her,” Bronwen said simply. “Remember I told you I felt sorry for her having to stay at the pub and not knowing what was going to happen next? It’s a miserable place, that pub, and she had no clothes, no toiletries . . . I had the spare room, so I invited her to come and stay with me until she was free to leave. She was very grateful, Evan.”
“Bronwen Price—one of these days . . .” Evan put his hands on her shoulders. “I’ve got enough to worry about without having to worry about you doing stupid things!”
“Stupid things indeed,” she said, tossing her mane of hair. “You should be thanking me that I’ve kept her on the spot, just where you want her. Now you don’t have to go chasing after her, do you? Although I must say I can’t believe that she’s as wicked as you say. She seems so nice and polite and grateful.”
“There are plenty of serial killers who seemed nice and normal to those around them,” Evan said. “But you’re right—I do have to be grateful to you. When she hears what we’ve discovered, maybe she’ll finally tell us the truth.”
Chapter 21
The woman he had known as Madame Yvette was sitting beside the aga stove in Bronwen’s kitchen, wrapped in one of Bronwen’s fringed shawls, and looking remarkably like a witch, her hook nose more pronounced and her eyes hollower than he remembered.
She looked up when she saw him and smiled warily. “Ah—it is Monsieur Evans. You went down to Sussex, I ’ear. But you did not see zee remains of my poor restaurant, I sink—zey tell me zere ees now a new building where it used to be and zere ees nossing to show zat I was zere anymore.”
He looked at her. She was still relaxed, confident that they had found nothing that could incriminate her.
“We didn’t just go to Sussex,” he said, watching her face. “We went to France as well.”
There was another flash of wariness, then she shrugged. “A wasted journey, I should sink. Nobody ees alive now in France who remember me.”
“On the contrary,” Evan said. “It was most informative.”
The wariness returned to her face.
“We learned, for example,” Evan went on, “that the body in your restaurant was that of Jean Bouchard—your husband who died five years ago, Madame Yvette. It seems he returned from the grave to die again. And you know the strangest thing? He came into the restaurant and you didn’t recognize him. I don’t think a person changes that much in five years, do they?”
Madame Yvette drew the shawl around her. “I don’t know what you talk about,” she said. “I had nevair seen zat man before in my life.”
“What man?” Evan asked.
“The man who came into zee restaurant while you were ’aving dinner,” she said, then flushed when she realized he had tricked her. “You saw ’im come in. He was a stranger, monsieur. I swear zis on my honor.”
“Of course you do,” Evan said, “and I know you’re telling the truth—why would you recognize Yvette Bouchard’s husband when you aren’t Yvette Bouchard?”
He heard a sharp intake of breath and the dark eyes flashed at him defiantly. “Can you prove zis, monsieur?”
“Of course,” Evan said. “We went to your cooking school. I’ve got your photo with your name written across the back in your own handwriting—the same handwriting in which you signed your police report—and Yvette’s photo, too. So you were classmates, were you? Did you come over to console her when her husband was lost at sea? The next thing we know, her restaurant burns to the ground and poor Madame Yvette is dragged out, badly burned. Was that really an accident? I can’t work out what would make you do it, unless it was spite and jealousy. Were you jealous of your friend, Madame? Did you begrudge her the good life she had in England?”
A look of scorn crossed her face. “Zee good life you say? Eet was a life of drudgery, monsieur. She struggle to keep zat place going. Wizout me she would have ’ad to close long ago. I kept her going—”
“And then burned her to the ground? Why?”
“As you say, why? Why should I want to burn down ’er restaurant? Let me tell you, monsieur. When zat restaurant burned, my own ’opes of freedom were destroyed.”
“So you’re saying that you didn’t burn down the place? You were certainly quick enough to take advantage of the situation, weren’t you? Madame Yvette