Frites was probably doing nothing more than limbering up, practising one of his well known leaps in case he had need of it.
Bending over, he reached across the bath for the cord switch which operated the wall heater. As he did so the unbelievable happened. Unable to contain himself a moment longer, Pommes Frites gave a warning growl and then launched himself forward, sinking his teeth as he did so into the nearest available object. And as he dug his feet in and tugged, the sound of growls and tearing cloth combined with a roar of surprise and indignation in a way which made their previous efforts at a duet pale into insignificance, drowning as it did so the splash of something heavy landing in the water, the flash that accompanied it, the hiss of escaping steam which rose a split second afterwards, and the sound of running feet as someone entered the room.
10
A MOMENT OF TRUTH
‘What’s up? Is anything the matter?’ Tante Louise nearly tripped over Pommes Frites as she entered the bathroom. ‘I was on my way back from the boulangerie when I heard Pommes Frites howling. Then there were a lot of other sounds as if someone was in pain …’
She broke off and put a hand to her mouth. ‘Mon Dieu! It is not possible.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse clambered unsteadily to his feet and then froze as he followed the direction of her gaze. The electric fire lying in the bottom of the bath looked unbelievably sordid and sinister.
His blood ran cold. He might still have been touching the tap, or testing the temperature of the water, or even … even operating the cord switch while sitting in the bath as he had done the night of his mishap in the Sanisette. It was no wonder that Pommes Frites had been so agitated. He must have been instinctively aware that something was wrong without actually knowing what it was.
‘How could it have happened? Did you slip?’
Monsieur Pamplemousse looked up at the wall above the bath. ‘I think it was helped on its way.’ The screws had been removed and the wooden plugs in which they’d been embedded prized out slightly so that the fire had rested on their protruding ends, needing only the slightest of tugs to release it. Nails holding cable clips to the ceiling had been carefully removed, the cable itself remaining in place through years of over-painting.
‘Armand again?’
He nodded. ‘I’m afraid so.’
‘He must have been crazy.’
He wondered if the thought made her feel better or worse. It certainly removed from his own mind once and for all
any faint feeling of remorse it might have harboured about whether or not he could have acted more quickly the day of the storm.
‘Crazy and desperate. Perhaps he mistook me for someone else.’ It occurred to him as he spoke that perhaps the notebook filled with cryptic writing in his own special code had made Armand suspicious. That and the locked case. He must have felt that things were closing in around him.
He reached down and patted Pommes Frites. To his credit Pommes Frites responded not with one of his ‘I told you so all along’ expressions, for which he could have been forgiven, but instead rubbed himself contentedly against his master’s leg. There was really no need for words. ‘Good boy’ would have been totally inadequate. The pat on the head said it all; the trust which had been so nearly shattered wholly restored.
As he removed the piece of pyjama material from Pommes Frites’ mouth Madame Terminé came into the room.
‘Oh, la, la!’ She took in the situation at a glance but passed no other comment. It might have been an observation on the state of the weather. She would probably be the same on Judgment Day.
‘If Monsieur would care to remove his pantalons I will repair them for him.’
‘For you, Madame, I will happily oblige. It may give you material for a further chapter in your memoirs.’
‘That was very naughty of you,’ said Tante Louise reprovingly as the outer door slammed shut. ‘And also unnecessary. Justine has already apologised.’
‘Then she can work out her repentance with a needle and thread,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. Wrapping a towel round his hand, he took hold of the cable, lifted the fire out of the bath and placed it carefully on a shelf away from everything else. The fuse would have blown, but from the look of the wiring there was no sense in taking unnecessary risks.
‘And now,’ he continued, ‘I am about to remove the rest of my clothing so that I can take a bath at long last. I shall be down for breakfast in fifteen minutes.’
As the door closed for the second time he pulled the plug and began helping the dusty water on its way with his hand. Depressingly, when he refilled the bath the temperature of the water started to go up and then rapidly went down again. He was washed and dressed and seated in the dining-room in ten minutes flat.
The croissants were delicious. Warm and light and buttery to the taste. He was halfway through his third when Tante Louise entered carrying a pot of coffee in one hand and his notebook in the other. His spirits rose. Suddenly, without bothering to look out of the window, he knew the sun would be shining.
‘The maintenance men found it in the Sanisette and brought it to me. It has your name inside. There were other things too – mostly to do with drugs.’ The Director’s aunt shivered. ‘He must have been taking them even as he watched the hotel through that dreadful periscope.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse took the notebook and thumbed through it quickly to make sure it was intact. The writing danced about like the moving images in an old-fashioned flick-a-book.
Tante Louise looked at him curiously. ‘The book you are writing … food plays a big part? I couldn’t help noticing when they gave it to me.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse gave a start. He had forgotten about his book. ‘Oui, c’est ça,’ he answered non-committally. ‘You could say that.’
Translated into a readable form, the notebook was almost publishable as it stood. One day he might even try. He knew he wouldn’t, of course – it would be breaking faith with Le Guide – but it was nice to have unfulfilled dreams.
‘It is nearly finished?’
‘The present chapter is. There are still a few loose ends to tie up. I may do that on the way back to Paris.’ Calling in on Bernard would be one such end. He couldn’t wait to break the news. Given all the evidence at his disposal Bernard should be home and dry. With luck he wouldn’t even have to stand trial.
‘It will seem strange without you. So much has happened I can hardly believe you have been here less than a week. I think I may close down for a while. The season is over …’
He stared at her. ‘Close down? But you can’t. Mark my words, your season is only just beginning. The name of the Hôtel du Paradis has been in all the journaux. Its precise location has been shown on every television screen in France. People will start to come out of sheer curiosity. They will bring their cameras and they will take photographs of the square and of the cellar steps where only two days ago I was ravaged. They will take pictures of the Sanisette. Then they will almost certainly wish to stay here in the hotel.
‘It will be like St. Marc in Brittany, where Monsieur Hulot took his famous holiday. Thirty years later people still go there and ask if they can sleep in “his” room. Human beings get a vicarious pleasure out of reliving these things. You will have to engage a chef, of course. You cannot carry on as you are.’
‘A chef! I cannot afford one.’
‘Nonsense! You are sitting on a fortune.’
‘But that is no longer so. If what you say is true it has been washed away in the storm. By now it will be well on its way to the sea. Anyway,’ Tante Louise pulled a face. ‘I could not have made money out of Grand-mère’s tisane. It would not have been right.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse wetted his finger and dabbed at some lumps of crystallised sugar that had fallen from his brioche. ‘I am not talking of the tisane. I am talking of the wine you showed me. A lot of it is pre-Phylloxera – bottled before the turn of the century. I know someone who would help and advise. Someone you could trust. He owes me a favour.’
That would be another matter to talk over with Bernard. Given his contacts in the trade he was sure to help.
‘If you auction only half of it in London or New York it will pay for a new kitchen. You can have the hotel rewired, instal new plumbing and heating. Paint the outside.’
He licked his finger again and wiped it dry with the serviette. ‘Grandpa would not be pleased if his precious wine was left so long it became undrinkable. That would be a tragedy – to see such an expenditure of love and care and time turn to vinegar. It would have him turning in his grave.’ He nearly said turning in his crocodile, but thought better of it.
‘Besides,’ he brushed some crumbs from his jacket as he rose from the table, ‘as far as a chef is concerned, I know of someone who would be eminently suitable. She cooks like a dream and it is time she branched out. You will be doing many people a favour if you take her on. You will have to watch her puddings from Yorkshire – they will not go well with the noisettes de porc aux pruneaux, but I think I can safely say that I have only to give the word and she will be here. Who knows? One day you may have a star in Michelin, a toque in Gault Millau, or even a Stock Pot in Le Guide!’
He was whistling as he made his way back up the stairs. It was always pleasant when things worked out for the best. He wanted to telephone the Director straight away to tell him the good news – put in some groundwork before annual increment time, but prudence dictated otherwise. He’d managed to escape too many questions so far.
His pyjama trousers were neatly laid out on the bed, folded for packing this time, not for sleep. On top of them was a small square parcel wrapped in brown paper and tied with string. He decided to open it later. Now that he had set the wheels in motion all he wanted was to get away as quickly as possible.
The Director’s aunt was waiting for him behind the desk in the entrance hall as he came down the stairs with Pommes Frites. She had another parcel. This time it was unmistakably bottle shaped.
‘It is for you. A present from Grandpa.’
He hardly knew what to say. ‘You are very kind. I shall think of you when I drink it.’
‘I hope you will come back soon.’
‘That would be nice.’ Even as he uttered the words he knew he wouldn’t be back for some while. One day, perhaps. The integrity of Le Guide had to be preserved at all costs. It wouldn’t do for Elsie to recognise him. Next time it would be someone else. Perhaps Bernard would pay a return visit.
Goodbyes said, the luggage packed into the boot, he wandered back into the square. There was time for some quick shopping. Pommes Frites’ supply of vaseline was running low.
On an impulse, as they entered the pharmacie, he took a bubble-packed razor set from a rack just inside the door. ‘I would like this gift-wrapped, s’il vous plaît,’ he announced grandly.
He felt the assistant’s eyes following him as they left the shop. By the time they reached the lane at the side of the boulangerie she was standing in the shop doorway.
The boulanger eyed Monsieur Pamplemousse and Pommes Frites nervously as they appeared at the entrance to his laboratoire.
‘Pardon, Monsieur.’ He pointed to a notice on the door. ‘Chiens are interdits.’
Monsieur Pamplemousse inclined his head in acknowledgment. ‘We are not stopping.’
He looked around the room. It was always interesting to enter other people’s worlds. The doors to the huge ovens at the back were open; the long wooden paddles used for sliding the loaves around so that they would bake evenly were clipped to a rack on a white-tiled wall nearby, their work done for the day. Near the doorway, where the temperature would be coolest, was the croissant area – an enormous slab of shining marble. The floor below was as spotless as the officine in the pharmacie he’d just left. He could see that Pommes Frites would not be popular if he left a trail of paw prints all over it.
‘This is for you. A small parting gift.’ He held out the parcel. ‘If you take my advice you will use it. If you do not then I can only say that the softness of your brain is equalled only by the hardness of the crust on certain of your baguettes and you do not deserve the good fortune that awaits you on your very doorstep.’
Without waiting for a reply he turned and led the way back to the car park behind the hotel. It was a very satisfactory end to his visit. One last good deed. Thankfully his tyres were all intact. It would have been a very ignominous rounding off of things if they hadn’t been.