14

Edie was standing where I had left her, the Taser 3 still in her hand. There was no sign of the men from the camp.

I felt as though I had been holding my breath since the moment I had left her. I exhaled as she turned to look at me.

‘What happened to your face?’ she said.

‘I was born this way. What’s your excuse?’

Her cool fingers traced the mark the CRS man had left on my face.

‘Did we get Mr Click-Click?’ she said.

‘He’s gone,’ I said. ‘He was on the hard shoulder and a lorry hit him. The lorry was driving on the hard shoulder. It didn’t stop. It didn’t even slow down.’

She frowned, struggling to understand.

‘He’s dead, Edie. And it’s chaos down there. Nothing moving. The boys from the camp think they’ve won the Lottery. The CRS are going to need a lot of extra tear gas before they clear it.’

‘Did you tell them who you are?’

‘I tried. They weren’t very impressed. They called me connard. Does that mean respected detective?’

‘No, Max, connard means shithead.’

‘That’s what I thought.’

‘Was it definitely him?’

I nodded.

‘What happened here?’ I said.

She laughed. ‘They bottled it. They came close but in the end nobody wanted to take a hit for the team. I didn’t fire a shot.’

She slipped the Taser into her pocket and we smiled at each other.

‘Let’s go home,’ I said.

Then I saw her face twist with pain.

She collapsed into my arms, the pain suddenly replaced by panic, and I held her close, already knowing, my mind whirling ahead, wondering where the nearest hospital was, and how fast I could get there, and if it could possibly be quick enough.

I scooped her up in my arms and carried her towards the car.

When she spoke, her face pressed against my chest, the words were muffled by my jacket and choked with what sounded like bereavement.

‘My baby,’ she said.

They were very kind at the Centre Hospitalier de Dunkerque.

When they finally let me see Edie a few hours later, she was sitting up in bed in her own private room wearing a white smock, pale as a red-haired angel.

I sat on the bed and took her hand.

‘I lost the baby,’ she said, as matter-of-fact as she could make it. ‘Apparently I’ll have cramping for a day or two. Bleeding for a week. Is that too much information?’

I shook my head. I held her hand tighter. I had no words for her.