by Gil Brewer
“The fool?”
Follet shrugged and said nothing.
“Then what now?”
“You meet me here. At a quarter after seven, good? Yes?”
Follet rose, uncrumpled his hat, put it on, and ground out his cigarette. “I will go. You wait five minutes. Then you go.”
Baron nodded.
Follet went on out and closed the door.
When the five minutes were up, Baron walked out into the café. The woman was behind the bar. She did not smile at Baron. He walked over to the bar.
“A beer, please.”
She drew the beer, inspected it in the failing late-afternoon light, and set it on the bar. He paid her. She rang it up, brought him his change. He drank the beer, and discovered to his immense surprise that it was absolutely excellent beer. The woman smiled at him now and he left. He felt somewhat better for the moment at least.
* * * *
He had never seen so many policemen. They converged on the blocks surrounding the alley leading to Gorssmann’s headquarters, and Baron sat tensely waiting beside Follet in the Fiat, until Follet would give the word to move in.
“In case anything goes wrong, you will have your own car,” Follet had said. “It would look peculiar if Gorssmann found you wandering around loose—if he got away.”
So, sitting in the car, Baron went over everything and tried to make himself believe that this was the right thing to do. Some of the excitement came through to him, and by the time Follet said, “We’ll go now,” he was ready.
There was something about it from the very beginning. The opaque silence as he followed Follet down the alley toward the corridor door seemed too quiet, the night a soft shroud that held a kind of impatience that worked its way into Baron. He wanted it over with. And when it was over with, he would go to Chevard and talk. He did not care whether Chevard could be understanding about it. He wanted to get it off his chest, free himself of the nearly deliberate anxiousness, because of deliberate falsehood.
“That the door?” Follet asked.
Baron nodded. “That’s it.”
Three other officers came from the other direction in the alley. Two were with Follet and Baron. One remained outside.
The door was open. Baron had told them about the Opel, but they were unable to locate the car. They moved down the corridor, through the still garden with the smell of jasmine thick in the night. When they finally reached the door that led to the rooms in which Gorssmann lived, Baron knew. He knew from the way things had happened. And he was right.
Nobody was there. The rooms were empty. Gorssmann had left.
“I was afraid of this,” Follet said.
Baron said nothing as Follet ordered his men back to headquarters. They would not be needed now. Baron walked through the rooms. All of the furniture had been left behind, but it seemed to have been swept with a vacuum cleaner. The place was immaculate.
“There won’t even be a fingerprint,” Follet said. He was obviously disgusted. Baron saw that he did not want to look him in the eye. The secret agent walked through the rooms, rubbing, looking, checking every crack, every drawer, every closet.
Baron sank into the chair beside the huge desk, the same chair he had sat in that night that seemed so very long ago. He pointed out the room in which Joseph had beaten him, and Follet frowned.
“You know what you have done?” Follet said.
Baron looked at him.
“You have ruined chances of any help from us. It took a great deal of argument to pull this off. Now it is finished.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Being sorry arranges the least of nothing, monsieur. I said I would play a fool. I have. I should have known better.”
“You think somebody tipped Gorssmann off?”
Follet shrugged. “It matters little. They have flown. We can do nothing now.”
“You’re a great goddamned help,” Baron said.
Follet looked at him.
“What the hell are you birds for, anyhow? What the hell good do you do, anyhow?”
“This is the last time I can help you, monsieur.”
“Fine.”
“But you had better achieve something soon, Baron—very soon.”
He felt the fear coming strong into him again.
“Don’t worry.” His voice rose then, and excitement took him as he told Follet what he was going to do, how he was going to rifle the safe at the plant, get the plans for the breather, because he felt certain that’s where they were. “I’m through fooling around.”
Follet pursed his lips. “As you wish.”
“You don’t like it?”
“It gives with the bad odor.”
Baron stood sharply. He stared at Follet. “Anyway, that’s it. And as soon as possible, with or without your help.” He turned and started across the room. He walked out past the Chinese screen that still stood by the doorway. Another door across the first room was open. He went over there and looked into a bedroom. He saw something beneath the bed, clothes, sticking out by one of the legs. He kicked the clothes with his foot, picked them up.
There was a skirt, a black coat, and a pair of dirty gray gloves. They were marked with the name of a shop in Atlanta, Georgia.
Holding the clothes, he knew they were Bette’s.
Whirling, he stalked into the other room. Follet was standing with his hand on the knob of the door leading into the corridor.
“Yes?” Follet said.
Baron shoved the handful of clothes under Follet’s nose.
“My daughter’s, see?” he said. “Look at them! Do you know what that means? Do you?” He wanted to hurl them in Follet’s face.
Follet looked at him for a few seconds. Then he turned and walked out of the door. Baron stood there in the room with the clothes in his hand and it was very quiet.
CHAPTER 17
Jeanne Chevard stood in the doorway and smiled at him.
“No, Paul hasn’t come home yet,” she said.
“Think he’s going to stay out there a while?”
She shrugged. “Maybe. Why don’t you come in?”
Jeanne was wearing a thin, dark blue dressing gown. She looked very appealing, and when she invited him to come in, she smiled in a way that troubled him. She stood that way at the door, too.
“Paul isn’t home much any more,” she said. She kept on looking at him that way. “Nights especially, he’s often gone until very late. Sometimes he doesn’t get home until morning.”
“Well.”
She stood there in the doorway with the light from inside the house shining through her hair and over her shoulders and through the dressing gown, too. He could see the full outline of her body through the gown. When she smiled he saw that her lips were wet, but she kept the gown closed. She wasn’t going to press anything. He knew she was lonesome. He didn’t blame her. He knew she loved Chevard, but she was just so damned lonesome.
“You don’t know when he’ll be back, then?”
She shook her head, never once taking her eyes from his. “Certainly, not for hours yet. I can tell you that for certain.”
They watched each other. The light shone in her hair.
“My daughter’s staying at a friend’s house tonight.”
“It wouldn’t be right,” he said. “I wouldn’t feel right.”
“All right.”
Maybe the excitement and the way the night had been and the way he felt had done it. He knew he should have turned and left the instant she said Paul was not there. She moved now, in the doorway, from one foot to the other, shifting her weight, and he saw that she wore absolutely nothing beneath the gown.
“It’s been a terribly long time since Paul has stayed around the house for more than a few hours,” she said. She kept on looking straight at him. “He isn’t like me, you see. I mean, there’s a difference. He’s wrapped up in his work.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re so damned noble,” she said. “Why do y
ou men have to be so damned noble?”
“I—”
“Forget it.”
“All right. I’d better be getting along.”
“You had damned well better. No, listen—it’s all right.” She smiled at him. “Say hello to Paul.”
“Sure.”
“I could fix you some coffee, Frank.”
They both laughed then, and it was all right. He waved his hand and turned away, and she closed the door.
Driving over the road to Cassis, he began to think about Patricia and how the way Jeanne had reminded him of Pat. He had been too busy, too. Only there was a difference. Jeanne would stick with Paul and everything would turn out all right. He knew that. She wasn’t the same as Patricia.
He remembered Graff. John Graff. A tall, broad-shouldered, blond roamer with a scar across his forehead that humped up like a pencil. Graff had been around before and during all the mess at the factories. He hadn’t realized until later that Graff was with Patricia every night he was away, and all of the days. He should have known. It must have been perfectly obvious to everybody. Graff was a smooth one, though. And when the trials came up, he disappeared. It was during that time, just before Patricia left, that she told him.
Somehow, he had not hit her. And anyway, what good would that have done? Graff was gone, and she didn’t care about that, either. And she got Bette, anyway. There was nothing he could do about any of it. And all the time he had been on friendly terms with John Graff.
He lived in a hotel then. But he had returned to the big house one afternoon and the shades were all pulled, the air smelled close, and the sun shone yellow through the shades with the dust motes crawling in the beams of sunlight, and he walked from room to room, picturing them in his mind because he couldn’t help it, and that same night he had tried to find Graff. He failed. Graff was gone.
“Mr. Graff gave me a present, see, Dad?” Bette had said the day before. It was a brooch, a gold brooch studded with fine stones, and Bette was crazy about it.
“Yes?”
“Isn’t it lovely?”
And he had asked to see it. Something uncontrollable took hold of him and he dropped the brooch to the floor, there in the hallway on the terrazzo floor, and smashed it with his heel. Bette stared at him, maybe a little wild.
He told her he was sorry. He would get her another brooch just like it.
“It’s all right, Dad,” she said. “I think I know.”
And she turned and left and came back and looked at him and said, “It’s because of that night Mr. Graff stayed in the guest room, isn’t it?”
He hadn’t known about that, either. He hated the way Bette wised up to things. She had a mind that snapped out and caught at everything very quickly. “Yes,” she said. “Patricia”—Bette always called her Patricia when she was mad about something—”took him a tray. She told me they were going to talk and play cards. She never came to bed that night. I know because I checked twice and I thought I heard her crying in the guest room, only now I know what it was.”
“Run along, Bette.”
And a week later he was putting on one of his shoes and he saw something sparkle. It was a ruby jammed into the leather heel of his shoe. He remembered sitting there on the edge of the bed, staring at the ruby in the leather. Patricia and Bette had already left town and he was due on the witness stand that day.
* * * *
Lucinda and Georgette were not in the outer office. Baron walked past the wooden barrier and the door leading to Chevard’s office was open. He stood there a moment, looking in, and Chevard was seated at his desk, looking at some papers in a large folder.
Chevard looked up and saw him and grinned. Then he frowned down at the papers, and Baron stepped quickly into the office and stood there.
“What brings you?”
“Stopped by your place and Jeanne said you were out here. I’m feeling some better. Thought I’d take a run out, for something to do.” He was lying like all hell. He was beat. He was starved. He hadn’t eaten a thing all day and had not had a moment’s rest.
“I see.”
“Sure.”
Only, he thought, you don’t see at all, you poor fool. And you’d better damn well get home right now. Or maybe you had better wait. Your wife might be out someplace for a time.
Chevard looked dead tired. His eyes were red-rimmed hollow sockets, with the pupils glaring.
The door leading into the room where the safe was was open. Baron noticed, without actually looking, that the guard was in there, seated on a chair. The door to the safe was open and his mind began working, planning it all even without consciously thinking it.
He had the feeling the papers on Chevard’s desk were the papers he wanted. He began to tremble down inside, standing there, and Chevard was plenty nervous about something. It was too quiet and he did not know quite what to do. He wanted to sit down, but he could not move from in front of Chevard’s desk.
Then Chevard rose. Baron could see that the papers were blueprints and his heart rocked.
“Jeanne all right?” Chevard said. He edged around to the side of the desk and tried to shove some books over the folder. Then he must have thought better of it and Baron knew Chevard was fighting it out with himself as to whether or not he should tell him about the breather. It was very plain and Baron began to feel sorry for the man again. Chevard’s eyes kept snapping up at him with the excitement in them, and Chevard wanted to tell him about that breather. He had to tell him. Because he trusted him, only he wasn’t supposed to say anything, only he had to, and Baron began not to feel sorry for him. He tried to summon hate.
“You didn’t answer me,” Chevard said.
“She’s fine. She looked lonely, though.”
“Suppose so. Well, I can’t help it.” He kept looking from the folder to Baron, then to the folder again. Then he made some kind of decision and he picked up the folder.
Baron knew what he was going to do. It had been in the back of his mind all along, about the safe. If the papers were kept in the safe, then how in hell was he ever to get it open? Because the combination would be memorized—by Chevard and possibly a couple of others. He didn’t have the time to find out who the others were, and he knew what he was going to do—what he had to do.
It had to be timed exactly right and it could fail miserably and easily, but right now it was his only chance. He already knew that tomorrow was going to be the day, too.
“Just a moment,” Chevard said. He dropped the folder in a large envelope, tightened a string clasp, glanced at Baron, and walked into the other room.
Baron knew he was meant to wait here, where he was. He didn’t. That was part of the plan. Disconcertion. He followed Chevard into the other room.
The guard stood up and looked at them.
Baron saw Chevard’s shoulders tighten as he realized Baron was in the room, too. It was nothing, really, because they were friends. But just the same, it bothered him, and Baron was beginning now to understand just exactly how important those papers were.
The guard did nothing. He was young, with a blunt face; a stolid man who would be difficult to push.
Chevard put the papers in the safe, straightened, and closed the door with one hand touching the dial on the front of the safe. All he had to do was twirl that knob once, and Baron knew the thing would be in the soup worse than ever.
He spoke quickly in the silence, praying and with the perspiration streaming down inside his shirt and beading across his hairline.
He struck straight at what Chevard was thinking about, knowing it was the best psychological jar. The safe door was closed, Chevard’s hand was a finger’s breadth from the knob.
“That where you keep your skeletons?”
Chevard snapped erect, looking sideways at him. The hand came away from the door.
“Good Lord,” Baron said. “I didn’t mean to scare you, Paul!”
The guard’s leather creaked and Baron began talking in a steady stream. He felt
that if Chevard moved toward that knob now, he would jump him.
He told him he was sorry he had startled him, talking steadily, standing close to Chevard. “The way you began creeping around here when I came in, it’s sure something, Paul,” he said. “Listen,” he said. He reached out and took hold of Chevard’s arm, then dropped his hand. “I need a drink and you look like you could use one. Keep anything around?”
He grinned at Chevard, and, turning, winked at the guard. The guard grinned back.
“Come on,” he said, reaching out and rapping Chevard lightly on the shoulder. “You must have a bottle stashed away somewhere. Remember Paris, during the war? You had bottles in every room in the house. Say, remember that night we took the case of cognac to the Follies?”
Chevard grinned. “I sure do.”
“Well, come on. You got anything?”
Chevard snapped his fingers, moved toward the other office. “By God, I could use a drink,” he said. “I haven’t had a drink in days.”
Baron followed him into the office. He did not look at the guard now. He could hardly see. His head thrummed and thumped like a kettledrum.
For the moment, the safe was open. He knew it. All you’d have to do would be to turn the handle and pull.
They sat there in the office and drank two thirds of a liter of cognac. After five drinks, Chevard began talking about the breather, and Baron sat there by the desk and cursed himself for the worst kind of heel. The brandy had grabbed hold of Chevard like a steel clamp. The man was dead tired, exhausted, and with the first drink his eyes had glazed and his mouth twisted and he was licked. He talked all right for a time, sitting there behind the desk, pouring the cognac into a couple of inkwells. He had emptied the ink into the wastebasket and cleaned the glass receptacles with paper. They didn’t hold too much, but they served.
The guard in the other room kept watching them, but Baron knew better than to offer him a drink. Pretty soon the guard could no longer stand it. He came over and silently closed the door and Baron began to feel safe.
He did not think about what he had to do tomorrow. He wished he had the nerve to do it tonight. It would take more than a bottle of cognac, though. A hell of a lot more.