Murder for Love

Chapter 2

2July 7, only two more days of school. The children were wild with excitement and the heady anticipation of freedom, and the staff wearily looked forward to the summer break as well. Caroline Dubois, who worked in the office, was using her lunchtime to try to bring order to the principal’s desk, as futile a task as that was.

“Tristan,” she said quietly to her boss, “if you would just sort the email as you receive it, it would not pile up in such an ugly mess.”

“I don’t mind mess,” said Tristan Séverin cheerfully. “Which I suppose is a lucky thing, considering.”

“I suppose so,” agreed Caroline, shaking her head. She was a pretty young woman, dressed in tailored clothes that flattered her figure. “I understand if you don’t want to give me a play-by-play, but you did mention last month that you were trying something new for your…your trouble with focusing? Has it helped at all?”

She asked the question but was fairly sure she knew the answer, since Séverin’s desk was as messy as ever, and he still needed constant reminders of his schedule to keep from missing meetings. He was a very successful school administrator, beloved by many families in Castillac for his generosity and creativity in helping their children. But organized and focused he was not.

“Fish oil,” scoffed Tristan. “I would much rather just eat more fish, you know? But the doctor insists I take the supplement. Can’t tell any difference at all, except that occasionally I have the most unpleasant burps.” Tristan grinned.

“More than I wanted to know,” said Caroline, gathering up a heap of files from a corner of his desk. “Well, your breath might be bad but I suppose you do have your charms,” she added, shaking her head and smiling.

“I’m glad you feel that way,” said Tristan. “I don’t know what I would do without you,” he said, waving a hand at his desk, from which papers were spilling onto the floor on one side and which held a number of empty coffee mugs. “Now let’s talk about the rest of the day, and then I’m going over to the cantine to have a last lunch with the children. This afternoon I’m meeting with those parents from Salliac, correct? And then the district video-call after that?”

Caroline nodded and sorted the files at the same time. “That’s right. Maybe that fish oil is doing something for you,” she said with a chuckle. Tristan beamed at her and took off, his shirt untucked in back and a flurry of papers falling off the desk as he went by.

The remainder of the school day passed without incident and Caroline got to leave a few minutes early. She would still be coming to work, school or no school; her vacation wasn’t until August. But nonetheless it felt like an achievement, getting through another school year, and even though there were still two more days left, she looked forward to getting home and making an effort to celebrate, however underwhelmingly: a kir royale, enjoyed by herself out in her small yard, with her dog and cat for company.

“If I were you, I’d just paint right over it,” said Molly’s old friend Frances, who had come to Castillac for a visit and never left. She was lying back on the old sleigh-bed, watching Molly work.

“I considered that. But see all these seams in the wallpaper? That’s going to look terrible painted over, unless I use some technique other than simply one color with a roller, and I don’t have the patience to learn anything new right now.”

“Don’t you think this wallpaper has some vintage charm? It’s faded in a pleasant, old-fashioned way.” Frances got up on her knees and ran her hand over the wall behind the bed. “Have any of your guests complained?”

“I’ve only had one guest stay here—Wesley Addison. He wasn’t…interior decorating was not one of his subjects. Blessedly. Now call me superstitious…but something about this room gives me the creeps. I call it the Haunted Room, though obviously not to the guests. I’m thinking that a little refreshing of the decor might help lift the creepy factor, you know?”

“Let me see,” said Frances, lying on her back and closing her eyes. “I’m communing with the spirits…remember when we used to do Ouija Board?”

“You mean when you would shove that thing around and try to scare me?”

“Yeah,” laughed Frances. “Man, I miss being a kid. Just thinking about those days makes me miss the Julys of childhood, because they lasted forever.”

“And your mom made really good lemonade.”

“Only homemade will do!” said Frances, imitating her mother’s voice.

Molly laughed. Then she took the scorer she’d found at the hardware store and scraped it over the wallpaper. Then dipped a sponge in a bucket of water and wiped it over the wall.

“Is that really going to loosen the glue?” asked Frances.

“Youtube says so. And youtube is never wrong.”

“Ha.”

“So how are things with Nico going? Give me an update.”

“Well….”

Molly glanced over her shoulder at her friend, who was gracefully raising her arms and legs to imaginary music, as though dancing ballet while lying in bed. “I don’t know, Molls. Love is…tricky.”

“Indeed,” said Molly. She put down the sponge and scraped tentatively at the soggy wallpaper with a putty knife, then put some force into it, making heaps of the stuff go splat onto the old sheet she’d spread on the floor. “Boy oh boy, this is satisfying. Goodbye sinister faded roses that remind me of a horror movie!”

“I thought you were obsessed with roses.”

“I sort of am. But if you knew the movie I’m talking about, you’d be over here helping me get rid of the wallpaper as fast as possible, believe me.”

Frances made no move to get up. “Who’s staying in your gîtes now? I don’t think I’ve met them. Anybody I’d like?”

“I can’t really say. An artist is staying in the pigeonnier by himself—Roger Finsterman. He’s usually out early in the morning, sitting in the meadow with a sketchpad, although once when I peeked at his sketch it was a wild abstract drawing, nothing to do with the meadow at all that I could see. There’s an American couple in the cottage. I’ve barely seen them, though they’ve only been here a few days. They have a car and leave early in the morning and don’t come back until after dinner.”

“I think you should have a party every week for everybody. Nothing fancy, just like…an apéro so the guests can be introduced to each other.”

“Great idea,” said Molly, “but maybe I’ll wait until I have a few more gîtes up and running. A party with 3 guests is a little hard to get moving, don’t you think? Or are you offering to come over every week and provide some entertainment?”

“I can dance,” said Frances, saying ‘dance’ in a terrible French accent. “Or maybe, given your not-so-secret love of detective work, you could put on one of those mystery evenings, where everyone dresses up and plays a part, and tries to figure out who the murderer is.”

“Always wanted to do that. But I’ve had my fill of detecting lately. Right now I want nothing more than to just work on La Baraque, hang out with you and Ben, and enjoy the simple pleasures of a Castillac summer.”

“Yeah, right,” said Frances, smiling to herself as she went downstairs in search of lemonade.