Free The Devil's Cave: A Bruno Courrèges Investigation (Bruno Chief of Police 5) by Martin Walker Page A

still a lot of the local history that he didn’t know.
    ‘It’s the family estate and it’s where she grew up. She used to come from time to time but I haven’t heard anything about her for years. My uncle worked for her as a gardener, worshipped her. I even met her once when she came to see my uncle in his shed, sometime in the late Fifties. I’d have been eight, maybe nine. She was a stunner. I’ve still got the book she gave me, about King Arthur and his knights of the round table.’ He paused and laughed. ‘I kept imagining her in it, you know how kids do.’
    Bruno nodded. ‘How far is the château?’ he asked.
    ‘A few hundred metres, but it’s up the slope above theflood level and behind that cliff, in a kind of fold in the hill.’ Antoine looked at his watch. ‘If you want to make some inquiries, you’d better come back another time. We’ve got a lot of river to cover.’
    As they returned to the main stream and rounded the bend that led to the bridge before the Grand Roc, they saw on the far bank a handsome new dock and terrace. Steps of bright new stone and a gravel pathway led upwards to a fold in the hills, with a large terrace and restored building of the local honey-coloured stone just visible. A woman was standing on the dock, shading her eyes. Bruno raised his paddle in salute and she waved back.
    ‘I haven’t seen that dock before, but they were working on this place last year. It’s just down the hill from the old village of St Philippon, the one that was abandoned. You can just see the top of the chapel up on the ridge,’ said Antoine. ‘Better take a look.’
    ‘Welcome to the Auberge St Philippon,’ the woman said once they crossed the river to greet her and introduced themselves. She had the long-limbed look of a tennis player and beautifully cut fair hair. Bruno felt sure her hairdresser was based a long way from St Denis. She told them to call her Béatrice and that she was the manager of the newly restored inn. Bruno guessed she was in her early forties and spending time and effort to look younger. Dressed in a blue and white striped shirt-waist dress, she had a twinkle in her eye, as if to say she found life endlessly delightful. Bruno explained his mission and her face turned grave.
    ‘I’ve seen no dead women floating past here, but you’rewelcome to come and ask the staff and guests. And perhaps you’d like a drink. That paddling must be warm work,’ she said. ‘As you can see, we’ve no boathouse yet and no boats for my new dock. You’ll be christening it for me, the first guests to arrive by water.’
    The dock stood a good metre and more above the level of the river. There was as yet no ramp to haul boats ashore and not even the foundations of a boathouse. Bruno had heard of plans for the new hotel but was surprised to learn it was already open. Antoine tied the canoe to the dock and they took off their life jackets and donned their shirts, Bruno conscious of Béatrice casting an eye over his naked torso, and clambered up a wooden ladder. Once on the dock, Bruno realized that looking upward from the canoe he’d misjudged Béatrice’s height. She barely came up to his nose, but somehow her clothes made her look taller. Her watch was a Cartier Tank, a model he recognized because a previous girlfriend had brought a counterfeit back from a trip to China, and worn it even after it stopped working. Bruno felt certain Béatrice was wearing the real thing.
    As the path curved uphill, a windsock on a large and flat stretch of grass signalled a helicopter pad and beyond it the auberge began to emerge. Inn seemed too modest a term for the building. He guessed it was eighteenth-century, and expensively restored. It had two main storeys of tall windows with open grey shutters, and smaller semicircular windows in a mansard roof of dark slate. Wide steps led up to a handsome pillared porch with double doors flanked by two weathered stone cupids holding vases filled with