A moment later I was sorry that I had done so, for I saw a movement against the skyline.
Beghin stopped and called down to me to go back. At the same moment Roux’s bullet hit the rail near my feet. Beghin fired back, but Roux was no longer visible. The fat man clattered up the last few stairs. When I caught up with him he was raising his head gingerly over the top of the ledge running round the roof. He swore softly.
“Has he got away?”
Without answering me, he stepped over the ledge to the roof.
It was long, narrow, and quite flat. Near us was a large water-tank. At the far end was a triangular structure containing the door leading below. Between was a forest of square steel ventilating-shafts. Beghin drew me into the shadow of the tank.
“We shall have to wait for reinforcements. We should never find him among those ventilators, and he could snipe us if we tried it.”
“But he may get away while we’re waiting.”
“No. We’ve got him here. There’re only two ways off this roof-the fire-escape and that door over there. He’ll probably try to shoot his way out. You’d better stay here when the men arrive.”
But there was another way off the roof, and Roux was to take it.
We did not have to wait long. Almost as soon as Beghin had finished speaking, gardes mobiles with rifles were pouring on the roof through the door. Beghin shouted to them to spread out, and advance towards us. They obeyed promptly. The line began to move. I waited with bated breath.
I don’t quite know what I expected to happen, but what did actually happen was unexpected.
The line of men had almost reached the last row of ventilators, and I was beginning to think that Roux must, after all, have given us the slip, when suddenly I saw a figure dart from behind the ventilators and make for the ledge opposite us. A garde shouted and raced in pursuit. Beghin ran forward. Roux leaped up on the ledge and steadied himself for an instant.
And then I understood. Between the roof on which we stood and that of the next warehouse was a space of about two meters. Roux was going to jump for it.
I saw him crouch for the take-off. The nearest garde was about twenty meters from him, working the bolt of his rifle as he ran. Beghin was still farther away. Then Beghin stopped and raised his revolver.
He fired just as Roux was straightening his body. The bullet hit him in the right arm, for I saw his left hand clutch at it. Then he lost his balance.
It was horrible. For one brief instant he struggled to save himself. Then, as he realized that he was falling, he cried out.
The cry rose to a scream as he disappeared, a scream that stopped abruptly with the dreadful sound of his body hitting the concrete below.
I watched Beghin walk over to the ledge and look down. Then, for the second time in twenty-four hours, I was violently ill.
When they reached Roux, he was dead.
“His real name,” said Beghin, “was Verrue. Arsene Marie Verrue. We’ve known about him for years. He is-was-a Frenchman, but his mother was an Italian. He was born at Briancon, near the Italian frontier. In 1924 he deserted from the army. Soon after, we heard that he was working as an Italian agent in Zagreb. Then, for a time, he worked for the Rumanian army intelligence service. Afterwards he went to Germany for some other government, probably Italy again. He came here on forged papers. Anything else you want to know?”
We were back in the office of the Agence Metraux. Inspector Fournier had been taken away in an ambulance. Detectives were busy transferring all the papers, files, and books in the office to a van that had been summoned for the purpose. One man was engaged in ripping open the upholstery of the chairs. Another was prizing up the floorboards.
“What about Mademoiselle Martin?”
He shrugged casually. “Oh! She was just his woman. She knew what he was up to, of course. She’s down at the poste now in a faint. We’ll question her later. I expect we shall have to let her go. The one I am glad to get is Maletti, or Metraux, as he calls himself. He’s the brain behind all this. Roux was never important, just an employee. We shall get the rest soon. All the information is here.”
He went over to the man at work on the floor, and began to examine a bundle of papers that had been found below the boards. I was left to myself.
So it was Roux. Now I knew why his accent had seemed so familiar. It was the same accent as that of my colleague Rossi, the Italian at the Mathis School of Languages. Now I knew what Roux had been talking about when he had offered me five thousand francs for a piece of information. It had been the hiding-place of the photographs that he had wanted. Now I knew who had hit me on the head, who had searched my room, who had slammed and locked the writing-room door. Now, I knew, and it did not seem to matter that I knew. In my ears was still that last agonized shriek. In my mind’s eye I saw Mademoiselle Martin and the dead spy standing in front of the Russian billiard table. I saw her pressing against him. But… Roux was never important… just an employee… she was just his woman. Yes, of course. That was the way to look at it.
An agent came into the room with a package in his hand. Beghin left his papers and opened the package. Inside it was a Zeiss Contax camera and a large telephoto lens. Beghin beckoned to me.
“They were found in his pockets,” he said. “Do you want to see the number?”
I looked at the camera in his hand. The lens and shutter mechanism were crushed sideways.
I shook my head. “I’ll take your word for it, Monsieur Beghin.”
He nodded. “There’s no point in your staying any longer. Henri is downstairs. He will take you back to St. Gatien in the car.” He turned once more to his papers.
I hesitated. “There’s just one more thing, Monsieur Beghin. Can you explain why he should have stayed on at the Reserve, trying to get his film back?”
He looked up a trifle irritably. He shrugged. “I don’t know. He was probably paid on results. I expect he needed the money. Good night, Vadassy.”
I walked downstairs to the street.
“He needed the money.”
It was like an epitaph.
19
It was nearly half past one when I arrived back at the Reserve.
As I tramped wearily down the drive, I noticed that there was a light in the office. My heart sank. According to Beghin, the St. Gatien police had explained the situation to Koche, and prepared him for my return; but the prospect of discussing the affair with anyone was one I could not face. I tried to slip past the office door to the stairs, and had my hand on the banisters when there was a movement from the office. I turned. Koche was standing at the door smiling at me sleepily.
“I have been waiting up for you, Monsieur. I had a visit from the Commissaire a short while ago. He told me, amongst other things, that you would be returning.”
“So I understand. I am very tired.”
“Yes, of course. Spy-hunting sounds a tiring sport.” He smiled again. “I thought you might be glad of a sandwich and a glass of wine. It is here, ready, in the office.”
I realized suddenly that a sandwich and some wine was precisely what I should like. I thanked him. We went into the office.
“The Commissaire,” he said as he opened the wine, “was emphatic but evasive. I gathered that it is most important that no hint of Roux’s real activities should get about. At the same time, of course, it is necessary to explain why Monsieur Vadassy is arrested on a charge of espionage yesterday, and yet is back again today as if nothing has happened.”