Lottie still looked blank.
“Don’t you watch police procedurals on TV?” demanded Martha.
“Of course. Hamish McBeth, Morse, The Sweeney,” she shrugged.
“I meant French ones, and from this century. You know, that series about Alice Nevers, can’t remember its name, or Main Courante?”
“What, French TV?” Lottie gazed at her in horror. “I never watch that. Why on earth would I?”
“Because you live in France?” cried Martha. She sighed dramatically. This was getting nowhere. “Look, never mind. Just get out of here before we get into more trouble.”
“More trouble? Why should we be in trouble at all? We’ve found a body, that’s all. We weren’t responsible for getting it there,” Lottie pointed out reasonably.
“True, but bodies seem to be piling up around me, which looks a bit dodgy. And ransacking a murder victim’s house is definitely suspect.”
“Oh OK.” It was Lottie’s turn for an expressive sigh. “There’s so much crap here it could weeks to find anything that might be useful anyway.”
She shoved the fallen papers back on the table and followed Martha outside.
“Philippe is severely narked,” warned Martha.
“I’d already gathered that,” replied Lottie.
“Well, times it by ten now. No, twenty.”
Lottie waved that aside. “Still no ambulance,” she remarked, unnecessarily as Martha could also clearly see it hadn’t arrived yet. “You need to be in good health in this part of the world, don’t you?”
Martha nodded. It was something that crossed her mind from time to time, but generally the advantages of living in the countryside far outweighed the few advantages of city life. So you might bleed to death waiting for an ambulance, or have to watch your house burn down due to the nearest emergency services being half an hour away, but that was a risk Martha was prepared to take for the sake of the space, the fresh air, the wildlife, the closeness-to-nature that she experienced every day.
They trotted into the gloom of the dairy parlour and silently materialised next to Philippe, who was on the phone telling someone to get a flaming move on. He ended the call and turned his attention to the women. Martha would have preferred him to keep insulting people down the phone. However, the grimness of his expression lightened a little.
“You’re fired,” he told Lottie. “You were meant to keep Martha out of trouble. Some babysitter you turned out to be.”
“Well, I didn’t know there’d be a body waiting here,” Lottie defended herself indignantly.
“But why are you here anyway?” asked Philippe.
“Lottie’s got a viewing this afternoon at the Saunier cottage down there,” explained Martha. She waved an arm in what she hoped was the right direction. “We just called by to make sure the brothers had moved some decaying furniture out of the way, like they promised Lottie they would. They hadn’t, so we came here to remind them to do it, heard the racket the cows were making, guessed something was wrong so had a look around. That’s when we found Bruno and Remy.”
Philippe shook his head and surveyed the gruesome scene.
“As well you did, or we’d have had two corpses,” he observed morosely, taking in Remy’s fragile state. “And we still might. Where in God’s name is the dratted ambulance?”
He pulled out his phone again but the very movement precipitated the arrival of several vehicles. Lottie knelt down to straighten up Remy’s blankets a bit, to try and make their amateurish first aid attempts look more professional, while Martha trailed Philippe to the dairy entrance to greet the newcomers. She was upset that she’d upset him.
“I’m sorry,” she blurted out.
She almost bumped into him as he stopped in his tracks and swung round to face her.
“You English, always apologising for things that aren’t your fault.” At last he managed a brief smile. “This is turning into a very nasty business and it keeps involving you. It worries me and makes me cranky.”
Martha realised that was as close to apologising that he’d get. She beamed gratefully.
“And your friend never went into the house, OK?”
“OK,” Martha nodded frantically.
“So go tell her, quickly,” prompted Philippe, then turned as voices drew closer.
Martha scuttled back to Lottie and passed on the command.
“Got it. I’ve been thinking, we should come back and have a proper look later, when everyone’s gone.”
“What?” squeaked Martha, eyes wide.
“And we need to nose around Lecerf’s place too,” added Lottie firmly.
This time Martha just squeaked. She couldn’t form words. By the time she’d regained the power of speech, the ambulance crew had descended. A thin, jolly man smiled at them and told them what a good job they’d done on Remy. His plump female companion remarked, in what was definitely a disappointed tone, that Martha and Lottie seemed to be holding up very well, considering the shock they must have had on finding the brothers.
“Oh, we’ll be in pieces later,” Lottie predicted. “Delayed reaction, and all that.”
That cheered the large woman up. “Nasty thing, shock,” she nodded. She looked like she hoped it would be very nasty indeed in their cases.
As well as the ambulance, the scene of crime team had arrived, and also Etienne and his teenage son and farmer-in-training, Fabien. Etienne immediately entered into negotiations with Philippe about which milking machines they could use, and after the obligatory argument, a requisite part of any self-respecting French conversation, settled on half a dozen at the far end of the parlour. The cows could be walked in through a smaller door, shut but fortunately not locked, at the other end. The men got to work and the background bellow of the cows gradually subsided.
Martha and Lottie were sent outside. Seeing that the shadow from the huge cherry tree under which they’d parked the car was shrinking as the sun rose higher, they got the dogs out and, after checking with Philippe that it was permissible, walked them around the orchard full of ancient, gnarled and unproductive trees. There was hardly an apple or pear to be seen, but the walnut tree promised to yield a few handfuls of nuts in the autumn. They were silent. Martha was trying to process the morning’s events. She felt so grateful that Mark had died of natural causes, although far too soon. Hard as that was, it was surely far easier to cope with than murder, a life savagely and maliciously cut short by evil. How could one person do that to another? She glanced at Lottie, also lost in thought. However, there was a gleam in her eye that suggested she wasn’t cogitating the frailty of the human lot but how to outdo the gendarmerie on the crime-solving front.
“The police will soon sort this mess out and find the killer,” Martha said firmly, in hopes of quashing Lottie’s intentions.
Lottie huffed. “In about five years’ time perhaps,” she said dismissively. “Local bobbies are usually a bit dumb.”
“That’s not true,” Martha said loyally. Philippe was a local bobby and he was a very intelligent and conscientious man.
“Do you want to be looking over your shoulder for five years?” Lottie went on, hearing but not absorbing Martha’s remark. “Worrying that this lunatic might attack you, because he probably will, you know. I mean, these crimes keep happening around you.”
“Geez, thanks Lottie!” retorted Martha. “I feel so much better now.”
Lottie ignored both the tactlessness of her own words and the sarcasm of Martha’s. “That’s why we need to act. And fast. We’ve got to find this guy. We need to check out all three murder scenes. The shop will be easy enough. Apparently the son’s running it, afternoons only. We can go there, and you can buy some alpaca hoof oil or whatever while I have a poke around.”
Martha groaned and rubbed a hand down her face, and not just because, like many people, Lottie was under the false impression that alpacas had horse-like hooves. Camelids had two toes. Two leathery-soled hoofed toes, true, but enough to classify alpacas
as even-toed ungulates whereas horses were odd-toed ungulates, which brought along many other characteristics. Didn’t people know anything?
Lottie was warming to her theme. “And we’ll do some surreptitious evening reconnaissance on the two farms.”
“And what if someone sees us?” demanded Martha.
“We’ll just be two middle-aged ladies walking their dogs,” shrugged Lottie.
“On other people’s private property?”
“Oh, stop picking holes,” sighed Lottie. “We’ll just say the dogs ran off after a deer or cat or something. And anyway, there’s no one round here to see us. You know as well as I do that it’s as quiet as the grave in these parts.”
Not the most tasteful simile to use, but it was a true one.
A thought struck Lottie. “You know, we’d make perfect heroines for a cosy mystery. There’s always a pair of friends doing the sleuthing. And there has to be pet animals too, and we’ve both got dogs.”
“Who in their right mind would want to write a mystery about us?” chuckled Martha.
“Well, it would be quite an exciting novel, given recent events,” Lottie pointed out.
“Too exciting,” muttered Martha. “Way too exciting.”
“It’s not that exciting right now, though, is it?” grumbled Lottie. “I’m getting bored of walking round and round this orchard, and so are the dogs. Let’s take that little path there. I’ve got a feeling it goes round the back of the farm and comes out near the cottage.”
Up until then Martha hadn’t noticed the small opening in the thick green hedge of holly, chestnut and field maple that surrounded the orchard. At first glance the path appeared quite overgrown, but she was wearing her walking boots and Lottie had changed into Nike trainers so they were suitably shod. Everyone seemed to have forgotten about them for the time being. The car would still be there, so Philippe would know they hadn’t snuck off home and thus couldn’t be far away.
The three dogs, who had, as Lottie had noted, flumped down on the ground waiting for something interesting to happen, got up at varying speeds according to how old they were, and caught up to their owners who were disappearing down the narrow green lane. It was cool and dim between the tall hedges that were generously interspersed with trees. Martha focused on the beauty of the moment. It was relaxing to walk along the grassy track, brushing against occasional low-hanging branches and catching glimpses of birds fluttering from twig to twig. Butterflies burst up from the ground in front of them, and here and there a startled lizard scuttled away. The dogs trotted on ahead, stopping regularly for sniffs. Martha felt herself relaxing, at least a little. She hadn’t realised how tense she’d been, although she should have guessed. Finding an old man dangling from the roof of his dairy parlour with his brother collapsed below him was a little stressful, to say the least. She shuddered.
“It is a bit chilly, isn’t it?” Lottie misinterpreted her friend’s shivering and rubbed her own arms.
“Mmm,” said Martha absently.
They walked a little further then came to a crossroads. Lottie turned sharply to the left. Martha paused, looking around.
“It’s this way,” Lottie told her.
“Yes, I know.” Martha hurried to catch her up. “I recognise where we are now. Mark and I cycled along this track we’re on now. We didn’t mean to. Further that way,” she gestured behind her, “it’s partially tarmacked. Mark said it would be a handy shortcut home, but the track got rougher and rougher and eventually became completely overgrown. We had to give up and turn round.” She smiled at the memory. Mark had been very indignant about it. Whatever app it was he used on his phone to plan their bike routes had claimed that it was a suitable route. “Looks like it’s all been opened up now.”
“Yeah, someone around here has a bee in their bonnet about clearing all the old overgrown green lanes. I’ve noticed more and more being made passable.”
“I wonder who that is?” mused Martha. “If it’s somebody local I might know them. I’d offer to give a hand. It’s brilliant that people can walk along them again. They were the thoroughfares of old.”
“Hardly thoroughfares,” Lottie countered. “Pathways for the occasional peasant, more like.”
“There was a much higher rural population two hundred years ago, Lottie,” Martha said. She loved history and had read a few books about that period in France. “Some villages were even overpopulated and there were terrible food shortages.”
“But now the place is an estate agent’s delight,” smirked Lottie. “Lots of empty dwellings crying out ‘buy me’ to people wanting to live the expat dream.”
Martha realised she didn’t have a sympathetic audience and so fell silent. Her eyes dropped to the ground. This track had heavier use than the first one they’d been on. There were other people’s footprints and even a bicycle tyre track. The ground was quite boggy, despite the fact it hadn’t rained for several weeks. It can’t have been easy-going on a bike, especially with such narrow tyres. Their tread had a strange wavy pattern that didn’t look like it provided much grip. Probably, like Mark, they’d misjudged the element of cycle-friendliness of the path.
A left fork in the path took them, after another ten minutes’ walk, to the cottage where old Madame Saunier had lived.
“Voilà,” announced Lottie smugly.
“I suppose you want another go at budging that sofa,” sighed Martha.
“Well, Remy and Bruno aren’t going to be able to do it for us, now are they,” said Lottie matter-of-factly. “And I want to make a sale this afternoon. We have to move it.”
As they rounded the front corner of the house, a figure loomed out of the doorway, making them both gasp with alarm. Lottie grabbed Martha’s arm with a vice-like grip while, at the same time, pushing her slightly forward. Lottie slunk sideways, behind her. Martha managed a rueful smile, despite her thumping heart. Her best friend saw her as a human shield. Was that flattering?
Their momentary terror dissolved when they saw it was Philippe, but was almost instantly replaced by anxiety. He didn’t look pleased.
“You’re not moving anything,” he said firmly. “You’re coming with me to talk with the magistrate. And you were told not to go anywhere.”
Lottie’s courage resurfaced and she stepped out from behind Martha.
“We were just walking the dogs. And we’re not going anywhere else until you help us move a sofa.” She crossed her arms defiantly.
“Sofa?” Philippe shot Martha a questioning glance. She raised her hands in surrender to indicate firmly that this had nothing to do with her.
“It’s big and disgusting and I need it moving, like we’ve already told you. If it hadn’t been for that sofa, those two poor old boys would still be there in that parlour, undiscovered. So I think you owe it, and me, a favour.”
“I owe a sofa a favour?” Again Philippe looked to Martha for enlightenment.
Lottie evidently wasn’t going to let this business of sofa moving go so Martha thought it best to back her up.
“It’s played a significant role in this morning’s activities,” she agreed.
Philippe knew when he’d met his match. Two determined ladies united against him, or even a highly indignant Lottie accompanied by a more reasonable but loyal Martha, made for a formidable enemy. And if moving a piece of furniture was the way to get them to comply, then so be it.
“All right, I’ll help. Then you come with me, instantly.”
“Absolutely,” nodded Martha.
“Obviously,” sniffed Lottie.
Philippe stepped aside to let Lottie open up. She bustled past him and disappeared into the dim dinginess of the hallway. Martha followed her. As she passed him, Philippe asked quietly, “Are you all right?”
She smiled thinly but it was enough to dispel the gloom around them for Philippe. “Surprisingly, yes. But I don’t suppose it will last.” She was fairly sure that the horror would catch up with her later, either in the form of tears or ghastly ni
ghtmares. “Look, I really didn’t intend to get mixed up in all this,” she added. She suddenly couldn’t bear Philippe being angry with her. “And neither did Lottie.”
“I know, I know,” he admitted. “It’s just…” He trailed away. He didn’t need to spell out to Martha how not good it looked with her being involved in some way in each of these three grisly murders, or how anxious he was about her ending up on the bad guy’s hit list. He gently brushed away a lock of hair that had stuck itself to her warm, damp cheek. “At least tomorrow I know you’ll be in safe hands. What would you like to do?”
Martha smiled properly up at him. “That’s easy. Go on a bike ride. I’ve entered the fun race on Monday so I need to do some training.” Then, worried that she sounded too commandeering, and realising that Philippe might not even have a bike, she added, “If that’s OK?”
“Of course,” he said nobly. “There’s a bike somewhere in my garage… I think.”
“If not, you can borrow Mark’s,” suggested Martha. “That way you don’t have to try and transport a bike to my house. Actually, thinking about it, I could drive to your house with both the bikes in the back of the Renault.”
“Oh no, I’m not having you even thinking of driving yourself anywhere alone. You’ll be bound to come across an upturned coach full of nuns with their throats cut.”
Martha was about to put that decidedly disturbing image down to bad memories from experiences at a Catholic school, but then she remembered that education in France was secular. He must have bumped into some menacing nuns somewhere else.
“Are you two coming, or what?” came Lottie’s annoyed voice. “This sofa won’t move itself.”
Philippe grinned at Martha. “No rest for the wicked.” Again, not the most subtle thing to say when the work of an evil and deranged individual was raging all around them. But she knew what he meant.
Lottie supervised while Philippe and Martha literally got their hands dirty moving the stinking old sofa out of the way. A mouse popped out of a seat cushion and slithered down Martha’s leg before gaining traction on her foot and streaking off across the floor to safety, but it was Lottie who shrieked. Martha had regular close encounters of the furred kind around the farm so rodents invading her personal space didn’t faze her. Philippe did most of the heavy work while Martha focussed on helping steer the monstrosity out of the room, down the hall and into the garage. However, she was still exhausted, panting and red in the face once the task was complete. Philippe had barely broken into a sweat. He was in remarkably good shape for a chess player, Martha considered, definitely impressed.
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