by Nell Goddin
That was no television show. It was no joke.
Molly had never thought of herself as having an especially strong sense of justice, at least no stronger than any other typical, law-abiding person. But perhaps she had been wrong about that. She felt a sort of outrage when she thought about a murderer sitting in the dove-gray dining room at La Métairie, deciding for her or himself who should live and who should die. The arrogance was unspeakable. Molly wanted to see the smug expression on the murderer’s face fall as he or she was marched off to prison.
With a start Molly realized she had gotten all the way to the épicerie without seeing where she was walking. She went in, grateful for the heat, and picked out a couple of bottles of red wine. She added a handful of caramels at the cash register but did no conversing because the young woman at checkout had a funny accent and Molly couldn’t understand a word she said. Was it a speech impediment or a regional accent that made her sound as though her mouth was full of marshmallows?
What she wanted was a villager to talk to her about the guests at the party. But where would she find anyone on a cold Monday afternoon? All of Castillac was holed up someplace warm, out of sight. There was no market, no public gathering place in December. While she waited for an idea, Molly left the épicerie and headed, as though on a track, to Pâtisserie Bujold. It was toasty inside and it felt as though the heavenly aromas were almost solid, wrapping her up in a delicious vanilla blanket.
“Bonjour, Monsieur,” she mumbled to the proprietor, who as usual stared delightedly at her chest instead of making eye contact.
“Madame Sutton! It makes me very happy to see you today. Would you like your usual?”
She wasn’t sure whether to be happy or sad that she had a “usual” at the pâtisserie. She did make a pig of herself, it was true. But these almond croissants, today—these were strictly medicinal. She had a murder to solve but no way to find anyone she needed to talk to. Surely an almond croissant would help.
Then, after so many rambling thoughts, Molly had a moment of clarity: it was Adèle Faure she needed to talk to.
But how to find her?
15
1969
Josephine had studied the fashion magazines carefully and put in plenty of time practicing at her vanity table. She had it now, the perfect cat’s-eye eyelining technique, the black line thickening and swooping up as it went past the outer end of her eyelid—a confident, unwavering line, the epitome of modern. She was wearing a pair of silk bikini underwear Albert had sent her when he was off on a business trip, with a silk bra to match, all in the most flattering rosy peach color. She stood and walked to her bedroom door, then whirled around to catch herself in the vanity mirror—yes, she was practically Jean Shrimpton. How could he resist?
Josephine slipped a clingy Pucci dress on. Her feet were bare, and her chestnut hair tied in a cascading topknot just like the model’s on the cover of that month’s Vogue. She went barefoot because she had gotten the idea that Albert liked her feet. Padding downstairs to his office, she paused for a moment on the stairs, watching herself as though she were in a movie: seeing herself glide down the wide stairs, her legs shapely, her makeup perfect. Seeing herself go to her husband’s door, and slowly open it.
Transfixed by her vision, she imagined Albert leaping up from his desk, his face turning red from desire just at the sight of her, screws and wires and bolts dropping to the floor in his haste to come to her.
Josephine approached his office, her steps quiet. Still, it was as though a camera were going, as though she were not one person but rather several, one of whom was always observing. She was always her own audience and never fully whole.
“Albert,” she said, as sweetly as she could.
Albert did not look up.
“Give me a moment, if you would,” he said. On his desk was a magnifying apparatus and he was looking through it at something vanishingly tiny on his deck. Keeping the rest of his body as still as possible, he reached in with a minuscule pair of tweezers and then pulled them back, resting his hand on the edge of his desk, staring intently into the apparatus.
“Albert!” said Josephine, her fantasy breaking up, feeling as though the jagged bits and pieces of it swirled around her head and into her mouth, threatening to choke her. “You won’t so much as look up when I come in? You won’t stop your work for just one single solitary instant?” For a moment she stood trembling, jaw clenched. And then in her rage she reached over to his desk and picked up a musty-smelling book. “This is what I think of you and your stupid work!” She threw the book directly at the magnifying apparatus, knocking it to the floor, although Albert had moved quickly and put his hands over the circuitry he was working on, and it remained safe.
After that, Josephine was unable to make any more unannounced appearances in Albert’s office, because he locked the door. A different sort of man might have divorced his violent wife, even though of course divorce was far less common then than it is now, and on top of that it would have killed his deeply Catholic mother. But Albert Desrosiers was a man who carried through with his commitments, even if those commitments turned out to be horrible mistakes, and so Josephine and Albert lived all the years of their marriage in separate forms of abject misery.
Though they were rich, which for Josephine at least, provided nearly enough compensation for the rest of it.
16
2005
“My Sabrina worked for her two years. I tell you, Desrosiers was a devil,” Jean-François said to his friend at the bar of Chez Papa. The friend nodded and drank his beer.
“You saw how my girl has to wear a splint on her hand? That old shrew set rat traps out, trying to hurt her!”
“Maybe the house had rats?”
“No! And the trap that got Sabrina was in a bucket, who sets a trap in a bucket? I’m telling you, it gave that harpy pleasure to hurt her. She knew Sabrina really needed that job. It’s not easy for immigrants to find decent work, you know that. Too many of our women end up having to clean for the capitalists!”
“Well, the old lady’s out of the picture anyway,” said the friend, with a sideways look at Jean-François. “So you gonna marry Sabrina now?”
“Pft. Sabrina and I, we are soul-mates. Documents from the state or the church, these do not matter to us. This is something you do not understand.”
“Oh, I think I do. I know, I know, hardly anyone gets married anymore. But all I’m saying, Jean-François, is that chicks like it when you ask them to get married. I don’t care how political they are. Socialists, communists, doesn’t matter. They can be anarchists to the marrow—they still like it.”
“You only say that because your mother is more religious than the Virgin Mary.”
“No, Jean-François, not at all. I say it because it’s true.”
“And you speak from your long experience of asking women to marry you? You are single, you crétin!”
The friend smirked and drank his beer.
“Another?” asked Nico, coming to their end of the bar.
“He’s already drunk,” said Jean-François, pointing at his friend. “Spouting more nonsense than you can believe.”
Nico drifted away back to the other end, where a good-looking Dutch woman was flirting with him.
Jean-François’s face darkened. “I love Sabrina more than life itself,” he said. “Why do you think I work so hard for the cause? It’s because I want a better life for my girl. This is love, yes?”
“Well, no, not in my book. But eh,” said the friend, shrugging and giving another sideways look. Jean-François loved to argue politics and always had, and could use it to justify anything he wanted to do or not do. “Anyway, Desrosiers crapped out from a heart attack, that’s what I heard. So who’s Sabrina going to for work now? A bad job is a whole lot better than no job.”
“Ah, no,” said Nico from down the bar, having heard that last remark. “What I heard was poison. Not heart attack after all.”
Jean-François did not look surprised.
“Well, poison is a woman’s weapon. I can tell you right now that no man with any balls is going to poison someone, especially a weak old woman.” He thought for a moment. “Not that she didn’t deserve it.”
Molly was just coming out of Pâtisserie Bujold with a bit of powdered sugar on her upper lip when far down the street she saw a woman in a chic trenchcoat, walking with a bit of a limp. That’s got to be Adèle, she thought, and hurried along, grateful that in a village where people walked almost everywhere it was possible to run into someone you were looking for. Molly’s legs were not long but Adèle was walking slowly, almost meditatively, and Molly had no trouble catching up with her.
“Oh my,” Molly said, out of breath. “I saw you—”
“Salut,” said Adèle, amused at Molly’s gasping for breath. “Are you training for some sort of event?”
“Yes. The fifty-yard dash while holding a bag of almond croissants,” she said.
Adèle smiled, but Molly stopped, her eyes wide. “Okay, I know that was not the best joke on earth. It was not even funny. But I think it may be the first joke I ever made in French, without thinking about it. I mean, the words just came out the way English words do. Or used to, I find I can’t really speak English all that well anymore, but that’s a different thing.”
Adèle applauded lightly and said, “Félicitations! My English is not the best and I agree that jokes are the most difficult. Which is quite a shame, since jokes—I mean, you know, laughing together, humor—that is the joy in life, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Molly agreed. They walked part of a block in silence, Molly trying to figure out a way to ask Adèle about the guests at her aunt’s birthday party without seeming like a terrific busybody. Even though she admitted to herself that’s exactly what she was.
“So Adèle, I know we’ve really barely met, and it’s sort of a delicate subject to talk about, but I heard the news about your Aunt.”
Adèle looked at Molly in surprise. “What?” she said, confused.
“I know, it does seem like there’s an underground or even magical communication system in Castillac where people instantly find out the news about everyone else. I’m not a part of it, myself, really—but I have a friend…anyway, I’m sure your family is shocked. I know I was,” she added, disingenuously. She felt quite proud at having thought of poison before hearing about it, but she couldn’t exactly tell Adèle that.
Adèle stopped. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand you. I…I mean, I understand the words you’re saying, but not the meaning?”
“Shall I speak in English then?”
“I don’t think that would improve matters,” said Adèle. She started walking again. “Oh, look, I adore this little boutique. The woman who owns it has impeccable taste, don’t you think? Look at those hats!” she said, pointing at the display in the window.
Molly wasn’t sure whether she had been brushed off or hadn’t been making sense. Both equally possible. In that moment Adèle seemed like the answer to everything—she would have history and details about everyone at the party. But how to get her to talk?
Molly made agreeable noises about the hats without paying them any attention. Then she pulled out her phone to check the time. “Oh look, it’s after 5. Wait, let me think…it’s after 17. Is that right?”
Adèle smiled. She liked this woman who tried so hard to take on everything about French life—look at her with her market basket, her scarf, and now using the 24-hour clock. The sweatpants not so much, but Adèle was willing to give her a pass this once.
“Would you like to go somewhere for a kir?” Molly asked.
“Bon,” said Adèle with a nod, and steered Molly down a street she hadn’t seen before, and into a small bar with no sign outside.
“Sort of mysterious,” said Molly. “Interesting.” Which meant, What the hell kind of place is this?
The place was dark with purple lighting. The tables, the bar, even the napkins were black. It felt rebellious and young and to Molly’s mind did not fit with the well-dressed, mature Adèle. Clearly she needed to get to know her better.
“So here’s a typical American’s question,” she said as they waited for their drinks. “But I don’t mean it to be rude. What kind of work do you do?”
“Ah yes,” said Adèle, motioning to the bartender.
“Wait, no—let me guess. Is it anything to do with fashion?”
Adèle laughed, “Not even a tiny bit. Why in the world would you guess that?”
Molly shrugged. “You’re always so well put together. Your clothes are really, really nice.”
“That’s habit more that anything else. It was important to my mother, when I was growing up, that my appearance was…that it had a certain polish. Which is a bit odd, actually, because she doesn’t care a fig about clothes or her own looks. As you might have noticed!” she added, laughing.
Molly laughed too, a little nervously because how early in a friendship can you have a good laugh over how dowdy the other person’s mother is? Back in America she would have had a feel for it, but here in Castillac, she wasn’t so sure. “Well, whatever the reason, every time I see you, I adore your outfit.”
God, do I sound like the most ridiculous suck-up?
“I am confused about what you said earlier,” said Adèle. She smoothed her wool skirt with both hands. “You mentioned something about getting the news of my aunt. What do you mean? You were the one who discovered her, after all.”
“Oh, I mean the new news,” said Molly, wondering how Adèle had not heard of the poisoning. Had Dufort not even told the family yet? Or did the family not talk to each other? “Um, no one has said anything about…?” Molly sent a pleading look to the bartender to hurry up with the kirs, but she was leaning on her elbows in deep conversation with a man with six ear piercings. “Okay, well, this is awkward. But I heard that your aunt was poisoned.”
Adèle sat very still. Her eyes widened and she looked away from Molly. Molly saw that she was breathing rapidly and her nostrils flared.
It certainly looked like Adèle was surprised, but the main feeling Molly sensed in her new friend was fear.
17
“Poisoned?” said Adèle, almost too quietly for Molly to hear.
Molly nodded. “Yes. I’m…I’m so sorry. It’s sort of scary to think that whoever did it was probably at that birthday party. Your aunt seemed fine earlier in the evening, right?”
“We always said she’d outlive us all.” Adèle was holding on to the bar with both hands. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m…I’m in shock, to be honest. You did say poisoned?”
“I know! I mean, who would want to kill a little old lady?”
“That’s the thing, Molly. With Aunt Josephine…possibly a lot of people.”
“Not the most popular?”
“No. I don’t think she had any friends. Michel said he was scraping the barrel to come up with guests for her surprise party. As far as family, Maman is her only sibling and they couldn’t be more different. Maman is hard-working and uncomplaining. She hasn’t been a perfect mother, but then who has? She raised Michel and me by herself, and we turned out all right—she adopted Michel when he was just a baby, because she likes kids so much. But Josephine?” Adèle shook her head and let out a bitter chuckle. “Her whole life has been about trying to get under other people’s skin. At best she was an annoyance, at worst….at worst something approaching sadistic. No, not approaching. Absolutely sadistic. The poor people who have worked for her have really gotten it bad these last few years. She goes through housekeepers and gardeners at a pretty good clip, as you might imagine.”
Molly was listening intently, hoping she would elaborate. Finally she said, “Like…what kind of stuff did she do?”
“Well…” Adèle closed her eyes for a moment, remembering. “How about the time she switched all the gardening chemicals around? She emptied everything out of bottles and boxes—and believe me, we’re not talking about non-toxic organic stuff, either—an
d then she put everything back but all in the wrong containers. The gardener thought he was using a solution of fish meal but got muriatic acid instead. He was in the hospital for a month with disfiguring burns from that little trick.”
“Wow,” said Molly, searching for what to say when someone’s just announced her relative is a monster. “Did she get arrested or anything for that?”
“No way. The gardener just wanted to heal up and get as far away from her as possible. People were scared of her, Molly. I know it seems crazy, she looked harmless enough. But Aunt Josephine was anything but harmless. She lived to hurt people and she didn’t just daydream about it, she acted on her horrible twisted impulses—and the gardening chemical story is just an example of something I knew about. I hate to think of what she pulled off that no one ever found out.” Adèle shivered and tossed back the rest of her kir.
The bartender broke away from the guy she was talking to and came over. “Want another?” she said, scooping up a small bowl of chips from a bin under the bar and putting it in front of Adèle.
“Yes,” said Adèle. “Please.”
“Did she ever hurt you?” Molly asked gently.
Adèle swung her long blonde hair onto her back. “Not really. Nothing like what she did to the people who worked for her. She didn’t like me—she glowered at me, pinched me when I was a little girl to make me cry, always quick with a cutting remark…but luckily for Michel and me, our family did not get together with Aunt Josephine all that often. Brief events at holidays, that sort of thing. Months would go by without our seeing her.”
Molly sipped her kir, wishing she had asked for a hot chocolate instead, something homey and comforting. She tucked her hands under her scarf and crossed her fingers. “Would you mind talking to me about the other guests? That night when you all came in, I was so curious about how everyone was related.”
No, I don’t mind,” said Adèle, a little woodenly. “It wasn’t a large party, as you could see. Aunt Josephine used to talk about how all her friends were dead, but the truth is, I don’t think she ever had many friends. She…she was difficult, you understand, not just as an old person, but going way back.”
