Wish You Were Dead

4

‘Seriously?’ Roy said. ‘This can’t be it.’

Cleo was looking doubtful. ‘Hmmmn,’ she said. ‘That’s the name.’

‘So it must be,’ Roy replied, equally doubtful, turning in and heading up a steep, tree-lined and potholed carriage drive. ‘Let’s give this a go and see where we end up. But this can’t be a hotel drive.’

‘Darling,’ Cleo corrected him, ‘it’s not a hotel, it’s a chambre d’hôte — French for a posh guest house. Just the owner and his wife, who are our hosts. They probably don’t have the money to mend this drive — and they open their house just to make ends meet.’

‘Let’s hope that the house isn’t in the same condition as the driveway!’ Kaitlynn quipped.

‘I reckon the owners are serial killers!’ Bruno said, excitedly. ‘We’re all going to be murdered.’

‘Thanks, Bruno!’ Kaitlynn said.

Cleo turned to him with a grin. ‘Judging by all the TripAdvisor reviews, there are lots of people who stayed here and didn’t get murdered.’

‘The owners might have written all the reviews themselves,’ he replied.

The avenue wound left, then right, the car bouncing and splashing through deep puddles on what was little more than a cart track. At least the rain had stopped — for now, anyway. They crossed a broken-down bridge over a narrow, swollen stream, and carried on. At last, up ahead were two more pillars, again topped with stone balls.

Beyond, in the murkiness, they could see the silhouette of a huge mansion, with a round tower at one end.

‘Is that it?’ Roy asked. ‘Looks far bigger than in the photos!’

‘Wow, it’s a palace!’ Kaitlynn said, peering up from her phone.

To Roy, the chateau was grand but looked its age, just like the entrance and the bridge they had crossed. It stood on the far side of a circular driveway, with a fancy lake at the front. In the centre of the lake was a fountain, with a statue of a naked cherub — missing its head and an arm — standing on a huge seashell. But the fountain wasn’t working.

Their tyres crunched on the gravel, and Roy pulled up in front of a grand porch, with steps leading up. It would be a lot grander, he thought, with a lick of paint...

The front door opened and a mangy grey-and-white mongrel appeared, barking furiously, pulling itself down the steps by its front paws, dragging its hind legs behind it.

‘That’s terrible,’ Cleo said. ‘That poor dog.’

‘This place isn’t quite how it looked on the website,’ Kaitlynn murmured. ‘Maybe someone touched up the photographs just a teeny, weeny bit!’

Two cats appeared, and sat, like sentries, either side of the door. Their eyes seemed to glow yellow.

‘It’s horrible,’ Cleo said.

‘Give it a chance — we’re not seeing it in its best light, darling,’ Roy said.

‘Roy,’ Cleo said, ‘I don’t want to stay here. Let’s drive straight out.’

Tired and frazzled after the long and difficult journey, more driving was the last thing he wanted at this moment.

‘What about Jack?’ Kaitlynn asked, anxiously. ‘He should be here. But I can’t see a car.’

‘He might have parked around the back or in a garage, Kaitlynn,’ Roy said. Then, trying to stay positive, he added, ‘Maybe it’ll look nicer in sunshine.’

‘Maybe it’ll look even worse,’ Cleo replied. ‘I vote we leave now.’

‘While we can!’ Bruno added in a sinister voice.

‘Darling,’ Roy said to Cleo. ‘It’s 4 p.m. and we’re in the middle of bloody nowhere. And we’ve paid everything in advance.’

‘I’d prefer to be at home rather than here!’

‘But Jack’s here!’ Kaitlynn said. ‘We can’t just leave him!’

‘Of course not, we’ll tell him to come with us,’ Cleo said.

Before Roy could comment, the front door opened wider and a dumpy, rather stern woman stood there. She looked in her late forties and she was dressed in a drab summer frock and plimsolls. Her face was tight and pinched, behind large glasses, and her mousy brown hair was pulled back into a bun. She reminded him of someone, but at that moment he couldn’t think who.

‘She looks happy to see us — not,’ Cleo said.

‘We are a bit late,’ Roy replied. ‘You know what the French are like about food. They probably had a lovely lunch ready — as we’d asked for — maybe that’s why she’s looking annoyed,’ he said. He was trying hard to be positive, not wanting to start their holiday on the wrong foot. Although it seemed they were pretty well on the wrong foot already. Both feet, actually.

‘Like, it’s our fault?’ she replied. ‘And you’re right, Kaitlynn, this place doesn’t look anything like the images we saw.’

‘Maybe the website pictures were taken a long time ago.’ Roy shrugged.

‘A very long time ago!’ Cleo exclaimed.

‘I’ll go and say sorry in my best French — and explain why we’re late. Hopefully they’ll be able to rustle something up for us.’

‘Otherwise we can eat the dog,’ Bruno said. ‘It looks like it’s on the way out.’

Ignoring him, Roy helped Cleo lift Noah from his child seat, and asked Kaitlynn and Bruno to grab some of their bags. Quietly, to Cleo, Roy said, ‘Let’s give it tonight, at least. If we don’t like it, we can leave first thing in the morning.’

‘If we’re still alive,’ Bruno hissed, overhearing them.

Roy, carrying two suitcases, and Cleo, holding Noah, hurried through the rain and up the steps, into the shelter of the porch, followed by Bruno.

‘Bonjour, Madame, we are Monsieur and Madame Grace,’ Roy said, pretty much using up all he could remember of his schoolboy French. ‘We have a booking with you, I think.’

‘I am sorry, my English is not so good. You speak French?’

Roy looked at Cleo, then back at the woman. ‘My wife — ma femme — can speak French.’

Ignoring this, the woman said, a little frostily, ‘I am Monique, the Vicomtesse. My husband and I are your hosts. You are very late.’ She looked at them all, almost glaring at them. Then in French she added, ‘Nous avons préparé la déjeuner comme vous l’avez demandé.’

Before her job in the mortuary, Cleo had spent a year teaching English as a foreign language to students in Paris. Translating for everyone now, she said, ‘The Vicomtesse says she had prepared lunch for us, as we had requested.’

She turned back to the woman and said to her, in French, ‘We called you several times, Madame la Vicomtesse.’

The woman replied tartly, also in French.

Cleo translated for Roy, Noah and Kaitlynn. ‘She says no one called.’

Roy frowned at Cleo. What?

He noticed the woman’s unusually thick eyebrows. They were like two furry caterpillars, and again reminded him of someone, but he could not remember who.

Cleo spoke to the woman in French again, her tone pleasant. Then she quickly translated. ‘I just told her we got through several times but kept getting cut off.’

The woman seemed to thaw a little. ‘Ah, zis was you? We have problems with the phones today — from the weather.’

‘Say we also texted Jack Alexander to tell her,’ Roy said.

Cleo spoke to her again in French.

The Vicomtesse’s eyebrows crossed, as if the two caterpillars were now in a life-or-death fight. ‘Jack who?’

‘Jack Alexander,’ she replied.

The woman shook her head. ‘He is not arrived.’

Cleo opened her handbag and pulled out the email confirmation of their booking and showed the woman.

She took it and studied it for some moments. ‘Oui, zis is correct. I have booking for three rooms: Monsieur and Madame Grace, Monsieur Bruno Lohmann, Monsieur Alexander and Mademoiselle Kaitlynn Defelice, and a cot for Noah. Oui — yes?’

‘That’s right!’ Roy said. ‘But Monsieur Alexander is not here?’

Cleo asked the question in French.

The woman shook her head. ‘Non.’

‘Not here?’ Kaitlynn said, anxiously.

Roy turned to their nanny. ‘I’m sure he will be soon.’

Cleo asked the woman, again in French, ‘Is it possible to have a little snack?’

As the woman replied, Roy saw a strange look on Cleo’s face a couple of times. When she had finished, again Cleo translated. ‘Madame says her husband is a sick man, and they cannot wait for guests who arrive so late. She also says she has set the cot up, as we requested, in the nanny’s room.’

‘I thought it was going to be in our room,’ Roy said, noticing the look on Kaitlynn’s face. Her romantic week with Jack had just been ruined.

‘Actually, we wanted the cot in our room,’ Cleo said in French to Madame.

‘I’m fine with him being with me — us — Jack and I — for tonight,’ Kaitlynn said.

‘Jack must have been stuck in bad traffic,’ Cleo said to Roy. ‘I’m sure he’ll be here soon.’

‘God, I hope so,’ Kaitlynn said. ‘I’m getting really worried.’

‘Darling,’ Roy said to Cleo, ‘can you explain to her the ferry was delayed, then we got very lost. If we’re too late for anything to eat, could she tell us if there’s somewhere close where we can get something? Explain that we’re all very hungry.’

Cleo spoke to her again.

Madame replied with a reluctant nod, her voice sounding a tad more positive.

‘She says she will sort out a platter of cold meats and cheeses,’ Cleo said.

‘Merci — thank you, Madame,’ Roy said.

‘Merci, Madame,’ Cleo added.

‘Could someone give us a hand with our bags?’ Roy asked.

The woman looked at him, blankly.

He tapped a suitcase. ‘Assistance?’ Then he said to Cleo, ‘Darling, can you ask her if someone could give us a hand with our stuff?’

Cleo turned and spoke to the woman. The woman shook her head as she replied.

Cleo frowned for a moment, as if something wasn’t right. Then she translated, ‘Madame la Vicomtesse says that sadly her husband is in a wheelchair and there is no one else.’

‘I do not carry bags,’ the woman added, in broken English. ‘You must to understand, zis is not hotel.’

You can say that again, Roy thought, smiling inwardly.

‘A hotel,’ Bruno corrected, but the woman didn’t hear him.