Ben had to admit the guy might have a point about that. For months the city had been locked in increasingly turbulent civil unrest, boiling with constant anti-government protests that had sparked off over a long list of political and social grievances and seemed to grow more serious and violent each passing day. There had been mass arrests, the cops had started deploying armoured personnel carriers and water cannon in the streets, and there were no signs of things cooling down any time soon. Now the troubles had spread across the city into Ben’s normally quiet neighbourhood. He had lain awake for some time last night, listening to the screeching sirens and loud explosions of the latest pitched battle between rioters and the police. It had sounded like both sides meant business.

‘Who can tell where this will end?’ Gerbier had fretted over the phone. ‘The city’s falling into anarchy. Nobody’s buying any more.’

How justified was Gerbier’s pessimism, only time would tell. Ben had been up with the dawn that morning, as always. He’d laboured through his usual gruelling pre-breakfast workout of press-ups, sit-ups and pull-ups, taken a one-minute tepid shower, pulled on fresh black jeans and a denim shirt, scanned a few latest news headlines online, meditatively smoked a couple of Gauloise cigarettes while gazing out at the non-existent view for what might be one of the last times if he got lucky finding a buyer soon, then turned his thoughts to eating breakfast. Dinner last night had been a sandwich wolfed down on the hoof at the airport, and he was starving.

That was when Ben had realised that there wasn’t a scrap of food in the apartment. Worse, much worse, the bare kitchenette cupboards contained not a single coffee bean.

And so here he was, heading briskly along the street, his scuffed brown leather jacket zipped against the chill and the third Gauloise of the day dangling from his lip, in the direction of a local coffee bar where he could get some breakfast and a much-needed fix of the black stuff. It was a five-minute stroll, but when he got there he discovered to his chagrin that the coffee bar had had its windows smashed in last night’s disturbances and was shut.