Provence - To Die For (21 page)

A sound outside drew me to the window; I looked down on the wet pavement. A man in a trench coat crossed the street. Was it the same man I’d seen on the comer? I heard the creak of the outer door downstairs as he entered the building. Why was he following me? What did he want? Whoever he was, I had no desire to confront him in an empty building with no one around to sound the alarm.

How could I get out? The elevator was not an option. I rushed back down the hall, praying the stairwell door wasn’t locked. I twisted the knob and leaned with my shoulder. It opened. I closed the door quietly and crept down the stairs, wary of making any noise that would give away my location. The door on the first floor had an emergency push bar to allow people to leave, but not to permit access from the other side.

I put my ear to the door and listened. The whine of the elevator made me jump. I heard the elevator door open and close on the first floor. The engine whined again, and I waited for the sound of the door opening on the second floor before I pressed on the bar and escaped into the hall. All the office doors were closed now, and I fled the building, knowing the squeal of the front door would alert my pursuer. I hugged the buildings as I hurried down the street, hoping he wouldn’t be able to see the direction in which I was heading if he looked out the window. Bright lights at the intersection ahead promised a bigger thoroughfare, and I gratefully turned the comer onto a street with traffic and stores.

 

“Madame Fletcher. It is good to see you again, but I don’t think the authorities would be happy for you to be here.”

“I’m sure you’re right, Guy, so I won’t tell them if you won’t.”

“I am closing my lips with a lock,” he said with a sad smile. “Would you like to go in?”

I leaned against the side of the arched entry and scrutinized the medieval dining room where Emil Bertrand was killed. “Yes,” I said. “You won’t mind?”

“There is no need to keep away. The police have finished their forensic work in here. We start our classes again next week.”

“Oh, that’s good,” I said, stepping down into the room. “Will you be teaching?”

“As a matter of fact, I will,” he said, brushing off the front of his white apron, which was stained with the ingredients of tonight’s dinner. “Daniel has asked me to be director of the school.”

“Congratulations,” I said.

We gravitated toward the school kitchen. Guy opened the door and flicked on the overhead lights. I took the seat I’d sat in as a student. The room was immaculate. There was no sign of the last meal prepared here. The butcher-block table had been scrubbed; no rabbit blood stained its surface. In fact, it was empty except for a stack of folders next to a pile of starched white aprons. Guy walked around checking materials. He straightened the folders and turned the aprons so all the strings were on the same side. He adjusted the angle of one of the tall olive jars lined up on the shelf jutting out from the oven hood, making sure its “hermine” was precisely centered. He counted the number of knife handles jutting from a pottery pitcher.

“I take it the police returned all your knives,” I said.

“How do you know about that?” Guy asked.

“Daniel told me,” I said. “I met him at the truffle market in Carpentras.”

“Oui,
they did.”

“Do you ever go to the truffle market?”

“Non.
It is for the master chefs, not the sous chefs. Of course, I
could
go, if they gave me the money to buy. I know what a good truffle should be.”

“Of course you do,” I said. “You’re a chef with many years’ experience.”

He smoothed his mustache with his thumb and forefinger.
“C’est vrai.
That’s true.” He removed his glasses, letting them dangle by their cord, and leaned against the wall, his arms and feet crossed.

“I hope Daniel appreciates that,” I said.

A puff of air escaped his lips.
“Poufft!
No one ever gives me credit,” he said. “Daniel, he says I have great administrative skills. He thinks I don’t know he isn’t complimenting my cooking.”

“He doesn’t realize how observant you are.”

He nodded in agreement.

“You said once that Daniel hires chefs for the school even if he doesn’t like them,” I said.

“True.”

“I got the impression you were talking about Chef Bertrand.”

He nodded again.

“Why didn’t he like Emil?”

He pushed himself away from the wall and put his glasses back on. “The old man, he thinks Daniel is challenging him. He never likes that Daniel gets the hotel position, even though he didn’t want it himself.”

“And Daniel held that against him?”

“No, no. That wasn’t it at all.” He slid his fingers under his eyeglasses and rubbed his eyes.

“Then why?”

He blinked several times and squinted as if he were trying to see the story. “Daniel, he thinks Emil kept him from getting a star,” he said.

“How could he do that?” I asked.

“Oh, it’s a long tale, and maybe it’s not true about the star.”

“I heard there was a scandal about Emil some years back. Is this what they’re talking about?”

“Oui,
oui. I am sure it is.”

“You have to tell me what happened. You can’t leave me in suspense.”

“All right. I will tell you. But the story has been embellished so many times, it may not be true.”

“Okay. I’ll take it with a grain of salt.”

Guy started to giggle.

“Did I say something funny?” I asked.

He tried to hold it in, but his laughter broke out anyway. I watched, perplexed, as he bent his long body in half, hands holding his knees, and laughed till the tears rolled down his cheeks.
All the tension of the last week must be catching up to him,
I thought. Finally he wiped his eyes, and blew his nose in a big white handkerchief. “You will see in a minute,” he said with a grin. He cleaned his spectacles with a comer of his apron and pulled the sidepieces over his ears. The lenses magnified his eyes so that the one that turned in was now even more noticeable.

“Now you really have me curious,” I said, smiling at him.

“It’s called ‘L’ Affair du Sel,’ ” he said, stifling another giggle.

I laughed, too. “The Salt Affair?” I translated.

“Oui. C’est ça.
That’s it.”

“So tell me.”

He pulled out another of the tall stools and sat. He sighed, still smiling. “As an instructor, Emil, he is permitted to use the hotel kitchen for his food supplies for the classes. You understand?”

I nodded.

“It was said he put salt in the sugar box.”

“Uh-oh!”

“You can see what will happen, yes?”

“How bad was it?”

“Daniel, he has a table of important guests. He ruins his famous dessert, which takes many hours to make.”

“Oh, my goodness! Did he serve it to them?”

“He didn’t mean to. He sees something is not right, tastes the dish, and puts it aside. He is furious. He screams for the sous chef to get another dessert from the locker, and he goes to call who he thinks is the culprit. While he is out of the kitchen, the waiter finds the famous dessert unattended and brings it to the table with great fanfare.”

“What happened?”

“The guests take one spoonful of the dessert and spit into their napkins. The meal is ruined. They forget the delicious dishes that preceded this one and complain to the management that the chef is trying to poison them. News of the disaster flies all over the dining room, and people at other tables start to feel sick.”

“The power of suggestion,” I said.

“Very much so. One lady faints. Another throws up at the table. People are running from the room without paying for their meals. Ambulances arrive and cart the people off to the hospital. The reporters cover the story and Daniel is made a laughingstock. He was very lucky not to get fired.”

“And did Bertrand do that? Did he switch the salt and sugar?”

Guy shrugged. “He denies this, of course, but Daniel accuses him.”

“How could he be sure it was Bertrand who made the switch? And if Bertrand did do it, how can Daniel be certain it was deliberate? Couldn’t that have happened accidentally?”

“Emil was the instructor for that day. So he had the right to use the kitchen. He was furious at Daniel. Daniel had been sous chef under him, and he was offended that his student would be so ungrateful. He said that the famous dessert was just not good, and that Daniel made up a story to explain his failure. They didn’t speak for years.”

“And Daniel thinks that incident kept him from earning a star.”

He shrugged. “He could not know. The Michelin inspectors, they never reveal themselves. But he suspected they were here that night. He still has not been given a star, and he is a very fine chef. It is a pebble in his shoe.”

“I’m sure it is.”

“I must get back to the kitchen. I have taken too much time away. Do you want to stay more?”

“No. I’ll go, too,” I said, getting up and pushing the stool back into place.

Guy turned off the overhead lights, and we walked across the ancient courtyard.

“If you’re going to be director of the cooking school, does that mean you won’t be cooking for L’Homme Qui Court anymore?” I asked.

He appeared uncomfortable with the question. “It doesn’t look as if I will be offered the partnership I was expecting.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I said. “Do you know who the new chef will be?”

He cleared his throat. “It will be a little time, I believe, before the decision is made,” he said. “I am being considered, along with others. Emil had a star, you see. His partners want someone who will make certain they keep it.”

“Who are his partners?”

“Emil would be angry at what they do.” He waved his hand in front of his face. “I have talked of nothing but Emil this week. I don’t want to talk of this anymore,” he said. “Tell me, how is your little friend? Is she still in Avignon?”

“Yes,” I replied. “Mallory is staying with me.”

“I’m glad she has an adult to look after her. You will say hello for me, eh?”

“Yes, I will.” I hesitated, finally asking, “Have you been to see Claire?”

“Ah,
pauvre petite.
Poor little one. Such a shame. I tried to tell her he was cheating on her.”

“So you think she is guilty.”

He shrugged. It was a particularly French expression of resignation, a gesture that said, “What can you do? This is what the world is like. There is nothing to be done.”

 

“We rented a car to take rides into the country,” Jill Thomas said, pouring a cup of tea for her husband. “It was beautiful weather and we wanted to take advantage.”

“We would have tried to visit you in St. Marc, but the rental company didn’t supply maps,” Craig added. “Never heard of such a thing, not to have maps.”

“The hotel gave us a map, but it was just for the city,” Jill said. “We managed to make a nice day of it all the same.”

“I was away all yesterday morning at the Carpentras market,” I said. “You would have missed me anyway.”

“What brought you here today?” Craig asked. “Going to base one of your crime novels on the mystery of the dead chef?”

“Craig, don’t pry,” Jill said.

“That’s not such a terrible question,” he said.

“I was hoping to bump into you two, of course. Do you know if René Bonassé is still at the hotel?”

“He’s gone,” Jill said. “Captain LeClerq left us a message that we were no longer needed for the investigation. I assume he did the same for René. He checked out this morning.”

“Interesting. The captain took our passports—Mallory’s and mine—on Thursday, but he gave them back today,” I said.

“He must be convinced Claire is guilty,” Jill said, “although I have difficulty believing it.”

“I
think Madame Poutine ‘fingered her,’ ” Craig said. “Isn’t that what your American ‘cops’ call it?”

“I see you’re a fan of gangster movies,” I told him. “I don’t think Claire killed him either, but Madame Poutine did accuse her. Whether that’s Captain LeClerq’s only evidence, I don’t know.”

“Jessica, would you like some tea? The waiter can bring an extra cup.”

“I’d love some,” I said. “But would you two excuse me for a moment? I just remembered a call I need to make.”

The young man at the desk was the same clerk who’d replaced Claire after she was taken away by the police. He recognized me and greeted me warmly, evidently relieved to see that the chef’s murder had not kept me from returning to the hotel.

“Bonsoir, madame.
How may I help you?”

“I’ve signed up for one of your cooking classes next week,” I told him. “A friend said he might be taking it, too. May I see if his name is in your book?”

Eager to assist me, he pulled out the heavy cooking school ledger and laid it on the counter. He flipped the pages to the date I indicated and turned the book around so I could read it. I pretended to look at the names in next week’s class until a guest drew his attention away. I turned back to the page listing the students in the class I had taken. There were columns for names, addresses, and telephone numbers, and a place for signatures when the students signed in. Mme Poutine had not provided her address, but René had given his. The address was in Paris. I committed his telephone number to memory and went to the telephone booth, actually a table with phone books and a chair, in an alcove to the right of the front desk. I sat and jotted the number down on a pad next to the phone. I got out my calling card and dialed. A woman’s voice answered.

“Non.
Monsieur Bonassé is not here.”

“Do you know where I can reach him? It’s very important.

“Oui.
He is visiting his aunt. She lives in Les Baux.”

“Les Baux?”

The woman gave me the aunt’s name and telephone number. I wrote them down, although, given a choice, I wouldn’t announce myself with a call. Over the years I’ve found that face-to-face conversation yields much more data. Observing someone’s facial expression and body language while listening to the tone and inflection of their voice usually results in learning a great deal more than they think they are telling you.