She had an idea. “Turn the car around.”
“I told you, it’s no good. I don’t know where he is.”
“But I know someone who might.”
#
Gabriela pounded on the door to Alfonse’s flat. There was no answer. She pounded harder. “Alfonse!”
The stress and pressure of the last several hours was catching up to her. Had Alfonse and Christine been in the lounge when Hoekman led her out? She couldn't remember. Had the Gestapo already come to arrest them?
At last the door cracked. Alfonse peered past the chain. “Oh, Gaby. It’s you. I wasn’t expecting you to spend the night.”
“Can you let me in? We’ve got to talk.”
“The thing is, I’m, uhm, kind of busy at the moment. You were gone with Helmut and then I heard you’d left the lounge and. . .well, I didn’t know.”
There was enough light spilling through the crack that she could see he wore the silk robe he preferred when he played the sophisticated seducer. No doubt Christine was in the bedroom in some state of undress.
“I don’t have time for this, Alfonse. Let me in. Hurry up.”
“Who’s that man with you?”
“He works for Helmut.”
“I can’t right now. Why don’t you come back in the morning. We can talk over coffee. By then I’ll be feeling better. I’ve got this terrible headache.”
“Dammit, Alfonse, I know Christine’s in there. There’s no need to pretend. Just open the door.”
“Please, don’t be jealous. You’ve been gone a couple of days and she—well, I couldn’t resist. You know how I get.”
“Jealous? Don’t be an ass.”
“You’re not angry?”
“Of course I’m not angry, just open the goddamn door. I need your help. It’s an emergency.”
He shut the door and she thought he’d given up arguing and locked her out, but then she heard him fumbling with the chain and he opened up. He sighed and gave an exaggerated wave of the arm to indicate that they enter.
“Thank you,” she said with a note of sarcasm. “I’d hate to be any bother.”
“I let you in, didn’t I?” He looked at David with a frown. “Wait, it’s the Jew? You brought Helmut’s Jew here?”
“So what?”
“I don’t hate Jews, I don’t care, really. But if the Gestapo sees. . .”
“The Gestapo is on its way already.”
“What?”
Christine came into the hallway from further back in the flat. She wore one of Alfonse’s heavy cotton bathrobes. It hung open at the neck, showing most of her breasts. She glanced from Gabriela to David Mayer, and the corners of her mouth quirked.
“Glad to see you’re still alive, Gaby. You keep playing with Colonel Hoekman, I’m surprised every time you surface.”
“Never mind that,” Alfonse said. “What’s this business about the Gestapo?”
“There was trouble at the Egyptienne. They arrested Helmut’s friend. He’s under interrogation now. They’ll be hunting down Helmut as soon as they get some information.”
“Oh, god.”
“And then they’re coming here.”
“But I don’t have anything to do with that.” Alfonse sounded almost frantic.
“I knew it,” Christine said. “I knew Helmut was involved in something. He was too pure to be believed. So what is it? What’s his crime?”
“He’s an enemy of the Reich. Undermining the war effort.”
“Zut,” Christine said.
“My god, he is?” Alfonse asked. “I should have known. Always going on about helping people, it was all a front. Why would they come for me? Someone’s got to tell Hoekman I had nothing to do with this. My god, someone’s got to tell him.”
“Don’t worry, dear,” Christine said. She put a hand on his shoulder. “Paris is full of people who can vouch that you’re not involved in anything but yourself.”
Alfonse shrugged her hand away. “But where the hell is Helmut? He’s got to tell them, they’ve got to hear it from him. Now, before they arrest him, while he’ll still be believed.”
“That’s what you need to tell us,” Gabriela said. “You have to help us find him.”
Alfonse shook his head. “I don’t know, I have no way of finding out. Please, all of you just go, I don’t want to get involved. I’ve got to make a phone call.”
“It’s too late for that. It’s not just Helmut, all of us in this room are in danger.”
“No, I don’t believe it. All of you go. Please, for god’s sake.”
“What happened to the man who defended me on the Boulevard Saint Michel?” Gabriela asked.
“That was different.”
“Right, it was just a zazou. Easy enough to beat up some kid. But if there’s real danger, Alfonse is nowhere to be found.”
“It’s the Gestapo. There’s nothing I can do.”
“I was this close to killing him, Alfonse. If not for goddamn French collaborators, Hoekman would be dead. Now why are you scared?”
“Why am I scared? It’s the Gestapo. The Gestapo.”
“Alfonse, listen to yourself.” Christine said. There was an element of disgust in her voice. “Be a man and do something. We’re two whores and a Jew. If we can stand up to Colonel Hoekman, so can you.”
“You’re wasting your time,” Mayer said. “Come on, both of you. Let’s get out of here and leave this coward to the Gestapo. Maybe his friends in Berlin can save him.”
“Oh, come on, that’s not fair.” Alfonse licked his lips. “What can I do anyway?”
“You can tell us how to find Helmut,” Gabriela said.
“I already told you, I don’t know.”
“You have an idea, you have to.”
He looked back and forth between Gabriela, Christine, and Mayer. “He’s not at his flat?”
“No, but he’s somewhere in the city,” Gabriela said. “Waiting for a shipment.”
She explained what she knew, how the shipment had to be small enough to fit in a small truck or the trunk of a car.
“There’s a place Helmut goes to pick up packages,” Alfonse said. “A little warehouse in the Fifteenth Arrondissement. I once saw a truck pull up and a man go in with a large satchel and come out empty-handed. I later saw the same satchel in the back seat of Helmut’s car, but empty. I’m guessing it was fake papers for his workers, that sort of business. The thing about this place is that it has a private garage, big enough for three, four cars. It’s an excellent place to take a small shipment because nobody can see what you’re loading or unloading.”
“That sounds exactly right,” Gabriela said. “Can you show us how to get there?”
“If I do, will you promise I’ll never see any of you again?”
“With pleasure.”
Chapter Twenty-seven:
Helmut was not pleased to see Gabriela, Mayer, Christine, and Alfonse arrive at the warehouse. Alfonse, especially, was a bad sign. And the look of terror on his face made it instantly clear that something had gone horribly wrong.
He listened with growing alarm as Gabriela gave a summary of what had happened at the Egyptienne. Hoekman alive, barely wounded. Gemeiner taken captive. Thank God Gabriela was alive and free; other than that, the operation had been an unmitigated disaster.
“So why did you come here?” he asked when she finished.
“To warn you,” Gabriela said. “And you need our help. You’ll never get out of the city alone.”
“Out of the question. You’re going with David to Geneva and that’s final.”
“No, I’m not. I’m going to help.”
“I don’t need help. I’ve loaded the truck and I’m ready to go.”
The driver of the first truck had helped him move the boxes without comment, then driven off. All he had left to do was clean up a few incriminating papers here in the office and then he’d have been gone. Five more minutes. And then captured at the first checkpoint he reached, based on what he�
��d just heard from Gabriela.
“There were police in the streets, already,” she said. “I’ll bet every Gestapo agent in the city is awake and looking for you. How many in Paris?”
“Dozens,” Helmut said. “Add to that probably hundreds of informers. Plus the police, the milice, the Franc-gardes. Even those laughable junior fascists. They’ll be out looking for us.”
“You won’t be laughing when JPF kicks in your face,” Alfonse said. He sat at a desk in the corner, smoking and muttering to himself, none of his traditional bravado. It occurred to Helmut that he was the sort of officer who, when caught in a surprise attack, would cringe in the foxhole while his men begged for leadership, until finally the position was overrun and everyone killed.
David Mayer kept guard in the front room of the safe house, peering through the windows. The cars and the panel truck sat in the garage, out of sight. There was a back alley where they could slip out without emerging onto the main street. Unless the Gestapo surrounded the entire block, of course. If Gemeiner were alive, and under torture, it would only be a matter of time until they found him.
“It’s going to be a hell of a chance getting out of Paris,” Helmut said.
“I know the streets,” Christine said. “I’ve lived in Paris long enough, I could practically drive a taxi. I can get us out of here.”
“No, forget it.” He paced the room. “And you’re sure? Gemeiner is alive?”
“He was an hour ago,” Gabriela said.
“I can’t believe it. After all of that, you’d think he’d have that cyanide capsule pinched between his teeth where it could do some good. Not in his pocket.”
“It’s not his fault,” Gabriela said. “Just bad luck having Franc-gardes on a mission to impress the boches. Gemeiner wasn’t expecting trouble.”
“Of course not.” He forced himself to remain calm. “Nobody is. That’s why you carry the goddamned capsules, it’s a contingency.”
“There’s nothing we can do about it now.”
“No.”
“What does he know?” Gabriela asked. “Everything?”
“Thank god, no. I got a sealed envelope from the man who helped me load the shipment in the truck. From our Vichy contact. Gemeiner doesn’t know his name.”
It had seemed a needless complication earlier, but now Helmut was glad for the precaution.
“But that’s the only good news,” he added. “He can find this place, or close enough for the Gestapo to finish the job.”
“Any chance he can stand up to torture?” she asked.
Helmut considered. “For a little while, maybe. He’s no coward and he lived through the trenches in the last war. POW camp for eleven months. Who knows what the Russians put him through? But Hoekman can be persuasive. Sooner, rather than later, he’ll talk.”
“Do you have extra cyanide capsules? One for each of us?”
“Forget about it,” Alfonse said. “ I’m not taking a goddamned capsule.”
“Nobody expects you to,” Helmut said. “We expect you to babble everything you know in the first five seconds of interrogation.”
“Interrogation? Hell, no. I’m going back to Germany. I’ve got friends who can protect me.”
“Sure they can, Alf.”
“You’ll see, I’ll come out of this just fine.”
“But I need one,” Gabriela said. She closed her eyes as if remembering something terrible. Her father, no doubt, and that angry scar across his forehead. When she opened her eyes, she looked resolute. “He’s not getting me. I won’t be taken.”
“Me, either,” Christine said. She looked pale. There was a tremble at her lip that somehow made her look more brave, rather than less.
“Come on, think this through,” Helmut told them. “I can get a third ticket for Geneva. You’ll be safe from the Gestapo there.”
David Mayer popped in from the front room. “Time’s almost up, boss. A suspicious car swung by here twice. How long until they start beating down doors?”
Alfonse ground his cigarette in the ashtray and rose to his feet. “That’s enough for me. Open that back door so I can get my car out, I’m going.”
“Sit down,” Helmut said. He turned to Mayer. “Keep watching. We’ll be done in five minutes.”
“I’m not sitting down,” Alfonse said. “I’m done.”
“Please listen,” Gabriela said to Helmut. “We can help you, you need us.”
“Yeah, how?”
“Let Alfonse go, first,” Gabriela said. “I don’t trust him. The less he knows, the better.”
Alfonse turned with a flash of temper on his face. “You don’t trust me? Who showed you how to get here?”
“No offense,” Gabriela said, “but you don’t care and if they catch you, you’ll tell them everything. The sooner you get out of here, the better. For all of us.”
“You were nothing when I found you.” His voice rose in pitch. “You’re still nothing. Listen to you, couple of working girls who think they’re going to be heroes. Go ahead, Helmut, give them the cyanide, let’s see just how brave they are.”
“Calm down,” Helmut said. “There’s a residential flat upstairs. Someone will hear you.”
Gabriela was right about Alfonse. Helmut hadn’t wanted to send him away until he figured out what to do with him. But if they caught him, he would talk. Helmut wasn’t bringing him along—even if Alfonse were to agree to go—which meant it was either kill him or let him go. Gemeiner would say to shoot him, but that was something he couldn’t do.
“Mayer will let you out. You’re done. Get back to your friends in Germany, if you can.”
“Sure, send me off with the Jew. Great, wonderful.” He turned to go, but stopped as he reached the threshold to the front room. “I never asked for any of this, it really isn’t fair.”
“Alf,” Helmut said.
“Fine, yes, I’m going.”
He could hear Alfonse still grumbling to David Mayer as the two went out the back door.
Helmut sighed, then turned back to Gabriela and Christine. “I’m listening. Give me a reason.”
“For starters, it’s a long drive to Marseille,” Gabriela said.
He started. “What? What makes you say Marseille?”
“Colonel Hoekman asked me. You keep going down there, he said, so why?”
The entire plan balanced on the edge of a razor. Hoekman knew too much already. Gemeiner had only to fill in the gaps. It made Helmut want to give up, sprint for his car, and flee in some random direction.
“Lots of checkpoints between here and Marseille,” Gabriela said. “Your French is almost perfect, but you have an accent. They’ll be looking for you. I can drive us through the checkpoints.”
“I can help, too,” Christine said. “My family lives in Toulon, not far from Marseille, and I’ve paid the smugglers five, six times to smuggle me in and out of the Occupied Zone. I know how to get in contact with them so we can bypass the checkpoints.”
“Maybe,” Helmut said. “You’d certainly be safer there than in Paris with Hoekman looking for you.” He turned to Gabriela. “But why do you want to go? It’ll be dangerous.”
“I know.”
“And what I’m doing is for the German people, not France. You were furious with me before, so why help me now?”
“I’m not finished, that’s why.”
“You could be.”
“No. You send me to Geneva and then what? I wait out the war. That could be years, or maybe it never ends. And meanwhile, Colonel Hoekman keeps hurting people.”
“With any luck, you’ll never see him again.”
“With any luck, I will. And this time I won’t fail.”
“Be reasonable.”
“I’m not a reasonable girl, Helmut. I never have been. I don’t forget, and I don’t forgive.”
“What about your father?”
“Yes, what about him? I can’t help him from Switzerland.”
“You can’t help if you’re dead.
”
“I’m not going to die.”
“You might not. It could be worse than that.”
“Hoekman had his pliers in my mouth. He was going to rip out my teeth. Nothing you can say will scare me more than that.”
Helmut glanced between the two women, came to a decision. “If you’re going to help, there’s something you should know.”
“Yes?”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a 20 franc gold coin. On the front was Marianne with a laurel wreath, on the back, the proud Gallic Rooster, the Coq Gaulois. “Do you know what this is?”
“Looks like contraband,” Gabriela said.
“French Rooster, 6.45 grams of gold. Enough to bribe a French police officer to stay in bed instead of making his rounds. Enough to pay an ancien soldat to get his gun from where it’s hidden in the barn, because he can feed his family for a month with this coin.”
“And what are you going to do with it?”
“A man will do a lot for a single French rooster.” Helmut returned the coin to his pocket. “I’ve got 70,000 in the truck.”
Chapter Twenty-eight:
Colonel Hoekman dropped a mouse into each cage in turn. Within thirty seconds, three mice lay twitching, eyes dulling, in the coils of three snakes. Below the snakes, in the cabinets, he could hear rodents in their cages. He’d have reason to bring out more in a few minutes.
The old man—Hoekman still didn’t know his true identity—lay strapped to the table, staring up at the ceiling. He could have watched, but he did not turn his head or show any interest. He wore a sullen expression, not fear. You couldn’t break a man until he was afraid. That was Hoekman’s first task.
Hoekman had made multiple mistakes at the Egyptienne. Underestimating Gabriela Reyes, of course, that was one. Secondly, where had this old man come from, and why hadn’t he noticed him in the lounge? Next, he should have taken his chances with the Franc-gardes. Instead, his first instinct had been to run here with the girl, come back for the old man later. First the girl had tried to kill him, then this old man. Who else was there? Was Major Ostermann about to burst through the doors, maybe von Cratz? He should have secured the building, then left with both prisoners. Instead, he’d stumbled into the night air and been surprised by a Jew.
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