Provence - To Die For (7 page)

“This is ridiculous,” I told myself. “You can’t spend half the night watching out the window.” Without turning on a light, I pulled my coat from the wardrobe, put it on over my nightclothes, and padded downstairs. Now where had I seen that flashlight?
Right! The mantel.
I pocketed the light, crossed the kitchen, opened the front door as quietly as I could, and slid out. Moonlight filled the patio and illuminated the front of the garage.

I walked quietly to the big barn doors and opened the one on the right. The wind grabbed the door and threatened to slam it back against the garage. I held on tight and peered into the gloomy interior, endeavoring to see if someone was hiding behind the rusting tools. I flicked on the flashlight and played the beam over the metal hulks and discarded furniture. The garage was empty. I shone the light on the ground. Were those smudges on the damp ground footprints? They appeared to lead to the left.

Feeling a bit foolish but determined not to take any chances, I grabbed the nearby bicycle pump, latched the barn door, and tiptoed stealthily around the side of the garage. A trail led past the building, uphill between tall trees, and into the woods. The moonlight was fainter here—as was the wind—but by now my eyes had become accustomed to the dark.

I listened to the sounds of the night. Was that some wild creature making those snuffling noises? I moved forward slowly, stopping every few steps, straining to hear over the rustling leaves. The moisture from the wet ground and soggy leaves underfoot seeped into my slippers. “Next time you chase a prowler, Jessica,” I told myself, “remember to put on your shoes.” A sound up ahead put all my senses on alert. I crept up the wooded path, gripping the pump like a baseball bat for protection, squinting to detect any movement that might give away the intruder. I crested the rise and stopped. About thirty feet in front of me, someone was kneeling on the ground, digging under a tree. A small dog was circling the person and whining.

“You there!” I called out, forgetting to speak French. From the top of the hill, I directed the flashlight toward the kneeling figure. “What are you doing? This is private property.” I held the bicycle pump aloft. “You have no business here.”

The dog barked sharply but backed away from this advancing apparition wielding an unknown weapon. The animal’s owner, dressed in a dark hooded jacket that concealed his face, cursed fluently and took off down the hill, a white canvas bag flapping on his back, the yapping dog running ahead of him. A moment later I heard the revving of a car engine and the whoosh of tires on the sand and gravel road below as the human and canine trespassers made their escape.

I lowered the bicycle pump and stood for a moment, waiting for my pulse to slow. Well, it was nice to know it wasn’t just my heated imagination that had conjured an intruder, wasn’t it? What could he have been burying under the tree? Loot from a robbery, perhaps? I shone the light on the ground beneath the tree, but there was nothing to see, except a shallow hole with an earth pile next to it. A distant bark sounded, followed by a howl, and then more barking. Coyotes? Did they have coyotes in France? Suddenly aware of my damp slippers and cold feet, I hurried to return to the house, not even stopping to replace the bicycle pump in the garage. Tomorrow, I pledged to myself, I would come back and see if there was anything more I could find.

Early the next morning, as I scrubbed down the bicycle in front of the house, M. Telloir arrived. I was dressed in my running outfit, gray sweatshirt and sweatpants, with an apron protecting the front of my clothes and a scarf around my neck for warmth. It was not exactly what I’d choose to wear to greet company, but since I hadn’t known he was coming, I couldn’t very well have prepared.

“Philippe Telloir at your service, madame,” he said with a slight bow. He held a wire basket with a half dozen eggs nestled in hay. He had workman’s hands, rough and red, with large knuckles and grease worked into the lines of his fingertips.

“I’m Jessica Fletcher,” I said, drying my wet hands on a dishtowel I’d slung over one shoulder. “I’m pleased to meet you. Martine said you’d stop by.”

He smiled at my greeting, his dark face lined from many years in the Provençal sun and wind, and wiped his right hand on his trousers before shaking mine. His eyes strayed to the half-washed bike. “It’s not bad, eh? You are doing a good job of it.”

“Thank you.”

“But Martine, she ’as a car, you know,” he said, winking at me.

“I know,” I said, “but I don’t drive. This will help me get around a bit faster than on foot. And if I can fix this basket, I’ll have a place to put packages.”

“Ah,” he said, contemplating my predicament. “Marcel Oland can drive you. ‘E ’as a good car. Very fast.”

I cleared my throat to hold back a laugh. “Yes, it certainly is,” I said. “Marcel drove me here from Avignon. Is he the only person who offers driving services?”

“In St. Marc?
Oui
.” He stuck his hand under his tweed cap and scratched his head, revealing sparse strands of gray-and-black hair combed over his mostly bald pate. “There is old Peristolle’s son, but ’e is very reckless. You are safer with Marcel.”

I sighed. Without an alternative, I would have to ask Marcel to drive me to Avignon next week.

M. Telloir put down his eggs, squatted in front of the bike, and tipped his head from side to side. His blue hooded jacket was unzipped, allowing his solid stomach to push out over his belt. He pinched his nose. “How are you going to attach that?” he asked, pointing to the wicker basket, which dangled from the handlebar by a thread of wire.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “I should be able to find something in the garage, but I haven’t looked yet.”

“Let me see,” he said, putting his hands on his knees and pushing up. He walked toward the barn before I could say not to bother, moving with the ease of someone accustomed to working outside, his bowed legs giving him a rocking gait that reminded me of a children’s toy.

I picked up the wet rag I’d been using to wipe down the saddle seat, and continued my chore, keeping an ear toward the barn where I could hear M. Telloir rummaging through the toolbox. The front half of the bicycle was indeed
“pas mal,”
or “not bad,” as he’d said, but the rust on the wheel spokes resisted my scrubbing. I’d finished removing the encrusted dirt and was wiping the bike with a clean, dry cloth when M. Telloir emerged from the barn. He clipped the wire holding one side of the basket to the bike, banged the basket against his leg, dislodging a sprinkle of dirt, and handed it to me. “It ’ave to be rinsed,” he said. “Then I attach it for you.”

“Thank you. I appreciate that,” I said, straightening from my polishing. “May I offer you something to drink, Monsieur Telloir? Martine has some English breakfast tea, and I think there’s a bit of cake as well.”

“I wouldn’t say no to some tea,” he replied. He followed me into the kitchen, and while I filled the kettle, he removed a bowl from the cupboard, put his eggs in it, and deposited the bowl in the refrigerator. It was a familiar routine for him, I imagined, Martine entertaining him just as I was about to do. I put the kettle on the stove and took the bicycle basket to the sink. M. Telloir shambled over to the side door off the kitchen as I poured water over the grimy wicker.

“I will be right back,” he said. The side door squealed as he opened it, and cold air circled around the kitchen, raising goose bumps on my arms. Two minutes later he reentered with an armload of wood and proceeded to fill the wood boxes next to the fireplaces.

“Would you like for me to lay a fire?” he asked.

“Are you cold?” I asked, placing two cups and saucers on the table.

“No. No, I’m fine,” he protested. “But you ...”

“I’m planning to go for a walk this morning,” I said, “and I wouldn’t want to leave a fire burning. But thank you for bringing in the wood. I’d wondered where the woodpile was.”

“It is just outside your door,” he said, pulling out a chair and dropping into it. “The wind was bad last night, eh? It knocked down a few of your logs.”

Okay,
I told myself.
Those were the thuds I heard. There’s always a rational explanation for everything,
I thought. But why was someone digging in the woods behind the house? I eyed M. Telloir’s hooded jacket.
No,
I
thought, I doubt he would be able to move as fast as my nocturnal prowler, but better not say anything yet.
I poured water over the tea, sliced a small cake Martine had left in the fridge, and put plates and silverware on the table along with a pitcher of cream and a bowl of sugar.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “There’s no lemon.”

“Don’t take it,” he replied around a mouthful of cake.

We sipped and chewed in companionable silence, enjoying the early morning sunlight streaming in at an angle through the kitchen window.

“I thought I heard a wolf howling last night,” I said to open the conversation. “Are there wolves in Provence?”

His eyes flicked up from his cup. “Probably a dog,” he said. “At what time?”

“Around ten or eleven, I think.”

“Did it sound close or far?”

“Far, I think. But it was hard to tell with the wind so loud.”

M. Telloir studied his cup, swirling the tea absently. “Thieves have been stealing dogs lately,” he finally said, “and that’s not all.”

“They have! Why would someone want to steal a dog?”

“They can be very valuable,” he mumbled into his cup, sipping the last of his tea.

“Are they a special breed?” I asked, standing to get him some more tea.

“No. Most of them are of many breeds, all mixed together.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” I said, refilling his cup. “What makes them so valuable?”

“Truffles,” he said.

“Truffles,” I echoed, referring to the exotic French fungus that grows underground on the roots of oak trees and is a delicacy prized by chefs the world over. Perhaps that’s what my trespasser was after. “I thought they were hunted with pigs,” I said.

“Pigs get stolen, too, but mostly it is the dogs now.”

“The thieves are stealing dogs that are good at finding truffles?”

He grunted his assent. “Last week they beat up a farmer who was selling a dog. Took the dog and left the man all bloody.”

“How terrible.”

“It’s the start of the season, you know.”

“No, I didn’t know,” I said. “Are you a truffle hunter?”

There was a long pause; he seemed hesitant to trust me with this information. At last he said, “My dog was stolen, too.”

“Are you all right? Did they hurt you, too?”

“Wasn’t there. They make a hole in my fence and take my dog. ’E had a good nose. Trained him myself.”

“What did you do? Are the police any help?”

He blew a stream of air through his lips and looked away from me.
“Bon à rien!
Useless,” he said. “The thieves take our dogs over the mountains. And if a farmer in St. Marc buys a new truffle dog, ‘e tells no one because ’e knows it could be stolen from somewhere else. Next week I go to the market in Carpentras. There’s a man I know who might sell me his dog.”

“What will you do in the meantime? Can you find truffles without a dog?”

“There are ways,” he said. “If it’s warm enough, I watch for
les mouches.”

“Flies?”

“Oui! They like very much the scent of truffles. One watches where they land under the tree, and dig there.”

“And you’ve found truffles that way?”

“Oh, yes. My dog, ’e was faster, but the flies, they know, too.”

I thought about the stolen dogs later that day while tramping in the woods behind Martine’s house. M. Telloir had fastened the clean basket to my newly shined bike, and promised to bring more eggs later in the week. He’d also indicated that the baker had a special cake I should try. It had powdered sugar on top. I took the hint, and added the cake to the shopping list I’d compiled for my first venture into St. Marc.

After M. Telloir had left and I’d washed up our few dishes, I put on a heavy sweater and further explored my surroundings. I located the woodpile on the same side of the house as the kitchen door. The wood was split and stacked three logs deep, as high as my shoulder. There was more than enough to last two months, and probably a sufficient supply for the whole winter.

The view down the driveway confirmed the first impression I’d had from Marcel’s car. Rows of olive trees stretched out on both sides, most of their silvery leaves still clinging to the branches but dry now, from the mistral, the constant wind that came from the north.

On the side of the garage, I found the trail I’d already explored in the dark. It led through a row of soaring trees and into a sparse forest of mixed growth. The tall cypresses may have been planted by a previous tenant, but the oaks and planes and pines beyond them had been put there by nature. I followed the well-traveled path that meandered uphill. When I stopped several times to look around or admire the view, I noticed little piles of dirt mounded around holes in the ground circling the trunks of oak trees. A truffle hunter had obviously been pursuing his quarry on Martine’s property. I doubted she’d given him permission.

 

“I’d like two croissants, one for now with some coffee, and one to take home. And a baguette, please,” I said in French, eyeing the tall, thin, crusty loaves of bread that stood on end in a crockery canister. “I think I’ll get a little cake as well.” A quiet day yesterday and a restful night’s sleep at last had inspired this morning visit to St. Marc—that and the diminishing supply of food in the refrigerator. I had taken Martine’s bicycle—she would never recognize its cleaned and polished frame—and walked the last half mile to the village, set atop a steep hill.

The baker, Mme Roulandet, was a birdlike woman, small and thin, with a pointy nose and narrow chin. Her dark hair was pulled back from her face and tied at the nape of her neck with a long scarf. She plucked two croissants from the pile, put one on a plate, and wrapped the other, twisting the ends of the white paper to seal it closed. She pulled a baguette from the canister and tied a piece of paper in the middle, leaving both ends of the bread uncovered.