Flashback

Observing all this from the lofty heights of his cockpit, Henri Claude was unnerved by a flashback of Garcia swaying at the open window with his machine gun. A girl – must’ve been Hajda – one of Carlos’s regulars dancing round the table, as fireworks lit up the night sky, and enflamed nostrils twitched over lines of white powder on the marble top. With this nasal spectre he seemed to hear the voice of his former associate. “It’s a set up, Henri C. - You always know when it’s a set up.” There was that kind of lucidity in his eyes that made it somehow all the more frightening and real when he remembered how it all ended: Garcia grinning like a fool as he shot up the chandelier. -