“Of course, an interesting conversation.”
“You may know that the young woman with us, the detective’s assistant, was able to hear your remarks from a loudspeaker in the kitchen.”
“I have a small speaker in each of my rooms so I can summon Madame Bonnet if necessary, and I sometimes forget to switch them off.”
Bruno asked if he could double-check the speaker system. The old man waved a hand as if giving his blessing, which Bruno interpreted as granting permission. Bruno asked the mayor to listen at the speaker in the kitchen. Then he went upstairs and began counting to ten in each room until with the mayor’s help he found the location of each microphone. He found the bedroom, bathroom, library, a small sitting room with a television and a large study. There was also one balcony above the main door, and he found another microphone there.
“I could hear you in every room you went into, including the balcony,” said the mayor when Bruno went downstairs again.
“Let me try again when I turn off the mikes.” Bruno went back upstairs, found a switch on each mike, turned it off while still counting and identifying each room. Then he went back downstairs.
“I heard a click when you turned each one off, but I could still hear you,” the mayor said, by now intrigued. “I’ll look for more speakers while you go and check the wiring on the switches. And keep talking—that will help me find other speakers.”
Bruno did as he was told, taking a small metal nail file from the bathroom to unscrew the back of the microphone in the library. It was wired direct, avoiding the switch. He checked the others, and they were all the same. Bourdeille might think he could not be overheard, but Madame Bonnet could hear everything he said. Back downstairs, he found the two men in a small sitting room behind the kitchen, evidently Madame Bonnet’s private lair, in which were an easy chair, family photos, a tray with some glasses and a bottle of vin de noix.
“All the mikes upstairs are permanently on, even when the switch is off,” Bruno said, addressing Bourdeille. “The system has been rigged so that Madame Bonnet could hear every word you said. She would have known from your conversations on the balcony that Claudia was trying to buy your chartreuse and its contents.”
“So what?” demanded Bourdeille. “I never said I’d sell and there’s not a damn thing Bonnet could do about it, anyway. And I can’t say I’m greatly surprised to learn that she’s been spying on me.”
“It’s not you I’m concerned about,” said Bruno. “It’s what happened to Claudia.”
Bruno was looking around the small sitting room. Among the photos was one of a young Madame Bonnet in a wedding dress alongside a tall, skinny man who looked to be a good ten years older, maybe more. They were standing in a garden in front of the mairie of Limeuil. There was a photo of the same couple in what looked like a hospital, and she was beaming as she lay in bed holding a newborn baby. Then there was a final photo of the same two adults with a little boy in shorts. He was not much more than a toddler, maybe three or four. There were no photos of Bourdeille or anyone else.
“It’s been a long day,” said Bourdeille. “Would you be so kind as to follow me upstairs and help me onto the couch in my study? And perhaps the mayor would like to look at my art collection. Here is the key.” He took from a waistcoat pocket a small but very modern-looking key, with tiny indentations rather than the usual blade and cuts of a conventional house key.
The mayor took the key and Bruno wheeled the old man into his elevator. There wasn’t room for him, so he took the stairs. He helped the old man to take off his jacket and then settled him on a handsome chaise longue.
“Anything I can get you?” he asked. “A drink, a book?”
“I have books here that I can reach,” Bourdeille said. “And I have some thinking to do about what you just said. Assuming Madame Bonnet overheard Claudia’s attempt to buy this place, do you really suspect she may have had a motive for Claudia’s murder?”
“I don’t know, nor do I know what she might have done if she did suspect it. But it’s food for thought. Did you have any other private conversations upstairs, or phone calls, that you would rather she hadn’t heard? I recall that you made a point of coming to the mairie to tell us of your bequest.”
“I’ve been trying to remember. When I made the appointment to see you and the mayor, I may have used the word ‘bequest.’ Mostly I used e-mails from my computer and sometimes through my cell phone.”
“Could she get into those?”
“I have a password for the computer that should be private and a simple four-figure access code to my phone, but I think she knows that. She said she might need it in an emergency, so she may have read some of my exchanges with my lawyer or my accountant. She may know what I told you in the mairie, that the house is in an SCI, a company which would allow me to sell the shares.”
“And thus to disinherit her,” said Bruno.
“If she knew enough about inheritance law and the implications of the SCI structure, then I suppose it’s possible she might have deduced that. I doubt it. But I see your point about Claudia. And now I’d like to rest, please.”
“One last question before I go. When you spoke to the tribunal today, did you show them the text of the will you signed in their presence?”
The old man glared at him. “What the devil do you mean?”
“I’m wondering what the will actually says, whether St. Denis is really the beneficiary or if you had some devious plot in mind that leaves your fortune elsewhere.”
“Why should you think that?”
“Because we haven’t actually seen your will, and I think we should, the one with the signatures of the witnesses at today’s tribunal.”
“You’re insulting me. Please get out and let me rest.”
The old man’s eyes were darting about the room as if searching for something. Bruno suddenly knew what it must be, so he smiled and said goodbye. He trotted down the stairs and out to the van, where he found the file Bourdeille had carried into the meeting that morning. The question about the spelling of his name must have distracted him so Bourdeille had forgotten to take it with him. Bruno opened it and began scanning the documents inside. The top one was a written statement, signed by the four witnesses and by Maître Lucier, attesting that Monsieur de Bourdeille had satisfied each of them that he was of sound mind and under no duress when he read aloud and signed the will in their presence and demonstrated to their satisfaction that he knew its contents and understood them.
Beneath it was the will, signed and witnessed that day. Bourdeille had left the shares in the SCI that owned his house and land, his art foundation, which owned his collection, his personal library and his shares in something called Entreprises Juin Société Anonyme to an entity named Fondation Juin-Bourdeille. In a separate legacy, Madame Bonnet was bequeathed the house she lived in, as was his gardener, each to be given an annuity that would guarantee them a pension of a thousand euros a month.
“We’ve been screwed,” Bruno murmured to himself.
Bruno skimmed through the rest of the file, looking in vain for some indication of what the Fondation Juin-Bourdeille might be. He found an accountant’s report of the various shares being held in the Société Anonyme, a range of oil and insurance companies, banks and a multinational printing corporation. The total current market value was listed at more than four million euros.
Bruno went back into the chartreuse and found the mayor standing at the doorway to the sixth and last room, the one Bruno had never seen.
“It’s a double shrine,” the mayor said, not turning his head. “Half of it is dedicated to his supposed ancestor Pierre de Bourdeille, with first editions of his books, framed letters he wrote and letters to him, including one by Mary, Queen of Scots, portrait engravings and so on. The other half is dedicated to the life and deeds of Paul Juin, including the original parchment signed by de Gaul
le naming him as a Compagnon de la Résistance.”
“And none of it is going to St. Denis,” said Bruno, handing the mayor the file. “The little ceremony we were not allowed to attend witnessed Bourdeille’s real will, which leaves everything to something called Fondation Juin-Bourdeille, and I can’t find out from the file what it might be.”
He opened the web browser on his phone and tapped in “Fondation Juin-Bourdeille.” There was no dedicated website, but he found a formal registration document of its origin the previous year, stating that it had been established under a law of 1987 that defined a fondation as “an institution designated by the act by one or several persons, physical or moral, deciding upon the irrevocable grant of goods, rights or resources, to the realization of a nonprofit work of public interest.”
“I see no indication that this fondation intends to devote its resources to something to be run by St. Denis,” said Bruno.
“Let’s not be hasty,” the mayor replied. “Don’t forget what I told him over lunch, that I don’t want this to be run by St. Denis. A fondation of this type is exactly what I had in mind—a nonprofit organization in the public interest. But I confess that I had assumed that we would be setting it up rather than him. And since we’re here, let’s go and ask Bourdeille exactly what he has in mind.”
The old man was dozing on the chaise longue when they entered his study. Then one eye opened and looked at them vaguely before the second eye opened with a snap and they were being examined with a piercing gaze.
“You forgot this in the van, monsieur,” said the mayor, putting the file on the desk.
“Am I to presume you have studied the contents?” he asked.
“First, let me say how impressed I am by your art collection and by the remarkable room dedicated to your ancestor and to Paul Juin,” said the mayor politely. “Thank you for letting me see it, and the other artworks in your collection. It reflects a life of great scholarship and remarkable taste.”
“So you’ve read it.” Bourdeille’s voice was an accusation.
“Of course we’ve read it, we have a direct interest in the contents,” the mayor said agreeably. “Your fondation seems very much like the structure I was proposing to you over lunch.”
“What did you do with my jacket when you helped me take it off?” Bourdeille asked Bruno.
“I put it on the coat hanger on the hook behind the door,” Bruno said. “It seemed the logical place.”
“You’ll find another document in the inside breast pocket. Take it out.”
Bruno complied. There were perhaps four or five folded sheets of good-quality paper, folded in three to fit the pocket. Bruno handed them to Bourdeille unopened.
“Give them to the mayor. Let him read it.”
Bruno did so, and the mayor began skimming through to the end, and then started again at the beginning, and read aloud: “ ‘The Fondation Juin-Bourdeille seeks to preserve in perpetuity the chartreuse, contents, lands and art collection, assembled through the labors of Paul Juin and Pierre de Bourdeille, for public access, edification and education in partnership with the mayor and council of St. Denis. The fondation’s funds are to be devoted exclusively to this purpose. The fondation will be administered by trustees to be appointed jointly by the mayor, council and education authorities of St. Denis, and by the current trustees of the fondation, Pierre de Bourdeille and the grand master of the Confrérie du Pâté de Périgueux.’
“That seems to be the most important part, and this document is defined as a codicil of your will and is signed by the members of this morning’s tribunal, including Maître Lucier,” the mayor said. “In the name of St. Denis I am most grateful.”
“You seemed a little suspicious, Bruno,” Bourdeille said.
Bruno nodded. “It’s my job to be suspicious. I’m also curious. Why the grand master?”
“I understand your suspicions.” Bourdeille waved a hand in what might have been a gesture of forgiveness. “The grand master is an old friend and the custodian of something that is precious to this region and to me. Paul Juin loved the pâté and provided the funds to rebuild the ancient confrérie.”
“Why did you take the fondation document from the file and put it in your pocket?” Bruno asked, his voice expressing honest curiosity rather than accusation.
“Because of something the mayor said over lunch about Paul Juin and your museum of the Resistance. I wanted to get the codicil redrafted to take account of that. But I suppose it’s good enough as it stands, so why don’t you take it? I can always get them to send me a copy.”
“Does Madame Bonnet not bring your mail to you?” Bruno asked.
“Yes, but I can tell if she opens it first. She never does.”
“But you couldn’t tell if she simply failed to hand it to you. And now you know that she has arranged your audio system so that she can hear everything that’s said up here.”
“I realize that,” said Bourdeille. “I’ll have an electrician here on Monday to change it.”
“I understand your thinking, but I’m not sure you should do that,” Bruno said. “I think we can all imagine circumstances where it might be useful to mislead Madame Bonnet.”
As he spoke the words, Bruno wondered if he could also use the case file to mislead the tiresome Madame de Breille. Perhaps she in turn could mislead Philippe Delaron.
“Interesting,” said Bourdeille, interrupting Bruno’s thoughts and studying him thoughtfully from beneath those bushy white eyebrows before nodding agreement.
“Does that mean you have some kind of plan, Bruno?” the mayor asked.
“Not yet, but I’m working on it.”
Chapter 32
It was shortly after four in the afternoon when they left Bourdeille’s chartreuse. “What do you plan to do now?” the mayor asked on their way back to St. Denis.
“Go to my office, open the computer and start looking at genealogy,” Bruno replied. “Those family photos in Madame Bonnet’s sitting room triggered my interest. I want to identify the man and child.”
“You mean she’s not the only one who may have a direct interest in Bourdeille’s inheritance?”
“Exactly, so we need to know who else might be interested.”
Bruno dropped the mayor at his home and returned the van and its keys to the retirement home. Once in his office, he logged on to the police computer and found the e-mail from France Télécom listing the phone activities he had requested, giving the caller and recipient numbers for each phone, texts as well as calls. Each contact was timed and located by the nearest cell-phone tower. He checked the numbers against his lists, and his suspicions began to harden.
Then he began searching for the wedding in Limeuil of a man named Bonnet. There was a Jean-Luc Bonnet who married a Nathalie Descaux in September 1987. Descaux had been Bourdeille’s family name before he changed it. Presumably that had been done after the issue of Nathalie’s birth certificate. She was eighteen at the time of her marriage, and her profession was listed as student nurse. Her husband was thirty-six, a farmer. Bruno then looked for births and found a Luc Bonnet born on March 1, 1984. He smiled to himself as he added up the months from wedding to birth.
Bruno looked for other families in Limeuil named Descaux and found none. He widened the search to the whole département and found scores of them, mainly born around Mussidan in the west and Brantôme in the north. Rather than wade through, he looked for Juin and found a note that the records had only been digitized as far back as 1980. Earlier searches would have to be done by hand. Searching for the name Bourdeille took him to a family living in the small town of that name, presumably the legitimate descendants of the sixteenth-century courtier. Finally he found the section for formal changes of name and came across the art historian, formerly Pierre Descaux and now officially known as de Bourdeille. As far as Nathalie was concerned, she was the ma
n’s legitimate granddaughter.
He e-mailed a request to the département registry, using his return address on the police computer, asking for an urgent manual search for copies of birth, death and marriage certificates relating to Paul and Rebekkah Juin of Périgueux, to Rebekkah Descaux and to Rebekkah Bourdeille. Then he searched the police and gendarmerie databases for Jean-Luc and Luc Bonnet, giving their dates of birth. Jean-Luc, the father, was clean. Luc Bonnet had one conviction for stealing a car when he was sixteen and another for assault two years later. He was charged alongside Dominic Darrail for beating up two other youths outside a bar in Bergerac; the owner had called the police. Neither offense carried a jail term, but the connection with Dominic was interesting. Each man’s birth had been registered in Limeuil in the same year, which suggested they had grown up and been to school together.
The birth certificate said that Dominic’s mother, Véronique Darrail, had been born to the family Cassini in Bab el-Oued in Algeria in 1959. That was the district of the white working class, the biggest concentration of settlers in the country. It was also the heartland and bastion of the movement to keep Algeria French. Bruno recalled Félicité saying that her landlady was a pied-noir who despised Arabs. She also hated de Gaulle for negotiating Algeria’s independence, which the pieds-noirs claimed condemned them to a choice between la valise ou le cercueil—the suitcase or the coffin. Véronique Cassini had married Jacques Darrail in Bergerac in 1982. Her profession was shop assistant, and his was self-employed waterman. Bruno presumed that meant canoe rentals.
Bruno called the baron, a veteran of the Algerian War, to ask if he’d ever heard of a pied-noir family from Bab el-Oued called Cassini. They had supposedly fled Algeria and moved to the region.
“Not off the top of my head,” he replied. “Do you want me to ask around among the Anciens Combattants? Some of the veterans stayed in touch with the pieds-noirs, mostly the right-wing ones. Not that I have anything to do with them, or rather they don’t want to have anything to do with me, since they’re in the Front National and I’m known as a Gaullist.”
The Body in the Castle Well Page 27
