Page 68 of Mountain Trial

“It’s close?”

It’s him.

Over the next half hour, she talked him through other prominent features until, finally, Bull’s face was complete.

“That’s him.” A sudden thought struck him. “What if he’s changed his appearance, though?”

Castel nodded. “I will make a few different versions. People often don’t realize how much about our own appearance we can’t change.”

Dogfish’s face was quicker, since Luc now had acquired some of the right vocabulary.

“That’s it. We’re done,” she said, while putting her tablet back in its case. “Thank you very much. I’ll work with this and with the other witnesses to finalize a sketch.”

By the time he came out, Kat was alone in the corridor, waiting for him.

“Your colleagues went home?”

She nodded.

“I’m sorry I kept you waiting.”

“You didn’t keep me waiting, Luc. I wanted to wait for you.” She paused for a second. “How was it?”

“She’s an amazing artist. But I meant to ask you one thing―why do they need her? Why can’t the police use the hotel cameras? Surely―”

“The cameras weren’t working, Luc.”

“They weren’t working?”

“We have a couple images from the start of the night, when the first guests started arriving―then nothing.”

“And you still have no idea what they wanted?” Luc shrugged. “I guess you can’t tell me that, right?”

“I couldn’t, if I knew. But I don’t know. From the way they acted, I’d say it had something to do with Mrs. Larsen. They knew who she was.”

“Where is she now?”

“Her husband picked her up in their private jet. He wasn’t happy.”

Yeah. I know how he feels.

“Bull and Dogfish are gone, aren’t they?” Luc asked.

“I’d say so, yes. I don’t know how they did it―our team was outside, and there were road blocks on all major roads coming out of Chamonix. But, somehow, they managed to escape.”

She shrugged, as if she didn’t want to keep talking about the incident. “So …” she began.

“Come back to my place,” he asked. “We’ll order some food and have an early night.”

“I don’t know that I’ll be able to sleep after sleeping the whole morning.”

“Then we’ll stay up late.”

Chapter 26

Kat

The end of the week came quickly. Slowly, it felt to Kat, the town started recovering from the shock. Chamonix was a small town―not so small that everyone knew each other by name, but most locals knew each other by sight at least. And now, the entire town was in mourning.