But now they sniffed the air. Now they stood on their hind legs and even he smelled the smoke.
Polar bears, ah Gott im Himmel!
Cautiously Kohler pulled himself up to a sitting position. The female—was it the female?—moved away to climb out of the pit and up to the fence. The male still sniffed the air. Then he, too, romped up to the fence.
Driven by the wind, the flames soon filled the snowy air with soot and sparks and glowing bits of debris. Now he saw the fence and the bears, now he didn’t. He climbed. He dragged himself up the opposite wall of the pit. There was sheet ice under the snow. He slipped, he went right back down again, all the way.
One of the bears had turned to keep an eye on him, but the pit was large. There was ice beneath the snow on the pond at its bottom. There was a den, a roof over its entrance. That den would lead to a cage door that would be padlocked.
Half-way up the slope, he heard a rush of flame, felt the blast of it and scrambled up to the fence, but the damned thing was too high. There was barbed wire at the top, three strands. He’d been able to cross the wire going in but now … now as he climbed, the top of the fence protruded above him towards the pit. He dangled in space. He pulled himself along, hand over hand, the mittens catching on the barbs, reminding him of the Great War, the war …
When he came to a post, he pulled himself up, bounced uneasily, his boots on the strands, and then was over.
One of his mittens remained behind.
He ran. He tried to reach the farm. He ducked sparks and cried out, ‘Louis … Louis …’
The nun was on the roof, the child was nowhere to be seen and neither was Louis.
‘Burn … let her burn. She did it. I know she did!’
Hot … it was so hot. Torn by the wind, flames poured from under the eaves at both ends of the barn. The mare tried to free herself. Her screams were mingled with the constant bawling of the cattle and goats. Why had he not taken the time to see to them?
Aching all over, St-Cyr knelt in the driving snow behind the barn, still clutching the child he had caught and dragged down.
‘She did it. She really did.’
‘Sister,’ he cried out. ‘Sister, run down the tiles and jump. It is the only way.’
Her back was to them. Caught in the blizzard, perched standing astride the crown of the roof well above and to one side of the dormer window she had crawled out of, Céline clutched something in the crook of each arm. The heavy black woollen cloak blew about, revealing black skirts and black leather boots.
One after the other, she released the chickens she held and they saw the things fly panic-stricken to be singed, torched and taken by the wind.
‘Sister, don’t make me do this.’
‘You can’t go up there,’ swore Nénette.
‘I must. Don’t argue. Behave yourself.’
‘I won’t.’
‘You had better. The Petite Roquette, the prison for women, it is not very nice and is at present terribly crowded.’
‘You’re cruel.’
‘One has to be.’
‘There are some barrels. If we put them on the wagon, you can climb up there.’
‘Thanks.’
The tiles were cracking with the heat. They popped. They shattered. Smoke seeped from under them. The snow melted instantly. The roof sloped up and up, and what the hell was he doing this for?
Caught in the chimney funnels of the loft’s dormers, flames roared out at him only to be taken by the wind, torn upwards and then pushed away. Sparks, glowing bits of rubbish and dense smoke filled the air. His eyes watered. His nostrils burned. Swallowing tightly, he clung to the tiles and cried out, ‘Sister, give me your hand.’
She must have heard him, for she turned, and when he reached her, Céline said bitterly, ‘You fool. Why have you come? I wanted those girls to die.’
‘We can discuss it later.’
She backed away, held out her hands to fend him off. Tears streamed from her. That defiance, that fierceness of prominent cheekbones and wide-set dark eyes said, Ah, no, monsieur. No! I am finished.
‘Please, Sister. Later, yes?’
‘I did it! I fed them first and then I took them to the stairwells. Dirty … they all have dirty little minds. Filthy, do you understand?’
He would have to distract her. He would have to rush her, grab her and fall. Together they would roll down the roof. Bones would be broken …
He saw the knitting needle gripped fiercely in her right hand. It had been hidden in the sleeve of her cloak.
‘Now do you believe me?’ A tile popped near her left foot. ‘I could not kill my girls, but I could kill others, those we fed.’
‘You did not feed them all.’
‘I hunted others. That little bitch I killed in les Halles had eaten at the soup kitchen of the Germans. Her underwear was dirty. When I turned her over on to her stomach, she screamed and tried to get away, but I gave her what she so desired. I made her feel the shame of it!’
Ah no …
‘The one in the Notre-Dame had lost a part of an ear-ring and was in tears. I helped her look for it and I killed her in a corner of the south belfry.’
She waited. He did not say a thing, this detective who had risked his life to come after her. ‘I opened her blouse. I tried to feed things to her, things she would not let me stuff into her mouth. Things that sister of mine had crammed into my pockets. Filthy things. Rubber things. I squeezed and turned their contents out. Out! do you understand? Then … then I wiped my hands on her seat, her mons, her breasts and face and I … I left her.’
Dear Jesus, save him. The needle was gripped like a stiletto of the streets and all around them the tiles were popping and sloughing, but he could not hear them sliding down the roof and wondered at this. The noise was too great. It was far too hot … too hot. Light danced over her face, sharpening the hatred in her eyes. Shadows … there were shadows.
He wet his lips in fear. He really did not know what to do.
‘Louis … Louis, catch hold of the ladder.’
‘Hermann … Hermann … Sister, please, if you love God, drop that thing and come with me!’
She lunged. He leapt back, slipped, went down hard on to his knees, looked up in pain and defeat, tried to see her through his tears. Smoke was billowing. Glowing bits of ash were funnelling between them. He ducked. He tried to shield himself, but the wind was blowing too hard, the snow was blinding. Meltwater and sweat stung his eyes and clung to his face.
Out of the blizzard she came at him. He grabbed the hand that held the knitting needle. He tried to stop it but seemed to have no strength. Ah, nom de Jésus-Christ! her wrist … he must grab her by the wrist and bend it back … back.
There was a snap, a shriek as the needle fell. Then he heard her voice, heard the strangeness of it as she cried out in anguish, ‘Please, God, forgive my Violette!’
Kohler caught her by an ankle. For a moment he had a glimpse of her hatred, haunted by tragedy, gaunt and raw, streetwise and ever-watchful. Then she bent down, took him by the hair and put her lips close to his ear. ‘Violette is innocent. Please allow her to go to Provence, to her little farm, but not with her priest. Never with that one.’
Ah merde … ‘Louis …’ he managed. ‘L … o … u … i … s!
‘Don’t let go of her!’
The wind came. It blew the flames up over the roof in bil lowing smoke and sparks. Tiles fell. Tiles slipped and popped and cracked. A hand gripped him by the wrist. An arm was swiftly wrapped around his own. A last glimpse revealed her perched up there, making her way steadfastly towards the conflagration at one end of the roof. For a moment she was engulfed, a dervish. Her screams, her cries were lost.
Somehow they made it to the ground, somehow they got clear before the roof finally collapsed in a rush of fire. Bathed in that terrible light, they searched but saw only the flames.
‘Louis …’
‘Yes, what is it?’
‘The child. She�
��s been taken—dragged away. Look, I’m sorry. I … I had no choice but to go after you.’
The birds were everywhere in the aviary and the smells of their feathers and their dung were heavy in the warm air. Madly the things flew about in the darkness, shrieking, chirping, giving their raucous jungle-cries or singing.
Softly Kohler eased the door shut behind him. Violette Belanger had been sitting on the floor near one of the stoves. There were aisles and aisles of cages, and she must have opened every one of them.
Taking out his torch, he shook it and tried to bring it to life. ‘Louis, where’s yours?’ he breathed, a whisper.
‘Incapacitated.’
‘Verdammt!’
‘No guns, Hermann. He’ll have the child. Nénette will be his ticket to freedom.’
‘Or the end of him.’
They began to feel their way forward. Cages to the left and to the right. Birds perched up there or swooping down. Birds screaming in fright, colliding in bursts of feathers and broken wings.
One flopped desperately on the floor. St-Cyr felt for it. Poor thing, he said silently. A finch, he thought.
Knowing he could not let it suffer, he twisted its neck, then gently tucked it away in a pocket. Are we to find that the child has also been killed? he asked himself. Is it to be from a cage of doves to this?
Aisles branched. Touching him on a shoulder, Kohler indicated Louis should take the left one, himself the right, and when he neared the stove, the smell of burning human hair came through the bird-stench and he said, Not her … not her. Please don’t let it be her.
The child …
The parrot was dead and, in the soft light seeping from around the firebox door, he could see it lying between Violette’s breasts, the soft mounds on either side of it, her hand still clutching it.
Blood trickled from the right corner of her lips. Scratches marred her breasts.
The hole in the middle of her forehead was clean and round, a nine millimetre, he thought. She had been crying, had killed the little parrot, and had looked up into the eyes of her priest a last time.
Vomit rose into his throat. He couldn’t stand the sight of her. He …
Gently Louis took hold of him. ‘Turn away. Leave this to me.’ And opening the firebox door for a little light, he cast his eyes swiftly over her, the cinematographer within him willing himself to record what he could before he closed her eyes and pulled her away from the stove.
He covered her bare knees by tidying her pleated skirt. He laid her other hand over the parrot. It would have to do for now. Raw … the skin had been pulled from the palm of that hand. Was it years since the death of Madame Morelle and this one’s flight across the roofs?
‘Open the firebox door a little more,’ breathed Kohler.
‘Fire,’ came the whispered warning.
‘Do it! Stay here. Let me find him.’
‘No guns.’
‘He’s got one, idiot!’
‘Then I will close the door.’
They moved away. They knew Debauve must be in the aviary with the child. Had he killed her, too?
Did he now realize it was too late for him?
The SS of the avenue Foch had allowed Debauve a pistol. Were they hoping he’d put an end to this partnership and wipe the slate clean? wondered St-Cyr.
Kohler went down another aisle. The place was like a maze. Cages upon cages. Birds everywhere …
One flew into his face. He pulled it away, cried out, ‘Louis! Verdammt! Ah merde, the thing has claws.’
He wiped his face, felt blood and torn skin. He tried to calm the creature but it was frantic.
‘That’s far enough.’
Ah Gott im Himmel, the bastard had the muzzle of a Luger—was it a Luger?—jammed against the right side of his head.
‘Don’t move,’ said Debauve.
‘Of course not.’
‘Tell the other one to call out to you.’
‘Where’s the child?’
‘Do it!’
The bird didn’t like being held. ‘Louis … Louis, if you’re still here, he’s got me.’
‘Louder!’
‘LOUIS, THE SON OF A BITCH HAS ME!’
Swiftly Kohler pivoted, ducked and thrust the thing into the bastard’s face. There was a flash of fire, a bang so loud his ears rang. Debauve fell back. He fired again and again, screamed once, twice, and fired once more. Ah no …
The birds flew madly about. Their sounds filled the air. On the rush of their wings there was a sigh, a ‘Pater noster qui es in caelis …’
‘Sanctificetur nomen tuum, adveniat regnum tuum: fiat voluntas tua, sicut in caelo, et in terra,’ breathed Louis, releasing Debauve’s gun hand, the priest’s accidental coup de grâce. ‘Are you all right, mon vieux?’
‘Ja … Ja, I’m okay. Ah nom de Jésus-Christ, Louis, tell me the kid is alive.’
They opened every firebox door, and in the soft, soft light, the birds of colour flew about, casting their shadows and emitting their noises.
She was lying between cages, lying just as her little friend had. The padded overcoat had been torn open. Her arms had been flung back. One white woollen kneesock had lost its elastic and was badly in need of mending and a wash. Her seal skin boots were turned in a little at the toes. Her legs were slackly spread.
Debauve had made the killing look as if Céline had done it.
‘Louis …’
‘Leave this. Go outside if you have to.’
‘No!’
It was a cry. Hermann tried to get past him.
She stirred. Her eyelids fluttered.
‘Alive, I think,’ said Louis. And then …
‘Is it over? He … he smothered me. I.… I couldn’t breath.’
‘It is not quite over. There are still one or two small details best kept for another time.’
‘The lion, Louis.’
‘Yes, yes, the lion.’
The Tarot cards were down, the Ace of Swords was last. The hand that laid it on the gilded Louis XIV table paused to smooth it out and touch the upraised sword whose point was encircled by a golden crown.
‘A tragedy,’ sighed St-Cyr. ‘A toy giraffe …’
He put it on the table in front of the Ace of Swords. ‘A murder so different from the others.’
‘I didn’t tell Julien to do it. I didn’t!’ swore Madame Vernet, colouring quickly and clenching her fists only to release them when others noticed.
They were gathered in the grand salon of the villa. The afternoon’s rare sunshine melted yesterday’s rare snow. Soon there would be freezing rain. ‘You did, madame. You saw in your niece’s search for the Sandman a way of getting rid of her. But the girls used those same bits and pieces to trap you.’
‘Bernadette, admit you’re guilty. Be brave. Distinguish yourself.’
‘Antoine, don’t be a fool. I’m pregnant, yes? There isn’t a court in the country that will send me to the guillotine until the child cries and the cord is cut. You have months of me yet. Please think of the scandal.’
Vernet was not happy. General von Schaumburg sat bolt upright on the edge of his chair, a monocle clamped fiercely to his right eye.
Kohler pitied them. For all his visits of inspection to the Wehrmacht’s brothels, Old Shatter Hand was a prude. Infidelity ranked very high among his most despised sins.
‘You said to Monsieur Julien that he must kill me, madame. I heard you,’ said the child earnestly. ‘You were in the folly together. I … I was up on the balcony making plans to escape and live the life of a brigand. You … you were standing right below me in the dark. Pompom was peeing against a table leg.’
‘When?’
Startled, the child flinched. ‘In the third week of December. On a Sunday night. Uncle … Uncle, he was away on business in Clermont-Ferrand, I think.’ She pointed at Vernet. ‘Your … your lover Julien didn’t want to kill me, but you … you made him say he would. You slapped his face. You said—’
‘I did no such t
hing! This is—’
‘Bernadette, let the child finish. Is it not enough to have killed her little friend and Liline? What more do you want?’
‘Tears …? You who are so cruel, are shedding tears, Antoine? Hah! Drink them, then. You will get nothing from me.’
The child could not look up. ‘You … you said his name would appear on the lists of those to be sent to Germany to work, madame,’ she whispered. ‘You said he probably wouldn’t come back and that … that only you could see that this did not happen.’
At a nod from Louis, Rébé was brought in to stand in leg irons and handcuffs, ashamed, afraid and in tears himself. ‘A former bicycle thief, a gigolo, General,’ said Kohler softly.
‘Boy, state the truth, then take your choice of the bullet or the rope.’
Rébé’s knees buckled under him. Dragged up, held up, he wept and managed to blurt, ‘She made me do it. She made sure the other one got it, too!’
‘Take him out. Let him make his choice. He may have a priest if he wishes,’ grunted von Schaumburg. ‘Just don’t waste time with him. The Santé will do.’
Old Shatter Hand was grim. St-Cyr studied the quartz crystal the child had had in her coat pockets. It was one of those ‘diamonds’ of the curious stone and mineral trade, a dipyramidal crystal perhaps two centimetres by one and a half, six-sided and pointed at both ends but grown awkwardly and full of internal fractures that caught the light and sparkled. ‘General, what madame says of our courts is only too true. There is always a penchant to excuse a betrayed wife or husband on the grounds of insanity due to jealousy. In such cases—’
‘There is only one solution. She waits her time. One cannot blame the child within her.’
‘Then let it be born in the Reich, General,’ urged Vernet. ‘Attend to her there after its birth.’
The bastard …
‘Ah no … NO!’ shouted the woman. ‘You cannot do that to me. You can’t! This house is rightfully mine, do you hear? Mine!’
Again the crystal was searched. ‘Madame,’ said Louis sadly, ‘you knew your niece had discovered who the Sandman was, yet you did not speak out. Instead, you plotted her death and used that information to blackmail Violette Belanger and her pimp into helping you with Liline. The sum of two hundred and seventy-five thousand francs changed hands. I have it here.’
Sandman Page 27