Evan and Elle (10 page)

He was halfway up the stairs, tiptoeing with his shoes in his hand so that he didn’t disturb Mrs. Williams, when the phone rang. Evan ran down again and caught it on the second ring.

“Constable Evans? This is the dispatcher at HQ. We’ve just had a 999 call about another fire. The chief thought you should be there, since it’s not too far from the other arson fires we’re investigating. He’s calling in Sergeant Watkins, too, and Sergeant Potter.”

“Right,” Evan said, slipping his foot back into a shoe as he spoke. “Where is it?”

“Just down the hill from you, I gather. The old chapel that’s now a restaurant.”

A few minutes later Evan was back outside Chez Yvette. Flames were shooting up at the rear of the building, silhouetting
the arched roof and illuminating the tall arched windows. The fire brigade had obviously arrived just ahead of him and men were rushing to hook up hoses.

Evan pushed his way to the nearest fireman through the small crowd that had gathered. “Where’s Madame Yvette?” Evan shouted above the roar and crackle of the inferno. “Do we know if the building was empty?”

The fireman glanced up, recognized him and went on dragging out lengths of hose. “She got out all right. She had to—apparently she called from a neighbor’s house to give the alarm.”

“Where is she now?”

“Haven’t seen her.” The young man sounded tense.

“And there was no one else inside?”

Captain Jones overheard as he ran past. Rivulets of sweat were running down his soot-smudged face. “Oh, Constable Evans—you got here pretty quick. There was no one in the restaurant. The front door was locked. I had to break it down and the place was empty. I couldn’t get into the kitchen, though. That was already completely involved. They said she didn’t have any kitchen staff working back there?”

“No, she did everything herself.”

“That’s good.” He turned back the men who were dragging the hose. “We’ll go straight in from the top, boys. The roof’s already gone at the back.”

Evan stepped out of the way to let the firemen work. He scanned the crowd but couldn’t see Madame Yvette. “Do you know what happened to the French lady who owned the place?” he asked a couple of local youths. “Did she get taken to hospital?”

“No, my mam took her down to the pub—the Vaynol Arms down the road. She was really upset.”

“So she was okay? Not burned at all?”

“Just crying a lot, as far as I know,” the boy said.

“You’re sure she was all right?” a man in a cloth cap asked. “This is a terrible thing to happen. I can’t say we wanted her here, but I wouldn’t have wished this on my worst enemy.”

“And you are?” Evan asked.

“Owen Gruffudd. I own the Gegin Fawr. The café down the hill. We’re neighbors.”

Evan looked at him with interest. Neighbors and rivals, he thought. But Mr. Gruffudd looked truly distressed. Evan would keep the name in mind for future reference, just in case.

Before he could head down to the pub, two cars drew up almost simultaneously. Sergeant Watkins got out of one and Peter Potter out of the other. They looked at each other with obvious distaste.

“No need for you to have been called out, Watkins,” Potter snapped in his flat southern voice. “I can handle this. You can bugger off.”

“My D.C.I. told me to come, and if he says jump, I jump.” Watkins walked past him to Evan. “I see they got you out of your bed, too. What news?”

Evan shook his head. “Not much. The restaurant was already shut when the fire started. The owner must have got out through the back door, gone to a neighbor’s house and called the fire brigade. I was on my way to get a statement from her.”

“I’ll come with you,” Watkins said. “We’ll let wonder boy get on with his job.” He glanced at Peter Potter, who was already prowling around the building. “With any luck a wall will fall on him.”

The Vaynol Arms was a long, whitewashed stone building about a quarter of a mile down the road. Madame Yvette was sitting on a bench close to the fire with a glass of brandy in her hand. She wore a black raincoat over her satin robe, pulled up high around her neck as if she was cold. Her face was hollow and tear-stained but her hair was still elegantly piled on her head. She held out a hand imploringly to Evan. “Zay want to get rid of me and now zay succeed.” Her voice cracked. “Who would do such a wicked sing, Mr. Evans, eh?”

“You have reason to think it was set deliberately, Madame?” Watkins asked.

Yvette gave an expansive shrug. “Why should my restaurant burn down? Zay send me zee warning notes,
non?
”

“Did you see anything suspicious at all tonight? Did anything unusual happen?” Watkins asked.

Yvette shook her head. “Nossing. It was a good evening. Almost full,
n’est-ce pas?
Constable Evans can tell you. He was zere.”

Watkins grinned. “Moving up in the world, eh, Evans? French restaurants now, is it?”

“This was the first time, Sarge,” Evan said. “We were the last customers to leave, just before ten.”

“So tell me when you discovered the fire, Madame.”

Yvette shrugged again. “All was well when I close up for zee night and I finish cleaning zee kitchen. Zen I am watching
zee television and I must have fallen asleep in my chair. I wake to smell zee smoke and see zee flames at zee bottom of my stairs. I put my coat over my ’ead and run down zee stairs to zee back door. I am lucky to get out alive!”

Evan cleared his throat. “You say you fell asleep watching the telly. Is there any chance you were smoking and a cigarette could have dropped out of your hand?”

“Then ’ow could the flames be downstairs and not upstairs wiz me?” she demanded. “And anyway, I am trying to quit. I tell you, someone wants me to go.”

“But you had no warning?” Evan asked. “No threatening phone call tonight? No note?”

“Nossing!” Tears started rolling down her cheeks again. “Whoever did zis is a monster. He ruins my life. He takes all I have worked and slaved for.”

Watkins put a hand on her shoulder. “You get a good night’s sleep. I’d imagine they’ve got rooms here, haven’t they, Evans?”

“Oh yes, Sarge. I don’t suppose they’re fully booked at this time of year. I’ll go and find out.”

“There you are, then,” Watkins said, patting Madame Yvette on the shoulder. “Constable Evans is going to arrange for you to stay here tonight. We won’t disturb you anymore. We’ll come back in the morning.” He motioned for Evan to follow him.

The fire had died down to a dull glow as they walked back together. Their footsteps echoed in the clear night air.

“If it was as she suspects,” Evan began, “then they’ve gone one step further.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean they’ve always been careful to target empty buildings before.”

“Either that, or we’re not dealing with the same perpetrators,” Watkins suggested. “This might be some kind of private vendetta. What do you know about this Madame Yvette?”

“Almost nothing,” Evan said. “She just arrived here about a month ago. I know she was married and her husband died, and they once had a restaurant in the South of England. And I know she went to the Cordon Bleu school in Paris. That’s about it.”

“Where have you two been?” Potter demanded as they approached the smoldering remains.

“Interviewing the owner of the building,” Watkins said. “Needed help, did you?”

“There’s not much I can do until I can get inside and take samples,” Potter said. “But from what I can see, I’m inclined to suspect we’re not dealing with the same serial arsonist. It wasn’t the same method, for one thing. This fire started at the back of the building. The front door was almost untouched.”

“The kitchen was at the back,” Evan pointed out.

“Which makes me wonder if it wasn’t just a simple accident,” Potter said. “Maybe she went to bed and left the gas on. Maybe tea towels were drying over the fire and one of them fell down. It happens all the time.”

“Only this was a very modern kitchen,” Evan said. “I didn’t see any kind of open fire.”

“So—there are plenty of other ways. She could have left a pan of fat cooking. She could have been smoking a cigarette.
Anyway, we’ll know for sure in daylight. In the meantime, Constable, I want you to get a list of everyone who was in the crowd tonight. Compare it to the two previous crowds. If anyone was in all three, I want them fingerprinted. Got it?”

“Yes, Sarge,” Evan said.

“Oh, and Constable. I want you to remain on duty here until I can get a bloke sent up from HQ to stand guard tonight. We don’t want to find trespassers have been mucking it up.”

“Right you are, Sarge.”

“Bloody little Hitler,” Watkins muttered as Potter went back to his car. “Who does he think he is?”

Evan grinned. “God?” he suggested.

Watkins clapped him on the shoulder. “See you in the morning then, boyo. I’ll get on the phone and make sure you’re not stuck up here too long.”

“Thanks.” Evan smiled grimly. “I suppose I better get started on those statements, then.” He pulled out his notebook and approached the nearest members of the crowd. The fire was now more or less out but a thick, cloying smoke hung in the air. People were already moving away to their homes. Evan yelled for everyone to stay put. He started with Mr. Gruffudd from the Gegin Fawr. The man still looked quite shaken. He’d been drinking in the bar at the Vaynol when someone had come
in
to say the restaurant was on fire. Several men from the village had been there with him all evening—Evan got their names.

As he worked his way around the crowd he almost bumped into a bicycle.

“Terry?” Evan grabbed at the handlebars. The young boy looked alarmed, then managed a grin. “Hello, Mr. Evans. I got here too late this time. Pity they already put it out. Was it a big blaze like the others?”

“Pretty big,” Evan told him, “but what are you doing out in the middle of the night? Does your mother know?”

A look of scorn crossed his face. “Of course not. I always sneak out down the drainpipe. I heard the fire engine, see, so I came to take a look. Have you found out who did it yet?”

“Not yet and don’t go anywhere,” Evan said firmly. “I’ve just got to get some names and addresses then I’m driving you home as soon as my replacement gets here.”

Next morning, when Evan’s alarm woke him just before seven, he wondered why he felt so terrible—until he remembered that he didn’t function well on less than five hours’ sleep. It had been almost two when he’d left the burned restaurant and then he’d had to drop
off
young Terry. He’d also allowed Terry to climb back up the drainpipe so that his mother would never suspect his absence. Evan could remember a few forbidden things he’d done at the same age.

When he was in his room, he found himself too wound up to sleep so he started studying the lists of people he’d noted at each of the fires. The comparison of the lists had been disappointing. As far as he could tell, no spectators had shown up at all three fires, except young Terry, who was hardly likely to be able to get his hands on cans of petrol,
or to carry them on his bike. So either they were looking at two different arsonists or this latest blaze was indeed an accident with unfortunate timing.

Evan put on his uniform and went downstairs. Nobody was stirring, which was unusual. Mrs. Williams was always up at the crack of dawn. So he drove down the hill without the fortification of a cup of tea. It was another beautiful day, crisp and autumnal but so clear that the sky looked like an arc of blue glass and the colors of the landscape glowed.

The front of the former chapel was still in good shape but the back was a ruin. The top floor and the roof had fallen in. Charred timbers and large roof beams lay haphazardly. Evan looked around for a note, but had found nothing when Sergeant Watkins arrived. Watkins looked as washed out as Evan himself was feeling.

“Solved the crime yet?” he asked, as he approached Evan.

“I haven’t a clue this time. I’ve compared lists of people and nobody was at all three fires.”

“I’m more inclined to think this was an accident in the kitchen,” Watkins said. “I mean, if someone was outside, surely she’d have heard him. She says she was just dozing. She’d have heard a door being forced or a window breaking, wouldn’t she?”

Evan stared, deep in thought. “Something’s just struck me, Sarge,” he said. “She said the smell of smoke woke her. Why not the smoke alarm? This restaurant was brand new. It must have had a fire inspection before it got its license to operate. So why didn’t the alarms go off?”

“Good question,” Watkins said. “Come on, let’s have a little snoop before wonder boy gets here.”

He started to pick his way through the rubble to the back of the building.

“Not much left back here,” he commented.

Evan nodded. “This part used to be two stories. She had her living quarters in the old organ loft above the kitchen.”

“That’s why it burned so well.” Watkins bent to retrieve a twisted cooking pot. “She had all those furnishings up there to fuel it.”

“And the wooden floor and stairs, too.” Evan stared down at the jumble of charred beams. There was nothing now to indicate that Madame Yvette’s upstairs room had ever existed—no sofa or bed in the corner. Nothing but blackened ashes.