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the Neuvic money and the Marshall Plan, and who knows which was which?’
    ‘That’s what I’m trying to find out,’ said Jacqueline. ‘That’s why my father’s memoirs are the key to all this. He was in it all the way through, from late 1945 to 1952 when the Marshall Plan became the Mutual Security Plan.’
    ‘And how much was the Marshall Plan?’
    ‘Altogether? About thirteen billion dollars. But another thirteen billion had already been sent in aid to Europe between the end of the war and the Marshall Plan starting in 1947. So the US pumped in a total of twenty-six billion, at a time when the American GDP was just over two hundred billion a year. Thirteen per cent of GDP is pretty generous if you ask me, but not too expensive to stop Western Europe going Communist. And it was certainly a whole lot cheaper than a war.’
    ‘I had no idea,’ said Bruno.
    ‘Not many people do. If you want to know what really happened in history, it’s like those two
Washington Post
reporters said in the Watergate scandal: Follow the money.’
    ‘The Mayor is right about your book having a big impact,’ Bruno said. ‘I think you’ll be rewriting the recent history of France.’
    ‘Oh goody,’ she said, an impish grin lighting up her face, making her look years younger and very much more attractive. ‘And wait till you see what I’ve dug up on secret nuclear cooperation. French independent nuclear weapons aren’t nearly as independent as you think.’ She said it as casually as if she were talking of the vegetables in her garden, went to one of her bookshelves and handed him a slim paperback. He looked at the title:
Le partage des milliards de la Résistance
, the distribution of the Resistance billions.
    ‘That will get you off to a good start; most of the background is in there. Let me have it back when you’re done. More coffee, or can I offer you something stronger? You look like you could do with a drink.’
    Even as he was thinking that a stiff scotch would be welcome, Bruno’s mobile rang. It was Albert, head of the
pompiers
, the local fire brigade, which also acted as the emergency medical service.
    ‘Got an emergency call from somewhere up in the hills by St Chamassy about somebody badly hurt with head injuries,’ Albert said. His voice was faint, the signal weak. ‘We’ve just got here and the Gendarmes should be on their way if they can find it.’ He gave Bruno directions. ‘And bring a doctor for a death certificate. The guy’s dead. I think we might have a murder.’

4
    There was still no sign of the Gendarmes when Bruno parked his van on the rough grass beside Albert’s red emergency vehicle. A rather battered silver Renault Clio stood beside it. In front of the cottage on a small patch of gravel was a blue Ford Transit, its side and rear doors open to reveal an empty interior. It carried English registration plates and a small GB plaque on the rear bumper. Beside it lay a lumpish shape, two men standing over it. One was Albert and the other was a stranger, carrying a plastic bag.
    The house behind them was like many others in the district, with a red tile roof in the shape of a witch’s hat and walls of light-brown stone that turned in the sun to the colour of honey. Wooden shutters hung on the windows, painted the usual pale grey that had become ubiquitous after the French navy sold off its vast stocks of paint very cheaply. To one side was a small barn and to the other a pocket-sized swimming pool, flanked by two cheap metal chairs that needed a new coat of white paint. A couple of empty flower pots waited for the geranium season. The front door was open to show a floor of terracotta tiles. There were no personal touches, no patch of herbs or vegetables, no children’s toys. It was a
gîte
, a farmhouse cheaply restored and transformed into a holiday rental.
    ‘Salut, Bruno,’ said Albert. ‘This is Monsieur Valentoux from Paris, who called us. The silver Clio belongs to him. He was going