Nightmare in Burgundy (The Winemaker Detective Series)
Page 10
“What is she up against, now?” Virgile asked, somewhat worried.
“Compared to what she has been through, she’s not in danger anymore. She’ll be able to get better treatment. After all, she didn’t kill anyone. She’ll surely be charged with disturbing the peace and defacing private property. But in my opinion, her mental state will be taken into consideration.”
“And yet, two teens were slain because of her, in a way. That’s the worst thing, it seems to me.”
“Indeed, that’s the most tragic part of the whole story. Their burial is next Monday in Gilly, and there may be a big turnout. Robert Bressel will have his front-page article.”
Cooker flashed his headlights to keep a Spanish truck from cutting him off while passing. The road sign announced that Bordeaux was four hundred and fifty miles away, and the night promised to be a long one.
“In my opinion, the librarian had guessed the whole thing,” Cooker continued, putting on the windshield wipers. “He knew Murielle Grangeon well enough and was aware that there were few individuals capable of quoting the Psalms of David and the Book of the Prophets by heart and knowing the old local traditions as well as she did. I do not deny that I suspected him of being involved in some way. After all, he also had sufficient motives for wanting revenge.”
“I personally think that it was honorable of him to say nothing,” Virgile murmured.
“Maybe Brother Clément had also guessed a lot of things. Murielle had often consulted him during her research. When I think back on everything that he told me, there were actually lots of clues to put me on the right track. Pierre-Jean Bressel emphasized the presence of children in all of the haunted-house stories. Brother Clément always brought me back to the themes of the vine, sorrow, and injustice, as if he were trying to steer me in the right direction. And then there was the owl reference that could have been read as a pelican, which relates to the sacrifice of mothers. Perhaps I should have known that we weren’t necessarily dealing with a man.”
“What did the monk say to you when he was dying?”
“Honora Dominum et vino torcularia redundabunt.”
“And what does that mean?”
“Honor the Lord, and vats will overflow with wine.”
“Magnificent! Imagine. His last word was ‘wine.’ I would love to die that way,” Virgile said with a yawn.
“Not really, his last word was ‘redundabunt’ because you always place the verb at the end of a sentence in Latin. As for the rest, the question is not so much knowing what you say at the moment of death but how you say it.”
La Traviata took off on a thrilling flight that the violins could not bring back to earth.
“You see, Virgile, we wandered in the age of the Pharisees, in the footsteps of the apostles and the mystic Jews. We experienced the tonsure of Cîteaux and the dungeons of the Middle Ages. We even came close to believing in the devil and ghosts, and finally, it was nothing but a modern story: divorced unemployed mother no longer entitled to benefits, children taken away, court orders. Hopelessly modern!”
Cooker turned to look at his assistant. Virgile had fallen asleep. He was snoring peacefully, his mouth half open like an angel. Cooker swerved a bit as he reached for his coat to cover his passenger. Then he lowered the volume of La Traviata until she didn’t have a breath of life left in her.
“Sweet dreams, my boy. Come the night, all is forgotten.”
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The Winemaker Detective Series
A total Epicurean immersion in French countryside and gourmet attitude with two expert winemakers turned amateur sleuths gumshoeing around wine country. The following titles are currently available in English.
Treachery in Bordeaux
The start of this wine plus crime mystery series, this journey to Bordeaux takes readers behind the scenes of a grand cru wine estate that has fallen victim to either negligence or sabotage. World-renowned winemaker turned gentleman detective Benjamin Cooker sets out to find out what happened and why. Who would want to target this esteemed vintner?
www.treacheryinbordeaux.com
Grand Cru Heist
In another Epicurean journey in France, renowned wine critic Benjamin Cooker’s world gets turned upside down one night in Paris. He retreats to the region around Tours to recover. There a flamboyant British dandy, a spectacular blue-eyed blond, a zealous concierge, and touchy local police disturb his well-deserved rest. From the Loire Valley to Bordeaux, in between a glass of Vouvray and a bottle of Saint-Émilion, the Winemaker Detective and his assistant Virgile turn PI to solve two murders and very particular heist. Who stole those bottles of grand cru classé?
www.grandcruheist.com
About the Authors
Noël Balen (left) and Jean-Pierre Alaux (right).
(©David Nakache)
Jean-Pierre Alaux and Noël Balen came up with the Winemaker Detective over a glass of wine, of course. Jean-Pierre Alaux is a magazine, radio, and television journalist when he is not writing novels in southwestern France. He is a genuine wine and food lover, and won the Antonin Carême prize for his cookbook La Truffe sur le Soufflé, which he wrote with the chef Alexis Pélissou. He is the grandson of a winemaker and exhibits a real passion for wine and winemaking. For him, there is no greater common denominator than wine. Coauthor of the series Noël Balen lives in Paris, where he shares his time between writing, making records, and lecturing on music. He plays bass, is a music critic, and has authored a number of books about musicians, in addition to his novel and short-story writing.
About the Translator
Sally Pane studied French at State University of New York Oswego and the Sorbonne before receiving her master’s degree in French literature from the University of Colorado where she wrote Camus and the Americas: A Thematic Analysis of Three Works Based on His Journaux de Voyage. Her career includes more than twenty years of translating and teaching French and Italian at Berlitz and at Colorado University Boulder. She has worked in scientific, legal and literary translation; her literary translations include Operatic Arias; Singers Edition, and Reality and the Untheorizable by Clément Rosset. She also served as the interpreter for the government cabinet of Rwanda and translated for Dian Fossey’s Digit Fund. In addition to her passion for French, she has studied Italian at Colorado University, in Rome and in Siena. She lives in Boulder, Colorado, with her husband.
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Contents
Cover
Praise
Title
Info
Quote
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Thank you
Winemaker Detective Series
About the Authors
About the Translator
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