The men on the street were getting uglier by the second. Claire paid them no mind as she made her way to the address she'd been given by her contact. It was a better neighbourhood then she had expected from the description she had of Anton the Alligator. He must have been paid very well for the French words job. A little too well, in fact. She found the door and knocked.

There was a brief eruption of movement within the flat, and then silence. From her private detective training, Claire recognised it as the silence of somebody moving very quietly towards the door. Quickly, she picked the lock with a hair pin and counted to three. She pushed the door open, slamming it straight into the head of an oily looking character who had clearly been bending down to look through the peep hole. Anton the Alligator collapsed backwards to the ground unconscious.

'Damn,' said Claire. It was going to be quite hard to interrogate him until he recovered. Closing the door behind her, she stepped over his prone body into the entrance hall of the flat. It was a very nice flat. The walls had been painted in tasteful pastels, the furniture was of good quality. Not quite Anton's style at all, she suspected. Her guess was confirmed when she entered the main living area of the flat and saw the tackily large television and stereo set up. He'd probably rented it furnished and only made additions that he saw as essential. The refrigerator held a dozen bottles of beer and a jar of peanut butter. Must eat out a lot. There was a couple of empty take away cartons in the garbage.

In the bedroom she came across something a little odd. Anton had not yet unpacked any of his clothes. He seemed to be living out of a large suitcase, as if he didn't expect to be here long. The bed was unmade. She went through the drawers carefully, but couldn't find anything to connect Anton to the French words. After giving the entire flat a thorough search she decided that she wasn't going to find anything lying out in the open. What she needed was in Anton's head. She only hoped she hadn't jarred it out when she made her entrance.

Back in the entrance hall, Anton was still out cold. She really should learn to be more polite when entering somebody's house. Since there was nothing useful in his pockets, she sat down to wait for him to come around. While waiting, she again tried to write her song, but came up against the same problem. During her investigations she had often taken a moment to try and come up with some good words while moving around the city. After all, she was in Paris, there was an artistic vibe floating around her at all times. It should have been a snap. Which it was in a way, but only in a 'Snap, Crackle, Pop' way. This was still not a very good song, no matter how she tried to convince herself. She just could not find the words. Anton began to groan and she looked at him with interest. Time to get down to business. 'This is your wake up call mister. Don't bother to get up.'

Anton lay on the floor and opened his eyes. 'Qui tes-vous?'

'In English mister. You know the rules of this novel.' Claire wasn't about to let this low life character get the better of her. She knew that she was much more important.

'OK. Who are you?'

'My name is Claire. I'm the girl you tried to talk to last week by throwing a bunch of letters in my window. Letters that were in French. French words. Remember that?'

'Would it help if I said I didn't?'

'Not a lot. I know that you did it. I want to know why. Who told you to do it?'

'I can't tell you. That's not how it works.'

'What do you mean?' Claire was getting tired of his stalling and reached out for the door handle. 'I could always open this door again if it would help.'

'No. I'll talk. I just don't know what you want to know. Here's the system. We have a sort of bulletin board set up in a pub. People who want jobs done put up notices. People who do jobs read the board. It's all run by the bartender. Nobody ever knows who they're working for or who's working for them. It's safer that way.'

Claire had to admit it was a pretty nice system. It seemed likely that she wasn't going to get much more out of Anton the Alligator. Perhaps a little more. 'Where did you get the words?'

Anton looked confused. 'Out of my mouth. I speak French very well, you remember.' He scratched the inside of his nose and sucked on his finger distractedly.

'But I touched those words!' Claire was horrified. 'I poked them with my chop stick!'

'Do not be so concerned. I am not a filthy pig dog. It is not so bad to touch my mouth.' He grinned and displayed a fine array of primordial soup stains.

Claire moved to the door. 'Pleasant dreams,' she said, as she opened it rapidly. She stepped outside. Then she stopped. She suddenly realised that she would have to wait for Anton the Alligator to regain consciousness for a second time so that she could make him tell her the address of the pub.