CHAPTER 30
Meredith fired the engine and drove her car past the Place de Deux Rennes, glancing at the place where the photograph had been taken, as if she might see the outline of her long-dead ancestor standing smiling at her from between the trees.
Pretty soon she had cleared the outskirts of the small town and was out on to the unlit road beyond. The trees took on strange, shifting shapes. The occasional building, a house or a shed for animals, loomed at her out of the dark. She locked her door with her elbow and heard the mechanism click reassuringly tight shut.
Taking it slow, she followed the directions on the map in the brochure. She put the radio on for company. The silence of the country seemed absolute. Beside her was a mass of forest. Above, an expanse of sky lit only with a few stars. There was no sign of life, not even a fox or a cat.
Meredith found the road to Sougraigne marked on the brochure and turned left. She rubbed her eyes, aware she was too beat to be driving. The bushes and telegraph poles at the verge seemed to be swaying, vibrating. A couple of times she thought there was someone walking along the side of the road, backlit by her headlamps, but when she got level, she discovered it was only a sign or a roadside shrine.
She tried to keep focused, but she could feel her tired thoughts wandering. After the craziness of the day – the Tarot reading, the cab ride across Paris, the drive down here, the rollercoaster of emotions – her energy had run out. She was totally gone. All she could think about now was a long, hot shower, then a glass of wine and dinner. Then a long, long sleep.
Jesus!
Meredith slammed on the brakes. There was someone standing right in the middle of the road. A woman in a long red cloak, the hood pulled up over her head. Meredith shouted, saw her own panicked face reflected white in the windshield. She jerked the steering wheel down, knowing there was no way to avoid the collision. As if in slow motion, she felt the tyres lose the road. She threw up her hands to brace herself for the impact. The last thing she saw was a pair of wide green eyes staring right at her.
No! No way!
The car skidded. The rear wheels swung round ninety degrees, then back, sliding across the road, rocking to a stop inches away from a ditch. There was a roaring noise, like the sound of drums, coming from somewhere, hammering, battering her senses. It was a moment before she realised it was only the sound of her own blood in her ears.
Meredith opened her eyes.
For a few seconds she sat gripping tight to the wheel, as if afraid to let go. Then, with a rush of cold dread, she realised she had to force herself to get out. She might have hit someone. Killed someone.
She fumbled with the lock and stepped out of the car on shaking legs. Dreading what she was going to find, she walked carefully round to the front, bracing herself to see a body tangled under the wheels.
There was nothing. Not knowing what to think, Meredith cast her disbelieving eyes all around, to left and right, back in the direction she had come, ahead to where the light from the headlights disappeared into a pinpoint of black.
Nothing. The forest was silent. No sign of life.
‘Hello?’ she called. ‘Is anybody there? Are you OK? Hello?’
Nothing but her own voice echoing back at her.
Bewildered, she bent down and examined the front of the car. There were no marks at all. She walked all round the vehicle, running her hand over the bodywork, but it was clean.
Meredith got back in the car. She was certain she’d seen someone. Staring right at her out of the darkness. She hadn’t imagined it. Had she? She glanced in the mirror, but saw only her own ghostly reflection looking back at her. Then, out of the shadows, the desperate face of her birth mother.
I am not going crazy.
She rubbed her eyes, gave herself a couple of minutes more, then started the car. Spooked by what had happened – what hadn’t happened – she took it pretty steady, leaving the window open to clear her head. Wake her up a little.
Meredith was relieved when she saw the sign for the hotel. She turned off the Sougraigne road and followed a winding single track, which climbed steeply up the hillside. After a couple of minutes more, she arrived at two stone pillars and a pair of ornate black wrought-iron gates. On the wall was a grey slate sign: HÔTEL DOMAINE DE LA CADE.
Triggered by a motion sensor, the gates slowly opened to let her through. There was something eerie about the silence, the click of the mechanism on the gravel, and Meredith shivered. The woods seemed almost to be alive, living and breathing, watching. Malevolent, somehow. She’d be glad to get inside.
The tyres crunched as she drove slowly up a long drive lined with châtaigniers, sweet chestnut trees, like sentinels on duty. The lawns stretched out on either side into blackness. Finally she rounded a slight curve in the drive and, at last, got sight of the hotel.
Even after everything that had happened tonight, the unexpected beauty of the place blew her away. The hotel was an elegant three-storey building, with whitewashed walls covered with flaming red and green ivy, gleaming in the floodlights as if the leaves had been polished. Balustrades on the first floor and a row of round windows at the very top, the old servants’ quarters, a house perfectly in proportion, amazing when she considered that part of the original maison de maître had been destroyed by fire. It all looked totally authentic.
Meredith found a parking slot at the front of the hotel and carried her bags up the curved stone steps. She was glad to have arrived in one piece, although she couldn’t quite shake the queasy feeling in the pit of her stomach from her near miss on the road. And the scene at the river.
Just tired, she told herself.
She felt better the second she stepped inside the spacious and elegant lobby. There was a black and red chequerboard tiled floor and a delicate cream paper of yellow and green flowers on the walls. To the left of the main door, in front of the tall sash windows, was a pair of deep sofas with plumped-up cushions set either side of a stone fireplace. A vast floral display stood in the grate. Everywhere mirrors and glass reflected the light from the chandeliers, gilt frames, and glass wall sconces.
Straight ahead was a sweeping central staircase, the handrails highly polished and glinting in the diffused light of the glass chandelier, with the front desk to the right, a large polished wooden claw-footed table rather than a counter. The walls were covered in black and white and sepia period photographs. Men in military uniform, Napoleonic rather than World War I at first glance, ladies in puffed sleeves and wide skirts, family portraits, scenes of Rennes-les-Bains in days gone by. Meredith smiled. Plenty to check out over the next few days.
She stepped up to the front desk.
‘Bienvenue, Madame.’
‘Hi.’
‘Welcome to the Domaine de la Cade. You have a reservation? ’
‘Yes, it’s Martin. M-A-R-T-I-N.’
‘It is your first time with us?’
‘It is.’
Meredith filled in the form and gave her credit card details, the third she’d used that day. She was handed a map of the hotel and grounds, another of the surrounding area, and an old-fashioned brass key with a red tassel and a disc with the name of her room on it: la Chambre Jaune.
She suddenly felt a prickling on the back of her neck, as if a person had come up behind her and was standing a little too close. She was aware of the rise and fall of someone’s breath. She glanced over her shoulder. There was no one.
‘The Yellow Room is on the first floor, Madame Martin.’
‘Excuse me?’ Meredith turned back to the clerk.
‘I said that your room is on the first floor. The elevator is opposite the concierge,’ the woman continued, indicating a discreet sign. ‘Or, if you wish, take the stairs up and go to the right. Last orders for dinner are at nine thirty. You wish for me to reserve a table?’
Meredith glanced at her watch. A quarter of eight. ‘That’d be great. Eight thirty?’
‘Very good, Madame. The terrace bar – the entrance is through the library – is open until midnight.’
‘Great. Thank you.’
‘Do you need help with your luggage?’
‘No, I’m good, thanks.’
With a backward glance at the empty lobby, Meredith took the stairs to the impressive first-floor landing. At the top, she looked down and noticed there was a boudoir grand tucked into the shadows beneath the staircase. Nice instrument, by the look of it, although it seemed a weird place to put a piano. The lid was closed.
As she walked along the passage, she grinned at the fact that all the rooms had names rather than numbers. The Anjou Suite, the Blue Room, Blanche de Castille, Henri IV.
The hotel reinforcing its historic credentials.
Her room was pretty much right at the end. With the shimmer of anticipation she always got when going to a new hotel for the first time, she fumbled with the heavy key, pushed the door open with the toe of her sneaker, and then flicked the switch.
She gave a wide smile.
There was a huge mahogany bed in the centre of the room. The dresser, closet and two nightstands all matched in the same deep red wood. She opened the doors of the closet and found that the minibar, TV and remote all were hidden inside. On the bureau, glossy magazines, the hotel guide and room service menu and brochures giving the history of the place. On a small wooden book-holder placed on top of the bureau, a selection of old books. Meredith ran her eyes along the spines – the usual thrillers and classics, a guide to some kind of hat museum in Espéraza, a couple of books on local history.
She crossed the room to the window and opened the shutters, breathing in the heady smell of the damp earth and the night air. The dark lawns stretched away for what seemed like miles. She could just make out an ornamental lake, then a tall hedge separating the formal part of the garden from the woods beyond. She was pleased she was at the back of the hotel, away from the parking lot and the sound of car doors slamming, although there was a terrace below with wooden tables and chairs and patio heaters.
Meredith unpacked, properly this time rather than leaving everything in the bag as she had in Paris, denims, T-shirts and sweaters in the drawers and her smarter outfits in the closet. She arranged her toothbrush and make-up on the shelves in the bathroom, then tried out the fancy Molton Brown soaps and shampoo in the tub.
Thirty minutes later, feeling more like herself, she wrapped herself in a huge white bathrobe, plugged in her cell to recharge and sat down at her laptop. Discovering she couldn’t get internet access, she reached over and dialled reception.
‘Hi. This is Ms Martin. In the Yellow Room. I need to check mail, but I’m having trouble getting online. I’m wondering if you can give me the password or if you can organise it from your end?’ Holding the receiver between her ear and her shoulder, she scribbled down the information. ‘OK, that’s great, thanks. Got it.’
She hung up, struck by the coincidence of the password as she typed it in – CONSTANTINE – and quickly got a connection. She sent her daily email to Mary, letting her know she’d arrived safely and that she’d already found the place where one of the photographs had been taken, and promising to be in touch if there was anything to report. Next, she looked into her checking account and saw with relief that the money from the publisher had at last come through.
Finally.
There were a couple of personal emails, including an invitation to the wedding of two of her college friends in Los Angeles, which she declined, and one to a concert conducted by an old school friend, now back in Milwaukee, which she accepted.
She was about to log off when she thought she might as well see if there was anything about the fire at the Domaine de la Cade in October 1897. There wasn’t much more than she’d learned already from the hotel brochure.
Next she typed LASCOMBE into the search engine.
This did yield a little new information about Jules Lascombe. He appeared to have been some sort of amateur historian, an expert on the Visigoth era and local folklore and superstitions. He’d even had a few books, pamphlets, privately published by a local printing company, Bousquet.
Meredith’s eyes narrowed. She clicked on a link and information flashed up on the screen. A well-known local family, as well as being the owners of the largest department store in Rennes-les-Bains and a substantial printing business, they were also first cousins of Jules Lascombe and had inherited the Domaine de la Cade on his death.
Meredith scrolled down the page until she found what she was looking for. She clicked, then started to read:
The Bousquet Tarot is a rare deck, not used much outside France. The earliest examples of this deck were printed by the Bousquet publishing company, located outside Rennes-les-Bains in south-west France, in the late 1890s.
Said to be based on a far older deck, dating back to the seventeenth century, aspects unique to this deck include the substitution of Maître, Maîtresse, Fils and Fille for the four court cards in each suit and the period clothing and iconography. The artist of the major arcana cards, which are contemporaneous with the first printed deck, is unknown.
Beside her on the desk, the phone rang. Meredith jumped, the sound raucously loud in the silence of the room. Without taking her eyes from the screen, Meredith flung out her hand and grabbed the receiver.
‘Yes? Yes, this is she.’
It was the restaurant asking if she still required her table. Meredith glanced at the clock on her laptop and was amazed to find it was eight-forty.
‘Actually, I think I’ll get something sent up instead,’ she said, but was swiftly informed that room service stopped at six.
Meredith was torn. She didn’t want to stop, not right now, when she was getting somewhere – although whether it mattered or what it meant was another issue. But she was ravenous. She’d skipped lunch and she was useless on an empty stomach.
Her crazy hallucinations at the river and on the road were evidence enough.
‘I’ll be right down,’ she said.
She saved the page and the links, then logged off.
