Murder Under The Kissing Bough: (Auguste Didier Mystery 6) Read Free

Christmases and come back to Europe without any ancestral mansions to go to, and in folks left alone here who want to escape from their own families and find another one for a few days. There’s quite a few of them. So I’ve hired Cranton’s for a Twelve Days of Christmas party. A grand old English Christmas, wassails and warbling, that sort of thing.’
    ‘
At Cranton’s. Christmas
.’ That voice floated through his mind.
    ‘
Non
,’ he told her firmly. ‘
Absolument pas
.’
    This Christmas he must consider the future of the cooking school. He would not go anywhere that held the slightest whiff of any crime, let alone murder. The nightmare of November was with him still. ‘I could not get the staff in time,’ he pleaded, unwilling to tell her what had happened, ‘train them to produce forcemeat, and puddings to the required standard. And the dinner, and mince pies,
le réveillon
for the new century . . . There would be too much to plan for in the time. Yet,’ he was suddenly abstracted, ‘we could have, I suppose, all roasted fowl, with lighter desserts. And I have always wished to try punch sauce with plum pudding. The boar’s head of course would be borne in by me, as
maître chef
.’
    ‘You haven’t changed, Auguste.’ Maisie was amused. ‘Don’t you ever think of anything but food? I don’t want you to be the cook.’
    ‘What?’ His face blanched. ‘Not the chef? Then who? Ah, Maisie, you were not serious about Soyer? You would not wish me to work
under
someone?’
    ‘No, no,’ said Maisie patiently. ‘I want you to be thehost, the manager, the
maître d’hôtel
for the holiday. I plan to drop in myself from time to time. George is going to Switzerland with his dear Mama, and it’s understood that where dear Mama goes, I don’t. I’ll divide my time between you and the children.’
    But Auguste was scarcely listening. ‘The host?’ All those unattainable dreams of his own hotel, for how could he ever afford to buy his own hotel? Now he was being offered a chance to pretend. . .
    ‘I’d get you a wonderful chef,’ promised Maisie gleefully, seeing sudden indecision on his face.
    He regarded her doubtfully. ‘He must be one who can both cook a baron of beef to perfection as well as the most delicate chanterelles, who loves both the raised pie and the paté de foie gras, the English crayfish and the. . .’
    ‘Yes, yes, I’ll make sure,’ Maisie said hastily. ‘You are free, aren’t you?’
    Auguste stiffened, his pride under attack. ‘As it happens,’ he said loftily, ‘I am.’ His current pupils would leave in a week’s time, two weeks before Christmas, and so far he had no new clients. It was tempting – but impossible. ‘But I cannot do it,’ he announced.
    ‘Why not?’ she said indignantly.
    ‘Because of murder,’ he blurted out, unable to dissemble any longer.
    ‘You’re planning one?’ she asked with interest.
    ‘I fear one,’ he said darkly. ‘I
saw
one.’
    She began to laugh. ‘If you could see my list of guests, Auguste, you’d know there was nothing to worry about. Stuffy as an embalmed crocodile, this party is. You’ll see.’
    ‘No, I will not see,’ he said sadly. ‘Hard though it is to refuse you anything, dear Maisie, this I cannot do.’ He rose to his feet in dignity, then remembered he hadnot yet tasted that most interesting looking confection, and sat down again.
    ‘What a pity,’ Maisie smiled sweetly. ‘And the owner of Cranton’s is a friend of Princess Tatiana too! How disappointed your Tatiana will be.’
    Auguste stiffened. He had no idea Maisie knew Tatiana. Now he had no choice. If the owner of Cranton’s was a friend of Tatiana’s, then to Cranton’s he must go. Otherwise news of his churlishness might reach her ears. Hopeless his love for her might be, but his honour at least must be kept brightly burnished in her eyes. So to Cranton’s he must go and forget this nonsense, his wild fancy of murder. After all, Egbert had