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

chest so that Hector could see the puppy, and from the sudden squirming against his chest, Balzac was eager to make the acquaintance of this enormous animal before him.
    Hector took the apple and chewed it delicately while studying Balzac. Bruno wondered if his horse had any memory of Balzac’s predecessor, Gigi. Horse and basset had become good friends, with Gigi sometimes sleeping in Hector’s stall and even riding on the horse’s back once when they had to ford a river. Hector stepped forward and nuzzled at the puppy, warm air from the horse’s nostrils flooding into Bruno’s jacket and across his chest. Balzac gave Hector’s nose a hesitant lick and then uttered a timid bark. Hector nuzzled him again andthen stepped back. Bruno let Balzac down onto the floor of the stall, where he played briefly in the straw, then crept up to rub one of his long ears against Hector’s leg.
    Moments later, they were walking up the lane to the gate where they turned off and began trotting through the meadow that led to the ridge, Fabiola leading on Victoria with Bess alongside on a loose rein. Squeaks of what he hoped were excitement were coming from Bruno’s chest as Hector began to lengthen his stride into the slope. There was still some light in the expanse of sky that unfolded as they topped the ridge, a red glow on the skyline where the sun had just dropped. Bruno slowed to enjoy it and heard the cawing of rooks gathering in the trees for the night. Little Balzac squirmed to get more of his head out, turning it from side to side to see this huge new world of the countryside. Bruno looked too, wondering what Eugénie might say in response to his questions about Thivion. But there was no other rider in sight, just the sound of Victoria’s hoofbeats to the rear.
    ‘Have you eaten?’ Fabiola asked, coming alongside.
    ‘Not yet.’
    ‘I’m making spaghetti but no promises,’ she said as they walked the horses back down the slope, letting them pick their own way in the gathering darkness. ‘I got the recipe for the sauce from a book.’
    ‘That’s the best place to find one,’ Bruno said, grinning at her. He’d long since stopped believing Fabiola’s protests that she couldn’t cook. ‘If you can read, you can cook.’
    He attended to the horses first while Balzac explored the stables and rolled happily in the straw. Once they weresettled for the night, he stayed in Hector’s stall to phone Pamela. She’d probably be at the hospital; she usually was. But when she answered, it sounded as if she were in a restaurant and he heard her say something in English before the background noise dimmed and then he heard her greet him in French.
    ‘This sounds like a bad time to talk,’ he said.
    ‘On the contrary, it’s a very good time, but I can’t stay long. I said you’re a potential client to rent a gîte for the summer, but thank heavens you called. I’m having dinner with my ex-husband and he’s making an offer he thinks I can’t refuse.’
    Bruno knew little of Pamela’s marriage except that her husband had been a banker who spent most of his time working, had an affair with his secretary and divorced Pamela to marry her. This second marriage had now collapsed.
    ‘He’s offering to pay for full-time care for my mother wherever I want, in a nursing home or where I live,’ she explained.
    ‘Wherever you live?’
    ‘No, that’s the catch. I’d have to go back and live with him, in England. I can have my horses, and my mother.’
    ‘It sounds like a financial transaction,’ said Bruno.
    ‘Of course it does, he’s a banker.’ She laughed. ‘It’s the only thing he understands. I’d better go. Can we talk tomorrow?’
    ‘Of course, and the horses are fine. I’m about to rub them down while Fabiola cooks.’
    ‘Love to you both.’ She rang off, and Bruno picked up his puppy and walked back, frowning, to Fabiola’s kitchen, where she was fishing in a bubbling pot for individual strands of spaghetti to see if they were done. He waited until they wereseated and served before he recounted the conversation with Pamela.
    ‘I think it’s what she has been afraid of,’ said Fabiola, grating parmesan over her food. ‘The ex-husband must know her quite well, to tempt her this way. He pretends it’s about her mother but it’s really about using his money to get what he wants.’
    ‘For Pamela, it is about her mother.’ He poured out some wine from the bottles he kept at Pamela’s