The Body in the Vestibule

hesitating, she eagerly followed the trail down toward the speck and was rewarded to find it steadily enlarge as she moved closer. The way leveled off again, but the light did not disappear, and after about a half hour, she stood looking at a large, two-story stone house with a variety of outbuildings. An old Citroen truck was parked outside and she felt like kissing its fenders. The light was coming from the ground-floor front windows and she summoned all the energy she had left to go to the door and lift the heavy iron knocker. It fell with a thunderous bang. She was weeping in relief.

The door opened wide immediately and a dramatic figure filled the frame. It was a very large man in his late forties, dressed like a farmer, but under his beret, his graying hair reached almost to his shoulders, where it mixed with a long beard, creating confusion as to where one left off and the other began. His bushy eyebrows rose slightly in mild surprise and he said in an incongruously soft voice, 'Vous etes perdue, mademoiselle?”

Very, very perdue. Tres, tres lost, Faith reflected as she answered, 'Out.”

A woman's voice called something out and the man stepped back, telling Faith to come in. It was a farmhouse, not unlike the one she had left but larger, and a different decorator had been employed—or rather, it was a matter of self-employment and frozen in tune at some point during the late sixties. Batik wall hangings, pots of geraniums swinging in macrame planters, and furniture that had been scrounged and/or made from scratch. She'd entered a time warp—a sensation heightened by the immediate appearance of the lady of the house, who wore her salt and pepper hair parted in the middle and down to her waist. She was clothed in multiple layers constructed, surely by her own hands, from bright, well-worn India-print cottons. Sandals with several pairs of wool socks completed the look—a look that identified the individual as belonging not so much to a particular nation as to the whole world—in 1968.

“Pauvre petite!' the apparition exclaimed, and quickly pushed a chair stacked with pillows toward Faith. Faith let herself sink gratefully into their softness. She'd made it. She was safe.

The man and woman began to speak at once, quickly. It was impossible.

“Parlez-vous anglais?' Faith asked. She was so tired and speaking French took so much concentration.

“You are English!' The man was thunderstruck. There might be some logical reason for a Frenchwoman to be wandering around what Faith would soon learn were the Gausses Mejean in the dark, but English? To be sure, they could be eccentric ...

“No, I am an American and I hope you will be able to help me.'

“American! Sacrebleu!' Faith hoped he would not go into orgies over Route 66 or the Large Apple, or, judging from the posters of Che, Lennon, Roman Polanski's A Knife in the Water and the like, American foreign policy for the last twenty-five years.

There were wonderful smells coming from the kitchen and she wanted to eat, but first she had to call Tom. Maybe call Tom while she was eating. She had to have something, anything, even a crust of yesterday's baguette.

“American,' he repeated in amazement. 'But what are you doing here? Have you been with some kind of hiking group? At this time of year, it is not advisable, you know.”

How to explain it.

“My name is Faith Fairchild and my husband, child, and I are visiting in Lyon. . . .'

“Lyon! But that is two hundred kilometers away at least!'

“Yes, I know. Do you think perhaps I could have something to eat and some water while I explain? I'd also like to make a phone call. Then, if you could take me to the nearest police station, I'm sure they will arrange for me to get back to my husband.”

Faith didn't think she had made a joke, but her queries seemed to cause both her hosts great amusement.

“Madame, the food is no problem, but you understand you are not in the centre ville of Lyon here. We have no phone, no electricity at all, and the nearest police station is in Meyrueis— fourteen kilometers away,' explained the woman.

“We would be happy to take you there,' her husband continued, 'but our fine old truck has at last refused all our attempts to start it and at the moment we are dependent on others to get our things to market. Tomorrow a friend will be here early to take us to Meyrueis and you can come, too.”

Tomorrow! As pleasant as these people seemed—Faith was already planning on sending them an extremely nice bread-and-butter gift, shoes perhaps, or a new truck, which it was a shame someone hadn't thought of earlier—the idea of another night away from Tom and Ben when they still didn't know she was safe was too much. She put her head in her hands and began to sob.

Mama and Papa Bear, as Faith had begun to regard them, were galvanized into action. He thrust a large glass of what smelled like pure alcohol into her hand, while his wife set a steaming bowl of thick vegetable soup on a low table next to Faith's chair. Faith sniffed mightily and wiped her eyes on the rough sleeve of the sweater she was wearing. Hard to know how to go about returning it, she thought disconnectedly as she set the glass down and grabbed the soup.

“Thank you. Merci, you are so kind. It's just that no one knows where I am. I was kidnapped yesterday morning and only succeeded in escaping this morning.'

“Kidnapped! Terrorists! Here in the Cevennes!'

“No, no, it was a neighbor in Lyon. You see he killed a clochard and I found the body, then he hid the body again and had his uncle pretend to be the clochard—' Faith stopped. Both their faces had 'escaped madwoman' written in Bodoni bold type straight across their granny glasses. She hastily slurped down the rest of the soup. It was delicious.

“I am not crazy, although I admit the story sounds bizarre. I should start from the beginning and tell you the whole thing.'

“But of course, madame. Let us sit in the kitchen. We were about to have our meal. If you sip some of this'—he indicated the glass Faith had set aside—'you will feel warm and perhaps calmer. It is my own eau de vie. I make it from the plums.'

“I'm sure it's wonderful, but I am pregnant and avoiding alcohol.”

This was the last straw, as far as madame was concerned. Lost, kidnapped, pregnant. She virtually carried Faith out to the kitchen, tenderly installed her in a chair near the hot cast-iron stove, and began to assemble the meal rapidly.

When it was ready, Faith had the distinct impression it was more than what had originally been planned.

“I hope you like French food. Ours is very simple. We make everything here. It is not Paul Bocuse, but Clotilde,' monsieur said proudly, with a sweeping gesture. Faith was amused that the chefs fame had spread to this tiny corner of the world, yet why not when his well-fed, smiling face appeared in restaurants and on products from Tokyo to Disney World.

Clotilde was not Bocuse, but she was right up there. Dish after dish appeared on the round kitchen table: a fluffy omelet oozing with sauteed mushrooms, crisp pan-fried new potatoes, and thick slices of tripoux, which Faith recognized as a regional speciality—round sacks of tripe stuffed with an assortment of the chopped tripe, vegetables, and aromatic herbs. It was all sublime. This was followed by salad, picked moments ago, and fresh goat cheese made by madame herself, fromage fermiere. Throughout the meal, Faith devoured slice after slice of bread, a dense, chewy combination of white and whole wheat, pain de campagne, made in the oven sending out such comforting waves of warmth. She was just beginning to feel well and truly fed for the first time in days when her hostess produced a jar of apricots, spooning the succulent-looking fruit into large bowls and liberally dousing them with cream. The coffee appeared and Faith started her tale.

By the time she had reached her escape from the kitchen closet, Clotilde and Frederic, first names having been urged at the same time as seconds of the omelet, were in tears—hers of sorrow and his of anger.

Frederic exploded. He jumped out of his chair and pounded his fist on the table. 'If only I could get my hands on this boy! Boy! He does not deserve to be called anything human. And what is even worse is that he is not alone. It is the majority of youth today. They have no morals to speak of, live solely for the