Cover Blurb

Dr. Lucien Muersac has spent decades enduring the sharp tongues of his so-called friends—Marielle, a ruthless artist; Valery, a fraud of a writer; and Gaston, a sculptor who barely acknowledges Lucien’s existence. Every month, their dinner table becomes a battleground of veiled insults and bruised egos. But Lucien has had enough.

This time, he’s serving more than just fine cuisine. Armed with knowledge, resentment, and the perfect plan, he prepares a meal his tormentors will never forget.

Yet as the day unfolds, unexpected alliances emerge, and Lucien begins to question whether revenge is truly the dish he wants to serve.

Set in the heart of Paris, and the beautiful countryside of Finisterre, L’Esprit d’Escalier is a sharp, darkly comic tale of power, regret, and the price of waiting too long for the perfect comeback.

Synopsis

Dr. Lucien Muersac, an ageing Parisian physician, leads a life of quiet frustration. He is bound to a toxic group of old university friends who meet monthly for dinner—an evening filled with veiled insults and long-standing resentments. His unrequited love for Marielle, a wealthy and ruthless artist, is one side of a love rectangle and only deepens his suffering; while Valery, a fraudulent writer, and Gaston, a sculptor who barely acknowledges Lucien’s presence, add to his misery. The dinners have become a monthly ritual of humiliation, but Lucien has finally had enough.

Fueled by years of pent-up rage, Lucien begins to plot his revenge. His research into poisonous mushrooms leads him to concoct the perfect crime—serving his so-called friends a deadly meal while ensuring his own survival through a carefully planned detoxification process. He methodically gathers the necessary ingredients, secures an alibi, and prepares for the ultimate reckoning.

However, life in Paris is not just about his tormentors. Although Lucien finds solace in his role as a doctor, he also experiences challenges with his patients’ varying ailments. His interactions with patients like Anna, a struggling single mother, Abdoulaye, a charismatic university professor with a complicated personal life, Raimund, an octogenarian former resistance fighter, and Cahssio, a Malian widow, add further to his woes. As the fateful dinner approaches, events both in the surgery and on his journey, become the last straw. Lucien comes up with his deadly plan. He decides to travel to Brittany to trial the lethal fungus.

His time in Brittany, surrounded by genuine friendship and warmth, begins to erode his thirst for revenge. Most significantly, he develops a bond with Patrice, a young woman from the Ivory Coast, with a tragic past. Her kindness and faith force Lucien to question whether vengeance is truly the answer. At the last moment, he chooses not to go through with the plan.

Instead of death, Lucien chooses life. He abandons Paris and his poisonous relationships, embracing a new beginning in Brittany, where love and peace replace the bitterness that once consumed him. On his final dinner date, he exorcises the Spirit of the Stairs, and leaves his erstwhile friends to destroy each other. The novel ends not with a dramatic act of revenge, but with Lucien reclaiming his own fate—finally walking away from the past that had held him captive for so long.

L’Esprit d’Escalier is a powerful exploration of regret, justice, and redemption, showing that sometimes, revenge is a meal best not served at all.

Prologue

Have you ever been in the position of receiving a barbed remark for which you have no retort? Then, a period later, the perfect response drops into your brain, albeit too late to blunt the original assertion? You will, at least, be thankful that French philosopher Denis Diderot coined a term to describe your predicament. L’esprit de l’escalier or Spirit of the Stairs is used in English to describe the quandary of coming up with the perfect reply too late. Diderot was the subject of such a remark, which robbed him of his tongue at the appropriate time.

He recorded the fact in his dramatic essay, Paradoxe sur le comédien (Paradox of an Actor), explaining, “A sensitive man, such as myself, overwhelmed by the argument levelled against him, becomes confused and doesn’t come to himself again until at the bottom of the stairs.”

The bottom of the stairs refers to the architecture of the typical Parisien home in which Diderort found himself the subject of the rebuke. The exact location in which our hero is in receipt of many such put-downs. A beleaguered Parisian General Practitioner suffers at the hands of his long-term so-called friends. Can he come up with the ultimate counter to their constant baiting?

Chapter One: Good Morning, Dr Lucien

Château Rouge, an area in the centre of the eighteenth arrondissement of Paris, is also known as Little Africa. Lying to the northeast of the egg shape, formed by the Boulevard Peripherique, it is one of the poorest yet most vibrant parts of the city. Every day, a black tide of humanity ebbs and flows, like that of the Mediterranean which brought them here. Their objectives vary from specialist food shops to cheap bars and cafés, from establishments selling unique religious items to those dealing in obscure CDs and DVDs from Port-au-Prince. For example, far from selling poultry-related goods, the Rue Poulet, Chicken Street is almost exclusively dedicated to shops trading in Afro wigs.

In a tiny apartment on the eastern slope of the mount, under the shadow of the Basilica of Sacré Coeur de Montmartre, resides Dr Lucien Muersac. Lucien has lived and practised here since graduating from medical school almost forty years earlier. In four decades, he has seen massive changes in his locale. His neighbours and patients originate from such exotic places as Agadez, Timbuktu, and Dakar. Their demands and ailments vary significantly from those of septuagenarian and octogenarian Parisians on other social scale.

His apartment block is a microcosm of the district, home to a cross-section of its population. Although a haven to Lucien’s love of all things cultural, his abode does not reflect the deterioration of the surrounding buildings. Once one exits his front door, one leaves the Paris of pre-sixty-eight protests and enters twenty-first-century decay and pre-Olympic regeneration.

Lucien has toiled a lifetime, but retirement is still years away, thanks to Macron’s intended unilateral increase in the retirement age. In any case, who would replace him? His fellow practitioners only stay a year or two and are either attracted by the richer rewards of better-off areas or frightened away by the sheer poverty of their work surroundings. This is his story.

Chapter Two: Daily Bread

The ancient alarm clock hummed on the bedside table. It had long lost its ring like a thrush with its tongue cut out. Lucien’s arm stretched out from beneath the covers and blindly felt for the source of vibration, stilling it with a click of the button. The mute timepiece brought wakefulness, and wakefulness brought pain. The pain of thirty-eight years of dedication to the wellbeing of humanity. His thumbs ached, his knees ground, bone on bone, and his hips groaned like an unoiled gate. Physician, heal thyself, the motto of his life.

He swung his aching limbs to the edge of the old brass bed, locating his slippers in the dark. As he slid his feet into the threadbare house shoes, he closed his eyes tightly and reached for the bedside lamp. He waited a few seconds and then opened them, thus avoiding the initial glare of the bulb. This was his favourite moment of the day as he took in the familiar surroundings of his bedroom.

This sanctum of Lucien’s other life lay before him—a refuge of French culture within four walls. Nobody could invade his private sanctuary, his one indulgence. The furniture, from the elegant bookcase to the massive wardrobe, was all from an era when France was an Imperial superpower—a post-aristocratic Republic led by a determined Corsican.

History faded for another day as Lucien considered the challenge ahead. The moment was gone, and he concentrated on getting ready. Bread came before anything else, even clothing, as he took his overcoat from the back of the door, his keys, and a handful of change from the dresser.

He exited the apartment into another world—a world of peeling varnish and chipped marble. The once elegant stairway gazed in the mirror like a fading actress. Lucien inspected each front door on his descent. Every number represented a file in his empathetic brain. A story he had listened to over and over again, told by their tenants, expanding the limited physical dimensions of this anonymous apartment block across the world and the human psyche.

The sweet, yeasty aroma of fresh baguette caressed his nostrils, and his stomach cramped with hunger. Lucien descended several flights of stairs and stepped out into the dark, empty street.

The yellow lights of Boulangerie Deschamps cut through the gloom and bathed the pavement next door, the only sign of life at this time. Soon, this area would be teeming with humanity from around the globe.

***

Pierre Deschamps is a fourth-generation baker of the eighteenth arrondissement. His bread and patisseries are the best in all of Paris. Unfortunately, his superior products come with a serving of right-wing politics. The baker resents the social changes that have swamped his once-great country. Blaming them on the influx of people from the former colonies. He is rumoured to be an active member of the newly formed National Rally.

***

The doctor entered the shop and was immediately blinded by the lighting and the delicious offerings on display. The wooden racks to the rear were stacked with loaves of various sizes, shapes and hues of gold. Enclosed in the glass counters to the front were arranged multi-coloured cakes and pastries like a collection of priceless artefacts in a museum. Sandwiched between both, wearing a light dusting of flour and a white apron, stood Pierre, arms folded.

“Good morning, Pierre. How does today find you?” Lucien’s mood was buoyed by the impending abatement of his hunger.

“Oh yes, it’s morning, isn’t it? I’ve been here since last night. How does it find me? Perplexed, that’s what,” snapped the baker, unfolding his hands and leaning on the glass counter. A fine mist of flour took flight around him, caught in the lights of the shop. Lucien steeled himself for the daily onslaught of nostalgia served with a helping of racism, sexism and every other ‘ism.’

“I’m sorry to hear that Pierre. Why don’t you employ an assistant?” The doctor knew he was spitting into the wind with his reply, which was returned with interest.

“Tell me, doctor, where would you expect me to find a Frenchman willing to do what I do daily? All of the decent folks have gone. It’s a different world out there,” Pierre sneered, lifting his head and pointing his five-clock-shaded chin to the door behind Lucien. The doctor switched off as Pierre continued his rant while wrapping a napkin around one of the baguettes from behind him.

That’s not true, and you know it. Frenchman? That’s where the problem lies, you fascist!

But the words didn’t leave the doctor’s lips. Instead, he took the loaf and left a handful of change on the wooden block, which paradoxically spelt Bienvenue à Boulangerie Deschamps! He turned away, trying not to listen to Pierre’s swansong.

“You know I’ll have to throw half of this away? Thanks to that spicy foreign muck your patients live on,” Pierre called after the doctor. As Lucien stepped out into the street, he heard the last volley from the baker, addressed to an empty shop.” What even is a samosa anyway?” Lucien allowed himself an inward smile, and his mouth watered as he thought of that very object.

Chapter Three: The Phone Call

Lucien trudged back up to his apartment, clutching the hot baton by the napkin wrapped around its slim waist, anticipating breakfast. He pinched the golden crust at the end of the loaf and popped the morsel in his mouth. The contrast of the crispy outer shell and soft, doughy centre was another of life’s few pleasures.

He placed the bread on the cutting board and filled the kettle; then rubbed his hands together vigorously to create some temporary heat. More permanently, he padded into the lounge to light the small gas fire nestled in the enormous mahogany surround. The open fire had been consigned to history during the last renovation. Fuel was heavy and expensive now for the elderly medic, so he couldn’t complain much.

***

The room is a temple to the First Emperor, and the furniture reflects it. Every item has been carefully collected from chiffoniers and sales throughout the years and around the provinces of France. Pride of place goes to the Empire mahogany bookcase, with four half-glass doors. Each shelf is lovingly stacked with leather-bound volumes displaying their content and creator by means of gold and silver leaf. The names of Voltaire and Zola rub shoulders with Camus and Sartre.

***

Some days, Lucien wished he could stay in his apartment and digest his literary collection while gazing at the enormous painting of Bonaparte astride Marengo, the small grey Arab the Emperor had brought from Egypt. A print of the second of five canvases Lucien’s hero had commissioned, depicted Napoleon crossing the Alps at the St Bernard Pass. The doctor shook himself out of the daydream and returned to the kitchen to prepare breakfast. Lucien’s problems started when the phone rang. Six-fifteen a.m. could mean only one caller; Marielle.

“Lucie! You’re awake. Do you ever sleep?” The pet name, the statement of the obvious and the judgemental question confirmed his worst fears.

“Marielle. Good morning. I hope you are well.” Lucien refused to acknowledge her attempt to goad him into anything other than a formal response.

“Is it? Well, I’m glad you think so. No, I am not well. You know how stressed I get before our dinner dates. Valery and Gaston are so exacting.” The woman paused, waiting for a response. None was forthcoming. He had a long day ahead at the surgery before having the pleasure of meeting her face to face in twelve hours. “Are you there, Lucie?” Her tone had changed from light mockery to mild annoyance.

“Yes, Marielle.” Lucien closed his eyes and waited for her irritation to ramp up.

“Well. Say something, man!” As predicted, it did exactly that.

“With respect, you called me. What can I do for you?” The next level would be fireworks, he thought. He’d pay for that later.

“Oh, yes. Right. Do you have everything for this evening? I’m sending Pascal out to the delicatessen. In case you can’t find the ingredients in that sink of a neighbourhood.” Marielle’s voice had risen an octave, and he could sense the spite in her tone.

“It’s all in hand. The shops here stock everything I need.” He was determined not to let her win. She would have that opportunity later with the help of her two allies.

“Fair enough. See you later, prompt, six for seven. Try and take a taxi if you can. I can’t stand the stench of the Metro on you.” Touche. She’d come up with a late winner in injury time before he could respond. “Goodbye, Lucie.”

Lucien gripped the receiver until his knuckles were white. Then, slowly, he counted to ten and replaced it in the cradle, like an errant child he’d decided not to slap. His heart raced, and his palms were damp with sweat. For the umpteenth time, the love of his life had succeeded in raining on his parade. He questioned the reason for his unrequited devotion to this witch of a woman. However, he only had to close his eyes and put a face to the voice, and his quandary was resolved.

From the day he’d first laid eyes on her, forty-five years earlier, Lucien had worshipped Marielle. They had enrolled at the Sorbonne in the autumn of nineteen seventy-nine, along with the two other members of their monthly soiree. Subsequently, while Lucien was tending to the sick and infirm of the eighteenth, the others had forged successful creative careers, bestowing on them great fame and wealth.

Lucien contemplated the evening ahead and his friends’ achievements. Marielle Mordelet was a celebrated painter. Gaston Grolet, the group’s baby by two years, plied his trade in clay and stone to great acclaim. Finally, Valery Doumer had written and sold millions of novels in many languages.

Chapter Four: No Breakfast