Schultz pushed the visitor’s hand down into the grease and held it there. Again Kohler took in the lark’s glimmer of madness. The cook was either looking for praise or sadistically impressed with what they could do. Their power, their stealth … the rape of the seas. ‘What happens to them when a depth charge hits you?’ he asked, just to put the bastard off. One had to do things like that sometimes.
The glimmer vanished. ‘They don’t usually explode, if that is what you are wondering. Sometimes they simply fall out of their cradles and crush a few torpedo hands.’
Borne on railway trucks of their own, the eels were hoisted up and tilted front end down so as to slide in the torpedo hatches. Each torpedo bore a label from the Trials Command along the shores of the Baltic, giving its idiosyncrasies of deviation on test firing.
‘The Dollmaker likes to get in close, Herr Kohler. No more than 500 metres for that one. The Bullet shoots from the maximum range of 5,000 metres and that, my friend from the Gestapo, is why the Lion prefers our Dollmaker.’
‘Let’s find Ali Baba’s Cave and work us out a deal. There are at least three others who might have killed that shopkeeper. Your boy wasn’t the only one.’
‘Then wipe your hands and smile sweetly at the Herr Oberleutnant, the Baron von Stadler, our First Officer. He’s the one who likes to see that uninvited detectives get dirty.’
‘What’s his nickname?’
‘Shit to some, when behind his back, Jesus at all other times because of his beard and piercing blue eyes, and because of his godly manner, especially after eight weeks at sea.’
‘He doesn’t like your cooking?’
Was it so puzzling? ‘No, he doesn’t. Now stop trying to have the last word. That always belongs to the cook. Even you should know a thing like that!’
Death’s-head’s laughter turned several female eyes and brought their smiles and catcalls, a popular man.
A dealer in the black market, swore Kohler inwardly. The son of a bitch has been selling stores on the side and getting all the ass he wants.
*
The city’s morgue was overcrowded. Draped with bloodied, bomb-ravaged white sheeting, old bits of sail canvas, plum-purple curtains, a woman’s red dress – whatever had come to hand – casualties from the raid all but covered the cold concrete floor.
Alone, at the back beside the ice storage vaults, the body of le Trocquer lay on its upraised pallet beneath a clean white sheet that had been drawn away to expose his battered head.
He was naked, of course, and the crude stitching of the coroner’s incision would not be pleasant.
A cinematographer at heart, St-Cyr let a breath escape slowly as he waited for the Sous-Préfet to bring the autopsy report. ‘Hermann couldn’t have stood this,’ he murmured to himself but aloud since no one else would hear. ‘He’d have thought of his sons and of all the dead he had ever witnessed.’
The smell always took a bit of getting used to. For one who prided himself on his sense of smell, it was not offensive, ah no. Merely unpleasant.
The paltry contents of le Trocquer’s pockets lay in a cardboard tray that had seen years of use and was stained with blood and other things.
‘One dirty handkerchief,’ he muttered softly. ‘One black comb with six teeth missing – did he try to use them as toothpicks?’ Identity papers and ration tickets – one wallet containing fifty-seven fanned out francs and twenty-five sous in change. A deer-horn pocket-knife, not very good, two elastic bands, an eraser … a lipstick, a compact and a small vial of cheap perfume …
A door opened, and the noise of it, crashing through the tomblike silence, startled him so that he looked up suddenly and only just stopped himself from saying anything.
Looking very tragic in a black-and-white polka dot cloche that was worn well down over her left brow, Paulette le Trocquer paused. Large silver ear-rings dangled. The thick blonde hair was brushed out into masses of soft curls. The black turtle-neck sweater, whose silver-and-rhinestone choker could just be seen beneath the black overcoat with the upturned collar, would cling to her.
There would be a broad belt with a large bright buckle of some sort and a tightly fitting, dangerously short skirt. Silk stockings too – ah, they were so scarce these days one hardly ever saw them any more – and, yes, black high-heeled leather shoes with criss-crosses and anklets of rhinestones and leather.
She swallowed tightly and lost the blush of colour in her fair cheeks. The red lips quivered, her chest filled. ‘Is … is this the right place? Is … is that him?’
A nod would suffice and he gave it curtly. Then he watched as she picked her way delicately towards him and he thought… Ah Nom de Dieu, what did he think? Only the Germans could have coined a word for it. The Germans … She is like a Leichengaengerin, a woman who walks over the corpses of her own making.
So many of them were there and she so tightly skirted, her progress was difficult. She looked down at each shrouded figure. She hesitated several times as if puzzled as to who the victim really was. Then, at last, she stood beside him at the foot of the pallet, now green beneath the dusky eyeshadow and the soft brush of beautiful eyebrows.
‘Mademoiselle, did Préfet Kerjean order you to come here to identify your father’s body?’
Perhaps she did not hear him, perhaps she was thinking back to childhood days and those bright moments that hung like ornaments on the tree of one’s life.
Unbidden, the china-blue eyes dropped to the cardboard tray. ‘Can I take those?’ she asked, a whisper. ‘They’re mine. He can keep the perfume. I won’t be needing it any more. I’ll have far better.’
Fastidiously her black-gloved hand found the lipstick and the compact. He hated to tell her she couldn’t have them just yet, though he found a vindictive pleasure in doing so.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said and gazed fully at him. ‘Mother couldn’t come, could she, so I had to. Someone had to. It might just as well be me. It’s always me.’
Kerjean should have accompanied her. Had the Préfet made her do it as a warning, a way of forcing her to keep silent?
It was a thought most troubling to him.
Hesitantly the girl ran her eyes over the shroud and only at the last forced herself to study her father’s head and the terrible wound that, because he lay face up, was only partly exposed.
‘Why is his mouth open like that? Why are the eyes? He had bad teeth. Even garlic couldn’t hide the stink of his halitosis.’
‘Tell me something, mademoiselle,’ he said quietly and, tossing a look the Sous-Préfet’s way, cautioned that one to stay put for a moment. ‘Where was your father on the day before his death?’
The 31st of December, last Thursday … ‘At the shop. It’s a busy time, isn’t it, the last day of the year? The Germans always buy things they’ve forgotten to send home. Maybe it’s guilt that causes them to remember their loved ones.’
‘Did he sell any of the dolls?’
Ah, the dolls, was that it? ‘One doll in particular, Inspector? A doll whose head was then broken?’
‘Please just answer the question.’
‘Ten of the dolls were sold. Ten! There, does that help you? All to Germans from the army and the U-boats and other things. All had to be parcelled up for the postmistress, yes? I ought to know. He made me do it. They donated the paper.’
‘And he didn’t pay you, did he?’
‘He didn’t even give me pocket money. I’d only waste it on things like those.’
She indicated the lipstick and the perfume the father had obviously confiscated.
‘What else did the men buy?’
‘China ashtrays – one had a dog mounting another. Does that tell you anything?’
‘Please, we need your help. Don’t ever taunt a police officer, not if you plan a life on the streets.’
‘I don’t. I’m too good for that. I’ve better things in mind but it’s interesting you should think me suitable.’
St-Cyr sighed sadly. ‘I don’
t, mademoiselle. For myself, I think you worthy of far more, especially now as you are so close to freedom.’
‘Monsieur Charbonneau and his daughter came to the shop. I saw them looking in the window.’
‘What did they buy?’
A doll – was this what he thought? Hah! she’d make him beg for it.
‘Mademoiselle …?’
That look of his was not cruel, but so searching it would uncover secrets she could not let him have. ‘Some green glass candlesticks the child wanted. A gift for her stepmother.’
His interest intensified. She could see the nostrils of that robust nose pinch themselves, and noted that the hairs were a little darker than those of his moustache.
‘Did you serve them?’ he asked, and she knew he was trouble and vehemently shook her head.
‘I came downstairs to see my father tucking the candlesticks into Monsieur Charbonneau’s rucksack.’
‘But … but you have just said you saw them looking in the window?’
‘Mother had to be seen to. He,’ she indicated the corpse, ‘wanted me out of the way so,’ she shrugged, ‘I went up to her even though it wasn’t time.’
But you did not stay, he said to himself as he studied her and asked, What was going through that mind of hers? What infamy had she really been up to if any? ‘And the child?’ he asked suddenly.
Her smile was brief. ‘She was watching my father do so, that’s all, Inspector. She was very cautious and silent as most girls are of that age, isn’t that so?’
Nom de Jésus-Christ, what was she hiding? ‘I think there is more to it, mademoiselle. Angélique Charbonneau would have seen Herr Kaestner’s dolls on display. Had she a doll of her own?’
So it was back to the dolls, was it? She’d be serious with him and would frown. Yes … yes, that would be best! ‘I … I don’t know. I don’t think so. She’s a little too old for dolls, isn’t she?’
‘Too intelligent perhaps but then … ah then, mademoiselle, age and intelligence do not always coincide and one can still welcome the comfort of friends.’
‘And that child has none of them?’
‘None.’
‘Does she play with her dolls – is this what you are thinking? Dolls the Kapitän Kaestner had made for her? Dolls of her mother, her stepmother and her father, perhaps? The Dollmaker could have used photographs of the dead mother, couldn’t he?’
The attempt had been desperate, the truth still hidden. ‘The doll I want was neither of those but something the Captain did not make.’
‘Then I can’t help you, can I?’
There was nothing he could do to ensure caution. With some it was useless to try. They had to discover everything for themselves. ‘Take care of yourself mademoiselle. I may want to talk to you again.’
She would give him a moment more to see if he remembered the briefcase and wanted to ask her about it. She would study him as he had studied her, stripping away not the layers of clothing but those of the mind. She would smile briefly and extend the hand of friendship just in case. ‘Au revoir, Inspector. Auf Wiedersehen.’
The Sous-Préfet’s comment was terse as they watched her pick her way among the corpses. ‘That girl is trouble. I would not be at all surprised if she not only knew where the money was but counted it before bed.’
‘Don’t tar the child with the sins of the father – this is something I am presently telling myself. No child can be totally blamed for the loss of innocence, yet all lose it, some far sooner than others.’
Unsettled by the all too evident sadness in the Chief Inspector’s voice, le Troadec handed him the report.
He handed it right back. ‘You tell me, please. For the moment my eyes are not what they should be and I am too lazy to find my glasses.’
Understandingly the Sous-Préfet nodded. ‘Chocolate in the stomach. Candied cherries too, and cognac or brandy – enough alcohol in the blood to make him more belligerent than usual, which is saying something.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Yes. Black bread and smoked sausage. Pork most probably. No sawdust, and whole peppercorns, both white and black.’
‘U-boat food.’
It was not a question but a statement of fact, the Chief Inspector gazing off towards the door through which the girl had disappeared. ‘Someone from the crew must have visited him,’ said the Sous-Préfet. ‘The cook perhaps.’
‘Good! I’ll be in touch. Excuse me, you’ve been most helpful.’
He ran. Nimbly, as the soccer forward he had once been, the Chief Inspector reached the door and darted after the girl.
She was waiting for the bus amid the ruins where dazed and grief-stricken stragglers till wandered and the firemen were coiling their hoses. She was not happy to see him coming towards her with such determination …
‘The customers that came to the shop before your father left to take the bus, mademoiselle?’
She would hunch her shoulders forward and draw her neck in a little deeper so that her collar would push her hair up a bit. It had been most wise to listen to her intuition – she must always remember to do so and never deny it. She was glad she had decided to head home instead of going to see someone. Yes, she had listened to the warnings of her innermost self.
‘Mademoiselle …?’
The line-up for the bus was long and doubled. Several were taking notice and the detective had realized he should not have spoken out but he had had to know.
So she would tell him and tell them. Yes she would! ‘Don’t you remember, Inspector? My father had locked me in my little cage in the cellar so as to punish me. He liked to think of me in there as his prisoner.’
Ah damn her! ‘For what, please, were you being punished? For playing around with the enemy?’
A slip of the tongue, was it, Inspector? Beware the snake who listens then, beware the gossips in a little place like Quiberon. ‘The Germans may be your enemy, Chief Inspector St-Cyr from the Paris Sûreté, but they are not mine. Now, please, the autobus is negotiating the destruction given us by Mr Winston Churchill and the bombers of the British Royal Air Force. Unless you wish to stand in its way, I … why, I think you had better leave.’
‘For what reason did he lock you up, mademoiselle?’
Was it so important to him? ‘For things both he and my mother imagined.’
The smoked sausage had been good, the beer perfect and the black bread and Edam cheese added treats. Ali Baba’s Cave had turned out to be a brand-new concrete bunker some five kilometres to the west of Lorient on the outskirts of a small village. There had been tonnes of stores. Far more than enough for a little criminal to indulge himself.
But the warehouse had had another advantage. It was but a nice little walk to the clay pits and Schultz had logged himself into the warehouse on the morning of the murder: 1000 hours bang on and ready.
Kohler drew on his cigarette, one of many he had so recently acquired. He leaned the newly requisitioned Freikorps bicycle against the stone wall beside the road, and took time out to enjoy the day.
Death’s-head Schultz had been in his element. Surrounded by ramparts of tinned ham, pickled beef, peas, beans, chicken stew, tomatoes, plum jam, et cetera, et cetera, with whole smoked hams and sides of bacon hanging above among the rounds and coils of sausage, the son of a bitch had held court over a keg of fresh eggs that in Paris would have brought 200 francs a piece.
Four tins of Dutch pipe tobacco resided in a rucksack, along with six hundred cigarettes, eighteen bars of Swiss chocolate, thirty of soap, four towels, two face cloths, six handkerchiefs, eight pairs of socks and two litres of Russian vodka just to remind him of his sons, Hans and Jurgen Kohler.
‘But have I been had?’ he asked himself. ‘Ah Gott im Himmel, Louis, your partner who prides himself in getting the best of every deal is not so sure this time.’
Louis was still in Lorient, for all he knew, so the confession was safe from prying ears that would remember and recall it six months from now if necessary.
Schultz had played the usual game of distraction. ‘Flash’ cards of pretty Breton girls had been turned over as in a game of poker, some naked and in unusual and awkward poses, others half-naked and doing things no girl should let herself be photographed doing, others chaste and clothed and caught with sudden uncertainty in their eyes.
But none of them had been the shopkeeper’s daughter yet the clay pits were so near.
He wished he could see the autopsy report on the father; he had a feeling it would turn up something.
The deal had been set at a split of 33 to 67. Schultz had not been forthcoming about the Dollmaker, Baumann or any of the others of the crew. Indeed, his only derogatory comment had been about their First Officer, and even on the Baron von Stadler he had clammed up.
‘They’re special,’ he had said with that grin of his. ‘What one does for another, all do. We stick together because we must. We let the mould grow over us at sea and we brush it off our bread until the loaf is too soggy and the mould too deep to eat.’
When the sun came out, Kohler lifted his face to it and thought briefly of home and of the boys. He smelled the pinewoods, the perfume of new sawdust and that of wood-smoke at night. He heard the cows in the barn at milking, the horses as the plough broke the heavy clay. He felt the earth and squeezed a handful so hard, it was as if he was really there.
Then he got on the bicycle and headed down the long arm of the estuary to Kernével and Doenitz’s former command post in the requisitioned villa of a sardine merchant.
When he found her, Elizabeth Krüger was hard at work typing a report into one of two Siemens Geheimschreiber T-52 teleprinters.
To Befehlshaber der Unterseeboot Doenitz, 18 avenue du Maréchal Maunoury, Paris …
How nice. Looking right over the Bois de Boulogne.
‘Herr Kohler, you … you should not be here. It is top secret, yes? No one without the proper authority is to be allowed in this room.’
She smelled nicely, of soap, hot water and clean woman. ‘Not even if he’s from the Gestapo and on a special mission for Herr Mueller in Berlin?’
‘Get out! Please go to my office. The Kapitän zur See Freisen has not yet returned from the Keroman bunkers. There is … is coffee. Please ask Herr Gruber, the orderly, to provide you with some.’
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