The Beast of the Camargue Read Online Free PDF Page B

a hurry in fact,” he said, giving her the exact amount.
    He placed the book at the bottom of his bag and went out. The first tourists had now appeared. He walked fast, turned down the first alley to the right and stopped in a doorway, as though following a pre-rehearsed route, then from his bag he took a cotton jacket and a baseball cap. He added a pair of light sunglasses and took out his Nikon with the 200 mm lens.
    He retraced his steps and stopped for a moment to examine his appearance in the chemist’s window: his disguise looked convincing enough to confuse any potential witnesses. Whatever happened, he would be the man in a cap with sunglasses and a camera—a commonplace sight in the streets of Tarascon in midsummer.
    A minute later, he went into the Bar des Amis and ordered a beer at the counter by pointing at the tap of Leffe. That way, he would be the man in the cap who did not even speak French.
    The owner, a big Corsican with a gray complexion and smiling eyes, set the beer down and went on shining the zinc bar in silence, occasionally glancing at the television screen, which was showing highlights from that year’s football championship.
    All at once, Christian Rey emerged from the back room like a shadow, accompanied by the man with gray hair. The two exchanged a few words. As they did so, he paid and left the bar.
    Rey and the man with gray hair … this was something new. But, it did not disturb him, and did not unduly complicate the mission he had set himself. Maybe he would have to eliminate Gray Hair too? It did not matter much. One more or one fewer. He took a couple of photographs in front of the bar, as Rey turned left, and Gray Hair right.
    Then he had to change once again, quickly at the corner of ruede la Mairie. He knew that Rey was cunning, and he did not want to take any risks. He took off his jacket and glasses and put on a red polo shirt.
    Rey stopped at Chez François, then opposite the town hall at Le Narval, and finally at the Bar de la Fontaine, not far from the ramparts of King René’s Castle. Each time, the scenario was the same: he went inside, shook a few hands, then came out again a few minutes later with a package concealed in a supermarket bag. And each time, the man took some photographs.
    Rey then headed for the castle car park and got into his Kompressor convertible. The man watched as he drove off, and only stopped looking when he took the bridge that crosses the Rhône toward Beaucaire.
    The morning had been well spent. He now knew exactly where he would capture Christian Rey.
    Then he would take him to see the beast.
    It was time.

5.
    De Palma saw her as he passed the war memorial commemorating the dead of the wars in the Far East. She was standing on the other side of Corniche Kennedy, looking out to sea from the bridge of white stones that arches above the stream in the valley of Les Auffes.
    From that distance, he couldn’t make out her face, but she looked beautiful and blond, with a slender figure. Probably a foreigner making the most of the last light of day to take a photograph of the sea.
    Just like thousands of other tourists.
    But the woman had neither a camera nor a camcorder, just a black bag slung over her shoulder. And she seemed to be observing him.
    De Palma stopped for a moment and leaned on the cast-iron railing in front of the war memorial. Rain was on the way. At the far side of the port, the housing estates of the northern suburbs were fading into the dingy nightfall.
    A customs boat emerged from the Passe Sainte-Marie, slipping across the calm sea. The customs officers had recently decided to dismantle the cigarette-smuggling networks, so they were pulling in all the boats that came from North Africa. Instinctively, de Palma glanced to his left and, through the gray light, could make out the
El Djezaïr
in the distance as it slid calmly between the Château d’If and the Frioul archipelago.
    The din of cars along