Bruno, Chief Of Police

looked out over the plateau, where the view was even grander than it had been

from the cave, with the River Vézčre flowing into the Dordogne as it came from

an adjoining valley.

Swifts and swallows were darting above Isabelle as she rejoined Bruno. He had

built a small fire inside a nest of stones and laid across it a metal grill he

had brought with him. Two freshly gutted fish were steaming gently above the

coals. He had spread a large rug and some cushions on the ground, and two

champagne glasses stood on a large tray. He’d put a fresh baguette ready, with a

hefty wedge of Cantal cheese and a block of pâté on a wooden board. As she knelt

on a cushion, he reached into the cool box and pulled out a half bottle of

champagne.

‘Now there’s a responsible policeman. Only drinking a half-bottle because he has

to drive,’ she said, sinking to her knees on the rug. ‘This looks even better

than I could possibly have dreamed when I asked for a picnic, Bruno. Where did

you get the fish?’

‘From my friend the Baron. He caught those trout less than half an hour before I

met you at the hotel.’

‘What would you have done if he hadn’t caught anything?’

‘You don’t know the Baron; he’s a born fisherman. The fish stand in line for the

honour of taking his bait. But just in case you’re still hungry after the fish,

a couple of my homemade sausages from the pig we killed in February are in the

cool box.’

‘Can we have one of those as well?’ she asked, clapping her hands. ‘Just so I

can try them? I don’t think I have ever had a homemade sausage before.’

‘Certainly, anything for the lovely lady of Brillamont,’ he said, handing her a

glass of champagne, and then diving into his giant cool box to bring out a long

skein of sausage which he laid carefully over the coals.’

‘That’s far too much. I just want a little taste.’

‘Yes, but Gigi has to eat too.’ He raised his glass. ‘I drink a toast to my

rescuer, with my deepest appreciation. Thank you for saving me from a real

beating back there in the square. Some day you must tell me where you learned to

fight like that.’

‘My toast is to you and your wonderful imagination. I can’t think of a better

evening or a better picnic, and there’s no one I’d rather enjoy it with.’ She

leaned forward and kissed him briefly, letting her tongue dart out between his

lips, then sat back, smiling almost shyly.

‘I’m glad,’ he said, and poured the rest of the champagne into their glasses.

‘Drink up, before the sun goes down and it gets too dark to see what we’re

eating.’

‘Knowing you, Bruno, you’ll have thought of that, and some elderly retainers

will march out from the castle ruins holding flaming torches.’

‘I think I’d prefer the privacy,’ he laughed, and handed her a tin plate from

his picnic box. He moved across to the fire to turn the fish and sausage, and

looked back briefly. ‘Help yourself to the pâté and break me off some bread,

please.’ He turned back to his cool box, and came out with two fresh glasses and

a bottle of rosé. ‘This is why we only had the half-bottle of champagne.’

‘Tell me about this pâté – the softer stuff in the middle and the dark bits.’

‘That’s how I like to make it. It’s a duck pâté, and then the circular bit in

the middle is foie gras, and the dark bits are truffles.’

‘It’s delicious. Did you learn to make this from your mother?’

‘No, from friends here in St Denis,’ he said quickly. He paused a moment. How

should he go on? ‘I learned how to do this from my predecessor in this job, old

Joe. He taught me a lot about food and cooking, and about being a country

policeman. In fact, between them, he and the Mayor and the Baron probably taught

me everything I know. I didn’t have a family of my own, so my family is here in

St Denis. That’s why I love it.’

The fish were just right, the blackened skin falling away from the flesh and the

backbone pulling easily free. She saw thin slivers of garlic that he had placed

inside the belly of the trout, and he handed her half a lemon to squeeze onto

the pink-white flesh, and a small side plate with potato salad studded with tiny

lardons of bacon.

‘I couldn’t make a feast like this in a fully fitted kitchen, and you produce it

in the middle of nowhere,’ she said.

‘I think they probably had very grand banquets up here in the castle in the old

days. The sausage looks about ready, and we still have another hour of twilight

after the sun goes down.’

‘I wonder what the cave people ate,’ she mused, picking up a piece of sausage

with her fingers. ‘This is delicious but I’m getting full.’ She put her plate

down, and when Gigi came up to sniff it, the dog looked enquiringly at Bruno. He

put the plate down in front of his dog and stroked its head, giving Gigi

permission to eat.

‘We know what they ate from the archaeologists,’ he said. ‘They ate reindeer.

There were glaciers up in Paris in those days. It was the ice age, and reindeer

were plentiful. The archaeologists found some of their rubbish heaps and it was

almost all reindeer bones, and some fish. They didn’t live inside the caves –

they saved them for painting. Apparently they lived in huts made of skin,

probably like the American Indians in their tepees.’

He tossed the fishbones into the fire and put their plates and the cutlery into

a plastic bag. This went into his cool box after he’d brought out a small punnet

of strawberries and placed it beside the cheese.

‘This is it, the last course, but no picnic is complete without strawberries.’

Then he put some more sticks onto the fire, which blazed up as they lay on their

sides on the rug, the strawberries between them, and the sun just about to touch

the horizon.

‘It’s a lovely sunset,’ Isabelle said. ‘I want to watch it go down.’ She pushed

the strawberries aside and turned to lie close to him, her back against his

chest and her buttocks nestled into him. He blew softly against her neck. Over

on the far side of the fire, Gigi was discreetly asleep. Bruno put his arm

around her waist and she snuggled into him more tightly. As the sun finally sank

she took his hand and slipped it inside her blouse and onto her breast.

CHAPTER

23

Bruno woke up in his own bed, still glowing from what had happened the night

before. He reached across for the enchantingly new female body that had filled

his dreams and, for a moment, the emptiness of his bed surprised him. Then, with

his eyes still closed, he smiled broadly at the memory of the previous evening

by the fire before, reluctantly, they had dressed and Bruno had driven Isabelle

back to her demure hotel, stopping the car every few hundred yards to kiss again

as if they could never taste one another enough.

He sprang from his bed and into his familiar exercises, his mind fresh and alert

and alive with energy as he ducked into the shower, turned on the radio and

dressed to go outside and delight in the newness of the day. He fed himself, his

dog and his chickens, and then pondered the list of names he had scribbled down

from his telephone call the previous evening to the teacher of sports history at