After reading a few rather taxing books I gave myself a treat by turning once again to Evariste Clovis Desire Pel. Amusing, implacable, exasperating, coughing, and determined as usual is Pel. Even Madame Pel calls him Pel.
Mark Hebden, Pel and the Picture of Innocence (1988). Recommended.
Once again back in Burgundy where God created the good things of life, krims continue to annoy Chief Inspector Pel. When the charming low-life Maurice Tagliatti is murdered in a gaudy manner, Pel is outraged. Maurice was a villain and so good riddance, but a wild West shoot-out on Pel’s patch…! Sacré bleu! Off Pel goes with his trusty troupe behind him in various states of confusion. Misset is always looking for lazy way to avoid any work whatever. Lorraine has trouble getting through doors on his own. Claudel distracts one and all and once again proves herself far smarter than any of the types on the squad, who accordingly shun her. But Nosjean, De Troq, Dancy, and the others make up the slack.
It is a terrible case that requires Pel to leave Burgundy. This is a terrible case and he must leave Burgundy! At least it is not Paris, which he reviles. But wait! Londres! Yes, Pel is off to London, taxing his tourist English to the hilt(on). GeeBee is not nearly as bad he feared, though it is bad, but there was Yorkshire Pudding. Once back in Burgundy with the squad on the job, Pel tries to make Yorkshire Pudding. Suffice it to say that Pel concludes it can only be made in Yorkshire by a Yorkshireoisie. Madame Pel is left to put the kitchen right after his efforts produced…dog food.
Cut to the chase! Boules, that’s the key. Yves, the eight year old next door could have told Pel that right away if he had listened. Pel is not a good listener when sneaking a smoke in the backyard. [Though of course the all-knowing Madame Pel is quite well aware of his secret while pretending not to.]
In the end Pel likes, respects even, one of the villains, Cavaline. What a turn up that is. Pel, the scourge of villains, admits, only to himself, mind, that Cavaline is a ‘vrai sel.’ Literally ‘real salt.’ It is an idiomatic accolade that is so hard to translate that the ever economical author Hebden does not even try. ‘A real man’ will do as a translation if is taken to include a certain ironic nobility, a willingness to take risks for others, and the keeping promises even at personal cost, and not the radio shock jock definition of A REAL MAN which is smashing innocent people in the face, kicking someone down, and pushing the elderly and infirm out of the way. I think of Alan Jones when I read that. I wonder if anyone else does? It is not all testosterone because there is that alien Ann Coulter.