Read The Devil's Cave: A Bruno Courrèges Investigation (Bruno Chief of Police 5) for Free Online

justification for his arrest was an anonymous letter, which was not enough. Without a complaint from his wife, Bruno had few options. Before coming he had checked the list he kept in the office of those who’d paid for that year’s hunting permit. Junot’s name was not on it, so any evidence of hunting – even for rabbits – would justify Bruno in making an arrest. That would be a last resort and the Mayor had asked him to be discreet. His first task was to assess whether the beating was happening; the second to see if the wife would testify; the third to issue a warning. It was one of those tricky moments of policing when Bruno had few cards to play.
    Bruno heard the sound of hammering and a curse from the barn below the house. He saw a curtain twitch at the window by the door to the house. Junot’s wife had seen him coming, but she took her time answering the door and opened it just a crack. She knew him from open days at the tennis club, watching her young daughter play and mixing with the rest of the mothers as their children attacked the refreshments afterwards. But still she eyed him with suspicion as he removed his hat, smiled and asked if he could come in.
    ‘What for?’
    ‘I have some questions I have to ask you.’
    ‘What do you mean, questions?’ She had opened the doora fraction wider and he saw a bruised cheek and a black eye.
    ‘Questions about a written complaint we’ve received,’ Bruno said. ‘Either I come in and ask you about them or we’ll have to take you and your husband to the Gendarmerie.’
    It was not a threat he liked to make, but he had to. All anonymous letters were supposed to be filed, and the Inspectorate of Police had the right to read them and demand why a case had not been pursued. Wife-beating had become a prominent issue and Bruno could be in trouble if the Inspectors thought he were ignoring complaints.
    ‘I’ll get Louis,’ she said, opening the door with reluctance.
    ‘It’s you I need to speak to first,’ he said, stepping briskly inside in a way that made Madame Junot step back. As she moved, she lifted her hand to her side, as if her ribs hurt.
    ‘You’ve been hurt, Madame. What happened?’ He cast an eye around the big kitchen with its stone floor that would be bitterly cold in winter and an original stone sink. There were no taps. Water would have to be pumped up daily from the well outside. The only modern amenities were an electric light bulb hanging from the ceiling and an elderly cooking stove fuelled by bottles of gas.
    ‘I fell down the stairs.’
    ‘The stairs did not blacken your eye. What caused that?’
    She did not answer, but turned back to the stove where a large pot was simmering. She lifted the lid, releasing a scent of duck stock and of garlic, broke two small eggs into the soup and began to stir with an age-blackened wooden spoon.
    ‘Making
tourain
?’ Bruno asked, noticing the bowl filled with evidently stale bread she had placed beside the stove. A classicdish of the Périgord, it was the traditional cheap but filling lunch of the farmers, and simple to make. Based on the stock from the carcass of a duck, some garlic and salt, stale bread and an egg or two, it could be thinned out with water or milk or thickened with more bread or vermicelli. And when the bowl of soup was almost finished, any true Périgourdin would make
chabrol
, pouring in half a glass of red wine to swirl it around the plate, and then lift the bowl to his lips.
    She shrugged, keeping her back to him. She was wearing a wrap-around apron, washed so often that the floral print had faded almost beyond recognition. Underneath she wore sagging woollen stockings and a long pullover that she had knitted herself with wool from their own sheep. There was no sign of a TV, far less a computer. A shelf on the wall opposite the window carried an elderly radio, what looked like a bible, a farmer’s almanac and a battered cookbook. There were no other books in sight, no