The rankness of the couple was strong, mixed with the rather sandy, musty odor of the bones. Again, she inhaled, flaring her nostrils. Yes, there were other human beings within, also, all stinking of their foods and perfumes and the orifices they had secretly neglected. She smelled the damp biscuit odor of little boys, the soft cheese fragrance of girl children, and a bit of an older woman’s perfume. A class of mixed sex between the ages of six and ten was a short distance ahead, with their female teacher, who was thirty, no younger, and healthy. Miriam tested the air for new odors, filter-ing out those she had already identified. Some sort of exotic foodstuff came to her, spices of the East mixed with the odors of skin and spent cigarettes—a couple from Asia.

She entered the corridor. Her glance at the map had left her with a memory of precisely the number of steps she would have to go in every passage in the ossuary. In childhood, every Keeper was trained to use measured gaits, so she knew exactly how many inches she traversed with every step she took, no matter how fast her stride.

The entrance to the ossuary was marked by a group of thick, square columns painted white with black borders. She passed them, entering the earliest of the crypts. The most recent bones, quite naturally, were deepest. By human terms, they were ancient, but she remembered Paris perfectly clearly when there had been no catacomb full of bones and gawking tourists. In those days, the Keepers had the entire system of mines to themselves. One could ascend by an unknown stair into the street, take a victim down, and enjoy it at leisure, then have a nice sleep in the safety of the depths. The Paris Keepers had a pleasant life then.

She moved forward cautiously, seeking a certain spot that led from the ossuary into the deep shafts. There were other entrances, but this one was what you took if you knew what you were doing. Anyone coming down another tunnel would be assumed to be human.

The entrance was signaled, she knew, by a great cross. It would not be difficult to find. But to know its true meaning—that would be very difficult indeed . . . if you weren’t a Keeper. When she was certain that she was alone, she sprinted along the galleries. Here was Madame du Pompadour—that hideous old crank who reeked of sour milk and had somehow captured the heart of one of the later Louises, a prancing unwise fellow who blew farts and stank horribly himself from a fungal infection of the skin. Madame de Pompadour, indeed. Her real name was Jeanne Poisson—Jenny Fish. Well, so much for that marble tomb of hers. This was far more appropriate. Philippe Vendôme had made fervid, ratlike love to her, hadn’t he? Miriam recalled watching some sort of entertainment like that.