Zulu by Caryl Férey Page A

surveillance camera above the barrier, and stuck his badge and Nicole’s photo under the big guy’s nose.
    â€œHave you ever seen this girl?”
    â€œHmm.” He stepped back to take a better look. “I think so.”
    â€œDo you have a good memory for faces, or what?”
    â€œWell—”
    â€œNicole Wiese, the girl the newspapers are talking about. She was here last week.”
    â€œYes. Yes.”
    The walrus searched in his memories, but apparently they were a mess.
    â€œWednesday?”
    â€œCould be, yes.”
    â€œHow about Saturday?”
    He chewed that over. “Hmm.”
    â€œAlone or with someone?” Neuman asked impatiently.
    â€œThat I couldn’t tell you,” he said, admitting his helplessness. “There’s a festival on at the moment, and after midnight anyone can get in. Hard to say who’s with who.”
    He would have said the same thing about the Middle East conflict.
    Neuman pointed to the straw huts beyond the outside wall. “What barman was working here on Saturday night?”
    â€œCissy,” the man replied. “A colored girl, with big tits.”
    So he had a memory for some things after all.
    Neuman walked across the sandy garden where young people were drinking beer and shouting as if they were on the beach. The pimply guy with long hair shaking cocktails behind the outside bar seemed as drunk as his customers.
    â€œWhere can I find Cissy?”
    â€œInside!” he cried.
    Following the direction of his bloodshot eyes, Neuman opened the wooden door that led into the club. The latest Red Hot Chili Peppers was bouncing off the walls, the room was packed, the light dim beneath the spotlights. There was a smell of grass in spite of the warnings on display, but also a strange smell of something burning. Neuman pushed his way through to the bar. Few of the customers were over thirty. They were knocking back oddly colored cocktails, which would probably end up in the toilets or the gutters, if they could reach them in time. Cissy, the barmaid, had brown skin, and her breasts were squeezed into an unusually flexible leotard. She was being ogled by a bunch of tipsy youngsters. Neuman leaned over the umbrellas sticking out of the greenish cocktails she was making.
    â€œHave you ever seen this girl before?”
    From the chewing-gum grimace she threw at the photograph, it was obvious Cissy was more preoccupied by her cleavage than the melting of ice cubes.
    â€œDunno.”
    â€œTake a closer look.”
    She gave a pout that went down well with the school of pilot fish clinging to the bar. “Maybe. Yes, looks familiar.”
    â€œNicole Wiese, a student,” Neuman said. “Maybe you saw her face in the newspapers?”
    â€œEr . . . no.”
    Cissy didn’t even know what she was saying, she was thinking of her cocktails and the piranhas waiting for her.
    â€œThey won’t get cold,” said Neuman, moving aside the glasses on the bar. “A pretty blonde like this,” he insisted, “isn’t so easy to forget. Try to remember.” He had taken hold of her wrist—gently, but he wouldn’t let go. “Nicole was here on Wednesday night,” he said, “and possibly Saturday, too.”
    The lights began to dim.
    â€œSaturday, I don’t know,” the barmaid finally said, “but I saw her on Wednesday night. Yes, Wednesday. She talked for a while to the girl who’s performing.”
    The lights went out suddenly, plunging the room into darkness. Neuman let go of the barmaid’s wrist. Everyone had turned to look at the stage. He walked away from the bar. It was hot and the smell was sharper now. Coal. There were coals in the middle of the stage, a red-hot bed of coals he could see through the anonymous heads. Suddenly, the floor began to vibrate with the beating of drums.
Boom boom boom
. A thin line of smoke rose along the proscenium, every beat of the