David Dickinson - Death of a wine merchant

Powerscourt thought suddenly that Randolph’s targets seemed to drop ten years each time.

‘Jean Pierre was very struck with this girl. Her husband was believed to be away in North Africa. He was a soldier, a sergeant in the Army. Eventually the young wife gives in to Jean Pierre’s flirting. She gives him a kiss in their kitchen. She told me later that she thought he might go away after one kiss and leave her in peace, But then, dear me, in the middle of the kiss the husband walks in. He has unexpected leave from his regimental duties. He swears that he will take the traditional Frenchman’s revenge against my husband. He does not believe Yvette when she tells him it was only a kiss. They were never in the bedroom upstairs, never. Yvette’s husband does not believe her. He is very jealous. He is consumed with jealousy. He tells my Jean Pierre he is going to kill him. Jean Pierre flees out the kitchen door pursued by the jealous husband with a poker in his hand.’

‘What is the traditional Frenchman’s revenge, madame?’ asked Lady Lucy.

‘Why, in some parts of the country it still holds good. The French male believes he has the right to kill a man who has interfered with his wife without penalty. You can’t be sent to jail or the guillotine, you get off scot free. It’s as simple as that.’

‘God bless my soul,’ said Lady Lucy. ‘It does seem rather extreme.’

‘Does it still apply in these parts?’ asked Powerscourt, wondering about court cases where defendants could be given a sort of automatic acquittal for murdering their wives’ lovers.

‘I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to that,’ said Madame Drouhin. Powerscourt thought there was no chance he would be able to persuade any of these women to cross the Channel with him and give evidence in an English court. Could he, perhaps, find a lawyer who would take a signed statement from them? But first they had to meet Yvette.

‘Madame,’ said Powerscourt, ‘could you give us the name of the house where Yvette lives? We would like to hear her story for ourselves.’

‘I will take you to her myself,’ said Madame Drouhin. ‘You have been very kind to me, coming all this way with the unhappy information.’

A couple of moments later the strange party of three, the French widow, the Irish peer and his wife, were seated round Yvette’s kitchen table where Yvette was doing something culinary with a chicken. She was so mortified by her behaviour with the man she thought of as Madame Drouhin’s husband that she would hardly speak of it at all. It was Lady Lucy who solved the problem, narrating what she believed to have happened and asking Yvette to nod her head or to say yes in agreement. When they were past the dangerous rapids of the kissing Powerscourt asked her where her husband was now.

‘I do not know, monsieur. He went away after the events of that unhappy day and I have not seen him since.’

‘Has he gone back to the Army? Perhaps his leave was very short.’

‘I do not know, monsieur. He had not been in touch with me since that day.’

‘Really?’ said Powerscourt. ‘You don’t happen to know, madame, if your husband went over to England at all?’

‘Once again I just don’t know, monsieur. My Philippe is very impulsive, he is always changing his plans.’

‘And do you think he meant it when he said he was going to kill Monsieur Drouhin?’

‘Oh yes, I did believe it, he is a very violent man, my husband. He is perfectly capable of killing somebody. They teach you how to do those things in the Army. That is what armies are for, after all, killing people. May I ask you a question, monsieur? Do you know where my husband is? Do you know where Madame Drouhin’s husband is? This is not a good time for wives in Givray, I think.’

Powerscourt smiled. ‘We do not know where your husband is. Madame’s husband, as she has suspected for some time, is dead. He was shot over in England. We are not sure who killed him. We have been hired to try to find out who the real murderer is. We think the police have arrested the wrong man and the trial is due to start any day now.’

Yvette grew pale. ‘So you think my husband went all the way to England and shot Monsieur Drouhin? That is what you are thinking, is it not?’

‘I have to tell you, madame,’ said Powerscourt, ‘that we have absolutely no idea who killed Monsieur Drouhin, no idea at all.’

Powerscourt took a surreptitious look at his watch. The afternoon was nearly over. The two women had been through enough strain and emotional upset for one day. Signed statements would have to wait until the morning. He hoped they weren’t going to miss the court case altogether.

‘Ladies, thank you so much for your assistance this afternoon. I would like to return in the morning. I would like to ask for further help concerning this forthcoming court case in England. It is obviously impossible for you to cross the Channel and attend the trial in person, but I will find a local lawyer and we can prepare statements summarizing your position for you to sign in his presence in the morning. That will be very helpful for our court case.’

‘The finest lawyer in Givray, monsieur, is Antoine Foucard whose offices are just up the street from here,’ said Madame Drouhin, pointing helpfully in the right direction.

Powerscourt bowed slightly. ‘In that case, may we thank you both for your time this afternoon, and, Madame Drouhin, our condolences once again on your sad loss.’

Ten minutes later the Powerscourts were on their way back to the hotel. The lawyer had proved a most accommodating young man who promised to meet them in the morning. He said he would bring a copy of the marriage certificate for they had one on file in their offices. Powerscourt had said that he would bring prepared statements for the two women to sign. He thought it would save time.

Georgina Nash was completing her walk round the lake at the back of Brympton Hall. Every day for weeks past, whatever the weather, she had donned her wellingtons and set off with a couple of dogs for a trip up the road outside the house or a circuit of the lake. There was much on her mind. She still worried about the murder committed in her own house at her own daughter’s wedding those weeks before. She felt they had all been coarsened by it. It was, she thought sometimes in her more fanciful moments, as if they would never be clean again. She worried about Emily and her miraculous escape after the fling with Tristram. Georgina wasn’t sure that she herself would have chosen to marry Montague Colville, so decent, so well brought up, so stupid, so gullible that Emily had him plucked and trussed and ready at the altar less than six weeks after they met. She worried that Emily would get bored. Emily got bored very easily. She wondered about her husband Willoughby, so concerned that their position in Norfolk society might have taken a battering after weddings interrupted by gunshot. And she worried about the missing under footman William, gone from his post for days now, his cheerful face no longer on parade around the Hall. With every passing day she grew more certain that he was dead.

The dogs began barking furiously, shooting ahead of her and racing through the passageway to the long main drive in front of the house. They carried on barking and Georgina heard a voice talking to them now. It was a young man’s voice. He was obviously good with animals. Then she saw him. It was William, emerging from the gloom of a Norfolk dusk to return to his post at Brympton Hall. Georgina smiled with happiness and strode out to meet him. He was kneeling down with the dogs, stroking them firmly. Georgina knew that she should be cross, angry, the scorned employer, but she couldn’t do it when she looked at the boy’s face. He had been crying and very recently too. She brought him into the drawing room and sent for some tea. William had never actually sat down in this room before.