Mayhem (14 page)

‘Just tell us the time, Émile. Don't kibitz.'

‘So, okay, nine, maybe ten hours.'

‘That would put the time of death at between 5 and 6 a.m.,' said Cartier, the Préfet of Fontainebleau. ‘A dawn killing. It's typical of them.'

‘The dawn comes a little later, Commissioner,' commented St-Cyr drily. ‘We're almost at the winter solstice.'

Ah, Mon Dieu, the Sûreté … such big words … ‘the winter solstice', as if the killing had been some sacred rite.

‘You want an autopsy done?' asked Dandelin.

Kohler roared, ‘We already know what killed her, doc. There's no need to examine the contents of the chicken's stomach!'

‘She's a girl, a person …' began St-Cyr, only to shut up, shrug briefly and give an apologetic smile.

Hermé Thibault arrived, all arms and legs and gun-shy. Real lightning today. Two of the flics were delegated to hold a tarpaulin over him and the box camera on its tripod. In spite of the protection, he fussed, dropped things, forgot to wind the film, and in the end St-Cyr cornered him. ‘So, where is that negative, my friend?' he asked.

Thibault's eyes darted away. ‘The Resistance …'

‘What do you mean, the Resistance …?'

‘They came. They smashed all our billboards – my backdrops – and cut off my wife's hair. She …'

‘She
what
?' demanded St-Cyr. Hermann was watching them.

‘They asked if we knew the names of any collaborators in important positions and she gave them that negative of you and him.'

‘Thanks … thanks a lot, my friend!' swore St-Cyr. As if they didn't have enough trouble already!

To make it a full house, Talbotte, the Préfet of Paris, arrived in a fresh downpour. A man of around sixty, square of build and of medium height, he had Basque blood in him somewhere, the swift, hard eyes of a gangster and a voice that carried.

Everyone present knew why he had come. The Île-de-France
*
was his turf and the Sûreté had the rest of the country to forage.

Barging through the assembly, he strode up to the corpse, took one look around, then snorted, ‘As they say at the track, St-Cyr, step into the shit and let us get on with the race.'

‘We only wanted the time of death and a few photographs for Berlin,' offered Kohler, enjoying himself.

The Préfet scoffed. ‘Since when would Berlin be interested in such a death?'

‘That's what we'd like to answer,' offered St-Cyr evenly.

‘You'd like to answer,' mimicked Talbotte, clucking his tongue. ‘Well suck lemons, my old one. This little thing is ours.'

‘Come on, Louis,' urged Kohler. ‘We'll let the brass sort it out.'

‘Me, I am the
brass
, my friend,' challenged Talbotte.

Then he asked the one question no one had asked. ‘Who notified you of the killing?'

It was Beauchamp, the Préfet of Barbizon, who answered, ‘A woman, Commissioner. By telephone, this morning at about eleven o'clock.'

‘From where?' demanded Talbotte.

‘From the Jardin des Lapins Petits, that little restaurant in the woods on the outskirts of Arbonne.'

‘Half-way between Fontainebleau town and Milly-la-Forêt,' said St-Cyr. ‘Perhaps four kilometres to the north of us, Hermann. A little more by road.'

‘How did she sound?' asked Talbotte. ‘Distressed?' he all but shouted.

‘Ah yes, Monsieur the Commissioner. Very distressed.'

‘And her name?'

The Préfet of Barbizon was apologetic. ‘She gave none – she refused to do so when asked.'

‘Then go to that restaurant and find out, idiot! St-Cyr, leave it. I'm warning you. This little pigeon is ours.'

‘Then put her to bed beside the other one in your morgue, Commissioner, and tag her toe with the name Yvette Noel.'

He and Kohler had reached the clearing before Talbotte caught up with them, and it was obvious from the delay that the Commissioner wanted a word in private.

‘So, my friends, what's really going on, eh?'

You ingratiating bastard, thought St-Cyr. ‘We only wish we knew, Commissioner. Berlin
are
very interested.'

Talbotte threw a level gaze at the two of them, relishing the moment. ‘As are the General Oberg and his deputy at number 72, the avenue Foch.'

‘The Sicherheitsdienst,' swore Kohler. The Secret Service of the SS.

‘Everyone, it seems,' said St-Cyr, casting a woeful eye towards the heavens. Even God.

The Jardin des Lapins Petits looked out over a piece of woods whose naked branches were drenched by the downpour and the rising ground fog of evening.

‘A typical December night in these parts,' said Kohler airily. ‘Not a legal day for brandy. Therefore we are allowed the
vin ordinaire
, the red also, and a single cup of the Führer's ersatz best.'

The wine was sour.

‘You're the people that made it possible,' countered St-Cyr tartly. His overcoat was strung across the backs of three chairs and still dripped quantities on the floor.

‘Vienna was nice,' muttered Kohler, referring to the Anschluss, when he had been among the first into that city. Cakes and ale and cream like he'd never seen before. ‘So my little friend, what do we do? Go back to Paris to face the music?'

‘Use your charm and find out if it really was our chanteuse who made that telephone call from here.'

‘And you?' snorted Kholer. He was in rare form. Soaked through.

‘Me, I will continue with a reading I should have completed some time ago. Namely …' He held up Gabrielle Arcuri's little notebook.

‘Oh, that thing,' muttered Kohler. ‘It'll tell you, Louis, the Gorge of the Archers was one of their rendezvous.'

‘“12th July, 1942 – met at the Gorge of the Archers, in the turn-around.” So, in the car,' said St-Cyr.

‘Nice, eh? Laying that gorgeous stack of woman in a car.'

‘Perhaps. But there is no time given, Hermann. Now if we flip forward, my friend, there is an entry for 22nd November – one of the girls might remember if they stopped here, eh? “Arrived at the Gorge of the Archers and took the footpath up into the woods. Waited from 2.30 p.m. until 3.30 p.m. Sat in the car and talked until 5.10 p.m., after which, drove back to Paris.”'

St-Cyr lifted his bushy eyebrows. ‘A talk, Hermann. About what? I wonder. Sex in the car, eh? Or a certain pouch of diamonds?'

‘I'll go and forage the local pulchritude.'

‘We're not staying here tonight. We've a trip that has to be taken, Hermann, so don't get any ideas.'

‘Paris?' he asked, only to see St-Cyr shake his head.

‘The Loire, my friend, guided hopefully by the sketch of a child.'

‘You think she's next then?'

‘Certainly. Why else the telephone call from here?'

Kohler shrugged. ‘Maybe our girl got tired of her maid – did you ever think of that?'

‘Or the Resistance did, Hermann, but me, I think she's on the run.'

More he wouldn't say but went back to his browsing. The gun in her bureau drawer: its hasty and careless hiding implied a sense of urgency and panic that had begun – and this was important – before they'd left for the club last night. So, Gabrielle Arcuri and her maid had known trouble was on its way. The police, yes, because of the boy's murder, but trouble from another source as well.

But, and this was important also, they hadn't gone back to the apartment after the club had closed at dawn.

The maid had by then been dragged, screaming from a car, and executed in a most vile and brutal fashion.

A girl of … what? he asked. Sensitivity – ah, but of course, such eyes … such tragedy in them … Tears falling over the photograph of the boy she had killed.

A girl who had worn argyle stockings of grey and blue to match the plain blue skirt and shoes …

Brown … the girl had been wearing browns at the club. He was certain of it. She must have gone somewhere afterwards or changed at the club, but why? To look her best? To meet a lover? It didn't make any sense, but she had changed her clothes, had spruced herself up only to be dragged …

‘
13 July/42 – Fontainebleau Woods, the pond. Spent the afternoon sunbathing. Went swimming twice. Drank champagne. After the chase, there is resignation and acceptance
.'

Puzzled by the last line, St-Cyr flipped back to the sequence that began with two days at the château on 18th June, and then went through a quick run of places: Marseilles on 27th June, Lyon on the 28th, Nevers on the 29th, Orleans on the 30th, Tours on 1st July, and finally Angers on the 2nd.

And then, a meeting in a very public place – the Galeries Lafayette at 4.17 p.m. on 7th July, in Paris.

Clearly the pursued had made a run for it after those two days at the château. Marseilles had been followed by a race down the Loire as if to escape the liaison perhaps or to… what? he asked himself.

To taunt the pursuer?

Why else the meeting in the Galeries Lafayette in full view of thousands unless the pursued had wanted witnesses to what was going on and had decided to prove a point? To say nothing of having avoided all the checkpoints and controls, the need for passes that the war's restrictions imposed.

But who was the pursued, who the pursuer, and who … ah, yes, the observer?

The writer of this little diary? The blackmailer – was that it?

‘It was our girl, all right,' said Kohler gruffly. ‘The manager remembers her, and not just from this morning, from before.'

‘So?' asked St-Cyr, pocketing the notebook.

‘So, he remembers she met a certain general here and that they had lunch at this very table.'

‘That doesn't tell us much.'

‘It wasn't meant to. He's gun-shy, Louis, and in bed with a snake.'

‘Then we will leave him on ice, eh, and head south. Pouilly-sur-Loire, I think. The child's sketch shows five stone towers to the château and a maze in which there is, yet again, another small tower.'

‘What about our reports?'

‘They'll be a day late, I think, Hermann. Frankly, let's let them all trip over each other while we sort out the truth.'

‘The Arcuri woman was in tears, Louis.'

‘A mirage can have many faces, Hermann.'

‘You talk as if you'd been in the Foreign Legion.'

‘Was our general with Rommel, do you think?' asked St-Cyr suddenly.

It was a thought for which they had no answer. ‘A library then,' swore Kohler. ‘Louis, find me a municipal library – the bigger, the better.'

‘Let's try the one in Fontainebleau. We can get a reasonable meal at the Auberge de la Reine de Soleil.'

At a quarter to six Kohler strode up the front steps to Fontainebleau's municipal library, appearing shortly afterwards with two heavily burdened, badly frightened clerks, one chief librarian – still complaining and demanding that it wasn't their fault – and several stacks of magazines.

‘
Verboten
!' thundered Kohler. ‘Confiscated. Be thankful we don't shut you down.'

The magazines were piled into the back seat. Kohler flung his cigarette away before slamming the car door and hitting the gas.

‘We'll have dinner on the Loire,' he roared. ‘That'll have to suit, Louis.'

Air … we need air.

As they headed out of town, St-Cyr reached into the back seat. It was heaped with copies of Hitler's picture magazine,
Signal
.

‘Now we're going to get serious,' snorted Kohler.

Suddenly he stopped the car and said, ‘Remove the black-out tape, my friend.'

The road leapt before them. Fortunately there were no other cars and, in all the 150 kilometres, but one motorized patrol of three Wehrmacht trucks that didn't bother to pursue them.

The Auberge of the Miller's Second Son was in a converted sixteenth-century grist mill on the outskirts of Pouilly-sur-Loire. One could hear the constant trickle of water over the wheel while gazing raptly at ancient beams, hanging copper pots and paniers, sheaves of drying herbs, and a roaring fire in a giant stone hearth.

‘You're full of surprises, Louis,' said Kohler, beaming appreciatively.

Few patrons were about – some Wehrmacht officers who kept to themselves, a party of locals, who did the same.

Lanterns instead of candles or electric lights. Dumpling farm girls with rosy cheeks and roly-poly chests who waited on the tables and were given to giggling when tossed the proper eye.

‘A family business,' said St-Cyr dreamily. ‘The salt pork with lentils to your liking?'

‘Too much,' sighed the Bavarian. ‘That sausage and red cabbage …'

‘
And
the pâté, the bread, the green salad,
and
the leek-and-potato soup. If one strained credulity, Hermann, it's almost as it was before the war.'

The
coq au vin
had been superb.

‘You ever bring Marianne here?'

‘Twice, yes. Our honeymoon – Pharand gave me three days off then – and once after the birth of our son.'

‘Steiner's a louse, Louis. I'll fix it for you.'

‘Don't do me any favours. She'll come back when it's over and me, I'll take her back.'

‘You're not really worried about the Resistance getting your number, are you? That negative …'

The wine, a Pouilly-Fumé, was a truly remarkable vintage whose spicy flavour he had always found to his taste. A gunflint wine, though not of a gun or of flints, he had said to Marianne that first time.

‘A wine so named, Hermann, because the Sauvignon grape is called
le fumé
. When ripe, it acquires a gunsmoke bloom.'

‘End of travelogue. I asked about Thibault's negative and your number with the Resistance of Melun.'

‘That we must wait and see, Hermann, but yes, I, Jean-Louis St-Cyr of the Sûreté, do take the threat most seriously.'