Ripley Under Water (33 page)

“Dead?”

“Drowned. So it appears. It was—well, really quite an upsetting Saturday morning here for us! You know the Leferre boy, Robert?”

“I’m afraid I don’t.”

“He goes to the same school as Edouard. Anyway, Robert came along this morning selling raffle tickets—with a friend of his, another boy whose name I don’t know, doesn’t matter, so of course we bought ten tickets to please the boys, and they went off. This was a good hour ago. The next house is empty, as you know, and they evidently went on to the Preechard house, which—alors, they came running back to our house, scared to death! They said the house was open—the doors. No one answered the bell, a light was on, and they went—out of curiosity, I’m sure—to take a look at the pond at the side of the house there, you know?”

“Yes, I’ve seen it,” Tom said.

“There they could see—because the water is pretty clear, it seems—two bodies—not quite floating! Oh, it’s so horrible, Tom!”

“Mon Dieu, oui! Do they think it was suicide? The police—”

“Oh, yes, the police, of course, they’re still at the house and one was even here to talk to us. We just said—” Agnes gave a great sigh. “Alors, what could we say, Tome? That those two kept strange hours, played loud music. They were newcomers here in the neighborhood, they had never been to our house, nor we to theirs. Worst is—oh, nom de Dieu, Tome—it is like black magic! Horrid!”

“What is?” asked Tom, knowing.

“Below them—in the water—the police found bones, yes—”

“Bones?” Tom echoed in French.

“The remains of—human bones. Wrapped up, a neighbor told us, because people went there out of curiosity, you know?”

“Villeperce people?”

“Yes. Till the police roped it off. We didn’t go, I am not that curious!” Agnes gave a laugh, as if to relieve her tension. “Who knows what to say? Were they insane? Did they commit suicide? Did Preechard fish these bones up? We don’t know any answers yet. Who knows how their minds worked?”

“True.” Whose bones could they be, Tom thought of asking, but Agnes wouldn’t know, and why should he appear curious? Like Agnes, Tom was shocked, merely. “Agnes, I thank you for telling me. It’s really—incredible.”

“A fine introduction to Villeperce for your English friend!” said Agnes with another relieving laugh.

“Isn’t it true!” said Tom, smiling. An unpleasant idea had come to him in the last seconds.

“Tome—we are here, Antoine till Monday morning, trying to forget the horror not so far away from us. It is good to talk to friends. And what do you hear from Heloise ?”

“She’s in Paris! I had a telephone call from her yesterday evening. I expect her home today. She stayed the night with her friend Noelle who has an apartment in Paris, you know?”

“I know. Give Heloise our love, will you?”

“Indeed, yes!”

“If I learn anything more, I’ll telephone you again today. After all, I am closer, unfortunately.”

“Ha! I realize. Thank you infinitely, dear Agnes, and my best to Antoine—and the kids.” Tom hung up. “Whew!”

Ed stood some distance away, near the sofa. “That’s where we had drinks last night—Agnes—”

“Yes,” said Tom. He explained how two boys selling raffle tickets had looked into the pond and seen the two figures.

Even knowing the facts, Ed grimaced.

Tom narrated the events as if, indeed, they were news to him. “Terrible for kids to have to come on that! I suppose the boys are about twelve. The water is clear in that pond, as I recall. Even though the bottom’s mud. And those funny sides—”

“Sides?”

“Sides of the pond. Cement, I remember someone saying—probably not thick. But you can’t see the cement at grass level, it doesn’t come up that high, so perhaps it’s easy to slip at the edge and fall in—especially carrying something. Oh, yes, Agnes mentioned the police finding a bag of human bones at the bottom.”

Ed looked at Tom, silent.

“I’m told the police are still there. I’ll bet.” Tom took a deep breath. “I think I’ll go speak with Madame Annette.”

A glance told him that the big square kitchen was empty, and Tom had just turned to his right to go and rap on Mme Annette’s door when she appeared in the short hall there.

“Oh, M’sieur Tome! Such a story! line catastrophe! Chez les Preechards!” She was ready to narrate all. Mme Annette had a telephone in her room with her own number.

“Ah, yes, madame, I just heard the story from Madame Grais! Truly a shock! Two deaths—and so near us! I was coming to tell you.”

They both went into the kitchen.

“Madame Marie-Louise just told me. Madame Genevieve told her. All the village knows! Two persons drowned!”

“An accident—do they think?”

“People think they were quarreling—that one slipped and fell in, perhaps. They were always quarreling, did you know, M’sieur Tome?”

Tom hesitated. “I—think I heard people say that.”

“But those bones in the pond!” Her voice fell to a whisper. “Strange, M’sieur Tome—very strange. Strange people.” Mme Annette made it sound as if the Pritchards were from outer space, beyond normal comprehension.

“That is certain,” Tom said. “Bizarre—so everyone says. Madame—I must now go and telephone Madame Heloise .”

Again the telephone rang, just as Tom was about to pick it up, and this time he cursed silently with frustration. The police? “Hello?”

” ‘Allo, Tome! C’est Noelle! Bonnes nouvelles pour vous—Heloise arrive …”

Heloise should arrive in a quarter of an hour. She was driving down with a young friend of Noelle’s called Yves, who had a new car and wanted to run it in. Besides, the car had room for Heloise’s baggage, and was more convenient than a train.

“A quarter of an hour! Thank you, Noelle. You are well? … And Heloise ?”

“We both have the health of the most rugged explorers!”

“I hope to see you soon, Noelle.”

They hung up.

“Heloise is being driven down—any minute,” Tom said with a smile to Ed. Then he went to impart the news to Mme Annette. Her expression brightened at once. Heloise’s presence was more cheerful than thoughts of the Pritchards dead in their pond, Tom was sure.

“For the luncheon—cold meats, M’sieur Tome? I have bought very good chicken liver pate this morning …”

Tom assured her that it all sounded excellent.

“And for this evening—tournedos—sufficient for three. I was expecting madame certainly this evening.”

“And baked potatoes. Can you do that? Really well done. No! I can do it all outside on the grill!” Certainly the most cheerful and tasty way of baking potatoes and grilling tournedos. “And a good sauce bearnaise?”

“Bien sur, m’sieur. Et …”

She would buy fresh string beans this afternoon, and something else, and perhaps a kind of cheese Mme Heloise liked. Mme Annette was in seventh heaven.

Tom returned to the living room where Ed was looking at that morning’s Herald Trib. “All is well,” Tom announced. “Want to take a walk with me?” Tom felt like jogging, or leaping a fence.

“Great idea! Stretch our legs!” Ed was ready.

“And maybe run into Heloise in that fast car? Or is Yves running the car in? Anyway, it’s due.” Tom went to the kitchen again, where Mme Annette was calmly at work. “Madame—M’sieur Ed and I are going out for a short promenade. Back in fifteen minutes.”

Then Tom rejoined Ed in the hall. Again he thought of the depressing possibility that had occurred to him that morning, and Tom paused, hand on the doorknob.

“What’s the matter?”

“Nothing specific. Since I’ve—so taken you into my confidence—” Tom pushed his fingers through his straight brown hair. “Well, it occurred to me this morning that old Preekhard might have kept a diary—or even she, more likely. They might have written down that they found the bones,” Tom continued, lowering his voice, glancing into the broad doorway to the living room, “and dumped them on my doorstep—just yesterday.” Here Tom opened the door, needing sunlight and fresh air. “And that they hid the head somewhere on their property.”

They both went out on to the graveled forecourt.

“The police would find the diary,” Tom went on, “and learn soon enough that one of Pritchard’s pastimes was harassing me.” Tom disliked talking out his anxieties, usually so fleeting anyway. But certainly Ed was to be trusted, he reminded himself.

“But both of them were so cracked!” Ed frowned at Tom, and his whisper was hardly louder than their tread on the gravel. “Whatever they wrote—might be fantasy or not necessarily true. And even so—their word against yours?”

“If they’ve written anywhere that they delivered any bones here, I’m simply going to deny it,” Tom said in a quiet and firm tone, as if that were the end of the matter. “I don’t think it’ll happen.”

“Right, Tom.”

They walked on, as if to get rid of nervous energy, able to walk side by side because cars were few or none. What color was Yves’s car, Tom wondered, and did people have to run in any new car these days? He imagined the car yellow, tres sportif.

“D’you think Jeff might like to come over, Ed? Just for fun?” Tom asked. “He said he could make himself free now. By the way, I hope you’ll stay on at least two more days, Ed. Can you?”

“I can.” Ed glanced at Tom. The English pink was back in his cheeks. “You might ring Jeff up and ask. That’s a nice idea.”

“There’s a couch in my atelier. Quite comfortable.” Tom much wished to enjoy even two days of holiday at Belle Ombre with his old friends; at the same time, he was wondering if his telephone was ringing at this moment, ten past twelve, because the police would like to speak with him about something. “There! Look!” Tom jumped into the air and pointed. “The yellow car! I’ll bet!”

The car with its top down rolled toward them, and Heloise was waving from the passenger seat. She raised herself as much as her seatbelt permitted, and her blonde hair blew back.

“Tome!”

Tom and Ed were on the same side of the road as the car.

“Hi! Hello!” Tom waved both arms. Heloise looked very suntanned.

The driver braked, but still went past Tom and Ed, who trotted back toward it.

“Hello, darling!” Tom kissed Heloise on the cheek.

“This is Yves!” said Heloise , and the dark-haired young man smiled and said, “Enchante, M’sieur Ripley!” He was driving an Alfa-Romeo. “Would you like to get in?” he asked in English.

“This is Ed.” Tom gestured. “No, thank you, we’ll follow,” he replied in French. “See you at the house!”

The back seat of the car had been laden with small suitcases, one definitely new to Tom, and Tom had not seen room even for a small dog there. He and Ed went off trotting, then running, laughing, and they were no more than five meters behind the yellow Alfa by the time it turned right and went through the gates of Belle Ombre.

Mme Annette appeared. Much chatter and greetings and introductions. Somehow they all helped with the luggage, because there were innumerable small items in plastic bags in the trunk. For once, Mme Annette was permitted to carry the lighter items upstairs. Heloise hovered, pointing out certain plastic bags which contained “patisserie et bonbons de Maroc,” and which no one should squeeze.

“I shall not squeeze,” said Tom, “just take them to the kitchen.” He did, and returned. “May I offer you a glass of something, Yves? And you are also welcome to stay for lunch.”

Yves declined both with thanks, and said he had a date in Fontainebleau and was a bit late now. Goodbyes and thanks between Heloise and Yves.

Then Mme Annette served two bloody Marys at Tom’s request, for himself and Ed, and an orange juice for Heloise, her choice. Tom did not want to take his eyes from her. She had not lost or gained weight, he thought, and the curve of her thighs under the pale blue trousers seemed things of beauty, works of art. Her voice, as she chattered on, half in French and half in English, about Morocco, was music to him, more delicious than Scarlatti.

When Tom looked at Ed, who stood with his tomato-colored drink in hand, he found Ed equally fixated, gazing at Heloise as she looked out the French windows. Heloise asked about Henri, and when was the last time it had rained? She had two other plastic bags in the hall, and brought them in. One contained a brass bowl, plain and not decorated, Heloise pointed out with pleasure. Another item for Mme Annette to polish, Tom thought.

“And this! Look, Tom! So pretty and it costed so little! A briefcase for your desk.” She produced a rectangle of soft brown leather, tooled, but not too elaborately, and just at its borders.

What desk, Tom wondered. He had a writing-table in his room, but - Heloise was opening it, showing Tom the four pockets within, two on each side, also made of leather.

Tom still preferred to stare at Heloise, so close to him now that he imagined he could smell the sun on her skin. “It is lovely, darling. If it’s for me—”

“Of course it is for you!” Heloise laughed and gave a quick glance at Ed, pushed her blonde hair back.

Again her skin was a bit darker than her hair. Tom had seen this a few times before. “It’s a wallet, darling—no? I think not a briefcase—which usually has a handle.”

“Oh, Tome, you are so serious!” She gave him a playful push in the forehead.

Ed laughed.

“What would you call this, Ed? A letter-holder?”

“The English language—” Ed began and didn’t finish. “Anyway not a portfolio. I’d say a letter-holder.”

Tom agreed. “It is beautiful, my dear, and I thank you.” He seized her right hand and gave it a quick kiss. “I shall love it and keep it polished—or cared for.”

Tom’s thoughts were more than half elsewhere. Where and when could he tell her about the Pritchard tragedy? Mme Annette would not mention it in the next two hours, because she was occupied with serving lunch. But the telephone might ring at any moment with more news from someone, the Grais, perhaps, even the Cleggs if the news had spread for kilometers. Tom decided at any rate to enjoy a pleasant lunch, and listen to accounts of Marrakesh and the two French gentlemen who were nice for dinner, Andre and Patrick. There was much laughter.

Heloise said to Ed, “We are so glad to have you here at our house! We hope you will enjoy your visit.”

“Thank you, Heloise,” Ed replied. “It’s a beautiful house—very comfortable.” Ed glanced at Tom.