‘Kriminalrat, this turtle will tell us everything. Just give me a few moments with him at Rudy de Mérode’s. Les joyeuses, n’est-ce pas, then the bathtub with iced water and he’ll soon cough up the answers, if not, a few lessons with the rawhide to mark him like that partner of his.’
Virtually all of what had just been said made little sense. ‘Just clamp a handkerchief to his head and get him into the car. Kohler can’t be intending to collect him. He’d have been on top of us by now, but we’ll take no chances.’
Lying on a table in the Lokal, amid scattered cigarette ashes, saccharine and a wash of acorn water, were the bloodstains and a flat, almost full and forgotten bottle of Jägermeister.
Pocketing this last, Herr Kohler didn’t hesitate. ‘And this Frenchman who hit him?’ he demanded.
‘Owlish with black Bakelite specs, a broken, sticking-plaster covered nose, new suit, fedora, tie and topcoat, and relish at what he’d just done.’
One of the Wehrmacht’s career losers, this unshaven, un-anything fifty-year-old ‘cook’ was waiting for a handout. ‘Now tell me where they were taking him since that Kriminalrat was supposed to be on his way back to Berlin.’
While that was interesting, felt Karl Ludwig Hoefle, all he really could do was to give a shrug and then … ‘Ach, after I had helped the frog to get your partner into the backseat of that car, he scribbled something down and handed it to me. Now what the hell did I do with it?’
‘What?’
‘A scrap of paper with an address. Ach, he said that his wife was now working there and needed lessons, and that if I would give her “the works,” I was to tell the boss-madam he would pay for it.’
‘His wife?’
‘Évangéline.’
‘What house?’
Now this was far more interesting and haste was, of course, necessary but …
Peeling off a 500-franc note, Herr Kohler finally handed it over, and when told a 1,000-franc note would help, uncovered the answer. ‘My French isn’t too good but I think it was the Lupanar des garennes.’
The brothel of the wild rabbits and one of the forty that were reserved for the Wehrmacht’s rank and file but obviously also owned by none other than Rudy de Mérode.
‘Apparently the house is on the rue Vignon,’ said Hoefle.
Known as Hookers’ Alley, and just off place de la Madeleine and its boulevard, which all too soon became place des Capucines and home to a certain bank. Were things coming full circle? Heinrich Ludin wouldn’t dare take Louis there and would have to find a place where no one would bother them, but could Louis hold out and stall them long enough to get what needed to be done before the search for him could begin? ‘Tell no one you’ve given me that address, mein Freund. Mention it to anyone and I’ll find you.’
Another 500-franc note was handed over, but to seal such a bargain, a further 500 was found.
Louis would have to be taken somewhere, but where, since Ludin was now disobeying Kaltenbrunner’s orders and that could only mean one thing.
Fumes were what had finally brought him round, felt St-Cyr. Gasoline fumes, not the voices he now heard, but he’d keep his eyes shut. The engine had been switched off, a side window rolled well down—the driver’s side: Heinrich Ludin’s. Rocheleau was the one who was rapidly talking and therefore still feeling his oats.
‘Kriminalrat, if you don’t want to take him to Rudy’s, let’s find a quiet spot in the Bois de Vincennes.’
‘Verfluchter Franzose, Sei still! Kohler has to have gone somewhere. Ach, my gut! Has it burst?’
A moment of quiet was needed, flecks of dark blood perhaps seen on a hastily clutched handkerchief, Rocheleau irritably finding himself another cigarette but crying out when the match either broke or showered sparks into his face.
It was Ludin who again gasped and, doubtless signaling, said in Deutsch, ‘See if there’s another bottle of that stuff, then check to see if you haven’t killed him.’
Ah bon, felt St-Cyr, the wrists had been linked in front, but merde the bracelets were far too tight. Danger that he was, Rocheleau continued to suck on that cigarette, disregarding entirely the fumes and that the prisoner’s face was still crammed uncomfortably against what could only be a hastily filled jerry can of gasoline, apparently one of three or four.
Holding the cigarette well away from himself, his nervous fingers probed for a pulse, that hand being grasped and yanked hard, the head being butted by an already wounded one, Rocheleau yelling so hard his face hit the jerry can, blood erupting from his nose and lips, the cigarette having thankfully fallen to the road.
Slamming him down yet again, took care of him, but now a Walther P38 was threatening from the driver’s seat.
‘Shove him out,’ said Ludin, ‘and lock that door and the other one.’
Good riddance, was it? ‘No one will touch him, Kriminalrat, because of yourself and this car, but he does need medical and dental attention.’
‘Where the hell are we?’
‘Is it that you’re wondering about all those blacks?’
‘Just tell me.’
‘Certainly. All are French citizens, the men veterans of that other war and many of those, the Chemin des Dames and the ruins at l’Abbaye de Vauclair, the absent younger males now prisoners of war in your country and/or enduring the forced labour. Quite by accident, you’ve turned south, and having crossed place de Jussieu and driven right past the back of Halle aux Vins and that also of the Jardin des Plantes, are on the rue Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire and all but at the entrance to the Turkish baths that are in the cellars of the Paris mosque.’
‘What’s Kohler got in mind?’
‘Hermann? Believe me, if I knew I would gladly tell you.’
‘Where’s the Bois de Vincennes?’
‘Make a left at the corner and I’ll guide you.’
That Louis would be needing him was all too clear, felt Kohler, but it was already 1047 hours and the Porte de Versailles was still so busy there had to be another high-priority. Long lines of heavily laden farm wagons, gazo trucks and a few cars awaited entry, while over to the east and nearest the Parc des Expositions, cyclists and foot traffic were also being given the thorough. No one was going to get into or out of Paris, but had Kleiber grabbed that girl and called for a clamp-down or was it simply random?
Scanning the entrance, taking the time when such was no longer available, the cause of the trouble continued to elude him, but over to the west was a little something. Right in Werner Dillmann’s territory was a faded red, 3.5-tonne Renault whose canvas tarp had been flung aside to reveal nothing but an apparent emptiness.
That broad, carefully combed moustache, the shrapnel scars, missing fingers, deceitfully wary blue eyes, and all the rest were the same, the look one also of knowing a little but wanting to know a lot more and expecting everything.
‘Ach, Hermann, mein Lieber, am I glad to see you. Corporals Mannstein, Weiss and Rath, take over. It’s another of those controls. Like the power outages and the raids on the unlicensed brothels, they never tell us until it’s too late, but where is that partner of yours?’
Had he heard something or was he just fishing? ‘Busy as usual and preparing for the pay-off at 1830 hours sharp and not a moment too early or late, understand?’
‘Of course, but is the Vaugirard horse abattoir still necessary?’
Now what the hell had happened? ‘Isn’t it the most perfect of places?’
‘Most certainly, but the boys tell me there are others who are showing a decided interest in it, though those have yet to approach it too closely.’
Kleiber hadn’t listened. Already he must be getting men into position, but the location couldn’t be changed, not with Anna-Marie having been told of it. ‘Just remember the time. In and out, and faster than fast.’
A cigarette was necessary, and after three deep drags,
handed over. ‘Dank,’ said Hermann whose gaze, it had to be admitted, had repeatedly flicked to that empty truck.
‘Three suitcases stuffed with forty-five thousand fivers, Werner.’
Those big, beautiful white notes of the English, but had he heard him correctly? Enough not only to buy one’s way out of France and into Spain, but to retire in comfort forever. ‘In exchange for what?’
As if he didn’t already have a good idea. ‘A kilo of boart.’
The cheapest of the cheap and at an agreed-upon price like that? ‘And you need me.’
‘Definitely. Few others would know how to do it.’
‘Then perhaps we should first consider that truck I stopped early this morning. Nothing in the back, my Hermann, but two small and rather shabby suitcases, forgotten, I think, in the haste to leave it. A bicycle as well.’
Scheisse! ‘And the driver?’
That was better, and even more humble when handing the cigarette back. ‘His papers leave a lot to be desired and when questioned not only was he evasive, he tried to buy me off with this.’
A baguette brilliant, a beautifully cut oval, clear-white, and of about two carats.
‘Perhaps it is, my Hermann, that this girl you and that partner of yours have been chasing, felt I might weaken and let him go, but of course, when a whole city has been turned upside down looking for her by a Sonderkommando straight from Kaltenbrunner himself, even such as myself and my men have no choice but to do our duty.’
‘So you’ve kept his papers, taken the keys, told him to sit tight and have been waiting for me to show up.’
‘One Arie Beekhuis who sounds as if from of all places, Rotterdam—that is close to Amsterdam, is it not?’
‘Close enough. And those two little suitcases?’
Gut! ‘Nothing but scatterings of female underclothes, an extra blouse or two, a toothbrush that must have been shared—that sort of thing. And the bicycle, of course. A Belgian one, which is curious in itself, as was the city’s name on it. Did that truck happen to come through Liège?’
There was nothing for it but to beg. ‘Let him go, Werner. Handing him over will only complicate what I have in mind.’
‘And that is?’
Did he need to hear it again? ‘The boart for the cash.’
‘But he’s insurance, my Hermann, and I will need such a release in writing from you, stating, of course, that you have indeed checked his papers most thoroughly and have ordered me to release him, or is it that you …’
The son of a bitch. ‘How much?’
That was better, considering the risk. ‘Two of those three suitcases you mentioned, the last for yourself to do with exactly as you please.’
‘And still to pay Rudi Sturmbacher out of my share? Ach, I think I’ve got it.’
‘Gut. Just don’t try to cross me.’
‘Liebe Zeit, how could I even think of such a thing? Just be there when needed. No sooner, no later than that 1830 hours and over and done in such a rush, no one but us will be the wiser.’
Downing three of the Benzedrine, spitting out the pocket fluff, he got back into the car.
Eighty-four avenue Foch was busy: cars and motorcycles out front, armed men in uniform and not and going to and fro, orders being given, and upstairs in that temporary office of Kleiber’s, the billiard table as nerve centre.
Enlarged, a detailed street map of the eastern half of the Vaugirard clearly showed the abattoirs, arrows pinpointing the entrance off the rue des Morillons, but there was also a photo of the two life-size bronze bulls that still marked it in spite of the Reich’s incessant scrap-metal actions. Apparently nothing was to be left to chance. The routes in by foot, and the rail line which ran along the southern edge, were all indicated, the fences too, for it wasn’t a place for the casual. Another enlargement detailed the sewers and pointed out suspected and known caverns, caves and tunnels in the Left Bank’s bedrock that had supplied so much of Paris with its building stone, but had Kleiber thought of everything? He was using a cue to point things out to Johannes Uhl and Ulrich Frensel. And at the far end of the table was one of the suitcases: alligator leather, not inexpensive, and with the LV monogram of none other than Louis Vuitton.
By the travel stickers alone, its former owner had had a penchant for taking the waters: the Friedrichsbad in Baden-Baden, the Grand at Italy’s Montecatini Therme, the Hôtel du Palais in Biarritz, Vichy, too, and Vittel’s Parc Thermal where last February Louis and he had come up against nearly 1,700 British and a 1,000 American females in that internment camp.
‘Kohler, ach you’re just in time. Two of the suitcases are being fitted with their transmitters. That was an excellent idea of yours. The Reichssicherheitschef was most impressed and has given his full support. We are to let those verdamte Banditen believe they are getting away and will track them with the wireless-listening vans. Already those are in place, others on patrol, and still others on foot with the hidden listening devices up the sleeve or in the fedora for the close-in work. Already, too, and I must inform you of this, we have located one enemy wireless which will be taken out as soon as our Mausefalle has sprung.’
Louis would have sadly shaken his head and said of the irony, Didn’t Hector Bolduc use freshly baited mousetraps in that garage of his? But real coffee, schnapps and Lebkuchen had been laid on, the warmers holding sausages, with mustard, sauerkraut and dill pickles to the side, and another with no less than strudel: the cherry, the plum and the apple-and-raisin. Freshly whipped cream, sweetened with real sugar, was to help that last one go down and stay there.
‘Those were for that traitorously incompetent Kriminalrat,’ said Uhl. ‘Herr Frensel and myself were unaware of his having been recalled in such disgrace.’
‘There will be no more of his mistakes, Kohler,’ said Frensel. ‘Now we are to accomplish the inevitable seizure of the black diamonds those filthy Juden tried to hide from such as myself. Mein Gott, you’d think they might have learned. Ach, they even tried to use their children, thinking that I wouldn’t know where to look!’
In bundles of one-hundred notes, and piled in a heap, even with some still in the pale green linen packets they had come in, the fivers were near that suitcase. Each packet had been sealed with red wax, stamped with the swastika signet and labelled Geheime Reichssache.
Stark white against the flowing dark black script, each note had Britannica on a throne in its upper left, the signature of K. O. Peppiatt, chief cashier, in the lower right, and in those and elsewhere would be the hidden security checks that would expose the counterfeit. Additionally, of course, there were all the marks and signs of having been well used: those of the banks each had passed through, the shops, the scribbled signatures, et cetera, and the consequent wear.
All the packets were addressed to Munimin-Pimetex and though Göring must have had them sent, all had come directly from none other than Heinrich Himmler. But even knowing of these, if not of the privileged, would carry the death sentence, to which Louis would have said, And didn’t I tell you we were digging a bottomless hole for ourselves?
‘You’ll be checking in with Bolduc, will you, Kohler?’ asked Kleiber. ‘Be sure to tell him that the van, with himself as driver and Serge de Lenz as assistant, is to be here and ready at no later than 1500 hours. I must be absolutely certain that everything is in order. We’ve clocked the route several times and will be using the Pont d’Iéna and an average of seven minutes, thirteen seconds. French traffic police are already stationed at every interchange to clear the way, the speed not too fast, you understand, so as to avoid unnecessary attention.’
Given the repeats and the traffic flics, lots would be sure to watch.
‘I’ll have the suitcases for you, Kohler, and right inside the rear door of that van. I’ll hand them out and take the boart in, you then closing that door and handing them the cash.’
‘A kilo,’ sai
d Uhl. ‘It’ll be in a white cotton bag with the usual tie.’
‘Only one of those suitcases will need to be opened for checking, Kohler—that one,’ said Kleiber. ‘Here’s the key. You can tell them it will open the others.’
If bought at the same time, Louis would have said. Also, une souricière du diable.
‘Doubtless they’ll be using the same car as at place de l’Opéra when they executed that fool of an actor Kriminalrat Ludin insisted on using,’ said Kleiber. ‘A Ford Model C Ten, the same as were made in the Reich from 1935 to 1940.’
‘The Eifel accelerates from zero to 80.5 in 18.2 seconds, Kohler,’ said Frensel. ‘Cruises at no less than 106.2.’
‘Has three forward gears and a four-stroke, side-valve, four-cyclinder engine,’ added Uhl.
‘Witnesses have sworn that the car’s wheels were not wire-spoked, Kohler, like those of the British models,’ said Kleiber.
A probable guess and nothing more, though a terrific car, but it was now all but 1200 hours and there was still far too much to do. ‘I’d better be getting over to Hector Bolduc’s bank, Colonel. Louis will be wondering where I am.’
‘Eighteen thirty hours, Kohler, and make sure Lenz is with Bolduc. Since I’ve decided to bring Mérode and the rest of his gang in on this, they’ll be watching the flank areas. Sealed, I tell you, Kohler. This whole area and the rest of the city as well.’
‘Eighteen-thirty it is, Standartenführer. Meine Lieben, until later. Chez Kornilov, I think, and the champagne first, then that partner of mine can get to sample the trout with the walnut sauce that he ordered last night but had to miss and has been complaining about ever since.’
Now here, now there, occasional mushroom seekers scavenged this part of the Bois de Vincennes, hoping to find what the weekend’s traffic might have missed and what the last few days and nights of new growth would have produced. Sticks were immediately snapped into small pieces so as to be hidden in rucksacks, acorns quickly pocketed since it was illegal to gather anything save those feelings of being outdoors and the Bois was exceedingly popular, especially on weekends.
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