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I smiled. “Well, that’s torn it. He’ll be thinking we’ve gone sneaking off to do something romantic.”
“Nah.” Paul grinned. “We could do that right here at the hotel. Besides, Thierry knows me better than that.”
“What, I’m too old for you?” I teased him.
He shook his head. “Hardly. But I’d never hit on someone else’s woman.”
“Someone else’s…?”
“Anyhow,” he changed the subject, picking up his notepad. “Do you want to know what I’ve just found out?”
I stopped frowning and leaned forward. “Please.”
“Well, the librarian only knows of one man who reads foreign history journals and takes an interest in the tunnels—a local poet by the name of Victor Belliveau.”
“Victor…” I tried the name, experimentally.
“Was that the name your cousin mentioned, on the phone, do you think?”
I shook my head. “I can’t remember.”
“Because it sounds like this might be our guy, it really does. Apparently he’s been poking around the tunnels for years, making maps and things. Kind of a personal obsession. So if this Belliveau did write your cousin, then your cousin might have met with him when he was here in Chinon. Assuming, of course, that he was here. It can’t hurt to ask.” Paul checked his notes again. “He lives just outside Chinon, sort of. I’ve got the address, but there isn’t any phone number. The librarian doesn’t think he has a phone. Our Monsieur Belliveau is a true artiste—a little bit eccentric.”
“But you said he doesn’t live far from here?”
Paul shook his head. “Just up the river, past the beach. A fifteen-minute walk, maybe. Do you want to go there first, then? Or would you rather start by taking another look around the Chapelle Sainte Radegonde? I’ve got the key.”
“How did you manage that?”
Another shrug, more modest than the first. “I just went round to Christian’s house this morning, before breakfast, and asked him for it. Christian’s like Neil, he wakes up with the birds, and I figured he wouldn’t mind.”
“Well, I’m most impressed, I really am. You’ve had a busy morning, Sherlock.”
“Morning isn’t over, yet,” he reminded me. “So where do we start? The poet or the chapelle?”
I took a moment to consider the options. The Chapelle Sainte Radegonde, I thought, was the more appealing prospect, and I was quite certain Harry had been there, but then again… I rubbed my thigh unconsciously, recalling the hellish climb along the cliffs, and the endless winding steps that led back down again.
I smiled at Paul. “The poet, please.”
***
The house of Victor Belliveau stood on the fringe of the community—a sprawling yellow farmhouse with an aged tile roof, set off by itself with a scattering of crooked trees to guard the boundary fence.
Thierry had confirmed the man’s artistic status. “He was a famous man, this Belliveau,” Thierry had said in response to Paul’s casual question. “Not just in Chinon, but in all of France. I read his poetry at school, in Paris. But now he drinks, you know, and he is not so well respected.”
His property reflected that, I thought. The yard was pitted and unkempt, and the stone barn, built long and low to match the house, was tightly shuttered up. And the rubbish! Peelings rotted everywhere among the weeds, and paper wrappers cartwheeled in the wind to fall exhausted in the rutted muddy lane before us.
“Oh, boy,” said Paul.
“My thoughts exactly.”
“I guess poets don’t make much money, do they?” Paul strolled across the road and tried the fastening of Victor Belliveau’s gate. It was a long gate, stretched across what might have been a drive, and it was unlocked. One push sent it creaking back on its hinges. The sound spoke of loneliness and isolation, and I’d not have been surprised to see a snarling dog come slinking round a corner, but the only animal that came to greet us was a small black chicken. Keeping its distance, it turned a round and curious eye to watch us cross the lawn toward the house.
It was a farmer’s house, square and sturdy. Great blocks of smooth pale stone framed both front windows and the door that stood between them, but the rest of the walls were made of rubble. Much more economical, I supposed. It might have been made quite a pretty house, if someone had cared enough to take the trouble. It only wanted some new roof tiles and a lick of paint on the sagging shutters, perhaps some curtains and a flowerpot or two to brighten things. But I could clearly hear the rattling of the cracked and graying tiles, and on the wall see places where the years had worn away the mortar so the dampness could creep in between the dirty yellow stones. The windows, staring out across the littered yard at the still and shuttered barn, had a blank and empty look.
No one, I decided, had cared about this house for a very long time.
I had already conjured up a vivid mental picture of Monsieur Victor Belliveau, and so I was completely unprepared for the sight of the man who actually opened the door to Paul’s polite knock. This was no unkempt wild-eyed poet, half mad with drink and raving in his solitude. Instead a tidy, dapper little man, with crisp gray hair and a shaven face that smelled of soap, looked back at us in pleasant expectation.
