Into the Fire

by Into the Fire (retail) (epub)

  ‘Did you sleep well, Jeanne-Marie?’

  Nodding, with her mouth full. The bread was really something. ‘Well enough, thank you.’ She’d added. ‘It’s very kind of you and your wife to let me stay here.’

  ‘Ah. It’s our pleasure.’ He’d dumped himself at the table, rather too close to her for comfort. Squat, with arms like a weight-lifter’s dusted with flour, and a strong body odour ruining the scent of the bread. A sideways smile: ‘Mine, anyway.’

  For ‘smile’, read ‘leer’. She’d shifted her chair – making room for him, it didn’t have to be taken as a rebuff… ‘Only for a few days, of course. Until I find somewhere of my own.’

  ‘Yes. That’s wise. Sorry to have to say so, but—’

  ‘It’s a fact of life.’

  ‘Unfortunately.’ He’d shrugged. ‘You’re a smart girl, Jeanne-Marie.’ The leer, again. ‘We could be good friends – hunh?’

  He’d reached over, to squeeze her shoulder. Warm, heavy hand, unpleasantly clammy through the thin cotton of her blouse. It was one of several articles of clothing which Louis had found for her – or the tarty little assistant in his shop had. They’d tarted her up, to some extent – clothes, the shoes, make-up, sunglasses, a smart new holdall as well as the sample-case – in which there was room for her radio under a cleverly fitted false bottom – and a change of hairstyle. Louis had arranged for a young male friend of his to come to the house to cut and set her hair yesterday, before he himself had taken her to the Gare Saint Lazare and put her on the Rouen train. The hairstyle was fairly disastrous, she thought, but didn’t want to offend Louis by mentioning it. He’d explained in some embarrassment and with repeated apologies throughout the period of transformation that in his business a degree of sophistication was de rigeur, perhaps especially so for a representative of Maison Cazalet; and she’d been more than ready to go along with it, through awareness that the Gestapo and/or S.D. might well be looking for the young woman of rather homely appearance who’d been on the train from Brest.

  If Guillaume had heard enough, and had remembered, been able to describe her, he might have been – or soon would be – induced to tell them all he knew: or even to select items for them which might be less close to his heart than others.

  One’s life was always in other people’s hands. As it was now to some extent in that slob of a baker’s. In the kitchen earlier this morning she’d moved her chair a second time, not giving a damn whether it offended him; he’d shrugged as if to some invisible audience – these girls, how d’you ever know? – and poured himself some coffee. Telling her – almost as if he’d read her mind on the other subject – ‘Not that we’d worry, ourselves, in the normal way of things. But – fact is – we have a daughter – married, but she often visits – and she’s – well, doesn’t share our own view of – of the situation generally. D’you understand me?’

  Louis couldn’t have known they had a daughter who was pro-Nazi. Married to a collaborator, probably. To a German, even. It would be as well to make sure he did know, as soon as possible. Although thinking ahead – as one had to, every minute of the day – if the girl walked in right now it wouldn’t necessarily be disastrous.

  It would have played into this bastard’s hands for her to seem worried, anyway.

  ‘Is she your only child?’

  ‘Sadly, she is. We had a son – Etienne – but he was killed, in a road accident. He was working for your cousin, Monsieur Cazalet. He may have told you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, he was extremely generous to us, at the time, although he was in no way – responsible… That’s why – anything we can do for him…’

  So that was the connection: she’d wondered what it could be. Louis assuming he’d have these people’s loyalty, in return for the ‘generosity’: which must have been in the nature of a hush-up, she guessed. Having, she told herself, a nasty mind… But she liked Louis, didn’t let herself think about it.

  Eleven-ten: time to make a move. The Café Belle Femme faced into the Place de la Pucelle, which was only a few minutes’ walk from here, just this side of the old market. Plenty of time, therefore: but she’d have a good look at the place before breezing in there. If there’d been another café within sight of it she’d have been there now, watching the Belle Femme for any sign that it might have become a mousetrap: signs like Germans in plain clothes… Anyway – twenty minutes on this hard stone had been quite enough: her feet had had as much of a rest as they were going to get… As she got up, and picked up the sample-case, there was a tramp of heavy boots, and raucous voices: a group of German soldiers, eyeing her as they passed along the quai. One of them made some remark and several glanced back at her, sniggering. All shouting at each other again, then: reminding her of how strongly she disliked their ugly, brutal-sounding language. Her loathing of it obviously stemmed from its various associations in her mind, but it was a reaction as instinctive and immediate as the hackles rising on a dog’s back.

  Fear was a part of it, of course. A mental and sometimes actual shiver at the thought of physical contact or even proximity. Dangerous, potentially. She’d reminded herself just in the last day or two, at some point, not to let her feelings show. That lot had gone on, anyway; she was crossing the road to walk up Rue Jeanne d’Arc towards Gros Horloge: wouldn’t go that far, would turn left in a minute into Rue aux Ours. She’d memorized a lot of the street names earlier on, had the geography fairly clear. She went back to thinking about the Bonhommes again, and the fact she’d left all that money in their attic. She’d really had no alternative: and it should be safe enough – in the new holdall, which had a strong padlock on it, and with their reliance on Louis. The fact they were still in touch with him did rather suggest that it might be a continuing reliance. Chalk and cheese, otherwise. Left here now: Rue aux Ours. Time – eleven-sixteen… No doubt Madame Bonhomme would be having a good snoop up there, but she’d hardly go further than that, risk killing the golden goose.

  All the same – the sooner one moved, the better. At the core of her uneasiness, she realized, was the near certainty that they’d crack under pressure. Even a threat or two might have them grovelling.

  That was it. And Louis did need telling.

  Rue de la Vicomté… Over it, slantwise, and Place de la Pucelle was just around the corner – a sizeable square, with the café directly across from the imposing Hôtel Bourgtheroulde – iron gates leading into a courtyard, and ancient carvings in the stone, but utterly ruined now by a swastika banner above the gates. Fine place for a rendezvous, she thought, ironically: there’d be Boches in the café too, as like as not. But – on second thoughts – since it was such a scruffy little place, there might not be. They tended to patronize cafés which they’d taken over for themselves – verboten to the French and of course offering far better food and drink.

  Eleven twenty-one: César should have been there six minutes, would be expecting her in another four. Well – three and a half…

  The visible tables were outside, under a striped awning. Six or eight of them occupied. And there were two uniformed Germans at one. Only two men sat alone – one fat with a mop of dark hair and one ancient, with none. She’d passed by fairly slowly: and there was nobody even faintly resembling him… Might be inside, of course: despite the sunshade there was a reflection on the glass making it impossible to see through. Have to go in there, anyway. Not really expecting to find him, now: he’d surely have been outside where she could have seen him and where he could have seen her arriving. He wouldn’t have sat inside the cafe in order to keep away from those Boches, either: he was an experienced agent, would be aware that the best way to avert suspicion was not to give a damn if they practically sat in your lap.

  Like using a café right opposite a building they’d taken over as some kind of headquarters, she thought. Recalling also her day in Paris, dining with Louis at Maxim’s, which had been full of them, also a surprising number of well-heeled collaborators. Louis being one of that
fraternity, of course: several of them had exchanged warm greetings with him.

  She turned at the next corner, and started back. As a matter of routine, looking for any tail. César wouldn’t have blessed her for leading the bastards to him. But there’d been no tail all morning, and wasn’t now. Gazos passing, a gazo van unloading vegetables: then as she reached the café three nuns in line abreast, their eyes downcast. The fat man showed surprise at seeing her again, looking at her with interest as she passed between his table and another: she was in the doorway then, a grubby old waiter with a tray pulling back to let her into the contrasting gloom and the smell of floor polish.

  No customers at all, in here. Only a woman behind the counter, drying coffee-cups and looking ill.

  Not floor polish, she thought. Rotting cabbage.

  ‘Twenty gaspers?’

  Wordless, reaching into a drawer for a pack. ‘Gaspers’ was right: whatever label they carried, there’d be a minimal content of real tobacco in them. These were at a black market price as well. ‘I don’t know – might have a coffee, while I’m here.’

  ‘At a table, then. Waiter’ll take your order.’

  He’d take a tip, too. ‘D’you have a telephone?’

  ‘There. You’ll need a jeton.’

  ‘Well – not immediately. I’ll see…’

  She decided against the coffee. Emerging into the brightness, getting some looks up and down from several men including the two Germans. Deciding against coffee not because it would be ersatz, made out of acorns, so they said – you got used to that, when there was no alternative – but because these people had seen her pass and then come back, and if she sat down now one or other might try his luck – thanks to Louis’s tarting-up efforts. She didn’t want any complications.

  No César, anyway. The fat man was the only one by himself now. But some refreshment, now she’d thought about it, might go down well. Find another café, relax and think this out. She hadn’t doubted that he’d be there: had been ready for something like, ‘Well, about time you showed up!’ Blue eyes, fair hair, a year or two short of forty: she’d had him pictured in her mind, expecting to recognize him immediately… Entering the old market square now – Place du Vieux Marché – where five hundred years ago the English had burnt Joan of Arc – and starting to work it out, assess her position and prospects without César… Her first thought on realizing that he wasn’t there had been that she was off the leash at least until Tuesday next, could get on with her own business. Then the familiar worry – which nagged whenever a fellow-agent wasn’t where he or she should have been – whether he might have been arrested. This had flashed through her mind between the doorway and the counter, and the ensuing reflex – resulting in her asking about a telephone – had been that she might ring the contact number she had for Romeo.

  That did need thinking about.

  It would come under the heading of clutching at a straw, she realized. In the absence of the one colleague on whom she could totally have relied, turning to the next best thing. Even knowing it might turn out to be the next worst thing. Maurice Buckmaster’s drawl, last Sunday: If he’s a traitor, your cover’ll be blown the minute you contact him…

  So why even think about it?

  She spotted a place on the north side of the square: Brasserie Guillaume. The reference was to William the Conqueror, not to the one who’d been in her thoughts these last few days. This road, in fact, was Rue Guillaume le Conquérant.

  Another shabby little dump. But they’d have the ersatz coffee – alternatively watery beer, and possibly some kind of aperitif – if this was a licensed day. And if it was a good day, something to eat. Sometimes there’d be black-market stuff on offer – under the counter and at a crazy price of course, and they wouldn’t offer it to anyone they didn’t know. But there were a few tables out on the pavement here too, and there were some women among the customers, which seemed to her to provide a measure of – security, of a kind… She crossed the road – from the market-place, dodging bicycles and a horse and cart – and found a table at the back, where she’d have the rest of them in her sight.

  Including a man reading the collaborationist newspaper Je Suis Partout. One of its leading lights – might have been either the proprietor or the editor – was a friend of Louis. They’d met in that Paris restaurant and embraced, but Louis had told her who this was and she’d hung back, managed not to be introduced. Shy little country cousin…

  Forget Louis – who so successfully and usefully played both ends against the middle. Think about Romeo. Putting the sample-case with the Mark III in it under the table, between her feet… Romeo, who might have been turned. Reasons for that suspicion being – one – that he’d survived when all the others in his réseau had been arrested, and two, that he’d been that group’s pianist and parachute drops he’d called for in his signals had fallen straight into German hands. There was no proof of treachery, but the details of the drops would only have been known to him and to the réseau’s organizer – who had been arrested.

  Correction – one other possibility: the Resistance people who were to receive the drops would have known all about them, and their group might have been penetrated, or informed on.

  ‘Mam’selle?’

  She ordered coffee, and the waiter – stooped, pigeon-chested – confided in a whisper that he still had a little garlic sausage to offer but wouldn’t have for long. Otherwise there was only turnip soup. She ordered sausage, with bread. It was what everyone else here was eating, she could see. Could smell, too. Even out of doors.

  Back to Romeo, though. Why get in touch with him?

  First and foremost, for any news of César: there was no other way she’d get it. Second, whether there’d been any instructions from Baker Street. They’d told Romeo not to transmit, until further orders, but he’d surely have been listening out. Third, to ask him where she might get hold of a bicycle without paying a fortune for it. And lastly to arrange to meet him – next week, and perhaps depending on whether César had shown up by then – in order to try to make up her mind about him, part of that process being to ask him to agree to making a trip to London to be vetted. ‘Debriefed’, was the euphemism. If he was straight, he’d accept the invitation, otherwise he’d either refuse or initially express willingness and then come up with reasons for delay.

  If he was working for the Germans, though?

  Well. She wouldn’t mention the Bonhomme establishment: or that she was looking for lodgings elsewhere. Wouldn’t say what she wanted a bicycle for, or name any place, day or time for a rendezvous next week. All he’d be getting was the fact that ‘Angel’ was now in Rouen – and that ‘César’ apparently was not – if he hadn’t known this already, which he might have – and that she’d be calling him again some time next week.

  The imperative of taking him on trust to this limited extent was the hope of finding out what might have happened to César. She had to know, and so did Baker Street.

  She reached down for the sample-case, and went inside, bought a jeton and went over to the telephone – stopping the waiter to tell him, ‘I’ll eat in here, please. That table.’ Then she was dialling a number she’d been carrying in her head for the past week.

  ‘Bistro Suisse.’

  Male, and grumpy-sounding, probably quite old. She asked him, ‘Is Martin Hardy there, please?’

  ‘Hardy,’ pronounced the French way: ‘Ar-di.’

  ‘Who wants to know?’

  ‘Well… He knows me as Angel.’

  ‘Does, does he?’ A grunt. ‘Gets around, that one… No, he’s not here.’

  ‘D’you have any idea when—’

  ‘Might be in some time, I don’t know. If he’s in town, of course.’

  ‘Well – he could call me – if it’s in the next hour, say?’

  ‘Give me the number.’

  She read it out to him, off the sticker beside the jeton slot. ‘I’d be most grateful, monsieur, if—’

  Gone. Hung up
. She did the same. Thinking, Bistro Suisse… She might try to find it, be there when he arrived. She wouldn’t know him but the proprietor would speak to him and then he’d go to the telephone and she’d see him getting a dusty answer, hanging up.

  Achieving what, though? A person’s looks might prejudice you one way or the other, couldn’t tell you anything.

  She’d got to the table which had her so-called coffee on it but no sausage yet, was about to sit down when the phone began to ring, behind her. She went back to it quickly, driven either by intuition or by wishful thinking, and with a wave to the girl behind the counter – who in any case hadn’t moved an inch.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Angel?’

  ‘Who’s this?’

  ‘Can’t guess, my darling?’

  ‘No. I can’t. Look, I’m going to hang up—’

  ‘No, please… I’ll tell you. Since you have a pretty voice – call me Romeo?’

  ‘Ah. Well…’

  ‘Interested, eh? Makes two of us… Can we get together – right away? Make the fur fly a little, maybe?’

  ‘Any news of César?’

  ‘No. None.’ A two-second pause… ‘Anyway – three’s a crowd—’

  ‘He can’t be in town.’

  ‘As far as I know, he isn’t. Can we meet, right away?’

  ‘Actually, I’m afraid not. Not before next week.’

  ‘Next week! How can I possibly wait that long?’

  ‘Well – you might try taking cold baths?’

  ‘How can an angel be so cruel!’

  ‘You tell me something, if you would. Where can I hire or buy a bicycle at a reasonable price?’

  ‘Easy. Garage I use. I have a gazo, see. Marc Pigot – tell him I sent you. In an alleyway off the Rue Bras-de-Fer. He does cycles as well as cars, does have some for hire, I know.’

  ‘You have a gazo, you say?’

  ‘Have indeed. I’m a travelling salesman, darling. Come to think of it, why bother with a bicycle—’