Gently they carried her up to her bedroom and drew the coverlet over her warm-hued face which was now drained of blood but looked even more lovely in the peace of death. She could have felt little pain and she was gone now to a place where there were no Gestapo bullies to compel her to sell her body in exchange for her brother's life.
When they got downstairs again Kuporovitch took a bottle of brandy out of a cupboard and said: 'This is not my war, Gregory, but these Nazi swine shall pay for that. Not yet, though. You must not count upon me for help tonight in anything that you may decide to do; because I'm going to get drunk —I am going to get very drunk indeed—as drunk as only a Russian knows how.'
'O.K.,' said Gregory quietly. 'I'd keep you company and show you what an Englishman can do in that direction if it weren't that I may have to go out on the job when Erika gets back.'
Kuporovitch half-filled a tumbler with neat brandy and swigged the whole lot down, then he said: 'You'll notice, by the way, that they didn't bomb the Chateau.'
'No. Apparently not,' Gregory agreed. 'But what d'you infer from that?'
'Simply that they didn't mean to. Ever since we reached Ghent I've been living within a few hundred yards of King Leopold. I can't remember how many air-raids we've been through; I've lost count of them; but it's shown me one thing— they don't want to get the King—their game is to scare him. They drop the bombs any damned place where it's near enough for him to hear them crashing and they don't mind whom they kill in the meantime, but they haven't dropped a bomb yet that's even been remotely dangerous to him.'
'I get you,' Gregory nodded. 'If they blew him to bits the little Duke of Brabant would succeed, and he would simply be a puppet in the hands of his Ministers. Belgium would fight on, and that is not according to the Germans' programme. They want the Belgians out of the war so that they can encircle the British Army. Their game is not to bomb Leopold but to drop so many bombs all round him that he gets the jitters and lets his Allies down.'
'That's the game,' Kuporovitch agreed, tipping another quadruple brandy into his tumbler. 'Well, here's luck to you people who don't like Hitler! But now little Paula's dead and you're back with Erika there's not much point in my staying here. I can probably do just as good work for the Allies in France now the battle has become general. I think I'll set out for Paris tomorrow morning. D'you realise, Gregory, that it's May again—just think of it, Paris in May.'
'Just as you like, Stefan. You've been a good friend to us. I'll be truly sorry to lose touch with you, but maybe we'll come across each other later on.'
The door behind them opened suddenly and Erika stood there. 'Thank God you're both safe!' she whispered, and sat down with a little sigh.
'We're all right, but we had one casualty, and a fatal one, here just now,' Gregory told her, breaking the news as gently as possible.
'What?' Erika's eyebrows went up. 'The old landlady—or— or—Paula?'
'Yes, Paula. One of those damned bombs fell in the street and a splinter sailed through the window; it got her through the ribs, went right into her heart. Don't take it too badly, sweetheart; she could hardly have known what hit her. It was all over in ten seconds and she was dead before we could touch her.'
Great tears came into Erika's eyes as she murmured: 'Poor Paula—she was very young—and those Gestapo devils threatened they'd kill her brother if she didn't do just what they told her to do.'
T know,' Gregory nodded. 'But in some way she's well out of it. We're going to beat the Nazis yet—you know that—and what sort of future was there in store for her? Tell me about Leopold. I wouldn't ask you at the moment, but the lives of a quarter of a million British soldiers may hang upon it.'
Erika choked back her tears. 'He's worse—nearly at the end of his tether. He's one of those artistic, highly-strung people; he adored his wife, Astrid, you know, and he's never really got over her loss, although it's said that before the war he had an English mistress of whom he saw a lot on his visits to London. He knows perfectly well that he ought to fight on, and the memory of his father seems to haunt him; but so many people round him have always told him that Hitler is great and wise and good. He feels that every Belgian is being as badly bombed as he is and that he only has to ask the magnanimous Fuehrer for honourable terms and he'll get them and save his people from this nightly horror. That's why he sent his Cabinet to Paris. He's clever enough to realise that if they were with him they would bully him into holding out, and intimate pretty plainly that he was a coward if he even suggested caving in. But they're out of the way now, and the final decision lies entirely with him. He's only got to sign an order and the Belgian Army will pack up. It was all I could do tonight to make him promise me that he wouldn't do anything until he had seen a friend of mine.'
Kuporovitch emptied another quarter bottle of brandy into his tumbler as Gregory looked up inquiringly.
'Yes,' Erika said, 'it's you I mean. You've got to talk to him. He's not even mentioned what he's feeling to his Generals or to the high Allied officers who are attached to his person; he's terrified of what they might say to him, but he'll take it from an outside person who is introduced by myself. You're a wonderful psychologist, darling, and you understand the tortuous ways of the human heart better than anybody that I've ever met— even Hugo, who was so marvellous. He's a pathetic figure, Gregory, showing a brave face each day and breaking down each night. You've got to hold his hands and put your immense strength into him to save him from himself and from the shame that will attach to him for all time if he surrenders.'
'All right,' Gregory said gently. 'If you feel that it's up to me, I'll do everything I possibly can. When am I to see him?'
'Not until tomorrow morning. He hasn't slept for nights, but when I left him he was going to turn in and his doctor had promised to give him a really strong dose of Medinol. Orders are being given that he's not to be woken, however grave any fresh news that may come in, so it's to be hoped that in spite of the bombs he may sleep right through and be more his own man tomorrow.'
'In that case,' said Gregory, 'we'd better try to get some sleep ourselves.'
Erika sighed as she stood up. 'Yes, darling. If only those devils Goering is sending over will let us.'
Kuporovitch emptied the remaining contents of the brandy bottle into his glass and grinned at them.
'Sleep well, my children; I'm staying where I am. By the grace of God there are another three bottles of brandy in that cupboard and either I'll finish them or they'll finish me.'
He raised his glass on high, and added: 'Blessings on you; we'll meet in Paris yet—Paris in the sunshine, eh?'
'Pray God we may,' Gregory muttered.
Erika said: 'Goodnight, Stefan dear,' and Gregory followed her out into the passage and up to her bedroom on the first floor.
In the last days they had become so used to the scores of tragedies that were occurring every minute within a few miles of them that normally, having found each other again, they would have shut the tortured world around them out of their minds for a few hours to rejoice in being together once more; but Paula's death had brought things so near to them that it had robbed them both of any desire for love-making. As at any moment they might find themselves in the midst of another air raid, they took off only their shoes and outer garments, then lay down together on the bed. The night was so sultry that they did not even draw the coverlet over them.