Gypsy (34 page)

And what of Nana? he asked. Nana had had one of the revolvers from the Gare Saint-Lazare in her purse but had claimed she'd not been given a chance to tell Herr Max about it. Another good citizen unjustly wronged, but where, please, were the other two Lebels that had been taken during that robbery?

None of them had confided much. Indeed, the lies and half-lies had been piling up to screen the whole thing. Henri Doucette would have been a threat to them. He'd have held back from letting Herr Max know everything. Tshaya could well have told the Spade things Nana and the others couldn't have him repeating.

Certainly the murder implicated Tshaya. Certainly it would send a definite message to the Gestapo of the rue Lauriston and to all such types. It would say exactly how great had become the hatred of them. But had it been Tshaya who had killed him?

Still deeply disturbed by the murder and by the horror of it, he sadly shook his head but spoke aloud and softly. ‘Tshaya must have obtained the cognac during the villa robbery while with De Vries. The SS always drink the most expensive stuff since they don't have to pay for it.'

From the rue Nollet to Saint-Cloud was half-way and some across the city, easy enough if the Gypsy had had a car and had been able to hide it safely. But in her statement to the police Gabrielle had sworn that just after curfew on Thursday morning she had been forced to drive De Vries to the quarry. They had used
her
car. Tshaya had had the flu and had not been able to go with them.

Only the coroner could give a reliable estimate of the time of the Spade's murder, but had Doucette been killed when Hermann and himself had been in Tours on Wednesday?

By then Nana had come face to face with Doucette not only at the Avia Club but at the party in her former villa on the eleventh. She had also talked to the Spade's latest pigeon who must have been at the party too.

Tshaya had been at that affair. The cognac could have been taken then, her mind set in its intention to kill.

He knew he was arguing with himself, knew also that Boemelburg would have his own suspicions. Walter would have sensed doubt in him. Walter would have begun to question the murder.

*

Subdued, terrified – pulled from a fitful sleep at 0347 hours – Gabrielle stared emptily at the cognac in her glass. She knew she must say something, that they had to have answers.

‘
Drink it
!' said Boemelburg using French.

Anger flared. ‘Why should I? I
don't
want it! I want a robe – something to cover these … these pyjamas which are not my own.'

A hand was raised. She wouldn't duck. She would take the blow and rebound from it.

The hand was halted in mid-air.

‘Now drink it,' grunted Boemelburg.

The cognac was the
Vieille Réserve
. Was he certain it would make her sick? ‘We didn't kill the Spade, if that's what you're thinking,' she said ashenly. ‘We had no reason to. I've never met him. Tshaya …'

‘
How could she have tied him down like that if alone
?' demanded Engelmann in
deutsch
.

An irritated shrug was all she would offer.

‘The Gypsy wasn't with her. He was in hiding, was he not?' said Boemelburg quietly.

Ah damn him. ‘I
don't
know. How could I?' she winced.

Her throat constricted. ‘The Spade was useful to us,' said Boemelburg, reverting to French, ‘but now that he's gone, you and the others are our only leads.'

‘Then bring us all together, Sturmbannführer. Let us tell you what we know. We'll help you in any way we can,' she pleaded.

‘Where were you last Wednesday night?' he asked flatly.

Herr Engelmann was incensed at the continued use of French. ‘I … I was at the Club Mirage.'

‘And during your breaks?' asked Boemelburg.

‘In my dressing-room. Your … your Listeners should have a record of it.'

‘Those tapes are mostly silent.'

‘Then please ask the Rivard brothers, the owners. I did not leave until after the curfew had ended at five on Thursday morning as you well know.'

‘The explosives …'

‘She's lying,' said Engelmann in
deutsch
. ‘There were no other terrorists. She went willingly with De Vries to the quarry.'

‘
Bitte, ja
? Herr Max. I wish to get a sense of things. You will have your chance with her, never fear.'

‘There … there were six of them, Sturmbannführer, and I am certain one of the three who came with us mentioned a campsite in a forest, at some ruins. I swear it. I wouldn't lie to you. There … there is too much for me to lose.'

‘The Château Thériault and your son.'

‘Yes.'

More cognac was called for and again she found herself staring at it and unable to lift her eyes to him.

‘Did he scream?' asked Boemelburg.

She leapt. Her drink was spilled. ‘He … he must have,' she blurted, forcing herself not to burst into tears. ‘The … the rabbits shriek when blinded. It's a despicable practice and, yes, I've seen it done.'

Ah Sweet
Jésus
, save her now, she thought, quickly draining the refill he had given her.

‘Why will you not co-operate?' he asked. ‘I don't want to see you hurt, Mademoiselle Arcuri. The people who do those things are not nice.'

She tried to speak but couldn't. Furious with her, he told Engelmann to bring the veterinarian. ‘
You
, go and sit on the bed and keep silent.'

Pale and badly shaken, Suzanne-Cécilia was hustled into the room and thrown into the chair. Terrified, she tried to make herself as small as possible but they shone the light on her. The nightgown she wore was thin and someone else's. Wounded, her dark brown eyes lifted furtively to them only to duck away as she was struck once, twice, three times, not knowing what had been said to them, not even knowing if she had been betrayed.

The thick auburn hair was dishevelled. The long lashes and perfect eyebrows were knitted as she cringed in pain, Gabrielle realizing in that moment that Céci had earlier worn Marianne St-Cyr's clothes and that they had fitted her perfectly.

It was a silly thought and such jealousy had no meaning here.

‘
Je suit partout
, madame,' said Boemelburg quietly.

‘
Oui
?' she blurted, blood trickling down her chin, the fear in her wounded eyes all too clear.

‘At 1630 hours Thursday a woman telephoned them to report that she had “information on the whereabouts of the estranged wife of Henri Doucette”.'

‘And?' she asked, biting off the word.

‘Did you or did you not give them the address they then printed?'

She sucked in a breath and wiped the tears from her eyes. ‘“Estranged”, it's a big word for an anonymous informer to use.'

Verdammt
! he'd have to cut to where it would hurt. ‘Your husband, madame?'

‘My dead husband, yes?' she blurted in tears.

‘Your wireless code was similar to that of his unit during the invasion. It was modified but followed the pattern of those advocated by Delastelle.'

Ah no, the book … ‘Honoré told me very little about his life in the army. If his code, or one like it was being used by whomever hid that wireless set in my zebra house – and I'm not saying there was a wireless set there – I … why I know nothing of it. How could I?' She wiped blood from her lips and nose with the back of a hand that trembled. Smarting, she blinked her eyes to clear them but could not seem to stop herself from shaking.

Engelmann passed in front of the lamp to throw his shadow over her. Then he stepped behind her and she had to ask herself what was he going to do now?

‘Your student days,' breathed Boemelburg. ‘One of your professors mentions “a remarkable ability with electronics”.'

‘I …' she began, only to flinch as she felt Herr Engelmann's hands brush the back of her neck. ‘I was young. I was interested in everything. It … it was just something to do.' She shook him off.

‘But when asked, the professor was quite convinced you could have built a wireless set and would have had no trouble in operating it. “As a student, Madame Lemaire belonged to a group we called the Cricket Talkers, the Society for the Improvement of Wireless Transmission.”'

‘But … but why would he have referred to me as Madame when I was to him unmarried at the time?'

Tears were blinked away.
Verdammt
! why would she not confess without the use of reinforced interrogation? ‘The questioner gave him your married name,' snapped Boemelburg gruffly.

‘Then he should have used Carrière, Sturmbannführer. My father is a pharmacist, a gold medallist, as is my mother. This professor you speak of did not know me. If he had, he would have shaken his head in despair at the memory of all my questions, and would have referred to me as Céci or
la petite espiègle
.'

The little imp! Furious with her, Boemelburg grabbed the front of her nightgown and, bunching it up, shoved his fist under her chin so that she was pushed back into Herr Engelmann. ‘
Bring the other one
!' he shrieked.

The left side of Nana's face was very red and swollen. Her lips were bleeding again. The bruises on her neck were darker, bigger. Violently she was thrown into the light. The nightgown had been torn and hung by a single shoulder strap. She'd been banged up against a wall and had been struck repeatedly.

‘
I'm your only link
,' she hissed, yanking herself free of Engelmann. ‘
I may even know where Janwillem is hiding, but as long as I live I will tell you nothing
!'

Ah
nom de Dieu
, winced Gabrielle.

‘
Leave us. Get out
!' he shouted in
deutsch
at Engelmann, and when the door was closed, took a moment to study these three. Everything in him said that things were not as they should be. The wireless signals, the Gypsy, the robberies, each of which must have been well surveyed beforehand. The murder of the Spade … the death of Hans Wehrle … Berlin were demanding an end to things. Himmler had taken a personal interest and had been shrieking for blood.

Calming himself, Boemelburg indicated they should sit together on one of the couches. Cursing them silently, he gave them each some of the cognac. ‘Now tell me', he breathed, ‘where Dr Vries and his woman are hiding. Do it, damn you, or I swear I will have you taken from this house and given over to those who would like nothing better than to strip you naked and beat you until the answers gurgle from your battered lips and punctured lungs.'

Ah
Jésus
… ‘If … if we knew …' began Suzanne-Cécilia only to feel Gabrielle's warning hand on her arm.

‘Nana …' Gabrielle tried to find her voice. ‘When … when Janwillem left you in the spring of 1938 you had just discovered you were pregnant. Do you remember we met at the Café de la Paix? You were so upset,
chérie
. You thought Tshaya must have come back into his life and that he was staying with her father's
kumpania
. A woods to the west of Paris, some ruins – I think you said it was at an old monastery, or what was left of one.'

Nana stared at her cognac and tilted the glass to let some of it run over her fingers, but if she thought the
Vieille Réserve
a deliberate reminder of the Spade's murder, she gave no indication of this.

She bathed her lips and indicated Céci should do the same.

‘That … that was all I knew at the time,' she said. ‘A place the gypsies had been going to for centuries but one, yes, that the
Deuxiéme bureau des nomades
knew nothing of.'

There, she would let this Gestapo pig digest the crumb she had given him.

His watery blue eyes sought her out. ‘Are we to search every woods to the west of the city?' he asked blandly.

‘Only those with ruins,' she countered swiftly. ‘I
don't
like being hit, Sturmbannführer, nor having my nightclothes ripped from me, nor do I like being nearly drowned when a few sensible questions calmly given are all that is necessary. Janwillem is not himself, not any more, but your people and the Norwegians before them kept him in prison so long he can only think of himself as a gypsy and therefore at complete odds with the rest of us. Get that into your head. You're a
Gajo;
he's now of the Rom completely.'

‘Versailles,' hazarded Boemelburg only to see her vehemently shake her head and hear her acidly toss the words at him. ‘It's too popular, too fashionable, particularly these days.'

‘Then try to think. Try to give us a little more.'

‘
So that the guillotine or the axe might fall on a neck whose head was empty
?'

He sighed. ‘That temper of yours is far too swift for your own good. If you and your friends are innocent, I will personally see that you are cleared of all charges. You have my word on it.'

Is it as good as your Führer's? she silently asked. Will you apologize for what you've done to us? ‘Agreed,' she said but did not try to smile.

He gave her a moment. Gabrielle took her by the hand. ‘A monastery … You told me the gypsies always marked the way they had travelled by using special signs. You wanted us to look for Janwillem, Nana. You were certain that together we could find him.'

‘The
patterans
,' she said. ‘The trident, the cross – heaps of leaves or grass at a corner of a crossroads, branches piled up in winter.'

‘The swastika,' said Suzanne-Cécilia. ‘I remember once reading of it. An ancient symbol from India which was adopted and used by the gypsies in their wanderings. The gypsies …'

‘Don't you
dare
taunt me, madame. And as for you.' He looked at Nana. ‘De Vries would not have marked his trail this time.'

‘Not unless he wanted other gypsies to follow and to gather,' said Nana softly.