The Crowded Grave

crude bomb in the conference room, behind some new plasterboard. Sticks of dynamite and a digital timer, they tell me. A good job we got that Semtex before the terrorists did.”
    How the hell could that have been done, and by whom? Bruno tried to remember the security arrangements for the château. Carlos and Isabelle had shared the responsibility, but the patrols were mounted by gendarmes from Périgueux. They’d all have some explaining to do. The brigadier would have people tearing apart every wall to see what else may have been planted. So far as Bruno knew, only he and the brigadier were aware of the plan to shift the site until the security teams started redeploying last night, so the Domaine should be secure.
    Bruno nodded to the sergeant and spurred forward to the gardens behind the Domaine, Gigi at his heels. The schedule called for the two ministers to meet at the Bordeaux airport and then to take two helicopters on the forty-minute ride to St. Denis. He checked his watch. They should be arriving in not much more than an hour. He wondered if Isabelle would be told to stay back at the château to clear up the mess torn by the security breach, or if the brigadier would want her here. His heart gave a gentle jolt at the thought of seeing her again so soon, and he felt a smile come to his face as he turned into the stable yard. It was empty except for two black-clad and heavily armed
mobiles
from the gendarmes. He reined in at their challenge and pointed to the brigadier’s metal badge on his lapel. They asked him to dismount and show his special security pass with his photo. Behind them a sizable pile of horse manure steamed just by the stable door, a pitchfork stuck into it. Gigi ambled up to investigate and then to cock his leg against it. They’d better get that cleared away before the choppers landed.
    “Anybody else inside?” he asked, as the gendarmes salutedand returned his pass after checking it against a very short list of names.
    “The brigadier and the female inspector and a Spanish advance team,” he was told. “Caterers are on their way, under armed escort. They’ve already been checked.”
    Bruno put Hector into the stable on a loose rein and left Gigi there in the stall. Once he checked in with the brigadier, he wanted to ride the perimeter and check the patrols. That was the work he knew, rather than the internal security, and he wanted all the patrolling troops to see him and learn to recognize him before the choppers landed and they went on hair-trigger alert.
    In the main salon of the hotel all seemed chaos. The brigadier glared at him and nodded while talking fiercely into one phone. Isabelle had a hand over one ear and a satellite phone in the other. Carlos was shouting in Spanish into a third, two armed and serious-looking aides flanking him. All wore the same enamel badge that the brigadier had given to Bruno. Isabelle turned and her eyes seemed to flash as she saw him. Her cane leaned against the conference table. Carlos ignored him. Two CRS men stood in the lobby by the far entrance door, another on the landing of the broad staircase and another by the door that led down to the vast wine cellars. Two more black-clad men wearing the enamel security badge and Spanish flags on their sleeves were carrying submachine guns so futuristic that Bruno had never seen one before.
    “You heard about the security breach?” the brigadier called across to him, snapping shut his phone. Bruno saluted, an automatic reaction in this militarized atmosphere. “Yes, sir.”
    “Checked the perimeter patrols yet?”
    “Just the riverbank so far, sir. Can I continue?”
    The brigadier waved approval, and with a final glance at Isabelle Bruno headed back to the stables, showed his pass againand mounted Hector. The manure pile was still there. He left at a walk, Gigi trotting behind, and then Bruno urged Hector into a trot as he rode up the main lane beside the winery that led to the largest vineyard and to the figure of a mounted man at the far end of the vines. Farther up the lane was a parked jeep with two paratroopers inside. He slowed as he approached and held his pass at the ready. They checked him and waved him on between the vines where the other horseman was approaching.
    “We should never have given up the horses,” said the major, grinning at the sight of the basset hound as Bruno rode up beside him so they could shake hands.
    “Better not let the brigadier hear you say that,” Bruno