The French Confection Read Free

hung over the main entrance and there were brightly coloured flowers in the front windows. On closer inspection they turned out to be made of plastic.
    The reception area was so small that if you went in too quickly you’d be out the other side. There was a receptionist standing behind the desk which was just as well as there wasn’t enough room for a chair. He was an old man, at least sixty, with a crumpled face and something terribly wrong with his eyes. When he looked at our passports he had to hold them up beside his ear. He took our names, then sent us to a room on the fifth floor. Fortunately there was a lift but it wasn’t much bigger than a telephone box. Tim and I stood shoulder to shoulder with our cases as it creaked and trembled slowly up. Next time, I decided, I’d take the stairs.
    The truth was that Bestlé hadn’t been too generous with the accommodation. Our room was built into the roof with wooden beams that sloped down at strange angles. It made me think of the Hunchback of Notre Dame. You needed a hunched back to avoid hitting your head on the ceiling. There were two beds, a single window with a view over the other rooftops, a chest of drawers and a bathroom too small to take a bath.
    “Which bed do you want?” I asked.
    “This one!” Tim threw himself onto the bed next to the window. There was a loud “ping” as several of the springs snapped. I sat down, more carefully, on the other bed. It felt like the duvet wasn’t just filled with goose feathers, but they’d also left in half the goose.
    We dumped our luggage and went out. This was, after all, Thursday morning and we only had until Sunday afternoon. Back in the reception area, the receptionist was talking to a new arrival. This was a square-shouldered man with narrow eyes and black, slicked-back hair. He was wearing an expensive, charcoal grey suit. Both of them stopped when they saw us. I dropped the key with a clunk.
    “Merci,” I said.
    Neither of the men said anything. Maybe it was my accent.
    There was a mirror next to the front door and but for that I wouldn’t have noticed what happened next. But as Tim and I made our way out, the man in the grey suit reached out and took my key, turning it round so that he could read the number. He was interested in us. That was for sure. His eyes, empty of emotion, were still scrutinizing us as the door swung shut and we found ourselves in the street.
    First the death of the steward on the train. Then the last whispered warning:
“Beware the mad American!”
And now this. There was a nasty smell in the air and already I knew it wasn’t just French cheese.
    “Which way, Nick?” Tim was waiting for me, holding a camera. He had already taken three photographs of the hotel, a streetlamp and a post-box and he was waiting for me in the morning sunlight. I wondered if he had remembered to put in a film.
    I thought for a moment. I was probably being stupid. We were here in Paris for the weekend and nothing was going to happen. I couldn’t even be sure that it really was Marc Chabrol who had fallen under the train. “Let’s try down there,” I said, pointing down the street.
    “Good idea,” Tim agreed as he turned the other way.
    What can I tell you about Paris? I’m no travel writer. I’m not crazy about writing and I can’t usually afford to travel. But anyway…
    Paris is a big city full of French people. It’s a lot prettier than London and for that matter so are the people. They’re everywhere: in the street-side cafés, sipping black coffee from thimble-sized cups, strolling along the Seine in their designer sunglasses, snapping at each other on the bridges through eighteen inches of the latest Japanese lens. The streets are narrower than in London and looking at the traffic you get the feeling that war has broken out. There are cars parked everywhere. On the streets and on the pavements. Actually, it’s hard to tell which cars are parked and which ones are just stuck in the