Part 5 (1/2)

Dimly, I heard the murmur of conversation picking up inside the hut, the clink of gla.s.ses, a toast of some sort. For one moment, envy possessed me. I had eaten nothing since leaving Lotingen, and the wine was burning a hole in my stomach. The hot fumes rushed to my head.

'Are we going far, Colonel les Halles?'

'Not far,' he growled, holding up his lantern.

The light glowed like sulphur. It hurt my eyes as I trailed behind him.

The night was warm, the damp air seemed to cling to my skin. A light breeze ruffled the hair on my neck, and I s.h.i.+vered. I was, I realised, a trifle inebriated. And yet, I thought (one of those blatant idiocies for which drunkards are renowned), a spinning head and a sheen of sweat on my brow were better than the gut-wrenching stink of excrement on the streets of Lotingen.

My thoughts flew home to Helena.

Her battle with the flies, her efforts to keep them away from the children and out of their food. If I could just conclude this case, I thought, I might be able to make capital of my success, and force General Malaport to take steps to resolve the situation.

I felt a sardonic smile form on my lips.

Was this what it meant to be a Prussian magistrate? If I were able to solve the problems of the French, would it result in a thinner layer of merde on the streets of my home town, and fractionally less fetid air for my children to breathe?

The colonel stopped in front of the last hut, and held the lamp up.

'Tell no one of what you are about to see.' He stared at me for longer than was necessary. 'Is that quite clear, monsieur? The details, I mean. You must act with circ.u.mspection.' Still, he held my gaze. 'Are you ready?' he asked, as if he were inviting me to leap into deep water from a great height.

'I am here for no other reason,' I said.

As he unlocked the door and ushered me into the room, my nerves were taut.

I was not prepared for the fetid smell, and had to swallow hard. A tangy stench of organic decomposition seemed to have worked its way into the wood from which the hut was built. You might consume it with fire, but you would never wash it away. An animal might have been rotting under the floorboards.

And what was that object laid out on the table?

In the gloom, it looked nothing like the body of the woman that I was expecting to find.

Indeed, it looked more like a very large badger.

Les Halles held up his light.

'Blast their eyes!' he cursed. 'Somebody has been here.'

I did not hear the rest. My eyes were drawn to the object on the table in the centre of the room. It was draped with a cloak of animal pelts. Some were brown, others black and every shade of grey. Was this furry winding-sheet made of rat-skins? Only the head and the face remained exposed.

I corrected myself.

What remained of a face . . .

The conversation I had interrupted in Lotingen that morning came to my mind.

'. . . Pure evil! Why would anyone . . . ?'

Les Halles set his lantern down on the edge of the table.

The light revealed a forehead that was blue, the skin pulped and split. A thick crust of blood had congealed in a black sheet across the woman's left temple. Her left ear was a solid lump of blood, which had dripped down onto her slender neck. The nose was turned up at an angle that was obviously unnatural. But below the nose, all was a mystery. There was a gaping hole where the lower half of the face ought to have been.

'You won't see much if you stand dithering there,' les Halles called sharply. 'Come closer, man. You'll need more light. There ought to be some candles.'

While he rummaged on the shelves which ran the length of the far wall, I stood beside the table, alone with the body. He wished to illuminate it, render it more terrible, more indelible in my mind. He fumbled in the gloom, while I prayed that he would not find what he was looking for. There was too much light for me as it was. I cringed at the task which lay before me. No sight is worse than a lifeless corpse, except the spectacle of a woman who has been hideously mutilated.

'What do you make of it?' he called over, roughly opening drawers, slamming them closed again.

'That wound is terrible,' I managed to say.

He returned with a fistful of candles, muttering beneath his breath, lighting them from the lantern-flame, setting each candle firmly upright in a pool of its own wax along the table edge. Like the high altar in a church. The orange light swelled, casting dancing shadows on the brutalised face. The sunken cheeks seemed to quiver with animated life.

'What's this?' les Halles exploded, as he set a candle down beside her head.

I looked where he was pointing.

A trail of stones had been laid out on the table like a halo.

He s.n.a.t.c.hed one up, held it to his eye, then threw it to the farthest corner of the room. 'I gave strict orders that no one be allowed in here,' he hissed. 'They are devils. They come and go as they please. G.o.d knows how, but they do it. There's no stopping them . . .'

'Of whom do you speak?' I asked.

I was unable to look away from that devastated face.

'The Prussian girls. They must have wormed their way in here, covered the body with that vile thing, then laid these baubles out on the table. Thieves, the whole blasted pack of them!'

'I'm sorry?' I said.

Faced with a corpse, he seemed more interested in bits of stone.

'This is amber,' he replied, as if he were spitting out nails. 'Unpolished amber! These women are barbarians, monsieur. They'll steal it and sell it, yet they believe in every legend that is spoken about it. This, I suppose, is some sort of pagan funeral rite. Somebody's going to pay for this . . .'

I raised my eyes and stared at him.

'Would you punish this woman's friends because they care?' I asked.

'I don't give a d.a.m.n about her friends!' he exclaimed. 'There are more important issues. One of my men has been seduced. How could they get in here without help? That soldier has disobeyed me. Do you see now, Herr Magistrate? Do you understand the gravity of it? They wrap my men around their little fingers. If those girls know what happened to her, everyone in Nordcopp will know.'

I looked down at the damaged face.

Which religion prescribed the strange manner in which that corpse had been laid out?

'A ritual, you say? What kind of ritual?'

Colonel les Halles shook his head. 'This cloak is supposed to save her from the Baltic cold when she's laid in the ground. The amber will buy a seat near the fire in their Valhalla.' He blew his lips together noisily. 'You Prussians are master storytellers. This coast has more tall tales to its name than a children's nursery.'

He spoke of barbarity as if he were an apostle of civilisation. Why would he not allow the women to mourn for their comrade who was dead?

'What was her name?' I asked, unable to tear my eyes away.

I heard him rustling in his pocket, the sound of a paper being unfolded.