by Nell Goddin
Lawrence shrugged. “Maybe. If he knew.”
“You know. Why do you think Pierre didn’t?”
Lawrence smiled. “Because I know practically everything, my dear. Haven’t I convinced you of that yet?”
“Hold on a second. Nico—did you know anything about Iris having an affair?”
Nico shook his head, not making eye contact and continuing to cut lemons.
“You’re all completely exasperating!” said Molly, getting back on her stool and drinking her kir, determined to get the name of Iris’s lover out of Lawrence if it was the last thing she did on this earth.
16
It was Tuesday, the day of Iris Gault’s funeral. Molly got up early. She was feeling morose and trying to shake it off. She didn’t think she deserved to feel sad—she’d barely met the woman after all. But murder had an effect, not only on Molly but on many in the village: they felt as though no one was safe, not really. It wasn’t that they expected Iris’s killer to keep on killing, picking off Castillaçois one by one. It was more that if a familiar married couple like Iris and Pierre had argued, and that had led to the fatal shove down the stairs—well, that could happen to anyone, couldn’t it? Was everyone just one bad day away from getting offed?
Coffee in hand, Molly halfheartedly wandered around the backyard with Bobo, who did her usual bounding and and flying ahead and then hilariously skidding to change direction, but Molly wasn’t paying attention. She turned her head at the sound of a car and Bobo streaked around the side of the house, barking her I-know-you welcoming bark.
I suppose it’s Ben, thought Molly, and the corners of her mouth lifted a tiny bit in spite of herself. She stood up straight and followed Bobo, curious to hear if he had any new information to share. She figured she would have to tell him about Iris’s affair, but she planned to hold the news back for as long as she could, simply because she was feeling ornery.
Ben and Molly did not say anything at first, but both were sorry about yesterday’s spat and it showed in their expressions. They kissed on both cheeks and stood holding hands for a moment, the hot sun beating down on them though it was only eight in the morning.
“Iris was having an affair,” Molly blurted out, her orneriness melted by the feel of Ben’s hands in hers.
Ben looked startled. “Who did you hear that from?” he asked.
Molly shook her head. “I can’t say.”
“Lawrence.”
Molly shrugged. “So Pierre hasn’t said anything to you about it?”
“It might not be true,” said Dufort. “I would imagine the rumors about Iris and other men have been bubbling along for years, nothing but fantasies.”
“My source is solid.”
“Well, even if the entire village believes it, we need to have some proof before racing along whatever avenues an affair seems to open up.”
“If you want to get all nit-picky about it, whether it’s a rumor or not doesn’t actually matter. It’s whether Pierre believed she was having an affair—that’s what matters.”
“Only if you—” Ben closed his mouth and looked down at the ground for a moment. “How about we go inside. You can pour me a cup of your very good and strong coffee. And we can talk this through.”
Molly took a deep breath. Why did he have to be so pig-headed? Couldn’t he see?
Once they were in the shade of the terrace with fresh cups of coffee, Molly said, “All right, there’s no point in arguing back and forth until we have more evidence. How can we go about getting that? Who do you think is a likely lover for Iris? Who were their friends?”
“I didn’t see them socially. I gather neither of them went out much—Iris was in her garden most of her free time, and Pierre…he works. Always got at least one big project going, sometimes more than that.”
“She must have been lonely.”
“Possibly. Or maybe she liked spending time by herself. Not everyone is a raging extrovert,” he said affectionately, and ruffled her hair. Molly smiled. “It’s sort of bad timing with the funeral today, but I plan to ask Pierre to let me search the house. I’ll go through Iris’s things with this affair idea in mind. Probably Maron has already taken her computer and phone. I doubt he’s going to be open-handed about anything he uncovers.”
“I wish Thérèse were still here. And it’s too bad people don’t write letters anymore.”
“Yes. A shame for many reasons. I have not written or received any romantic emails, how about you?”
Molly just hooted. “Listen. I don’t want to fight with you over this case, Ben. But here’s how I see it. Iris was having a kind of midlife crisis. So like—she’s hit her forties, and wondering if her life is pretty much done. In her view she’s going to keep serving lunch to the kids in the cantine until she’s too old to work. She’s going to spend all her energy maintaining an incredible garden, because her husband barely speaks to her—”
“—hold on—”
“Let me finish. So, she’s not ready to have one foot in the casket yet. She takes a lover. And oh yes! It’s amazing to have someone appreciate her! She feels young again! Loved! Except…Pierre finds out. He’s furious. They argue, and the next thing you know, Iris is lying at the foot of the stairs with a broken neck. Pierre didn’t mean to, not really. It was a heat of the moment kind of thing.
“So what I’m saying is that it wasn’t a planned murder, he didn’t do it to get the insurance money or anything like that. A burst of anger, of passion….”
“You could be right.”
Molly forced herself not to cheer.
“But I do not believe you are. I know you think that since I have known Pierre all my life that I cannot be objective. And maybe you are correct about that. But it also means that I have an understanding of him that goes quite deep, even though we are not the best of friends and never have been. Proximity for all those years, it adds up to something, Molly.”
“Something I will never have.”
“Not for Castillac, not for a long while, no. But of course fresh eyes are valuable too, in their way.” Ben stretched out his legs and drank some coffee. “You don’t have any croissants lying around, do you?”
“Shockingly, no. For once.”
“All right, my turn. Here’s my version of what happened, off the top of my head with this new information you’ve gathered about the affair. Let’s say you have it all exactly right about the state Iris was in and why she started the affair to begin with. But then something goes wrong. She wants more. She wants her lover to take her away from Castillac, to start a new life in Switzerland, or America…but the lover refuses, for any of a million reasons. Perhaps he only wanted Iris briefly, to prove that he could have the most beautiful woman in the village. Or perhaps he was married, and unable or unwilling to leave his wife.
“They quarrel, and Iris is terribly angry and hurt and she moves to shove him—not to hurt him, only to convey her frustration—and he steps aside, purely out of instinct, and she tumbles downstairs.”
“Or…Iris could have broken the affair off, and it was the lover who pushed her.”
“That too.”
They sat, watching Bobo’s speckled head appear and disappear in the tall grass of the meadow, tail wagging like mad.
“We have a lot of work to do,” said Ben.
“You’re right. Okay, what time is the funeral? Want to go together?”
Ben laughed. “We’re probably the only couple in the Dordogne who thinks of a funeral as a really good date.”
“Maybe it’s insensitive,” Maron was saying to Monsour as they walked up Pierre Gault’s driveway the morning of his wife’s funeral. “But he’s likely to be feeling his loss this morning, of all mornings. We want to see him when his wife’s death is hitting him hard.”
Monsour nodded. He had never had anything to do with a murder apart from watching them on television dramas, and he was looking forward to making quick work of this guilty husband.
“Not a word out of you
,” said Maron. “Let me do the talking.”
They rapped on the door. Maron felt a trickle of sweat run down under his collar. He wished he’d gotten a haircut recently; he hated feeling damp hair on his neck.
“I don’t hear anything.”
“I told you, not a word!” Maron cocked his head, listening. From far away, he could hear slow, heavy steps. He imagined Pierre walking downstairs, half-dressed, trying to make himself look as innocent as possible. Maybe even faking some tears.
The door creaked open. “Yes, officers, what can I do for you?”
“We’d like a word. I understand Iris’s funeral is today—”
“—in a little over an hour—”
“—which will give us plenty of time. Sorry to bother you on what must be a terrible and sad day for you.” Maron looked carefully at Pierre.
Pierre shrugged. “I need about five minutes to finish getting ready, that’s all. Whatever you need.” He walked into the living room and gestured for the gendarmes to follow.
“I imagine I don’t need to tell you that you’re in a bad position,” started off Maron. His stomach was feeling jumpy and he wished he’d planned out what to say more thoroughly.
Pierre gave a short nod. He did not look concerned.
“So to begin with, if you would tell us your whereabouts on last Friday? The evening of July 11. From nine to eleven.”
Pierre sighed. He scratched his forehead. “I’m doing a job, over at the Lafont’s. Part I’m on now is a circular staircase made of limestone. It’s quite tricky. People don’t appreciate the engineering that goes into something like that, with these large blocks of stone needing to be supported as the structure rises up through the air in a column—”
“Yes, I’m sure it’s quite complicated,” said Maron. “Your whereabouts?”
“I was at the Lafont’s until after dark, then dropped by Chez Papa before coming home. I’ve got some lights set up so I’m not a slave to sunset. I worked on the staircase until around 9, and then neatened up after that. It was dark but I have the lights. Customers are happier if you keep a neat workspace, and I’m a thousand times happier. Can’t abide mess.”
“And so you left the Lafont’s at what time?”
“I didn’t look at my watch.”
“But sometime after dark.”
“That’s what I said, yes.”
Maron and Monsour couldn’t miss that Pierre’s annoyance.
“And when at last you got home, what did you find?”
Pierre looked at Maron as though he had two heads. “My wife, lying on the kitchen floor. Is that what you mean? Is this meant to be an interrogation? Because I don’t mind telling you, Officer Maron, you’re very bad at it.” Pierre looked amused.
“Are you not interested in catching your wife’s killer, Monsieur Gault?” asked Maron.
“Of course. Which is why your taking up my time with this inanity on the day I have to bury Iris is trying my patience.”
“I hear you are a very patient man,” said Monsour. “Would you agree with that?
Maron glared at Monsour.
“Stonework requires it,” Pierre answered. “Now, if that is all? I’d like to be on time. I’m sure you understand.”
Maron and Monsour were ushered back outside into the heat, Maron racking his brain for some other questions to ask, something that would stop this arrogant man in his tracks. The fact that Gault was not falling over himself to help the investigation was very damning in Maron’s view.
When he was in Paris, Maron hadn’t been afraid of anyone. Now that he was in charge of the small force in Castillac, he was constantly off-balance, his confidence wavering. I’m going to nail Pierre Gault, he said to himself as he and Monsour walked back to the station. I’ll prove I don’t need Dufort holding my hand to get this guy in handcuffs.
That’ll put things right again.
It was curious, at least to some.
Iris, whose physical gifts were so extraordinary she should have been whisked off to Hollywood, or at the very least walking the runways of Chanel and splashed on the cover of Vogue, had different ambitions. She simply wanted a houseful of children and a happy family to cook for, and garden to putter in. Some villagers kept hoping she would take off for New York or Los Angeles or Paris and make the village proud, but Iris never showed even a flicker of interest in any of that.
She married the stonemason who doted on her and settled into the house his parents had left him when they died. Everyone who knew her expected pregnancies to come right after. But they did not.
Three years after the wedding, when Iris and Pierre were still quite young and Iris’s beauty undiminished, Pierre disappeared on a mysterious errand one Saturday morning. Iris showed only mild curiosity about where he was going and went to the garden to start the day’s work.
At Madame Langevin’s florist shop, Pierre was not buying flowers but talking to the proprietress, whose old friend in Paris was a friend of a talent scout for a famous modeling agency. Only a few degrees of separation there, it wasn’t wrong to use connections when you had them, right? And surely if the desired children were not appearing—for whatever reason—his wife would want to find something else to do. Something that would use her talents to best advantage, thought Pierre. Something that would give her the honor she deserved.
Madame Langevin was happy to help. The friend of a friend came through, and with the agent’s name and number in hand, Pierre proceeded to the travel agency and made arrangements for him and Iris to go to Paris for a week. He had never spent so much money before on something so intangible, but it gave him a thrill to be arranging a surprise for his wife, knowing how complimented and encouraged she would feel by his gesture.
“My love!” he exclaimed when he got back to the house and found her still in the garden. A spot of mud darkened her cheek and he noticed that she had thrown off her gloves as she often did, preferring to feel the dirt and plants with her bare hands.
“What is it?” Iris said, unfolding her long legs and standing up with a faint smile.
“I have quite a surprise for you.” Pierre put his large hand on her shoulder and squeezed it. He wanted to prolong the moment of anticipation, of imagining her happy reaction.
“Well?” she prodded.
“We’re going to Paris in two weeks. I’ve bought train tickets and made hotel reservations.”
“Oh! That’s…that’s lovely of you,” said Iris, her voice dropping. “For how long? We don’t want to miss the first roses blooming. I think this year they’re really going to come into their own.”
Pierre dropped his hand from her shoulder. “Forget the roses for a minute. The trip is only part of it. I’ve also arranged for you to have a meeting with an agent. He works for Elite, one of the top agencies in the world if Madame Langevin knows anything, and I think she does.”
Iris looked up into her husband’s eyes. They stared at each other for a long, long moment. Iris felt as though her blood was draining down away from her head, imagining for a split second that it was running right out of the bottoms of her feet and into the ground where she stood.
“I thought I’d explained,” she said quietly. “I…I don’t want that.”
“But Iris! You must know how much—”
“I’ve told you, being in magazines, all that stuff…it doesn’t matter to me. I have no desire at all to leave here. Is money the problem? I’ve told you, I am more than happy to work. I would be glad to get a job here in Castillac.”
“No!” Pierre shouted. “It’s not money! Money is not the point at all!”
Iris stepped back. She looked down at the tender rose leaves just unfurling from a Comte de Chambord. She raised her eyes once more, hoping to see some softness in her husband’s expression, or at least a willingness to understand what she had tried to explain to him so many times. She did not like being the center of attention; all she wanted was babies, and failing that, to work in her garden.
But Pier
re was glowering at the Comte de Chambord and he reached out and tore off a fresh green shoot loaded with tiny buds, then threw it on the garden path and stomped on it.
Iris walked rapidly around the side of the house, picking up a pair of gardening shears on the way, and busied herself with pruning the wisteria in the front arbor while tears spilled down her cheeks. Pierre stood in the garden utterly baffled, tiny rivulets of blood marking where the rose thorns had torn up his hand.
17
The last funeral Molly had gone to was the one for Joséphine Desrosiers the previous fall. It had been raining a little, and there had only been a handful of mourners present (if you could even call them that, Joséphine not being known for her warmth and generosity.) The Gault ceremony was shaping up to be an entirely different thing; as Molly and Ben walked down rue des Chênes to the small village cemetery, they could see a long line of cars parked, reaching almost all the way to the village. A crowd stood by the iron gate and another throng was inside. It looked as though every single resident of Castillac was in attendance.
“I don’t see Pierre, do you?” Ben murmured, taking Molly’s hand.
Molly squeezed his hand and shook her head. “The whole world is here! She must have been very popular.”
“Or admired. Not really the same, is it.”
“When you’re young, being admired seems like exactly what you want. But it’s really not worth that much, I don’t think. Nothing compared to having real friends.”
Ben nodded. He was scanning the crowd and nodding at people he knew. “Madame Bonnay,” he said. “Is Yves well?”
“Very well,” answered Madame Bonnay. “But this—it is wrong for us to be at Iris’s funeral. She was taken too young, too young indeed!”
Ben nodded and pulled Molly behind a mausoleum. “If she was having an affair,” he whispered, “then he’ll be here, almost certainly.”
Molly nodded. “Let’s split up. We’ll be able to watch more people that way.”
