‘The location is perfect, Hermann. Maximum exposure if fear of repeat fires is what was wanted.’
‘Publicity. Someone who knows the city well,’ grunted Kohler. ‘A pattern, Louis.’
‘An uncomfortable thought and an arsonist totally without conscience. But for every fire there is a reason, no matter how warped.’
‘Or sick.’
Again the murmuring intruded but now there was that unmistakable feeling of never knowing if they were being watched by the arsonist.
‘Louis, our visitor is feeding the pigeons. There, over there. Behind the fountain.’
The stiff woollen greatcoat was Prussian blue, the rubber boots, whose tops were folded down, were well used and black, of pre-war vintage. Little more could be seen of him beyond the stallions with their flailing hooves and wild-eyed muzzles, but the murmur increased and became more excited. The black leather gloves had been removed and stuffed into a pocket. The left hand held a torn loaf of white bread-white, no less and seldom seen on the streets these days!-while the fingers of the right hand ripped off bits and tossed them to the pigeons, his little friends.
‘Does he keep doves at home?’ hazarded Kohler, baffled that, in the face of such a catastrophe and hunger among the civilian population, anyone could be crass enough to unthinkingly undertake such a sentimental task.
‘Maybe he’s homesick,’ offered the Surete.
‘Maybe he wants to show you French exactly how unimportant you are!’
Such inflammatory statements from Hermann were best ignored but why should they be? ‘Is it that he has seen it all so many times before, Inspector, or is it that he needs to find release from the horror in such a simple task?’
Kohler grinned at Louis’s use of ‘Inspector’. The Frog was one up on him in rank and always pulling it. ‘Hey, Chief, cut the crap. He’s budgeting the crumbs. He’s making sure that the weak and not-so-weak get their fair share but like all good Nazis he admires the brave and the strong. See how he flicks the extra bits down at his boots as a reward.’
It was St-Cyr’s turn to grin. ‘You’re learning, mon ami. Being stuck with me is good for you. Let’s hear what he has to say.’
‘Let’s ask him exactly why the fuck he’s here and what he intends to do about it!’
The grunt of acknowledgement from the fire chief was terse, the bread summarily ripped into four large chunks and thrown among the pigeons so as to equalize the fight. ‘Leiter Weidling at your service, Herr Kohler. Lubeck, Heidelberg and Koln. This one’s done it all before. Same technique, same pattern. Gasoline poured on the floor to run under the seats and around the shoes and boots of the unsuspecting. Then across the entrances to the foyer or across the staircase. Then the match or cigarette lighter.’
‘But … but the usherette has said there were two women …?’ began St-Cyr in German that was far from rusty.
Unimpressed that a Frenchman could speak his native tongue, Weidling fastidiously brushed crumbs from thick, strong fingers before pulling on his gloves. Again he spoke only to Hermann. ‘Lubeck first, in late May of 1938. A cinema in the student quarter near the university.’
The blue eyes were lifeless in that rosy, apple-cheeked countenance. A man of sixty or sixty-five, a father probably and a grandfather. The lips were thin.
‘Heidelberg in early July of the same year, a crowded lecture hall, a Party meeting. The first fire killed sixty-seven, the second only twenty-eight. Then Koln and a night-club in mid-August-again the same technique, again a good number-sixteen to be precise-but most escaped through the stage doors and I count the thing a failure.’
Was he really telling them everything? ‘Two women?’ asked Kohler, watching him intently.
Weidling returned the look. ‘Perhaps, but I happen to think not.’
‘And since those fires?’ hazarded the Surete.
Again he was ignored. ‘Nothing of a similar nature, Herr Kohler. Other arsonists, of course, but now this, yes? A student perhaps who visited the Reich in 1938 and then went home to Lyon. My people are checking into things and will send me the case files. You can read them yourself.’
A student, a citizen of Lyon …
‘Leiter Weidling is to become a professor at the Fire Protection Officers’ School in Eberswald. We are fortunate to have him with us. He’s the only fire marshal in the Reich to have been decorated three times for bravery beyond the call of duty.’
This had come in French from Lyon’s fire marshal, Julien Robichaud.
‘On holiday, is he?’ snapped Kohler in French, for that was the way one got things done quickly.
Weidling grinned, for though he hadn’t understood a word, he had understood only too well the drift of Herr Kohler’s thoughts. Hero firemen sometimes lit their own fires. ‘Here for the International Fire Marshals’ Convention and staying on a few days.’
It was Kohler’s turn to be unimpressed, but he tried hard to hide his feelings by offering precious cigarettes all round and insisting Louis take one. ‘A coffee, I think, and a glass of marc?’
Robichaud strode over to the nearest pumper truck and returned with a thermos jug, four tin cups and a bottle. ‘Emergency rations, messieurs,’ he said, gritting his teeth self-consciously. ‘It’s not a day for alcohol but …’ He gave the shrug of a man uncertain of his position and definitely worried about it. ‘But one has to have a little something, eh? to settle the stomach.’
Kohler took the bottle from him and uptilted it into his mouth, shutting his eyes in blessed relief. ‘Merci,’ he said, wiping his lips. ‘Louis?’
St-Cyr shook his head. ‘In the coffee, I think. Yes, yes, that will be sufficient.’
They were a pair, these two detectives, thought Weidling. Gestapo Leader Mueller’s telex from Berlin had said to watch them closely. Gestapo Boemelburg in Paris had been emphatic: St-Cyr was a patriot and therefore untrustworthy; Kohler a doubter of Germanic invincibility. They’d been in trouble with the SS far too many times. They had made disparaging remarks about some of its members and had held them up to ridicule.
Weidling helped himself to the bottle. The coffee was good-the real stuff-the brandy barely passable, the French fire chief nothing but a nuisance to be got rid of quickly. ‘You will need a list of all those who were in the cinema, Herr Kohler, both the victims and those who escaped.’
‘It’ll be impossible to get a complete list.’
‘Nothing is impossible. Get one. Also the employees, the night-watchman and the cleaners, the concierge if that’s what they call him, the manager and the owner and their closest relatives. Also all previous employees over the past four years. Grudge fires are not uncommon.’
Kohler grinned. ‘I thought you said it might be a student? Lubeck, wasn’t it?’
‘Or Heidelberg or Koln. Ja, ja, you will still require the lists. It’s best that way. Find out if the staff have been turning anyone away. Sex in the back rows. Some filthy Frenchman or Algerian exposing himself to women and little girls or boys. Some black or brown bastard making suggestive remarks. A woman betrayed by a husband with a lover. A Jewess. Those are always possibilities but you are correct, Herr Kohler, hero firemen could very well become ‘hero’ arsonists to advance themselves, but not this one. You will find me at the Bristol. Inquire at the desk. Get a list of the tenants too. There were apartments above the foyer and behind the balcony and projectionist’s booth.’
Brusquely he shook hands with Robichaud and made excuses about having to tidy up for dinner. ‘The wife,’ he grunted. ‘She’ll have purchased the last of her silks by now and I must examine them. Have the lists compiled, Herr Kohler. You can bring them over at dawn. Gestapo Mueller wants this solved before it happens again and wishes me to give the matter my fullest attention. Even here in France people have a right to know they are safe under our administration. Heil Hitler.’