Dollmaker (24 page)

She placed them between his hands. ‘I will make us some tea. Camomile, I think. I can't sleep. I am so worried Yvon will … will do something stupid out there or catch pneumonia. I've taken a couple of blankets up to Angélique. She'll be warm enough. You needn't worry.'

‘You've always been very kind to her.'

‘It's what a mother does, isn't that so? Besides, every time I see her, Angélique reminds me of Adèle and of my sister.'

Her eyes pleaded with him for compassion, and to tell her what the girl had said but he could not yield. She hadn't liked his going through the scrapbooks. No, of course not. When one hides, one must be so careful.

‘The palm of your left hand, madame? A moment, please.' He got up quickly and turned towards her. ‘It has been recently hurt?'

‘It … it was only a scratch. A few simple stitches – didn't Angélique tell you about them?'

He shook his head. ‘She told me about the ones you had sewn in your husband's hand on the evening of the day of the murder. The palm … the ham of the thumb and a deep puncture. One much bigger than your own and still quite swollen.'

‘Yes … why, yes. I'm getting rather good at mending people. It's what I do best these days, isn't that so? At least it is what I try to do best.'

If tapped, he felt she would shatter. Moisture had collected in her eyes. She fought to stop herself from breaking down and only succeeded through a supreme effort of will he had to admire.

‘I'll make the tea, shall I?' she said.

He could not punish her by asking any more. ‘Please go into the kitchen, madame. I will join you in a moment.'

On the night of 9th/10th November 1938, black-shirted and brown-shirted Nazi hoodlums had ransacked property throughout the Reich. Burning, looting, raping and arresting. Smashing so many windows, the sound of breaking glass could still be heard by all those of conscience.

For a visitor such as herself it must have been an especially terrifying experience. Some said over twenty thousand had been arrested without cause on that one night alone. Innocent people taken from their homes and beaten in the streets. Looting, arson and murder. It had gone on for a week.

All border crossings had been sealed. Her passport and visa would have been left with the hotel's management. She, like so many, would not have known what was about to happen. They might even have had to drive through the streets.

When St-Cyr rejoined her, Hélène Charbonneau was standing in front of the stove with the kettle still in her hand. She could not speak or even turn to look at him. She could only bow her head and let the tears fall freely knowing that they, too, would betray her.

On the 16th of July 1942 in Paris alone, twelve thousand Jews had been rounded up. Others had quickly followed. They had poured in from all over the Occupied Zone. Now perhaps as many as forty thousand had been arrested. It was a number one could not yet put a finger on or completely comprehend the tragedy. Most didn't want to think about it. Subsequently they had all been deported, even the youngest of children and separated from the parents. He had had no part in it. He had been out of touch on a case with Hermann, though he could not have done much except resign and go with them, yet he still felt guilty at not having done a thing. He had since taken steps to gather evidence against the perpetrators, particularly the Préfet of Paris, a dangerous thing especially as Talbotte now knew of it. A last case, a left fist that had exploded under the Préfet of Paris's jaw when it should have minded its own business. A case of missing persons, of fourteen girls whose only crime had been a desire to become mannequins.

The blitzkrieg, the isolation of the Breton coast and marriage to Yvon Charbonneau had saved her but only for the moment. She would have lived each day never knowing if and when she would be discovered. Never knowing when they would come for her.

‘Madame, please. Your secret is safe with me. I will do everything I can to keep it hidden, no matter the outcome of this investigation.'

‘It won't be enough. Not after what Angélique did to me. Not after what has happened.'

‘Please tell me before it is too late.'

She slammed the kettle down. ‘I can't! I won't! I mustn't!
You're
the detective.
You
figure out what happened.'

Ah
merde
, she had burned both her hands. She still had one of them on the stove.

‘
Paulette … Paulette …
' she cried. ‘Dear God, why did she have to do it to us? Why could she not have seen that Angélique was so unhappy?'

There was still no sign of the Captain and his keepers. A vocalist named Bonnie Baker was belting out a song called ‘Oh Johnny', and the Bar of the Mermaid's Three Sisters was jumping. It was slosh time.

Kohler found another cigarette and lit up. He'd take four more of the Benzedrine and that was it. They didn't mix too well with alcohol.

Still ravishing in her tight black skirt and turtle-neck sweater, Paulette le Trocquer was dancing with one of the boys from U-297. Though a little tipsy, she wasn't so far gone her eyes didn't seek him out at the bar for reassurance.

‘She's wary and that's good,' he grunted and tossed down the pills.

Bleary-eyed ratings, their middy-collars stained and rumpled, thought of home, slept sprawled over their tables or wantonly ogled the girls and threw lewd asides to their pals.

Several fights had broken out. When there were so few girls to go around, what else was there to do? No one had been seriously hurt but sailors were sailors. Beer flowed and was spilled. Brandy and wine, the rougher the better, were downed as well with no thought of the day to come. The rush to the heads was constant. There were line-ups, distractions in there, much ribald laughter and encouragement. Ah what the hell.

He felt like a grandfather on duty.

One torpedoman, caught in the clasp of his girlfriend, had hiked her skirt and slip up her backside to show his pals that the painted stockings on her legs stopped at generously firm thighs. No secret now. She was too drunk to notice the whistles and catcalls until, entangled in her underpants, she took a swing at her boyfriend and hit the floor. Puke all over the place and wallowing in it, she got up slowly, teetered and dashed for the toilets.

They gave her the run and they crowded in after her. Everyone heard the cheers.

‘
Anblasten!
' (Blow tanks!)

‘
Boot steht!
' (Boat steady!)

‘
Boot steight langsam!
' (Boat slowly rising!)

And then, as the song came to an end and couples looked towards the heads, ‘
Folgen!
' (Track!) ‘
Feuerlaubnis!
' (Permission to fire!)

‘
Rhor Los!
' (Launch!) There was a huge cry from the men in there and then, in chorus, ‘
Eins! Zwei! Drei!
' (One! Two! Three!)

Pale and shaken, the shopkeeper's daughter took the bar stool next to him and sipped his beer. ‘They are pigs,' she swore. ‘Oh
mon Dieu
, what am I to do?'

‘Stick with me, I think.'

One by one the Captain's keepers began to filter back into the party. They came via the front entrance and there were six of them. Baumann … the boy, Erich Fromm … the Second Engineer… and three others. Tough …
Verdammt!
were they the flotilla's champions? They did not sit together but lost themselves among the tables.

The cook was the last to arrive and he stayed nearest the entrance, leaning against the wall in darkness like a petulant shadow.

‘Wait here,' said Kohler. ‘A friend has just arrived.'

Taller and bigger than most, the detective headed straight across the dance floor and she watched with dismay as he dodged fluidly among the couples until, at last, he had reached the cook.

‘Death's-head,' she whispered distastefully, ‘you are not the reason I am here, idiot! The Leutnant zur See Huber has left me to take the telegraphist Elizabeth Krüger back to base, the Ensign Becker is sick. You can have your stockings back. I don't want them.'

Gone were the promises of better things. When Herr Kohler's beer was done, she asked for brandy and kept it near, for it would sting the eyes and she wasn't going to give them what they wanted.

8

It was now perhaps three in the morning. The Chief Inspector was very worried. As he carefully spread antiseptic cream over the strips of gauze for her burns, Hélène Charbonneau could see that his mind, though concentrating on the task, was rapidly fitting the pieces of the murder together and leaping ahead to their inevitable conclusion.

At a sound – a loose shutter upstairs – he stopped so suddenly she felt the instant of alarm. He relaxed. He said, ‘I had best go and close it, madame. A moment, please.' It would only shatter the window-panes if left – she knew this was why he hurried away.

‘He thinks I will remember
Kristallnacht
. He is conscious of my feelings and afraid I might panic'

A roll of gauze, a pair of scissors, a lighted candle on the kitchen table between them, and one already bandaged hand later, she had told him nothing further. He had not pushed. He had only been kind and was therefore a very difficult adversary. ‘He will uncover the truth,' she said sadly, and reaching out, held her bandaged hand just above the candle flame. ‘Yahweh, I was never yours. As a family, my grandparents and parents had put You from us. I really didn't think much about it – I was away at school so much and just like the others. But now You have come to reclaim us. It isn't fair. Angélique never suspected it of me before Adèle was killed because the matter never came up. My maiden name wasn't even Jewish because my grandfather had changed it. But of course it was all there in the records and of course I had to have help in hiding.'

She took the hand away from the flame and examined the gauze for scorch marks. Finding none, she said more loudly, for she knew he had come back, ‘Victor helped us with the records and the marriage certificates. He's a good man, Inspector. Oh for sure his son came to place impossible demands on him but, please, Victor did not mean to do what he did and you must spare him so that he can continue to help others.'

Sacré nom de nom
, was she accusing Kerjean of the murder or only of the theft?

The Chief Inspector went over to the sink to wash his hands and dry them. Without a word, he sat down and began to dress her other hand. So great was his concentration, he did not meet the look in her eyes until the job was done. ‘Three weeks, perhaps four,' he said. ‘The dressings should be changed … ah, let's say twice each day. More if you get them wet or dirty. Angélique will have to help you. She's really very capable.'

There wouldn't be time and he knew it too, but would go on as if there would be out of kindness. ‘I should have told her the truth about myself, Inspector. That might have helped. I … I really don't know. These days everything is so uncertain, so tenuous. Children can be made to tell others. The Captain and she were often alone discussing things. He was teaching her everything he knew about dollmaking, he was teaching her to identify the various types of bisque. He …'

‘Did Herr Kaestner ever suspect it?'

‘Never. I took steps to see that he didn't. I had to, isn't that so? When Johann first became interested in me, I kept my distance for as long as I dared but he was too persistent and would not take no for an answer. A man like that never does. Yvon had left me completely alone and it was obvious I was worried about my husband and not knowing what to do about it.'

‘Please, I know it must have been very difficult for you.'

‘Oh? Do you really understand how it was, how I felt when he kissed me, when he put his hands on my body – my nakedness, Inspector? I could not cringe. I could not in any way let him know how I really felt. I learned to cry inside.'

Ah
nom de Jésus-Christ
! ‘How long has the affair been going on?'

Her eyes leapt. ‘The affair – is that what you would call it?'

Rebuked, he waited. He did not answer. ‘For over a year and a half I and my little family of two have had to live with it, myself hiding always in the arms of the enemy. There, does that make you feel any better?'

‘Of course not. Is Kaestner a Nazi?'

‘What do you think?'

She would have to be told how serious things were. ‘I believe he must have been a good Nazi at first – even one of the hardliners – but now he has become very disillusioned. Like so many of our German friends, the Reich's mounting losses are causing them to have second thoughts. This does not mean, madame, that honour if slighted cannot be reclaimed. Herr Kaestner is much revered by his men. In their eyes their chances of survival without him are zero; with him, but a little better perhaps, or as Herr Baumann feels, not at all, since nothing for that one can now prevent the inevitable.'

‘Johann is tormented by nightmares of failure, of dying encased in steel at the bottom of the sea, but when awake, he is the most totally alert man I have ever met. I sometimes used to wonder if he ever slept. Then when he did, I found out and had to stop him from screaming.'

Angélique would have seen them in bed together, perhaps even naked. ‘Did he take a snapshot of you with him?'

‘To pin up in that cubicle he calls his “cabin”?'

‘You know that is what I mean and why I must ask it.'

There was no place to pin up anything in a submarine but he would have taken it out now and then. The men would all have seen it and commented amongst themselves. ‘He had snapshots of myself and Angélique with him always, and yes, I think he was very much in love with me if ever such a man can truly love anyone. He wanted me to leave Yvon. He used to plan what it would be like for us after the war and I had to listen to it. Sometimes naked on the beach and with only the sun above us and the gentle sound of lapping waves; sometimes in bed with the softness of a breeze blowing among the curtains and the sound of gulls crying. He wasn't going to go home right away, Inspector. We would live here for a time and in Paris while he built up the business. We would have everything just like it had been for his grandfather in the old days. It was a fantasy that terrified because if it ever came true, I could never have lived it, and because I knew increasingly that he was using it to hide his very worst of fears.'