Bones in High Places by Suzette Hill Read Free Book Online Page B

check the tyres for punctures.’
    I could not see from the back seat, but knew she would be growing pink and formulating some sharp put-down. I leant forward. ‘And tell you what, the first one to spot a café gets a digestif on me.’
    ‘Good Lord,’ exclaimed Nicholas, ‘you are in the holiday mood. Better make it two while you’re about it – we shan’t hear that offer pass this way again.’ And so saying, he accelerated (smoothly) and passed Primrose a mollifying Sobranie. For the next twenty minutes there was silence as they scanned the terrain with hawk-eyed intensity.
    Eventually we approached a crossroads and a better surface, and taking the route south continued for another couple of kilometres until we reached a small hamlet which at first seemed to have nothing in it at all, not even a filling station. But as we rounded the bend, resigned to pushing on, Primrose suddenly cried out, ‘Oh, there’s something, look!’ On the edge of a tiny square there were a couple of zinc-topped tables, a battered umbrella and a tricolour waving wanly in the breeze. A lurcher lolled under one of the tables, and at the other a girl in pinafore and slacks sat engrossed in a book.
    As we got out of the car, I heard Nicholas murmur to Primrose, ‘Remember – that’s two digestifs Francis owes you.’
    ‘Yes,’ she replied sweetly, evidently still smarting from his reference to her Morris Oxford, ‘one for me and one for him.’
    He grimaced good-humouredly, and adjusting his scarf sauntered over to the girl. In fractured but theatrical French he asked for three coffees and a look at the carte des vins . The latter was sparse, listing mainly Stella beer and one or two local ciders. The appallingly bitter Cynar featured, as did the French version of Babycham. There were, however, three brands of pastis. Nicholas, with unctuous charm and fulsome gesture, tried to elicit which of the three could be recommended. But torn from her reading, the girl seemed unminded to discourse on their respective merits, remarking with a Gallic shrug that as far as she was concerned they were ‘ tous la même chose ’. As she ambled off to fetch our order I glanced at the cover of the discarded book: the title read J.P. Sartre et la Bêtise Anglaise . I placed it on the other table.
    Our order arrived and, despite its chicory addition, we sipped the coffee appreciatively. And then even more appreciatively we diluted the pastis from the water carafe, lit cigarettes and took our ease in the now warm sun.
    ‘Hmm,’ said Nicholas, stretching languidly and sniffing the air, ‘I can smell the south.’
    ‘You do talk nonsense,’ laughed Primrose, ‘we’re barely out of Normandy!’
    ‘Ah, but it beckons, it beckons …’
    ‘So does Maurice,’ I said. ‘Look.’
    They turned towards the car where a furious face glared out from the back window.
    ‘He does look a bit disgruntled,’ observed Primrose.
    ‘When doesn’t he?’ said Nicholas. And then in kinder tone suggested I took ‘the poor little toad’ out of the car and find him some milk. ‘Go on, the girl’s bound to have some.’
    Diffidently I approached both Maurice and the girl. The cat was unexpectedly compliant and allowed himself to be hoiked from the back seat with little demur. But I was nervous of asking for anything extra from our po-faced waitress. A baby in hand might have seemed more legitimate. However, I pushed through the plastic ribbons of the café entrance and enquired tentatively if there was any chance of some water for the dog and milk for the cat. The girl gestured towards a tap and a cracked bowl, and then to my surprise her impassive face broke into beams of delight, and in the next instant she had wrested Maurice from my clasp and carried him off to some nether region behind the counter, babbling to whoever was within to ‘ donnez du lait au pauvre petit chat anglais. Il a beaucoup de faim .’ I had not thought that Maurice looked particularly