The Dalous and the other three men had also prepared some rather interesting distractions that might keep the enemy busy.
But all the same, Max was worried. There were several things about this business that he did not like. The short notice. The high risk—for he told Charlie that he thought there was a good chance they’d both be shot when they made the attack—and the complete uncertainty about how Müller would be guarded.
“If at the last moment Charlie and I see that the thing can’t be done,” he told the team, “then we stand down. You hear no shots, and you all vanish.”
One big question had been whether to make the attempt as Müller arrived at the theater, or when he left. Since it would still be broad daylight when he came, it was decided to try as he departed.
“He’ll probably come out before the rest of the audience. That means that we’ll be visible, but have a clear shot. If not, then we’ll just have to mingle with the crowd and take a shot if we can,” Max said to Charlie. “It’ll be more complex. Frankly,” he confessed, “if this were for a lesser target than Müller himself, I wouldn’t attempt it.”
Charlie carried a small pistol, Max a large Welrod with a silencer. Between them, they also had a Sten gun.
As the time of the theater opening approached, the audience began to gather on the cobbles among the trees. Gradually they filtered through the doors. There was no sign of any official presence until, just as the last of the audience went through the doors, a police truck rolled up and halted at the end of the cobbles. A dozen police got out, but remained surveying the scene by the bus. A couple of minutes later, three cars drew swiftly into the street on the other side of the theater. Two Gestapo men got out of the first, another two from the last. The middle vehicle was a larger staff car. Three obviously high-ranking Gestapo officers stepped out. The general in the center was a dark-haired, middle-aged man with a clear-cut, rather sour-looking face.
“That certainly looks like Müller,” Max whispered. The first two Gestapo men swiftly entered the theater, presumably to make sure the way was clear. Then the others, moving in a posse with the general in the center, walked straight in through the doors. The police stayed where they were. After this, there was silence.
Charlie and Max waited over an hour. Charlie wondered if there would be an interval, but as nobody came out through the doors, he assumed not. Dusk fell. The policemen remained by their bus.
“There’s only one thing to do,” Max said. “You’ll have to open up on the police with the Sten gun. That’ll give me cover, and the noise will alert the others. Give me your pistol. I’ll make a dash for the general with that and the Welrod. If I get back, we leave as planned. If I go down, you leave alone. Don’t hang about.”
Another half hour passed. It was getting quite dark. They inched the door of the building just ajar and listened carefully for any whistle from the surrounding streets. There was nothing.
And then it all started to happen.
The first two Gestapo men appeared at the theater doors. Moving swiftly, they went over to the staff car while the driver leaped to open the door. The policemen gazed placidly from in front of their bus. The two Gestapo men looked around to make sure the streets were clear.
And then Müller and his two companions stepped out.
“Now,” said Max.
It happened so fast that the men in front of the theater hardly knew what hit them. Charlie raked the policemen with the Sten gun and the air filled with noise. He saw half a dozen of them go down. Others were trying to take cover and return his fire. They hardly even noticed Max, his hat pulled down over his face, sprinting toward the Gestapo general.
Before Charlie’s first burst of fire was completed, an uproar arose from the streets all around. There were shots, explosions, huge flashes. This was the Dalou boys and their friends putting on a show.
Both the police and the Gestapo men were totally distracted now. Max was face-to-face with Müller.
And then Müller screamed.
“We’re French. It’s a trap!” And his two companions were shouting as well. And Charlie saw Max stare at them and then swivel, bob his head down and double back toward him. As he came closer, Charlie saw one of the two Gestapo men still in the theater run around the theater door and take aim at Max, but he managed to bring the Sten gun around and got him with a short burst.
Then Max was crashing through the doorway, and Charlie smacked it shut and locked it behind him, and then both ran down the passage and out through the window at the back. And they kept running into the narrow alleyway, and got over a garden wall, and burst into the building beyond.
Max was panting as they reached the doorway that gave out into the street beyond. They looked out. There was nobody there except the small form of Thomas Gascon, at the edge of the trees, a hundred yards away, signaling to them that the coast was clear.
They had just caught up with him, and were running up the slope when they heard the sound of boots in the street behind them. Four or five police were on the roadway. They were taking aim. Charlie heard a rattle of fire, felt something thud into him. The next moment he felt Max pulling the Sten gun out of his hands. The Sten gun chattered into life. He heard a scream. Max’s arm was under his left arm, Thomas Gascon’s under his right. The old man was amazingly strong. He felt himself stumbling forward. Max glanced back.
“They won’t follow,” he said. “But within the hour, they’ll be searching house to house. We’ve got to get Charlie somewhere safe. Can you walk a bit, Charlie, if we help you?”
“I think so.”
“Well,” said Max to Thomas, “do you know a place we can hide around here?”
“Yes,” said Thomas, “I do.”
When Luc saw Thomas and his companions at his door, he was horrified.
“We’ve got to get him out of sight,” Thomas whispered.
“What do you mean?” Luc whispered back.
“You know.” Thomas turned to Max. “We’re going into the garden at the back.”
Luc seized Thomas by the arm and pulled him to one side.
“Are you insane?” he hissed urgently. “That’s my hiding place. That’s just for you and me.”
“It was a trap. He’s been shot. We have to hide him,” Thomas answered.
Luc moaned.
“You don’t understand. They’ll know my hiding place.”
“Not if we’re quick. We left them back at the bottom of the hill. They’ve hardly started searching yet. Open the back door, for God’s sake.”
“Oh, brother, you’ve just killed me,” Luc told him.
But Thomas took no further notice.
“We’ll need a lamp,” he said.
It was a long night. At about midnight, the police rapped on the door of the house. Luc, half asleep, opened the door. He seemed puzzled, and asked them what it was all about. They searched the house, went into the garden at the back, opened the shed. But Luc had done a good job. There was no sign of people hiding or of any disturbance to the place at all. After searching the other buildings nearby, the police abruptly left.
For Thomas and Max, alone with Charlie in the cave, the hours passed slowly. They hadn’t taken Charlie all the way down to the chamber at the end, but found a place around the first bend where there was enough room for him to lie comfortably. Some of the food supplies that Luc had stored were stacked just a few feet away.
Max had looked carefully at the wound in Charlie’s back. Charlie was shivering a little.
“Can we get a doctor?” Thomas asked.
“Difficult now. Maybe in the morning,” said Max.
“I just thought …”
“I was in the war in Spain,” said Max quietly. “I saw a lot of people get hit. Just trust me.”
A little after midnight, Charlie’s mind seemed to wander. He started murmuring. He said the name of Louise. Then Esmé. Then he grew quiet. He was breathing with difficulty.
“Mon ami,” said Max, “you know who I a
m?”
“Yes, Max,” said Charlie.
“We were betrayed tonight. Could it have been Corinne?”
“Never. She would never …”
“One can never be sure, Charlie. What if the Gestapo threatened her family?”
“She came from England. She’s no family here, except for her son, Esmé.”
“Where’s he?”
“Down in the country with his grandparents. The Germans think they’re Vichy.” He paused. “Max, I’d better tell you I’m his father.”
“Ah.” Max considered. “She wouldn’t betray the father of her son. No, I don’t believe that. But if she didn’t betray us deliberately, then she must have been used. Someone planted the information on her.” He nodded. “I have to warn her, Charlie. I’d better do it fast.”
“Yes. Don’t be seen.”
“I’ll take care. But remember, Charlie, Corinne’s your contact. We just get the messages at the safe house. You’ll have to tell me who she really is.”
“Madame Louise. She owns L’Invitation au Voyage.”
“Ah. I know of it, of course. It might have been one of her girls, then.”
“Perhaps … Or someone else.”
“Maybe I can find out if I talk to her.”
“Maybe. Can you protect her?”
“Yes, Charlie. I’ll protect her. I promise.”
“That’s important.”
“Don’t worry about a thing.” He gazed at the aristocrat. “How do you feel now?”
“Cold.”
“All right. Nothing to worry about.”
There was a long pause. Charlie looked strangely gray.
“Max.”
“Yes, Charlie.”
“Would you hold my hand.”
Max took it. A minute later, Charlie gave a shudder, and his head fell to one side. Then Max closed his eyes.
“Did you know he was dying?” Thomas asked, after a long pause.
“Yes.”
“Have you any idea who betrayed us?”
“Not yet,” said Max.
Thomas was thoughtful.
It was a little after one in the morning when Schmid began to question Louise. So far, he thought, things had gone very well.
It was unfortunate, of course, that so many policemen had been wounded. One of them was probably going to die. But that was a police problem, not his. Everything else had been entirely satisfactory.
It amused him that the prisoners dressed in Gestapo uniforms had given the game away. No doubt, thinking that they were about to be shot by the Resistance, they had hoped to help their colleagues by giving the game away. In fact, they had done the Gestapo a favor. It was far more discouraging for the Maquis to know they had been betrayed than to think, however mistakenly, that they had shot Müller. He wouldn’t have to keep the three men in prison any longer either. They could all be shot at dawn.
As for the mission, of course, he had already gotten the information he wanted the moment the attempt had been made.
Madame Louise was Corinne.
They had raided the brothel at midnight. The various officers using the place had been politely asked to leave. The girls had been asked for their papers, then sent home.
And now, at one in the morning, Madame Louise was sitting in an interrogation room in the rue des Saussaies.
He began quite politely.
“Madame, let me save you the tiresome and unpleasant business of denying your identity. The little comedy you witnessed between myself and Colonel Walter the other evening was in order to plant false information with you. You passed the information on to your contacts. As a result, an attempt was made tonight on a man pretending to be Müller. Thanks to this, we know for a certainty that you are Corinne.”
Louise said nothing.
“Perhaps you would like to tell me the names of your associates.”
Louise said nothing.
“Let us start with something easier then. How do you pass on the information?”
“There is a drop.”
“Thank you. And where is that?”
“In the River Seine.”
“Ah, madame. I am afraid it will be necessary for me to persuade you to do a little better than that.”
He worked on her for a while until she fainted.
It was time to turn in. If necessary, he could always bring other forces to bear on her. She had a son somewhere, he knew. Any threat to a child will break most parents. But it irked him professionally to have to resort to those means. He would persuade her. It would be a challenge to break her.
Early that morning, Max Le Sourd stopped in the rue de Montmorency and gazed toward L’Invitation au Voyage. There was a van and a Gestapo car in front of it.
He didn’t go any closer, but stopped at a nearby café to ask what had happened.
“They came at midnight last night and arrested Madame Louise,” he was told. “The place is closed. No one knows anything else.”
It was nearly ten in the morning when Schmid returned. But when he did, he received a shock.
“Dead? How? You did not leave a blanket or sheet in the cell?”
“No, Lieutenant.”
“A sharp object?”
The fellow looked embarrassed.
“A knife. When the guard brought her breakfast.”
They showed him. She had slit her wrists, in the correct manner. She had bled to death in minutes.
Schmid cursed and cursed, in fury. Then he ordered a car to take him to her house. That must be closed and sealed. At least he’d have her pictures.
As Thomas sat in his usual place by the bar, he supposed that he should be grateful. Luc hadn’t much wanted to have Charlie’s body in the cave at all, but as Thomas pointed out, it was less likely to be found there than anywhere else they could think of.
After that, he’d made his way home, where Édith had been more than relieved to see him. In the middle of the morning, Michel Dalou had come by to let him know that everyone had gotten back safely from the operation.
“Do you think anyone was identified?” Thomas asked.
“No. We all had face covering of some sort, and before the police recovered from the racket we made, we’d all run off.”
“That’s good.” Thomas didn’t tell him about Charlie. He’d have wanted to know what they’d done with the body.
“I heard we were set up,” said Michel Dalou.
“Maybe. Leave that to Max. He’ll work it out.”
“Are we safe?”
“Yes. Nobody got captured, and you say no one was seen—so the police and the Gestapo have nothing.”
“That’s good,” said Michel Dalou, and left.
But Thomas Gascon was thoughtful. The events of last night were forming a pattern in his mind. And it wasn’t a pattern he liked at all.
Corinne was Louise. He knew Louise: the girl that Luc had set up, long ago. She’d paid his brother too, for years, before they’d had a falling-out.
He remembered also how his brother had been so anxious that he should not go on the mission last night.
And what about the cave? He’d said he’d been preparing it as a hiding place for him. Yet he’d never mentioned the fact until last night. Did that make sense?
Stranger still, now that he thought of it, had been Luc’s reaction when he and Max had arrived with Charlie. At the time Thomas had been so concerned about Charlie that he hadn’t paid much attention. But what had Luc said? “They’ll know my hiding place.” But who? Max; Charlie, if he’d lived. Why was that so terrible? Was he planning to hide from them? And then that final little cry: “Brother, you’ve just killed me.” He wasn’t just planning to hide from the Resistance. He thought that one day they’d kill him.
He remembered how Max had already been suspicious of his brother. And how he himself had made no comment, because, alas, he knew Luc’s character.
Luc had known that last night was a trap.
It was early afternoon when Max stopped
at the bar.
“Louise has been arrested. Midnight last night. I think I’ve figured it out. There are two alternatives. They may have used her to lure us into a raid, so that they could capture us. But I don’t think so.”
“Why?”
“Because they failed to catch us. They could have had plainclothesmen hidden around the place. They didn’t. So that wasn’t their object.”
“Go on.”
“I believe they set up Louise. Fed her false information that she passed on in good faith. They wanted to know if she was Corinne. By taking the bait, we confirmed it for them, and they arrested her. We just destroyed Louise.”
“So someone must have informed the Gestapo that Louise was Corinne,” Thomas reasoned.
“I think that must be it. One of her girls, perhaps.”
“Perhaps,” said Thomas.
Then he was very sad.
Luc was sitting alone in the room that gave onto his garden when Thomas arrived. He looked up a little anxiously when Thomas came in, and seemed relieved when he saw that his brother was alone. Thomas had a knapsack on his back. He put it down and went to sit beside him.
“I have a message from Max. He says thank you.” Thomas reached into his pocket and pulled out a flask of brandy. “We need a drink.” He poured two glasses. “What shall we drink to?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well then: To us.”
They drank. Thomas waited a little while.
“There is one thing more.” He paused. “I need you to tell me something.”
“Whatever you want.”
“I’ve been thinking about last night. I didn’t understand at first. Then I remembered how you had tried to stop me from going. You said you’d been having bad dreams. And you reminded me I could hide in the cave.”
Luc said nothing.
“You were trying to save me,” Thomas continued. “You tried to save your brother. I know it.” He put his arm around Luc. “Do you remember when I fought Bertrand Dalou after they took your balloon?” He held his brother closer. “It’s always just been you and me. And now you tried to save my life. Do you know what that means to me?”
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