Gypsy (32 page)

Boemelburg snatched the newspaper from him and when he had read the notice, he thrust it at Gabrielle.

‘
Those wishing to find Tshaya, companion and accomplice of the safe-cracker known as the Gypsy, need … She paused to look up at them. ‘Need hunt no further than the garret at the head of the stairs in the house at 15 rue Nollet
.'

The newspaper was a weekly but published on Fridays, today then, the twenty-second.

‘Henri Doucette will have seen this by now,' she said, dismayed by the thought. ‘If he should get to her before you do, Sturmbannführer, what will he do to her for disobeying him? Will she be alive long enough to tell you where Janwillem De Vries is?'

‘Tshaya,' said Nana Thélème, her jet black hair now braided, her voice still far from strong. ‘I first met her in 1914. I met Janwillem then, too, General. The
kumpania
of her father was at a bend in the Guadalquivir among the cork oaks and junipers. There were some sheep – merinos of ours – and my uncle had ridden out with my cousins and some others to settle the matter.'

She was clutching at straws, thought Engelmann. She coughed. Her throat was sore. Her lips and the left side of her face were badly swollen. ‘Forgive me,' she said.

They waited. Von Schaumburg had insisted she be allowed to speak. Louis was grim and clearly felt she would have to tell them everything. She had that look about her and stood facing Old Shatter Hand, her eyes never once leaving him.

‘Even at the age of nine I recognized the hold Tshaya had on Janwillem but I wanted him too, and I told myself I would take him from her.'

‘How old was Tshaya?' asked St-Cyr.

Stung by the interruption, she glared at him, her eyes smarting. ‘Seven, I think, but one can never tell with those people because they live entirely in the present.'

‘And this incident?' asked von Schaumburg.

Again she lost herself in memory. ‘To understand what happened, General, is to understand the harshness of Córdoba. The heat is so great, the sun refuses to relinquish its hold on life. Distant among the foothills of the Sierra Morena a bluish haze remains. The olive groves seem everywhere, and there is the soft but heady scent of them and of juniper and sage, of sheep and horses, too, and it mingles with the heat to sharpen the silence.'

‘
You're a terrorist, damn you
!' seethed Engelmann. ‘
We have the proof
!'

‘The
what
?' she countered sharply, not turning to face him but painfully choking. ‘General, your people don't really know if I'm a terrorist or not. Janwillem sends me a gun to implicate me further and succeeds with this one because, when I bring it to him, he doesn't give me a chance to tell him. He just shoves my head under water and tries to drown me!'

Engelmann leapt from his chair. A hand was raised to stop him. ‘General …' he began, only to hear von Schaumburg saying, ‘
Sit down
! Don't make an even bigger fool of yourself than you already have.'

Again she was given a moment to compose herself.

‘The gypsies were very poor and in rags, as was Janwillem, who was a boy of eleven, yet they had a resilience and love of life which transcended their poverty. My uncle …' She tried to ease her throat. ‘He let them stay and help with the olive harvest and gave them the sheep, knowing they would steal no more from him because that is the gypsy way. For them he became a protector, a benefactor who soon found himself taking up their cause with the
guardia
. A
Gajo
, yes, but kind and useful, and one whom they came to respect greatly.'

Still she hadn't taken her eyes from von Schaumburg except for that momentary lapse to glare at Louis. From somewhere a white cashmere throw had been found, but it was in the way she had wrapped this about her throat to hide the marks, and in the way she stood that one saw how fiercely proud and defiant she was.

‘Some years they came to our hacienda to help with the harvest, some years they didn't, but I never forgot Janwillem or Tshaya. You see, it was through her and others of the
kumpania
, and at my uncle's insistence, that I really learned to dance and sing, though she relished the opportunity to show me she could still do so far better than I.'

‘The party on the night of the eleventh at your former villa,' said St-Cyr.

Though she didn't look at him this time, she said, ‘Yes. Under gypsy law, she could never marry a non-gypsy.'

‘When she was fifteen,' said St-Cyr, ‘she ran off to Paris but couldn't find De Vries and married Henri Doucette instead.'

‘The boxer,' murmured von Schaumburg. ‘One of that gang over on the rue Lauriston.'

The French Gestapo.

‘Her family took her back that first time but he came after her and beat her terribly, General. Janwillem had by then started in on the life he was to lead. He's very cool-headed and is fascinated, not just by locks, but by explosives. He is at heart a true gypsy. This is what you must realize. He believes himself one of them and that there is nothing wrong with his robbing the
Gaje
or of his lying to them or cheating them if …' She paused to gaze at Herr Max with contempt. ‘If in the end it will give him what he so desperately craves, his freedom.'

‘
Where is he? Where have you been hiding him
?' demanded Engelmann fiercely.

‘General, if the story is not told, the answer cannot be given.'

Ah
merde
, thought St-Cyr, try not to be so swift to anger.

‘Janwillem came into contact with
kumpaniyi
all over Europe – remember, please, that he speaks their language fluently which very few non-gypsies do. Everywhere he went he behaved as one of them. He shared completely and freely the loot he had stolen, buying food, wine, whatever was needed, and became very close to them and loved as one of their own.' Again she paused to moisten her throat. ‘So he knows, General, all the ways they would use to mark a trail, all the safe havens, the protectors too, like my uncle, who serve as letter boxes and listening posts. A brief telegraph or telephone call, a word passed from one caravan to another and a haven is ready with whatever it will take to hide him for as long as he wishes.'

It was von Schaumburg who asked if she was suggesting the terrorists who had stolen Gabrielle's car had been in contact with De Vries from the moment he had arrived in Tours.

‘From well before that. Probably right from the night he was arrested in Oslo in 1938. Prison is death to a gypsy. Tshaya betrayed him – she's exceedingly jealous of me and very possessive of him but he still doesn't see this. I had him, General. He was mine! We were to have a son in a few more months. I had the villa in Saint-Cloud. Everything was waiting for him to …' She ducked her head a little in acknowledgement of her own folly. ‘To give up the life he had led and live the one I wanted. We had agreed to marry.'

But he had lied even to you, thought St-Cyr, and asked, ‘Did he finance the purchase of the villa?'

‘What would you have me say?' she countered hotly. ‘That it was bought with stolen money? Ah! you do not understand us Andalusians, Inspector, and I pity you. I bought it myself with funds borrowed from my uncle and with those gained from my work!'

‘Forgive me,' he said, mollified but very conscious of that temper of hers.

She did not toss her head. ‘For Gabrielle's sake I will. This whole affair is rubbish, General. Of course I wanted to see Janwillem when he dropped in so unexpectedly from Tours but he stayed less than an hour and as I stand before you, I have not seen him since.'

‘She's lying,' said Herr Max.

‘
I'm not
!' she countered swiftly. Again she choked and had to force herself to swallow. ‘He's … he's completely under Tshaya's spell. If you want him, then find her.
Her
! They will not be staying together – have you even considered this? Ah! I see that you haven't.
Think
as a gypsy. Stop
being
the son of some
Gaje … Bitte, bitte
, what was your father?' She snapped her fingers.

‘A woodcutter.'

Verdammt
! but she was magnificent, swore Kohler. A natural. A gypsy herself in many ways. Louis could see it too.

‘Tshaya will be separate from Janwillem because if the one is taken, the other will be ready to bring freedom or revenge. And please don't forget she's not alone but has others to help. Gypsies who know their lives count as nothing, so what, please, is there for them to lose?'

Uncomfortable at the thought, von Schaumburg asked, ‘What will they do next?' and she said, ‘General, this is a confusion of his, a flimflam, a sleight of hand, a typical gypsy ruse that is guaranteed to bewilder the
Gaje
. Tshaya and he will have it all planned. The lure is your recovering the loot, the cyanide and explosives and in silencing a press which continues to laud him. These temptations will drive you to allow him to accomplish what he wants.'

‘Which is?'

‘Something so shocking it will show you all up for what they think you really are.'

‘And where might he be hiding?' asked Herr Max acidly. He'd had enough of her.

‘Please just tell us what you think possible,' said von Schaumburg.

‘A place known only to gypsies and that is why you must find Tshaya but remember he's one of them if not by birth, then by all the rest. He'll be ready to disappear at a moment's notice.'

She let the silence hang in the room, then told them exactly how it would be. ‘Tshaya will have remained in the city. She'll be co-ordinating things with the others. That husband of hers will be looking for her – he is, isn't he? but she'll be waiting for him too, to rid her life of him. Go carefully. She'll have explosives because, as Janwillem's accomplice from time to time over the years, she, too, has learned their use.'

Ah no!

‘And then?' asked von Schaumburg.

‘Either you will take Janwillem, General, or he will vanish without a trace until he's ready to surface again.'

‘And the loot?' asked someone.

‘Will go with him, of course.'

‘He has blank papers,' said Kohler. ‘
Ausweise
, identity cards, ration tickets …'

‘And all the franking stamps that are necessary,' said von Schaumburg, scowling at the incompetence of the SS, the Gestapo and Herr Max. ‘Berlin are too far removed from us. See that this Tshaya is found and then convince her to tell us where he is.'

Only Herr Max breathed a little easier, for in those last few words room had been cautiously made for him to proceed. Von Schaumburg was only covering his own ass. These days everyone did so if possible.

Had it been daylight, Hermann would have said he didn't like the look of things. At six minutes to curfew, and with the rue Nollet in utter darkness and its tardy citizens prevented from hastily entering or leaving the area, he said nothing, a sure sign he was deeply troubled.

All attempts to find Henri Doucette had failed. Boemelburg's Daimler, with the General's Mercedes in front of it, was parked just ahead of the Citroën. All engines were silent. Wehrmacht lorries had sealed off each end of the street. Troops were deployed, some to the rooftops, others to watch the adjacent streets.

Searchlights would be used, torches too, and headlamps. If Tshaya tried to make a run for it, she would be stopped.

‘But is she alive, Louis? Has the Spade already taught her a little lesson in obedience?'

‘He has a temper,' sighed St-Cyr. ‘If she's dead, he will simply have left her for us to find and will claim he knows nothing of it.'

The rue Nollet was perfect. Les Batignolles was in the seventeenth arrondissement and largely industrial. One of the city's garment districts, it had formerly been a quiet little village but had suffered repeated incursions of slum-housing.

The huge railway depot and switching yard that serviced the whole of the Occupied North was but a street away and offered unparalleled chances for escape. Not far to the south, and in line with the yards, were those of the Gare Saint-Lazare. The quartier de l'Europe was to the east; the Club Monseigneur not far.

‘The citizens of this district have a total allergy to authority and a complete aversion to the police,' sighed St-Cyr. ‘That is why all attempts have failed to find her.'

Even the reward of 100,000 francs hadn't been claimed,
Je suis partout
were co-operating but could only say that they had received the news by telephone.

‘He knocks off the Ritz on the night of the eighteenth, then fades up the rue de la Paix to Cartier's where Tshaya is waiting for him,' snorted Kohler. ‘Then the two of them knock it off and hit the ticket office of the Gare Saint-Lazare.'

‘After which they simply fade away to here and let the police and everyone else hunt for them.'

‘Then the son of a bitch boldly hangs around the Gare Saint-Lazare waiting for me to blow myself up!'

That had been in the small hours of Wednesday, and afterwards the Gypsy had gone on to the Gare de l'Est to knock off the pay-train before the curfew had ended.

Fifteen or so hours later, they had emptied the wall safe of the villa in Saint-Cloud.

‘Their timing's perfect, Hermann.'

‘And they still have plenty of explosives.'

‘I'll come with you.'

‘No you won't. You'll try to look after Giselle and Oona if anything happens.'

A knock on the windscreen was soft, though it had the sound of finality about it.

‘
Au revoir, mon vieux
,' breathed Kohler.

Hermann's grip was far from firm. ‘
À bientôt, mon ami. Bonne chance
.'

St-Cyr got out of the car to silently close its door. Standing in the darkness and the freezing cold, he looked up at the house and wondered what awaited his partner. Another tripwire, another bomb?