‘So am I.’
‘Why didn’t the Captain return for his satchel?’
‘Perhaps he was too shaken and forgot it,’ offered the Sûreté.
‘Then Kerjean really did leave it there for us to find.’
‘Perhaps.’
They worked in silence, each taking a side of the tracks and retracing their steps to the fragments and beyond them to the Captain’s collecting bag.
‘An ammunition satchel,’ grunted Kohler, looking down at the thing. ‘Regulation issue. Kriegsmarine blue. Stores must be tolerant of heroes. Quite obviously he saw something up ahead and eased this thing aside.’
‘Yes, but what did he see? A broken doll on the tracks? The visitor sitting there or standing? Or both the doll and that person?’
‘Whatever it was, it caused him to make a little detour.’
‘And that detour could just as easily pin the murder on him.’
It was only as they retraced their steps and searched along the tracks well past the body, that they came upon an abandoned shed and found in the scant gravel nearby, the marks of a bicycle’s tyres.
‘Both coming and then leaving,’ murmured Kohler, running fingers lightly over them. ‘The leaving in haste, I think. The road is just beyond the shed. That’s where our friend the Préfet should have left the car and led us to the railway spur but decided not to.’
St-Cyr heaved a troubled sigh. ‘Then he knew of the cyclist but has made no attempt to remove the evidence.’
A strange man. One up to his ears in something. ‘There are no footprints,’ said Kohler. ‘Whoever pushed the bicycle into that shed, took the trouble not to leave any.’
‘Perhaps … but then, ah mais alors, alors, Hermann, were they removed later?’ There was plenty of bare rock, so the task would not have been difficult. ‘Was the owner of the bicycle the visitor?’
‘Or someone else? A fourth person.’
*
One by one the lanterns went out of their own accord and still there was no sign of the Préfet and the coroner. Only the sound of the breaking seas kept St-Cyr and Kohler company but this was soon muffled by dense fog that came in of a sudden and decided to stay.
Beaded mizzle broke on icy cheeks. Noses constantly dripped. Kohler wiggled his toes trying to find a particle of warmth. Far out to sea, the long lament of a fog horn sounded faintly.
‘That’s the one on the Île de Groix,’ commented St-Cyr grumpily. ‘A good ten kilometres. Dead flat and painfully mournful, as is appropriate!’
‘Let’s find that shed. Maybe it’s dry.’
‘Is Kerjean deliberately leaving us out here to stew in our own juice?’
‘Maybe the coroner likes to sleep in? Maybe he had to come all the way from Vannes, eh? Hours, Louis. It could take the son of a bitch all day to get here!’
‘Nom de Jésus-Christ, Hermann, what is it this time? A photographer without a film? Some argument as to bills unpaid – a last job perhaps? Or is it that the Admiral Doenitz needs to be informed of recent developments and has demanded one of his photographers assist?’
These days there were always complications. Others always had to get in the way. ‘The shed, remember?’ snorted Kohler and when they found it, he held the door open and from some hidden cache among his inner pockets, offered a flask of peach brandy, though God knows how he had obtained it and one did not often ask such questions.
There were two upended wooden kegs that had once held sleeper spikes. These they used as stools, resting their backs against the bare cold boards and sharing a last cigarette in silence until Louis was moved to say, ‘Misery unites us.’
Kohler ran his eyes over the inside of the shed. It was nothing much. Bare pine poles clad with boards. Tarpaper on the roof, thank God. No leaks. Just room for a bicycle or two and, in a corner, lots of flattened, clean straw. No sign of sheep dung or any other such item …
‘Don’t even think of bedding down!’ seethed St-Cyr acidly. ‘You do and they will be certain to arrive.’
‘Hey, I thought that’s what you wanted?’
Did Hermann always have to grin at adversity?
The Bavarian leaned over the straw, and from a niche on one of the cross-timbers, plucked a package of cigarettes. ‘Voilà, Chief. Lucky Strikes.’
‘Pardon?’
He pulled down a lower eyelid in mock salutation and rubbed his frizzy, fast-greying hair that was not black or brown but something in between. ‘Nineteen of them, my fine Sûreté flic. One is missing, in case you wondered.’
They lit up, savouring the blend of fine Virginia tobaccos. They drew in deeply and looked at each other for the longest time. ‘U-boat cigarettes?’ asked Kohler.
‘From an American freighter or a downed aircraft from North Africa? Could it be possible?’ suggested St-Cyr, examining the glowing end of his cigarette. Marvellous … They were absolutely superb.
Kohler shook his head. ‘A freighter. My gut tells me our friend the Captain left this little souvenir for the owner of the bicycle.’
St-Cyr drew in deeply. When the fog had arrived it had made him damned worried, for with it would come the rain to wash everything away. Now he found a contentment which, though he knew he ought to be wary of it, he welcomed. ‘Our Captain is turning out to be quite interesting.’
‘Aren’t the sinkings of twenty-seven ships and the deaths of five hundred and forty men interesting enough? Or the more than two years of surviving what must be a damned desperate war?’
‘Or the 6,000,000 francs? He seeks only the richest pockets of clay – is so anxious to get at them he arrives back from Paris and wastes no time in coming here. None at all apparently. He must have had a car at his disposal.’
‘An expert, and not just with the periscope.’
‘A dollmaker whose grandfather was famous for it.’
There was silver foil in the cigarette package and an aroma that was still so superb, Kohler had to have Louis sample it. ‘They come in cartons of twenty-four packs, I think. Maybe someone on one of the lifeboats handed them over after the Captain blew their ship right out from under them.’
‘Honour and courtesy on the high seas or the threat of U-297’s deck guns?’
Deep down in the straw there was a lady’s crumpled white handkerchief. So hard had the fist been clenched, the handkerchief had to be tugged at to open it but there were no initials and only the faintest trace of perfume. ‘Sandalwood, rosemary, lemongrass and bitter orange,’ said St-Cyr. ‘Something quite old and expensive, I think. A woman, then, who values herself, is valued by someone else, or both. Let me keep the cigarettes and this, Hermann. Let me add them to the tufts of coarse black wool from the tracks and the shards of bisque, particularly the one with blood on it. Say nothing of these to our Préfet or anyone else. Not for the time being. Let us have our own surprises.’
At a shout, they returned to the fog which was now so thick, they could barely make out the Préfet’s lantern.
Six men were with him and their shapes grew but slowly. The Sous-Préfet in his blue uniform, cape and kepi, the coroner looking more like a startled grey-brown mouse in a heavy brown tweed overcoat, scarf, no hat and seaboots, two photographers, one German, one French, the latter decidedly uncomfortable, the former quite content.
And two workmen in dusty, tattered blue denim jackets, black corduroy trousers with coarse black woollen pullovers and heavy wooden clogs, their black berets absolutely filthy, their expressions impassive. Had they seen so much, these two, nothing surprised them any more?
The workmen had a stretcher between them and both coveted it so much, the gnarled hand of one was placed firmly above that of the other.
‘Inspectors, if you will be so good as to tell these gentlemen what you want photographed, they will do their utmost while the coroner examines the body.’
‘Why not let them shoot it first?’ hazarded St-Cyr, surprised.
The Sous-Préfet, a serious and uncomfortable forty-year-old, threw the Préfe
t an uncertain glance. ‘But … but Monsieur Tessier, here, he has already photographed it several times?’
‘Why were we not informed of this, Préfet?’ demanded Louis sharply.
Ah, Paris, why did they have to think each little oversight an insult? ‘There seemed no need. After all, they were only preliminary shots. I knew others would be required by such as yourselves.’
The bastard! Was it now to be open hostility? wondered Kohler. ‘Louis, let me handle this. Take a hike. Go and have a look at the clay pits, eh, and pick up the Captain’s satchel.’
‘In this?’ snorted Kerjean, flinging a hand up in disgust. ‘Ah pfft! Jean-Louis will see nothing of the pits today. Nothing! Besides, there is nothing there to interest you.’
‘But all the same, I will do as he suggests, Préfet. Hermann, see that the photographers capture all the footprints and give us a shot or two of the bicycle tracks.’
‘What bicycle?’ demanded Kerjean swiftly. ‘There was no bicycle.’
‘Oh but there was, Préfet. Show him, Hermann. Let him see this one thing the gumshoes from Paris have discovered. Nothing else. Keep him in suspense. Let him worry about the rest. It’ll be good for him.’
The light was now a pearl grey, with everywhere the fog so close it was not until St-Cyr was almost at them, that he saw the standing stones and sucked in a breath before hastily crossing himself. Then he left the railway spur and went among them to touch their clammy surfaces and say to no one but himself, ‘How many murders have you witnessed down through the ages?’
Like Hermann, he came upon the edge of the clay pits quite unexpectedly and, leaning back, for the precipice at his feet was sheer, gazed dizzily down and then out into the fog.
As if with open hands, their fingers claws, the pits stared up at him and he saw at once how difficult it would be to find a man down there. And even as he tried to see further into the maw of the place, the rain began and made the ground below run with milk. ‘It’s slippery,’ he said and turned uncomfortably away.
At 10 a.m. Berlin Time, 9 a.m. the old time, they left the place in the Préfet’s little Renault, all crammed together and with the ambulance and the body behind. In the centre of Lorient, perhaps some ten kilometres from the clay pits, they let the Sous-Préfet and the photographers out at a bomb-damaged square, then dropped the coroner off at a shattered railway station. Devastation was everywhere. The homeless were on the road en masse to friends and relations in the countryside: hand-drawn carts, wagons and baby carriages heaped with belongings, children, old people and blank stares when confronted with the Préfet’s incessant honking.
Then they took the road from Lorient to Quiberon and its peninsula, a distance of at least fifty kilometres through fog and rain and finally wet snow that did not hang about but melted instantly.
There were farms, salt marshes, bits of pine forest – other alignments, yes, and dolmens – along the way but nothing to alleviate the depressingly cold grey landscape.
‘You are booked into the Mégalithe,’ said the Préfet. ‘I hope the accommodations are to your satisfaction.’
A twenty-five room hotel in which they were the only guests.
‘It’s the off-season, Louis. We ought to be grateful they’ve opened the place up for us.’
‘Of course.’
* The forerunner of Interpol.
2
When one single set of shutters was opened, a grey and dismal light washed into the massive dining-room of the Hotel Mégalithe whose legions of empty tables still held the white linen cloths and settings of the late summer of 1940. Every sound echoed. The place was freezing. Dust clung to the bread-and-butter plates and overturned coffee cups, the knives and forks and spoons.
Even the menu had to be blown off. St-Cyr threw the girl in black broadcloth and black velvet, with the white lace apron and the giant stovepipe coif of starched white lace, an uncertain glance. ‘A dozen oysters,’ he said, his words crashing on timid ears that were all but hidden by curls. ‘A bottle of the Muscadet, the sole meunière, pommes à l’anglaise – ah, I know it is heresy to ask for English-style potatoes. Cauliflower and Brussels sprouts, I think. Cheese and dessert. Oh, and coffee. The real stuff if you have it.’ He’d ask. These days one could only dream but Herr Doenitz might have interceded on their behalf. It was just possible, wasn’t it?
The girl, no more than seventeen, blurted something unintelligible and, with moisture rushing into her stark blue eyes, turned and raced from the dining-room.
‘Can I do nothing right in this place?’ he asked himself. All of the other windows were shuttered tightly. He had had a battle just to get this one open and had finally done it himself.
Sitting down with his back to the alcove’s sombre panelling, he passed uncertain hands over the table-cloth which was not just cold but insufferably damp and likely mildewed.
‘Inspector, what is the meaning of this?’
The sharp voice of the owner’s wife shattered the silence. St-Cyr picked up the menu and, gazing across the room, heaved a futile shrug. ‘Some oysters?’ he winced.
‘Don’t be absurd! You may have the cotriade’ – the fish soup that was more like a poor man’s stew – ‘and the bread if you have enough tickets.’
Shit! ‘I … We … that is, my partner and I have none, Madame Quevillon. Are this week’s orange, lime or yellow? I can never remember which is which and am seldom home in Paris long enough to update my ration booklets.’
‘Paris, hmph! They are chartreuse and you must ask the Préfet to supply you. No food can be given without them. This is not Paris!’
Formidable in severe black, ankle-length voluminous skirts, and without the benefit of an apron but with a metre-high coif of stovepipe lace – was it that high? – she looked like the warder of a medieval prison for women. ‘A glass of the Muscadet, then?’ Would it be possible?
‘Forget it,’ she said tartly. ‘It is not a day for alcohol.’
‘Then please tell my partner I have gone for a walk to seek nourishment from the fog!’
‘As you wish. It’s just as you please, monsieur.’
‘Inspector! It’s Chief Inspector St-Cyr!’
‘Of course.’
He caught himself at the door, forced humility into his voice and begged the location of Monsieur le Trocquer’s shop.
The woman drew herself up so that she towered over him with that ridiculous coif. Her shoulders were every bit as wide as his. ‘It is on the rue de Port-Haliguen not far from the cathedral. You cannot miss it, since the door will wear the wreath of black and the shutters will be closed.’
‘And the cathedral?’ he asked. Was she always so forbidding?
‘Follow the promenade to the rue de Lille. Go up it to the cathedral, then rum right.’
‘Merci.’
‘Will you be taking supper?’
Carelessly he tossed the hand with the shabby, wet fedora. ‘I doubt it. The meals leave much to be desired. Please do not expect a tip!’
The fog didn’t want to leave, and with the snow, it made more forlorn what had once been a thriving seaside town of three thousand in winter, some eighty thousand in summer.
All along the promenade behind that great, sweeping curve of sand, the grand hotels and boarding houses were shuttered and, if not empty, occupied only by their owners and/or perhaps an ancient retainer or two. Hardly a soul stirred. Beached sardine and tunny boats huddled as if so leaky they dared not put to sea and feared the highest tides. Flaking paint marred the wet, fine sand with its bits of shells, while here and there on weathered signboards frayed notices cried out the delights of former days. Palms read and fortunes told. Young ladies and gentlemen need the truth about embarking on their futures before it is too late.
Swimming lessons were given by a Professor Armand of Paris, who was also assistant instructor at the Lutétia Pool and the Cité des Sports. A busy man. Children under five had to be accompanied by a parent or guardian, those from five to ten and older wou
ld come themselves but all were to bring their butterfly floats. Strict obedience was imperative. Dismissals were not uncommon. There were no refunds. Absolutely none.
Ballroom dancing competed with moonlight cruises to Belle-Île and other places. Boules, croquet and tennis were by floodlight if one chose. There was gambling. There was even a cinema but the title of its last feature film in the spring of 1940 had been picked away by curious boys determined to undress its leading lady.
Excursions to view the megaliths – the ‘druidic’ stones – were common and recommended the picnic lunch or moonlight supper. Bathing was not encouraged and most certainly not recommended except for those sites where the ruins entered the sea and the currents allowed of safety.
Marianne and himself had spent their honeymoon here. Her choice of location. He had looked forward to their exploring the megaliths. Four days between cases and hardly time to get to know each other better.
As he plodded up the rue de Lille, St-Cyr vowed not to tell Hermann how disastrous that honeymoon had been. He’d never hear the end of it if he did. Marianne had had a severe allergy to scallops, discovered on their very first night – God did things like that to detectives. Robbed them of simple pleasures. Her family’s farm was inland near Ploërmel, well away from the fruits of the sea, so no one could have blamed her for not knowing. ‘Yet she tried her best to make our visit enjoyable,’ he said. ‘The poor thing. Life isn’t fair.’
She had been absolutely lovely and of a very quiet, gentle nature, with soft blonde hair and large blue eyes just like that young girl in the dining-room. A woman so lonely in Paris, she had succumbed to the attentions of the Hauptmann Steiner.
Love? Had it really been love? he asked himself and fortunately could not answer since the shop was now in view.
A nothing place – one could see it at a glance. Faded letters – second-hand goods. Teacups and teapots, probably. Bits of glassware and china, old lace, costume jewellery and dolls, yes, dolls. Yet the place had so little of the look of prosperity, he was forced to wonder why the Captain would have taken on such a partner.
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