by Kate Mosse
The Tarascae had taken it in turns to keep watch through the short summer nights. Only a few hours of darkness between dusk and dawn. Each was armed. Those who had fought, either in the service of the Roman army, or to defend their land, held swords or javelins, slings. Many were armed with clubs, knives, their weapons the spoils of war, skirmishes and ambushes, rather than campaigns or battles. Most of the villagers were guerrilla fighters, using the woods and the forests, untrained in the art of fighting but with a raw belligerence suited well to these lawless border lands.
Arinius had a heavy rectangular shield. His old hunting knife was in his right hand, though he prayed he would not be called upon to use it. He was prepared to fight to the death to protect his friends, their community, but he did not wish to take the life of another.
He knew he was being naïve – and that Lupa, had she been there, would have laughed at his moral distinction. She, more than him, was able to reconcile God’s commandments with the cruelties of the world in which they lived. For him, though, the gentleness of the gospels, the words of John and Luke sang more truly. His God was a God of light and redemption, not of vengeance and judgement.
He did not wish to kill another human being. Only God, he believed, had that right. And he had seen too much death in his youth, saw how it corrupted and despoiled all that was best in human nature, left a scar on the soul.
‘A false alarm, do you think, peyre?’ one of the young men asked him.
He had tried so many times to make them address him by his name, feeling dishonest and humbled to be singled out and ranked above his station. And ‘peyre’ was a strange, local word, a hybrid, neither Latin nor any other language Arinius had come across. But they insisted and he had given up trying to stop them.
‘Could it be a false alarm?’
Arinius wanted to give them hope. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I do not think so.’
He could feel the twist and shift of evil in the air, a malignancy like a physical presence stalking them, coming closer.
‘No, they are coming,’ he said. ‘Maybe not tonight, maybe not tomorrow, but they are close at hand. Soon they will be here.’ He caught his breath. ‘May God deliver us.’
‡
Chapter 117
CARCASSONNE
JULY 1944
‘But with respect, sir,’ Laval said, ‘why not arrest them now? Marianne and Sandrine Vidal still live there. Another woman is always there, tall with cropped hair.’
‘What did Fournier’s sister actually tell you?’ Authié demanded.
‘That they are discreet, careful to observe the blackout. Sometimes they are out late. Past the curfew.’
Authié had drunk more than he’d intended with Schiffner, then spent the rest of the night going through the surveillance files. It was now five o’clock and he had a headache, but he wasn’t ready to call it a night. Laval had spent the past two hours gathering information about interrogations and arrests – firstly, in the past week, then, the past fortnight – going backwards and forwards between the Commissariat and the Feldgendarmerie. Much of it was classified and, although Laval had requested the records, they would not be made available until the morning. But Authié had read enough to have a clear picture of the state of affairs in Carcassonne.
There was a great deal of circumstantial evidence, though no proof, that all three women were involved in partisan activity. Suzanne Peyre, whom Authié remembered, had been taken in on Monday, but released without charge. Authié intended to institute several such raids today. It didn’t matter who they arrested or why, only that the population should be aware that there was a new regime in place.
‘What about Pelletier? Did she mention seeing him at all?’
‘Madame Fournier said she hadn’t seen a man answering Pelletier’s description,’ Laval admitted. ‘It doesn’t mean he’s not there.’
‘Have you tried the Quai Riquet?’
‘Not yet, sir.’
‘Well do it,’ he snapped. He rubbed his hand across his forehead. The headache was getting worse.
‘Sir,’ Laval said cautiously, ‘I think we should act now. Raid the house. Arrest everyone there.’
Authié opened his eyes and stared at his lieutenant. For a moment, he wondered if he was right. If it would be better to strike while everyone was asleep. It was only instinct telling him that Sandrine Vidal had anything to do with the device the guards had discovered in the Tour de la Justice – it could have been put there by any partisan group – but since reading the police reports in Toulouse, he had been unable to shake the idea that Sandrine Vidal and ‘Sophie’ were the same person. And nothing he had read in the surveillance files in the past few hours had caused him to change his mind. If he was right, then even more reason to bide his time.
De l’Oradore had ordered him to find and interrogate Audric Baillard. Sandrine Vidal might be his best chance of finding the historian.
‘Two birds with one stone,’ he repeated to himself.
Authié met Laval’s gaze, his moment of indecision over. ‘No, we are going to wait. Wait to see what happens in the Cité tonight. See if they – anyone – act. Otherwise, we shall be waiting for them tomorrow.’
He could see from his expression that Laval thought he was wrong.
‘But surely . . .’
‘I don’t want to run the risk of the terrorists calling off their attempt in the Cité.’
‘Why would they?’ asked Laval.
‘Rumours will be spreading that something is planned. Both our side and theirs will be aware of the dinner. I want to give the insurgents something else to think about. Draw their attention to the Bastide and away from the Cité.’
‘Very good, sir,’ Laval said, though it was clear he didn’t understand what Authié was trying to do.
Authié waved his hand. ‘Get some sleep, Laval. Check on Madame Pelletier first thing, go back to the Vidal house, then report back. I have set in train a series of raids for tomorrow afternoon. I want the insurgents to believe that those arrests are our main priority.’
Laval saluted, then walked quickly across the room and out into the corridor. The sound of the door slamming ricocheted through Authié’s head. He opened his desk drawer and hunted around for an aspirin. It was his own desk, and he had already hung his maps back on the wall. Schiffner had provided space for him in the Feldgendarmerie, rather than Gestapo premises. It was an odd sensation to be back in the same white building, one floor higher up. As if nothing had changed.
He closed the drawer. There were no aspirin.
Raoul came out of the club and stood on the street. The light was just beginning to turn from a deep blue to the pale white of early morning. His euphoria at their successful operation last night, in setting the bomb and getting away unobserved, had drained away. Now he was left with a vague, anxious feeling in his stomach. He pushed his hands deep into his pockets, breathing in the warm night air. He didn’t know what time it was, but it felt nearer to morning than to night.
He wished he hadn’t drunk so much. But Robert had kept filling his glass while they waited for Yvette to arrive. Raoul needed to think but his brain was sluggish. All he wanted was to get back to Sandrine and sleep. Sleep and never wake up. He was too tired to think. But something Yvette had said had set off a ripple of alarm in his head. What was it? Why couldn’t he think straight?
He headed towards the Canal du Midi, down the shabby side street and on to the towpath. For an instant, he looked across the still water towards the Quai Riquet to see if there was a light burning in his mother’s window. He had visited once or twice, but his presence so frightened her – she seemed to think he was a ghost – that he’d given up. Kinder to stay away, though he felt shabby about it.
The window was dark.
He made himself run through yet again what Yvette had said. A telephone call had been received at Gestapo headquarters as she came on shift. Plans for the dinner tomorrow night. Schiffner and his deputies were angry. Someone was
coming from Toulouse, but arrived earlier than expected. She hadn’t been able to work out if the visitor was German or French, but arrangements were disrupted because of it.
Then what?
Raoul felt his chest tighten. Something was eating away at him, something that struck a wrong note. He kicked a stone into the water. It fell into the canal with a dead splash. He hesitated, a glimmer of a thought piercing his consciousness, but he couldn’t get hold of it.
He tried to imagine the scene. The visitor arrives and goes into Schiffner’s office. Yvette hears raised voices, but then the telephone rings again and the mood changes. She hears laughing and a trail of cigar smoke comes from under the door. The door opens and the visitor’s talking about his girlfriend, or his wife, Yvette can’t tell. Pretty name, though. All disjointed, fragments overheard as the door closes again.
Raoul frowned. Yvette said so much, it was hard to work out what mattered and what didn’t. He stopped, took his cigarette packet from his pocket and saw he was down to his last two.
Laughing in Schiffner’s office, talking about tomorrow. No one much about. Raoul stopped dead, a trickle of realisation finally penetrating his sleep-starved mind. Was that all that was niggling at him? That there should have been more going on? That the Gestapo should be on full alert for Authié’s arrival? Why wasn’t Schiffner in the Cité himself, ensuring the finishing touches were in place? It was an obvious target for an assassination attempt.
Raoul struck a match. Was it possible the visitor from Toulouse was actually Authié? That he had arrived a day early? And that second telephone call, when, as Yvette put it, the mood changed? From the garrison in the Cité? No reason to think so, but yet, now the thought was in his mind, Raoul couldn’t shake it. Because if the bomb had been found, then of course Schiffner didn’t need to be in the Cité. He already knew what was planned. He just had to sit tight and wait for them to put their plan into action. Schiffner and Authié, laughing and smoking and drinking. Sociable, she’d said.
Finally, he realised. Remembered the one word that had stuck like a splinter under his skin and had been festering there all this time. Yvette’s cheerful voice in his head, rattling on and on.
‘Such a pretty name. If I’d had a daughter, I’d have called her that. Too late now, I suppose.’
‘Sophie,’ said Raoul.
Yvette had said the visitor’s girlfriend was called Sophie. Except he wasn’t talking about his girlfriend.
Raoul began to run, away from the Quai Riquet, across the boulevard Antoine Marty, doubling back towards the rue du Palais just as the birds began to sing.
Chapter 118
Sandrine heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs. She had dozed on and off since she’d got back, running over the events of the night in her mind, but was too full of adrenalin to go to sleep properly. She hated the fact that Raoul hadn’t stayed, though she knew it was the right thing to make contact with Robert to see if Yvette had heard anything more. It felt as if they had pushed their luck far enough, and she wished he wasn’t out on the streets as the day was dawning.
‘Sandrine?’ he called.
A rainbow of scattered light from the landing window slipped into the room with him. Sandrine felt relief flood through her. He was back, safe. Now he would come to bed and lie beside her. Kiss her. And, for a moment, at least, there would be nothing else.
‘Sandrine, wake up.’
She heard the urgency in his voice and sat up, instantly wide awake.
‘Raoul? What is it?’
‘I think he’s already here,’ he said, the words tumbling out.
‘He? Who, Authié?’
‘At Gestapo headquarters with Schiffner. Yvette said there was a visitor from Toulouse.’
‘Toulouse? Raoul, slow down. Start again.’
Raoul forced himself to draw breath. ‘Yes.’ He sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘Sorry. Yvette didn’t come in until four. She said a visitor arrived unexpectedly. At first it was difficult, but then there was a telephone call and the atmosphere changed. The visitor was talking about his girlfriend, Yvette said, but I think she misunderstood.’ He hesitated. ‘She heard him say the word “Sophie”.’
Sandrine froze. ‘They were talking about me?’
‘I think so. She also heard them talking about the Cité. She assumed it was to do with the dinner tonight, but again . . .’
Sandrine swung her legs out of bed and started to get dressed. Raoul watched her for a moment, then stood up too.
‘Is there any proof it was Authié?’ she asked, stepping into her slip and dress, her fingers hurrying with the buttons. ‘From what she said, I mean?’
‘No, but it’s logical to assume it was.’ He ran his fingers through his hair. ‘You didn’t notice anything after I left you here last night?’
‘No, I did the usual checks before coming in. Madame Fournier was in her position at the window, as always, but there was no one watching the house so far as I could see.’
‘You’ve not heard anything from Marianne and Suzanne? You don’t know if they arrived in Coustaussa all right?’
‘No, but I told them not to call.’
Sandrine laced her shoes, then they both went quickly out of the bedroom and down the stairs.
‘If you’re right – if Yvette has passed on what she heard accurately – are you saying you think Authié’s come back because of “Citadel”? That his presence is nothing to do with the Codex?’
‘I don’t know. There’s no reason to think anything’s changed on that front. Monsieur Baillard is . . . well, we don’t know where he is. We’ve both kept our ears to the ground and heard nothing about the Codex.’ He sighed. ‘In any case, I’m not sure it even matters. Either way, he’s searching for you. It makes no difference why. The end result is the same.’
‘How would he know I’m “Sophie”?’ she said. ‘We’re jumping to conclusions based on a conversation overheard by Yvette. She could have got the wrong end of things entirely.’
‘True.’
Sandrine stopped at the bottom of the stairs, her thoughts racing ahead of themselves. ‘There’s no reason to think Authié knows about Coustaussa,’ she said slowly. ‘No one’s ever come looking for me there.’
Raoul frowned. ‘Are you sure? It must have been common knowledge you used to go out of town for the summer. Madame Fournier must have known.’
‘Yes, but my father never liked Monsieur Fournier, or trusted him. He was always courteous, of course, but careful about what he said. Even before the war.’
They walked down the corridor to the kitchen.
‘How many people know the house is called citadelle?’ Raoul asked.
‘Not many, actually. The name was a joke of my father’s, a bit of fun. He put up the sign, made it himself during the last summer we were there all together.’ She broke off, remembering her father’s face smiling with pride at his handiwork. ‘It only lasted for about two weeks. Papa wasn’t awfully practical and the sign wasn’t strong. It came down in the first storm.’
‘So it’s not officially registered under that name?’
Sandrine shook her head. ‘No, and what’s more, it’s actually registered in my mother’s maiden name. Saint-Loup.’ She saw the look of surprise on Raoul’s face. ‘It’s a huge family, cousins all over the place. It’s a very commonplace name.’
‘The first time I met her, Eloise Breillac told me you were distantly related. I’d forgotten until now.’
Sandrine smiled. ‘It was my mother’s family house, not his. Papa always meant to get the deeds changed into his name after she died, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it.’ She paused. ‘Authié would have to dig deep into the records to find the connection. At least, that’s what I hope.’
Raoul was frowning. ‘But everyone knows Marieta is there, and her connection with you and Marianne. It only takes a neighbour here, or in Coustaussa, to say something in front of the wrong person. It’s hardly a secret.’
‘I know that,’ Sandrine said quietly. ‘But there’s nothing we can do about it.’
‘If Authié’s determined to find you, he will.’
‘I know that too.’ She looked at him, his eyes wild with worry and lack of sleep. ‘Let’s think it through. Not rush into anything.’
Sandrine filled the kettle with water and put it on the stove to boil. She put a spoonful of tea into the china pot, then took two cups from the dresser and set them ready on the side with the remains of the honey.
‘I don’t think we can risk going through with the attack on Authié,’ Raoul said. ‘Even if it wasn’t him with Schiffner last night, he’ll arrive today. From what Yvette said, they’ve found the device. If that is the case, Authié won’t go anywhere near the Cité tonight. They’ll be waiting for us.’
Sandrine poured the hot water on to the leaves.
‘They’ll flood the Cité with men,’ he continued. ‘Milice, Gestapo, the Wehrmacht troops garrisoned there as back-up.’
She stirred the pot, then got the strainer and poured the tea into the cups. A half-spoonful of honey each for flavour. Then she joined him at the table.
‘I agree,’ she said.
Raoul stared. ‘You do?’
‘I agree that they might very well have found the device, and plan to simply lie in wait for us to return to detonate it.’ She took a deep breath, knowing that Raoul wasn’t going to like what she was about to say. ‘But I’ll still have to go back tonight.’
‘Why?’ he demanded.
‘It’s dangerous, Raoul. We can’t just leave the device there. Even if the Gestapo are watching the tower every minute of the day, who’s to say someone won’t find it – a child – and set it off by accident?’
Raoul threw his hands in the air. ‘You can’t seriously be considering going back to disable it? If I’m right and they have found it – and put guards in the tower itself – you’ll be caught.’
