By Paul Carrier
Judging by the appeal it holds for writers and readers alike, Provence has to be one of the most-celebated regions of France. It has been the subject of memoirs, travel guides, cookbooks, novels, and collections of photographs, as well as books on gardening, art and architecture.
Not to mention the occasional mystery.
One entry in that last category is the Vertaque and Bonnet series by M. L. Longworth, a Canadian-born writer who moved to Aix-en-Provence in 1997. There are four books to date, starting with Death at the Château Bremont and culminating in Murder on the Île Sordou.
Set in and near present-day Aix-en-Provence, a mid-size city just north of Marseille, Death at the Château Bremont opens with the murder of Étienne de Bremont, a young, married nobleman who has made a name for himself as a documentary filmmaker.
Bremont plummets to his death when someone shoves him through an attic window at his family's historic but rundown château. At first, it looks like Bremont may have fallen by accident or committed suicide. But Antoine Verlaque, a handsome, wealthy, somewhat smug judge, and Bruno Paulik, an opera-loving police commissioner with humble roots, think otherwise.
As their investigation progresses, suspicion mounts. Jean-Claude Auvieux, the caretaker who found Bremont's body, seems nervous under questioning. François de Bremont, Étienne's high-living brother, strikes Verlaque as being fearful for some unknown reason. And Isabelle de Bremont, the victim's widow, lies to Verlaque about her whereabouts at the time of her husband's demise.
Then a related death occurs -- this one, definitely a murder -- and the case grows in complexity.
Everyone with ties to the victims "is hiding something," Verlaque says early on. "It's turning into one of those old-fashioned plays in which everyone has a secret, all the characters casting sideways glances whenever someone moved an inch in the elegant living room."
As I mentioned at the outset, Death at the Château Bremont is billed as "A Verlaque and Bonnet Mystery." So who is Bonnet? An attractive law-school professor in Aix-en-Provence, Marine Bonnet was Verlaque's girlfriend, for lack of a better word, until he broke up with her six months ago. She's still strongly attracted to him, despite the fact that he rarely praised her during their relationship and, in fact, constantly criticized her appearance and menu choices.
Bonnet has known the Bremont brothers since they were children, and even played with them in the attic of the château. Ostensibly because of her familiarity with both the family and the scene of the crime, Verlaque summons her to the château, to see if anything in the attic strikes her as odd or amiss. But is that his real motive for dragging her into the case? Or is he still smitten by her, and looking for a way to lure her back into his life?
Light in tone but with a solid command of plotting and character, Death at the Château Bremont unfolds against the backdrop of the evolving Verlaque-Bonnet relationship. The setting itself is a character in this mystery, as Longworth introduces readers to the charms of Provence.
Pastis, an alcoholic beverage, as well as gougère and brioche, two types of pastry, make periodic appearances in the novel, which features loving references to wine, cigars, tisane (herbal tea) and all manner of food.
The novel acknowledges Paul Cézanne, the French artist who painted several versions of the Mont Sainte-Victoire, near Aix-en-Provence. The mistral, a strong wind to be found in the south of France, blows in and out. And virtually all of the characters, male and female, are forever exchanging la bise, a platonic kiss on the cheek.
As for Verlaque, he represents what may strike American readers as a quirk of the French legal system, but one that works well in a mystery. Verlaque is what is known in France as a juge d'instruction, or investigating judge, who helps gather and evaluate evidence to determine whether a case will go to trial. As such, he works closely with the police, and is intimately involved in investigating the two deaths that are at the heart of this endearing novel.
