I would like to dedicate this part to my high school French teacher, Ms. Aufflick (now Mrs. Taylor). Thanks for the funny language and the trip to the country, ma'am.

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France is a nice place, by most metrics. It's too bright at night, though, even among larger countries. When you travel as much as I do, tourist destinations become pitstops, their details lost over countries and continents.  Such goes with my jaunt through the dusty little seaside town of Calais. It feels weird to be heading South when all I want to do is go North, to Russia, but I have something to pick up. 

I can't go home, obviously. If they were smart enough to track me to England, they're smart enough to track me home. I won't be surprised if I notice another tail tomorrow. 

I board a train where the conductor talks all too loud, and try to lose myself in the classical music the first class car's speakers play. Bach and Salieri aren't enough, though. Facing the window, I end up looking more at the reflection of the aisle and its passerby than the countryside itself. 

The train debarks at a lonely station along a forested road, cabs lined up waiting to take passengers to towns and hotels. A shame buses don't run this far rural. Good thing is, the French don't take their passenger security policies very seriously, and I can ride without worrying about my face or handwriting being documented.

In any case, it's been years since I've been loudly talked to by a French driver. I approach a cab, its window rolled down. Smoke casually rolls from the openings, disappearing in the late-night air.

The man inside is sitting dangerously close to the steering wheel. His ribs might break if he so much as rear-ends someone. 

I throw my question over the din of passengers and idling engines, "Savez-vous où se trouve Saint-Jean-Pied-de-Port?"

He thinks for a second, nods. He speaks through a cigarette. The smoke shows its distress as it dissipates. "Jolie petite ville. Hôtel ou bar?"

I grin. "Bar."

He grins back, his eyes squinting. I like him.

I open the car's back door, only slightly cringing at the smell of a few too many Gauloises. 

Once I'm settled, my suitcase and laptop bag on the seat next to me, I ask, "Parles-tu Anglais? Mon Français est de la merde."

He belts out a hearty laugh. "Your French is fine, believe me. I've heard worse from my fellow Frenchmen." He has a deep voice, gravelly. The cigarettes, I suppose. "What are you traveling to Saint-Jean for?" The car rolls out of the train station, and we're off through dense green forests.

"Visiting the country. Needed a getaway." Oh, how literal.

"Ahhh, it is beautiful this time of year, yes? Make sure you walk the d'Ayou!" It's a fifteen mile trail that cuts through vibrant forests and hillsides, starting in Saint-Jean and ending half-short of Pyrénées-Atlantiques. I've been, but I don't tell him. He seemed proud to tell me about it, I don't want to kill his spirits.

"There a bar you'd recommend? I need something strong after the past few days."

"Yes, yes, there is a wonderful place I will take you to. Le Navarre. Sit outside and enjoy the air and the people, yes?"

"It sounds lovely." 

A few minutes go on in silence, but I decide to ask where a clothing store would be. I'm planning on ditching my clothes, I need replacements. 

"Yes, there is a place somewhere on Rue Espagne, though the name escapes me." 

I thank him, he lights another cigarette, and the rest of the ride is pointless small talk. 

I tip him a moderate amount when he drops me off at the sidewalk in front of Le Navarre. It is a nice place. It's a more primitive sort of architecture, use of stone and wooden beams prevalent. I love it. Metal table and chairs await in a fenced-off outdoor seating area. I hoist my suitcase and laptop bag over the fence, reserving myself a seat, and make my way inside. The place is warm and not too bright, hazy incandescant bulbs burning yellow. There are maybe ten people in the restaurant, which is perfect. The sounds of English and French mingle with the clatters and bangs of the staff in the kitchen, and I feel more content than I have in days. I'm certain I wasn't tailed. Nobody after the hotel, nobody on the train, and definitely nobody in the cab. 

I approach the bar, where a woman with a small face awaits my order. "Avez-vouz Picon Biére?"

She nods and taps me a glass. I take it, thank her, leave a ten note, and step through the blocked-open double doors that lead to the seating area outside. I take myself into a small chair at the far end of the patio, in shadow and corner.

It's a beautiful night, and the town isn't too alight to see some stars in the sky. I count them as I sip my apéritif, allowing myself for just a moment to feel peace. 

But eventually, of course, I'm pulled back into my current circumstances. Pulled back roughly, by the sound of an argument. A man and a woman. I stand up and slink my way to the bar proper, hoping to make out more of the conversation. I use my phone as a mirror again, nonchalantly sipping my drink.

"C'mon, I could show you a gooood fuckin' time!" I hear some conversations begin to die down, making room for such big talking. A tall blond woman is speaking French-tinted English, looking up and down a shorter man. He's not very muscular but still very cute. And he looks uncomfortable. They're standing at the opposite bar end of me.

"I've already said no." He sounds timid, scared. He tries to turn away but the blond woman cuts him off.

"You don't get to say no to me, baby. You know who I am?"

"N-no. And I don't care to."

I'm halfway across the restaurant when he says this, but I see her face contort into violent offense. I close my eyes.

They open. I pick up my speed as she raises her hand.

I make it to the pair just as her hand flies down. I grab it from the air and use the shoulder momentum she's got going to pull her off her feet, and she slumps onto a table, knocking over glasses. The impact sends a whuff out of her, but once she realizes what's happened, she screams. 

"You chienne!" She pulls herself back up on her feet, her nice blouse soaked in alcohol. She's got murder in her eyes. 

She lunges at me and I step out of the way. She grabs at nothing. Another cry from her. She turns on a dime and stalks over to me, like a hunting wolf. Doesn't matter. I've got a .12 Guage. She raises her hand far too slowly for it to be a surprise, but this time it's a fist. Oh no! I'm so scared!

"You're fucking dead, you petit merde. Fucking dead!" 

She throws the punch and I let it connect. I pretend to fall backwards, and I can almost smell her false pride under the designer perfume. She retracts her hand too slowly, however, and I grab it, pulling her down with me. I put a foot out behind myself to stop my fall and make sure she hits the ground. She lands on her back. I've still got hold of her hand, and I make sure she known this, putting a foot on her breastbone and tugging violently on her arm. She whimpers. 

I taunt her. "Not so big are you now, hun?"

She thrusts her legs up, trying to kick me, but she doesn't have the leverage necessary to do so. I keep talking. "Apologize to that poor man you were trying to seduce. Go on." I point at him with my other hand. He looks pretty damn shaken up. 

She turns her head and spits on the floor in his direction.

I smile. "Erreur." 

I give her wrist a flick and I hear the bones break. She screams, a real scream this time, and her body goes into frenzy mode, damn near convulsing under me.

I snap out of my daze and look up from my drink as I hear her palm connect with his cheek. He recoils, brushes the wound with his fingertips as she storms out through the doors. A little crookedly, I should add.

I walk out of the bar into the night air, my blood still cooling. It's lighter now, maybe nine AM. I grab a map from a tourism rack, pull my luggage back over the fence, and set off down the street, following signs to a hotel. I find a cheap little place, barely more than a house, that doesn't document me, and pay in cash. I'm shown up a flight of stairs to a... quaint little room, with a bed on one wall and a toilet and bathtub against the other. The tub looks more comfortable than the bed. But I haven't slept in over thirty hours, so as soon as the hostess leaves the room, I lock the door behind her, hang sheets on the windows, and lay in the bed. I sigh. 

I'll only be here till tomorrow anyway. 

After I take a ???-hour nap, I'm delighted to see that there are still hours of daytime left. Good. 

Feeling refreshed, energized, and aggressively not followed, I exit my room and lock the door behind me, bringing only cash and the regional map along in my jacket pockets. After renting a bike, I ride around town and find a nifty general store. It ends up having everything I need: a shovel, a case of matches, and a bookbag. 

I leave town and bike through the forest trails, my mind weaving a route through what I remember of the area, cross-referenced with my memory of the map.

Rule Number Five: always memorize the map.

Eventually, after a good hour or so of biking through lush green forests and rolling hills, I make it to a particularly thick area of the forest and lay the bike down flat, roughly smattering leaves and twigs over it. It's less of an effective concealment measure than it is peace of mind for myself.

I thread the needle that is every pine forest and eventually I come to a rotting tree stump, about a foot and a half in diameter. I look up at the sky, orienting myself, and walk about ten steps North of the stump. 

I start digging. Eventually, I pull a suitcase out of the hole I've dug. It contains five items, all of extreme importance for getting me into high-security countries like Albania, China, North Korea. 

Russia.

After I pack everything I need into a bag, I burn everything I don't.

When I get back to the hotel room, I dump my luggage in the dumpster behind the building and take another nap before catching a cab to the Biarritz Pays Basque.

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I hate planes. Trapped in a big box, thousands of feet in the air, where I have no backup plan for anything that could go wrong. At least Air Marshalls don't have to wear raid jackets anymore; I got to leave that fucker to burn in Pyrenees.

I approach security confidently, as I have to. When comes my time, I flash the US Marshall badge and passport I don, laying my wallet, laptop bag, and new gun on the conveyor. I step through the x-ray as they examine my identification, and I'm soon on my way. 

Sitting between a 50-year-old woman and a young man who looks like his eyes might pop out, I feel the inertia of the plane gathering as we glide the runway. We take air, and I'm pulled against my seat. 

Eventually, the plane levels out, and we're cruising. 

A connecting flight in Turkey will take me to Moscow, where I'll hole up in a hotel room for a few days until my broker gets back to me. 

After that, I don't exactly know what I'm going to do about Lebedev yet. But we'll see.

Russia is an unpredictable place.