Five months without a murder… and counting. Here we were in mid-March with the spring bursting out in our new garden. No sign of evil anywhere. Birds singing, trees burgeoning into leaf and bees busy with the first flowers. Over the winter Beaucoup-sur-Mer had recovered from the spate of killings that had rocked our little French seaside town in the late summer and early autumn after our arrival in our new home at Les Dragons.
Our father’s will had laid down that we had to move from our then home in Notting Hill Gate in London, England, to his second home in France. It had been an unwelcome upheaval for all three of us: for my brother Jimbo, who was only nine and had to start school in France without being able to speak French, for my brother Sam, who at eighteen had wanted to go off and do his thing but now had to stay with the family and help us adapt our lives to living in France, and for me, a new barrister with my first portfolio of clients. The only members of the family who didn’t seem to mind the move were our two German shepherds, Zig and Zag.
Arriving in France, we had come upon our long lost mother Gwinny who had deserted us all seven years previously. Jimbo had been ecstatic; Sam and I less so, forgiveness being good for the soul but hard to come by.
Along the way, the three of us had gained a friend in Felix who’d been sent from the Middle Congo by my father, Sir Archibald Munro, to be my bodyguard. I needed one. The wicked witch doctor of the Wazini back in Africa was out to kill me in revenge against my father’s support of the government there, in their campaign to stamp out the murderous Leopardmen.
Thereby hangs a tale as they say. When delivered at our door in Beaucoup-sur-Mer, Felix was a handsome Savannah cat, but he was a shifter who could morph from cat to leopard to man in any order. He had taken me by surprise the first time I came upon his human form. But as he said, as a supernatural myself it was time I got used to such strange happenings.
After seven months I was coming to terms with finding out I was a white witch. At first I’d been rebellious, thinking all that magic stuff was nonsense. As a barrister with a mind trained to analyze facts and nuances of the law, it took me some time to come to an understanding that I had been called; that using magic in the fight of good against evil was my vocation in life. At first, it had been difficult for me. At twenty-five, I was a late starter and had a lot of catching up to do. Being dyslexic had only added to the difficulty of learning the spells I needed. My father had sent me my mother’s Book of Spells along with his will. Faced with such a vast amount of material to learn, I’d been advised by Felix to tackle the spells as and when they were needed. So far, the High Council of the Guild of White Witches, who monitored my progress, had been happy with that approach. I hadn’t needed to learn a new spell since our adventure at Christmastime when we’d given Santa a helping hand. However, with a performance review due any day from the High Council, I might have to up the pace of my studying.
All this was running through my mind as I sat in the kitchen with Felix having a mid-morning cup of tea and one of my favorite chocolate éclairs.
“Penny for your thoughts,” said Felix.
“Shouldn’t it be a Euro or a centime?” I replied.
“Some things don’t translate. Go on. Tell me what’s giving you that far-away look.”
“I was thinking about how far we’ve come since our family moved over here to France. The money spent on the garden is beginning to pay off. Look out of the window as it comes alive with the onset of spring. Jimbo’s doing well at school and will soon speak a more colloquial French than either of us. Life is peaceful at last. That monsoon of evil that swept over Beaucoup-sur-Mer after our arrival here has blown itself out.”
“Sam’s not too happy and you, yourself, still have to find a means of earning a living.”
“Sam’s time will come. This year is giving him a chance to decide what he wants to do with his life. Although the gap year was forced on him by my father’s will, it has been good for Sam.”
“And you, boss? What are you going to do with yourself for the rest of your life?”
“I’ve been giving it a lot of thought recently. Should I stick with a life in the law, undertake the necessary study to qualify as an advocate in France? The whole philosophy of the law here is so different from the Anglo-Saxon model. I’m not sure I could get my head or my heart around it. Then there’s the antiques business.”
“How about private investigator?” asked Felix with a wink.
I rolled my eyes before I could stop myself. “That was forced on me, I didn’t choose it. I don’t want to spend my life peering into the worst aspects of people’s actions.”
“You can’t deny you sought and found justice for the victims.”
I sighed. Felix was right, but it was dirty work even so.
Felix put his hand over mine. “Don’t sweat it, Penzi. It will come to you. There’s no harm in taking a few months off after all the hard years of study you’ve put in while bringing up your two brothers.”
I turned my head to look at Gwinny who was standing at the sink peeling potatoes for lunch. I was sure I’d heard her sniffle.
“Gwinny,” I called out, “Felix wasn’t getting at you.”
She looked over her shoulder at us and wiped her eyes with her spare hand. “Don’t you worry about me. It’s these onions.”
Felix and I exchanged a glance. My mother had been waiting for us in Beaucoup-sur-Mer when we’d arrived the previous summer. She’d been the one to renovate the house for us and since then she’d been living with us, much to Jimbo’s joy. Felix had rebuked me several times in the past for being so unforgiving towards her for the seven years she’d left me to care for my siblings.
She dropped the paring knife in the sink with a splash, pulled out the chair at the end of the table and sat down drying her hands on her apron. She put out a hand to cover mine and Felix’s.
“Penzi, take your time,” she said. “The universe will give you the answer when you’re ready. I wish I could take back the last seven years and start over, but I can’t.”
To my dismay I’d flinched before I could stop myself when she placed her hand on mine. I quickly covered our three hands with my other one and gave hers a squeeze, hoping she hadn’t noticed my reaction. My heart was still closed to her, but I didn’t want to cause her pain. My coldness was my problem, not hers. I had to work on forgiveness.
“Thanks Gwinny,” I said. “I hope you know how much we value your help now that you’re living with us.”
She gave me a faint smile, withdrew her hand and returned to the sink.
“Oh,” she said as she looked out of the window. “Martine’s here. Right on time for her morning coffee.”
Martine Courier was our postwoman and something of a family friend. She’d proved invaluable on many occasions with her knowledge of local gossip and personalities. In France, postmen have a duty to report if they consider anyone needs assistance. That makes them inquisitive by nature and a useful resource for a private investigator.
She rapped on the front door and bustled into the kitchen taking the seat vacated by Gwinny only a few moments before. It took her a few seconds to throw our mail down on the table and settle her large bulk into the chair.
Gwinny placed a cup of hot coffee before her and signaled to Felix to pass her the box of éclairs.
Martine wriggled to get comfortable, pulled down her tunic and reached for one saying, “I really shouldn’t but I can’t resist.”
She took a bite. “Good. Not as good as Tidot’s were, but not bad.”
On top of the usual Monday morning pile of publicity catalogs lay an A4 manila envelope, an official looking missive. I raised my eyebrows at Felix and he nodded back. Recent history had made me wary of such letters. I waited with impatience for Martine to push the mail towards me, but she carried on munching her éclair quite oblivious of my anxiety. The pastry demolished, she downed her cup of coffee in a couple of mouthfuls. At last she raised her eyes and caught mine.
She gave an embarrassed titter and pushed the pile towards me. “I’m sorry, Penzi. I’m such a gourmande. Forgive me.”
I was no closer to knowing what the envelope said. I could make out my name but that was all. I extracted the sheaf of publicity papers from the bottom and passed them to Gwinny. The letters, half a dozen or so, I handed to Felix to read noticing as I did so that there were two large manila envelopes, not one.
Felix picked up the two envelopes. “The first one’s for you, Penzi, but the other one’s addressed to me. Who could know I’m living here with you? The postmarks are French.”
“Well, open them then,” I said as I reached behind me for a knife with which to slit them open and passed it to him.
I waited with my stomach muscles tightening. Official letters never brought good news. Were the authorities checking up on Felix? He had no legal standing as far as I knew. He had immigrated into France as a cat, not a human being, and we had faked his application for a UK passport.
Felix pulled out the letter and scanned it quickly, the furrow between his eyes deepening as he read down the page. He flipped over to the second without looking up at me. It had to be bad. I dug my nails into my tightly wrapped palms.
He flicked the first page back over the second and stared down at the letter while he gathered his thoughts.
“What is it, Felix? You’re scaring me,” I asked him unable to keep the note of apprehension out of my voice.
At last, he glanced across at me. “It’s from the Ministry.”
“What do they want?”
“It’s about our last case.”
“Are we in trouble? Did we break a law?”
Felix relaxed enough to chuckle. “You know we did, but that’s not it. Let me check the one addressed to me before I tell you anything.”
Martine held her cup out to Gwinny for a refill. In my anxiety I’d forgotten she was still sitting there enjoying her usual break from her postal delivery routine. I wanted to warn Felix not to say anything in front of her. Pas devant les enfants came to mind, but that wouldn’t work because Martine was French, so I gave Felix a hefty kick under the table.
“Ouch!” he said rubbing his shin and glaring at me. “There’s no need for that. I’m taking my time because I want to be sure I understand all this legal French properly.”
Martine was reaching back to take her refill from Gwinny, so I risked a jerk of my head in her direction and put my finger to my mouth to say watch it.
Felix took the hint, rising to his feet and saying, “We need a dictionary for this. Let’s go into the study, Penzi.”
I pushed back my chair and made it to the kitchen door before Felix, tossing off a quick au’voir to Martine over my shoulder on the way out.
As soon as the study door was closed, I turned round to Felix and punched him on the arm. “Stop being such a rotter and tell me what the letters say. I’m getting more and more anxious.”
“Chill, boss. I want to be sure about this before I tell you what they say.”
I hurried across to my father’s chair and sat down. Felix pulled a French-English dictionary down from the bookshelf and spent a few minutes rifling through the pages, giving a slight grunt every time he found the word he wanted and scribbling it down above the typed French.
Satisfied at last that he understood the content of the letters, he put down his pen, shut the dictionary with a thump and shot me a beaming smile.
“You’ll never guess,” he said.
“Of course, I won’t. Tell me what they say. I can’t stand the suspense. Good news or bad?”
“I wouldn’t be smiling if it was bad news, would I?” he said reaching across the desk for my hands and holding them tightly.
He stared deep into my eyes and said, “Mpenzi Munro, you are now officially a millionaire.”
“What?” I gasped. “What on earth are you talking about?”
“The letters are from the Ministry informing us of our share of the reward for solving the case of the oyster farmers. The four of us, Izzy, Garth, you and I, are granted over two million Euros each.”
I blinked and blinked again while the import of Felix’s news sank in. No more money problems.
“For real?” I whispered as the breath whooshed out of me.
Felix nodded. “Both of us. We’re set up for life.”
“I can’t believe it. I can make sure Sam and Jimbo get the education and training they want. I’ll be able to take care of Gwinny as she grows older… and help other people. It’s magic.”
I snatched my hands away and leapt to my feet. Throwing my arms in the air I did a victory dance whooping, “Yes, yes. Maaaaaagic.”
The door to the study opened and Gwinny stepped in with Martine peering over her shoulder.
“What’s going on in here? Are you all right?” she asked.
“Never better,” I answered not breaking off from my jig of happiness.
“Well?” she asked.
Felix put his finger to his lips. I didn’t need his warning. There was no way I wanted Martine to know about our exotic windfall. It would be all round the town and we’d be besieged by demands for financial help. And Gwinny shouldn’t know either. But what to say? I had to think of something.
I stopped prancing about.
“Izzy has managed to persuade her friend who works in the Louvre to come and appraise all those paintings in the brocante. He’s coming next month.”
“Your reaction seems a bit over the top, but I suppose it’s progress. It’s time you started earning some money,” Gwinny said as she left the room pushing Martine backwards into the hall.
“Phew!” said Felix stifling a laugh. “We nearly gave the game away there.”
I took my seat again. “We can’t let anyone know. We’ll never have a moment’s peace.”
“I agree with you there. But we have a more serious problem than keeping all this secret.”
“What’s that?” I asked him.
“What are we going to do with the rest of our lives if we don’t need to earn a living?”
As usual, Felix had put his finger right on the crux of the matter. What indeed?

Coming - ISBN 9782901556282