Madame ushered Roy and Cleo to their places, side by side at the head of the table, facing the statue of the naked man with the marble drapes over his arm. There was another figure a short distance in front of the statue. Low down and motionless was a man in a wheelchair, wearing dark glasses. He was heavily bearded, with a mane of silver hair that covered his forehead and tumbled down to the shoulders of his velvet jacket. He wore a bright-yellow cravat.
The woman walked across, held out an arm towards him and spoke to them all in French. When she had finished, Cleo translated.
‘Madame says she would like to introduce her husband, the Vicomte Michel du Carne de Chabrolais, fifteenth Vicomte Joigny. She says he speaks even less English than she does. She is sorry that he is not able to get up from his wheelchair. He’s recovering from a stroke. But Madame says he is proud to be our host for our stay in his beautiful Château-sur-L’Évêque, and if there is anything we need, to please ask either of them.’
Roy filled Cleo’s glass with sparkling water, then raised his flute of champagne at the man in the wheelchair. Cleo and Kaitlynn raised their glasses, too.
‘Cheers!’ Roy Grace said.
The Vicomte, clearly struggling, managed to raise an arm a little in response.
Roy turned to the nanny. ‘Still no luck with Jack?’
She shook her head, looking very upset. ‘I’ve been outside and tried there, too. There’s just no goddamn signal.’
‘OK,’ Roy said. ‘Look, Kaitlynn, I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about. Jack’s a big boy and he knows how to look after himself — he’ll have a perfectly good reason for this. But before I have anything more to drink, I’m going to drive back down to the road and see if I can get a signal there. If Madame serves the starter, don’t worry about me, I’ll have it when I get back.’
But before he could get up, Madame appeared as if from thin air with her most pleasant smile so far. She was carrying another huge silver tray, on which was laid out a generous platter of smoked fish. ‘For Madame and Mademoiselle,’ she said, smiling at the two women.
Their hostess left through a door and returned with another equally large silver tray containing the rich goose-liver pâté, called foie gras, sweet pickles and rich brioche buns. ‘For Monsieur Grace and Monsieur Bruno!’ she said, laying it down.
Roy had recently read about how foie gras was created and had vowed never to eat it again. He was only doing so now to try to be close to his son, who was already tucking in.
Madame topped up their glasses, then stepped back, folded her arms and stood a short distance from them, like a sentry. ‘Please you will enjoy,’ she said. ‘Bon appétit.’
‘Merci!’ Roy said, followed by Cleo who politely said the same.
Roy ate a mouthful of the rich pâté. Then he checked his phone again. Still no signal. He looked at Kaitlynn. She shook her head, then glanced at her own phone. ‘I still don’t have a signal.’ She slipped away from the table to go and check on Noah. And, no doubt, Jack.
‘Papa, do you know how foie gras is made?’ Bruno said. ‘It’s gross! They force-feed a goose, making its liver swell until—’
‘Bruno!’ Cleo said firmly. ‘We really don’t need to know right now, OK?’
Roy stood up. ‘Right, what I’m going to do is drive back down towards the road, where we last had a signal, and try Jack from there.’
‘Roy, finish eating, at least,’ Cleo said.
‘Darling, he might be broken down somewhere and going nuts trying to contact us. I’ll be back in ten minutes, OK?’
He told Madame the foie gras was delicious and that he would be back to finish it. Then he left the dining room and hurried out through the front door into the porch. And stopped. A wall of rain was pelting down even harder than before. There was another brilliant flash of lightning and it was followed, almost instantly, by a massive crash of thunder. It was as if the sky above him had been torn apart.
The storm was right overhead. He remembered something his dad had taught him many years ago. If you could count five seconds between the flash and the thunder, the storm was one mile away. If the thunder followed the lightning instantly, it meant danger, it was right overhead.
Should he go back in and wait for it to move away? That would be the sensible thing. But poor Kaitlynn was desperate, and in truth he was now very concerned about Jack, too. He glanced warily at the sky, then ducking his head, he sprinted across to their Citroën. He gave the driver’s door a hard yank.
It was locked.
Shit. Bugger. He remembered he’d left the keys all the way up in his room. Great! Seventy-two very steep steps both ways and no sodding lift.
There was another brilliant flash and a crash that rippled on and on, as if the sky was now being ripped into a thousand pieces. Holding his breath, he ran back to the porch, stepping inside gratefully, and totally drenched. Then he raced back up the staircase, passing the stag that stood at the top like a sentry, and along the landing to the spiral staircase. Hauling himself up every step with the handrail, he reached the top of the tower. Drenched in sweat as well as rain, he stopped to get his breath back as he stood outside their room. Thunder again crashed outside. This time it sounded as if a million metal dustbins were banged together at the same moment.
Grabbing the keys from the dressing table, he walked carefully down, again using the handrail. As he stepped back out into the porch, there was another lightning flash. He counted. One... two... three... then boom.
That meant the storm wasn’t right overhead any more.
He dashed back over to the car, pressing the key fob button to unlock the doors on the way. But nothing happened. He tried again. Rain pelted down like he was standing under a shower, drenching him even more. Still nothing. Was the battery in the fob dead?
He pushed the key into the door lock and had to twist hard to turn it. The door unlocked with what seemed an unwilling click. He pulled it open, jumped in and pulled it shut against the weather. He was a little surprised that the interior light had not come on. Then he looked at his phone once more. Still no signal. He tried sending another text to Jack, but just like the previous three, he got an unable to send message.
He would have to drive down to the road to get a signal, he thought, and pushed the key into the ignition. But when he turned it there was just a dull click from somewhere in the car’s electrics.
He tried again. Another click. Nothing else.
Flat battery. Shit, shit, shit. Of all the times to get one... This bloody car was almost brand new, with less than three thousand kilometres on the clock. There had to be an electrical fault — a short of some kind. Hadn’t the rental company checked it out properly? Or had the heavy rain somehow got into the wiring? If they’d been in England, he could have called out the RAC. Was there an emergency help number somewhere in the car’s paperwork, which he’d shoved into the glove locker after they’d left the rental place?
Using his phone torch — and suddenly noticing, to his dismay, that he had less than 20 per cent charge remaining — he found a bunch of stapled papers. Scanning through, he found the emergency number for Europe.
Duh! No signal. He couldn’t bloody call it!
All the same, he tried.
With no success.
10
God, how long had he been here now, Jack wondered?
Suddenly, he heard the sound of a door creaking open on rusty hinges. He held his breath. At last, was someone coming to release him?
A bright light swept across the room. He caught a fleeting glimpse of two other figures, on the far side, who also seemed to be tied up, gagged and chained to the wall. He tried to call out, but the sound was trapped by the tape across his mouth.