“You know this area?”

Felix shook his head. Gebhart squinted up out of the windshield at the heights that came slowly closer as they wove through the curves.

“They’re a bit cracked up at these altitudes,” Gebhart said.

“Spinnt, as they say. You think it’s true?”

“‘Nothing personal’ here, right?”

He was glad to see a small grin eke out over Gebhart’s features.

The air was cool, with an edge to it. There were few cars. Gebhart slowed and stopped by the entrance to a mildly rutted road. He scrutinized the roof of the house that nestled behind a brake of trees there.

“A red roof on one of the barns” he muttered, and moved on “I thought…,” Felix began, but stopped awkwardly.

“That I know this area, or where we’re supposed to be going?

Well I don’t.”

“But a rough idea? Isn’t the person a, well someone you know?”

“I only met him a few times. In a place in town. He has a kid, I have a kid.”

Something in Gebhart’s tone drew a curtain down over further questions.

A half-dozen Simmentals clustered around a feeding cage at the corner of a half-hectare patch to the right.

“There’s a red roof,” said Felix.

“That’s the one,” said Gebhart, “I’ll bet. The big wooden gate too.”

There were pools on the laneway. It was hard to tell how deep they might be. Felix rolled down the window. The sun had gone in behind a fairly solid mass of clouds not long before. He heard water swish at the floor pan as Gebhart let the Opel down the lane.

“You said this was a bit out of the ordinary,” Felix tried.