The Resistance Man (Bruno Chief of Police 6)

Bruno tracked him down to the house he was restoring. He would not meet Bruno’s eyes. ‘Seems to me it’s the foreigners you ought to be locking up.’ The other builders at the site had backed him up, muttering that there would have been more than a few bloody noses if they had known what was going on.
    There was little more Bruno could do, but he called on Joe, his predecessor as the town’s policeman, and was shocked at his advice.
    ‘What’s the problem?’ Joe had asked. ‘A couple of English queens get taught a lesson. They won’t be messing around withany more of our young lads. It’s not the first time something like this has happened and it won’t be the last. I know there’s a lot of talk about community policing these days. Well, this is community justice and you interfere with that at your peril.’
    He was equally shocked when his Mayor congratulated him briefly as they filed out at the end of a staff meeting at the
Mairie
. ‘Glad you managed to tidy up that mess without any fuss,’ the Mayor had said, with a reassuring squeeze of Bruno’s arm.
    *
    As he turned into the driveway that led to Pamela’s house, Bruno’s mood lifted when he saw her with Fabiola and his own riderless horse leaving the stables. He sounded his horn in a double peep, parked, and went up to take Pamela in his arms as she swung down from her mare. She kissed him squarely on the lips.
    ‘If you must stand me up at the airport and then turn up late for the horses, I suppose a murder is just about acceptable as an excuse,’ she said as she hugged him.
    ‘Murder be damned, it’s good to see you,’ he told her.
    She put her hand to his cheek, kissed him again and turned. ‘We’re heading for the ridge. Catch us up. Or there’s no dinner for you.’
    She slid from his arms and put her foot back into the stirrup to mount her horse. She tapped Bess’s sides with her heels and trotted away while Hector ambled across to nuzzle at Bruno’s chest, expecting his customary apple. Bruno stroked his horse’s neck and gave him his treat. In the stables he greeted his puppy Balzac and installed him in the binoculars case that he strapped around his chest. He donned his riding boots and helmet,changed his uniform jacket for a windcheater, mounted Hector and set out after the two women.
    The day had been too busy for reflection about the reunion with Pamela. Theirs was an affectionate friendship, based on a common love of food and horses and convivial evenings that often enough ended in bed. But she had made it clear that she had no wish to deepen their relationship, nor to make it permanent. Bruno wasn’t at all sure what he wanted. He was comfortable in her company and content in their time together but there was the constant thought that he wanted something more. It was not as simple as saying that he wanted children and she did not, that he wanted to experience a full family life. Bruno knew that he also wanted passion in his life, and for all the delight he took in Pamela and the sensuality she could display and share in private, passion and emotional tumult were not what he knew with her.
    That brought his thoughts back to Isabelle, mercurial and tantalizing, fierce in her ambition and her determination to carve a brilliant career. Sometimes moody, sometimes capable of a deep and embracing calm, she stirred him in ways that were so profound he felt himself exulting in the great gift of knowing her. But they each knew, however often fate and sexual need drew them back together, that there was no future for them; that she was as committed to the potential and power of Paris as he was locked in the deep peace of the Périgord.
    Isabelle’s phone call had come as he was driving to Pamela’s to say that her train had just reached Bordeaux and she had rented a car to drive to her hotel in Périgueux. Might he join her for dinner? Or perhaps your Mad Englishwoman has returned, she had added, with a touch of something in her voice that was part frost and part mockery.
    ‘She’s not English and she’s not mad,’ he had replied, as he always did. The initial nickname the inhabitants of St Denis had given to Pamela had almost disappeared, except for Isabelle. It was one of the few things about her that he found tiresome; such a casual dismissal of another woman was beneath her.
    ‘I’ll see you at Crimson’s house tomorrow, or we could meet for coffee in St Denis and I’ll take you out there,’ he had