Three Hours in Paris

by Cara Black

  “Under coercion, no doubt,” she said.

  “The final corroborating factors, miss, are the bullets. You see the lab compared the bullet taken from the victim’s brain and the bullet lodged in the pillar of Sacré-Cœur. All consistent with the remaining bullets in the magazine of this Lee-Enfield. Now, with your fingerprints, my work is done.”

  “Just like that?”

  “Instead of the thirty-six hours I was originally given to apprehend you, it’s taken me . . .” He consulted his watch. “It’s now six o’clock, so it’s been thirty-three hours.”

  “Nice and neat, eh? Expecting a pat on the back from the Gestapo?”

  “Depends on the Führer’s mood.”

  Her blood went cold.

  “I’ll be accompanying you to Germany for the trial.”

  A crisscross of sunlight played over her dirty toes.

  “A trial in Nazi Germany?” she said, trying to sound sure and careless. “I’m an American citizen. We have diplomatic relations. That would be against the Geneva Convention.”

  “Have a passport to prove it?”

  “The embassy will furnish papers. Clear this up.”

  “You’ve been talking in your sleep, miss.”

  “What?” The word caught in her throat.

  “How do you say? Talking funny, what’s the word?”

  “Delirious,” said the French doctor.

  What had she said?

  “Ja, the doctor insisted if you were given mild sedation and hydration, you’d be in condition for transport.”

  The doctor nodded. “You were suffering severe dehydration, erratic heartbeat, extremely low blood pressure. But we treated you in time.”

  In time to be shot. Her mouth went dry.

  Failed again. The boat had sailed, Philippe had betrayed her and the film was lost to German hands.

  Trust no one, Stepney had said, time and time again.

  Idiot.

  She’d accomplished nothing, saved no one and put others in harm’s way.

  “Your false French papers are enough to imprison you,” Gunter Hoffman told her. “But tell me why an American would be an assassin for the British.”

  Smart again. How had he figured that out?

  “Tell me and I can circumvent unpleasant things for you.”

  Like she believed that.

  “You kept calling out for Dafydd. Who’s that?”

  She swallowed with effort. Said nothing.

  “I’m personally escorting you on the plane to Berlin.” Gunter wrote something in his notebook. “Then tonight I’ll be home with my wife to belatedly celebrate my daughter’s second birthday, which you made me miss.”

  A little teddy bear sat on an attaché case by her hospital bed.

  Kate’s thoughts went to Lisbeth’s rosy cheeks, her sweet breath, her warm baby smell, the last time Kate had held her in her arms. “You’re lucky to have your daughter to go home to.”

  Knocking came from the door. The doctor looked at Gunter, who put his finger to his lips. Then Gunter motioned his aide, Niels. Together they rolled her hospital bed through a door into another room, then through that into yet another. Closed the door.

  He’d clasped her hand in his. Those red-rimmed gray eyes probed hers.

  “Keep still and cooperate. It’s for your safety so I can escort you to the plane.”

  “Safety?”

  “I finish my case. Serve justice.”

  “By delivering me to your Nazi land of butchers?”

  His lips pursed. “I hate loose ends. Why didn’t you have a cyanide pill?”

  Speechless, she shook her head.

  “Why wasn’t it in your back molar like the other four snipers?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  In this small examining room, Gunter took the contents of her pocket from a paper bag and set them on the aluminum tray. “Nothing makes sense unless . . .” He rooted through the contents. Stared at the small dirty bit of scarf she’d smudged with charcoal and diamonds she’d caked with mascara. Before handing off the scarf to Antoine, she’d kept two for a bribe if she needed it to escape.

  Deflect him. Her heart in her mouth, she said, “So, Mr. Gunter, what doesn’t make sense to you?”

  He looked up. “I got you wrong from the beginning. I underestimated you. My mistake. After you murdered Admiral Lindau, you photographed Directive 17 plans with this . . .” He pulled the Minox out. “To sabotage the invasion.”

  Terror stricken, she wanted to die right now. She couldn’t face prison and torture.

  “I always believed the Führer was your target. So did he. But all along you were the distraction for the real assassination, the snipers who were parachuted in to target the High Command arriving at le Bourget. You did your job admirably. We almost missed them and lost you.”

  So it was true. Damn Stepney had used her.

  And she had to hear the truth from a Nazi.

  “We knew where to find you at the Café Littéraire because the radio operator you arrived with gave you up under torture.” He caught her eye. “Not by me. But did you know you were sent here to be captured and interrogated? You were meant to talk.”

  That matched what Max had said.

  “Look, if you’re saying all this because you think I’ll confess to something, you’re wrong. I’m an American citizen.”

  She heard voices in the adjoining room.

  “But you were never caught, as your handlers thought you would be. You’ve always been a step ahead. When I cornered you, I saw how you killed Max Verdou, who betrayed you. Your training is superb.”

  Kate met his gaze. “If you expect a compliment in return, forget it.”

  Gunter watched her, reading her expression with a burning intensity.

  Like hell she’d give in to him and confess. Now she felt so full of anger she had no room for fear. “I’m an American citizen. I demand to go to the embassy.”

  “You’re what we call tough as day old bread,” he said. “But you know old bread cracks.”

  Niels motioned to him. “The ambulance arrived. So has Roschmann.”

  An ambulance? What did that mean? Whatever it was, it didn’t sound good.

  Visibly annoyed, Gunter slipped the bear inside his case. Took out his pistol, a Luger, and covered the door. Niels lifted her into a stretcher, wheeled her through another door, out of the hospital and into a waiting ambulance.

  “We’re getting you on the plane. Now.” Gunter secured the wheelchair. “You’ll get a fair trial. But I want to know why you did what you did.”

  “Taking me to Germany makes no sense.”

  “I’m on the Führer’s orders. No one will sabotage this.”

  “So you’ll bring your ‘spoils of war’ home to a pat on the back from the Führer?”

  His gray eyes looked faraway. Tired, he sat down on the ambulance bench. His shoulders sagged, but the alertness never left him. And when he spoke, his words came out low. “That’s not why. I’m a cop. I do my job to the end. My wife calls me a Rottweiler because I never give up. I can’t.”

  He’d opened a window into himself.

  “Just a guy doing his job?”

  She wiggled her toes, flexed her calves. Everything seemed to work. Physically she felt better than she had in days after the rest and hydration. She doubted she’d live to enjoy it.

  “We’re on opposite sides. Still, I admire an opponent like you. I feel sorry for you that you have gotten yourself into this.”

  “I don’t need your pity,” she said. “You’re to blame, all of you.”

  “And you’re a killer,” said Gunter, his voice thin. “Like all killers, you have a reason. Justification, ja?”

  Why wouldn’t she want revenge?

  Gunter rapped on the ambula
nce’s door. “Let’s go, Niels.”

  “Looking for the right key, sir,” Niels called from the front of the ambulance. “One moment.”

  She was going to die. What did it matter now if she told him why?

  “Then write this down in your little notebook, Mr. Gunter,” she said. “Dot the i’s, cross the t’s and get what I say right.”

  She hated reliving it yet again. But she made herself.

  “My daughter, Lisbeth, was eighteen months old. Almost your daughter’s age. We lived on an island and one of your submarines bombed a ship in the harbor. In the chaos my husband and child were in an accident. It shouldn’t have happened. Never. In a few minutes my baby and husband were gone. Burnt alive.”

  Gunter looked away.

  “No, you look at me and you listen,” she said, grabbing his arm. “I couldn’t save them. After that, everywhere I looked, everything I smelled and touched reminded me of them. Dafydd’s big warm arms, his laugh. He was such a talented artist. My little Lisbeth’s sweet smell, her first words, the way she giggled when I blew on her toes. That’s why I failed. I hesitated.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “At Sacré-Cœur. It was the little girl with the yellow dress. Her blonde curls—she looked so like my Lisbeth. If I had shot your Führer the bullet would have gone through her cheek. Killed her. She’d be dead and another mother would suffer a hole in her life.”

  She was nothing—she had failed every attempt to avenge her family.

  Telling the story to the enemy would be the only payback she’d ever get. Pathetic.

  “I wanted to get back at you Germans.”

  A sob stuck in the back of her throat.

  The siren wailed as the ambulance pulled away into the parking lot. Gunter leaned close to her ear. “I’m sorry you lost the family you loved.”

  She hated the thoughts coming in her head—that she wanted to trust him. That something told her he was straight up. A family man, albeit a Nazi. A cop who, despite his allegiance, followed the code of the law.

  “I trusted someone who betrayed me.”

  “Who?” Gunter strained to hear.

  Suddenly, Kate heard the screech of skidding brakes. Felt a sickening jolt as something crashed into the ambulance. Gunter’s arms shot out, shielding her from crunching metal and splintering glass. Time slowed, suspended in heat and glass shards as the crash’s force crumpled the back door. She saw Gunter thrown against the window. Kate felt wetness on her hand. Blood.

  The stretcher strap ripped loose; then she was smacked against the window, too. Outside she saw a Mercedes had crashed into the ambulance. Then she was falling on the floor. Gunter scrambled toward the driver. Blood dripped from his brow. “We have to get out of here, Niels. Go.”

  He turned to her. “Stay down.”

  As she crouched, she saw Gunter’s pistol in his pocket. Could she use this accident to escape? The ambulance engine sputtered. Kate scrabbled in the evidence bag, only had time enough to stuff the scarf down her front before she heard shouts in German.

  The ambulance door scraped open, and the rest happened in a blur. It happened so quick they hadn’t even gotten out of the the parking lot to the street.

  A sack was pulled over her head, her wrists tied. She was herded stumbling down a chill passageway back into the hospital from what she could figure out. A church bell pealed and she counted: one, two, three, four, five, six . . . silence.

  She doubted she’d hear it peal seven.

  Kate shivered, barefoot, on a bench behind bars in a tall cage-like cell. Cracked plaster veined the scuffed green wall under a sign that read juridiction de police de paris.

  So she was in a police cell for criminals in the hospital facilities. From somewhere came the dull clanging of a boiler.

  Dabbing blood off his forehead with a handkerchief, Gunter spoke to a man in a stiff, angry voice. He faced this man, standing legs apart, as if for battle. The man was a black-uniformed SS with meaty paws, thick neck, wide-set dark eyes and thick lips. A thin arched scar replaced half his left eyebrow, giving him a permanent quizzical look.

  The SS man set down a fat file on the gouged desk. Smiled. When he spoke it came out in a calm voice.

  Was she some pawn in a Nazi power play?

  “I’m transporting you to Berlin,” Gunter said in English, addressing her. He had picked up the receiver on the black melamine phone and spoke into it, his voice low. Was he requesting backup, an escort to le Bourget?

  The SS man turned to her. A smile still on his face. “This is my investigation now, miss,” he said in almost unaccented English. “My file already contains a list of evidence, preliminary autopsy, statements, forensic tests and ballistics. The only thing I’m missing is your confession.”

  He untied a gray felt pouch, unrolling it to reveal a set of surgical scalpels neatly tied in place like a set of carving knives. Fear tingled up her spine. He walked to the cell. Surveyed her with those dark, wide-set eyes like she was an animal in the zoo.

  Sweat dripped down her back. She willed her panic down. She’d learned never to show fear in the face of a wild animal.

  “You caused such a lot of trouble, miss,” A shake of his close-cropped blond head. His words were soft, like a teacher issuing a gentle reprimand. “Now, you know this won’t do. I’ll need your confession.”

  Kate stared him down. Kept her mouth shut.

  “Ach, let’s not start out on the wrong foot,” he said, wagging a finger.

  Don’t show fear. That was what his type enjoyed. He thumbed through the file.

  “My report won’t be complete without your confession. Let’s start with a few questions.”

  “Stand down, Roschmann.” Gunter slipped his notebook in his case and nodded to Niels, who waited at the cage door. Niels opened the cell, motioning Kate forward. Her bare feet stuck on the cold tiles. “The escorts will arrive any minute. Everything’s been arranged.”

  “So soon? That of course changes things.” The man rolled up his felt pouch, pocketed it and drew a pistol. Kate struggled to hide her fear. The boiler’s metallic clanging raked her skin like needles.

  “It will go in my report that she was shot while escaping,” he said. “You can have the honor, Gunter.”

  All this was in English. He wanted her to understand. To terrorize her before she died.

  He handed Gunter his Luger, an automatic 9mm Parabellum.

  “You wanted to finish the case. Finish it.”

  Controlling her terror, she locked eyes with Gunter. He was so close she could smell the coffee on his breath. She couldn’t read his gray eyes. Would he actually shoot her after his talk about evidence and justice?

  She heard the cock of a trigger. Tore her gaze away to see the SS man holding a second Luger to Gunter’s head.

  “You’ll fire, Gunter, or I shoot you, too, for getting in the way of the Führer’s direct orders.”

  Cold chills traveled from the soles of her feet up her legs.

  “Nice try,” said Gunter, his voice even. “The Führer gave me thirty-six hours and they aren’t up yet.”

  What deadly game was the SS man playing?

  “You think that matters? No one cares.”

  “I care. I’m a policeman and act according to the law. I know you have no orders to shoot her or me. You won’t set me up to murder a prisoner.”

  Kate marveled at the authority in his voice.

  “Niels, open the door,” said Gunter.

  The SS man turned and fired twice at Niels. Gunter whipped around and slammed the pistol butt against the man’s outstretched arm. He yelped in pain. His pistol clattered across the floor, rolling under the desk.

  Gunter, Luger in one hand, pulled out his handcuffs, but the next moment both men were on the floor, punching each other. Everything happened so fast—Kate saw
the man reaching for the pistol under the desk.

  A shot. Then another. She was stuck standing hemmed against the cell bars. A bitterness of burnt powder in the back of her throat.

  In horror, she heard Gunter’s gurgling breath. Saw the blood dripping from the shot to his neck.

  Gasping, she bent down. She saw the helpless look in his eyes, felt the gun in his trembling hand. He was trying to give it to her.

  She put her hand over his. Gunter’s gray eyes fluttered, then closed.

  The man was heaving himself to his feet. He brushed off his black uniform and smiled. “It seems he chose to spare your life, so we have a bit more time together. Shall we hear your confession?”

  “Don’t count on it.”

  She fired, hitting him between the eyes, the second shot to his heart. As any ranch girl knew, you shoot twice to make sure. Surprise arched his brow. He was a big man, collapsing over the desk, sending his report cascading onto Gunter’s blood-spattered body on the floor at her feet.

  Kate checked the magazine. Four bullets left in the Luger. Enough to do some damage. She took Gunter’s attaché case and wiped her bloody feet on Roschmann’s black jacket.

  She gathered the papers, took a last look at the carnage and opened the door, her heart thumping. She expected a volley of bullets, charging troops, but all that met her was the boiler’s dull clanging and the whine of an ambulance pulling into the adjoining emergency bay.

  She found the nurse’s locker room and stared at the blood smudged on her face, her feet. Her hands shook. Her face had gone numb with shock.

  Focus.

  She splashed water on her face and forced herself to clean up.

  In a nurse’s locker, she found a pair of worn espadrilles and a sun hat. She put them on. From a surgery supply cabinet she took a needle, catgut thread and a scalpel.

  With the scalpel she picked off the teddy bear’s eyes and replaced them with the painted diamonds in short tight stitches. She thought of the little girl who wouldn’t see her father again and this birthday present he’d tried so hard to bring her.

  At the hospital incinerator, when no one was looking, she dumped the papers from Gunter’s case, the drawing of her and everything else except his loose change and her French identification papers.