Monsieur Pamplemousse Afloat (5 page)

Monsieur Pamplemousse glanced around the room. As the sole representative of France amongst the passengers, he suddenly felt outnumbered in his own country. He hoped the others wouldn’t want to play games in the evenings.

The room gradually grew light again and as it did so he became aware of a pair of eyes boring into him. Looking out of the window he saw Pommes Frites gazing down from the side of the lock. Raising his glass in greeting, Monsieur Pamplemousse toyed guiltily with the food for a moment or two, as though having difficulty in forcing it down. At the same time he looked for signs of premature malnutrition; the odd protruding bone, perhaps, or a tail at half mast, a dry nose even, but to his relief all seemed well. He shook himself. It was early days. Although it seemed much longer, he had only been on the boat a few hours. Give it time.

His conscience pricking him, Monsieur Pamplemousse pushed the plate to one side with a show of distaste. As he did so he felt a second pair of eyes watching from an open doorway leading to the galley.

Caught between the crossfire as it were, he nodded briefly to the chef and made a desultory stab in the direction of his plate. He managed to spear a
dandelion leaf, but it fell off the fork before reaching his mouth.

‘You are unhappy with the food,
Monsieur
?’

‘I am saving myself for this evening,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.

The chef looked less convinced by the explanation than Pommes Frites would have done had he been able to overhear it. Pommes Frites regarded his master with some concern as the boat rose higher and higher in the water until they were almost on a level with each other and able to make eyeball to eyeball contact. What he saw did little to quell his feeling of unease.

In truth, until a few moments earlier he had been enjoying himself. One of his first priorities after their arrival had been to make friends with the kitchen staff, and on the strength of it he had dined early. Then there had been various run of the mill encounters along the way. If the proverbial red carpet had not exactly been laid out, bones and other titbits had been readily forthcoming. The
voyeur
in him had also been more than satisfied. It was surprising what goings on you could see from the bank. Had Pommes Frites been of a literary bent and able to put pen to paper, he could have garnered enough material for a sizeable tome.

Normally he would have been only too happy to share all these experiences, but in choosing to stay on board, for reasons best known to himself, his
master was clearly opting for the monastic life; a life of frugality and self denial. A life totally out of keeping with his normal catholic mode of behaviour.

Pommes Frites gazed after
Le Creuset
as it nosed its way out of the lock. He couldn’t remember ever seeing his master push a plate of half-eaten food away like that. Even if it wasn’t up to scratch he usually managed to force some down in the interests of research. In the case of the
jambon persillé
it was unbelievable. Pommes Frites licked his lips in recollection. He had personally tasted the
jambon persillé
and he could vouch for its authenticity. It was no wonder the chef had looked upset. There was no doubt about it; something would have to be done.

Meanwhile on board
Le Creuset
Monsieur Pamplemousse gathered up his bottle of wine and a glass. Bereft of a plate, which had been silently removed by the waitress – a silence broken only by the pointed scraping of a fork against china as she deposited the remains in a waste bin – he made his way towards the lower deck with the avowed intention of drowning his sorrows.

He had almost reached his cabin when a door on the opposite side of the companionway opened and the American whose table he had already shared emerged and stood barring the way. He was swaying slightly and Monsieur Pamplemousse had little option but to stop.

‘You going on the trip this evening?’

The question took him by surprise. ‘To the
négociants
in Beaune?
Oui
.’

‘And you’re some kind of detective – right?’

Monsieur Pamplemousse nodded. It was easier than trying to explain his one time connection with the Paris
Sûreté
.

‘I’d like you to keep an eye on my wife – OK?’

‘It will be a pleasure,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.

‘Yeah? Well, make sure it don’t become too much of a pleasure – right? You know what her problem is?’

Monsieur Pamplemousse decided not to hazard a guess, although he could have come up with a number of possibilities.

‘Ever since she won the title Miss Goldenslopes, Napa Valley, guys have been ringing up wanting to tread her grapes. I’ll kill any bastard who tries.’

‘But do you not want to go on the tour?’

The question was brushed aside. ‘I’ve only been on this goddammed boat two days and I’ve had it up to here with wine. That’s all they talk about. I got other things to do. In the meantime she needs looking after – right?’

‘If you say so,’ replied Monsieur Pamplemousse.

‘I do say so. She needs protecting from herself. You know what I mean?’

‘I think so,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse with rather less conviction than before. It struck him that
Hunn might well need protecting from other people too.

‘Like I said, I’ll kill any bastard who thinks he can take on the job without my say-so. She means well, but she’s too easy going. If she’d been born a chicken she’d have arrived with a “lay by” date stamped on her butt. You know what I mean?’

Monsieur Pamplemousse confined himself to a nod. It seemed the easiest way out.

‘She’s got this generous streak. So, like I say, she needs protecting from herself. She gets fantasies, right? Elevators, aeroplanes, the Golden Gate Bridge in rush hour …’

‘You mean …’

‘Yeah. Too right. That’s exactly what I mean. So, watch it, OK.’

‘I give you my word of honour,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘As a Frenchman.’

‘Yeah?’ It sounded as though the promise rated rather less than an alpha plus. ‘In particular watch out for the Bell Captain or whatever he calls himself. The guy who drives the bus. I don’t trust him.’

‘Boniface?’

‘That’s the one. He’s up and down like a yo-yo. Either he plays with his dong or he’s on the prowl. You get a load of his aftershave?’

Monsieur Pamplemousse was forced to admit the truth. It had been hard to escape the smell within the confines of the coach.

‘I think it is Paco Rabanne.’

‘You mean it was. He changes it six times a day.’

Almost as though on cue, a small door in the crew’s quarters at the far end of the companionway swung open. There was a girlie calendar hanging on the back. Glancing towards it, they both caught a glimpse of Boniface making some last-minute adjustments to his person. Bereft of a steering wheel he looked smaller than Monsieur Pamplemousse remembered. He was having to stand on a box in order to see his reflection in a mirror.

Catching sight of his audience, Boniface hastily closed the door again, but not before they caught a waft of perfume. Patently, it was a different
marque
to the earlier one. He guessed at Eau Savage.

‘What did I tell you?’

‘Two down and four to go,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.

The man stared at him for a moment, then his face cleared. ‘Yeah. That’s right. You know something? I like you.’ He held out his hand. ‘People know me by my initials – JC.’

Monsieur Pamplemousse hesitated before committing himself. He decided to stick to his surname for the time being. ‘Pamplemousse.’ Try as he might he couldn’t bring himself to say ‘AP’.

‘OK. See you around, Pamplemousse. And don’t forget what I said. No pompling around, right?’

As he closed the cabin door behind him, Monsieur
Pamplemousse reflected bitterly that he was hardly likely to. He wondered what he had let himself in for. Going over the conversation in his mind he wasn’t aware that he had, at any given moment, agreed to anything, let alone acting as bodyguard to a nubile nymphet the like of which he hadn’t encountered this side of the silver screen. One thing was certain, no one else in the wide world would believe his side of the story. He could picture the remarks some of his colleagues would make if they got to hear.

Pouring himself a glass of wine, Monsieur Pamplemousse spent the next few minutes slowly unpacking the rest of his belongings. Undoing the lid of
Le Guide
’s issue case, he removed the Leica and its supply of lenses and other accessories. It was time they had an airing.

He wondered if he should tell Doucette what had happened. It might be a wise precaution. There was no knowing who he might bump in to while he was away. He would have to concoct a suitably edited version, of course. It would need honing.

‘Poor girl. She is clearly aware of her failings. It must be a dreadful cross to bear.’

Picturing Doucette’s reply, he drank some of the wine. Was it his imagination, or had it acquired a certain acidity?

Someone struck up a tune on the piano in the bar; a rendering of Chopsticks followed by some passable
boogie-woogie. An awful thought struck him. Would there be sing-songs after
dîner
in the evenings? Drinking songs from the two Germans; barber-shop from the group of Americans. If pushed, he might do his rendering of ‘
Sur le pont
’.

Hearing the tramping of feet overhead and the sound of bicycle bells he looked out of the porthole and realised
Le Creuset
was about to enter another lock. Once again there was darkness followed by a roar from the engine as Sven went into reverse thrust, holding the boat steady while Martin made fast.

The size of the boat was such that it left a bare four or five centimetres to spare on either side, hardly any more room fore and aft; it needed teamwork. This time, as they drew level with the top of the lock a gangplank was swung into place and he saw Boniface making his way along it, carrying a bicycle over his shoulder.

Mounting the machine, he headed off back down the towpath the way they had come. Presumably he was going to pick up the coach and drive to the next stopping point so that it would be ready and waiting in time for the evening excursion.

He heard the sound of laughter and more ringing of bells and looking out again he saw the party of Americans disembarking. Whooping with delight, like so many schoolboys let out to play, they spent several minutes circling around each other before
heading off in different directions, some following the path Boniface had taken, others going further on up the canal. One of the members was already having trouble with his chain and had dismounted in order to do some running repairs. It reminded him of
Le Guide
’s annual get-together, when everyone let their hair down and shed a few years in the process.

An elderly weather-beaten woman in a blue smock who was operating the lock gates eyed the antics with stolid detachment. Her cocker spaniel regarded Pommes Frites circumspectly from the safety of a wired-in enclosure. Beyond it a few hens wandered aimlessly about, pecking at the ground. In the background he could see a line of some half a dozen rabbit hutches. A small patch of land to the right of a tiny cottage with a blue front door was filled with vegetables; potatoes, beans, carrots. A board fixed to a picket fence offered fruit for sale. Several gnomes and a small stone elephant with a hanging basket of flowers on either side completed the picture. It was a self-supporting, self-contained little world of its own.

He wasn’t sure if he felt envious or not. It was a way of partially opting out of things without being entirely cut off. Winter would be crunch time. The huge pile of neatly sawn logs stacked near the kitchen door said it all.

Loading his camera with a reel of Kodak Panther
100 which he was trying out for Trigaux in the Art Department, Monsieur Pamplemousse swapped the standard lens for a wide-angle and went up on deck. To his relief it was empty. Trigaux reckoned Panther was the bees knees in colour saturation. Well, they would see. The sun was high enough in the sky to illuminate the rose-covered porch of the cottage, yet still provide plenty of interesting shadows over the water from trees on the opposite bank. He tried composing a picture with the
lock-keeper’s
wife on one side of the frame and a bench with a solitary figure of a man reading a newspaper on the other.

He almost wished he’d left his standard lens on and loaded up with black and white. There were all the elements of a Cartier-Bresson; several in fact. The woman leaning against the lock gate, mistress of her domain, for a start; and in the second picture, the somewhat incongruous figure of the man dressed in city clothes sitting on the bench.

The only disturbing element in the latter would be the sight of Pommes Frites hovering in the background. He appeared to be munching a sandwich. From a distance it was impossible to tell whether it was cheese and tomato or plain ham, but whatever it was, he was certainly taking his time about it, oblivious to the complications he was causing his master.

Realising the boat was about to get under way,
Monsieur Pamplemousse took a quick picture of the woman, then followed it with one of the man. They could always be trimmed down later. The man looked out of place; totally inharmonious, as though expecting someone for a business meeting. As
Le Creuset
moved slowly past, a black executive bag came into view. Lowering his
journal
, the man picked up a camera and pointed it towards the boat. Instinctively, Monsieur Pamplemousse operated the shutter for a third time. Of all unlikely people, it was the paper rustler who had plagued him on the way down!

Apart from Pommes Frites, who had taken it upon himself to establish squatters rights across the back seat, Monsieur Pamplemousse was the first to board the waiting coach after
Le Creuset
tied up at Velars-sur-Ouche. Master and hound eyed each other with a degree of circumspection, each trying to read the other’s thoughts, neither wanting to be the first to break the ice. It struck Monsieur Pamplemousse that far from having lost weight, Pommes Frites might have gained a kilo or two, but possibly it was the way he was sitting.

Deciding to give him the benefit of the doubt, he turned to Boniface, freshly laundered and smelling of Xeryus. ‘How far is Beaune?’

Boniface emitted a non-committal whistling sound. ‘An hour, perhaps a little less. We are due to
reach the
négociants
at eighteen hundred.
Dîner
is at eighteen-thirty after a tour of the premises. The pageant is at twenty hundred.’

‘How many kilometres is that?’

Boniface looked even less inclined to commit himself. ‘Thirty-five … maybe a little more. It is hard to say. We go the back way – the route of the vines – and we stop from time to time.’ He glanced at Monsieur Pamplemousse’s camera. ‘It is so that people can take photographs.’

Monsieur Pamplemousse hesitated. In his mind’s eye he could hear the Director’s voice.

‘Nonsense, Pamplemousse. You heard what the driver said. The
autobus
stops from time to time
en route
. It is just what Pommes Frites needs. It will get rid of the cobwebs.’

Monsieur Pamplemousse made his way towards the rear of the coach and tested the water.

‘
Un promenade?
’

A patently cobweb-free tail, which until that moment had been thumping the seat like a diffident upholsterer testing his workmanship after a difficult repair job, froze in mid air. Pommes Frites contemplated his master for several seconds as though wondering if he had heard aright, then settled matters very firmly by closing both eyes and pretending he was asleep. He’d had quite enough
promenades
for one day. Discretion being the better part of valour, Monsieur Pamplemousse decided
not to pursue the subject. In any case the other passengers were starting to arrive.

Colonel and Mrs Massingham glanced disapprovingly at Pommes Frites and pointedly seated themselves near the front of the coach; the party of Americans scattered themselves noisily around the middle section. The two Germans did their best to distance themselves from the Massinghams without making it appear too obvious, and the Swedish lady settled herself by the door, to the right of the driver’s seat. Boniface looked as though he had been hoping for better things.

The girl was last to arrive. She had changed from her lunchtime outfit into a black crocheted dress; fashioned, it seemed to Monsieur Pamplemousse, by someone who had set out to make the largest number of holes out of the smallest possible amount of material. The task completed, the girl had been poured into it and no one had thought to say ‘when’. The effect was all that must have been intended.

Holding a video camera above her head, she made her way down the centre of the coach. Envy and naked jealousy filled the air in equal parts, not least from Boniface, as she squeezed past Monsieur Pamplemousse and seated herself between him and the window. Her bare shoulders were tanned and smooth, the nape of her neck covered in a light down. It was easy to see why she had won the title of Miss Goldenslopes.

‘Hi! JayCee tells me you’re my bodyguard for the evening.’

Monsieur Pamplemousse made a gruff, but suitable assenting noise, conveying to those in front the minor role he had played in the decision, and that the guarding of heavenly bodies was an everyday occurrence in his daily round. He was keenly aware that the rest of the party was displaying more than a passing interest in what was going on behind them. Even Pommes Frites had gone so far as to open one eye a fraction. It looked a trifle jaundiced, as though he had seen it all before.

‘That is my privilege.’

Relieving the girl of her camera bag, Monsieur Pamplemousse took her free hand and raised it halfway to his lips in a gesture of gallantry. It struck him that little further help would have been needed from him for it to have completed the rest of the journey of its own accord.

‘The name is Pamplemousse.’

‘You don’t say?’ She licked her lips. ‘I had one of those for breakfast this morning.’

Monsieur Pamplemousse wasn’t sure if the snort came from Mrs Massingham or the Swedish lady.

Boniface started the engine and attention was momentarily diverted as he carried out a U-turn. Having avoided backing into the canal by what seemed less than a hair’s breadth, he drove through the village to the
autoroute
, headed east for some five
kilometres, then came off it onto the D108, taking a short cut in order to bypass Dijon.

Dijon was dismissed by Boniface with a wave of the hand. ‘The suburbs are now all built up. The only wine left is from Montre-Cul. You know why it is called Montre-Cul?’

There were no takers.

‘Because the vineyards are on the side of the mountain and during grape-picking time people used to stop and admire the women’s bottoms.’

Boniface’s chuckle lasted all the way up the hill.

‘And you?’ asked Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘What should I call you?’

‘I’m down as Gay Lussac, but that’s just my pen name.’

‘Gay Lussac?’ Monsieur Pamplemousse gave a start.

‘You’ve heard of me?’

‘It is a very illustrious name in the world of wine. His work on the alcoholometer was invaluable.’

‘Yeah, that’s the one. I got it out of a book. Just liked the sound of it, I guess.’

‘It was a good choice for a pen name,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse.

‘My real name’s Brittany – as in France, but people who know me call me Honey-bee.’

‘I shall call you by the French equivalent,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘
Abeille
. Strictly speaking it should be
abeille domestique
, but if you will forgive
my saying so, I do not think you are very domestic.’

‘You can say that again.
Abeille
.’ The girl rolled the word round her mouth several times. ‘I guess I like that even better than Gay.’

‘It suits you,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘Once again, forgive my saying so, but neither do you look like any wine correspondent I have ever met.’

‘So what’s a wine correspondent supposed to look like?’

‘They tend to show signs of their calling,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘Too many invitations to too many tastings take their toll. The English are either elderly and very knowledgeable, or if they are young they are mostly products of one of their so-called public schools. They are like the
matelot
, Martin; they conceal their knowledge beneath a mask of schoolboy charm and a quiff of hair which falls down over their forehead. It is one of their great strengths. It disarms the opposition, who do not always take them seriously until it is too late.

‘Your fellow countrymen are on the whole very earnest. They analyse everything to the nth degree and talk a lot about micro-climates, forgetting that in Burgundy every stone hides its own micro-climate.’

‘And the French?’

‘We French simply cannot believe that anyone knows more about the subject than we do. But that, I fear, applies to most things. It is in our nature.’

‘So where do I fit in?’

Monsieur Pamplemousse felt sorely tempted to repeat that she was like no wine writer he had ever dreamt of. He modified it instead to ‘You are like no one I have ever met before.’ Spoken in a whisper, the effect was not quite as he had intended.

‘Tell me more …’ Abeille turned and fastened her eyes on his.

Monsieur Pamplemousse tried hard to consider them as objects in their own right, rather than as part and parcel of the whole. It wasn’t easy. They were cornflower blue, bluer than they had any right to be, far bluer, he decided, than those of the Director’s wife, and disconcertingly impossible to read; not so much expressionless as bottomless, without any kind of perceptible focal point.

‘You are very hard to catalogue.’

That, too, came out not quite as he had meant it to sound, but once again Boniface saved the day. Selecting a cassette from one of several in a holder screwed to the dashboard, he slipped it into the player. After a short fanfare a commentator’s voice began describing in various languages the route they were taking. At least it didn’t have Japanese overtones.

The coach went quiet as everyone concentrated on the Route des Grands Crus: the Champs Elysées de Bourgogne.

Avoiding the main N74 heading south, Boniface turned on to the D122 running parallel to it. It took
them along the bottom of the wood-capped slopes of the Côte d’Or, through the vineyards of Fixin and Gevrey-Chambertin.

At one point he slowed down to point out the vineyard belonging to the
négociants
in Beaune.

‘… You are looking at Clos Ambert-Celeste. In France the word
clos
means a walled enclosure. It is a very old vineyard. Originally it was simply Clos d’Ambert. The word
celeste
was added at the end of the last century.
Celeste
means “heavenly”…’ Bells rang in Monsieur Pamplemousse’s head. The estate must belong to the Director’s wife’s family.

Negotiating the bends with one hand, Boniface pointed towards an imposing house set on the hillside away from the village itself, with its church and its cluster of tiny houses.

Clos de Vougeot came into view, then Morey St Denis. Absorbing the names on the signposts as they came and went was like reading from the roll call of a vinous hall of fame.

‘Isn’t it cute the way they name all their villages after the wine,’ said Abeille.

Monsieur Pamplemousse gave her a sidelong glance. ‘How long have you been a wine correspondent?’ he asked.

‘What time is it?’ Abeille felt inside the camera bag and took out her translator. ‘I’ll let you in on a little secret. Not long – thanks to this. Name me a wine.’

Monsieur Pamplemousse thought for a moment. ‘Since we are passing through Chambolle-Musigny, how about a Domaine George Roumier?’

He watched as she entered it on the keyboard. Half expecting her to ask him how to spell it, he was impressed when she got it right.

‘What year?’

‘Shall we say 1989?’ It had been a near perfect vintage in the Côte d’Or.

She typed in the date.

‘What is the name of the wine?’

‘Les Amoureuses.’ This time he helped with the spelling.

‘Very good year. Ninety-five points. Fruity taste. Ready for drinking now.’ Using the American style of classification, awarding points out of a hundred instead of the European twenty, the same Japanese voice issued from the tiny loudspeaker.

‘Who needs books?’ said Abeille. She snapped the gadget shut, replaced it in the camera bag, and began eyeing the passing countryside through the viewfinder of her camera.

Monsieur Pamplemousse sat back feeling deeply depressed. It was not what life ought to be all about. At this rate the day was not far distant when
Le Guide
in its present form would be made redundant and quite likely he would too.

‘What did you do before you became a wine correspondent?’ he asked at last.

Abeille switched off her camera. ‘After I left high school I was in grunt and groan movies for a while before JayCee rescued me.’

‘
Quest que c’est le
grunt and groan?’

Abeille licked her lips. ‘You know the kind of thing. I guess you have them in France too …’ Snuggling down, she kicked off her shoes, placed her feet on the back of the seat in front, and gave vent to a series of moans. They were accompanied by a certain amount of bodily writhing.

Heads turned. Monsieur Pamplemousse caught Boniface’s eye in the mirror as the coach swerved and nearly didn’t make Vosne Romanée.

‘Geez! There go my Dolly Partons!’ Abeille did some running repairs to an unsupported
doudon
which had become temporarily displaced. ‘I guess I get carried away when I’m performing. I should never have let myself get talked in to having breast augmentation like I did.’

‘How did you get to be one … a wine correspondent I mean?’ asked Monsieur Pamplemousse, hastily changing the subject.

‘It’s what JayCee calls Kismet. JayCee’s in communications. He owns a corporate presence in LA and he spotted me in reception one morning.’

‘You were visiting him?’

‘No, I was working there on the front desk. I’d just started and it was love at first sight. We were married within a week.’

‘That sounds very quick.’

‘JayCee’s like me. He goes after what he wants and he doesn’t rest until he gets it – one way or the other. I’m not the sort of girl to play around, so it had to be the other. After we were married JayCee made me wine correspondent for a newspaper he has an interest in. He thought it might stop me from getting bored.’

Very wise, thought Monsieur Pamplemousse. And it would mean he could keep an eye on you at the same time.

Once again he was conscious of the blue eyes fastened on him. ‘So what business are you in? Aside from being an ex-dic.’

‘I write about food.’

‘You do?’ Her eyes grew rounder still. ‘So you know about wine too?’

‘A little,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse modestly.

‘Gee. Then you could help me with my lecture.’

‘Lecture?’ Monsieur Pamplemousse tried to remember what the Director had said about it.

‘I’m supposed to be giving a talk on gridlock in the wine cellar. JayCee let me in for it. He says it’ll keep my mind occupied. He didn’t tell me I’d be giving it to a party of wine groupies.’

‘It is not a problem I have ever encountered,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse dryly.

‘If you live in LA you know all about gridlock,’ said Abeille. ‘It’s part of the way of life. Like when
it’s time for laying-down do you prefer horizontal or vertical?’

Boniface turned the volume down a fraction.

‘I take it as it comes,’ said Monsieur Pamplemousse. ‘There is no point in meeting trouble halfway.’