Read The Seven Turns of the Snail's Shell: A Novel Online
Authors: Mj Roë
Anna tasted it and nodded her head approvingly.
A salad of
haricots verts
and green hazelnuts was next, followed by
la pièce de résistance:
thinly sliced duck breast a
u romarin
, draped over a mound of ratatouille-like vegetables and served with violet asparagus, small zucchini flowers, and miniature potatoes.
“
Eh bien
, Lucie has finally outdone herself,” Léo announced as he savored the show-off dessert: an earthy, elegant, and mysterious concoction that consisted of a fresh pear tart topped with candied baby eggplant and lavender-scented ice cream. They all nodded in agreement.
Coffee and glasses of Calvados followed. By the time they had finished eating and drinking, it was after midnight, the band had finished, and the square was quiet.
“It was such fun,” Anna said to C-C as they, followed by Max, walked to C-C’s house in the darkness.
“They are quite a group when they get going.”
“I had to laugh when Jacques passed on telling his duck story. Actually, I thought he was going to tell it when he launched into that booming,” she lowered her voice and tried her best imitation of the Corsican accent, “And now I will tell the sad story of the duck.” Then she laughed, “But he caved in with all the hissing and booing.”
“He was in rare form tonight.”
They had reached the house. As C-C opened the door for her, she said, yawning, “Doesn’t Diamanté ever take that beret off and keep it off?”
“Not that I’ve seen. He gives the impression that he was born in it.”
“I wonder if he sleeps in it?”
“One thing is certain: he’ll probably die in it.”
“Oh, C-C,” she said, shaking her head.
A
nna awoke late the morning after the dinner welcoming the wedding guests. Jet-lagged and slightly hung over, she rolled over and yawned. The side of the bed where C-C had been was empty. On the nightstand, tucked under a vase with a fresh rose, she found a note: “Gone to check on a patient. Back around eleven o’clock. There are tea bags in the kitchen.
Je t’aime.
”
Anna swung her feet off the side of the bed and looked at the clock. Eleven o’clock was a half hour away. She went into the bathroom, washed her face and brushed her teeth, then found her gray running shorts and a white tank top in her suitcase and slipped them on. As she descended the staircase barefoot, she peeked toward the front of the house. Not a soul in sight. Good. No patients waiting in the foyer.
In the kitchen, Anna found a felt-lined, mahogany tea chest on the marble counter. As she filled a copper tea kettle with water from the faucet, she eyed the gas stove. It was one of those stunning
miprofessionnel
stoves she had read about, made of cast-iron and with elegant, polished brass hardware and painted with the same hard enamel used on car finishes. This one, a glossy
aubergine
to match the color of the intricate detail in the antique tiles above the work counter, had beautiful oven doors, and its top was brushed stainless steel. She set the tea kettle on one of the six gas burners. The medallion in the center of the backsplash read
La Cornue
.
“Whew!” she whistled. “This one’s the top of the line. Wonder why he spent so much money on a stove he doesn’t even use?”
When the water was boiling, she found a china cup and saucer in the cupboard, selected a chamomile from the assortment in the tea chest, placed it in the cup, and poured the hot water over it.
The scent of roses and lavender coming through the open French doors drew her into the back garden. The sun beat down from a flawless blue sky, and the air was hot and still. She plucked a fresh mint leaf from a pot on the terrace, sniffed its distinctive aroma, then placed it in her cup of tea. Except for the grasshoppers and cicadas, the garden was deserted. She wandered around to the south side of the house, where Clo the gardener had created a paradise of multicolored roses, all in full bloom. A small pathway led to a bench by a birdbath under a rose arbor at the back corner. The white roses on the arbor extended to cover the entire wall of a small building. As she studied the tile-roofed structure, Anna took a sip of her tea, savoring the sweet flavor of the mint followed by the cool aftertaste. There were no windows, only a large garage door with a small door beside it. She tried the handle on the smaller door. It was unlocked. The light spilling in from the outside fell across a sleek black roadster, the distinctive three-pointed Mercedes star on the back of its trunk flanked by SL55 and AMG.
She whistled again. If this was C-C’s car, something bothered her. She knew doctors in France didn’t make the kind of money that they do in the U.S. C-C certainly didn’t earn enough to afford all this as an ER physician in Paris. She recalled what he had said about not having very many patients here. How then? This handsome house? The expensive renovation? A caretaker for the grounds? This car? Her eyes narrowed. She closed the door and wandered back through the garden and into the kitchen. A few minutes later, she heard the front door open and close.
C-C crept up from behind and pulled her to him. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yes, but I’m still jet-lagged. And I think I had a little too much Calvados.”
“I see you found the tea.”
“Yes. I drank it in the rose garden. It is so beautiful out there.”
“It’s Clo’s life. He will be happy to hear you appreciate it.”
“I’ll tell him myself when I meet him. C-C, I noticed a building that looks like a garage next to the garden. What’s in it?” she asked innocently.
“My car.”
“Do you use it often?”
“
Non
. Occasionally I go to Nice or into the mountains. But I don’t get much time off to go any farther than that.”
“It doesn’t sound like you. You, the traveler that I remember.”
“I guess you discovered another thing that’s different.” He nuzzled her ear, speaking softly. “Diamanté and Elise have invited us for a late lunch. He wants to get to know you better. I promised them we’d be there by one o’clock. We’ve got two hours,
amour.
Let’s go upstairs.”
As they walked slowly up the staircase arm in arm, Anna asked, “Does your PC in the reception room have a connection to the Internet?”
“
Oui
,
pourquoi
?”
“Do you mind if I use it someday to check my e-mail? My agent mostly communicates with me that way. I didn’t want to bring my laptop since I declared this a vacation, but I promised him I would find an Internet café or something to pick up any urgent e-mails he might send. I don’t suppose there is an Internet café in Castagniers?”
“No, not yet anyway.” He stopped at the top of the stairs and kissed her passionately, and then he said, “You are welcome to use the PC whenever you want. Except, not now.”
Anna’s concerns of the morning vanished. The anticipation of lovemaking was delicious; his lips tasted delicious. She told herself it was C-C’s business how he could afford all this, not hers. Maybe he had inherited or borrowed the money. There had to be an explanation. She would most likely find out.
They lay down on the bed together. He pulled off her tank top and kissed her breasts and bare stomach. She pulled him to her and caressed his back. He was hard and ready, but he took her slowly. ”We’ve got two hours,” he whispered.
L
unch was in the tranquil shade of the garden in back of the Ajaccio, where the celebration the evening before had taken place. Martine greeted C-C and Anna and invited them to be seated at a small table covered in a pale green, linen cloth and set with china and crystal. In the background, they could hear the constant hum of cicadas singing with gusto, their unique, high-pitched hissing and whirring filling the air in the heat of the day.
“I will let Diamanté and Elise know that you have arrived,” Martine called over her shoulder as she hurried back into the kitchen.
“She’s on her good behavior today,” Anna remarked with a wry smile as she fetched her camera from her handbag. “She stayed at least a foot away from you.”
C-C was absorbed in examining the label on a bottle of wine cooling in a silver bucket next to the table. Anna snapped a photo of him. At the sound of the camera click, he looked up at her with a seductive grin.
Diamanté appeared just at that moment. “How about a photo of the two of you together?” he suggested. Anna handed the camera to him and walked over to C-C, who turned her gently, placed one arm lovingly under her chin, and squeezed her to his chest. Diamanté moved in close and took the photo.
“Now your turn,” Anna said as Diamanté handed the camera to her.
“Should I remove my beret?”
“I thought it was glued to your head,” she teased.
“
Pas du tout
,” he said stiffly as he removed it and held it to his chest. Anna was surprised that, instead of smiling toward the camera, he looked off into the distance, as if deep in thought.
Elise came through the open French doors onto the back terrace. She embraced Anna, brushing her on each cheek, then graciously offered her own cheeks for C-C’s kisses.
“So I see you two have survived last night,” she said.
Anna blushed and looked at C-C. Elise was immediately apologetic. “Oh, my dear! I meant the dinner party. I myself was exhausted.”
Diamanté came to her rescue. “And she says she is going to dance until after midnight on our wedding night.”
“I am, too. You just keep up with me.” She poked him in the chest with her bony finger.
“Come, you two lovebirds. Stand together so I can take a photo of you.” Anna stood with her camera ready as Diamanté replaced his beret and folded his arms around his bride-to-be.
“
Magnifique
!” Anna said as Elise wrinkled her nose in pleasure.
They seated themselves at the table. Martine poured chilled rosé wine and served the first course, a goat cheese tart with baby artichokes.
“Who’s in the kitchen today?” C-C asked Diamanté.
“Both of them. Jacques allowed Lucie to have it all by herself last night, but he couldn’t stay away today. There are many tourists in the region, and it is the weekend. The
resto
will be busy all day.”
“
Waoui
,” Martine piped in. “But, you should hear them arguing!
Nom de Dieu
! The stories they tell on each other. You would think that they would be taking the cutlery to each other’s throats any minute rather than to the vegetables!”
Diamanté chuckled as he passed a basket of thickly sliced, hardcrusted bread while Elise served them a summer salad of zucchini, tomatoes, and black olives tossed with olive oil and sprinkled with lemon juice and fresh mint leaves.
“How long are you planning to stay in France, Anna?” Diamanté asked.
Anna looked in C-C’s direction. “I’m on vacation until the first week of September. I have friends not too far from here whom I am planning to visit. They purchased a
bastide
last year near Grasse and have been restoring it. I haven’t seen it yet.”
“Are they Californians?”
“No, Parisians. I have known them for a long time.”
“You should turn in your rental car,” C-C said to her. “You can take my car to visit them.”
“I haven’t seen a car rental agency in Castagniers.”
“There is one in a neighboring village that is a little larger than ours,” Diamanté said, trying to be helpful.
“I’ll think about it. It’s not costing me that much. Anyway, I may be visiting Monique and Georges for several days, and you might need your car,” she looked intently at C-C, “in case of an emergency, that is.”
He shrugged his shoulders, and their eyes locked. “It’s your decision,” he said.
What a strange suggestion
, Anna thought. They had not discussed any plans following the wedding.
“Let’s have some coffee, Martine,” Elise commanded when they had finished helping themselves to a dessert platter of Madeleines and miniature candied apples. “Then I will have to excuse myself for the afternoon. I have so many things to finalize before the wedding tomorrow, not the least of which, my coiffure.” She patted her hair.
After Elise had departed, Diamanté turned to Anna and said, “Come up to the library. It will be cooler, and we can have a nice talk.”
C-C excused himself as they got up. “I have a patient to attend to,” he said as he kissed Anna lightly on the cheek.
“
À très bientôt
,” she whispered in his ear.
Diamanté took C-C’s arm firmly above the elbow, saying in a low voice, “Can I have a quick word with you before you go?”
C-C nodded, and they strolled to the front of the restaurant together. When they were safely out of hearing range, Diamanté said in a low voice, “
Écoute
, Charlie, I have intelligence that Narbon disappeared two weeks ago. There’s been no sign of him since.”
C-C gave him a questioning look.
Diamanté shrugged his shoulders. “You and I must be careful. We are the only ones left who know.”