Spook's Gold by Andrew Wood

progressed and Marner relaxed into the pace, sure that he was not going to lose them, he began to look around for any other followers.  Due to the large number of people now on the streets at the end of the working day, it was not until they had crossed the Seine and made two turns and one sudden stop by Lemele to look in a shop window that Marner spotted the second man.  This one was on the same side of the street as him and Lemele, approximately mid-way between them and dressed in a light brown over-coat, despite the warm day. 
    Marner was already feeling the heat in his own over-coat, selected because it gave him the option of putting it on and taking it off intermittently to change his ‘look’, it being dark blue whereas his jacket was light grey.  The same logic lay behind his purchase of two different hats.  Anyone looking around for a tail on these busy streets would take in only his outward appearance, the style and the colour.  With him working this operation alone, the ability to change appearance was invaluable, but this would only work a couple of times; eventually his two ‘looks’ would become familiar to anyone who was regularly checking for his presence. 
    Fortunately, he had so far not received a backward glance from either of Lemele’s followers.  They were reasonably skilled at tailing, especially the first man in the grey outfit; the second in the overcoat was clumsy and had been thrown when Lemele had executed her window stop, halting suddenly when she did and so causing someone behind him to crash into his back.  It was this that had drawn Marner’s attention and revealed him.  Marner had to give Lemele credit: she was very cool and calm, no backward glances, not even to verify that he was truly there protecting her. 
    The group continued their progress, following Lemele’s meandering ramble through the markets of Les Halles, and then switching north-east towards République.  Marner spotted no one else in front and so took the opportunity of enforced stops at busy junctions to check behind him.  He had learned his skills from his partner in Berlin, an old time cop who made up in street savvy what he had lacked in investigational expertise.  Marner satisfied himself that no was behind and could be reasonably certain these two were all that he needed to worry about. 
    At the junction of Gravilliers and Beaubourg the man in the grey suit made a backward glance directly towards Marner whilst checking to cross the road.  Marner continued smoothly without hesitation, peering leisurely into a passing shop window as he walked, making no acknowledgement of the man’s glance, no connection.  He was confident that he had not been spotted as being out of the ordinary, just another businessman on his way home.  But he considered that he had used up his luck with the overcoat and so cast it and his first hat into an alleyway as he passed, donning the second hat, verifying that his pistol was secure in the inside pocket of the jacket.  His only concern was that without the overcoat the bulge of the gun was immediately visible from a few yards; he should have picked a larger, looser size of jacket. 
    Marner was also regretting having specified a destination so far away to Lemele, but at the time he had not known how long it would take him to pick out the shadowers.  He had had to walk a fair distance in an unseasonably warm overcoat and was sweating heavily; he did not lament the absence of the coat, but the act of throwing away something that had cost so much seemed utterly wasteful. 
    They were now passing from Rue des Gravilliers into Rue Pastorelle and the pedestrians suddenly thinned out.  This was part of the Jewish quarter.  Those few residents still living in these streets kept indoors, out of sight.  Lemele seemed to hesitate, perhaps having realised her error, but she was also clearly intent on not looking or turning back.  The problem was that they were close to the defined