Martin Walker - The Devil's Cave

‘Gaston Lemontin, followed by his wife Madame Lemontin,’ Valentin stammered. ‘I’m terribly sorry, there must be some misunderstanding, I shall take care …’

‘I didn’t ask you for the second name,’ the Mayor interrupted.

Bruno pursed his lips but kept silent at the sight of his mentor behaving so badly. He had understood by now that he had not been invited into this meeting by accident, but because the Mayor wanted him to witness the slow and careful humiliation of a proud man. He wondered whether the Mayor was enjoying this, as he seemed to be, or simply exercising a political muscle that needed to be flexed occasionally.

‘And what can you tell me of this Gaston Lemontin?’

‘He’s the deputy manager of our branch in this town.’

The Mayor picked up the petition fastidiously between finger and thumb and dropped it into his waste-paper basket. ‘Are you telling me he is still the deputy manager of your branch in my town?’

‘If you will excuse me a moment, Monsieur le Maire , please allow me to address this matter immediately, and then to wait upon you later today, at your convenience.’

The Mayor nodded, and Valentin scurried out. Bruno leaned back in his chair and blew out a long breath, shaking his head at the same time.

‘Is that admiration or condemnation?’ the Mayor asked, with a twinkle in his eye and not a trace of the anger he had displayed to the banker.

‘A bit of both; I’m not sure yet of the proportions. That will wait until I learn Lemontin’s fate.’

‘This is France; they can’t sack him or demote him. I imagine he’ll be transferred to another branch. And I also expect us to get extremely favourable terms for our next loan, and as a taxpayer you should be grateful for that.’

Bruno nodded. ‘There is one other thing that troubles me, the thought that Lemontin might have been on to something. He told me there were some real questions about this Paris investment bank we’re getting involved with.’

‘The bank will presumably do its own due diligence. That’s why we pay their fees,’ the Mayor said.

‘The economy of Europe is currently littered with the wreckage of banks and finance houses that we presumed to have done due diligence on American mortgages, Greek debt and Irish banks,’ Bruno replied.

The Mayor nodded, looking thoughtful. ‘Might you make a discreet inquiry into just what has got Lemontin so concerned?’

‘I’m no financial expert,’ Bruno replied.

‘Go ahead with my blessing,’ said the Mayor. ‘I always suspected that any financial transaction that cannot be completely understood by an honest man is probably best avoided.’

Isabelle’s text message had said simply ‘12.50’, which gave Bruno a little time. He stopped at Ivan’s Cafe de la Renaissance to check the plat du jour. Soupe aux haricots and Wiener Schnitzel, he was told, which meant that the buxom German tourist Ivan had brought back from his winter holiday in Morocco was still installed in his bed and his kitchen. The development of Ivan’s menu was a reliable guide to his love affairs. She might depart next week, but the Schnitzel would remain for ever a part of Ivan’s repertoire, at least until a Greek came to introduce him to the possibilities of moussaka or a Spaniard to lure him into deep bowls of paella. Bruno approved of the German girl. He’d never had veal quite like the Schnitzel she’d brought to St Denis. It was hammered out so thin that it almost hung over the edges of the plate and covered with a delicate coating of bread crumbs. It was served with a whole lemon cut into quarters, and a bowl of potato salad and another of coleslaw on the side. Bruno was thinking how a glass of Bergerac Sec would go perfectly with the veal when Ivan beckoned him inside, tamping down a new serving of coffee into the filter basket.

‘Try this,’ Ivan said. ‘It’s Griselda’s latest idea. She said she had it in Italy, called an affogato , so I’m going to try it here.’

He took an espresso cup, spooned in a small helping of vanilla ice cream and put the cup beneath the coffee machine.

‘What do you think?’ Ivan asked, as Bruno tried to decide whether he should eat it with a spoon or try to drink it first. He compromised with a small sip of what seemed to him like a particularly good coffee ice cream.

‘Be a good dessert for the plat du jour ,’ said Bruno.

Ivan shook his head. ‘I want them to buy a coffee as well as the menu. This will be something different, mid-morning maybe.’

Bruno asked him to hold two places for about one o’clock and then headed to Karim’s Cafe des Sports, also licensed to sell tobacco and close enough to the college to stock a vast selection of confectionery. Beyond the sweets were racks of magazines and newspapers, and beyond the tobacco stretched the big coffee machine and the bar. Rashida was serving glasses of Ricard for the pre-lunch crowd, her baby asleep in a shawllike pouch that kept him tucked against her breast. Her husband Karim, star of the town’s rugby team, loomed over the till.

‘ Un p’tit apero , Bruno?’ he asked. Bruno shook his head and handed him the plastic bag containing the bubblegum wrapper he’d found in the cave. He asked if Karim recognized it.

‘It’s this one,’ Karim said, reaching over the counter to pick out a small pack in garish colours. ‘It has cards inside, all the footballers who’ve played for France, and the kids collect them. I must sell fifty a week, maybe more. It’s a new line, running just this year.’

So it can’t have been litter from last year’s tourists, Bruno thought. Whoever had thrown away the wrapper had kept the card, which Bruno assumed meant it could have been a collector. That would suggest that the tableau in the cave had been the work of kids.

‘Would you know the main collectors?’ he asked.

It was a mixture, Karim explained, of the older kids in college and the younger ones in primary school, all the football fans, and quite a few girls. He broke off to sell a copy of Tele-Journal and some lottery cards to Ahmed from the fire station.

‘What about this cigarette end?’ Bruno asked, handing over another plastic bag. ‘It smells funny.’

Karim looked at the dark brown filter and sniffed at the bag, and grinned.

‘It’s a kretek , from Indonesia. I’m the only one round here who sells them. I keep them for my cousin Hassan, who won’t smoke anything else. It’s flavoured with cloves, supposed to have been invented by an asthmatic. It took me ages to find an importer.’

He pulled a pack from the rows of cigarettes behind him and handed it to Bruno. The pack was dark brown, and marked Djarum Black. Bruno sniffed at it, and picked up the faint scent of cloves.

‘Anybody else buy them?’

‘Hardly anybody, these days. When I began stocking them, a lot of people bought a pack to try after they smelt Hassan smoking them. Smells like apple pie. But once the novelty wore off, it was just Hassan. I can’t think when I last sold a pack to anyone else.’

Hassan lived in the nearby village of St Chamassy, where he worked for Electricite de France as a travelling maintenance man. His route would take him past the Cafe des Sports on most days.

‘I’m trying to remember how old his kids are,’ Bruno said.

‘Just the little girls and the one boy at the college here, Abdul,’ Karim said, a touch of alarm in his voice. ‘Is there a problem, Bruno?’

He shook his head. ‘Just routine inquiries. I presume the boy is a football fan.’

‘Mad about it, plays on the school team. Are you sure this isn’t trouble?’

Karim was obviously worried, and something in his tone made Rashida turn to look at her husband.