Mayhem

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At a place where the road pitched down through the gorges, the land sloped steadily upwards to the barren branches of the trees.

The fog was everywhere, hugging the road, putting frost on the tall, sear grasses, riming the stones and the spokes of the bicycle. Drenching the body.

Jean-Louis St-Cyr slid his hands into the pockets of his overcoat and waited. At dawn, Fontainebleau Forest gave itself entirely over to the birds, those that had not had the great good fortune to have migrated.

It was eerie and it was silent. It was cold, damp and a lot of other things. Kohler’s breath steamed impatiently and once in each breath, the Bavarian’s nasal passages would pinch and whistle with barely controlled fury.

A giant of a man with the heart and mind of a small-time hustler, the Gestapo agent stood knee-deep in bracken, looking down at the body. Was he thinking of the Russian Front, of his sons, of death, or merely of his shoes that might, quite possibly, be leaking? Sometimes one never really knew with Hermann – oh for sure, one could guess, but Hermann … He’d been a Munich detective before his transfer to Berlin, before his ascendancy to Paris. A good one too. Probably.

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