British Bulldog

by Sara Sheridan

  ‘Left or right?’

  ‘Right is the more natural turn. They drive on the right,’ Mirabelle decided.

  The streets were spaced randomly – Paris was not laid out on a recognisable grid. Here and there a dark passage linked the side streets. The iron gates were open but the shops inside were closed. They turned right and right again, and then from the other end of the street a familiar car chugged towards them.

  ‘There,’ Mirabelle said.

  No one was sitting in the back. Mirabelle waved down the chauffeur but he didn’t slow until McGregor stepped off the pavement and interposed his body. He raised one hand and pulled out his police badge with the other. The car came to a halt. Mirabelle was impressed. She felt a glow flush her skin. McGregor was surprisingly competent for a man who couldn’t speak the language and had never worked undercover.

  The driver rolled down the window and Mirabelle leaned in and spoke in swift French. ‘Are you going back to pick up the young lady you dropped at the bar?’

  The chauffeur didn’t respond to the question. ‘Who is he?’ he said, casting his eyes towards McGregor.

  ‘Police, of course.’

  You could tell a lot by threatening people with the police. It occurred to her that if the chauffeur had been paid off by someone he’d show some sign of panic – a twitch or a flicker in his eyes. Instead the man nodded stoutly at McGregor and drew himself up in his seat. Mirabelle pulled the woman’s clutch bag from her pocket.

  ‘Your mistress left this in the bar. She seems to have disappeared. Where were you due to meet her? When?’

  The chauffeur’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘It’s important,’ Mirabelle insisted. ‘She may be in danger.’

  The man stared at the clutch bag for a moment, weighing things up. ‘She should be there now. Get in,’ he said finally. ‘You can give it back to her yourself.’

  ‘How long have you worked for her?’

  ‘I work for her father,’ the chauffeur admitted. ‘The family.’

  ‘For long?’

  ‘Since I came to Paris after the war.’

  ‘So you know her well?’

  ‘I don’t know Mademoiselle Durand at all. I am a servant, madame.’

  Mirabelle noted the name and opened the car door. McGregor followed her onto the back seat.

  ‘This is risky,’ he murmured. ‘We don’t know anything about this man.’

  ‘It’s less risky with you here,’ Mirabelle whispered. ‘I had no idea you were so handy.’ Besides, the fellow was a family retainer. The driver pulled back onto the main road and overshot the turning for the bar, taking a left beyond it and then turning left again. He pulled up short of the next corner, parking tight into the kerb.

  ‘Mademoiselle Durand didn’t walk in this direction,’ Mirabelle pointed out. ‘She’d have had to pass us sitting in the window if she was heading here.’

  ‘She might have gone round the block the other way,’ McGregor said.

  The little street was as deserted as the rest of the area. McGregor got out of the car and walked to the end of the road, stopping on the corner and peering in the direction of the bar. The windows were black and the light over the door was switched off. He gestured towards Mirabelle, shrugging his shoulders. A ginger cat stalked across his path and stopped to look at this stranger.

  ‘Where were you going to take her?’ Mirabelle asked the driver.

  ‘Mademoiselle Durand didn’t say, madame.’ He checked his watch. ‘But it is customary to wait.’

  ‘Where does she live?’

  She could feel the chauffeur prickle. It was an unseemly question. The French were private, and even in England for a servant to reveal the address of his employer would be considered indiscreet. It was too much of an intrusion. Mirabelle tried another tack.

  ‘Have you brought her here before? To that bar?’

  The man’s eyes burned in the mirror. McGregor opened the rear door and slipped back inside.

  ‘Where does the woman live?’ he said.

  ‘You really think she is in some kind of trouble?’ the chauffeur asked.

  ‘Mademoiselle Durand has disappeared. Without her handbag,’ Mirabelle pointed out. ‘Yes. I believe she might well be in trouble.’

  ‘Then surely we should start a proper search,’ the man said. ‘You are right – she is usually back in the car by now. One policeman … surely we should report the matter properly.’ He eyed McGregor with dubiety.

  ‘How often have you brought her here?’

  ‘Three times. Perhaps four.’

  ‘In how long?’

  ‘The last few months. The first time was last summer.’

  ‘I take it she doesn’t make a habit of visiting dives late at night? But she comes here sometimes – always from the opera?’

  The man nodded. ‘Ten minutes,’ he said. ‘It takes ten minutes. A quarter of an hour at most.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘She goes home.’ The driver looked worried. ‘If Mademoiselle Durand is missing, the master has to be told. I always wondered about bringing her here, but she insisted and it was always quick. He’ll be angry, but if Mademoiselle is in trouble it’s my duty to let Monsieur Durand know.’

  Mirabelle cut in. ‘Let’s see if we can find her first, yes? That would make less trouble. I’m sure her father wouldn’t be happy with her for coming here, nor with you for bringing her.’

  The chauffeur’s eyes softened. Mirabelle continued.

  ‘Tell me, there aren’t normally customers in the bar, are there? Not at this time of night. Have you ever seen anyone else inside when Mademoiselle Durand made her visits?’

  The chauffeur shook his head.

  ‘We scared her. We changed the transaction. She got up from the table because she knew it wouldn’t go ahead. She wanted to get away.’

  ‘Then you think someone kidnapped her because of us?’ McGregor sat back.

  ‘No. I think we were a symptom not the cause. She wasn’t going to make the drop so she left her bag on the table to make it look as if she intended to return and instead she slipped out the back. She must have shoved everything important into a pocket – the scarf, her lighter, any money she was carrying. She secreted it all. The person she intended to meet might well have been watching from somewhere outside. When we arrived he would have left as well. The drop wasn’t to go ahead if there was anyone else in the bar, you see. My guess is that if she’s been taken it wasn’t by her contact.’ Mirabelle drew the little button from her pocket. ‘She snagged her dress on the way out of the door. I found this on the cobbles. I’m wondering if she was grabbed by a third party. Someone who wanted the information she was carrying. Someone who was desperate for it. I might have an inkling of who they are and where they’d go.’

  McGregor’s eyes narrowed. ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘They took me, too. Earlier today. But I got away.’

  ‘What on earth have you got yourself mixed up in? What do you mean, they took you?’ McGregor reached for her hand. It was too intimate a gesture. Mirabelle pushed him off.

  ‘I need to think. But if Mademoiselle Durand has been taken I think she might be in the rue de Courcelles. Do you know where that is?’ she asked the driver.

  ‘Yes, madame. But Monsieur Durand would want to be informed. Mademoiselle Evangeline is his daughter.’

  ‘In due course,’ Mirabelle said decisively. ‘First let’s go and see if we can find her. Take us to the rue de Courcelles and park on the corner. We don’t want to make it too easy for them to see us coming.’

  Chapter 26

  Trust the small voice inside you.

  Mirabelle had no idea how to get into the building. In England when she was on a special case, she broke into private residences with the frequency of a cat burglar. But in France the architecture was a lot more difficult to negotiate. The terrace on the rue de Courcelles was no different and the balcony that had made it possible for her to escape from number 8 was t
oo high to facilitate her return. There was no hotel or restaurant on the row through which she might access the rear of the buildings, and for the most part the street looked as if it was asleep. Of the few lights illuminating the windows, the top floor of number 8 burned brightest, firing her belief that Mademoiselle Durand might well have been brought to the house by Albert or one of his associates. Someone was up there, anyway. McGregor had managed to stay silent during the short drive as Mirabelle stared out of the window thinking it through. Now they had parked and were surveying the location from the safety of the back of the car, he could no longer contain his concern.

  ‘So someone kidnapped you?’ he said. ‘And you were kept here?’

  Mirabelle nodded. ‘Earlier today. I got out over the roof. If they’ve taken this girl to the same place then she’s behind that window on the fifth floor. They probably have other safe houses, but the men we’re looking for were set up here this afternoon. Please, Alan, don’t make anything of it. I’m perfectly all right. I got out.’ If he offered her sympathy she knew it would weaken her resolve, and the important thing at the moment was finding Mademoiselle Durand.

  McGregor squared up. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’ll be pragmatic. Do you think they know you’re gone?’

  Mirabelle shrugged. It had been several hours. It seemed unlikely they had not checked on her in that time. ‘I imagine so. On balance of probability.’

  ‘So your theory runs that having lost you, they went out and took another woman. Is that what you’re saying? It seems rather random, Mirabelle, and I don’t understand how you’re mixed up in all this. What’s the connection between you and this Durand woman?’

  Mirabelle cast a glance at the chauffeur, who showed no sign that he was eavesdropping on their conversation or for that matter was able to understand English.

  ‘We should walk around the block and get the lie of the land,’ she suggested. ‘And as for you,’ she addressed the driver in French, ‘keep an eye on the door of number 8. We won’t be long.’

  Outside she put up a hand to stop McGregor interrupting her thoughts. They turned left along the main street. McGregor had made a good point without realising its significance. When Albert had interrogated her earlier in the day, he had no idea how Christine Moreau had been passing on the information in her possession, or even exactly what it was. So how had he known about Mademoiselle Durand’s assignation? And if he had that piece of the puzzle, why had he spent time and effort picking up Mirabelle in the graveyard at Passy? No, she realised, it had happened the other way around. This was her fault. She cursed herself for being so slow. When she thought it through, what had happened was obvious.

  The first thing Albert would have done when he found Mirabelle missing was to check everywhere he associated with her. There was already a watch on Christine Moreau’s flat but it would be only natural for him to return to the rue de Siam – the address Mirabelle had visited directly before she’d been taken. And there, if they waited, they’d have seen von der Grün and his wife leave for the opera, assuming that was the woman in the purple dress. They’d have recognised Christine Moreau’s scarf just as Mirabelle had. From that point on all the Russians had to do was keep the party under surveillance. During the interval they’d have seen Frau von der Grün pass on the red scarf and they’d have followed Mademoiselle Durand, and for that matter Mirabelle and McGregor. Her lips pursed. She was out of practice, it seemed. She had only been looking ahead, not checking behind, and that meant that whatever had happened to poor Mademoiselle Durand was her fault as surely as if she’d pointed the girl out to Albert in the crowd.

  ‘Were we followed?’ She clasped McGregor’s arm. ‘I didn’t notice us being followed, did you?’

  ‘No. I told you when I arrived. There was no one on my tail.’

  Mirabelle’s voice was insistent. ‘I don’t mean at the Bistro Florentine. I mean at the opera. Were we the only people tailing Mademoiselle Durand?’

  ‘There wasn’t another car at the bar she went to. The streets were deserted, remember? If there’d been any traffic we’d have seen it.’

  Mirabelle tried to focus. McGregor was right, but there had been plenty of cars on the main road. Stupidly, she had been so busy removing the scarf from her clothing and so focused on Mademoiselle’s Durand’s car ahead that like a rookie she hadn’t paid attention to the rest of the traffic. She might know the drill, but her lack of practical experience was showing.

  ‘They could have pulled over on the main road and cut down the back on foot,’ she said.

  McGregor shook his head. ‘What, and just grabbed her as she left? The woman would have screamed. She’d have resisted.’

  Mirabelle recalled the effect of the chemicals on Albert’s handkerchief. But if he had knocked out Mademoiselle Durand, he’d have had to get her body back to the main road. For a moment she felt weak – had the poor girl been left behind the casks in the cellar of the bar? Had she walked right past her body in the darkness? No, she reassured herself, surely Albert would want to interrogate her. That was the purpose of taking her. Getting hold of the scarf was only part of the mystery. There was little value in capturing an encrypted message if you couldn’t decode it, or indeed find out its intended destination.

  ‘He must have knocked her out. Then he’d have carried her. I wasn’t quick enough, McGregor. He could have taken her in the other direction, back to a waiting car on the main road.’

  ‘Who?’ McGregor asked again. ‘Who is it?’

  ‘They’re Russian,’ said Mirabelle. ‘And I led them right to her.’

  By now they had made their way almost right round the block. There was a short run of shops, all of them closed, but no other obvious weak point that would afford easy access to the rear of the terrace. Together they turned onto the rue de Courcelles. Mirabelle looked up. The pane of glass she’d shattered during her escape had been taped up with what looked like newspaper. A light was on and the glowing newsprint made it look warm inside the top floor studio.

  ‘But I thought you were looking for a wartime flying ace.’ McGregor sounded genuinely mystified.

  Mirabelle let out a sigh. It seemed rather long ago that she started out on Bulldog Bradley’s mission and she still had no idea whether Philip Caine was alive or dead. Mademoiselle Durand’s predicament was far more pressing. ‘If I can get back up onto the roof …’

  McGregor regarded her open-mouthed.

  ‘If you give me a leg up I think I can do it. I got out that way so I can get in up there too.’

  McGregor spluttered, unable to voice his objections because they came in such a rush. Mirabelle ignored him, and by the time he managed to say ‘But that’s preposterous’ she had already rung the bell of number 2. The door was opened promptly by a housekeeper in a green housecoat. She looked most displeased.

  ‘I want to speak to the man on the top floor,’ Mirabelle said, ‘the one with the broken window. I have something for him.’

  The woman crossed her arms. ‘It’s very late for visitors.’

  ‘This is a family emergency,’ Mirabelle insisted.

  The woman surveyed the couple and reluctantly stepped back to let them pass.

  ‘I know the way,’ Mirabelle assured her. ‘We shan’t be long.’

  On the top floor they could hear the radio playing behind the closed door of the studio.

  ‘He may not be pleased to see me,’ Mirabelle warned McGregor. ‘That’s where you might have to come in.’

  ‘Who is he?’

  Mirabelle looked down. ‘The owner of these boots,’ she admitted as she rapped on the studio door.

  Before McGregor could respond, the door opened on a domestic scene. Warm air wafted into the hall from behind the figure of an elderly man of military bearing who wore a thick moustache – the kind that had become unfashionable lately. His clothes betrayed that he’d seen better days. He had not tied his thick cashmere dressing gown in place properly over his wing-collared shirt, and his bow tie da
ngled round his neck. Behind him were the remnants of a lonely supper – an apple and some cheese lay half eaten on a chipped plate that he’d left on the chair in front of the stove.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Mirabelle said in swift French. ‘I’m afraid I’m the person who broke in earlier this evening. My name is Mirabelle Bevan. I wanted to bring you back your boots. I left some money for the damage.’

  The man’s dark eyes surveyed her. ‘You broke the window,’ he said. ‘How on earth did you get up here? No one breaks into the fifth floor from outside. You made a hell of a mess.’

  ‘There’s a story to it,’ Mirabelle admitted. ‘I came from an attic further along and now I need to go back there. I’m sorry. Would you let me use your window again? Please.’

  The man eyed her feet. ‘Those boots are worth a fortune, you know. I got them in de Sousa in Lisbon. There aren’t even twenty pairs like them in Paris.’

  ‘I was desperate,’ Mirabelle apologised. ‘And now I’m desperate again. Please would you help us? This is my friend, Superintendent McGregor. He’s a British policeman. A detective.’

  The man hesitated. ‘It’s most irregular,’ he said, watching as Mirabelle peeled off the boots and the socks she’d stolen and laid them beside his bed. Her feet were filthy where she had escaped over the roof and her stockings sported enormous holes. She was aware that her woollen dress bulged at the waist, but just for the moment, how she looked really didn’t matter.

  ‘I’ll be safer in bare feet. I’ve been clomping around all night with those boots hanging off me. I feel quite light on my feet without them. May I?’ She indicated the newspaper that covered the window, which this time she opened using the catch. ‘You’ll need to give me a boost,’ she said to McGregor over her shoulder.

  The man broke in before McGregor could object. ‘What are you doing? First you break in and now it seems you’re breaking out. Are you burgling another apartment? You can’t come into people’s homes and just take things …’