The Institut

LaRochelle, France: 1938: "Gently," Inspector Edmund Defont ordered the body to be cut down. Those who did not know him would suspect he feared he might hurt the dead girl—or wake her. The two policemen who worked silently under his command knew his sole intent was to preserve the crime scene. Thus, begins Edmond Defont's police investigation into the nightmares of David Proust, a young, affable priest who dreams and women die. When Defont's prime suspect and best friend both disappear in the middle of the night, his search takes him to the Institut d'Infantiles: an ancient Roman fortress in the middle of the Carpathian Mountains in the wilds of Poland: a place that conceals the mysteries of centuries.