“It’s okay. It’s okay,” he said. “I was shaking too. Just a little bit. Just before—just before I did it, you know. Don’t be ashamed, Gini—it’s all right.”

“I can’t drive…” She backed away from him, then held out her hands. “Look. I can’t drive with my hands like this…”

He hit her across the face hard and without warning. Gini staggered and half fell. When she looked back at him, she saw the look Chantal had described. White skin, glittering eyes, something horrible, something that deeply repelled her, about his mouth.

“You fucking drive. You fucking drive and you fucking drive now.” He caught hold of the lapels of her coat and slammed her back against the car door. He was about to add the threat, the otherwise, and then did not. He had seen her fear, smelled her acquiescence. That made Gini ashamed, and shame made her angry. She did what he told her to do, as slowly as possible, and it seemed to her that he was deaf, unaware of danger. She could hear the swoop of sirens in the distance now; he, it seemed, could not.

He sat upright in the seat next to her, holding the gun pointed toward her stomach as they approached the mews gates. Gini took as long as she dared to turn out; she kept praying for police cars, for running feet He directed her then through a maze of little alleyways and back routes, and she kept praying they would come to some barricade, but they did not. The noise of the sirens was very loud, then more distant. He still seemed unaware of them. She felt he was watching something, some private horror film of his own, yet he remained alert, directing her first left, then straight, then right.

Once, when she thought he was not looking, when his eyes seemed fixed but sightless, she risked switching on the lights to full beam in an effort to attract attention. He noticed at once.

“Don’t do that,” he said. “Just don’t fucking fool around. Switch them off. I’m going to give you—the story of your life. You want that, don’t you? Make a right.”

Gini realized where they were going then. He was taking her by a more direct route than he had used earlier that day, but he was taking her back to Mathilde’s street, Mathilde’s apartment. Her mind was working better now; fear and anger were giving time an extraordinary clarity and precision. With precision, she saw that if she went up to that apartment with him, he would—sooner or later—kill her. That course of action had to be prevented, but she could see no way to avoid it. If she refused, he’d shoot her in the car, or in the street, or in the lobby, or in the lift.

“Star,” she said eventually, reducing her speed slightly, “did you hear the sirens back there?”

“No. Why?”

“Well—I’m just thinking. Are we going back to Mathilde’s?”

“Yes.”

“Do you think that’s such a good idea? We’re sure to have been seen. They could be following us right now—and if we stay in that apartment too long… You could get trapped, Star. You know what happens. They surround the building, cut you off, so there’s no possible escape.”