A Rather Charming Invitation by C. A. Belmond

Author:C. A. Belmond
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Penguin USA, Inc.
Published: 2010-11-09T17:15:59.725000+00:00

Chapter Twenty-five

A nightmare. That’s what it was. A nightmare. First, we called Thierry, who, technically, was a marine gendarme with the harbor police in Nice, so his jurisdiction was boats and sea troubles. But we knew and trusted him, because of what happened last year with the yacht. He, in turn, called a cop friend of his at the proper police department, and the cop came over quickly, accompanied by an Inspector who would be in charge of the investigation.

They arrived dramatically in a car with flashing lights, but parked on the road below us, so that they could come up the driveway slowly, on foot, searching for clues along the way. It was hard to learn anything from the tire tracks, though, since we’d had so many visitors with cars criss-crossing over one another’s path in the gravel driveway.

The Inspector was a short, elegant yet tough-looking man, with a bald head and very pale blue eyes set off by his suntanned face. He had a penetrating, no- nonsense stare that was a bit unnerving, as if experience had taught him to trust absolutely nobody. He was a proud dresser, right down to his gold watch and a gold chain around his neck. He gave short, sharp orders in rapid French that I couldn’t make out; but the young cop, who had big ears like a sugar bowl, sprang into action, checking windows and doors for signs of forced entry, looking for footprints inside and outside of the house.

Then they methodically began combing the first floor rooms for any other telltale traces of the thief. Whenever we asked a question, the Inspector was brief and brusque, and once he even held up his hand as if we were interrupting his thoughts and therefore jeopardizing the investigation.

“Later, we will talk,” he said.

I wasn’t in any particular mood to chat. My normal Girl Detective instincts had completely deserted me. Instead, whenever I passed by the drawing room, I kept staring at the wall where the tapestry had hung only a few hours ago, and I seemed to be trying, by sheer force of will, to make it materialize again.

I even found myself once more peering into closets and cupboards, harboring the wild, ridiculous hope that some well-meaning member of the group had put it there and forgotten about it. I had turned into an automaton, and I didn’t care if anything I did made sense or not. So it fell on Jeremy and Honorine to manage the police and our guests. At one point, though, Jeremy must have seen me walking about with my vacant gaze, and he took me aside.

“The police think they’ve figured out where someone may have entered the villa last night,” he reported. “One of the French doors in the dining room. The lock isn’t broken, exactly, but it looks as though it was tricked open. Possibly the thieves had cased it out earlier, and set it up for re-entry later at night. They could have put something

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