This Night's Foul Work by Fred Vargas Page A

said.
    â€˜Not known at all.’
    â€˜Except by a few wine experts, or people who live in the Ossau valley.’
    â€˜And?’
    â€˜And possibly the people in the next valley.’
    â€˜For instance?’
    â€˜The Gave de Pau valley.’
    â€˜It wasn’t exactly rocket science, was it? Can’t you recognise someone else from the Pyrenees when you’ve got one in front of you?’
    â€˜It’s a bit dark on this landing.’
    â€˜Never mind, I’m not offended.’
    â€˜It’s just that I don’t go round looking for them.’
    â€˜What do you think happens when someone from the Ossau valley works in the same outfit as someone from the Gave de Pau valley?’
    The two men both took a little time to think, staring at the wall opposite.
    â€˜Sometimes,’ Adamsberg suggested, ‘it’s harder to get on with your neighbour than with a perfect stranger.’
    â€˜There’ve been run-ins between the two valleys in the past,’ agreed the New Recruit, still looking at the wall.
    â€˜Yes. They’ve been known to kill one another over a scrap of land.’
    â€˜Over a blade of grass.’
    â€˜Yes.’
    The New Recruit got to his feet and paced the landing, with his hands in his pockets. Discussion over, thought Adamsberg. They could pick it up again later, on a different footing. He stood up in turn.
    â€˜Close the cupboard and go back to the office.
Lieutenant
Retancourt is waiting to take you to Clignancourt.’
    Adamsberg made a sign of farewell and went down the first flight of stairs, feeling annoyed. Sufficiently annoyed for him to have forgotten his little sketchbook on the top stair, so that he had to go back up. On the sixth-floor landing, he heard Veyrenc’s elegant voice in the semi-darkness:
    â€˜My
lord, take heed to me. Am I so little worth
,
That anger without cause should drive me from my place?

Is this the fair welcome they told me I would face
,
And am I to suffer, for the land of my birth?’
    Adamsberg tiptoed quietly up the last few steps, stupefied.
    â€˜Is’t a fault, or a crime, to have first seen the light

So close to your valley? Am I not then allowed

To have rested my eyes on the same silver cloud?’
    Veyrenc was leaning against the side of the cupboard, head lowered, auburn tears gleaming through his hair.
    â€˜To have run as a child on the same mountain trails

Which the gods gave to you, and the same deepest vales.’
    Adamsberg watched as his new colleague folded his arms and smiled briefly to himself.
    â€˜I see,’ said the
commissaire
slowly.
    The
lieutenant
gave a start.
    â€˜It’s in my file,’ he said, by way of excuse.
    â€˜Under what?’
    Veyrenc ran his hands through his hair in embarrassment.
    â€˜The
commissaire
at Bordeaux couldn’t stand it. Or the one at Tarbes, or the one at Nevers.’
    â€˜And you couldn’t help it?’
    â€˜Alas, I cannot, sire, though if I could I would
,
But my ancestor’s blood runs in my veins for good.’
    â€˜How the hell do you do that? Waking? Sleeping? Hypnosis?’
    â€˜Well, it runs in the family,’ said Veyrenc rather shortly. ‘I just can’t help it.’
    â€˜Oh, if it runs in the family, that’s different.’
    Veyrenc twisted his lip, and spread his hands in a fatalist gesture.
    â€˜Perhaps you’d better come back to the office with me,
lieutenant
. Maybe the broom cupboard wasn’t good for you.’
    â€˜That’s true,’ said Veyrenc, whose heart contracted suddenly as he thought of Camille.
    â€˜You know Retancourt? She’s the one who’s in charge of your induction.’
    â€˜Something’s cropped up in Clignancourt?’
    â€˜It soon will have, if you can find some gravel under a table. She’ll tell you about it, and I warn you, she doesn’t like the assignment.’
    â€˜Why not hand this one over to the