Accusations and Denials - Chapter 16

It was a blisteringly hot late afternoon in mid-July but without the usual heat haze and smog. In spite of the lingering, oppressive humidity in the wake of a brief rainsquall that had blown across Paris that morning, there was almost unlimited visibility under a pale blue sky. Across Pont Alexandre III hurried an endless throng of pedestrians, mostly eager tourists. They chattered noisily in a variety of languages, exclaimed over the magnificent, colonnaded design of this popular link between the two banks of the Seine, and paused now and then to aim their cameras in various directions from this strategic viewpoint. The two figures standing off to one side near the center of the bridge and arguing guardedly didn’t seem to belong in the same scene.