Provence - To Die For (12 page)

He was dead. There was no doubt. His body was slumped against the arched door in the wall to the right, the papers he had been consulting earlier scattered about him on the floor. A red stain above his heart was spreading down the front of his white shirt. His eyes were open, the vivid blue fading, and his mouth gaped, forming an O, the expression of surprise that must have greeted his murderer. Apart from the papers on the floor there was no sign of a struggle. No overturned chair. No obvious defense wounds on his hands. No clothing askew. The only blood was a few drops spattered on the stone near the wall but away from the body.

I knelt down and placed two fingers on his neck where a pulse should have been, and felt only cool skin. In his right hand he clutched a piece of stationery. I angled my head to read the name at the top. It said, P. FRANC,
AGENT IMMOBILER—
real estate agent. Bertrand’s fist had crumpled the paper. I knew not to disturb the scene and left the letter where the police would find it. I glanced over the other sheets on the floor. Most of them were recipes, lists of ingredients, and menus. A slight breeze ruffled them. I stood.

The door in the archway on the opposite wall was partly open. A sliver of light could be seen along the jamb, and the undulating sound of the Klaxon horns of emergency vehicles leaked into the room. Reluctant to leave my fingerprints, I pulled a handkerchief from my bag and used it to draw open the heavy wooden door. It led to a small paved area outside. From the doorway I scanned the ground for evidence, something the killer might have dropped if he or she had departed this way. A short flight of stairs connected to the street level. I went outside, climbed the stairs, and found myself halfway up a steep hill. The street was deserted. I couldn’t see over the top of the hill; not even a car crossed the intersection at its base. If someone had escaped through this door, they were gone now.

The sirens were deafening. I retraced my steps and reached for the door. Using the handkerchief again, I reentered the hotel, drawing the door closed behind me. My eyes had difficulty adjusting to the gloom, but I knew one thing: I was no longer alone.

“Bonjour, madame,”
said a voice filled with irony. “May I ask what you are doing here?”

“Oh, my,” I said. “You certainly gave me a start.”

“I could say the same of you,” he said in near-perfect English.

The speaker was a debonair man in a gray suit. A black trench coat was slung over one arm. His auburn hair was streaked with gray and he wore it slicked back from his forehead, which emphasized his high-bridged, prominent nose and the piercing look in his hard brown eyes. A colleague in a tweed jacket was leaning over Bertrand, his fingers probing the same area of the chef’s neck where mine had been earlier.

I put out my hand. “I’m Jessica Fletcher,” I said. “I was one of Chef Bertrand’s students this morning.”

“You are American?” he asked, ignoring my hand.

“Yes. I’m staying at the home of a friend who lives in St. Marc. I came to Avignon this morning to take Monsieur Bertrand’s cooking class.” I nodded toward the kitchen classroom.

“What are you doing down here?” he asked. It wasn’t a friendly question.

“I was having tea with some of the other students when Madame Poutine—she was also in our class—accosted us. She was distraught, and crying that the chef had been killed. I thought perhaps she’d been mistaken in what she’d seen. I rushed down here hoping he might be alive, in need of medical help. But, as you see, she was right. ”

“You are a doctor?”

“Heavens, no!”

“A nurse, perhaps?”

“No. I have no medical education.”

“Yet you came down here to offer medical help.”

“I know that sounds odd,” I said, “but if he’d had a heart attack or choked on something, I thought I could lend assistance until an ambulance arrived.”

“And, of course, you are trained to lend assistance. No?”

“In a way, yes,” I said, relieved I could answer in the affirmative. “I’ve taken several first-aid courses, and CPR; that’s cardiopulmonary resuscitation.”

“I know what CPR is.”

“Well, I wasn’t sure if it was the same in French.”

“And what were you doing outside, if I may ask?”

“Certainly,” I said. “I noticed that the door was ajar and went to see where it led. I thought perhaps the killer was making his escape.”

“And was this killer ‘making his escape’?”

“No. No one was outside.”

“You don’t seem at all disturbed to be confronted by a dead man. Women are usually—how do you say?—delicate. They scream or faint at the sight of a corpse.”

“That’s not—”

He interrupted me. “They don’t look so calmly around, notice the door is a bit open, and go investigate.
Vous gardez votre sang-froid.
You are very cool.” He raised an eyebrow and glared at me. “But what if the killer
had
been around, Madame Fletcher? Would you have known what to do if you were confronted with a gun?”

“Oh, he wasn’t ...” I stopped midsentence.

“You were about to say?”

I sighed. “I was about to say that I don’t think Monsieur Bertrand was shot. And I also don’t think that the killer would hang around outside, waiting to be discovered. ”

“And why is it, madame, that you don’t believe the victim was shot? Do you see another murder weapon?”

“No, but I also don’t see any shell casing. And there wasn’t a shell casing outside the door, or anything that could be a murder weapon. I checked. You’ll see that for yourself, I’m sure. From the hole in his shirt, it looks to me like Chef Bertrand was stabbed, although since I didn’t examine him, I can’t say what the instrument might have been.”

“You intrigue me, madame,” he said. “You are not, by any chance, a homicide detective?” His sarcasm was palpable.

“No, but I have made a study of the subject for some time.”

“And why is that?”

“I study murders because I write murder mysteries. That’s how I make my living, Detective ... I’m sorry, I don’t believe you gave me your name.”

“The rank is Captain, madame. I am Captain LeClerq.”

“Captain LeClerq, while you and I are conversing, the killer could be getting away. Chef Bertrand was alive an hour ago. The person responsible for his death may still be in the hotel. We should be looking for the murder weapon. We’re giving the killer too much time to dispose of the evidence.”

“We?”
His eyebrows rose. “You seem to think, madame, that Lieutenant Thierry and I are inadequate to the task. That we require your assistance.”

“I didn’t mean to imply—”

“Please allow us to do our job,” he said coldly. “The Commissariat Centrale d’Avignon is well equipped to investigate all crimes. We can do more than arrest the pick-pockets and petty thieves who arrive each summer along with the tourists.”

“I’m sure that’s true,” I said, sorry I’d gotten into this argument. I heard my name being called.

Mallory raced through the archway from the hall, and drew to a halt at the sight of the two policemen. “Mrs. Fletcher, are you all right?” She was panting, her eyes huge behind her wire-rimmed glasses.

“Yes, dear. I’m fine.”

“I heard upstairs”—she was trying to catch her breath—“that there had been a murder.” She shook her head. “You weren’t around.” A deep breath. “I got worried. And they wouldn’t let me downstairs to look for you,” she finished in a rush.

“Then how did you get here?” LeClerq asked.

Mallory flushed. “There’s a set of stairs from the hotel’s dining room.” She pointed behind her. “It goes to the other end of the hotel kitchen.”

Just then the elevator door opened and two men entered the room. One was carrying a small case, the other a camera with a flash unit.

“It’s getting a bit crowded in this place,” Captain LeClerq grumbled. “Perhaps you would be good enough to wait upstairs with the others so we may finish our work down here?”

Thierry had positioned his body to block Mallory’s view of the chef, but now he moved aside to allow the newcomers to conduct their part of the investigation. Mallory gasped when she glimpsed the lifeless body of Emil Bertrand. “Oh, my gosh. Is it him?”

“I think Captain LeClerq is right,” I said, taking Mallory’s arm and turning her around. “We should wait for him upstairs. Why don’t you show me where this other staircase is?”

We walked down the hall to the hotel kitchen, Mallory excitedly burbling about how she searched for me upstairs and begged the officer guarding the stairwell to let her try the lower floor. I recognized the signs of adrenaline release. It would take a while for her to come down from its intensity. I took her arm as we walked and patted her hand. “You can see I’m just fine,” I said. “Thank you for worrying about me.”

“Who do you think killed him? I can’t believe it. I’ve never seen a dead body before. Do you think the police are going to question us?” Her whole body was trembling.

“Shhh,” I said. “Try to calm down.”

As we passed the door to the office used by the hotel chef, I heard a sound, as if something had fallen off a desk or shelf. I put my ear to the wooden panel and my hand on the knob. Someone was inside. I twisted the knob and the door opened. Guy was on his knees, gathering a sheaf of papers and folders that had slid off the overloaded desk.

“Hello,” he said, pressing the folders to his chest. “Daniel’s desk is such a mess. Is it already time to start again?”

“Where have you been, Guy?” I asked, wondering if he was trying to shield the front of his uniform from view.

He looked confused. “I went to the restaurant to get materials for tomorrow’s class, and then I ... then I came back. There’s a lot of work to do to prepare for these classes. Why do you ask?”

“How did you manage to get in here without running into the police upstairs?”

“There are police upstairs?” A few papers slipped out of his grasp and fell to the floor. He made a grab for them.

“Oh, Guy, the most terrible thing,” Mallory began. I squeezed her arm, and she stopped abruptly.

“How long have you been here?” I asked, watching his face closely. I sensed someone behind me and whirled around.

“You’re doing my job again, Mrs. Fletcher.” The fierce eyes of Captain LeClerq bored into mine. “Why don’t you take this young lady upstairs, and leave the questioning to me?”

“Of course, Captain.”

Mallory and I left Guy’s office and walked through the silent kitchen to the other set of stairs.

“Guy doesn’t know, does he?” Mallory whispered.

“I don’t know,” I said. “But Captain LeClerq will tell him.”

“Do you think they’ll let me get my backpack from the classroom?” she asked, pulling her braid over her shoulder. I recognized the gesture. Mallory fiddled with her hair whenever she was nervous or insecure.

“I’m sure they’ll let you retrieve it later,” I said. “Unless the police are planning to camp out downstairs and use your sleeping bag.”

Mallory gasped. “They wouldn’t!”

“I’m only teasing,” I said.

Once back on the main floor, we traversed the dining room.

• A small staff was starting to set the tables for dinner. I checked my watch. Daniel would be coming back in another hour to start cooking. I wondered if the news had gotten out to the local media. If France was anything like the States, the hotel would be overrun with reporters as soon as the police withdrew, and probably even before.

We returned to the atrium, where the room was buzzing with rumors of the murder. Hotel guests returning from their day’s activities or coming downstairs from their rooms in response to the sirens had seen the emergency vehicles and heard whispers of what had occurred. Every table was occupied, and in the lounge next door, a noisy group crowded around the bar. Mallory went to get herself a Coke, and I found Craig and Jill Thomas, who were still sitting where I’d left them. René Bonassé had rejoined them. He’d changed into a slate blue knit turtle-neck and gray jacket, the colors accentuating his light eyes against his dark skin. His expression was fixed in a frown, and he chewed on the side of his cheek as he listened to Craig tell a story. Mme Poutine was nowhere in sight.

“Oh, Jessica, thank goodness Mallory found you,” said Jill. “We were really starting to fret.”

“I’m just fine,” I said, “but I’m afraid our instructor will not be revealing the secrets of his bouillabaisse to us tomorrow.”

“Then she was right,” Jill said, despondent. “I’d hoped she was just overwrought. The French are so high-strung. Oh, excuse me, René. I meant Madame Poutine was so high-strung.”

“I thought she was rather a cold fish myself,” Craig said, an opinion I shared.

“She had that appearance, I admit,” Jill said. “But look how distraught she was.”

“Understandable, considering the situation. Not every day one discovers a murder,” Craig said, putting his arm around his wife’s shoulder.

“Did she say anything more after I left?” I asked.

“I’m not sure,” Jill said. “You heard her say Claire killed him.”

“Did she say how she knew that?”

“She was close to hysterical and babbling in French, and we don’t really speak well enough to understand her. René came back right after you went downstairs. He spoke with her. She told him she saw Claire leaning over Bertrand’s body, and when she cried out, Claire ran out the door. René wanted to go downstairs after you, but we persuaded him to wait with Madame Poutine until the authorities arrived.”

“Where is she now?”

“When the police came, she collapsed altogether, and they took her off in an ambulance. Poor thing.”

“If there’s a ‘poor thing,’ it’s the chef, love,” Craig told his wife. “At least Madame Poutine is still alive.”

“Do you know her well?” I asked René.

He seemed taken aback that I addressed him. “No, madame,” he replied.