‘Spreading the gospel, was he?’
‘Enlisting support?’
‘But letters only within the zone occupee, Louis. It’s still forbidden to send anything south into the former zone libre.’
Even though the Occupier now occupied the whole country. ‘A campaign against wandering wives and fiancees of prisoners of war. Matron Aumont felt the girl’s attitude was that of the father who had raised Noelle from the age of five, Hermann. Apparently when asked about her mother, the girl would only state that she was dead, but such hatred on the part of the father demands answer.’
‘As does everything else. Just what the hell are we really up against?’
It had best be said. ‘The Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg. Noelle Jourdan must somehow have been getting things from one of their warehouses, as must Delaroche. Where else could that girl have picked up those figurines, where else, the colonel, that Ysenbrant painting and other objets d’art in his office?’
The Rosenberg Task Force, the Aktion-M squads, the plunderers of the household furnishings and other items of deported, transported individuals. Whole families, many of them, and certainly not all had been poor. ‘But why steal the stamps back?’
‘Especially as we were not to have been assigned to that robbery.’
‘Chance having been allowed to play its part, eh? Chance, Louis.’
‘Fate, Hermann. Was it fate?’
‘But we were told to head on over to the Restaurant Drouant.’
‘Having been assigned to it and the Trinite, should assaults take place at both, which they definitely did.’
‘The Agence Vidocq must have learned of Boemelburg’s assigning us to blackout crime even before we did, Louis.’
‘They’re very well connected and have more than adequate sources of information …’
‘Boemelburg has always kept us busy and has so far been able to counter SS and Gestapo rank-and-file hatred of us, simply because he has to display some semblance of law and order but now Berlin aren’t just being adamant. They’re demanding his recall should he fail.’
‘Oberg wants an end to us and hires the agence to work with Sonja Remer, using Giselle as bait …’
‘But she doesn’t let them take her, Louis. She wouldn’t have. I’m certain of it.’
Hermann was no more certain than himself, felt St-Cyr, but shouldn’t be contradicted. ‘Berlin want the streets safe and an end to this plague of assaults …’
‘Otherwise it’s bad for the image. Even the Swiss are citing Paris as an example of how bad things can become, so the chief does what he always does.’
‘He unwittingly assigns us to the task.’
‘Not knowing what Oberg really wants because that one hasn’t quite told him.’
‘And Oberg might well want the POW wives to be targeted, Hermann, since they’re being held responsible for the huge increase in venereal disease the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht have been bitching about.’
‘And the Reichsfuhrer Himmler wants to impress the Fuhrer and the High Command so that it and the army, like everything else can be put better under an SS thumb.’
‘And Oberg wants to take over complete control of the French and Paris police. What better way, then, than to prove them utterly incapable of controlling the streets at night?’
‘He also wants Judge Rouget taught a damned good lesson, Louis.’
‘And hires the Agence Vidocq to take care of the matter?’
‘Or did he? Couldn’t the agence have had another reason?’
‘Elene Artur is forced to make a phone call concerning the police academy victim, indicating that the agence is responsible for both.’
‘But why kill her in a building you’ve a flat in, one you let your secretary use, unless there is another reason? Why not simply kill Elene out on the streets where some would say she had definitely belonged?’
‘Some like Vivienne Rouget?’
‘I think so.’
‘We’re going to have to keep an eye on Mademoiselle Dunand, Hermann.’
‘And on Oona and Giselle, if we can find her before it’s too late, eh? And on Adrienne Guillaumet and her kids, and on Marie-Leon Barrault and her daughter. Gaston Morel can take care of himself.’
‘Come on, then. Me first, Hermann.’
‘No, me, and that’s an order simply because I’m better at it than you.’
‘Then let’s not become separated, for I think we are dealing with one who will not hesitate because he and the others can’t afford to.’
‘And that’s what Oberg really wants.’
‘An end to us.’
The house at Number 25 was far quieter even than when they had first encountered it. Rainwater, piddled on the lower stairs, glistened under torchlight but didn’t leak from above. Shoulders rubbed as they touched each other, first Hermann going ahead, felt St-Cyr, and then himself, the one hesitating and then the other. Landing by landing, and not a sound. No further sign of the rainwater on the third floor except for that from themselves. Had this killer realized the splashes would give warning and removed his shoes and coat, even to rolling up his trouser legs to stop the leakage?
The door to the Jourdan flat was closed but hadn’t been left that way by them. The string was loosely looped around its nail, but this could easily have been done from inside and then the door closed.
Hermann fingered the string-had their killer a gun? he’d be wondering. The SS might have supplied the Agence Vidocq with them; alternatively such weapons could simply have not been turned in after the 1914-1918 war; alternatively, too, they could be purchased on the black market, either from one of the Occupier or from any number of others-the German troops on leave were notorious for selling things. Hence Sonja Remer’s Tokarev TT-33 could just as easily have come by that route but would have been bought with a purpose. Always there would be a purpose behind such an acquisition by the SS.
The string was teased from around the nail, the door given but the slightest of nudges.
‘He’s in there, Louis,’ said Hermann, his lips moving silently under finger-shielded torchlight. ‘We split. We have to even things up.’
Showing a light only meant showing a target and yes, there was little enough furniture to contend with. The table at which Jourdan had written his letters and neatly stacked them for the daughter to post was empty of all but its ink bottle, pen, blank paper, blank envelopes and loose stamps. A gerbil scurried across the floor and one could hear it rooting around in a tin box, but then even that sound ceased. Now only the rain hitting the windows could be heard.
Kohler knew, from the feel of it, that he was in the girl’s bedroom and not alone, but had the son of a bitch wanted to separate him from Louis again or had he been unable to lay his hands on what he’d not wanted them to find?
The blackout drapes were of doubled burlap, dyed black no doubt and with a dyed sheet behind them next to windows that would overlook the gardens. Along from the curtains, in a far corner against the wall, there was an armoire whose doors were open. Clothes had been scattered as if the search had been in haste and desperate.
A thin cardboard gift box had been discovered but had fallen to scatter its contents and tempt the unwary.
The throw rug under this debris had been made of woven rags.
He lifted the Walther P38 and took aim, the darkness all around them and complete.
‘He’s gone, Hermann. As quickly and decisively as he came.’
Noelle Jourdan hadn’t had a lot. The mirrored doors of the armoire were losing their backing and gave reflections that appeared as if silver filings were being thrown at the viewer. The lower drawer had been yanked out and gone through, the box uncovered.
‘What was he after, Louis?’
‘Something that girl would have hidden from her father.’
It wasn’t under her pillows or under the mattress or in it, nor was it under the rug or behind the armoire. It was on top of this last and hidden behind the trim of a scalloped moulding.