Bright Hair About the Bone (12 page)

No one, it seemed, wanted to leave the convivial table. Tiny china cups of coffee had been refilled twice and they could no longer put off the moment of rising with polite compliments to Mme. Huleux.

“Hey! It's not late. Seems a shame to go to bed or crowd into the parlour…why don't we top the evening off with a brandy at the café? Have you tasted the local marc, Stella?” Patrick suggested. “Phil? Reverend? How about it?”

“Oh, I say…thanks very much but it's not actually my sort of thing, you know…” Gunning began to stammer and back away.

“It's quite all right, Mr. Gunning,” said Letty with an encouraging smile. “God's off watch, remember. And I'm sure Mr. Paradee wouldn't mind. This is France, where even the monks drink beer.”

“And brew stuff you've never even heard of!” said Patrick. “What's that firewater they make at the monastery up in the hills? It's green and sticky and made of herbs…supposed to make you live forever.”

“La Dame Verte,”
supplied Marie-Louise. “Do try it, Stella. It's quite delicious. But don't believe the stories. It has
shortened
quite a few local lives! Though I believe you have to drink rather a lot of it to achieve that effect. My father finds it works wonders for his cough.”

         

“Let's sit out here on the terrace,” said Phil, helping her into a seat at the Café de la Paix. “The interior gets a bit steamy and it seems to be kind of reserved for the local folk. Good that you brought your wrap, Stella—it can get a little chilly in the evenings. Here's the waiter…Monsieur!…ah…Now, is that ‘green ladies' all around? Stella? Sir?”

“Um…er…I'd rather have a plain brandy if you wouldn't mind,” said Gunning, looking about him uncomfortably.

The café had changed its character completely since the afternoon. No longer a quiet spot where a tourist might sip a lemonade or a mother and child indulge in an ice-cream served up in a silver dish, it was ablaze with light, crowded with people and, somewhere in a back room, a gramophone was playing: Mistinguett, throatily vowing eternal servitude to “mon homme.” Letty glanced at the other clients surreptitiously, then more boldly as she recognised that they were all quite openly staring at her. A mixture of young and old, they came and went with much hand-shaking and kissing. Finding no room in the smoky interior, a group of three lads chose to sprawl at a nearby table, shouted an order for beer, lit up yellow cigarettes, and took out a pack of cards. They were joined moments later by a fourth.

Letty's eyes lingered on the fourth. He was probably no more than sixteen, she judged, thin and white-faced and perfectly ordinary-looking. It was his furtive movements that had caught her attention. The boy was checking the crowd, though foreigners seemed to hold no interest for him and his eyes slid past their table. He placed himself, she noticed, with his back to the café, facing the square. Not at ease.

Letty followed the line of his nervous gaze but could see nothing alarming. She found she was looking, and looking with appreciation, at a charming stone building across the square, a building discreetly lit and having an elegant escutcheon over the door.

“Ah, that's the Lion d'Or,” said Phil. “The local auberge…hotel…restaurant…whatever you like to call it.” He traced its roofline with a forefinger. “That marked the north wall of the original abbey. We're digging over there, to the left of it. Farther down the road, to the right, you can see the Stud—the ‘Haras'—in the same stones. Built by Napoleon using material from the abbey he was demolishing. He pulled down the finest church in Christendom to build a stable!” He shook his head in disgust.

“And if you look closely at some of the houses in town, you'll see they've got a little extra decoration,” said Patrick. “Carved friezes, statues in niches, all taken from the abbey. Stolen? Rescued? Who's to say?”

“Ah, yes,” said Gunning knowingly, “we experienced the same sort of thing in the English Reformation. Much of beauty destroyed, but a surprising amount of things simply vanished…Altars smashed, but does anyone know what really happened to the gold or silver communion vessels that had rested on them? Interesting things turn up in English churchwardens' attics from time to time…” His voice trailed away and he looked casually from one politely interested face to the other and, leaning closer, confided, “And it's not always the vicar who gets first refusal…though in my last parish, where the church had suffered badly from the attentions of Cromwell's foot-soldiers, I was offered…ah—here come our drinks, I think.”

As the waiter came through the door carrying their drinks, he was jostled with unusual rudeness by an elderly man hurrying away from the café. Deftly, the tray and its cargo were whisked out of harm's way and placed with a flourish on their table. They raised their glasses and Phil proposed a toast to “successful digging.”

“You should have tried this, Mr. Gunning,” said Letty appreciatively after one sip of the violently green and viscous drink. “It's a bit like Chartreuse…but sweeter…very herby and…ooh—rather fiery as it goes down.”

Conversation was no problem. The Americans were ready talkers and entertaining, and seemed to understand that Gunning was more than happy to remain on the fringes; they treated him with the affectionate deference appropriate to a well-liked uncle. Letty began to relax and enjoy the company. She listened to the laughter around her, increasing in volume as the sky grew dark; she was entertained by the raucous squawking of jackdaws squabbling over the best roosting holes in the stonework. She hummed along with the tune when, Mistinguett having spiralled to a melancholy close, a man strolled from the bar playing an accordion. His selection from
The Vagabond King
seemed to be more in tune with the crowd's mood and everyone seemed to know at least the choruses.

The convivial atmosphere was suddenly shattered by the arrival onto the square of a rider. She noticed the horse before the man. It was a tall black stallion and it was being urged along at far too fast a pace over the cobbles. It slithered showily to a halt in front of the café and danced about, fretting, while its master flung the reins around the branch of a plane tree.

The accordion wheezed a last note, glasses were set down, and conversations ceased in mid-sentence. The crowd held its breath, all eyes on the dark figure striding towards the terrace.

“Oh, great heavens,” whispered Patrick. “Come on! Drink up! We should move on.”

No one else appeared ready to do this.

“Who
is
this man?” Letty asked, intrigued.

“Edmond d'Aubec, Comte de Brancy.”

Letty stared, like everyone else, at the outlandish figure, who stalked closer, sweeping the café with a hunter's eyes. He wore a black riding coat and black trousers tucked into shining boots, and approached with such swagger she almost expected to make out a sword belt around his waist. In his right hand he held a riding crop.

Suddenly sighting his prey, he stopped and slapped the palm of his left hand with his crop in triumph.

“Gadzooks!” muttered Gunning, laughter bubbling.

“Zounds!” said Letty, catching his eye. “Or should I say:
‘sacre bleu!
'? We're caught up in a Dumas novel, Reverend!”

A second later her amusement at the performance turned to dismay, then to horror as the stranger, with a violent gesture, knocked over a table, spilling cards and drinks to the ground, the more easily to get at the white-faced boy. The lad looked pathetic, rigid as he was with fear and mesmerised into complete stillness by the approaching threat. With a string of oaths, the man brought down his crop on the boy's shoulder with vicious energy, raised it, and slashed again. The victim cowered backwards but made no attempt to run away. His friends, flinching with each whistling cut, bowed their heads and made no move to come to his aid. No voice was raised in protest. No hand attempted to stay the flailing crop.

Letty's was the voice that broke the silence: “Stop him!” she yelled. “For goodness' sake won't someone stop that lunatic?”

CHAPTER 12

N
o one responded.

With a cry of exasperation, Letty picked up her half-drunk liqueur and was across the terrace. She sank her fingers into the rider's shoulder and tugged. When, distracted and impatient, he turned to shake her off, she flung the sticky liquid straight into his eyes. The glass fell from her slippery fingers and crashed at his feet.

His look of astonishment was all she could have hoped for. The exclamation that followed it was of the crudest. She took a step backwards, repelled, in spite of herself, by the savagery etched in every line of the man's body and features. Abruptly, she was pushed sideways out of his range and William Gunning's gaunt frame stepped between her and the attacker. Gunning gave no warning, issued no challenge. The only sound he made was a satisfying crunch as his left fist connected with the count's jawbone.

“Ladies present,” Gunning said calmly as the Count staggered backwards. “In England we don't use the language of the stableyard to greet a lady, and I expect it's much the same in France. Not quite sure what your problem is, but this is a pretty disgraceful display of private passion in a very public place. Quite spoiled everyone's evening. Suggest you apologise, whoever you are, and bugger off!”

Receiving no response but an incredulous gurgle from his dazed and blinking adversary, he changed to French and added in tones audible to everyone, “If you'd like to take this further, I daresay the management has a backyard we could use for fisticuffs. I have no quarrel with
you
but I'd say this lad could do with a champion. Will a weedy Englishman fit the bill, my boy?” He addressed his question with a smile to the paralysed youth.

Snorting disgust, the count pulled himself together. With another curse, he shouldered his way past the two unyielding forms of Gunning and Phil, who, fists clenched, had moved swiftly up in support. Weaving his way unsteadily over the cobbles to his horse, he mounted and spurred it away with a recklessness that made Letty wince.

Before the hoofbeats had died away, waiters were scurrying amongst them, righting tables, sweeping up shards, refilling glasses, and joking nervously with the clientele. The injured boy staggered quietly away from the scene, supported by his friends; the accordionist picked up his instrument and launched into a polka.

Phil, concerned and embarrassed, took Gunning's arm and led him back to the table. A waiter hurried to set down a double brandy in front of the older man with a murmured: “Are you all right, mon père?”

“Thank you, yes. It's nothing,” Gunning murmured, massaging his hand. And, with a smile for the two Americans: “Not as resilient or potent as it once was, I'm afraid, but my left hook has helped me to many a victory in school boxing championships. I have a very long reach. The only quality I have in common with Jess Willard. People find they can't get near me.”

Patrick groaned. “No reach is gonna be long enough to keep the count at bay. Now we're all in trouble! Paradee won't like this! He won't like it one bit.”

“Oh, come on, now!” said Letty in disbelief. “What concern can it possibly be of Mr. Paradee's? And I'd really like to know exactly who that cartoon character was. Why doesn't someone ring the police? Or even look a little outraged? That would be a start!”

“Waste of time,” said Patrick glumly. “Outraging the populace is the count's favourite sport. Edmond d'Aubec owns the château just out of town and most of the land around here.”

“Probably owns the chair you're sitting on,” remarked Phil. “Biggest employer in the region. There are folks in this café who won't appreciate your making their guy look like a monkey. They won't be applauding your little sideshow. Here, he's owed allegiance.” He glanced around him discreetly.

“But not respect!” said Letty. “Surely not respect, if he goes around behaving in that unbalanced way? I thought the French had got rid of their overbearing aristocracy in 1789?”

“As far as d'Aubec's concerned, there might as well never have been a Revolution. God knows how a family of parasitic bandits like the d'Aubecs ever survived the guillotine, but they did. And they go on lording it over the peasantry with impunity.”

“You're joking,” said Letty aghast. “You're telling me that an atavistic throwback like that can barge in here dressed up like the Black Pirate and whack away at anyone he chooses? Someone should tell him what century the rest of us are living in!”

The Americans exchanged amused glances. Phil shrugged. “He knows what century we're living in, Letty. His family not only survived the Revolution, they prospered. There have been ups and downs in their fortunes, but the present count is extremely rich and powerful—even Paradee can dig only where d'Aubec gives him permission, and as far as doing a little archaeological prospecting's concerned—forget it! Frustrating! D'Aubec and Paradee don't exactly get along.”

“In fact,” said Patrick uncomfortably, “we're all under orders to avoid him. The boss is going to hit the roof when he hears what just happened. And you two,” he paused, uncertainly eyeing Letty and Gunning, “are likely to come in for some unwanted attention when d'Aubec finds out who put a stop to his sporting activities this evening.”

“I expect he's boiling up the oil as we speak,” said Letty, “or adjusting his thumbscrews. Oh, come off it!”

“I mean there'll be explaining to do…”

“Leave it to us,” said Phil, kindly.

“Do you think he got a look at you, Stella?” Patrick wondered. “Before you blurred his vision?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, I think he did. I'd swear his expression changed. He gave me a rather odd look. But I don't care if he
does
remember me. I shall remember
him
all right, if we ever meet again,” she promised.

         

Letty was downstairs in the dining room early the next morning sipping from a bowl of black coffee and regretting the previous night's double liqueur when the men joined her. Gunning looked pale but well groomed, the Americans as ebullient as on the previous evening. Marie-Louise had already left for school and Mme. Huleux was in attendance. Just as they were rising from the table, the door-knocker echoed through the house. Mme. Huleux hurried to answer and, after a brief conversation with someone on the doorstep, she returned, in some excitement, with a bunch of creamy pink roses in one hand and a silver-wrapped box in the other.

To Letty's surprise she thrust both items at her with a delighted giggle. “For you, mademoiselle.”

“For me? What is this? Who on earth would send me flowers here? And great heavens! I know these roses—they're
Souvenir de la Malmaison
!” Puzzled, she buried her nose in the roses, enjoying their rich scent.

“
Souvenir de la
what? Is that something special?” asked Patrick.

“
Malmaison.
Oh, yes, they're special. They're named after the Empress Josephine's château, where she grew them. These were her favourite roses….” Silently she suppressed the thought:
And they're
my
favourite too.

“And delivered at…what's the time?…at half past seven on a working morning in Fontigny?” Phil's question echoed everyone's astonishment. Four pairs of eyes willed her to open the box on the spot and satisfy their curiosity.

“I don't know anyone in Fontigny. Could they be from Mr. Paradee, do you think? To mark my first day's work? Is that the sort of gesture he would make?”

“He didn't send
me
roses,” grumbled Gunning.

She tore off the silver wrappings to reveal a bottle of champagne—very expensive champagne, she noticed. A further tag around its neck carried a message in elegant and spidery French handwriting:

Brancy le Château.

My dear Miss St. Clair,

A thousand pardons for my intrusion into your evening. You were constrained to waste your drink on me, so at least let me repay you. I will meet you for dinner at the Hotel du Lion d'Or this evening. At 8.00 p.m.

Edmond d'Aubec.

“Well?” four voices asked in chorus.

Letty had turned pale.

“What is it, Stella?” Gunning asked quietly.

“Thumbscrews,” she answered. “I believe it's the first twist of the thumbscrews.”

She detached the tag and gave it to Phil, who took a swift look and passed it on to Patrick. They both burst out laughing and showed it to Gunning and Madame Huleux.

“I guess he didn't get a long enough look at you last night!”

“Seems to want another eyeful! What'll you throw next time, Stella? Cognac? Or champagne?”

Mme. Huleux, however, was impressed. The roses were put in water, the champagne was whisked away to the cool of the cellar. Something about her response made Letty say firmly, “I shall be dining here tonight, madame. I wouldn't like to miss your rabbit stew.” She found she was irritated by the polite assurance that it was a simple casserole and one guest more or less wouldn't make the slightest difference should Mademoiselle happen to change her mind.

A low whistle from Phil brought her attention back to the note, which he still held in his hand. “Say! Would you look at this here,” he said with an exaggerated drawl. “Stella, you didn't look on the back. The count must be really smitten with you! You rate wine, roses, and dinner—but not only that! Look, you've got a pretty picture too! Hadn't realised d'Aubec fancied himself an artist, but this is kind of good.” He held it up for everyone to see. “It's a pack of dogs—well, three dogs. They're all the same—black ones—and they're stepping out, all wearing gold collars. Now, what the heck is that about?”

For a moment, Letty couldn't move. Her heart was thumping; her voice was stuck in her throat.

“Say, are you okay, Stella?”

She snatched the card from Phil and took it to the window. With her back to the company she pretended to study it, hiding her confusion. “I've no idea what it's about,” she said. “But yes, it's very intriguing. Now, what can he be up to?”

“May I?” said Gunning, strolling over and holding out a hand for the card. He began to laugh. “Ah, yes, I thought it sounded familiar. Surely this is a reference to an old English nursery rhyme? How does it go?…

“The three black dogs of the Queen,

The blackest you've ever seen,

Ebony, Jet and Pitch,

As black as the blackest witch
…

“You're going to have to help me out, Miss St. Clair! You're much nearer the age of nursery rhyme than I am!”

She guessed, cynically, that he could probably have spun out the nonsense for several more verses, but she picked up his challenge to return to normality:

“Their collars, I'm told,

Were all of pure gold,…um…

You couldn't tell which was which,”
she finished with a rush.

The Americans stared from one to the other, uncomfortable with this display of English eccentricity. “But, alternatively, it could be a reference to the
French
folktale
Les trois chiens noirs de Chinon,
don't you think?”

“Oh, yeah? And if that's a French folktale, I'm the Gingerbread Man,” said Phil genially, holding out her jacket.

“Well, it adds another charge to the count's sheet,” said Letty dismissively. “To Grievous Bodily Harm and Exhibitionism you can now add Infantilism. He really should be put away in a place of safety.”

There was no time even to flash a look of gratitude to Gunning. Phil was herding them out the door.

“Save it for Paradee, Stella. You're ready? Don't want to be late on your first day. Come on now!”