‘It was no trouble, honestly.’
‘You will wait here, please, Madame,’ he commanded me, as I turned to leave. ‘Monsieur Valcourt, I am sure, will also wish to thank you.’
My hesitation must have shown, because he said to me again: ‘Wait here, please,’ before he finally left me. The tone of his voice left no room for argument. I linked my hands behind my back like a chastened schoolgirl and did as I was told, feeling a childish twinge of apprehension, as though it had been myself and not the girl Lucie who’d gone wandering off against the rules. This was, I thought, what happened when one got involved in other people’s problems.
Still, I had to admit that my situation was not entirely without interest.
The inhabitants of the Clos des Cloches, like Jim Whitaker, evidently bought their clothing tailor made. The tangible evidence of wealth met me here at every turning. Not only wealth, but old and polished wealth, generations of it, handed down with pride from time immemorial. The plush red carpet, the marble floor on which I stood, the golden sconces on the white-painted walls, the rich, dark tones of the gilt-framed portraits – all this spoke to me of money and of privilege.
A portrait by the staircase drew my eye, and I moved closer to examine it. It showed a boy just entering his teens, a boy with thick black hair and great dark eyes that watched me, lifelike. Those eyes, I thought, were faintly familiar …
‘Good evening, Madame.’ The deep voice spoke suddenly out of the air behind me.
I had not heard him come into the foyer, but my startled reaction was not due solely to the unexpected nature of his entrance. Pulling my eyes away from the portrait, I turned slowly round to face Monsieur Valcourt, and had the satisfaction of seeing his own features change abruptly.
‘You …’ he said, the flash of surprise in his dark eyes quickly swallowed by a spreading warmth.
I lifted my chin a fraction and summoned up the brightest smile I could muster. ‘You owe me twenty-five francs, Monsieur,’ I told him.
I ought to have been furious, I told myself. No doubt he had thought it a marvellous joke to be mistaken for a taxi driver, and he had certainly enjoyed that joke at my expense. It was a rotten thing to do, and I should have despised him for it. But the best I could manage was a kind of limpid irritation, and even that would not hold up beneath the smooth persuasion of his smile.
‘I owe my daughter a debt, I think,’ he said, coming forward. ‘I am Armand Valcourt.’
‘Emily Braden.’ I shook his hand stiffly, keeping the contact as brief as possible.
‘You’re angry with me.’ I did not answer, and his breath escaped him on a sound that wasn’t quite a sigh. ‘I never said, you know, that the taxi was mine. If you had asked, I would have told you no, I was just waiting for the driver to collect my luggage from the train, that’s all. But,’ he spread his hands, in self-defence, ‘you didn’t ask.’
‘You might have told me, later. When we met the second time.’
‘I might have, yes. But by that time you were convinced I drove the taxi. I thought it would embarrass you to find out who I was. And it was no great sacrifice for me to drive you to your hotel.’
‘You took my money,’ I reminded him.
‘You were most insistent, as I recall.’ His eyes were gently mocking above his smile. ‘I did not keep your money, Mademoiselle. I gave it to my friend, Jean-Luc, who owns the taxi. And if it matters, he also was not pleased with me, when he found I’d taken his taxi. So I have been twice reprimanded.’ Not that he looked particularly remorseful. He thrust his hands in his pockets and tilted his head to one side. ‘Am I forgiven?’
‘Possibly.’ I softened, noting he had switched to calling me ‘Mademoiselle’ in place of the more formal ‘Madame’. The change implied a subtle move in our relationship as well – no longer strangers, but acquaintances.
‘But you are right,’ he said, ‘I must repay you. Have you eaten yet?’
‘No, but—’
‘Then please, you must dine with me, tonight. François always cooks far more than I can eat alone. Do you like veal?’
‘Yes, but—’
‘Good. You can leave your coat there, if you like, beside the door. Here, let me help you.’
I hesitated, and he smiled again. It was a damnably persuasive smile. ‘Please,’ he said again. ‘I’ve upset you, and my daughter has dragged you across half of Chinon. The least that I can do is give you dinner.’
It would be harmless enough, I thought, to accept the offer. I was rather hungry, and the fact that he was flirting with me openly convinced me just how harmless it would be. Flirtatious men I could handle. It was the serious ones, like Neil, who made me nervous – the ones who looked straight at you and spoke simply and had no use for games. Men like Neil, I thought, might talk of love and mean it, while flirtatious men demanded nothing, promised less, and never disappointed. There could be no danger, I decided, in a dinner with Armand Valcourt.
‘Of course,’ he said, ‘if there is someone waiting for you back at your hotel …’
I shook my head. ‘No, I’m all on my own.’
‘Good,’ he murmured, cryptically, as I followed him from the foyer into a long, expansive room half shadow and half light, its understated elegance both soothing and surreal. It had been decorated with an eye to detail – the artistic arrangement of chairs and sofa, the graceful antique writing-desk, the swan-like pair of table lamps … but it looked more like a stage set than a sitting-room. A place where no one really lived. The image was compounded by the fact that one whole wall seemed made of windows, black as pitch at this late hour. As we moved, the glass threw back our images, distorted.