Free This Night's Foul Work by Fred Vargas

Haroncourt.’
    There was no need to tell Danglard where the little village of Haroncourt was. With his compendious and encyclopedically organised memory, the
commandant
knew all the districts and municipalities in France, and could tell you at once who was the local police chief.
    â€˜Had a good evening, then?’
    â€˜Very.’
    â€˜Is she still just good friends?’ Danglard hazarded.
    â€˜Alas, yes. The
opus spicatum
, Danglard, that’s where we were.’
    â€˜Piscatum
. If you’re educating him, at least try to do it correctly.’
    â€˜That’s why I’m calling you. Robert thinks it was just some young nutter who did the deed. But Angelbert, who’s the elder statesman round here, isn’t so sure – he thinks a young nutter can turn into an old one.’
    â€˜And this high-level conference took place where?
    â€˜In the café, at aperitif time.’
    â€˜How many glasses of wine?’
    â€˜Three. What about you?’
    Danglard stiffened. The
commissaire
was keeping an eye on his drinking problem, and that rankled.
    â€˜I’m not asking you about
your
way of life,
commissaire.’
    â€˜Yes, you are, you asked if Camille was still just a good friend.’
    â€˜OK,’ said Danglard, giving in. ‘The
opus piscatum
is a way of mounting flat stones – or tiles or pebbles – obliquely so that it looks like a herringbone, hence its name, which comes from the Latin for fish. It goes back to the Romans.’
    â€˜Ah. And then what?’
    â€˜Then nothing. You asked me a question, I gave you the answer.’
    â€˜But what’s it
for
, Danglard?’
    â€˜Well,
commissaire
, what are
we
for? Why are we on this earth?’
    When Danglard was in a bad way, the Unsolved Question of the infinite cosmos returned to plague him, as well as the fact that the sun would explode in four billion years, and that humanity was but a miserable and desperate chance occurrence on a piece of matter whirling through space.
    â€˜Is there anything precise that’s depressing you?’ asked Adamberg, anxiously.
    â€˜I’m just depressed, that’s all.’
    â€˜The kids are asleep?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Go out, then, Danglard, go and find an Oswald or an Anglebert. There are plenty of them in Paris as well as here.’
    â€˜Not with names like that, there aren’t. And anyway, what could they tell me?’
    â€˜That cast-off antlers aren’t as highly prized as antlers from a hunted stag.’
    â€˜I know that already.’
    â€˜That it’s only members of the deer family that have a bone growing out of their forehead.’
    â€˜Know that, too.’
    â€˜That
Lieutenant
Retancourt is sure not to be asleep, and that it would be beneficial to go chat with her for an hour.’
    â€˜Yes, that’s probably correct,’ said Danglard after a silence.
    Adamsberg heard a little more optimism in his deputy’s voice, and hung up.
    â€˜See, Tom,’ he said, cradling the baby’s head in his hand, ‘they put a herringbone in a wall, and don’t ask me why. We don’t need to know that, because Danglard knows all about it. Let’s give up on this book – it’s boring.’
    As soon as Adamsberg put his hand round the child’s head the baby went off to sleep, as indeed did any other child. Or adult. Thomas’s eyes were closed within a few moments, and Adamsberg gently removed his hand, looking in mild puzzlement at his palm. Perhaps one day he would understand through which pores of his skin drowsiness seeped out. Not that it interested him overmuch.
    His mobile rang. It was the pathologist, very wide awake, calling from the morgue.
    â€˜Wait a minute, Ariane, I just have to put the baby down.’
    Whatever the purpose of her call, and it certainly would not be a social one, the fact that Ariane was thinking about him was a distraction in his present state