Bruno knew that his plans for the evening could be derailed by the hunt for Mustaf, but he hoped he could find some way to keep his commitments to Horst and Clothilde. He would need about an hour to cook the salmon and only a few minutes for the young asparagus, which he intended to serve only with butter. Young Edouard Lespinasse from the garage had agreed for twenty euros to pick them all up and drive them home at midnight. The English archaeologist was staying with Gilles, the two Germans with Bruno, and nobody lived more than four kilometers from the baron’s chartreuse.
Chapter 18
As Bruno parked his van by the mairie, a woman called his name. He turned to see Amélie waving at him from a table on Fauquet’s terrace. A copy of Le Monde, a notebook and her ever-present smartphone were in front of her, along with a cup of coffee. He went to join her, apologizing for abandoning her that morning.
“Where’s Balzac?” she asked.
“At home. I couldn’t take him to the security meeting. It was a videoconference with Paris.” Even mentioning it brought Isabelle back into his head, a sudden memory of his undoing her hair from its bun and letting it trickle through his fingers. With an effort, he brought himself back to reality.
“Have you been here all morning?” he asked her.
“Fauquet has a good Internet connection, perfect croissants and excellent coffee, and I’ve been enjoying the sun, reading the paper, going over my notes and being surprised that there’s nothing on any of the news feeds about the attack on Dumesnil.” She gave a sudden shiver. “I didn’t sleep too well, remembering what they’d done to that poor man.”
“The hospital says he’s in intensive care. There’s nothing in the media because J-J wants to keep it quiet for the moment.”
“I presume this security meeting was about him?”
“Let’s not talk about that here. Are you ready for some lunch?”
“Always. Are we going to Ivan’s again?”
“No, to my place, so I can pick up Balzac and make you an omelette you’ll never get in Paris. It will be a light lunch because I have a big dinner tonight for Horst, the bridegroom at Saturday’s wedding. It’s his bachelor supper.”
He picked up a baguette from Fauquet, and they drove out on the familiar road home to find Balzac, who made a point of greeting every car he heard. As Bruno expected, the basset hound was waiting for them at the end of the lane and giving a tuneful howl of greeting. Now that he could sound like a grown-up basset hound, Balzac had become appreciative of his own voice.
“Mon Dieu, they could hear that back in town,” said Amélie, evidently impressed, as she bent down to greet the dog.
“That’s a sign of a good hunting dog, so I’ll know where to find him in the woods when he’s on a trail. He’ll never be fast, but he can run all day. That’s how bassets hunt wild boar, they run and run until the boar collapses with exhaustion. I think it’s nice enough to eat outdoors.”
He left Amélie to set the table on the terrace while he went to his chicken coop and took out six new-laid eggs. He picked some roquette and parsley and used his pocketknife to collect tiny green buds of pissenlit that would eventually become the yellow dandelion flowers. But Bruno had a better use for them.
Once he’d collected about twenty of them, he went to the kitchen, opened a bottle of white wine and poured each of them a glass. Amélie leaned against the kitchen counter watching as he washed the salad and the buds, put a large knob of butter in his frying pan and broke the eggs into a bowl. Once the butter was half melted, he added the buds of pissenlit and began stirring them so they were well coated. He whisked the eggs together with half an eggshell of cold water, salt and pepper, and poured the eggs into the pan just as the melted butter began to foam. He left it cooking while he tossed walnut oil and a little cider vinegar with the roquette in a salad bowl, then returned to twirl the frying pan, folded the omelette and shredded the parsley on top before serving the food.
“I didn’t know you could eat these,” she said. “It’s a very different taste, a little nutty, but it’s wonderful to eat food so fresh.”
With a fork in one hand and a chunk of baguette in the other, Bruno grinned at her. Amélie picked up the wine bottle to read the label; she looked surprised to see it came from St. Denis’s own vineyard. She sipped at it approvingly and then attacked her omelette again. They ate in silence, feeling wholly comfortable in each other’s company, occasionally breaking off to hand Balzac a piece of bread that had been wiped on their plates. When they were finished, Bruno took the plates back to the kitchen and brought out some Tomme d’Audrix cheese made by his friend Stéphane, explaining that it was made just up the road.
“Eat locally, that’s you,” she said, nodding in approval at the cheese. “Now, what can you tell me about the security meeting?”
“Not very much, but one of the men who attacked Dumesnil seems to be from Daesh, a man with a very bad reputation. We don’t know how he got into the country, nor what he’s planning to do, but Paris is taking it all very seriously. Police reinforcements are on the way, along with special security teams. I have another conference tomorrow morning, but it shouldn’t take long. And this afternoon I have to work in my office, going through e-mails from my network.”
“You mean your other local policemen?”
“Not just them, but all the hotels and rental agencies, campsites, restaurants, rental-car places, Internet cafés, mairies, tourist offices and supermarkets from Lalinde to Montignac. I have a list set up so I can contact all of them with one e-mail, and I’ve circulated the photos that we have of the four men and their car license plate. With any luck, I might have some replies by now, maybe even a sighting.”
“You did that yourself?”
“Not a chance, that’s way beyond my skills. The schoolkids did it for me as a club project. Do you want to drop in and take a look as we go back to the office? We’re very proud of our school’s computer club.”
It was officially the spring holiday for schools, but since Florence was there to supervise, the computer room was half full when Bruno and Amélie arrived, her appearance exciting the usual stir. Florence seemed startled by their arrival, her hands fluttering to her hair and smoothing her dress before offering her cheeks to Bruno to be kissed. He introduced his companion to the others as a colleague from the ministry in Paris. Two small children who had been playing quietly with a tablet on a couch in the corner suddenly realized Bruno had arrived, and they scurried to him, to be lifted one in each of his arms.
“Bonjour, Dora; bonjour, Daniel,” he said, kissing them both. “These are Florence’s children and much better on computers than I am.”
Amélie smiled at them and shook each small hand, although the pair looked not at all sure of this stranger. Amélie congratulated Florence on her children, but then her eyes widened as she looked around the room at the quality of the computers the youngsters were using.
“This is serious equipment.” She looked back at Florence. “How did you afford these on a school budget?”
“The students can explain better than I can,” said Florence. “It’s their club.”
“We earned them,” said Maurice Cordet proudly. Son of a tree surgeon, he was in his final year at the collège. He explained that they had started with computers rescued from the town dump and then began building websites for local businesses. Later they developed a computer game and tried but failed to sell it. However, one of the games companies had liked their approach and donated their old computers to the collège when they upgraded.
“We do testing for them, telling them what we think about their new games, and they’ve invited two of us to their offices in Grenoble for an internship,” Maurice added.
“What are you working on now?” Amélie asked two girls sitting side by side before a big screen. “And what are your names?”
“I’m Eglantine and this is Sylvie,” said the taller of the two. “We’re trying to build an interactive system to learn English, using songs
and phrases and scenes from movies we all know. It starts with some fun, a karaoke session where you sing along, and then the computer gets you to make new sentences using the words you know. It’s fine with our voices because it knows them, but it takes ages to recognize new ones.”
“Impressive,” said Amélie. “Which one of you set up Bruno’s network for all his contacts up and down the valley?”
“We all did,” said Sylvie. “It was just a data-entry chore.” She glanced at Bruno. “He’s a dinosaur on computers, hasn’t got a clue about social media.” It was said affectionately.
“I’m not extinct yet, and Amélie here has been showing me how it can help in my job, so I’ll probably be back here for you all to give me some more lessons,” said Bruno. “We’d better get going. Thank you, Florence, everybody.”
Back in his office, Bruno called the hospital in Sarlat to ask about Dumesnil’s condition. Stable, he was told, but still in intensive care. J-J had already asked to interview him when the doctors gave their approval. He forwarded to Amélie the photos of the two unknown young men from the Gare de l’Est, asking her to put them onto social media sites to see if anyone recognized them.
“No problem,” she said. “Do you have Florence’s number? I’d like to arrange to see her and ask how other schools might go about setting up similar clubs.”
He gave her the school number, Florence’s mobile and her e-mail. “You need a live wire like Florence to get it started. She’s a great teacher and a good friend and does an impressive job of bringing up those two kids on her own.”
Amélie gave him an enigmatic smile, then turned back to her phone and murmured, “She’s an attractive woman. Great cheekbones. Is she one of those friends you dine with on Mondays?”
“Yes, and there’s another young mother with children in the group. The other kids are English, so they’re all becoming very fluent in each other’s tongue.”
“I suppose it makes up for not having children of your own,” she said, her eyes on her phone as her fingers darted over its virtual keyboard.
What did she mean by that? Bruno wondered, before rising and saying he’d better brief the mayor about the security meeting. He was very fond of Dora and Daniel, but nothing really made up for not being a father. Nor could he say there was an important woman in his life. There was Martine, a businesswoman from the region who lived and worked in London and came to St. Denis every couple of months to see her parents and develop the project for a new rally for electric cars. They had lusty reunions together on her visits, but Martine made no secret of her other love affairs in London.
—
“How are matters working out with Mademoiselle Plessis?” the mayor asked as Bruno stood before his desk. He capped his fountain pen and pushed the letter he was writing aside.
“Better than expected. She’s sensible, courteous and sings so well I’m hoping she’ll perform at our concert evenings this summer. By the way, did you ever come across a medieval historian called Dumesnil who lives in Sarlat?”
“Yes, I know something about his work. The staff around the coffee machine this morning was talking about that horrible attack on him. Roberte has a sister who is a nurse at the hospital so word has got around. I hear he’s stable. Are you involved in that as well as this business at Commarque?”
Bruno explained the whole affair, stressing Amélie’s role in identifying Leah and the way Leah had managed to establish for herself a new identity and bank account. “I’m not sure that we’ll be a target here in St. Denis, but I think we have to postpone the opening of the scout camp. Yacov Kaufman is coming down from Paris tomorrow to see the camp, and you and I are giving him lunch at Ivan’s. It’s in your diary. I think we have to be frank with him about the reasons for postponing.”
“Very well. Are we still going ahead with Horst’s bridegroom supper this evening, or has that been put off as well?”
“No, we’re going ahead. It’s at the baron’s place, remember, and young Lespinasse will drive us all back afterward. I’ll get there about seven to start cooking, and we’ll serve drinks at eight. I think we’ll be ten altogether.”
“I’m looking forward to it and to officiating at the marriage. I presume you saw Horst’s latest piece in Archéologie?”
“I did, and I’ll be quoting from it in my wedding speech, if I ever get time to sit down and write it.”
As he said this, a knock came at the door, and Amélie poked her head inside, excusing herself but saying that Bruno had just received a new e-mail that looked important. The mayor waved him out.
The e-mail had been sent from the Casino shop in Le Buisson. Best known in France for its giant hypermarkets, Casino also ran a chain of small local supermarkets in rural villages that were otherwise ill served for basic foods and supplies.
He called the manager as soon as he read that one of the men in Bruno’s photos had just spent more than a hundred euros at the shop.
“Is he still there?” Bruno asked as he forwarded the e-mail to J-J, Prunier, Yveline and the brigadier.
“No, he left a couple of minutes ago in a white van, a Renault, no markings on the side. Somebody helped him load the bags, and then they drove off on the Sarlat road. I took down the license plate number and then e-mailed you.”
“Thanks, give me the number and I’ll be right there,” he said, sending second e-mails to the same addresses with the latest details. Then he went to his safe, opened it and took out his gun, a PAMAS nine millimeter of the kind he’d used in the army. He checked that it was empty, loaded a magazine, attached the belt holster with its pouch for a spare magazine and settled the gun at his side.
“Amélie, you’d better stay here until I get back. Please take care of Balzac.” He left, running down the mairie stairs and out to his car. As he got behind the wheel his phone rang. It was Yveline, asking if he wanted support, and indeed he did, asking her to call the Le Buisson gendarmerie and for her own team to join him at the shop. And could she arrange for roadblocks to be established at Siorac, Lalinde and outside Sarlat? No sooner had he closed his phone than it rang again, J-J calling this time.
“Have those special forces teams arrived yet?” asked Bruno.
“They just landed in Bordeaux, haven’t been briefed yet.”
“If they have their copter, better get them moving and see if you can brief them in flight. I’m on my way to Le Buisson, with two squads of gendarmes on the way. Yveline is asking for roadblocks.”
“That’s what I want you to do,” said J-J. “No point in going to the shop if they’ve left, but could you set up a roadblock outside St. Denis?”
“A roadblock? What with? I only have a handgun.”
There was a pause before J-J replied, “You’ll just have to do your best. I’ve got motorbike cops heading your way. Where do you plan your roadblock?”
“I’ll do it at the turnoff to Limeuil and try to get Yveline’s gendarmes to join me.”
“I’ll get her general to call her. Now get on with it.”
Driving one handed as he tried to call the baron, Bruno navigated the sharp S-bend at the railway crossing and then drove on cautiously, watching the oncoming traffic for a white van.
“Baron,” he said when the call was answered. “Can you come to the Limeuil turnoff on the road to Le Buisson with your hunting guns? Please call other hunters from our club and ask them to do the same. We’ve got an emergency, terrorists, probably armed. I’m setting up a roadblock there with my van.”
“As soon as I can,” the baron replied, a veteran who knew better than to waste time with questions. He’d been in the Algerian War, and despite his age he still played tennis, hunted regularly and was a fine shot.
At the Limeuil turnoff, Bruno stopped, his car across the center of the road. Leaving his blue light flashing, he pulled out the accident hazard–warning triangles from the back of his van and extended the blockade with them. He left only a narrow route through, part of it on a grass verge that bordered a ditc
h so any vehicle coming through would be forced to slow down. Then he put on a flak vest, left from a previous operation, over his uniform jacket.
The first vehicle that came was a tractor, driven by a farmer he knew, who stopped and eyed Bruno curiously.
“Emergency, Pierre,” said Bruno, his eyes on the road behind the tractor. “There are some armed criminals on the loose. Sorry, but I have to commandeer your tractor. Could you use it to block the road where I’ve put the accident triangles. Then I’d like you to get in the ditch and stay there until reinforcements get here.”
Pierre did as he was told, climbed down and asked, “Have you got another gun? I did my national service in the infantry.”
“Thanks, but no, only my own weapon. Sorry, I’d use you if I could.”
A small blue Ford driven by a middle-aged woman stopped at the roadblock, and Bruno waved her through. She was followed by an old Citroën he recognized, driven by Dr. Gelletreau.
“What’s this, Bruno? I’m due to be at the clinic.”
Bruno explained and asked the doctor to park his car behind the tractor, and then to stand by with his medical bag in case he was needed. Then from behind came the tooting of a horn and the baron’s stately Citroën DS cruised up to join them. From the backseat he took a shotgun and two Verney-Carron hunting rifles, each with a bolt action. He handed one to Bruno with a magazine already loaded, left the shotgun resting on the roof of Bruno’s van and then loaded his own rifle.
“What’s this roadblock for?” he asked.
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