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right, there had been a cold snap. It had been freezing. He’d forgotten that for a moment. He looked at the second screen once more. It was 21.2. Good.
    Numbers. Numbers everywhere. Red, most of them. Red numbers and graph traces. The machine next to him looked like a jetliner’s control panel. Someone had explained to him what it all meant but he couldn’t grasp it at the time. Too soon after the op. Numbers would cease to matter soon, anyway.
    A blur of green. A rustle of cloth.
    ‘Hello, darling. How are you today?’
    It was the blond girl. All beams and bellows. He blinked once.
    ‘That’s great! Soon have you up and running about, won’t we? Won’t we?’
    He blinked once.
    ‘That’s the way.’
    The fat one was with her. She smiled at him. A gentle hand on his forehead. And then on his endotracheal tube. The smell of soap under his nose.
    ‘The flange is making his mouth sore, look. Couldn’t we loosen it a little?’
    ‘Needs to be secure. Besides…’ The blond one dropped her voice. ‘…I don’t think he’ll feel it.’
    She was right. He wouldn’t.
    ‘I’ll just swab on a little barrier cream, then. And put some gauze under it. Just where it’s rubbing.’
    Bless you. Bless you for wanting to do something just in case it helps.
    The blond one shrugged.
    ‘Alright, then.’
    ‘Won’t be a sec.’
    For the moment, the only sounds in the room were electromechanical: the peculiar hollow
thuck
of the ventilator; the beeping of the heart monitor. Then the blond one unsheathed a chart from its scabbard at the foot of the bed. Glances jetted at the equipment. Pen strokes on the page. Brisk. Efficient.
    ‘Now we’ve got something for you,’ she said, ramping up the volume as she put away the chart. ‘You know what the Tour is, don’t you? The Tour de France? Cycling?’ She mimed riding a bike.
    He blinked once.
    ‘Starts tomorrow, doesn’t it? Did you know that? Well, it does. And you, young man, are going to be able to watch it. That’s right! You’re going to have your own TV in here. And it’s going to be set up at just the right angle to make it easy for you. You won’t miss a moment. Now you’d like that, wouldn’t you?’
    At last, the blond one had said what he wanted to hear. At last, there would be something absorbing to focus on. Something full of movement and colour. Something he loved. Something, indeed, he was depending upon. Using all the strength he could muster, he blinked repeatedly.
    ‘You don’t want it? Oh well, never mind. It will be more peaceful in here without it, won’t it?’
    No, no, no…
    The fat one returned. He smelled her fingers under his nose as she eased the pressure on the holder plate. It gave him a chance to correct his mistake. He tried to move his lips but there was no movement in them. With the tube pushing between his vocal chords well down into his trachea, it would have been impossible to speak anyway.
    The smell of salve. A smile from the fat one.
    ‘He didn’t even want the TV,’ the blond one said to her. ‘After all that rigmarole.’

2.58 PM
    Darac was already stripping off his overalls as he emerged from the crime-scene tent. Pulling at the hem of his polo shirt, he fanned a little air around his torso as he rang his home station, the Caserne Auvare.
    ‘Agnès – good, I caught you.’
    ‘How’s the riot?’
    Darac gave her an account of the story so far.
    ‘And thanks for your help with Frènes earlier. How the hell am I going to cope after you’ve gone?’
    ‘Providing you become a completely different person, you’ll have nothing to worry about.’
    Darac laughed but he knew she had a point.
    ‘We’re all still hoping you’ll change your mind and stay on, you know.’
    ‘All?’
    Darac glanced into the prayer room’s white-painted vestibule. At the far end, a door opened.
    ‘
All
. Better go, boss, Bonbon’s here.’
    He ended the call as Bonbon joined him on the pavement.
    ‘Learn anything?’
    ‘Nothing