Page 43 of Marble Hall Murders

This really wasn’t what I’d intended, but now that I’d started, I couldn’t stop myself. ‘Well, this may sound like a huge note, but it isn’t. It’s more of a question. Are you sure about the South of France setting?’

That threw him. ‘What’s wrong with it?’

‘There’s nothing wrong with the way you’ve written it. I think you’ve described it very well. I love the Chateau Belmar and the descriptions of Nice and Cap Ferrat. But I do wonder if you aren’t creating problems for yourself. For example, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for Margaret Chalfont to use a French solicitor to draw up her will rather than someone in London or Norfolk. Elmer Waysmith dividing his time between art galleries in Nice and London doesn’t feel completely realistic either. Are you saying that the gallery in Nice is closed for the whole of winter? I’m getting a sense of disconnection. The family is tied to England, but they seem to be spending a lot of time in France. Who’s looking after the estate while Jeffrey Chalfont is away?’

‘That’s the whole point. He’s not interested in the estate.’

‘I understand that. But he doesn’t have very much to do, lounging around in Cap Ferrat.’

‘He gambles.’

‘He’s a good character, Eliot, and I like the gambling. But you have a lot of foreign characters and you’re having towork in two languages. Sometimes that makes things complicated. Take the scene in the pharmacy, for example. You have a pharmacist who speaks only French, dealing with a customer who speaks English with an American accent. Then a Frenchwoman comes in and she also speaks in French, but she talks to the customer who’s English, so you have to translate everything word for word. It seems quite a cumbersome way to get across the point, which I suppose is the time of day.’

‘So where would you prefer me to set it? The Isle of Wight?’

‘I think that would be a very good setting, since you mention it. It would certainly make life a lot easier for you.’

‘That scene in the pharmacy only worksbecauseit’s in French,’ Eliot said, quite tetchy now. ‘You may not have noticed, but the woman who comes in tutoyers, which is to say, she uses the informal “tu” form of address.’

‘I hadn’t noticed,’ I admitted. ‘And I wonder how many of your readers will have A-level French?’

‘It’s a clue.’

‘Well, it doesn’t matter now, but it may be something you want to think about.’ I waved the conversation away. ‘What’s a cassone, by the way?’ There was one in Judith’s bedroom.

‘It’s a wooden chest.’

‘And a Mazarin bureau?’

‘It’s nineteenth century, French, with marquetry.’

‘You seem to know a lot about furniture.’

‘I had a job in an auction house.’

‘Well, they’re nice details, but – again – they could be a bit confusing. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with usingforeign words, but it’s a bit like when Margaret Chalfont quotes in German on page four. Adding a translation as a footnote is a bit of a distraction.’

Eliot added a second word to his notes. GOETHE. ‘Anything else?’

I’d said enough. ‘I really think you should keep going, Eliot. You’re doing a great job and the reason I came in today was to get to know you, not to start deconstructing the book. You obviously know what you’re doing and I can’t wait to read the next section, if you still want to show it to me. But my advice would be to get to the end before we meet again.’ I stopped as one other thought occurred to me. ‘There is something else I wanted to ask you, though,’ I said.

‘And what’s that?’

‘I noticed the name of the house in Cap Ferrat. The Chateau Belmar.’ I waited for him to speak, but when he said nothing, I filled in the blank. ‘It’s an anagram of “Marble”.’

He smiled at that, but not in a pleasant way. It was rapidly dawning on me that Eliot Crace – young, good-looking, talented, laid-back, wealthy – was, as I had expected, trouble.

‘I see you’ve picked up a few tricks from Alan Conway,’ I went on. ‘Is there anything else hidden in the novel that I should know about?’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

‘Well, your grandmother lived in Marble Hall. I was wondering if you’ve partly based Margaret Chalfont on her.’

‘What makes you think that?’

‘Your Miriam Crace died of a heart attack and Margaret Chalfont has a heart condition. They also have the same initials. It’s none of my business, and I don’t want to dig intoyour family history, but I’m sure you’ll understand that, after my experiences with Alan Conway, I’m not too keen on literary secrets.’

‘Alan used anagrams.’