Her fingers shook so much she couldn’t do it. A button flew off, another fell … Both hit the floor and rolled away, and she heard the sound of them against that of the sleet striking the windows.
Trembling, she tried to find the exact place where the papers were. The left side of the hem … Here … here, she said to herself and, pulling it up to grasp it in her teeth, yanked hard and …
He was standing in the doorway. She could barely make him out through the darkness. Had he raised the gun, was he about to kill her?
‘Mi … ch … el, please!’
He took a step, lurched into the room, ran at her.
Shrieking, she darted aside and felt him grab her by the coat. They fell, they both went down hard to roll madly about, she trying to get free of him, he trying to pin her down … down. Gun … gun … what has happened to his gun? she yelled at herself and sank her teeth into his ear.
He screamed and swung hard. Her head banged against the floor and she lay there panting with her eyes clamped tightly shut as the pain rushed through her.
‘Putain! Interfering slut!’ He caught breath. ‘Ah nom de Jesus-Christ! I’ve cracked my forehead.’
Through the webs of pain, she could hear his ragged breathing. He would kill her now, there was nothing she could do to stop it.
Bucking her middle fiercely up, she swung her fists hard, hitting him repeatedly in the face, then scratching at his eyes … his eyes and tearing at him as he hit her again and again and tried to grab her arms.
They fell back. She butted the top of her head against his chin and scrambled off him. Raced for the door … only to be caught, pulled back, dragged down …
Shrieking, she kicked hard and caught him in the face then scrambled away … away. The stairs … she had to reach the stairs.
When her hand came up against his gun on the floor, she dragged it up and threw herself over on to her back.
Against the sound of the ice pellets on the windows, le Blanc heard her breathing through her teeth. He would pull off his overcoat and throw it over her. He would kick her hard until the gun was empty or had fallen from her hands.
Kohler silently swore at himself. Kempf was good. Since leaving the bedrooms upstairs, the bastard had gone to ground so well there hadn’t been a hint of where he was. Only the feeling that he had not yet left the house by going up the back stairs or out the front door and onto the rue de Montpensier.
Off the downstairs corridor there were rooms-a library, a study, a billiard room, kitchen, pantry and those same back stairs …
When he stepped into what he felt must be the billiard room, Kohler knew instinctively he had made a mistake. There was nothing firmer to back this feeling up, now only the pitch darkness, the coolness of the draught from upstairs, the warmth of a radiator under his hand, the faint smell of chalk dust and green baize all billiard rooms had, that much stronger, far harsher smell of stale tobacco smoke, of cigars, cognac, pipes and cigarettes …
He waited for the bullets to come. Uncertain, his fingers trailed across the table. Finding a ball, he cautiously took it up. Where … where was Kempf? Standing over by the cue-rack? Behind a chair, beside a lamp, near the tallyboard …?
Cautiously he sent the ball rolling down the table. If one could play this game, so could two.
The ball didn’t go far. When it struck another faintly, that sound was all Kohler heard until a breath was released in a sigh and he realized it was his own. Gone … the son of a bitch was gone! Ah merde, Louis, watch out!
St-Cyr was torn by the waiting. Time collapsed, constricted-played tricks on the mind, expanding suddenly so as to make minutes seem hours not seconds. He knew he should have gone after Marie-Claire de Brisson, knew he must stay where he was, that Hermann would eventually flush Kempf up the stairs to the attic flat. Or would he?
It had been too long a wait. Something must have happened. Perhaps Kempf had left by the front door and would now be entering the house of Monsieur Verges from the rue de Valois to find Mademoiselle de Brisson and his friend-Was that how it was? She couldn’t hide for ever in that empty house, would be terrified.
Straightening, he eased his aching knees and back and lessened his grip on the revolver.
Again he waited, tormented by the need to follow the girl before it was too late, tormented by not knowing where the Sonderfuhrer was. If he moved back to the head of the stairs and, at some noise, chanced a shot or two down them, he might kill Hermann. Only by staying here could he use the degrees of darkness to satisfy himself that it was the Sonderfuhrer who came up the stairs or Hermann who was much taller, much bigger.
A board gave a little. He held himself ready, said silently, Come up the stairs.
There were no further sounds save those of the incessant sleet, and when, at last, a darker silhouette appeared against the lesser darkness but briefly, he was forced again to wait. ‘Louis … Louis, it’s me. He’s buggered off.’
‘The girl, Hermann.’
‘That house, Louis.’
Her breathing came easier now. As she lay on her back with le Blanc’s gun clutched in both hands, waiting for him to rush her, Marie-Claire de Brisson gingerly raised her knees a little more.
The last folds of her dress slid to gather about her middle, freeing her legs completely. Bracing the gun against her inner thighs, the backs of her hands were pressed into her garters and silk stockings and the cold skin above them, the smoothness of her naked flesh.
She heard someone on the staircase and, ripped right out of things, thought it was her father, said desperately, Never again will I let him touch me, and realized it couldn’t possibly be him.
Ah no. Franz .. was it Franz?
Craning her neck as far back as possible, she chanced a look directly behind her but the steps had stopped and there was nothing but darkness everywhere.
‘Michel, if you kill me, you will never find the money. I hid it elsewhere. I found it in the storeroom at the shop-I did. I moved it!’
There was no answer, there were no more steps behind her that she could discern. ‘Michel, I’m warning you!’
The gun leapt in her hands. There was a brilliant flash of fire, the instant image of her legs with knees up, then the acrid stench of smoke and a rush of sound, a loud bang, the sound of plaster falling and, finally, through the darkness and the smoke, the muffled shrieking of Madame Lemaire’s maid and the sound of the girl banging on her mistress’s wall.
Le Blanc waited. Holding his overcoat by the shoulders, he tried to bring himself to rush forward and throw it over Marie-Claire, to kick her hard and let her empty the revolver before it vas too late.
She’ll hit me, he kept on telling himself and asked, Where the hell is Franz? What has happened to him?
‘I’ll go to the police!’ came the muffled words from next door. ‘I’ll tell them everything, messieurs!’
He chanced a step and heard Marie-Claire suck in a breath, heard the hammer click as it descended on the cartridge, saw the flash of fire, the upraised knees, the stockings, the underwear, then heard the bang and felt the darkness closing in on him.
For perhaps ten seconds there was no further sound, then she gave a stifled cry, a sudden furious lurching up of her legs, a kicking, a thrashing. As the gun was grabbed from behind, it went off. Kempf forced her hands down between her legs. She had no strength, could not raise her arms, could not move her head for he was kneeling on her chest and tearing the gun from her. ‘Michel!’ he hissed. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Yes. The bitch nearly got me. What happened?’