Strange Beasts

by Susan J. Morris

“Officer Berchard said you might be coming,” M. Rossignol said, and he creaked the door wide enough for Sam and Hel to slip through. The folks in the crowd craned their necks, trying to get a look, but the man shut the door tight behind them, locking it. “I wasn’t sure I believed him.” “Does he lie often?” Sam ventured. “No,” M. Rossignol said. “It just seemed too unbelievable. A couple of Englishwomen come all the way across the Channel to look at French corpses? It sounds like the start of a bad novel.” “American and Irish, actually,” Sam put in, remembering the change it had worked on Officer Berchard. He raised his shaggy brows. “Oh, well then, why didn’t you say so? That’s completely different, isn’t it? Everyone knows how much American and Irish women love corpses.” Hel raised an eyebrow right back at him. “There are a number of women waiting outside to see these corpses.” “Of course,” M. Rossignol said, waving for them to follow him deeper into the morgue. “But they are French. These are their dead.”