After dropping the message off behind Mamba Noir, he walked a few hundred metres along the main drag to one of the all-night cafes where he could use his worker’s ration card. He’d made friends with the elderly waitress, who always made sure there were recognisable chunks of meat in his soup and double the cheese that the other men got. But there was nothing she could do about the black bread, which was made from rough rye flour and widely believed to be adulterated with sawdust. Joel had no idea if that was true, but he would have died for a fresh-cooked baguette with butter melting inside. It was a twenty-five-minute walk back to Alois’ place in Kerneval. Before setting off Joel decided to check out a couple of likely spots to see if PT was around and wanted to come home with him. He found him easily enough, slumped at the back of Le Petit Prince with too much drink under his skin. Le Petit Prince was the roughest joint in a rough town. Floor awash in spit, cigarette ends and dried blood, windows boarded, mirrors smashed.
