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sure.”
    “Time enough to find that out, Karl. I said: when were you last up here?”
    “Why would I come here? I’m a farmer. There’s damn-all to farm here, can’t you see? Nix.”
    Gebhart raised his eyebrows at Felix. Himmelfarb bent slightly and leaned to peer into the depths of the woods.
    “This is what we get,” he muttered. “This is what we get in the EU? The end of the borders down there?”
    Gebhart leaned over to whisper to Felix.
    “Where did you, you know . . . ? I’ll need to tell the KD when they show up.”
    Felix searched about, and nodded toward a tree.
    “I’m not totally sure, Gebi. Sorry.”
    Gebhart backed them out of the woods the way they’d come in.
    Their handsets had been fading in and out.
    Gebhart grunted and looked at his watch.
    “The one day I don’t bring my damned Handi.”
    “Handy what?” said Himmelfarb.
    “Cell phone my Handi.”
    “Hah,” said Himmelfarb. “Those things don’t work up here.
    You might as well use a hunting horn.”
    Gebi had phoned the post 20 minutes ago, and they had made the climb back up right after.
    “Inside the hour, I’m guessing,” he said to Felix. “The whole bit. A site crew, a truck no doubt. Forensics later. You’re one lucky fellow, Professor.”
    Before Felix could say anything, Gebhart turned to Himmelfarb.
    “Karl, best you wait down at the house. Nothing should be disturbed, you see.”
    “It’s my land, you know.”
    “Stimmt, Karl,” said Gebhart, and laid a hand on the farmer’s shoulder. “Just so.”
    “Cars come over the alm at night here this past while, you know.”
    “We’ll talk about that, Karl. That’s important.”
    “What are we going to do?”
    “Everything will be taken care of, Karl. There are procedures.”
    Felix watched Gebhart get Karl Himmelfarb started on his walk back. He waited then, and when Himmelfarb turned after a few metres, Gebi had some words for him. There was a lot of head nodding and a bunch of soothing gestures with his hands.
    “I’m lucky, am I?” said Felix when Gebhart made his way back up.
    “Are you okay? Do you need to, well, you know?”
    “Nothing left. Empty.”
    “Ah you poor kid. No, I don’t mean lucky like horseshoes in your arsch. I mean experience.You’ll learn a lot from this.”
    “Whether I like it or not.”
    “Natürlich. It’s the way of the world. They don’t teach that at the Uni?”
    Felix too began to look around at the trees and hills.
    “What do we do now?” he asked after a while.
    “Damned if I know. Never did a murder before.”
    “There must be something.”
    Gebhart turned back and gave him a quizzical, almost pitying look.
    “We just secure the site. The Kripo can do the rest.”
    “Like CSI?”
    “You watch that crap too?”
    “Only when it’s on.”
    Gebhart eked out a thin smile.
    “See? You’re beginning to get it. You’ll make it. Maybe you’ll bring me luck. I should blow my beer money on the Lotto soon as I get back to town.”
    “That’s the kind of luck I prefer.”
    Gebhart sighed.
    “You have a boy like Hansi?”
    Gebhart nodded.
    “You know Himmelfarb from that place?”
    “It’s more that he knows me. Like a dummy I went there in uniform once after work. Well, straightaway I was a movie star.
    There’s something about a uniform.”
    “That’s why he phoned?”
    “He didn’t know who to phone.”
    “Social work, they call that, don’t they?”
    “Call it what you want. Up here the Gendarmerie do a bit of everything.”
    Felix shook his head. Gebhart said nothing further. He seemed to be listening for some sounds from far off. Then he took out his cigarettes, the Milde Sorte that everyone said they bought to try to cut down. He didn’t offer one to Felix. He needed only one flick of his lighter to get the cigarette going.
    “So here we are,” Gebhart murmured after several moments.
    “Up here in the arschloch of Styria. Excuse me the picturesque centre of Styria. And you’re on the job,