The Poisoning Angel Read Online Free Page A

square-shouldered, with a bearded jawline, and sporting a white leather belt and laced-up shoes – appraised Jean’s two stony hectares, which stretched as far as the line of plum trees leading to the washing place.
    ‘So you’re selling your whole farm?’
    ‘Even with Anne it was difficult. I’ll never manage on my own. I’ll leave you the cottage as it is, with contents. I’ll just take my sword from above the fireplace.’
    ‘What will become of you, nobleman?’
    ‘Day labourer … beggar … I’ll do what my neighbours do. You’re well aware of the poverty and how many abandoned farms there are in the hamlet of Kerhordevin, since you’re the one buying them all up.’
    ‘How much do you want for yours?’ asked the wealthy landowner.
    ‘One hundred.’
    ‘You must be joking! It’s not the Jégado château at Kerhollain I’m getting. I’ll give you fifty but, since I’m going through Bubry anyway, I’ll drop your daughter at the priest’s house as promised. That’s a very pretty little fairy you’ve got there. How old is she?’
    ‘She was baptised on 28 Prairial in year XI.’

    ‘Year XI. Can’t you say 1803? Are you still using the revolutionary calendar, Jean? Alas, that fine secular invention of the Great Revolution is over. An erstwhile Chouan like you should be rejoicing that we’ve gone back to the Christian calendar, the Gregorian one …’
    ‘Oh? I didn’t know that. The only way those of us who can’t read the papers have of hearing about important events is from songs at fairs, you see.’
    ‘Go on, my little noblewoman, up you go into the carriage with your leather bag. It has a fleur-de-lis branded on it. Is it your father’s? What have you got in it?’
    ‘A cake I made.’
    ‘Right. So, Jégado, you’ll let me have your hovel?’
    Pulling out a hair – the symbol of property – Jean threw it into the wind. This was the equivalent of signing a contract, declaring that you would not go back on the agreement, since it would be impossible for the seller to recover the hair, which the breeze had carried away.
    The hair spiralled away in the wind, and the carriage, drawn by a mare, rolled off along a rutted road shaded by centuries-old oak trees. Putting her bag, which was divided into two sections, beside her, Thunderflower turned to watch her downcast father making his way back to the cottage. Soon the child lost sight of the Druid stones of her village as well.
    Late afternoon. The bell was ringing for the angelus. The light, two-wheeled carriage came at walking speed past numerous flour mills and squat windmills and stopped in front of the presbytery in Bubry. The wealthy landowner was lying motionless on his side, with one arm hanging down. His discarded whip lay on the flour-scattered cobbles. Behind the presbytery gates a woman in servant’s clothing and with bagnolet fluttering on her forehead called out, ‘Monsieur le recteur! Monsieur le recteur!’
    A priest came running to join the servant, who was wiping her hands on her apron and asking Thunderflower in Breton, ‘What’s the matter with him? He’s got foam at his mouth and cake crumbs in his beard!’
    ‘He’s dead, Tante Hélène. It came over him just as we arrived in this street.’
    ‘Oh, my poor little godchild, what a journey you must have had.’
    The priest raised Michelet’s head and gave his diagnosis in French. ‘He must have had a heart attack.’
    For the second time in her life, Hélène Jégado was hearing this strange language, of which she understood not one word.
    ‘Petra?’
(‘What?’)
    She was looking now at the façade of the priest’s residence, with carved coats of arms broken during the Revolution, while he was astonished by the sight of her blond mop of hair.
    ‘Mademoiselle Liscouet, your late sister’s daughter goes bareheaded?’
    ‘Girls don’t wear a headdress except at
fest-noz
until they’re thirteen, abbé Riallan,’ his servant reminded him.
    ‘What do