Death of a Chef (Capucine Culinary Mystery) (22 page)

CHAPTER 37

C
apucine’s call to Commissaire Lacroix to express her dismay at the lack of progress in the kidnapping case had started out badly.

“Slowly, slowly catchee monkey,” Lacroix had quoted with the hint of an edge in his voice. “Our net is spread wide. All the relevant lines are tapped, and we have the servants closely tailed when they’re off duty. We have a surveillance unit in the building across the street. Anything more and we risk spooking the kidnapper.”

“Chéri Lecomte?”

“She’s being tapped, too.”

“Why don’t we investigate her stand at the Puces?”

Reluctantly, Lacroix had agreed but had insisted that he was so shorthanded, Capucine would have to supply one of the brigadiers.

 

The next day, a Saturday, found Isabelle and Brigadier Durand meandering up and down the stalls of the Marché Biron, posing as a young, upwardly mobile couple on the lookout for furnishings for their brand-new Seventeenth Arrondissement apartment. When Capucine had briefed them early that morning, she had had serious misgivings. They were a very unlikely couple. Isabelle had increased the number of piercings in her face, with a particularly conspicuous gold ring traversing the left side of her lower lip. Durand, on the other hand, in his slightly too-tight wool jacket and raincoat, came across as a prissy insurance adjuster.

When they reached Chéri’s stand, Durand paused and gripped Isabelle’s arm to stop her. She pulled away in irritation and muttered an imprecation.

“Darling, wouldn’t that cachepot be perfect in our hallway?”

With the diffidence of the young, they approached the stand that held the Menton rafraîchissoir. Chéri materialized at their side.

“Lovely, isn’t it?” she said, flashing her gleaming teeth. “Menton, probably early nineteenth century, a remake of a design that was popular in the eighteenth century.”

“Originally for cooling wine, wasn’t it?” Durand asked ingenuously. “It really would be perfect in our flat. Don’t you think, mon petit chou?” he said, putting his hand around Isabelle’s waist. Isabelle looked at him sharply. Enough was enough.

“Exactly,” Chéri said. “It’s very unusual. Most of them were made to hold several bottles and are much larger.”

“Is it expensive?” Isabelle asked.

“It’s an original piece that will gain value over time. An investment. I could let you have it for thirty-five hundred euros.”

Isabelle looked at Durand with earnest hopefulness. He shook his head.

“I’m sorry. That’s out of our range. Give us a chance to look around your stall some more. We love your things. I’m sure we can find something that would fit our little pocketbook.”

Isabelle darted another dagger at Durand, frowning in disgust at the corniness.

They wandered to the opposite side of the stand and peered at a series of plates decorated with vegetables in high relief. A woman with an Hermès scarf artfully tied around her neck took their place in front of the rafraîchissoir and entered into earnest whispered conversation with Chéri. After a few minutes, Chéri was heard to say brightly, “D’accord, but you
do
drive a very hard bargain.”

 

The next day, Sunday, two slim, petite young women dressed in sequined jeans, the sort of designer T-shirts that cost well over two hundred euros, and quilted pastel vests, looking for all the world like a Saint-Germain couple, pawed over the stand, making alternatively admiring and disdaining murmurs. They were brigadiers from Lacroix’s unit. The two women stopped in front of a Menton rafraîchissoir placed inconspicuously at the very rear of a glass-shelved display case.

“That’s just
trop chou,
isn’t it, Noémi?”

A dialogue similar to the previous day’s ensued with Chéri. When told the price, one of the women exclaimed, “Ooh, la, la! We’ll have to think about
that
, won’t we, Noémi?”

Five minutes later Noémi was on the cell phone to Capucine.

“It could have been returned.”

“Who ever heard of anyone returning anything to the Puces? Buy it,” came the order.

By lunchtime the blue and white rafraîchissoir was on Capucine’s desk.

 

The next day, Monday, the Puces were open, but the crowd was thinner. It was a day when most stand owners stayed in bed and let assistants attend to the stand.

When Durand and Isabelle sauntered by Chéri’s stall, they thought they saw the same rafraîchissoir, now on a table close to the entrance. They bent over it, deep in whispered conversation. A tired-looking man with a wilted mustache and a dilapidated old pipe burnt halfway down on one side came up to them with a hangdog smile and proffered the now familiar litany about the piece’s provenance. Isabelle had no need to make a cell phone call. She had her instructions.

“Twenty-five hundred. But we’ll pay you cash and won’t ask for a receipt.”

The man hesitated. “Twenty-seven hundred and you have a deal. But it still has to be cash.”

It went for 2,650 euros in crisp bills.

An hour later a second rafraîchissoir, apparently identical to the first, was also on Capucine’s desk.

Another hour later an INPS forensic unit van was double-parked in front of Capucine’s commissariat, and two agents spécialisés were carefully packing the rafraîchissoirs into plastic containers.

“We’re only going to take very small chips from under the glaze of the base. The intrinsic value of the pieces will hardly be diminished,” explained one of the agents spécialisés.

“You can reduce the damn things to powder if that’s what it takes to get results,” Capucine said.

“Madame, we’re scientists, not philistines,” the agent spécialisé said. “You’ll have your results tomorrow afternoon at the latest,” he added, cradling one of the plastic containers protectively under his arm and walking out the door.

 

The next day, as she returned from lunch, the uniformed receptionist handed Capucine a thin sheaf of phone messages. The third was from Pascal Challoneau.

“So, Pascal, what have you got for me?”

“Those pieces aren’t Menton. They’re from Châteauneuf, even though they’re made to look like they’re Menton.”

“Forgeries?”

“That would be the term I’d use, yes. But, oddly enough, made in a well-known faïence and not in some crook’s basement.”

“How can you know they were made in Châteauneuf?”

“Elementary, my dear Commissaire. These faïences only use local clay. The analysis indicated the clay contained a small amount of extremely fine river sand typical of the Loire Valley south of Touraine. We ran a spectrographic analysis to make sure. Châteauneuf is the only faïence in the region. So one of our agents went to the Printemps and invested a hundred euros—a price that seemed exorbitant to me—in a rather simple-looking flower vase made by Châteauneuf. We took a chip from the bottom and analyzed it—identical to the so-called Menton rafraîchissoirs. It was as simple as that. I’m e-mailing you my report. You’ll have it in less than a minute.”

CHAPTER 38

T
he uniformed receptionist buzzed Capucine and announced that Monsieur Brissac-Vanté was on the line. She assumed he had misunderstood and that it was Yolande. It must be something serious if she was calling the police.

“Bonjour, madame,” Capucine said, putting as much smile into her voice as she could manage.

A tired and slightly hoarse voice replied, “No, Commissaire, this is Thierry Brissac-Vanté. I’m home, and I’m calling to thank you for being so supportive of my wife. She greatly appreciated your kindness.”

“You were released? When?”

“Oh, about ten days ago. I was hospitalized briefly for my ear, and the doctor insisted I rest at home incommunicado for at least a week.”

“Hospitalized? Where?”

“At the Clinique Fontini. It’s just around the corner.”

“Monsieur Brissac-Vanté, this is very serious. We need to catch these people. You should have called us immediately.”

“There’s no one to catch. I’m not pressing charges against anyone.”

“Monsieur, we do need to talk. When would it be convenient for me to see you?”

“After lunch today? Say three o’clock? Yolande will be here. I know she wants to thank you personally.”

 

That afternoon, when the maid opened the door to the Brissac-Vantés’ apartment, Yolande appeared behind her, a radiant lighthouse in a stormy night.

“Isn’t it wonderful he’s back? It’s been nearly two weeks, and I still can’t believe it. The poor darling was in such a state when he arrived. He had lost a great deal of blood and hadn’t been fed properly or allowed to sleep enough. Thank God we were able to get him right into Fontini. The food there is excellent, and they really know how to take care of people. But do come in. Thierry is dying to see you.”

Brissac-Vanté’s greeting of Capucine was subdued. He sat in a darkened room, the thick velvet drapes tightly drawn, in a black flannel robe with crimson piping and black velvet slippers decorated with an elaborate gold monogram. Even before he spoke, he seemed absent and distracted, not unlike the hero in an English black-and-white movie about a young squire who has been returned severely wounded to his country home after some appalling World War I battle and who is unable to wrest his thoughts away from the carnage of the war. Completing the image, a large white bandage was taped over his right ear.

When Capucine entered the room, he looked up listlessly.

“Commissaire, kind of you to come out here. I should have come to you, but I’m afraid I’m not really up to going out quite yet.”

“It must have been quite an ordeal.”

Brissac-Vanté did not reply.

“Tell me about your release. How did you get home?” Capucine asked.

Brissac-Vanté spoke in an inflectionless monotone. “There’s nothing much to tell. When they cut off my ear, it happened very quickly. I felt almost nothing. I think they must have done it with a straight razor. Then they gave me pills. They must have been some sort of powerful painkillers. It hurt, but I felt disassociated from my body, as if I was floating. I don’t know how many days went by. I had been blindfolded from the very beginning and rubber plugs had been put in my ears. I didn’t know if it was night or day. When I had a plug in only one ear, that made me even more disoriented.

“At one point I realized I was in a car. After a long time the car stopped, and I was taken out and left standing. I heard the car drive off. I knew my hands were not bound, but I still stood there for an eternity, not daring to take my blindfold off or take the earplug out. When I finally did, I discovered I was in a vacant lot. I had no idea where. I started walking. It was only when I reached a broad avenue with some stores that I discovered I was in Puteaux. There was a taxi rank. I got into the first one and gave my address. I must have looked like hell. The driver didn’t want to take me. But I threatened to call the police if he didn’t. When I arrived here, Maria do Conceição paid the taxi, and then it was over.”

There was another long silence, which Brissac-Vanté seemed to welcome. He breathed rapidly through his mouth.

“How many days were you held captive?”

“I have no idea. I couldn’t tell night from day. But Yolande tells me it was ten.”

As if speaking to a sick child, Capucine asked, “And how did they capture you?”

“Oh, that was very simple,” Brissac-Vanté said at the edge of exhaustion. “I left my office building to go out to dinner. Two men grabbed my arms from behind and pushed me across the sidewalk. Before I realized what was happening, they shoved me into the backseat of a car, put what felt like a sock over my head, handcuffed me, and stuck the earplugs in. Of course, it couldn’t have been a sock. It must have been one of those ski masks turned around backward.”

“Did you see any of their faces?”

“No, the men were behind me, and there was no driver in the car. Or maybe he was lying down on the seat when I was shoved in. I don’t know. We drove off. I could tell we went up the Champs, because of the incline. Then we went around the Rond Point and down the avenue de la Grande Armée. I knew that because we were going downhill. Then we got on the Périphérique, from what had to have been the Porte Maillot ramp. After a while we were on an autoroute, but I don’t have the slightest idea which one. We drove for a long time. An hour, maybe two, maybe even three. You get very disoriented when you can’t see or hear. Maybe I dozed. I don’t know.” He fell silent, exhausted.

With a sigh, he resumed his narrative. “All of a sudden the car stopped, and I was shoved out. I could smell trees and dead leaves, so it must have been somewhere in the country. I was pushed forward and told there were three steps. I guess that means it must have been some kind of house. Then I was put in a room with a bunk with a rough wool cover, and the handcuffs were taken off. I was told that if I got off the bed or took off the blindfold or the earplugs, I would be killed instantly. They brought me food and took me to the toilet when I wanted, but the rest of the time I either sat or lay on the cot.” He paused. “Even when—he swallowed a sob—“they . . . they . . . You know what they did.”

Utterly spent, he stopped, staring at the floor, lost in his memories. Capucine caught sight of Yolande peering at them anxiously from the door. It was clear she had no intention of allowing the interview to continue.

After the somber gloominess of the apartment, Capucine reeled from both the bright afternoon sun and the enormity of the situation. It seemed impossible that Brissac-Vanté had arrived home, been taken to the clinic, undoubtedly been visited there repeatedly by his wife, and then been brought home again, all unnoticed by the police surveillance team. It seemed equally impossible that a ransom had been paid without being detected by the fiscal brigade.

Capucine sat in her car, flipped the sun visor down, pulled out her cell phone, and pressed the speed dial for Jacques.

Jacques picked up before the first ring was completed. “Ma très belle cousine!” he greeted her coquettishly.

“Isn’t this your office number?” Capucine said, confused, having expected to go through two secretaries and wait for ten minutes, if she had been able to get through at all.

“It’s my cell. You dialed the office. We have new software that can redirect calls to various numbers when you’re out. For some unknown reason, the computer must be aware of your décolletage and decided to bounce you over to my cell phone.”

“Jacques, I’m furious with you.”

“You’re so right.
Bounce
was a poor choice of words.”

“No, Jacques, be serious. This is no laughing matter. Bris—”

“Yes, yes. He’s at home, feeling sorry for himself, and your policeman is going to have to scold his little scouts for being so inattentive. It’s these new little telephones they all have. They probably watch porn all day on those little screens, instead of keeping their eyes peeled.”

“Jacques, your people had a hand in this, didn’t they? You must have. How else would you have known that Brissac-Vanté was released?”

“Ma belle, I had not the slightest idea. I only guessed that from your tone. Actually, I only picked up your call because I was hoping you were after one of your evening assignations.”

“Hardly!”

“Well, then I’m going to have to ring off. I’m in the middle of something rather challenging out in the field, as we like to say.”

“Well, did you or didn’t you?”

“Silly you. You know the DGSE isn’t allowed to interfere in matters on the national territory. I really
am
going to have to run.” He paused for half a beat. “But I’ll tell you one thing. Those brown tweed trousers you’re wearing? They definitely give you a fat butt.” His shrieking bray was sliced in half when he cut the connection.