A Bouquet of Rue

by Wendy Hornsby

  Helping himself to oysters, David opened the conversation after catching Jean-Paul’s eye. “Maggie, my friend, Jeep, here, mentioned on the walk over that you had some interest in the case of a missing girl. Sounds to me like an ordinary situation where an adolescent, as an act of rebellion, does a runner. What intrigues you about it?”

  “I think the girl didn’t intend to run. If we believe Ahmad Nabi, the boy she was last seen with, she lied to her parents to get permission to stay out a few extra hours because she had something to talk over with a person she did not name. I have a bad feeling that the meeting didn’t go as planned.”

  “And you don’t trust the police to handle the situation?”

  “I do. But when Nabi showed up in our backyard we were suddenly put into the middle of the drama,” I said, squeezing a lemon wedge over my oysters. “He’s a very sympathetic kid. When he told us that he was a target for bullying, my heart went out to him.”

  “The mother instinct, yes?” he said, smiling. Next to me, Jean-Paul slid an oyster off its shell into his mouth and declared it perfect.

  “Some parental feelings, sure,” I said. “But I think it was when I met the boy’s grandmother that I became more interested. There she was, a cultured woman, obviously a member of the Afghan elite before her family was targeted by the Taliban, now working as a nanny and housekeeper. Her grandson, the only family she has left, is allowed by her employers to live with her in the servants’ quarters, but she can’t get away from her duties to participate in most of his school activities and he is not allowed to bring his friends over. On weekends, when I imagine her employers are around, Nabi goes away to work. The grandmother seems to feel very tentative about the security of her situation, and I wonder if she thinks she needs to keep the boy as invisible to her employers as possible. At the same time, she worries that he could become angry enough or feel alienated enough that he might succumb to extremism, as other Muslim refugee youth have. The two of them fled from one sort of hell into another.”

  David dabbed his lips with his napkin. “Smart of her to keep an eye out for the boy.”

  “It struck me that at the same time Nabi and his grandmother accept their less-than-perfect situation so that they can have a roof over their heads, a girl, his only friend, is in full rebellion against her own materially comfortable circumstances. I can’t help wondering what her issues are.”

  “Drugs, a boy, parental rules?” David said. “By the way, the wine is exquisite.”

  “Happy you approve.” I turned to Jean-Paul. “Have you heard anything like that about Ophelia?”

  He shook his head. “Drugs or boys? No. But both are possible. Don’t forget, I’ve been away.”

  “Sure, but you’ve known the Fouchets for a while. I hear their household is, well, stormy, and that they are very strict with Ophelia.”

  “Marian mentioned once that it wouldn’t surprise her if Ophelia rebelled one day,” he said. “She thought that Yvan and Claire, the parents, expected too much from the girl. And maybe too much from each other. Not a cheerful pair, on the whole. So, here it is, unhappy Ophelia has run away, and not for the first time.”

  I turned to David, who was heaping yet another empty oyster shell onto the neat pile on his plate. “The detective on the case, Fleur Delisle, referred to Ophelia as a delinquent. Does running away make her a delinquent?”

  Again, he caught Jean-Paul’s eye before he spoke. “Possibly. I cannot speak about a specific case, you understand, but there are all sorts of status offenses runaways commonly commit, such as shoplifting or panhandling, or perhaps squatting in a vacant building. It is common for squatters to build fires to cook or keep warm and the fire gets out of hand. At the more serious end of the spectrum are drugs, prostitution, and so on. It’s possible that your Detective Delisle merely made an offhand remark and the girl has no actual history of offenses, other than running away.”

  “I thought of that,” I said, looking up as my plate of empty oyster shells disappeared; we had eaten all of them. “Delisle is hardly forthcoming with information.”

  “Good. A discreet cop.”

  There was no hurrying about the meal. Soiled plates were removed right away, but we were given a little time to relax between courses. One after the other, a salad of fresh green beans and hazelnuts appeared in front of me, followed by coq au vin. Wineglasses never went completely empty. And the conversation moved on from missing teenagers to the problem of bullying, not only among children at school, but in the workplace. I picked up my knife and fork and turned my attention to the bird in front of me, but before cutting into it I glanced at my lunchmates. Their heads were bent over their plates, beef filet for Jean-Paul and fried calf sweetbreads for David. He raised his eyes and caught me watching him.

  “All is well?” he said.

  “I’m missing something here,” I said. Jean-Paul looked up and exchanged a told-you-so look with David. “And you two know what it is, yes?”

  “I can’t talk about juvenile cases,” David said, forking his first bite of sweetbreads. “But—”

  I waited, but he didn’t go on. But what? Jean-Paul, chewing, was watching me as if waiting for me to do or say something. David couldn’t talk about juvenile cases, but he could talk about what? Jean-Paul had a purpose in bringing him to lunch. It was up to me to ask the right question because maybe David could not volunteer information. I cut into the chicken breast.

  “Can you answer questions about adult cases?” I asked.

  Smiling, David toggled his head in that familiar maybe yes, maybe no response. “Depends, of course, on the nature of the case and the stage of a case. Once a criminal case has been presented in court, the pertinent details may enter the public domain. Issues relating to family and private life, however, remain private.”

  “Even when a child is involved?” I asked.

  “Depends on the nature of the situation,” he said. “How is your coq au vin?”

  I took a bite, declared it good with a nod, and turned to Jean-Paul. “A neighbor compared the Fouchet household to thunder and lightning. I discovered that Yvan Fouchet was mentioned in a magazine article about workplace harassment. I haven’t been able to find the article to know what he was accused of because he sued and the online edition was removed, but it suggests to me that he didn’t get along with everyone at work, either. The two times I’ve seen him he was in a state of great distress, which I would expect in the circumstance. I have never seen Madame Fouchet. Tell me about her.”

  “Claire?” Jean-Paul sipped his wine while he considered his answer. “Quiet. Nervous. Careful about appearances. I have never heard her say very much.”

  “Hmm,” I said, and turned my attention back to my delicious meal with the words quiet, nervous, careful about appearances running on a background loop through my mind. After a while, at about the time I had done all the damage to the chicken I could manage, I turned to Jean-Paul. “Cowed by a domineering husband? Or is she maybe a dominatrix in private?”

  “Can we know what happens behind closed doors?”

  “Yes, if it spills outside the doors,” I said. “Or someone gets hurt. Right, David?”

  He touched the end of his nose with an index finger; the answer was Yes.

  The waiter appeared just then to clear away the empty wine bottle and finished plates. Coffee and a variety of cheeses and tiny chocolates arrived not long after. I declined a digestif. I was not accustomed to drinks at lunch and was already feeling sleepy. When I decided that one more bite or sip of anything would be the tipping point between happily satisfied and stuffed, I set my cheese knife on the plate, leaned back and looked across at David.

  “I have learned a few things about your privacy laws. Now, what can you tell me about domestic abuse laws in France?”

  “Ah,” he said, and reached down for a slender attaché case on the floor under his chair. He pulled out a sheaf of maybe a dozen pages stapled together, turned to an inside page and handed it to me. A passa
ge in the middle of the page was highlighted by yellow marker: “Harassment of one’s spouse, partner, or co-habitant by repeated acts that degrade the other’s quality of life and cause a change to the other’s physical or mental state of health is punishable by a maximum penalty of three years in prison and a €45,000 fine.”

  I flipped to the first page to see what he had handed me. It was an informational pamphlet titled “Frequently Asked Questions about Spousal Rights under Law,” a document available to the public. I turned back and read the second marked passage. “Under Article 22 of the Act of May 26, 2004 on divorce, a violent spouse may be evicted from a conjugal home when the violence places a spouse or children in danger. Additionally, the Act of December 12, 2005 facilitates the eviction of a violent spouse prior to a judgment or following a court judgment, when it is a repeat offense.”

  Jean-Paul took my hand and held it under the table. He said, “You see?”

  “I see more questions in your immediate future, unless David is giving me a premarital warning, mon amour.”

  He laughed and brought my hand up to kiss before setting it back on his leg under the table.

  David took a quick glance at the tables nearby, perhaps checking to see if anyone was eavesdropping before saying, in a low voice, eyes holding mine, “If a teenager brought an accusation against a parent for domestic abuse by harassment, using the definition I showed you, there would, one hopes, be an inquiry. If the inquiry did not find that the home situation was serious enough to remove the child or the accused parent, you can imagine the quality of his or her home life afterward, yes?”

  “Bien sûr,” I said. “The kid might decide to run away. Is that what happened chez Fouchet?”

  David held up his hands, giving a little noncommittal shrug. “We are speaking only in hypotheticals. How many adolescents, do you think, believe that ordinary parental rules about dyeing their hair or staying out late amount to harassment and a degradation of the quality of their lives? At least, the lives they would prefer to live. Did you ever feel your parents’ rules got in your way or drove you crazy?”

  “No,” I said, laughing at the thought; my parents were very permissive, up to a point. “They sent me away to school and left rules and enforcement to the nuns.”

  David, smiling, shook his head. “Wish I’d done that when my son was fourteen. Merde, what misery kids can put a family through. But I’m happy to report that at about eighteen a fine human emerged from the belly of the adolescent monster. Now that he’s twenty I am no longer seen as the bête he once thought me. In fact, we are friends again.”

  Jean-Paul smiled, but didn’t say anything. During much of Dom’s adolescence, he and his father were grieving Marian. Jean-Paul told me more than once that he worried that Dom was overly careful not to cause his father any more stress than that created by simply getting up in the morning and putting one foot in front of the other. Three years later they were still very careful with each other.

  A saucer with the meal check face down on top was quietly left on the table halfway between Jean-Paul and David. Before looking at it, the two men had a brief but friendly verbal tussle over whose turn it was to pay. Jean-Paul won. He slipped a gold credit card out of his pocket, gave the tab a very brief glance, and put his card on top.

  After a quick visit to Napoleon’s hat, we said good-bye to David outside, with promises that we would get together again soon. He told us that, alerted by Jean-Paul, he and his wife had watched my brief turn on the Jimmy show. She was curious to meet this woman who was brave enough to take on Jean-Paul Bernard as a project. If the weather stayed warm, Jean-Paul said, we would have them over for a swim and barbecue. Cheeks were smooched all around, and we set off in different directions.

  When I saw that David was out of earshot, I asked Jean-Paul, “What did he tell you that you aren’t telling me?”

  “Nothing,” he said, pulling my arm through his. “But he reminded me about a school acquaintance, a terrible bully when we knew him, whose son was a habitual runaway. One night the boy stabbed the father while he slept.”

  “Killed him?” I asked.

  “No. The ambulanciers arrived in time; it was the son who called them. There was a great scandal because the father was a minister in the government, a very powerful man. The boy’s defense was exactly what Davey showed you at lunch. Abuse by harassment to the point the boy’s mental state was altered. The son got off. And immediately the wife sued for divorce using the same grounds. That happened around the time a new law was passed against bullying in the workplace. Our poor classmate, after being stabbed and divorced, was then tried for being such a workplace bully that three of his staffers committed suicide in despair after months of endless haranguing and harassment.”

  “He went to prison?”

  “Briefly,” he said. “He had very good lawyers.”

  “Should Yvan Fouchet be sleeping with one eye open?” I asked.

  “I wonder.”

  “What are your plans for the rest of the afternoon?” I asked, raising my face to the sun.

  “That was my question for you.”

  “Other than walking you wherever you have to go next, nothing.”

  “Perfect.” He put his hand over mine where it rested on his arm, we turned left and headed down the street.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “It’s a beautiful day,” he said. “I thought maybe, after that lunch, a nice walk in the Luxembourg Gardens is called for. You disagree?”

  “Lead on.”

  We crossed Boulevard Saint-Germain and continued along rue de Condé past the great stone Senate building and into the palace gardens. The flower borders were in full color, the lawns lush and green, at last. And there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. In other words, a perfect day for strolling arm in arm in the park with one’s lover.

  He asked about my morning and I told him about my run-in with Monsieur Roussel at the train station and the conversation that followed. We agreed that people are not always what they seem on the surface; maybe there was hope that Roussel had a kind heart beating inside that large chest. There was also, it seemed, a chip on his shoulder where the horsey set were concerned.

  “Jean-Paul,” I said. “You belong to the riding club, don’t you?”

  “Oui. Do you want to go for a ride?”

  “Sometime, sure,” I said. “Roussel mentioned that the Fouchets hung out with the equestrian crowd. Is there a clique?”

  “Bien sûr, of course. Like Marian’s parents and the golf club, there are people who center their social life around other riding club members to the exclusion of others. I am a member, as my father was before me, because I enjoy riding and there is no comparable equestrian facility anywhere near the city, and not because membership allows me the privilege of drinking with other horse owners. In fact, I find some of the members to be très snob.”

  “Roussel used exactly those words,” I said. “Did you ride with your father?”

  “Oh yes. From the time I was very young. He trained me in the rigors of haute école and when he was confident I could manage my mount, we spent many holidays riding together. When Dom came along, I trained him as I had been trained and he rode with us.”

  “Haute école is dressage?”

  “Yes, but generally we rode just for the pleasure of it, the way you ride your horses up into the Santa Monica Mountains in California,” he said. “Papa was a stickler. He would say that if you are to study music, you learn piano first. To dance, you must know ballet. Before I could ride off into the woods with confidence, he believed I had to know the classical forms of horsemanship just as your father grilled you on the physics of light and color, and now you are a filmmaker.”

  “I don’t know that Dad was that prescient,” I said. “I fell into filmmaking; it wasn’t something I trained for.”

  “Perhaps you didn’t train formally, my dear Maggie, but when the opportunity presented I believe you already had the essentials well in hand.
Otherwise you would not have succeeded,” he said. “Speaking of films, have you settled on topics for the fall season?”

  When I told him my ideas for fall film projects he listened with intensity and asked good questions. His last question was, “How much leeway do you have? For instance, can you film outside the eurozone?”

  “I haven’t asked,” I said, brushing my cheek against his shoulder. “Why?”

  “Just thinking about possibilities,” he said.

  “I’ll ask Diane Duval. Now, tell me about your morning.”

  “It was interesting.” He paused, seemed to be deciding what to say, or maybe where to begin. “You know that after Marian died so suddenly, my friends arranged for my appointment as consul general in Los Angeles so that Dom and I could heal, get a fresh start. My work had always required me to travel, sometimes for months at a time, while Marian managed the household and watched over Dom. The posting to Los Angeles let me stay put, with Dom, in one place for more than two years. I cherish the time we had together in California without the constant good-byes before flying off and away from the daily routines of his life. Now we are back in France and it is Dom who is preparing to fly away. I have him as a child under my roof for only one more year. I know he is eager to move on to the next, but am I?”

  “Trust me,” I said, speaking from experience. “It will be more difficult on you than on Dom when he goes away to university.”

  “Because I have only that one year left, when we returned to France from Los Angeles last fall, I dragged my feet about accepting any position that is more permanent than a short-term consultancy or a fact-finding mission. And now, there is you.”

  “Don’t let me get in the way of your work,” I said. “We’ve managed so far to juggle and figure things out.”

  “But I don’t want to juggle anymore,” he said, putting his hand over mine where it rested on his sleeve. “Since we’ve been together, we have never managed to be on the same continent for longer than a month or two at a time. You were here last summer, I was in California. Then in October we switched, you were there, I was here. All winter you were globe-trotting from war zone to war zone while I was examining refugee camps in Greece and Turkey. We were only able to spend time together during holidays and transitions from one place to another.” He took a breath. “Maggie, this morning I was offered a wonderfully interesting post with our trade mission to Singapore.”