The Tragic End of Diane de Briare

It was not Los Angeles, nor Chicago nor New York. The tragedy you’re about to live through happened in the most unlikely setting. It happened in the heart of a sweet and idyllic part of France, midway between the Loire Valley, its châteaux and vineyards, and the ancient city of Bourges and its towering cathedral. On that morning, the square of the village of Henrichemont, in the Berry region, looked as it did the previous day, or in the thirties or forties, even in 1640, when Sully, then minister of King Henri IV, designed it. Of course, since, the roads had been paved, and the apothecary had put aside his clysters and decorated his shingle with flashing green neon lights, letting the world know that he, now, operated a pharmacy. The usurer who had conducted his transactions from a portable bench on market days, he too had long disappeared, replaced by a branch of a multinational bank with a bucolic name chosen by the marketing department who knew that nostalgia was good for business. Very recently, this bank had added the finishing touch to the square by installing an ATM machine. It clashed somewhat with the decor, but it was just as they had in Paris, proudly commented the locals. It represented the ultimate illustration of the unstoppable progress accomplished by the Nation with the help of the financial institution. The hotel and the café on the square, on the other hand, had not changed much, save for the television that had never been turned off since the introduction of cable, and the two yellow parasols at the entrance of the café. A Dutch beer manufacturer had donated them, allegedly to protect the patrons seated at the tables of the sidewalk café from the elements. But old habits die hard and, oblivious to the advertising logos hanging over their heads, the clients still sipped their traditional rouge that Madame Yvonne now served chilled. She had heard that it was the way they now did it in the capital.

At Marcel’s restaurant, however, the solid values of traditional cuisine, refined, lovingly prepared and served as a work of art, still reigned supreme. The only pitfall was the fact that going there was a real adventure with unpredictable outcome. There was no way of knowing, in advance, whether the place would be open that day. You see, Marcel was not your average chef. He was a poet and an artist. Catering was only a hobby he undertook when he felt like it. The rest of the time, he either organized gastronomic trips to Burgundy from where he originally came twenty years ago, or arranged pilgrimages to Scotland to check on the quality of the Whiskey, as he maintained.

Philippe de Belfort always enjoyed this gastronomic fantasy. He missed it in London where he had been living for the past ten years. Thus, each time he came back to the region, he treated himself before going back, as on this day, to the delight of a meal at Marcel’s. He had made the chef’s acquaintance by chance during a visit to Scotland. They had become friends. Needless to say that lately Philippe de Belfort had another good reason to return to Henrichemont. After his divorce from Gwendolyn, his red headed Brit who held him responsible for all her miseries, he had tried to revive a childhood friendship, that of Diane de Briare who still lived in the area, in her chateau de Rosny, her family home since its construction, in the XVth century, by her ancestor Maximillien de Béthune, Baron of Rosny, Duke-peer of Sully. Diane de Briare, now the Baroness de Rosny, had also separated from her husband, the flamboyant Spaniard, a certain Julio. He was a penniless artist claiming to muster an enormous potential, but had no accomplishment to show for it. He had charmed her one day, while visiting her sister in Paris, and she developed a crush on him. Diane, being only twenty-two at the time, had agreed to marry him. But Henrichemont and the Berry region failed to live up to the expectations of the matador. He was bored, and ended up boring Diane. So, one morning, she made him pack, gave him a one-way ticket to Madrid, and bought his silence with, as the rumors have it, a substantial check. Marcel, whose patrons included most of the bank employees, had heard them talk about it at lunch in the restaurant. Apparently, it had been the transaction of the century, the largest sum of money with which their branch had ever dealt. Once Julio was out of the picture, Diane found herself alone with her old father, the Count de Briare. Her mother had passed away and her younger sister Isabelle who lived in Paris was the only close relative she had. Diane visited her every once in a while. It was Isabelle, in fact, who, remembering the attraction her sister and Philippe de Belfort, a great nephew of the Count, had for each other in their teen years, got in touch with Philippe. She encouraged him to rekindle the flame, now that the two birds were free, adults at last, and perhaps willing, she thought. Isabelle was convinced that the two were entitled to some happiness, and that they had enough in common for the relationship to work. She had been right. Philippe and Diane exchanged a reserved and proper correspondence at first, then, one day Philippe de Belfort dared inviting Diane to visit him, alleging the lame reason that she had never set foot in London. He did not wish to appear presumptuous, and could not take rejection. To his great surprise, Diane gracefully accepted his invitation.