“That’s more like it.” Thierry tears open the peanut packet clumsily, so that its contents spill onto the table. Scoops up a handful of nuts and offers them to Morgan. “Have a peanut.”

Morgan jerks his head no.

“What, you can’t speak? Can’t say yes please, no thank you, Tonton Thierry? Or is it the barefoot contessa over there,” nodding at Rat, “who won’t let you take munchies from me? She’s a tough one. Even tougher than her mother. Two she-wolves. Us men gotta stick together, huh, Momo? Huh, Jérôme? You heard of male solidarity? A circle of fire to keep the she-wolves at bay.”

Thierry pours himself a glass of pastis. “Go get me some ice, Mo.”

Morgan rises once again from his place beside Rat, slips a tray from the freezer, cracks the cubes into a bowl, and lays it before Thierry.

“That’s my good boy.”

Vanessa is pacing the room, chewing on a nail. She looks pretty wound up. “So what was the problem with Jens?”

“The problem?” Thierry repeats, laughing sourly. “The problem is the guy’s a fucking cheapskate. He gets these builders off the bus from Ukraine to do the work for him half price, and then when something goes wrong, I’m the one who gets the blame.”

“What happened?”

“Some Paris lawyer Jens wants to impress rented the house in Eus for the weekend, only it turns out the plumber installed the wrong kind of siphon in the shower. So suddenly the whole house is stinking like a cesspool, and it’s all my fault.”

Vanessa puts on her patient voice—a voice Rat doesn’t get to hear too often. “I think the point is, you’re supposed to be there, Thierry. On call. Available, in case there’s a problem. Where were you all day, anyway?”

“Where were you?” mimicks Thierry in a shrill falsetto. “You should hear yourself, Vanessa. You’re such a shrew.”

Vanessa ignores this. “Did you straighten things out with Jens?” she persists. “He sounded pretty sore. He said it wasn’t the first time you’d gone AWOL when a renter had a problem. I’ve never heard him that angry before.”

Thierry smiles his thin-lipped ragged smile. “You don’t know much about Jens, do you, sweetheart? You think he’s this big cuddly teddy bear, just because he likes to grab your ass when his wife isn’t looking. But you couldn’t be more wrong. Jens is a real mean bastard, and crooked as hell.”

“Did you manage to straighten things out?” Vanessa persists.

Thierry laughs. “Yeah, we straightened things out. I straightened him out. I’m, like, You try to fire me, I’m going straight to the Tax Office; I’m telling them who—”

“He’s threatening to fire you?” Vanessa interrupts, her voice shooting up high.