The Body in the Vestibule

Faith in passing and called out, 'Tea tomorrow? I'll speak with you in the morning,' before disappearing into the building.

Faith stopped directly in front of the clochard and said in the careful French she had been rehearsing since entering the church an hour earlier, 'How are you? You did not seem to be feeling very well the other night in my hallway.”

She had no idea what to expect, but she wanted to see what he would say and also get a better look at his face, obscured as it was by the cap. She looked at his hands again. One held a cigarette and the other possessively clutched a liter of wine—Le Cep Vermeil, The Silver Vine— its low price and wide availability belying its elegant name.

She stared at his hands. Not even a trace of a scar, but there was a trace of a ring on his right ring finger—a very definite place that had escaped the sun. Her clochard, as Faith had come to think of him, hadn't been wearing a ring.

Nor did she recall that his nails had been bitten to the bloody quick as this one's were.

She repeated her question, since the man had made no reply and had, in fact, not moved at all.

This time, he answered. 'Get away, putain,' he hissed in a low voice without looking up. 'Get away!”

Shaken, she hastily moved into the church and walked down the darkened nave to the small chapel of St. Expedit, patron of lost causes. It was always cool inside St. Nizier and at the moment the only sound was the soft shuffling of the priests as they went about their work. One passed close to her and when she turned to look at him, he nodded and smiled. He was carrying an armful of baguettes and wearing white Nikes under his robes. She stepped up into the chapel, dropped some francs in the box and lighted a candle. The sun shone through the stained-glass window, dappling the statue of the boyish-looking saint in greens, blues, and gold. Faith bowed her head and got down on her knees. The position was surprisingly comfortable, whether from an easing of the soul or of baby fatigue, she wasn't sure. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

It was certainly a different man. And that could only mean the other clochard was dead. There was no other reason to go to all the trouble of impersonating him. But this poor wreck outside hardly seemed capable of engineering such a switch, let alone committing a murder.

Murder. She'd said it finally—or rather thought it and knew it was what she had believed ever since hearing the body was gone. Someone had killed the clochard, put the body in the poubelle, then removed it before the police arrived. It would have to have been done quickly. A car waiting outside? But she had been at the window like Sister Anne in the tower and she hadn't heard a sound until the police pulled up. And why kill the clochard in the first place. Who was he? There had been no trace of violence and presumably the police had checked for obvious bloodstains in the trash. Given the man's nature, he might have been killed in a fight with another clochard who then panicked and dumped him in the bin, yet that left the charade of the last two days.

And what about the man outside? Who was he? She hadn't expected the frighteningly venomous response— it wasn't every day she was called a whore—but then, what had she expected? That he would tell her what was going on?

She got quickly to her feet. Ben and Tom would be waiting.

When she went back outside, the clochard was gone.

The Leblancs had come up with an old but perfectly reliable Citroen Deux Chevaux for the Fairchilds' use. It had a canvas roof that folded back, windows one pushed open and clicked into place on the exterior, and something akin to park benches as seats. It was bright red and they had all come to love it, especially Ben. Now they chugged their way up a steep hill to St. Didier-au-Mont-d'Or, where Paul's parents lived. They found the address after only a few wrong turns and pulled into the gravel-covered courtyard. It was a beautiful old stone house with a magnificent garden. Large hydrangea bushes on either side of the front door spilled their puffy flowers out into the sunshine and filled the air with their soft scent.

Sunday dinner in the country—straight out of a French movie, and after struggling to keep up with sisters, cousins, cousins' sisters, Faith gave up on pairing names with faces and let the infectious good humor of the day sweep over her. It was a relief. She resolutely switched her mind to automatic pilot, put a smile on her face, and decided to live in the moment. There was nothing she could do just now, anyway.

Ben was immediately claimed by the Leblanc children and their kin. When she went to check on him, he was happily seated in the driver's seat of a vintage pedal car, zooming around a smaller garden, complete with vine- covered playhouse. The older children were busy setting places at a picnic table under a tree and assured her she was completely unnecessary for Ben's well-being and happiness. Well, she had eyes, too. Not sure whether to be delighted or rebuffed, she returned to the adults, and it wasn't long before delight won out—easily.

It was just like all the other parties and dinners she had attended. People came to have a good time. There was a great bustling to and fro from the kitchen. The adults were also eating outside at a table set up under a grape arbor adjacent to the house. Faith tried to help and was firmly placed in a canvas lawn chair next to Paul's father, who told her in slow, very precise English that he was a great admirer of the United States and did she know Philip Roth. 'We like his books here very much. I try to read them in English, but I have to look at the French sometimes to be sure. You must have the same problem when you read French.”

Faith gave what she hoped was a noncommittal reply, her reading in French being limited to the French editions of Elk and Vogue, with an occasional glance these days at Le Monde, and quickly asked about his family, which took them away from Moliere, Colette, and whomever to the table. He was continuing to list various relatives and telling stories as they sat down.

“You see that beautiful statue there?' Faith nodded as he pointed to an Italian marble garden statue of some female deity. 'My grandfather brought it back from Tuscany and that naughty girl there'—he moved his arm from indicating the statue to a very pretty dark-haired woman bringing a bowl to the table—'that girl, ma fille, my own daughter,' he continued in a slightly louder voice now that everyone was listening, 'painted it bright blue when she was a child. You can still see traces of the color,' he told Faith as the group exploded in laughter, as if hearing the story for the first time.

“And it looked much better, too,' his daughter, Mi-chele, rejoined.

Paul's mother apologized for the picque-nique and Faith immediately insisted, truthfully, that it was all the food she loved the most. There was a large platter of oeufs en gelee—perfect three-minute eggs taken out of their shells and placed in a small mold, then covered with gelatin. These also had tiny shrimp set on top and a flower cut from a carrot slice and parsley, so the unmolded result both looked and tasted delicious. The eggs were surrounded by fresh tomatoes. Another platter held slices of cold veal that had been stuffed with pistachio nuts. Then there were several large bowls— saladiers—of tabouleh; potatoes with herring and a vinagrette sauce; the tiny lentils from the town of Le Puy, the so-called caviar of Le Puy, mixed with bits of bacon, shallots, and a mustardy vinaigrette; a large green salad with several lettuces; and salade museau, something that appeared to be thin slices of some kind of ham in a light mayonnaise. It went down better with some English-speaking people if it wasn't translated, Paul told them. Pig's snouts did not sound as good as they tasted. In addition, there were all sorts of the famous Lyonnais sausages— rosettes, cervelas, sabodet—and plenty of bread—crusty baguettes and large round country loaves. The board groaned. It was a feast. Pitchers of Cote du Rhone and water were passed around and the noise got louder. Paul was sitting next to Faith.

“We are a bit crazy on the weekends. There's always this dinner at my mother's. She has the largest house and whoever is around comes.'

“I like it,' Faith responded. 'And you certainly seem to be a close family.'

“Oh, we are. We may hate each other, but we are close.”

She looked surprised.

He laughed. 'It would be impossible to be with this many people without some friction, and from time to time we won't see someone for a while. Eventually, he or she comes back. No one is ever turned away, no matter what.”

Faith wondered if this was a universal French custom. It certainly wasn't something she'd observed often in the States. But families there tended to be more spread out and that had to account for some of it. She was on the point of asking him more when he told her how much he had enjoyed the dinner party at her apartment.