Read Online Murder à la Carte by Susan Kiernan-Lewis - Free Book Online Page B

vigorously at the wine-facts of her husband.
    Maggie parked the car in front of the boulangerie . It was going to be a long evening.
    Madame Renoir sang a happy greeting to her from behind the counter when Maggie entered the little shop. The shop owner’s ruddy cheeks were spanked white with flour and Maggie could just imagine the gesture that produced the marks: two chubby hands flying to even chubbier cheeks with a Mon Dieu! over some burnt cupcakes or a too-runny icing. Maggie bonjour- ed back and took in a deep breath of the wonderful, yeasty smells emanating from the ovens behind the woman.
    “ Comme ça va, Madame?" the stout baker asked, her eyebrows shooting up like two inverted commas. She held a huge tray of bread loaves in her hands as she spoke, and Maggie guessed that a good deal of the baker’s apparent blubber must be pure muscle.
    “ Bien, bien," Maggie answered, hoping the woman wouldn’t decide to launch into a long conversation without a translator handy. Maggie didn’t see the infamous Babette in the shop today. “ Je voudrais du pain," Maggie said, pointing to one of the large baguettes in the display case. Better make it two, she thought. We can eat what’s left over for breakfast. “ Deux pains," she said, holding up two fingers.  "S’il vous plaît."
    The baker put down her tray of bread loaves and immediately began to chatter in French. Maggie shrugged, held her hands up in a broad gesture of incomprehension and continued to point to the long, flour-dusted torpedoes of bread.
    “She wants you to tell her ahead of time when you will be coming for your bread.”
    Maggie turned to see Babette standing quietly behind her, a dustpan in one hand. The girl wore a flat, disinterested look and stared directly into Maggie’s eyes. Her coarse blonde hair was plaited in dozens of swinging braids, her face was dramatically made up with blue eyeshadow. Mascara clotted her lashes but whether by design or as the result of having been slept in the night before, Maggie couldn’t tell.
    Immediately, Madame Renoir spoke to Babette, and raised the volume on her babbling. The girl snarled something back at her and then turned to Maggie as if the ordeal of living was being made compoundedly more difficult by each moment that passed.
    “You tell her,” Babette said wearily, “and she holds it back for you. These are extras.” She jerked her head at the bread loaves that Madame Renoir was now stuffing into a bag for Maggie. “You were lucky today. Most people reserve. Comprenez-vous?"
    Maggie nodded, grateful for the girl’s English, if not her attitude. She thanked her but didn’t really want to invite further conversation. She found herself embarrassed by what she knew about the girl. Embarrassed to be Connor’s countrywoman.
    To Maggie’s dismay, the girl leaned against the glass pastry display counter and continued.
    “I am seeing your husband,” she said, glancing down at Maggie’s dark, straight skirt and dark hose. “He comes for brioche . You do not bake brioche for him at home?”
    Maggie took the bread from Madame Renoir and dug out the correct change from her purse.
    “Not yet, anyway,” she said pleasantly.
    “Your husband is a very handsome man,” Babette continued. “Rich, too, I am thinking.”
    Maggie nearly laughed in the girl’s face.
    Was she trying to make her jealous?
    “Well, thanks, anyway, Mademoiselle, for all your help,” she said as she paid Madame Renoir.
    "Il n’y’a pas de quoi," the girl answered with a shrug.
    Before she could leave, Madame Renoir spoke rapidly to Babette who then turned to Maggie.
    “Madame is making many special gâteaux tomorrow,” she said in a bored voice. “Will she reserve one for you?”
    Maggie nodded at Madame Renoir. "Oui, merci," Maggie said. “ Deux, peut-être?"  
    The little baker beamed broadly and jerked her head down in a single, affirming movement. 
    Maggie gave a farewell nod to the decidedly snotty Babette, now