The Devil's Cave: A Bruno Courrèges Investigation (Bruno Chief of Police 5)

for the coming summer’s local music festivals, the usual string quartets playing in ancient churches or jazz ensembles in town squares. He typed in his password and opened his email, to find an announcement of new speed limits from the Prefecture and a characteristically curt message from Isabelle.
    ‘Have two days off. Arrive tomorrow with special gift from me and Brigadier.
Bisous
, Isabelle. xx’
    Remembering that emails from Isabelle were like a crossword puzzle with emotions attached, he leaned towards the screen intent on deciphering her meaning.
Bisous
was at the lowest rung of affection, the literary equivalent of an air kiss. The extra xx gave it a slightly warmer tone, but not enough to persuade him that any advance would be met with Isabelle’s open arms. Tomorrow was tricky, since it had been sent at two minutes after midnight. Did that make it this day or the next? There was no request for him to book a hotel, but that was not necessarily a signal that she’d want to stay with him. There was nothing about trains to be met, nor any time or place for a rendezvous. And what might the special gift be? Since it also came from the Brigadier, herboss, it was hardly personal. It also gave her trip a slightly official flavour. The next test was to draft his reply.
    After some moments of slightly edgy reflection, he typed: ‘Wonderful news. Intrigued by gift. Do you arrive 18th or 19th and will you be here in time for dinner? Where shall we meet?
Bisous
and hugs, Bruno.’
    He read it again, pondered the ‘Where shall we meet?’ but decided a little precision was justified after Isabelle’s vagueness, crossed his fingers and hit the Send button just as his desk phone rang and another email pinged into his inbox.
    ‘Tomorrow being today. On morning train from Austerlitz and on usual mobile number. Warning: a new man in my bedroom but he sleeps on floor. Will msg ETA. Ixx’
    She must have sent that before getting his reply. At least he had the right date, and there were no more than four trains from the Gare d’Austerlitz in Paris, each arriving in St Denis at very different times. He decided that while he knew he was being teased he couldn’t bear to interpret the phrase about the new sleeping partner. He answered the phone to hear a friend’s excited voice.
    ‘Bruno, it’s the Baron. Something very urgent has come up, not for the phone. Can you come out to my place? And be discreet, park at the back and bring a civilian jacket.’
    The Baron was convinced that Claire at the
Mairie
’s reception desk eavesdropped on phone calls, fuelling her taste for town gossip. Bruno had too few secrets to care, and if discretion was required he had his new mobile phone, supplied by the Brigadier during a previous case, that was reputed to be secure against all invasion. He always kept an anonymousdark windcheater in his official van. Checking that he had his notebook, pen, phone and torch, and a set of latex evidence gloves and bags in his pocket, he told Claire he was going on patrol. He used his phone to text Isabelle with the message ‘What time do you arrive?’ and headed down the stairs.
    The Baron lived in a
chartreuse
, the local name for a historic home just one room wide that was too small to be a château and too large to be a manor house. His family had owned it for centuries. The rear of the building, which faced away from both the hillside and the river, was an almost solid wall of stone, interspersed with arrow slits for windows and flanked by two formidable towers. Bruno turned into the courtyard to park before the much more welcoming façade. He sat for a moment, enjoying the way the Renaissance builders had softened the look of a fortress with large stone windows, a handsome staircase and a balustraded terrace. The main door, a massive structure of wood reinforced with iron studs and bars, still carried the scorch marks of the Revolution. Having failed to storm it, the local peasantry had vainly attempted to burn the home of the Baron’s ancestor, their feudal oppressor. This same ancestor had gone on to become one of Napoleon’s generals. As a result, the Baron liked to say, the peasants had been taking on rather more than they had bargained for.
    The door opened and the Baron came out, car keys jingling in his hand. ‘Got a call from Marcel at the Gouffre,’ he said. ‘There’s been a break-in overnight and he said he wanted both of us there to see it. He sounded worried.’
    ‘Any