Title: THE CHARLEMAGNE CONNECTION
Genre: Mystery
Author: Richard Michael Cartmel
Publisher: Crime Scene Books
Purchase on Amazon.
The
Charlemagne Connection, Cartmel’s latest mystery, is an exhilarating tale of
villainy in the vineyards featuring the rumpled but shrewd Inspector
Charlemagne Truchaud of the Paris police.
About The Charlemagne Connection: Something sinister is afoot
in the charming little Burgundy village of Nuits-Saint-Georges. Inspector Truchaud will have an elaborate
mystery to unravel when a young German tourist goes missing in
Nuits-Saint-Georges. What appears, at
first, to be a straightforward case takes a dark turn when a decomposing body
is found in the woods….
A
captivating tale that transports readers to the vineyards of Burgundy, The Charlemagne Connection crackles with
suspense. Smart, seamless, and sensational, The
Charlemagne Connection blends a to-die for setting, a well-balanced,
full-bodied plot, and irresistible characters. Celebrated novelist R.M.
Cartmel uncorks a wild, witty, and winning wine mystery in The Charlemagne Connection.
Prologue
Nuits-Saint-Georges, sometime after last
year’s harvest
Captain Duquesne raised an eyebrow when
the angular features of young Constable Lenoir appeared round the corner of the
door without warning. He was usually expected to announce himself from his seat
behind the counter in the outer office, with a quick call on the intercom.
After all, you never knew quite what the Chef might be doing. ‘Can I help you,
gendarme?’ he asked icily.
‘There’s a woman out here with a problem
which I think you ought to be aware of,’ the Constable replied carefully.
Duquesne thought for a moment, and then
replied, as Lenoir looked as if he required some sort of answer. ‘Well, are you
going to bring her in then?’
Constable Lenoir’s head disappeared from
round the door, but his shoulder remained in sight, as Duquesne heard him
telling someone outside to ‘come on through’.
‘This is Madame Blanchard,’ Lenoir said,
introducing the middle-aged woman. ‘She runs the campsite just south of town.’
Duquesne remembered his manners and
invited the woman to sit down, before asking her what appeared to be the
problem.
‘It’s one of our campers,’ she said. ‘I
think he’s disappeared.’
‘How might you mean disappeared?’ he asked extremely politely, somewhat to Lenoir’s
surprise.
‘Well, he always comes to the shop at the
beginning of the day, to buy some fresh bread and milk for breakfast; sometimes
croissants as well; sometimes not. But for the past three days, he hasn’t even
been into the shop at all.’
‘Might he have found another shop to get
his breakfast from?’ asked Duquesne, the polite tone persisting, but with a
slight overtone of dryness creeping in over the top.
‘Oh, I agree,’ she replied. ‘We’re not a
monopoly, and we don’t demand that our campers buy only from us. All we expect
is that our campers pay up for the rentals of their pitches. And his pitch
rental also became due yesterday.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘Well, we charge a daily fee for each day
stayed. When he first arrived, he paid a week’s rental up front in cash. He
also used to come to buy his breakfast from us each morning. He was quite
chatty, and spoke good French for a German, and each time he’s stayed, his
French has improved, so he really seems to quite enjoy testing out his latest
French idioms, while collecting the bread and milk.’
‘You mean this isn’t the first time he’s
stayed with you?’
‘Oh no. This must be the fourth time he’s
stayed at the Camp Millésime.’
‘And he has always got his breakfast from
you?’
‘Yes, without fail; every time he’s
stayed.’
‘Go on.’
‘Well, yesterday, as part of my walk
round the campsite, to make sure all is well, I looked round his area, and he
wasn’t there, and nor was his bicycle.’
‘Bicycle?’
‘Yes, he has a bicycle to get about on.’
‘He didn’t come all this way from Germany
on a bicycle, did he?’ asked Duquesne, sounding slightly surprised. ‘What is
he: an athlete in training for the Tour de France?’
‘No, captain. He comes here in an old
Volkswagen Kombi campervan, which he parks up and sleeps in while he stays. He
then potters about on a bicycle which he brings with him. He does appear to be
quite fit, I suppose, but the Tour de France? No, I don’t think so.’
‘How old is he?’
‘About twenty-five,’ she replied.
Duquesne grinned at Lenoir. ‘Do you think
he has found himself a little friend to make his holiday more fun?’
‘I thought that too,’ said Mrs Blanchard
without missing a beat. ‘But when I came back this morning the pan was in
exactly the same place.’
‘The pan, madame?’ enquired the captain
quizzically.
‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘the pan. You see,
when I went by yesterday there was a saucepan, of the sort you might boil water
in, or cook things in perhaps, that was lying just outside the door of the
camper. It was still in exactly the same place this morning. So, it’s extremely
unlikely that he came back last night, because if he had, he would have had to
move it, even just slightly, to get into the camper without twisting like some
sort of contortionist. And why would you do that when all you have to do is
shift a little saucepan?’
‘And it was in exactly the same place?’
‘Yes.’
‘Wasn’t that rather unfair of you leaving
the young man’s pan outside? Anyone could have stolen it,’ remarked Lenoir.
‘But no one did. That’s the point. Nobody
moved it to get into the camper either. I did ask the young couple with the
baby — who had a pitch and a tent just across from him — if they had seen him
at all, and they said they haven’t; not for the past three days.’
‘And he owes you money?’ remarked the
captain.
‘Well, yes, but only a couple of days'
worth.’
‘And if he had been fully paid-up, then
you wouldn’t have come round here bothering the Gendarmerie with all this?’
‘Oh, captain, I don’t think that’s fair.
I’m worried for him too. He seems a nice young man: always comes on his own;
seems a solitary lad; but has always been polite and pleasant to us. He doesn’t
flirt with the assistants or anything.’
Captain Duquesne shrugged. The
realization was dawning on him that he wasn’t going to get rid of this woman
without making some sort of effort to address her concerns, unless he just physically
threw her out, and that simply wasn’t Duquesne’s way. ‘What time are you going
to be back at the campsite, madame?’ he asked.
‘I should be back there in about half an
hour,’ she replied.
‘I shall come and have a look at the
scene when you get back, or perhaps young Lenoir here will,’ he added, tossing
a glance at the gendarme still standing behind the woman. ‘Do you know how to
get to the campsite, constable?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Then you can show Mrs Blanchard out.
Once you have done so, will you come back in again?’
Lenoir returned almost immediately.
‘Sit down,’ his captain instructed him,
and he did so where erstwhile Mrs Blanchard had been sitting. ‘Your concerns?’
he asked.
‘Well, sir, I was just thinking … suppose
she’s right? I mean, people don’t just disappear, not here in
Nuits-Saint-Georges.’
‘You’re telling me that you’d like to
investigate this?’
‘Yes, sir, if I may. Just to see if there
really is anything to her concerns.’
‘Go for it then. You’ll find it good
training, if nothing else.’
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