by Susan Finlay
“Did you see the victim up close?”
“I didn’t want to look, but I had to peek. It made me sick to my stomach and I got out of there fast.”
It struck him that her words were very similar to Maurelle Martin’s. Not surprising, he supposed. Unless one was familiar with death, it was a shock to see a victim of a stabbing.
“Did you recognize the body?”
She nodded. “It was Luc Olivier.”
“You could identify him with that one brief look?”
“Yes. There was no mistaking him. For a man of fifty, he is, was, quite distinguished-looking. Women were naturally drawn to him.”
“How well did you know him?”
“Oh, no, you don’t think I—”
“Sorry, Madame, I didn’t mean to imply that. I’m merely trying to find out what you know about the man’s life.” Inwardly, he smiled at her belief that he was suggesting there might be some romantic entanglement, although once she must have been an exceptionally attractive woman.
“He hadn’t lived here long. A few months at most. Hardly anyone knew him well, except maybe Aimee Augustin. She’s an estate agent in Reynier. She helped him find the spot for his restaurant. I think they were seeing each other for a while after he rented it.”
“Seeing each other romantically, you mean?”
Jeannette nodded.
“Do you know what happened? Why did they end the relationship?”
She shrugged, then turned to Simone, who was standing behind Jeannette’s chair. “Do you know, dear?”
“I can’t really say for sure. I heard rumors.”
“What kind of rumors?”
“That she was too aggressive and that he dumped her for a younger woman because of that.”
“Do you know who the younger woman is?”
“No.”
“Could it have been his waitress, Felicia Beaumont?” Edward asked.
“Possibly, but as I said, I don’t know who it was.”
“Have either of you ever see this woman before?”
He handed Simone a photo of Gabrielle Thibault. Jeannette leaned in close to Simone to look at the picture.
Both women shook their heads.
“What about this car?”
He handed Simone a photo of Gabrielle’s white Renault.
Jeannette said, “I don’t think I’ve seen it.”
Simone frowned, then shook her head.
“Is there something you aren’t telling me, Madame Charbonneau?”
“I really can’t say. I don’t think I’ve seen it, either, but I’m not positive.”
Goddard sighed.
“If either of you think of anything pertinent to the case, please contact me right away.”
Both women nodded. The captain and Edward stood up to leave, and Jeannette escorted them to the front door.
THREE HOURS LATER, back at the Gendarmerie, the Medical Examiner knocked on Goddard’s office door.
“Ah, there you are. Come in. Do you have something for me?” Goddard asked, standing.
“Indeed I do. I haven’t done a complete postmortem on Luc Olivier yet, you understand, but my preliminary evaluation indicates the time of death as occurring less than an hour before his body was discovered.”
“And the cause of death?”
“Single stab wound to the chest. A knife of some sort. But I have to assess the details, the exact dimensions, shape, and style of the wound before I can provide you with my thorough report.”
“Thank you, Doctor. I appreciate your quick assessment”
After the Examiner took his leave, Goddard sat down at his desk. He rubbed his eyes and stared at the photographs spread out across the desktop—photographs of the latest murder victim. Luc Olivier, or more accurately Bertrand Martel, had a stubble of beard, dirty hair, and tufa-covered clothing, which told Goddard the man had probably been hiding out in the caves for a while. The same caves where Bruno Houdan sometimes slept. The victim had hazel eyes, dark brown hair, and a good physique. The hole in his chest was small, but the amount of blood covering the front of his shirt was not insignificant. Goddard stretched, rubbed his eyes again, and scratched at his chin, noting the healthy set of sandpaper stubble forming. This was going to be a long night. He picked up his phone and called his wife to tell her he wouldn’t be home for dinner.
“But you need to eat something, Pascal. Is it all right if I bring dinner to you?”
“It’s more than all right, Chantal. Thank you. I love you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
THE NEXT MORNING Dave and Edward drove to Belvidere to meet with Goddard. The captain had called Edward and asked him to stop by at nine o’clock. “Bring your son with you,” he said.
The officer at the front desk escorted them into Goddard’s office. Goddard greeted them both and asked Dave to shut the door behind him.
Once they were all seated, Goddard said to Dave, “Your father told me you and he arrived at yesterday’s murder scene while Jeannette Devlin was still there.”
“That’s right. Your men were already inside the cavern.”
“My men told me the two of you overstepped the police tape and entered the crime scene.”
“That’s my doing, Goddard,” Edward said. “Sorry if we went against protocol.”
“In future, I must ask that you wait for my instructions before pushing your way in. You put my men in a difficult situation.”
“Gotcha. It won’t happen again.”
“’Gotcha’? Ah, yes, I see. Now, the other reason I asked you both here, is to run some ideas by you.”
“By all means.”
“I’m looking at this as possibly two separate cases. There are several scenarios. First, we have the two young female victims, with a few similarities—Gabrielle was thirty-two and worked as a teacher. Felicia was twenty-six and worked as a waitress during the summer but as a teacher the rest of the year. Both women were single and both were rumored to be involved with a married man. One had an illegitimate child, and the other, I have discovered, was pregnant. From all accounts, Gabrielle Thibault refused to name the father of her child. Her parents believe the man was from Reynier. As for Felicia Beaumont, my men have heard several local men’s names mentioned as possibly her lover.”
“So, you’re thinking both women were involved with the same man?” Edward asked.
“I’m leaning toward that theory.”
“Find the father, find the killer.”
Goddard nodded, then said, “Our third victim, Luc Olivier, was living in Reynier under a false identity. His real name was Bertrand Martel, a co-owner of a Paris restaurant, along with his girlfriend, Nina Girard. When Nina was interviewed, she indicated that she had funded seventy percent of the business, with Bertrand only funding the other thirty percent. He ran the restaurant while Nina attended culinary school. About a month before graduating, she visited the restaurant. According to Nina, she and Bertrand quarreled over how the business should be run. She didn’t like the gaudy decorations, the advertising he was doing, the questionable clientele he was bringing in, and so forth. This led to a break up. Nina, owning the larger share of the business, insisted Bertrand sell her his interest. She wanted to run the business herself. He agreed, and she returned to school. She returned, a few days later to settle their affairs, only to learn that he’d taken the money from the business account, stripped the equipment away, and disappeared.”
“And he showed up here and opened a restaurant,” Dave said. “I remember Aimee Augustin bragging about her new client. She told everyone that he was bringing in top of the line restaurant equipment and was going to remodel the place and turn it into something great.”
Goddard said, “I’ve also spoken with Nina Girard’s niece. The niece was seen by Bruno Houdan, arguing with Luc Olivier, a.k.a. Bertrand Martel, near the back door of the restaurant. Bruno told me Martel went inside and came back and handed her a wad of cash. She confessed that she’d recognized him one day w
hen she’d been in his restaurant in Reynier, and she had since been blackmailing him.”
“Interesting. Well, I may have another piece of this puzzle,” Dave said. “Yesterday, I spoke with Yves Rousseau who works at the petrol station. He saw Gabrielle Thibault—at least he thinks it was her. She had stopped for petrol. He said he might be wrong but he thinks she asked him for directions to the café or the restaurant. He couldn’t remember which one.”
“That is also interesting. Who is this Yves? Is he related to your mayor, Claude Rousseau?”
“Yves is Claude’s uncle.”
“Back to the two female victims for a moment, do you know if they knew each other?” Edward asked. “You said they were both teachers.”
“We’ve looked into that but haven’t made any connections yet. We did discover that Maurelle Martin and Gabrielle Thibault attended the same university in London, and their time there overlapped by one year, but we have not found any evidence that they even knew each other. However, you can see why we can’t officially remove her from the suspect list as of yet.”
Dave and Edward both nodded.
“That brings up another somewhat awkward topic.”
“What’s that?” Dave asked.
“The suspect list of local men rumored to have been involved with the two women—Jonas Lefèvre, Paul Sinclair, Alain Delacroix, Luc Olivier, and you.”
Surprised, Dave blurted, “Me?”
“Afraid so. Another possible suspect scenario,” Goddard said, “is that of a jealous wife or girlfriend trying to eliminate her competition. The list could include, among others, your wife, Lillian Lefèvre, Simone Charbonneau, and Aimee Augustin. Monsieur Rousseau’s statement about Gabrielle Thibault stopping at the petrol station and asking for directions to the restaurant or café could mean she went to see Alain Delacroix, and Simone found out.”
“Let’s not rule out Nina Girard,” Edward said. “We don’t really know whether she had discovered Luc’s, I mean Bertrand’s, whereabouts, do we? Maybe the niece took the blackmail money and still told Nina.”
Goddard rubbed his chin. “Yes, true enough. I’ll add her to the list,” he said as he scribbled a note on the pad on his desk.
“Oh, one more thing. I really don’t know if this means anything,” Dave said, shrugging, “but I did see something odd a few days ago. I’d forgotten about it until you mentioned Lillian. I was out walking, returning to town, and saw her throwing something into the river. It was dreary weather, sprinkling, and after she threw whatever it was, she looked around as if making sure no one was watching. I don’t think she noticed me standing behind a tree.”
Goddard pursed his lips. Something he’d heard last night also came to mind.
“Officer Durand was talking with two elderly men outside the general store yesterday. Paul Lepage was coming out of the store and joined the conversation. I don’t know all the details, but Durand said Paul told them about an incident when he was a lad. He said Alain Delacroix had tried to strangle him after school one day.”
Dave said, “I remember hearing about that years ago. They’ve always had problems with each other. Sometimes they’re almost friends, other times they’re antagonistic toward each other. I’ve never really understood what the problem was.”
“How do they get on now?”
Dave shrugged.
“I think we need to interview these people,” Goddard said. “I also want to run DNA tests on them and on any other males we’ve identified with Paris connections. Since you’re here already, Dave, I’ll ask you to step into our lab. I’ll send my men out to get the others. When you’re done in the lab, I’d like you to speak with Aimee Augustin. Edward, I’d like you to speak with Lillian Lefèvre. I will interview Simone Charbonneau and then go back and talk with Nina Girard’s niece. I’ll send Durand to Paris to meet with Nina Girard.”
JEANNETTE DEVLIN RUMMAGED through the kitchen cupboards and the refrigerator, making a list of the items she needed to purchase. When she finished, she shook her head in surprise. The list was longer than she’d expected, and by the looks of it, if she bought everything she needed, she wouldn’t be able to carry it all. Oh dear.
She collapsed into a chair and tossed the paper and pencil onto the kitchen table. She shouldn’t have delayed going to the market for so long. It wasn’t really her fault. How could she have known the village would be inundated with murders and gendarmes everywhere, making her too distracted to remember to shop? However, excuses didn’t make the problem go away.
Her daily routines were all in disarray—hairdresser on Mondays, clothing and jewelry shops on Tuesdays, market on Wednesdays, butchery on Thursdays. Normally Simone, Coralie, or Alain would drive her to Belvidere for some of these outings, but with the frenzied customer activity caused by the murders, they all had been far too busy to attend to her needs. Even her other daily activities were muddled. The café for lunch and sometimes breakfast, the outdoor bakery café for a snack and a chat, weather permitting, of course. This week, when she did make it to the café, it was crowded with strangers, making it hard to get seated, and her friends weren’t there. When asked, Simone would say she’d missed them by ten, twenty, or thirty minutes. No one was following their routine.
Jeannette sighed. Catching up on the latest news wasn’t the same without Fabienne, Helene, and Anouk. Old Yves was too cranky and, well, Maurice and Jacques were all right but most of what they told her was hardly juicy enough to make it worthwhile for her to endure their old fish stories to get to the real meat. She’d heard them all a hundred times.
Coralie couldn’t spend time with her, either. She was busy at the general store, the murders bringing in out of town customers and more in-town business, as well. Of course, some of the extra business from the locals was just people stocking up on supplies so they wouldn’t have to leave their houses again until the killer was caught.
Both Simone and Coralie seemed happy for the extra income the gruesome affair afforded their businesses, but both women looked worn down from the strenuous effort required, making Jeannette worry for their health but also feeling rather lonely.
Feeling sorry for herself, Jeannette thought about her friend Fabienne. Fabienne’s daughter was here, and with her granddaughter-in-law pregnant, she was all wrapped up with them. Soon Fabienne would have a new great-grandchild and that meant she would be doting on the baby and wouldn’t have time for chatting with her oldest friend.
Jeannette closed her eyes and remembered back when her grandchildren were born. Simone had been a whiny little thing, shriveled and red-faced, colicky and needy. But Paul—he’d been round and robust and the joy of her life. From the first time she’d held him she’d felt the rush of love—fierce love. Their grandfather, Charles, had loved them both, but even he had a special love for Paul because he’d always wanted a son.
Though she loved it here, loved her children and grandchildren, sometimes she missed her old life in Paris. Charles had, at least he always thought, rescued her from a life of squalor in Paris. She couldn’t explain to him—never even tried—that she’d actually loved the big city and hadn’t really felt like she needed to be rescued. Ah, what times she had. She and Fabienne had worked two jobs, really, day jobs as seamstresses, and their night jobs. She shook her head and shifted in her chair. Reynier had been a turning point. She and Charles had come here first. He’d practically dragged her here, saying it was a great opportunity. Jeannette hadn’t been at all impressed. No bright lights and bustling streets, no elegant restaurants and fancy nightclubs. If it hadn’t been for Fabienne moving here a few months later, well, Jeannette might not have lasted.
Jeannette smiled. In fact, Reynier had ultimately been good for her. She’d worried for a long time that this small town life would hold back her children and grandchildren but it hadn’t. Coralie and Brigitte had grown up here fine. But then Coralie had moved to Paris and married a photographer. Oh, their marriage didn’t last, but it did give her Simone. Although Simone h
ad some success with a modeling career in Paris, she eventually tired of it and moved here to Reynier.
Brigitte had stayed in Reynier and married an artist. When he ran off with one of his models, Brigitte was devastated for a long time. However, five years ago she met another man and remarried. The following year they moved away to Orleans.
Paul was the only one who’d stayed all these years. Of course he’d gone to Paris for a while to get his training, but he came back as soon as he graduated.
With Coralie and Simone both here again, and both running businesses, and with Paul here and his art career preparing to take off, Charles would have been proud. They’d done a good job with their little family.
Yes, and Fabienne’s husband Claude would have been pleased, too, that their daughter, Eloise, was back and had made-up with Fabienne.
No longer feeling sorry for herself, deciding the town would soon be back to normal and she was where she should be, brought her back to groceries. Well, worst case she would just make two trips.
MAURELLE STOPPED IN front of the butcher shop, peering inside. Jeannette was inside talking with Lillian who was behind the counter listening while weighing a slab of meat. Camille Wickliff was standing around waiting, obviously getting impatient. She raised both hands in an exasperated manner, grumbled, and shuffled her feet, but the other two women didn’t appear to notice.
“Are you trying to decide whether you want to go inside?”
Maurelle turned toward the voice. It was Paul Lepage. He gave her one of his usual flirty smiles. She could see why women fawned over him.
“Oh, well, no. Actually, I was out for a stroll and noticed your grand-mère. She seems quite animated today.”
“Yes, she loves to gossip. Must be having a heyday with all the activity going on around this place.”
“Fabienne is the same way. Sometimes I think they feed off one another.”
“Do you think it’s a good idea, being out for a stroll alone right now?” Paul asked. “Aren’t you scared? Most locals are staying indoors unless they have to go out, or at least traveling in pairs.”
