‘If I have to, I’ll use the Purdey.’
The rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine ran from place de la Bastille to place de la Nation. On either side, in the 11th and 12th arrondissements behind what must once have been elegant residences with wrought-iron balconies, shops and all the rest, were warrens of narrow passages and courtyards. Generations of cabinet and furniture makers still had their shops here and, in the past, had incorporated marquetry, gilding and bronze work and become known for it throughout Europe. ‘Yet it’s also an enclave of political troublemakers, Hermann. Repeatedly they have taken to the streets with their likes and dislikes.’
There were also produce shops, and the long lines of the Occupation had already been forming since the lifting of the curfew at 0500 hours. Some had even brought a stool or fold-up chair. Kids with runny noses and untied shoelaces seemed everywhere, baby carriages too, and even grandmothers wearing carpet slippers, all with the inevitable shopping bag, flowers pinned to their hats and the hopes of getting something more than the likelihood of a few radishes and carrots with tops for the rabbits if lucky.
The bank’s garage was just to the east of the intersection with the rue de Charonne. Four- and five-storey tenements, all grey with prewar soot, had balconies whose livestock awaited the sunlight. Merely a slot in the wall, the entrance was labeled GARAGE in grey-blue tin metal with flanking notices for CITROEN, HOTCHKISS, PEUGEOT and RENAULT repairs too, but who had cars other than the chosen few?
Iron bars guarded the lower windows, and above and beyond those were curtains, some open, others perpetually drawn. The depot and repair bays were at the very back of the courtyard, the beams above them sagging. Ateliers of two and three storeys were to the left and right, while in the tenements above, the grey and flaking walls from which laundry hung definitely needed repairing.
‘There’s an iron gate that closes all this off at night, Hermann.’
‘And a hive of industry with hardly a sound. Is it that we’ve been expected?’
Bicycles, well chained, were nearby. Rank on the damp air was the stench of the outdoor toilet, while from the cast-iron tap of another century, a constant stream dribbled as two Alsatians lapped at it, completely ignoring Hermann’s, ‘Ach, meine Schatzen, you’re lovely.’ They barely tolerated his touch, but he was never one to give up easily and soon had these ‘treasures’ all over him.
‘Guard dogs they may be, Louis, but a little scavenged smoked sausage does miracles.’
Beyond the bay for greasing and minor repairs, and the one for flat tires, the sliding door opened into the service centre, a warehouse that seemed, by contrast, huge. Four of the bank’s eight vans were in a row, leaving three still out and probably soon on their way back to Paris, the mechanics and their assistants in bleues de travail and busy, though casting glances at them. But there were also a Vauxhall sedan, a Citroen coupe, a Ford Model C Ten and a forest-green, four-door Cadillac Series 60 limo that was absolutely beautiful. A 1938 or ’39.
Daylight now entered the barred windows high above, while a gleaming black Renault Vivastella four-door, the 1939 and capable of 177 kph (110 mph), had beat them to it.
‘The hood’s still warm,’ said Louis.
‘Inspectors … Inspectors,’ came a deeply resonant voice from on high, behind an iron walkway’s railing at the back. The suit and tie were those of a banker, the gut and shoulders something else again. ‘Mon Dieu, but you’ve had a time of it, I gather. Hector Bolduc a votre service. Come up, come up. Back of this walkway is my office away from the bank. A little coffee and cognac to take the chill off? Two trusted bank employees murdered, was it, at l’Abbaye de Vauclair of all places? Their wives and children have been notified, have they? Funeral expenses will have to be found-the bank of course-and a little set aside to keep them all going.’
A hand was quickly extended, theirs taken by the grip of a wrestler. ‘Here, I’ll close the door to let the boys get on with their work. Gregoire will soon be here. You’ve left the van locked, have you? The keys then, for later.’
He, too, snapped his fingers just like Yvonne Roget. ‘A few questions first, Chairman Bolduc,’ began Louis. ‘Nothing difficult you understand, since your return from the Cote Sud des Landes has been so remarkable, my partner and I are a little taken aback.’
And if that wasn’t kindly, what was? wondered Kohler, for if damage control was intended, the set of this one’s lips and arch of the fiercely bushy grey-black brows and the look in those deep-brown eyes said enough. Greying at the sides, thin and curly and almost bald on top, the hair would see a barber every other day at least, but the grizzled cheeks, chin and throat simply reinforced the appearance not just of toughness, but of a slum landlord about to toss out a family of ten.
The big hands gestured at the thought of his still being in Paris. ‘Yvonne was only trying to give me time to get here. I’m not off until Thursday at 0500 hours. Hauptmann Reinecke and Leutnant Heiss, who are assigned to my bank, are to deliver the Dornier DO-24T flying boat we at the bank have donated to the Luftwaffe’s Coastal Command. It’s come straight off the line at the Potez-CAMS works at Sartrouville.* Very safe and reliable, it’s the perfect reconnaissance aircraft. The Dutch are also producing them. Now please, a little refreshment since Yvonne has told me you hardly touched a thing she had ordered in for you.’
‘A moment,’ said Hermann. ‘Are Reinecke and Heiss also attached to Abwehr-West?’
The Army’s counterintelligence service and the usual for such. ‘Would it matter?’
‘It might.’
‘Then that I wouldn’t know, would I, otherwise it wouldn’t be top secret.’
Seizing the coffeepot, he filled the mugs, then smoothly set three glasses in a row and gave them the Remy Martin Vieille Reserve. ‘It’s a favourite,’ he said. ‘Fifteen years in the cask. Look at how deep the colour is, savour its aroma first. Warm it in the hand and only then brush the lips while breathing in the scent. It’s magnificent.’
One could but try, thought St-Cyr. ‘Monsieur, the back of that van of yours was loaded not just with cash, but items gathered along its route for sale on the marche noir. Brie, wine, champagne, bacon, ham, flour, eggs, truffles …’
Confessions would be out of the question, felt Kohler, since the swiftness of a dark and challenging look had erupted into, ‘What’s this you’re saying? That trusted employees of my bank would dare to do such a thing when half the city is starving and the other half entirely hungry? No milk for the newborns whose mothers have gone dry?’
‘Apparently so,’ went on Louis, ‘but those employees of yours certainly got taken on the truffles. They’re not of the winter variety. They’re from last summer and, in a foolish attempt to increase their price, have been dyed with the juice from walnut husks.’
‘And what, please, am I to say? That I’ll cut the balls off the sellers, eh, since I knew absolutely nothing of this matter?’
Indicating that he should sit facing them both from across the table, this Surete even had the audacity to drag out a little notebook and a pair of ivory bones!
Kohler had already started in on the cognac and judging it perfect, had given him an appreciative nod and was now lathering one of the buttered, hot croissants with the jam, so one had best calm the voice. ‘It’s blue damson, Inspector, albeit from Poland, but from before those people started the hostilities that have taught them such a lesson. Word has it that the Crusaders brought the plum back to France from Syria, the Romans having grafted it.’
And a little like the walnut husks, but ancient history when needed, was it? wondered St-Cyr. ‘Again, monsieur, I must remind you of the contents of that van of yours.’