Far from the quiet cemetery where the funeral gradually faded into silence, another journey had already begun beneath the bright afternoon sky. Inside one of the police vehicles moving steadily through the neighboring city, the officer remained seated beside his assistant while rows of unfamiliar buildings drifted past the windows. Neither man spoke for several minutes. The only sounds inside the car came from the steady hum of the engine and the occasional rush of passing traffic outside. The officer observed the streets with patient concentration, studying every intersection and every neighborhood as though attempting to memorize the city itself before making his next move. Eventually the silence became too heavy for the assistant, who finally asked how much longer they intended to continue driving aimlessly through the roads. The officer listened without immediately answering, his attention remaining fixed outside until he finally explained that, for the moment, he simply wanted to study the city carefully before acting.
The explanation did little to satisfy the assistant. After another short silence, he spoke again, suggesting that instead of wasting valuable time driving without direction, they should begin asking local citizens whether they had seen the wanted doctor by showing them his photograph. The officer offered no immediate response, allowing the suggestion to linger between them while the assistant continued steering the vehicle deeper into the city. Several streets later, the assistant noticed two pedestrians walking together along the roadside footpath. Slowing the vehicle carefully, he brought the car alongside them until both pedestrians stopped, turning curiously toward the unexpected police vehicle. While the officer remained silent beside him, the assistant reached into a bag resting at his feet and searched through several documents before finally pulling out a photograph of the wanted doctor. Leaning partially through the open window, he prepared to speak before either pedestrian had the chance to ask why they had been stopped.
The two pedestrians had no idea that the police were searching for the same man one of them had already encountered only a few hours earlier. One was an elderly man, while beside him walked his young grandson. The old man immediately recognized the assistant's gesture inviting him closer to the vehicle and slowly approached the open window. Meanwhile, the officer quietly suggested they should simply continue driving instead of stopping random civilians, though something in the assistant's expression revealed that another idea had already formed inside his mind. Ignoring the suggestion without openly refusing it, he waited patiently until the elderly man reached the side of the car. Only then did he extend the photograph toward him and politely ask whether he had ever seen the man pictured there before.
The old man accepted the photograph carefully, but instead of answering immediately, he remained completely still. His brows narrowed as he examined the face in silence, slowly lifting the photograph closer to his eyes while comparing every visible feature against a memory that had not yet fully surfaced. His gaze shifted repeatedly between the photograph in his hands and the narrow street stretching away before him, where the wanted doctor had passed earlier that same morning. The hairstyle. The build. The posture. One by one the details settled into place inside his memory until certainty quietly replaced hesitation. After another thoughtful pause, he finally nodded twice before looking back toward the assistant. He explained that he had indeed seen someone who looked remarkably similar earlier that morning. The assistant immediately asked where the encounter had taken place, and without hesitation the old man simply raised his hand and pointed toward the narrow residential street standing directly ahead of them.
Both the assistant and the officer turned their attention toward the street the old man indicated. It appeared ordinary enough from the outside, lined with modest houses and quiet lanes that revealed nothing unusual to passing traffic. Having answered the question, the old man thanked neither of them, quietly returning the photograph before walking away with his grandson as though the conversation had never happened. The assistant, however, did not start the engine again. Instead, he remained seated exactly where the car had stopped, silently watching the entrance to the narrow street for several moments. Finally he reached for the walkie-talkie resting beside him and calmly instructed the remaining officers to gather at their current location immediately. His decision earned another quiet glance from the officer, who remarked that the assistant was repeating the same approach that had caused difficulties before. The assistant looked away toward the surrounding buildings before answering with measured confidence that they were merely studying the city, exactly as the officer himself had instructed earlier. With that brief exchange concluded, both men remained inside the parked vehicle, waiting quietly for the arrival of the rest of their team while the narrow street lay undisturbed before them, unaware that the search had just taken another decisive step closer to its target.