good, he thought; hearing it would cut into the man’s confidence even more than being stranded out here alone. The knowledge that he was effectively cut off would be demoralising.
‘You ready?’
Claude nodded and lifted his shotgun.
At a nod from Rocco, they stepped apart to reduce the targets and walked forward into the trees.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
It was like stepping into a different world, immediately more sombre in spite of the lack of leaves on the trees. The outside sounds faded as the branches overhead seemed to close in on the two men, shutting out the snow-heavy sky and leaving only the chatter of the police radio to remind them of the outside world. The trunks here were jammed close together, never thinned by man, each new growth pushing against the next, reaching skywards and searching for every bit of space. Dead trees lay withered and rotting or, where there hadn’t been space to fall, hung limply like drunks off their neighbours.
Claude stopped and sniffed the air, eyes flicking over what he could see, then hunkered down, gesturing to Rocco to do the same.
The minutes slipped by, neither man speaking. Rocco was breathing easily enough, but he’d felt his heart rate increase the moment they had stopped moving. Movement was good, to a city-bred cop. It kept you awake, showed you and everyone else that you were busy and active, allowed you to check you didn’t have someone coming up behind you. But as he’d learnt long ago, movement could be a killer in the wrong place. The kill could come from under your feet, rigged to pierce your flesh with needles of bamboo; it could come from overhead, a swish of noise triggered by a careless kick against a carefully laid peg; it could come out of the undergrowth, so thick you couldn’t see through it to the danger lurking just a couple of metres away.
He said, ‘What are we doing?’ Claude was the expert here, the woodsman, and he was content to let him lead the way. But Rocco liked to know what was going on.
‘We’re waiting.’ The reply was low, just above a whisper.
‘For what?’
Claude pointed at some trees deeper into the wood, where a few small birds were twittering softly and flitting from branch to branch. ‘When they stop, we’ll know.’
They waited some more.
‘You okay?’ Claude queried, and Rocco realised he was grinding his teeth together. He relaxed his jaw and nodded. He wasn’t, quite, but he was getting there. Another few years of creeping through the woods with this man and he’d be as good as new.
Claude seemed to know what he was thinking. He leant close and said softly, ‘I knew a man once who did what you did. Went through the same thing, but in another war. Couldn’t stand the trees. Reckoned they were whispering to him like we are now, calling him names. Actually, he was just scared shitless, but couldn’t admit it.’
Rocco said nothing.
‘Anyway, in the end, he got over it by facing his demons. Went native instead of hiding in a car in city streets all day.’
Claude was talking about himself.
‘I’m like that man, you mean?’
Claude shook his head. ‘You’re nothing like him. Even in here, if I had you on my tail, I’d be running as fast as I could and I wouldn’t stop. I know you don’t like it in here, and why should you? But you use it; you don’t let it beat you. You’re always looking, even when you can’t see anything.’ He stared at Rocco, holding his gaze. ‘But others … like this man we’re looking for, he’s a rat in a tunnel. He only reacts to what he can see. Sooner or later, you’d catch him before he caught you.’
‘Is this leading anywhere?’
Claude smiled. ‘Shit, don’t ask me. I’m just talking to calm my own nerves.’ He stopped and looked round.
The birds had gone silent. Everywhere.
Only the branches whispered overhead, like an army of crickets. Anyone watching right now, Rocco thought, would have the advantage over a newcomer stepping into the trees from the outside. He slowly turned his head behind them, to the light. It was clear.
He heard a grunting noise, followed by a snap of a twig somewhere not far away. The sound triggered an unwelcome memory flash from years ago: heavy vegetation underfoot, stifling humidity, no sky to speak of and a wall of green in every direction. Unlike here where there was only brown and black, apart from the top ends of the