The Witch Who Mysteries Box Set

by Katie Penryn

  “I’d love to,” she said. “I could use the company, but I haven’t any clean clothes and we’re all filthy, covered in dust and goodness only knows what.”

  “Send Garth back to fetch you a change of clothes and your make-up kit,” I suggested.

  “Good idea,” she said going inside to find Garth and give him his orders.

  They came out together and Garth drove off in his runabout.

  “He wasn’t happy about that,” Izzy said. “Threat management experts don’t do such errands, he said.”

  “You surprise me. He always seems so amenable and ready to do anything you ask of him.”

  “He gets a bit sulky from time to time but he’s good-hearted underneath it all. You’ll see he’ll be fine when he gets back.”

  “Back to work then,” I said as we pushed off from the wall and made our way inside again.

  “On second thoughts,” I said as we reached the doorway. “With you staying for dinner and the two women expected, I’ll pop along to Tidot’s bakery and buy some of his wonderful éclairs. You’ll love them. Best ones I’ve ever tasted. We can offer the women coffee and cakes when they come to choose what they want to take away.”

  “But Sam’s got your car.”

  “I could take Gwinny’s, but I feel like a walk. I’ll see if Felix wants to come with me.”

  “Just who is this Felix? This is the first time I’ve met him and you didn’t introduce us properly.”

  Izzy was right. I had forgotten she had only met Felix in cat mode.

  “Felix is my bodyguard.”

  Izzy blinked. “Why do you need a bodyguard? It’s not as if you’re in danger of being abducted because you’re famous or attacked by a mad fan.”

  “It wasn’t my idea. My father sent him to protect me. I don’t know any more than that. Anyway, he’s living with us now. You’ll like him.”

  Izzy continued on her way into the store, and I caught hold of Felix as he came out carrying yet another old tin bath.

  “Come with me to buy some éclairs for dessert. We’ll have to hurry. The baker will be closing soon,” I said half dragging him down the street.

  “Hey, steady on, boss. Why are you suddenly so mad about éclairs?”

  “Don’t keep calling me boss. You sound like Garth. That’s what he calls Izzy.”

  “That’s where I got it from. I think it’s cute.”

  “It puts too much distance between us. I’d rather we kept our relationship on a friends basis. After all, I don’t employ you, do I?”

  “True. I earn my own living as I told you. All I ask from you is board and lodging.”

  “Perhaps you should pay for that. I’ve heard hacking is a well-paid profession.”

  Felix stopped in his tracks and regarded me with one eyebrow raised. “You are teasing, aren’t you?”

  I let him sweat it out for a few seconds before I burst into laughter. “You should see your face.”

  “I’m glad you were only joking,” he said taking hold of my arm. “How much further is it?”

  “Not far.”

  “Not that I’m in any hurry to get back to that dirty store room and your extended family.”

  We stepped out across the Esplanade and turned up the main street reaching Tidot’s bakery just as he was turning the sign on the door from Open to Closed. Felix pushed the door open quickly, and we hurried inside almost knocking poor Monsieur Tidot over.

  “I’m so sorry, monsieur,” I said taking hold of his arm to steady him as he staggered back against a display counter.

  “Don’t mention it, madame. It was my fault. My leg’s not too good. I saw you looking at my photos last time you were here. I was invalided out of the Legion.”

  We shook hands.

  “Good evening, Madame Munro. It is good to see you but as you will notice I am about to close up for the night.”

  “Please, monsieur. Do you have any of your wonderful éclairs left? I need some for my guests tonight. I’ve told them how good yours are.”

  “Sadly, I just sold the last two. As you can see my display cases are empty.”

  He gestured towards some shelves at the side of the room where a carpenter was working putting up an extra rack of shelving. “I have some meringues and some biscuits over there, if you would like to have a look.”

  I shook my head trying to hide my disappointment. I had set my heart on presenting Izzy with Tidot’s wonderful confections. Felix opened the door for me and I was on my way out when Tidot’s shop assistant popped her head round the door at the back.

  “I’ve finished icing the cakes for the party. Do you want me to box them up?”

  I swiveled round and caught Tidot’s eye as he turned to look at me. We had the same idea, or did we?

  “How many éclairs did you want, Madame Munro?” he asked me.

  I did a quick count up in my head. “Say, a dozen, mixed icings.”

  “Done,” he said. “They’re not going to miss a dozen éclairs. I’ll put something else in the order for the party instead.”

  He asked his assistant to box them up for me. “Nicole, two boxes mind so they don’t get crushed.” He turned back to me. “The icing will still be wet so be careful on the way back.”

  I paid him and while we waited for Nicole to bring the boxes into us, Felix and I watched the carpenter at work.

  Nicole brought the boxes out. Tidot told her she could leave.

  He took off his apron and stood by the door ready to lock up when we left. I heard him say to the carpenter, “Let yourself out when you’ve finished, Sean.”

  “Enjoy your evening,” Tidot said as he closed the door on us. As we left, he walked out into the kitchen at the back of the shop.

  “Nice guy,” said Felix.

  “He makes the best éclairs and Brioche makes the best croissants. We are lucky to have such good bakers where we live.”

  “I hear it’s difficult to find a bad baker in France. The French take their daily bread and their pâtisserie very seriously.”

  *

  The storeroom was clear and cleaned out by seven o’clock. Audrey gave us a fifteen minute warning for dinner to give us all a chance to shower and wash our hair which was stiff with dirt in spite of our headscarves. Sam asked if he could invite Emmanuelle round for dinner. Of course, I said yes. She hadn’t been able to join us for the second day, something about babysitting her younger siblings.

  Audrey served gazpacho as we took our seats. “I didn’t know when you would be ready to eat so we have a selection of cold meats and salads and, of course, your delicious éclairs for dessert, Penzi.”

  “Thank you, Audrey. It all looks wonderful. I don’t know what we’re going to do without you when you move out to your own home.”

  We took our time over our meal. We were all tired but happy the worst part of the job was done, and we had much to talk about.

  The museum director, Monique LeBrun, and the shop owner, Jane Smithson, arrived while we were drinking coffee so I invited them in to join us for an éclair and a coffee. They both said they had already eaten but when I told them the éclairs were from Tidot’s they couldn’t resist.

  We discussed how we would share out the loot waiting for their inspection on the pavement outside. It was agreed that the museum should have first choice. Both ladies had had the forethought to arrive in a white van. With Felix and Sam to help them load, I hoped we would finish everything before the light faded.

  Monique and Jane haggled over a few items. Jane accused Monique of choosing items already represented in the local museum and said that wasn’t fair.

  Monique compromised by saying that if she found she didn’t need anything she would give Jane a ring and let her have it.

  The rest of us spent the time putting away the few items we had decided to keep in the now cleaned out store room.

  Sam walked Emmanuelle home and returned in time to join us in waving goodbye to the two ladies.

  No one wanted to stay up la
te. We had worked hard during a hot summer’s day in clouds of dust and dirt.

  “Tomorrow we start on the brocante itself,” I called out after everyone as they made their way upstairs.

  *

  I awoke to an earth shattering bang that shook my bed and rattled the window panes.

  A shell?

  Oh no, the bomb squad must have missed one.

  I fumbled for the light switch by my bed, snatched up my dressing gown and dashed out onto the landing where I met Felix and Sam.

  “It must have been one of those old shells,” said Sam taking the words out of my mouth.

  “You stay here and look after the women and children, Sam,” said Felix grabbing my arm and pushing me down the stairs in front of him. “We’d better have a look.”

  The dogs began to howl as we reached the ground floor.

  All was in order downstairs. Nothing had fallen on the floor. No windows broken.

  “Quick the brocante,” said Felix unlocking the front door and running out into the street. But the brocante was still standing. No sign of any damage.

  “If it wasn’t one of our shells,” I said. “What could it have been?”

  “An earthquake?”

  “Not around here.”

  “A terrorist attack?”

  “That’s all too possible.”

  Our neighbors spilled out onto the cobbles, everyone asking if anyone knew anything. And then the fire engines and police sirens started wailing at the top of the town.

  We all pushed forward to the end of the street and spread out onto the Esplanade just as two police cars zoomed into place blocking off the main street that ran up the hill.

  Monsieur Didier who lived in the first house in our street jumped up onto one of the benches arranged along the seawall and called for silence.

  “It’s the mayor’s office on the phone,” he said, dragging his finger across his throat to quieten us down. “It’s not terrorists. Tidot’s bakery has blown sky high.”

  As he finished speaking a helicopter flew into view angling a powerful searchlight down onto the erstwhile bakery and shop. The scene was not visible from where we were standing, but clouds of dust and debris spun in the beams of light.

  “Tidot’s,” I said holding tightly onto Felix’s arm with one hand and Jimbo’s hand with the other. “We were there yesterday evening buying éclairs for our dessert. How terrible.”

  Garth had hold of Izzy while Audrey carried Simone in her arms and Sam gripped Wilfred’s hand.

  A great silence grew on the Esplanade as the mayor’s message was passed around, and we all realized the magnitude of the calamity that had occurred in the early hours of the morning.

  The crowd surged as one towards the police barrier not out of unthinking curiosity, but because we had to see with our own eyes so as to believe. The police let no one through and told us all to go home and get some sleep while the Fire Brigade coped with clearing up the devastation.

  In small groups the crowd turned away, our party among them.

  “What about Monsieur Tidot?” I asked everyone we passed, but no one knew any more than I did.

  We put the three children back to bed when we reached the house but the night’s catastrophe had made it impossible for us adults to go back to sleep as if nothing had happened. We sat around in the kitchen making guesses and waiting for the dawn to break. If it wasn’t an earthquake and it wasn’t a terrorist bomb, what was left?

  “A gas explosion,” suggested Sam.

  “Accident or sabotage?” Izzy asked.

  Felix took down the cognac and glasses. “Whatever it was we all need a pick-me-up. I thought it was one of those shells exploding and we were on our way to kingdom come.”

  I nodded in agreement. “I expected to find the whole house had disintegrated when I came downstairs to look.”

  Chapter 10

  By daybreak the sirens had ceased their screaming and although a pall of dust hung over the middle of the town, it was nowhere near as thick as it had been when the explosion occurred. The clock ticked round to six o’clock.

  Garth insisted that Izzy should go home to the château. After farewells and promises to keep them posted, I pulled Felix out of his chair.

  “Come and get dressed and we’ll fetch the morning’s croissants from Brioche’s. It’s too dangerous out there this morning for Jimbo to go. And we can find out if anyone knows anything.”

  Minutes later the two of us came back downstairs. I told the others Felix and I were off to fetch breakfast before Brioche sold out.

  “With one local bakery gone up in smoke everyone will be wanting their bread from Brioche and he could sell out quickly.”

  We put the dogs on their leashes and stepped out into the crisp morning air. A thin sea mist spread in from the sea enveloping the Esplanade in a veil of mystery. As we neared Brioche’s bakery we saw the police cars were still on station, but the police were allowing people through on foot now.

  As we had expected there was a queue at Brioche’s. It wasn’t until we reached the front that I realized Madame Brioche was serving on her own. Perhaps her husband was helping the police. As she put our order of croissants in a bag, I asked her where her husband was.

  “He’s at the Regional Bakers’ Conference in Bordeaux for the weekend,” she answered. “Along with Monsieur Tidot. Thank goodness.”

  Someone in the queue behind us pointed out that Tidot didn’t live above the bakery any more now that he had bought a new house close to the town wall.

  Madame Brioche tutted at this comment. “True, but sometimes Tidot sleeps above the bakery. When he has a set piece to prepare for a banquet or a wedding. But not this weekend. He’ll be safe and sound in Bordeaux discussing the latest ovens.”

  Everyone in the shop laughed at that, glad that Tidot hadn’t been harmed.

  We thanked Madame Brioche and left the shop.

  Being curious by nature I turned towards the police cars.

  Felix pulled by arm. “We ought to go straight home.”

  “No, let me be, Felix,” I said pulling away from him “It’ll only take a couple of minutes to have a look at what happened up there.”

  Felix sighed. “All right, but stay close to me and don’t go off on your own. There may be loose masonry hanging about. And give me a croissant,” he added taking the bag away from me and helping himself.

  He needn’t have worried about hanging masonry. There was nothing left for it to hang from. Where the bakery had stood there was nothing but fragments of brick and stone, shards of glass and splinters of oak.

  “It must have been a powerful explosion to shred those old oak beams and completely disintegrate a two-story building built of stone,” said Felix, when we reached the second barrier the police had set up surrounding the immediate vicinity of the site of the explosion.

  “There are bits of metal lying about but nothing recognizable,” I said.

  Felix pointed to an enormous industrial oven with its doors hanging off and twisted pipes exuding from its left-hand side. “What about that?”

  As he spoke a low loader backed into the area to pick up the oven with its crane.

  Gendarmes and fire brigade personnel were advancing down the street in a line towards us, picking up everything and bagging it.

  I went up to a nearby policeman who was manning the barrier. “Have they found anything suspicious yet?” I asked him.

  He tapped his finger to his nose. “I can’t tell you that, can I?”

  I turned away and started walking back down the street towards the Esplanade.

  “We’d better go home, Felix. There’s nothing here for us to do and I don’t like rubber necking.”

  *

  We didn’t loiter on the way back but we didn’t hurry either. It was so rare for us to have time alone in such a busy household. Not that there was any significance in our being alone. It was restful. That was all. The sea mist had cleared. Council workmen drove their cleaning machines up
and down the Esplanade and another gang were on pick up duty on the beach cleaning it ready for another day in Holidayland.

  “Life is so strange, Felix. I would never have guessed Tidot’s was going to blow up like that when we were there yesterday evening. All was peaceful with the scent of baking pervading the shop.”

  “And now all one can smell is the dust, wood chips and a lingering pong of gas.”

  I tucked my spare arm in his and vowed I would make sure I lived every day.

  We walked back to the house down the cobbled street in a companionable silence only to have it broken when we walked through the front door.

  “Penzi, thank goodness you’re back. You didn’t take your phone with you,” said Sam thrusting the landline phone at me.

  “Whatever’s the matter?” I asked him.

  It wasn’t like Sam to become agitated over a phone call.

  “Penzi, it’s Monsieur Bonhomie, the mayor. He wants to see you right away. He’s called three times already.”

  “Pass me the phone then,” I said taking the receiver from Sam.

  “Mpenzi Munro speaking, monsieur. You wanted me?”

  “Yes, yes, madame. Can you come now — to my office? I know it’s Sunday morning, but this is an emergency.”

  I put my hand over the receiver, “He’s asking to see me now at his office. I can’t think what for?”

  Everyone shrugged. Nor could they.

  I removed my hand. “Monsieur, I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

  I replaced the receiver almost cutting off the mayor’s thanks.

  Felix was the first to speak. “Penzi, it’s got to be something to do with the explosion. That’s all that the mayor will be dealing with today, surely?”

  “Let’s not speculate. The sooner we get there the sooner we’ll find out. Sam and Felix, you come with me. Gwinny and Audrey mind the children. Meanwhile, please would someone pour me a coffee while I dash upstairs and tidy myself up.”

  I was back in a trice and drank my milky coffee down in three swallows, grabbed a croissant from the bag as did Sam, and we left in our car. We had to make a wide detour round the scene of the explosion as the main street was still blocked off.