Nightshade. Tom Henighan

sat mesmerized, literally awestruck. The forest was delivered to his mind and senses in all its impersonal majesty and fury. Gods and goddesses were there, as powerless as men, and finally an irresistible wind howling at the heart of nature, then dying away in the saddest of descents into the darkness of non-being.

      The music stopped. The audience held its breath. There was silence, then a random, uncertain clapping from some, followed by a roar of sustained and passionate applause and cheering. Something momentous had been communicated, and words could neither explain it nor repeat it. Yet everyone appeared to be deeply moved.

      Paul held Sam’s arm and steered him into the aisle and toward one of the foyers. “We’ll have to talk to Ginette later. I wonder what it was like to be in the middle of all that.”

      “Like being in a giant’s cauldron maybe, or in the eye of a hurricane … I have to thank you for this evening, Paul. It’s already been great. That dinner! Snails and rognons de veau like I’ve never tasted. And dessert, and that wine — what was it? Château du Grand Gaumont Corbiéres? — I’m seriously thinking of settling down here.”

      “We won’t allow it. We couldn’t stand the competition.”

      “Don’t forget, I mostly handle bedroom cases.”

      “I know — you’d be busy here. But I can see you’re enjoying the change. This murder business suits you.”

      “I take that as a compliment. But say, that plump fellow with the bushy hair and the mauve evening jacket. Is that Chen?”

      “It is. I’ll introduce you. You can question him right here and catch him off guard.”

      “And gape at the beautiful women, too?”