Silver-Tongued

Carole Fournier’s legal assistant – the same one Franck had seen the day before in the Palais de Justice – nodded. He did not know her name. Fournier had not used it when ordering her to help him, and she had not volunteered it in the course of the twenty minutes they had spent together in an archive room, unlocking a series of reinforced steel cabinets and sifting through folders. Their work done, she had escorted him back to her boss’ imposing office, where Fournier stood with her back to a series of tall windows overlooking avenue Kléber.