Free Murder à la Carte by Susan Kiernan-Lewis

standing with arms crossed in front of her chest and leaning against the counter.
    “ Au revoir, Mademoiselle," Maggie said.
    "Et vous, aussi, Madame," Babette said. “Or should I also say ‘Mademoiselle’?”
    Maggie turned and walked briskly back to the car. She shifted the long, awkward loaves in her arms, her head bent down intently. Before she reached her waiting car, Maggie collided with the running form of Gaston Lasalle.
    The air knocked out of her in an agonizing whoosh that she heard even as she made it, Maggie sat gasping and holding her scratched knee on the cracked and dirty curb in front of the village post office. Gaston had only stumbled when he hit her. Now he stood over her uncertainly, clenching and unclenching his hands. His dark hair was wild about his face in startled layers, like a black dogwood tree, Maggie thought in her daze.
    “Stupid girl!” she heard him say in French. “Stupid American.” Instead of rushing off, he remained standing near her as she slowly regained her breath.
    Maggie looked around for her bag of bread. The smell of urine and things rotting came flooding up to her from the gutter. To her surprise, Gaston suddenly reached down and grabbed her under the arms. In one swift jerk, he pulled her to her feet, cupping her left breast firmly in his hand. Maggie staggered away from him and fell against the fender of her car. Her eyes darted wildly to the streets for any passersby. The post office was closed. The streets of St-Buvard were vacant.
    “Stupid girl,” the young Frenchman said again, his eyes flashing over her in a way that made Maggie want to be sick all over his dirty leather boots.
    “Get away from me,” she croaked hoarsely, catapulting herself off the car with her hands and away from him. She stopped to pick up her undamaged bread, and watched him over her shoulder as he began walking away.
    Quickly, Maggie got into her car. Her hand was shaking as she turned the key in the ignition box. Before she pulled away from the curb, she leaned over and slammed down the lock on the passenger side door. As she did, she caught sight of Babette standing in the doorway of the boulangerie .
    Babette was smiling.
     
     

 
     
     
    Chapter Four
     
    1
    “No! I hate you! I won’t! No! No!” The child pulled herself to her full height of just over three feet and flung the opened medicine bottle at Windsor who, for some reason unknown to Grace, dodged it instead of catching it. Grace stood behind him and watched in dismay as the bottle fell to the floor and the murky pink liquid seeped into the original coral Isfahan rug beneath their feet.
    “You’re really good with kids, Win. Anyone ever tell you that before?”
    “Shut up!” he yelled, turning towards her. “Just shut the eff up.”
    “How wonderful.” Grace lit another cigarette―her third this morning―and it wasn’t yet eight. “He doesn’t swear around children,” she said to no one in particular. “He just alphabets them.”
    Windsor pushed past her to stand in front of Taylor who was oozing snot down the front of her face and wiping what she could on her clean, pressed school uniform.
    “Taylor, stop that!” he barked, knowing she would ignore him.
    The child began to sob, a whiny, aggressive sort of sobbing that tended to enrage its listeners rather than solicit their sympathy.
    “I don’t want it,” she sobbed, still clutching and smearing at her short little blue tablier.
    “Darling, it’s all right,” Grace said softly to the child.
    “Mommy, I don’t want the medicine.”
    “Yes, yes, Taylor. You don’t have to have it.”
    Windsor whirled on Grace. “What?” he exploded. “And what child care book is that out of?”
    “Look, Windsor, she―”
    “Is that the chapter that says wait until they’ve gone completely haywire before you give in because anything less and you won’t be respected by them? Thanks a lot, Grace...”
    “How can we give her medicine now? First, she’s a