Coffee-man from the Sixth Brigade, part 1

The two escaped the chaos of the crime that was committed on Monso Rooster's grounds. Quite ironic that the most important person of the premise, the owner itself, went away to discuss other matter rather than cooperate with the police in search of valuable painting. And finally, Eugene would be able to find out the reason why the old man put this family in high regard, his connections to them and reasons of their ill mannerism.

They sat by the small table in the corner, the same one Eugene used as his art station during his first coffee brewing contest against Sylvia. Right now, a telephone was sitting on it, patiently waiting until the operator connected someone's voice to the line of the café. It did not ring too often, since Arnold was not fond of its pesky sound, usually café workers were the ones to call someone.

Arnold went off to quickly brew two cups of espresso using their espresso machine, leaving Eugene one on one with the phone, which reminded him of the situation at his place.

"Arnold, I need to call Chris. My apartment was also robbed today by Phantom Cormorant."

Arnold turned to him with a surprised expression, "And you are telling me this just now?"

"Yes, because a whole ass another robbery was committed here! I totally forgot about that one, I will tell the police later, but would like to inform Chris now."

The old man lowered his head to the floor while the espresso machine was pouring the hot drink into the cup. Arnold autonomously replaced the full cup with an empty one and said, "May I guess, your wires had been cut?"

Eugene raised his brow and said, "How did you know?"

"It actually explains a lot, prior to the… happening, Vera called me concerned. She said that your neighbour was concerned about weird sounds coming from your room while you were supposed to be at work. Vera tried to call you, but the operator could not connect you, thus she called me. She also tried to reach out to you in the morning, but you were at work. At that time everything was fine and the call went through."

"Vera? But why?"

"She tried to inform you about Christopher going on a business trip to the UK. It happened around half an hour after you left to visit the la Avise family."

"I never heard of that trip, but at least someone has it great these days." faintly smiled Eugene, to which Arnold replied while putting two cups of coffee on the table, "Was not he accused of murder and later kidnapped by fascists?"

"And he recovered just in a month! What a man he is!"

Eugene managed to giggle a little, which was followed by Arnold's sigh, not an irritated one, however, but with notes of relief. The two sat around for a few seconds in silence, took a sip out of their cups and looked at each other.

"So Arnold." broke the silence Eugene, "What connects you to the la Avise family?"

Arnold slowly nodded, took another sip of coffee and explained everything that happened between him and the la Avise family.

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Années folles, the time of peace, stability, economic growth and revolution of entertainment. The United States was not the only country that experienced the roaring twenties to its fullest. France, Britain and even Germany, which was devastated by the loss in the Great War, were finally recovering from all the misery of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, their economy stabilized and society was struck with individualism. Despite many societal and political problems that still remained in Europe, the cultural boom painted the world of many into the colours of warmth and hope.

One of the people, who was able to reach great heights during that time, was the founder of "Monso Rooster. This café was founded in the early 20s by an already middle-aged veteran of the Great War, Arnold. He was lucky enough to escape grave injury, poverty and even delirium that haunted participants of the trench warfare. The whereabouts of the café were not random either. Before the start of the war, it belonged to his uncle who, unfortunately, lost his life during the Battle of the Somme. Since Arnold remained his only living relative, the heritage of the building as well as his life savings were given to the nephew. To this day, Arnold occasionally wore his uncle's trench coat, especially during wet seasons like autumn or spring. He did so to honour the life of the man that died for his country, as well as made his dreams come true. But since Arnold was not a talkative one, many would guess this trench coat to be his own, in the end, Arnold also fought in the war, alongside Eugene's father, Friedrich Dagaz.

Arnold never knew Friedrich before the war, they first met during military training. Even though his uncle had prior connections in the army, Arnold was not given any special privileges, thus this faithful meeting was well possible. During the training, they were comrades in arm, but on the battlefield, the two became close friends. Friedrich even saved his life when an artillery shell hit their shelter, if not for his quick reflexes that demanded to push Arnold away, the flying debris would have cut Arnold's right foot clean off. He was able to escape with a light wound, which still caused him to limp if he needed to move in a hurry.

At the time of war, Arnold learnt of Friedrich's wife and son, he was eager to introduce them to his friend. Alas, no invitation to Friedrich's house ever came to Arnold after the war. At first, the man was afraid that his friend succumbed to the Spanish flue, that ravaged the country, but after seeing one peculiar article in the newspaper, he got upset. There, a young boy whose name was Christopher Dagaz had won a maths Olympiad. As a medal of honour, the picture consisting of the whole family was printed in the newspaper, thus he witnessed his friend with wife and children happily posing for such an occasion. Friedrich had forgotten him, so Arnold did the same.

Arnold knew of the niche he wanted to dip his toe into. From early ages he was a huge fan of coffee, his dream was to serve the best coffee in the world, but he did not have any means to try out his skills in practice. At least such was the case before the death of his uncle, afterwards, he finally had a place and money to bring his dreams to life. It was a hard road that ate a lot of finance and time, fortunately, he was already experienced as a "Coffee-Man from the Sixth Brigade" back in the military. He was skilful for your average Joe, but there was still a long road to be considered a coffee sommelier. In truth, "Coffee-Man from the Sixth Brigade" was the original name of the café, but after Monsieur Garland, sommelier of Paris, burst out laughing from this name, Arnold decided to change it to "Monso Rooster".

Only in a few years, Arnold was able to carve his way into the top of the coffee places of Hauts-de-France. And as the country was slowly emerging from the financial crisis, more and more clients visited "Monso Rooster" to have a taste of his coffee. After hardships of war, Arnold was rewarded with fruits of success, he truly reached his peak and was going only upwards! But one day, a letter was sent to him that brought shock to his face and made him close the café midday for a whole week. Besides the address of Paris residence, there was but one sentence written on it, "Friedrich is dead, please, visit us."

The ones to meet Arnold were a heartbroken woman and two young children, pale at face. The woman, whose name was Margaret, had silently given another letter to their guest. The envelope was yellowish, but other than that in perfect condition. The hands that wrote the letter were definitely shaking at the time, making it difficult to differentiate letters. With a little time, however, Arnold got used to the text and read following:

"Greetings, my friend. It has been a while since we last met, right? I hope you are doing well. Perhaps, you already opened your café, the coffee-man of the sixth brigade would surely accept such responsibility! Anyway, you must be wondering, where have I been all this time? Why have I never invited you over? For that, Monsieur Arnold, I am deeply sorry. Sorry for not writing to you, sorry for ignoring you. I am really sorry, but it is needed. I know of your heritage and of your kind heart. You are a great man! But that's the reason why I promised to myself to never meet with you again. I am pathetic, I am a monster, I am alien to this world, even to my own family. I do not know how to live, I wake up from the quietest noise at night, I get angry over the most trivial stuff, I do awful things to Margaret and Christopher! I had another son, Eugene, but I am afraid of taking him into my arms, he is so small and fragile. I am scared of what I might do to him. I can't think, I can't love, I can't do anything. I caused pain to many of my friends, even if they forgive me, I keep fucking up over and over again. I am no longer human, Arnold, and that's why I can't meet with you. I really treasure the time we shared during our service, I remember how we laughed, cried and screamed together. I do not want these memories to be tainted and thus, at any circumstances, we are not allowed to meet one another. I am sorry Arnold, but that's how it is, your life is one thing I do not want to ruin the most. And if you are reading this after I died, I succeeded. I will pray every day for your success, Arnold, and again, sorry for letting you down, but that would be better for both of us. Sorry and goodbye, coffee-man of the sixth brigade, you will always be my best friend."

Arnold's eyes followed the words of the letter and as he was getting closer to the end, the more tears formed in the corner of his eyes. By the end, he could only sob and hide the pained expression from Friedrich's family. Only after he forced his eyes to stay dried, Arnold was able to once again look at those who were left behind. He smiled through bitterness in his throat and said, "My name is Arnold Clockwork, I am friend of your papa. I guess, you are Christopher and Eugene?"

The two boys nodded slowly, still on guard with their guest. Then, Arnold's eyes were directed at the woman who sat on the chair with her gaze elsewhere from this world. He came closer to her, then sat beside her and said, "I am really sorry, for your loss, Margaret. Friedrich was a great man."

She kept quiet for a while, but then said, "He told us about you, Arnold. I am sorry, that you had to learn about him… this way."

"That's totally fine, Margaret. How about a trip to my café? "Monso Rooster", perhaps, you heard of it. We will carry out Friedrich's spirit by a cup of coffee, he was really fond of it, after all. Kids will have cacao, though."

The older child smiled, however, the younger one was not aware of such a drink, but seeing his brother's enthusiasm his face was shortly brightened up with a grin as well. The mother spent some time in thought, but afterwards agreed to his invitation. Such was Arnold's first meeting with his best friend's family.