The booby trap … A travelling salesman fresh off the boat from Buffalo, New York, in 1903, had installed the bloody thing on a trial basis and had never come back for it. The Badger Safe Protector. Two little vials of fulminate of mercury probably, but those hadn’t blown the door off and wrecked the room.
For that De Vries had used the fulminate to detonate a charge of nitro or dynamite. Three or four sticks at least.
‘The bomb boys can pick up the pieces and tell us all about it. How many dead?’
‘I do not know. None so far.’
In the pandemonium of injured and rescuer, cop, stretcher-bearer and nurse, there was no sign of Oona or Giselle. Oona had been at one of the wickets. He, himself, had taken shelter before using a length of cord to pull the handle open. He had called out to her to leave and she had … ‘Oona!’ he cried out, startling several. A flic started for him, a Feldgendarm also …
Desperately he searched the hall. Both of their backs were to him. She was standing beside Giselle who had an arm about Oona’s waist. There were no cuts, no abrasions. She must have tripped and fallen to the floor. They were staring at a poster … a poster!
DANCE
TANGO, WALTZ ETC AND ALL THE LATEST BALLROOM DANCES
LESSONS AND CLASSES
Madame jeseauel, Professeur Diplome, et Mademoiselle
Nana Theleme, danseuse electriaue de flamenco.
Studio Pleyel No. 6
252 rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honore, Paris
Telephone: Carnot 33.56
Deutsch spoken
se habla espanol
5
The revolver weighed at least a kilogram when loaded. The build was grim, the grip firm, and when Nana Theleme pulled the hammer back, it made two clicks, at half-cock and the full.
She knew it was madness to have such a thing. The box had been wrapped in newspaper but tied with a red silk rose and left with the coat-check girl downstairs in the club but now …
She pulled the trigger. The click, as the firing pin struck an empty chamber, was louder still. There were six packets of cartridges, one hundred and twenty rounds, the two other revolvers. All had been cleaned of the grease that had protected them from rust over the years in that safe at the Gare Saint-Lazare. They looked brand-new.
‘The 1873 Modele d’ordonnance,’ she said, a whisper. Why had Janwillem sent them to her? She had loved him. She would have done anything for him. ‘I didn’t betray you in Oslo!’ she swore softly and clenched a fist. ‘Tshaya must have but you … you are still blaming me. She’s a Gestapo informer, Jani. A betrayer of others too!’
Picking up the card that had been inside the box, she hurriedly reread it. Pour toi, cherie, et pour tes amies de l’armee secrete. Bonne chance.
Batard! she silently cried. He had told them he had escaped during the battle for Norway in the spring of 1940. A trawler to England, and bravo! She had wished it with all her heart. But had the British then found him such a nuisance they had been only too willing to get rid of him, or had he simply lied enough to convince them of his usefulness in France?
And what missions had the British assigned him, in addition to their own targets? The safes of the SS at numero 84 avenue Foch? Those of the Abwehr at the Hotel Lutetia, or those of von Stulpnagel, the Military Governor of France?
Three revolvers. One for herself, one for Suzanne-Cecilia, and the last for Gabrielle.
He had had no need of them and had never used a gun during all of the robberies he had committed. ‘I prefer explosives,’ he had once said and had given her that smile of his which had warmed her heart with its gentleness and yet had been so full of gypsy mischief. ‘They’re much better, but like a good woman, you have to know how far you can go with them.’
He had gone too far with her, had promised marriage early in 1938 but had then taken up again with Tshaya and had left for Oostende at that one’s beckoning.
And from there, the two of them had gone to Oslo.
Mollergaten-19, prisoner 3266, cell D2. Seven long months of solitary confinement for one who had always been free, and then cell C27. Three other convicts for constant company, the space shared being no more than 8 square metres. Four bunks to a cell, and a tiny, grilled window too high to look out of and forbidden in any case.
Had he told Tshaya he couldn’t stay with her any more, that he was to have a son? Had he said he was going to marry her arch rival?
Prison would have been enough to have made him hate her instead of Tshaya. None of her letters to him before the war had been opened. All had been returned. Only sketchy details of his existence had been provided by the prison authorities.
And now he was giving not just herself but the others a last chance. Three revolvers against those of the Gestapo, the SS and the Wehrmacht.
The soup had been excellent, the Chief Inspector St-Cyr more than content. No matter the lateness of the hour, and she but a perfect stranger, he liked to have a woman about the house at 3 rue Laurence-Savart. He was pleased the clothing of his dead wife had fitted so well. The long and heavy white flannelette nightgown from Brittany was warm enough perhaps. The black lisle stockings could not be seen but for a slice of ankle above the low-heeled black leather pumps. Grey flannel trousers had been rolled up out of sight but were ready in case she needed to escape a Gestapo visit.
Suzanne-Cecilia was glad she had taken the time to ruffle her hair so that it would constantly remind him of her awakening.
‘Madame,’ he said, having given up all thought of rationing the last of his emergency pipe tobacco, ‘let me ask again if you know Mademoiselle Nana Theleme?’
‘The chanteuse at the Club Monseigneur and also sometimes at the Scheherazade?’
‘Yes, that’s the one.’
Her soft brown eyes would not duck away as some might have done but would gaze steadfastly at him with complete candour. ‘Does she have a little boy?’
Merde, why must she continue to avoid things? ‘There’s no perhaps about it. He’s the Gypsy’s son.’
She tossed her auburn curls at his gruffness. ‘It’s a family matter then. No. No, I cannot say that I have made her acquaintance. So many people come and go at the Jardin. Saturday afternoons and Sundays are busiest, even in winter. My work does not allow me close contact with any of them.’
‘Yet you became the mistress of one.’
‘Clement Laviolette, of Cartier’s, yes. It’s a puzzle, isn’t it?’ Did he think it a tragedy? she wondered.
Neither Gabrielle nor Nana Theleme could possibly have been recently in touch with her, thought St-Cyr. The risk of using the telephone would have been too great but, still, she must be very aware of Gestapo interest in herself because of the house on the rue Poliveau if nothing else. ‘Tell me then,’ he asked, ‘why is it that Mademoiselle Theleme said you let her son feed the wolves?’
‘I can only tell you what I know to be true, Inspector. If this … this singer of gypsy songs says she has met me, well … what can I say but that the chance meeting so often leaves no memory.’
He sighed in despair. He looked at her steadily as if in judgement and, yes, Gabrielle had said he was persistent but why had he suddenly taken to using his matchbox as if it were a wireless key? Gabi had told him about having access to a transceiver – yes, of course – but not about herself. Never that!
The message came to an end. It had read: sos GESTAPO, and she thought he had tapped that out because of listening devices in the house and this sickened her, but then he said, ‘Your husband, madame. Please tell me a little about him.’