Free The Ghost Riders of Ordebec (Commissaire Adamsberg) by Fred Vargas

besotted with the bitch on that farm, just over there. If I don’t bring him over to cover her now and again, he’s impossible. Renoux, the farmer, is furious, he says he doesn’t want his yard full of little mongrels. But what can you do? Nothing. And I’ve had a summer cold, and haven’t been able to bring him out for ten days.’
    ‘Aren’t you afraid, all alone on this path?’
    ‘What of?’
    ‘The Furious Army?’ Adamsberg suggested tentatively.
    ‘Oh don’t worry,’ said the old woman with a shake of her head. ‘In the first place it isn’t dark, and in any case, I don’t see them. It isn’t given to everyone.’
    Adamsberg could see a huge blackberry above the old woman’s head but he didn’t dare disturb her to reach it. It was strange, he reflected, how instinctively the urge to pick berries returns to humans the minute they go into a forest. That would have pleased his friend, the prehistoric scholar Mathias. Because when you think about it, it’s the act of gathering that’s bewitching. Blackberries in themselves aren’t all that marvellous a fruit.
    ‘My name’s Léone,’ said the woman, wiping another drop from her large nose. ‘Usually known as Léo.’
    ‘Jean-Baptiste Adamsberg, commissaire from the Serious Crime Squad in Paris. Glad to have met you,’ he added politely. ‘And now I’ll be on my way.’
    ‘If it’s Herbier you’re after, you won’t find him along there. He’s lying in a pool of dried blood, up by St Antony’s Chapel.’
    ‘Dead?’
    ‘Yes, and he’s been dead for some time. Not that anyone will grieve for him, but it’s not a pretty sight. Whoever did it didn’t mess about, you can’t even see his face.’
    ‘Was it the gendarmes who found him?’
    ‘No, young man, it was me. I often take flowers to the chapel, I don’t like to leave St Antony all alone. St Antony protects animals. Do you have an animal?’
    ‘I’ve got a sick pigeon.’
    ‘There you are then. When you go to the chapel, you need to make a request. He helps people find things that are lost as well. As I get older, I lose lots of things.’
    ‘You weren’t upset? By finding a corpse up there?’
    ‘It’s not the same if you’re expecting it. I knew he’d been killed.’
    ‘Because of the Ghost Riders?’
    ‘Because of my age, young man. Hereabouts, a bird can’t lay an egg without my knowing about it or feeling it in my bones. So for instance, last night you can be sure a fox took a chicken from Deveneux’s farm. He only has three legs and no tail.’
    ‘The farmer?’
    ‘The fox. I’ve seen his droppings. But believe me, he’s quicker than you’d think. Last year this coal tit took a fancy to him. First time I’ve ever seen anything like it. It would perch on his back and he never snapped at it. Just that one, no other bird, mark you. The world’s full of details, have you noticed? And since no detail is ever repeated in exactly the same shape and always sets off other details, there’s no end to it. If Herbier’d still been alive, he’d have finished up killing that fox, and while he was at it, the coal tit as well. That would have led to a lot of trouble during the local elections. But I don’t know whether the coal tit has come back this year. Out of luck.’
    ‘And have the gendarmes come? You’ve told them?’
    ‘Now, how could I do that? I had to wait for my dog. So if you’re in a hurry, you can just call them yourself.’
    ‘I’m not sure that’s a good idea,’ said Adamsberg after a moment. ‘The gendarmes don’t like Paris cops coming and sticking their noses in.’
    ‘So why are you here then?’
    ‘Because a woman from Ordebec came to see me. So I thought I’d take a look.’
    ‘Mother Vendermot? She’s frightened for her brood. And she’d certainly have done better to keep her mouth shut. But this business has upset her so much she couldn’t resist going for help.’
    A large beige dog with long floppy ears emerged suddenly from