LACKING VIRTUES

by Thomas Kirkwood

  “Brava, Sophie!”

  “Let’s hope so. Steven, go out and buy the things the two of you will need to sneak into Michelet’s place in this weather. In the meantime, I’ll do what I would never have thought any person or situation could induce me to do. I’ll get your guns.”

  “We appreciate it,” Warner said.

  “All right, subject closed. Frank, you mentioned you had some prep work to do on your listening equipment. You can do that here while we’re away. Anything else?”

  “Food,” Steven said.

  Sophie said, “I’ll take care of that, too. Now, what about transportation? Did you rent a car, Frank?”

  “A Peugeot 305.”

  “Will that get you where you need to go, Steven?”

  “No way. We’ll have four of five miles of overgrown tractor path to cover, very secluded, very rough. It doesn’t look like it’s been used for decades. It narrows down to a couple feet where new trees have grown. There are holes all over the place you have to avoid. There were stretches I had to get off and walk even before this rain. We’ll have to take my Harley.”

  “That’s all right,” Warner said. “The point is to get there.” He glanced at his watch. “When do we need to leave?”

  “Noon,” Steven said. “I’d like to be in the basement before the search starts, not during.”

  Sophie said, “What about the possibility of arriving after the search? Have you thought of that, Steven? The way you described it, they came, rummaged around and left. Why be there when they are?”

  “I’ve thought about it, Sophie. There’s a reason we need to arrive early. Michelet comes during the search because he’s a suspicious bastard. Doesn’t even trust his own searchers. When they take off, he stays. If we wait to sneak in, it means we’ll have to cross his lawn with him on the premises sniffing in all directions.

  “There are these crows that go crazy when you pass their tree. The servants are deaf but Michelet isn’t. Besides, when you open the door to the cellar, lights come on automatically. If it’s dark outside, which it might be by six o’clock on a ugly day like today, the lights can be seen from the kitchen and that entire side of the house. Michelet and the deaf servants could be tipped off.

  “So I think it’s better to go early. They don’t really search the basement thoroughly – at least they didn’t on Wednesday. The dogs stayed up in the yard, and when the security people came down, all they could think about was Michelet’s wine cellar.”

  Warner said, “I don’t like this aspect of your planning. The basement wasn’t searched the last time. So what? The dogs stayed upstairs the last time. So what? These are hardly guarantees it will be the same this time. We have to be prepared for all contingencies before we take off. Otherwise we stand a good chance of crashing.”

  “Yeah, all right,” Steven said. “I was just feeling lucky, I guess, because I usually am. But I get your meaning, Frank. I just don’t see how we are going to come out on top if trained dogs come into the cellar. It seems to me our choice is to take a risk or lose everything.”

  “There are ways to deal with trained dogs,” Warner said. “If you had grown up where I did, you’d know a few tricks.”

  “Yeah?” This guy, thought Steven, was sounding more like an agent all the time.

  “Another thing. I’d like us to stay together while Sophie runs her errands. It’ll only take me minutes to check out the listening equipment. I have some purchases to make after that, and I’m going to need your help getting around the city. I speak German but not French. We better get moving. Do we meet here?”

  Sophie was already putting on her coat. She said, “My flat is near my contact and I can shop for your food in the square out front. It’s also on your way out of town. Steven has a key if you two finish up first. Why don’t we meet there?”

  “I’m not going near the place,” Steven said. “Michelet might have his castration force staked out by now.”

  Warner said, “I’ll go up alone. You can wait for me around the corner, Steven.”

  “Until then,” Sophie said.

  She started for the door. Steven tried to read her expression but her face was a mask. He thought she might be having second thoughts about the guns. He could understand why, given what she had seen in her lifetime.

  He hoped she didn’t change her mind. Warner’s talk about being prepared for all contingencies had made him more nervous than he already was. Going in there without a gun would be like showing up for Wimbledon without a racket.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  The Harley roared through the rain toward Fontainebleau, bearing two men, a dozen rats and an arsenal of Heckler and Koch automatic pistols. Warner, the passenger, wasn’t as miserable as he had expected to be. The boots and weather-proof paramilitary outfit he had bought in Paris kept him warm, the motorcycle helmet shielded him like a hunter’s blind from the dense pulse of life around him.

  He was tired, sure. He hadn’t slept for the past two nights. But he was accustomed to fatigue. And just being out of Washington after his most recent experience was exhilarating. A fine thought reached him through the cloud of anxiety over his renegade mission: maybe he was far enough beyond the politicians’ grasp to actually get something done.

  South of Paris, Steven turned off the autoroute in favor of a winding two-lane. There was no traffic. Pine forests stretched to the horizon, their gentle summits lost in the overcast. Stone farmhouses clustered around lonely crossroads. An ancient church steeple rose in the distance.

  Europe, he would never understand it. Why did this womb of art, science and religion produce so much madness? Wasn’t Hitler enough for one century? Being here always made him want to go home – not to Washington but to Nevada.

  They turned on to a smaller road, paved but badly potholed, and bounced over a railroad crossing. Not many miles later, the asphalt deteriorated into muddy gravel.

  Steven drove slowly, watching the trees to his left. He must have seen whatever he was looking for, because he suddenly guided the big bike off the road, over a board spanning a roily irrigation ditch and into a gap in the foliage. He gave Warner the thumbs up sign.

  Warner strained to see through his rain-streaked glare shield. This was it, he guessed, the tractor path they were looking for.

  A hundred yards into the dripping woods, they had to get off and walk the bike around an enormous puddle. After several minutes of good progress, they encountered mud thick as mortar. Steven stopped the bike. “We’d better go it on foot from here,” he said. “We’re only a half mile or so from where I parked before.”

  “Wise idea,” Warner said. “Let’s screw on the silencers. I’ll give you a quick shooting lesson.”

  Steven tapped him on the shoulder. “I don’t need a shooting lesson, Frank. I didn’t want to say any more about guns in front of Sophie.”

  “You’re comfortable with a nine millimeter automatic?”

  “Used it in my firearms course. I play a lot of tennis, so my hand-eye’s pretty good.”

  “Well, that’s a relief. We’d better split this baggage up. Mind carrying the rats?”

  “Hey, no problem. Rats don’t bother me. Those boys might be the defenders of my manhood.”

  Warner was too tense to laugh. He checked to make sure he had everything: the binoculars, the modified CVR, the tennis shoes and infrared camera. He helped Steven secure the Heckler and Koch in his breast holster without getting it wet, then slid the silencer into Steven’s pocket. He thumped him on the chest.

  At times, Warner found his partner boastful and annoying. But there could be no doubt about his physical condition. He felt like a granite wall.

  Warner strapped his own pistol in place while Steven talked to the rats he was fishing one by one out of the Harley’s luggage carriers. He placed them carefully in the fold-up wire cage they had bought at the pet shop.

  One rat got away and darted for cover. Steven snared it with a grab so quick it startled Warner. The hand-
eye remark was hardly an exaggeration. Maybe this kid wasn’t a boaster after all; maybe he just struck you that way because he was so disdainful of convention.

  No assumptions, Frank. The truth would reveal itself in the course of their work.

  They walked in silence through the forest, encapsulated by the foliage and the rain. Warner was drawn to Steven in spite of his doubts. That special camaraderie men feel when they fight a war together had begun to forge an emotional bond. This was good. If he was going to believe in himself and his mission, Warner needed to believe in the other half of his team.

  “Look a little to your left through those trees,” Steven said when the forest thinned.

  Warner pulled up beside him. “You mean the house?”

  “Yeah, that’s Michelet’s place. The servants’ cottage is just to the left, half hidden behind it. Can you pick up any indication of life with your field glasses?”

  Warner carefully surveyed the area. “Smoke. A few wisps.”

  “Where’s it coming from?”

  “The servants’ cottage.”

  “Nothing from the manor?”

  “Nothing.”

  “We’re in luck, Frank. It means they haven’t moved over to the main house yet.”

  “How does that follow? You said the heating system had been converted to natural gas, which means they have gas in the kitchen. A gas furnace and a gas oven don’t smoke.”

  “They have a gas oven in the kitchen, that’s true. Nicole showed it to me when we took our house tour. But these peasants have strong traditions. They still use the wood-burning oven from the last century, think it cooks better. Nicole says her father agrees with them. It smokes, Frank. I’ve got another piece of hard information for you. There is a gas furnace, but Michelet likes to use the fireplaces when it’s below sixty degrees and he’s entertaining. It’s one of his trademarks. It’s about fifty now. I guarantee there’s no one in the house. Let’s fly.”

  “All right, go.”

  They emerged from the woods, skirted the lily ponds, crossed the meadow. At the edge of the manicured lawn, they paused to take stock of the situation. No sign of life, not even a crow.

  They made a dash for the house and waited in the space between the hedges and the wall to catch their breath.

  So far so good. Steven had been right about the smoke.

  When they reached the cellar door they exchanged their muddy boots for the clean sneakers they carried in their packs. Steven opened the lock.

  “Okay,” he said, “when I pull this thing up, the lights come on. We want to get down in the hole and get the door shut on top of us as fast as we can. Ready?”

  “Ready,” Warner whispered.

  Steven gave a tug. The heavy metal plate swung open without a sound.

  Light hit Warner in the face, irritating light. He ignored it and slipped into the opening. Steven came behind him. When he closed the door, they were plunged into welcome darkness. Steven pulled out his flashlight and locked up.

  “Well, we’re here,” he said.

  “Good work. Give me a rat, would you?”

  “Coming up. I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  “I do. Hurry.”

  “Here’s a beauty,” Steven said. “Gray and fat with a hairless possum tail.”

  Warner took hold of the hideous creature. Its eyes glowed red in the beam of the flashlight. As they made their way down the old stone stairs, Warner occasionally touched it to the walls.

  Steven said, “These are Nazi dogs, man, German shepherds with a lot of training. I don’t think this is going to work.”

  Warner stopped at the bottom of the stairs. “Then you weren’t listening when I told you about my method of hunting coyotes when I was a kid. The dogs are going to smell us and that is not going to be a problem.” Warner glanced at the lighted dial of his watch. It was three o’clock. “Let’s get this done. We can talk about the merits of the plan later. Where’s the door by the furnace you were talking about?”

  “Follow me. I’m glad you’re confident.”

  They started through the labyrinthine basement. Warner kept one step behind Steven, who navigated the dim vaulted passageways with the cage of rats in one hand, a flashlight in the other. He couldn’t blame the kid for being skeptical. But Warner knew dogs from a childhood of hunting and a career of sifting through crash wreckage for everything from bodies to drugs. And he knew their masters even better. They were human beings, and human beings had an instinctual urge to make assumptions based upon the first thing they saw.

  So he wasn’t really counting on his ruse to trick the dogs; he was counting on that instinctual urge of humans, that critical weakness he found without exception in the trainees who came to work for him. It was too much to explain to his partner at a time like this.

  They circled the new furnace and passed by the great shadowy carcass of its coal-burning predecessor. Warner kept his rat busy, touching it here to the floor, there to a pipe or wall. Probably wasn’t necessary, he thought, but it couldn’t hurt.

  The beam of Steven’s flashlight scoured a pitted concrete wall and stopped on a rotting wooden door a hunchback couldn’t have gone through without stooping. “This is it, Frank.”

  Warner lifted the wooden lock bar and pushed on the door with his foot. It groaned and creaked as it swung open. “Give me some light in there,” he said.

  Steven crouched and directed the beam through the opening.

  Warner stuck his head in. There were pipes, old and new, cobwebs, and a hard earth floor rising at a sharp angle until it leveled off two feet from the ceiling. The rear quarter of the manor had been built without a proper basement. It was perfect. “Pass the cage, please.”

  “What’s in there?”

  “A crawl space. Made to order.” Warner tossed his rat into the darkness, then let all but two of the others go. He shut the door and lowered the bar. He took the next to the last rat out of the cage and placed it at his feet. He smiled as it scampered off toward the furnace.

  “Keeping one for company?” Steven asked.

  “That’s right.”

  “Do we hit the wine cellar now?”

  “First the vent. Wherever you go from now until the search is over, take a circuitous route. No direct lines from point A to point B.”

  “Got it.”

  They had been walking for less than a minute when Warner heard footsteps overhead. He stopped in his tracks.

  “It’s the servants,” Steven whispered. “Michelet sounds like an Angus.”

  “Where’s the vent? That needs to be confirmed.”

  “A to B?”

  “We’ve been weaving around long enough. Pick up the pace.”

  Steven twisted open the louvers. Warner peered nervously into the gray afternoon. Rain, fog, no cars, not a soul in sight. The footsteps echoed somewhere in the distance. He heard scraps of a gruff male voice.

  “That’s Henri,” Steven said. “He’s in the kitchen with his wife, cooking. These men you’re about to meet are gluttons. If they weren’t knocking down planes, you’d get the idea their goal was to eat themselves to death.”

  “All right. You’ve done your research well. Let’s set up.”

  “A to B?”

  “No, circuitous.”

  They walked the maze again. Steven stopped in front of a more attractive door, old but well maintained. Its heavy wood face was polished to a sheen and reinforced with hand-crafted ironwork. He fished out his keys, unlocked the door and reached around the jamb to turn on the light switch. “After you, Monsieur.”

  Warner stepped inside and suppressed his desire to whistle. Hundreds of crates and boxes lined the walls, stacked three to four high and three to four deep, separated by a few strategically placed aisles.

  A segment of one wall was set aside for special vintages. Here the bottles were not in crates but nestled horizontally in individual wooden cubby holes. A wire mesh gate with heavy locks protected the treasure. The cubby holes wer
e labeled. Warner didn’t know much about wine, but he couldn’t help notice vintages dating back to the war.

  He didn’t look up; the eye wasn’t naturally drawn that way. Steven had to direct his attention to the ceiling.

  The network of overhead heating ducts was complex. A dozen large-diameter pipes ran parallel to the center of the ceiling, then branched off in different groupings and at different angles. Amid the taping and elbow joints Warner, professional investigator, didn’t notice the small rectangular flaps Steven had cut in three of the ducts.

  He nodded his approval when Steven pointed them out, showing how the flaps could be pulled out for listening, then folded back in position to disguise their presence. “Excellent,” he whispered. “Now I’d like to prepare a hiding place behind the crates.”