Black Diamond by Martin Walker Read Free Book Online Page B

said it, Bruno knew that it didn’t reflect quite what he felt. He smiled at her, trying to make a joke of it.
    “I take you as you are,” he said. “Whatever the terms.”
    “The terms are still under negotiation,” she said, unfolding herself from the sink and coming across to take his face in her hands and kiss him softly on the lips. “Come on, dearest Bruno, and take me to bed.”

4
    Didier, the manager of the truffle market, was a short man with a clammy handshake, a potbelly and a bad haircut. Bruno tried to damp down the instinctive dislike he felt even as he turned himself a little sideways to avoid the man’s sour breath. Didier was explaining the various steps required to match a basket of truffles sold in the market hall with an Internet order. Bruno tried to concentrate on the process as he observed Didier for any signs of nervousness. Bruno had assumed even without Hercule’s hints that a successful fraud would require somebody on the inside who was familiar with the way the market worked. Didier was his guide to this process but also an obvious suspect. Bruno had expected defensiveness, but that was not the way Didier seemed to be reacting.
    “The difficulty is that we don’t have the authority to control the whole market,” Didier said, sounding more aggrieved than nervous. “If all the sales had to go through us, there’d be no problem. But the mayor doesn’t want to upset the
renifleurs
. He might lose their votes, and some of the big customers insist on using them anyway.”
    Bruno nodded encouragingly. “Politics always seems to get involved, that’s true.”
    “It’s politics all the way in this town. Especially now that the elections are coming up. I suppose that’s why the mayor called you in. The last thing he wants is a scandal, which would explain why you’re not in uniform.”
    “I don’t have any jurisdiction in Ste. Alvère,” Bruno said. “But I don’t think it’s just the elections. The new plantations are going to increase the truffle supply and make the trade even more important for the town.”
    Didier nodded and helped himself to more coffee from the jug that a young woman had brought in when Bruno arrived. It was weak and slightly stewed, and Bruno had left his cup unfinished. From his chair in front of Didier’s desk in the office of the market hall, Bruno had a clear view of the tower of the ruined castle that dominated the town center.
    “The growth is for the future. But right now, because the mayor doesn’t want to upset the
renifleurs
, we have to have a double system,” Didier said. “There’s the market we control, where we buy in the truffles and then sell them. And then there’s a consignment system, where we sell the truffles on behalf of the grower or the hunter. We only pay him once we get paid. We charge a small fee when we give a guarantee of quality.”
    Bruno had already looked over the account books that lay open before him. Last year, the market had issued certificates for almost eight million euros’ worth of truffles, so the fees for the certificates amounted to a quarter of a million. The figures had surprised him. There was more money involved here than he’d thought. The market was required by the
mairie
to take a five percent profit on the truffles it bought and sold directly, and last year that had been worth another quarter million.
    “It looks like half a million a year in income for the
mairie
,” said Bruno.
    “I’m proud to say that I run the most profitable single department of the
mairie
,” said Didier, sitting back in his chair with a smug expression on his face. “Of course, buying and selling on our own account means there’s another problem because of the cash flow. We pay cash to buy the truffles, but we don’t get paid until we resell them. That’s a problem when there’s a surge in supply like we get in January. We have to pay interest on the bank overdraft, and that cuts our profit.”
    “The profit