Author's Note: The songs in the story are not mine - I translated and re- worked some "street" songs popular in the Soviet Union in the 1950s and 60s.

Would you know the dog from the wolf? You may look at his paw,
Comparing the claw and the pad; you may measure his stride,
You may handle his coat and his ears; you may study his jaw;
And yet what you seek is not found in his bones or his hide,
For between the Dog and the Wolf there is only the Law.

- Poul Anderson

„As for me, I still have many visits to make,
So draw your curtains, so check your latches!"

Only through sheer willpower did Valjean manage to set his glass carefully down onto the table and avoid spilling wine in his lap.

„You may think you are safe with your doorman and dog
You may think leaving lights on will keep you;
But I've already taken a print of your lock..."

The singing was coming from behind a wooden support beam about three tables away. Thick plumes of tobacco smoke and turned down lanterns veiled much of the goings-on around him, but Valjean found that if he skewed his eyes enough to the right, he could observe two men sitting under the fly-dotted portrait of Jean de La Fontaine near the bar; or rather, he could observe the back of one man and the profile of the other. The one who sat with his back to Valjean was bent over a plate and had two wine-bottles standing in front of him. The other one sat on the high, narrow steps leading to a locked door, probably the entrance to the provisions cellar, and sang in a playful, but low voice, punctuating some sentences with aggressive guitar chords.

"Shaking branches were all that you saw and you heard,
From your bed, where you prayed, wept, and trembled..."

The deep, guttural timbre of the singer's voice was unmistakable. Valjean felt that he was going mad. The desire to turn his head and confirm the terrible truth was overwhelming, but Valjean called to power all of his self-control and remained as he was. In his head, a piece of nonsense rolled around like a pebble in a clay jug: one person more, one person less, one person more, one person less.

Ten paces behind him sat Javert.

Ten paces behind him sat Javert, and he was singing a thief song.

Valjean's mind flashed back to the article in the Moniteur. Body found under a boat. Irreproachable public servant. A writing left behind at the station on Place du Chatelet. A fit of mental aberration and suicide. So why was this irreproachable suicide singing thief lore in a guinguette near the Fontainebleau barriere?

Javert's voice barely carried over the near-deafening clamour and chatter; Valjean had to strain to hear the words. Every so often, a mug would get slammed against the table somewhere to the side, showering a company with beer, or roars of savage laughter would tear out of several tobacco-scraped gullets at once and cover for a few moments all other sounds. Waitresses bustled between tables, constantly blocking the singer and his companion from Valjean's furtive observation.

The song was ended with two forceful chords. Apparently, the final notes finally won the attention of Javert's pie-eyed neighbours: there were a few shouts of appreciation and someone's unsteady hand reached toward Javert with a glass. Javert accepted with a smile and took a small, polite sip. His companion must've said something to him, because Javert looked up at him and nodded into the glass. After setting the unfinished wine onto the low table, he lowered his head and began to re-tune the guitar with swift, precise motions. The process took a surprisingly long time: the strings must've been of poor quality. Having finished, Javert tossed his head, shaking long, loose hair out of his eyes, and set to singing another well-known tune, this time a melancholic one:

"Such is the fate and fortune of a thief;
One wants a plain and finds a wall instead;
Though we part forevermore with freedom,
Even then our brother never hangs his head."

Valjean had heard the song previously, both in the galleys of Toulon and in the naval prisons of Brest. If a new man was introduced to a cell, and the group felt reluctant to accept him, they would wait to voice their concerns until he sang something. One can tell a lot about a man by the songs he sings under duress. This was one of the songs almost guaranteed to win respect from the old-timers, provided it was sung with the appropriate intonations and accents. Javert sang it perfectly. His "a's" were drawled, his "o's" were muted, and the emphasis was correctly misplaced in the important words. There was even a hint of slightly hysterical sarcasm behind the lines, which only served to enhance the illusion that the singer was, as the thieves said, fresh from the "hospital" and recovering from a long "illness."

"It may be that life prepares a quietus for me;
A ray of sun streaks the sky but rarely.
Darling, crows are useless to a trapper;
Only nightingales and finches sit in cages."

This time the surrounding tables were quieter during the rendition and paid the singer far more attention at its end, fairly deafening Valjean with applause and whistles. Javert inclined his head modestly, but the attention seemed to please him, because suddenly he stood up from the stairs - Valjean felt his insides congeal into a ball of ice – and shifted to a high stool near the bar, making himself more visible to the public. Applause and hoots of encouragement started up in the farther tables as well. Someone shouted a single, hoarse oath and then a word Valjean did not understand: "Davay!"(1)

Javert, who was once again busy re-tuning his guitar, calmly responded with a phrase in the same language. Companies from several tables burst into uproarious laughter, the loudmouthed customer among them.

Careful not move too suddenly and not to make any noise, lest he attract Javert's gaze, Valjean pushed his chair back until he was sitting at the table closest to the wall. The man behind it paid no heed to his new companion. He sat there with his stubbly chin in his hands and grinned around a still-smoking pipe, watching Javert fiddle with the instrument.

"Nice voice he has," noted Valjean, feeling the waters cautiously.

The smoker said nothing but raised his thick, black eyebrows and tightened his mouth in a grimace indicating assent.

Valjean waited patiently to see if anything more informative was forthcoming. But apparently, his interlocutor felt that he explained his feelings with sufficient clarity and offered nothing else.

The situation was saved by a waitress, who approached Valjean's old table with a bottle of wine and a plate of cheese and bread and paused, looking around for her customer. Valjean signaled to her to bring his order to the new table and slipped her a silver coin. The waitress curtsied silently and left, tucking the coin into a small pocket on her stained apron.

"Your health," offered Valjean to his neighbour, filling up the glass in front of him.

"Thank you, dear sir," suddenly said the neighbour, tipping the rest of the bottle into his own glass. "Yes, a toast is definitely in order."

"Oh?" only offered Valjean innocently, holding the glass near his mouth.

The man turned to him and chuckled.

"Your health!"

They drank.

"How long have you been with the Surete?" asked the man, wiping his mouth.

"Not long," lied Valjean smoothly. "To be honest, I don't even know what the occasion is."

"Ah, so they sent you a plain one as well."

The man reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a familiar cream card with printed black lettering.

Valjean squinted, then pulled out the card he himself received in the post two days earlier and put it on the table next to the man's. The two cards were identical, save for one detail: the hand-written number in the top right hand corner of Valjean's card read "24," while the stranger's read "17."

"I heard they sent gold-embossed ones to the veterans," said the man with apparent envy. Valjean once again looked over the cards. Both gave the address of the place, date, and direction to come "between eight and nine in the evening."

He stretched out his hand and asked, "May I?"

"By all means," allowed the stranger with a broad hand gesture.

Valjean turned both cards over. The strange emblem on the back was also the same: a heater shield with an elegant silhouette of a howling wolf and below it the device "Melius in umbra pugnabimus."

Valjean sat back in his chair and glanced once more at Javert, who appeared to be deep in conversation with some barrel-chested brunette dressed in the tan jacket of a river-docks strongman on holiday. The brunette kept leaning down close to whisper into Javert's ear, and each time Javert tossed his head back and laughed, flashing his even white teeth.

"What is your guess?" asked Valjean, hoping the stranger would bite this time.

The man shrugged. "I think they probably finalized the decision. Otherwise why bring so many in at once?"

Valjean heaved a mental groan of frustration. Outwardly he nodded casual assent and reached for the bottle again.

1) – lit. "Give it!" (i.e. "Let's go!") (Russian).