Before the Dawn

by Candace Camp

  Dragon gave a ghastly imitation of a smile. “Yes. So he pretends.”

  “My God!”

  “Will you tell him?”

  “Yes. Yes, I swear.”

  “Good. Bless you.” Dragon moved the pill over with his tongue, and his remaining teeth came down upon it. It burst, spilling powder into his mouth. He swallowed, his mouth still twisted into a smile, and died.

  Bousquet didn’t notice what had happened to the other man. He was too astounded by what he had just learned. The spy who had baffled the Germans was Philippe Michaude! The most infamous collaborator in Paris. A friend of Schlieker himself. A small smile touched Bousquet’s lips as he thought of Schlieker’s face when he told him the Duke’s identity. How it would puncture that proud bastard’s vanity to know that he had been duped. That he knew the spy personally and had probably even given him information!

  Bousquet wished he could leave right now. He wanted to run to Schlieker with his information, but he waited. Schlieker wouldn’t know how long it would take him to get the information. He wouldn’t send for him for several hours—perhaps even all night. The thought chilled his blood.

  He glanced over at Dragon. His arm dangled off the bed. His face was frozen, contorted in an awful grin. Dragon was dead. Oh, God! He was stuck in a cell with a dead man. Bousquet shivered and huddled within his arms. The room seemed suddenly very cold.

  *****

  When Alyssa regained consciousness, she was lying on the ground, trees branching thickly above her head. She was no longer bound. Slowly she sat up, and her head swam. She held herself very still until everything righted itself, then looked around her. She was in the midst of trees. Some distance away men were grouped around a low fire. She turned her head the other direction and jumped. The mustachioed man sat not two feet away, watching her.

  Strangely, he smiled. “Hello, I’m Scorpion. Abominable way to meet. Are you all right? Philippe will murder me if you so much as get a bruise.”

  “Philippe!” His name was the only thing that made sense to her of what the man had said, and in her confused state, she tried to rise to her feet. “Oh, my God, he was hurt!”

  The other man shook his head and laid a restraining hand on her arm. “Don’t worry about him. Just a tap on the head in the place most likely to create a little bleeding. He’ll be all right, I promise you. He always had a hard head.”

  Alyssa’s head was aching and foggy. “You hit him! And kicked him!”

  “He didn’t warn you at all, did he?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  He sighed. “Typical of Philippe. It would make you behave much more realistically if you had no idea we were going to stop the car.” He laid a hand on his heart theatrically. “I swear to you, he’s fine. That was just a charade we played for the German chauffeur. So he’ll report to his masters that you were seized by the resistance and are probably dead by now. We hope that will keep Philippe in the clear while you escape to England.”

  She continued to stare, and he grinned. “We pulled our punches, of course. You can’t think I’d really hurt le Duc, can you?”

  “What!” Her jaw dropped, and she put a hand up to her head as if to anchor it firmly in place. “The Duke!”

  A look of guilt flitted across the man’s face, and he muttered a curse. “You didn’t know, did you? He didn’t tell you a thing!”

  “No! What are you talking about? Are you saying that Philippe is…the Duke?”

  “Now I’ve really done it. He will have my head. But I never dreamed—Georges called you his ‘duchess,’ and I presumed that—well, that you knew. I should have known better.”

  “He’s the spy? But he’s a—“

  Scorpion smiled. “A collaborator. Of course—what better way to get information from the Germans?”

  Alyssa gaped at him for a moment. The world spun around her. Philippe was the Duke! She burst into a grin, dazzling the man before her. Suddenly her heart was alive and singing with joy. Philippe wasn’t helping the enemy at all! He wasn’t dishonorable or cowardly. Just the opposite—he was risking his life playing a most desperate, dangerous game with the enemy. He had endured the contempt of the woman he loved and of the people he was working to save. She had reviled him; resistance fighters had tried to assassinate him. And he had kept silent, all the while chancing his life by stealing secrets from the Nazis. Why, if he were found out—”

  Alyssa shot to her feet. “Oh, my God!”

  “What?” He was instantly alert.

  “He’s in danger! Philippe’s in terrible danger. And to think I knew all this time! If only I’d known who he was, I could have warned him. Scorpion, please.” She reached out a hand to him, her face pleading. “You have to take me to him. I must see Philippe.”

  “What? Are you insane? He’d murder me if I brought you back to him. You’re supposed to leave for England tonight.”

  “But I know who the traitor is. And the Gestapo has Dragon.”

  “Dragon? What traitor?”

  “Dragon is connected to the Duke. I sent a message for him, and it said it was from the Duke. A man named Unicorn saw the message. He realized who Dragon was and he betrayed us. The next day Dragon and I were arrested when we met at the Brasserie Lipp.”

  “And you are sure it was this man who turned you in?”

  “Only two other people besides Dragon and me knew where and when we were meeting. One of them was Allegro, whom Dragon told me was his cousin. He said he’d trust him with his life. The other man was Unicorn, who had been in the same group I was it but had escaped with me when about half the network was blown. He has to be the informer. I think he must have betrayed the first group, too.”

  Scorpion’s face hardened to stone, and his eyes were like bright black marbles. “He will be taken care of. I promise you. I have contacts in Paris, and I will let them know. You must tell me everything you can about this man.”

  “But what about Philippe? I have to tell him that Dragon was captured.”

  “Yes, yes, I’ll go to him immediately. He’s at his château, resting after Georges came along and ‘rescued’ him and his Nazi guard. I will call Paris from there.”

  “And you’ll take me with you?” Alyssa gripped his arm anxiously. Her eyes were huge and swimming with tears. “Please, I beg of you. I must see him. I didn’t know what he was doing. I said terrible things to him. I can’t leave him with that between us. I have to talk to him, apologize. I have to tell him how much I love him.”

  Scorpion hesitated, then nodded. “Yes, all right. Now tell me about Unicorn.”

  *****

  Schlieker had the guards bring down Bousquet shortly after supper. He couldn’t wait any longer to find out if he had learned anything. Surely after two hours the man would at least know if it was likely that he would get any information.

  The guard opened the door, and Bousquet entered, bringing with him the awful stench of the cell. Schlieker’s nostrils tightened, and he brought out a handkerchief to shield his nose from the worst of it. He looked into Bousquet’s face and immediately forgot about the smell. Bousquet’s eyes glittered; he was bursting with excitement.

  “Did you find it out?” Schlieker dropped the handkerchief on his desk and rose.

  Bousquet had never seen Schlieker display such interest or emotion. He luxuriated in the moment, stretching it out as long as he dared. “Yes, I did. He asked me to give the name to Allegro, so that he could become the Duke’s new contact.”

  “And? Damn it, man, who is the Duke?”

  “Philippe Michaude.”

  All the color in Schlieker’s face seeped out. Bousquet carefully kept his expression blank, despite the spurt of delight it gave him to see the officer so stunned. “Michaude?” Schlieker asked in a voice not quite his own. “Are you sure?”

  It seemed impossible to Schlieker. Could he have been such a poor judge of character? Philippe Michaude was one of the few men he l
iked. The man was sophisticated and intelligent; Schlieker had enjoyed conversing with him. He wasn’t like the other French flunkies, always groveling, soft and spineless. There had been something hard and confident in him, something strong.

  But, of course, he would be strong if he were playing such a dangerous game. He wouldn’t be like the others. No wonder he had seemed almost an equal. In a way he was—the enemy, but a man of courage and daring and brains. A man fighting for his country.

  Albrecht Schlieker could understand that. He could even admire Michaude for it. And he hated him to the depths of his soul.

  Michaude had fooled him. Humiliated him. He had taken secrets not only from German army officers, but from Schlieker himself! All the time that he was so anxiously hunting the Duke, he’d been right at his side. Michaude must have been laughing with glee at Schleiker’s blindness. Red rage filled Schlieker, and he slammed his fist down on the desk. “I’ll kill him!”

  Bousquet wisely kept still. Schlieker struck the desk again and again. The whites shone all around his eyes, and his pupils were pinpoints of black. Bousquet wouldn’t have been surprised if he started foaming at the mouth.

  But Schlieker quickly regained control of himself. He clenched his fists and forced himself to sit down. His eyes flickered to Bousquet. “You may leave,” he said in a voice like ground glass, and Bousquet didn’t stay to inquire about his reward.

  Schlieker watched him leave, hardly seeing him, his mind on Philippe. He thought about the information Michaude had given him this morning. No doubt the great majority of it was false and the rest of it unimportant. The girl would probably mysteriously escape while they were at Michaude’s country house. Michaude must have known that providing him with false information and letting a prisoner escape would increase his risk of discovery. Why had he done it? The woman must mean something very special to him indeed.

  If Philippe lusted after her that much, Schlieker didn’t imagine Philippe would forgo the pleasure of her body just yet. She would doubtless remain at the château for a day or two before her “escape.” If he acted quickly, he could get both Philippe and the woman, and with her in his hands, he would be able to get any answer he wanted from Michaude. He would make him beg.

  A frosty smile touched Schlieker’s lips, and he picked up his telephone. When Dieter Gersbach answered at the other end, Schlieker said crisply, “I’ve decided to give you what you requested. Drive down to Philippe Michaude’s estate immediately and bring both him and the girl back to me.” He paused, listening to the man on the other end, then said, “Yes, you shall have the girl. Just as soon as I am through with the two of them.”

  *****

  Alyssa described everything she could remember about Unicorn, including the false name he had used on the identity papers he secured for them. She knew nothing about his job or his true identity, but she pointed out that if there were any members of Allegro’s or Oak’s cells still alive and free, they would be able to recognize him.

  It seemed a pitifully small amount of information to catch the traitor, but Scorpion smiled and told her not to look so downcast. “We will find him. Now it’s time for us to go.”

  He said a few words to the men around the fire and returned to her. He no longer carried the rifle, but now he slid a German Luger into his belt at the back beneath his light jacket. He settled his soft cap on his head at a jaunty angle, grinned, and motioned for Alyssa to follow him.

  He struck off briskly through the trees, but Alyssa had no trouble keeping up. If anything, she was so impatient to see Philippe that Scorpion’s pace seemed too slow. They walked along narrow paths through fields and trees, crossing fences and once jumping from stone to stone over a small stream. Finally they emerged from a stand of trees, and Alyssa saw that they were behind Philippe’s house. Scorpion left her in the shelter of trees and walked through the garden into the house. Alyssa sat waiting for what seemed like ages, clenching and unclenching her fists and watching the upper stories of the house.

  “Alyssa.”

  She whirled. Georges, Philippe’s valet, stood a few feet from her. He had come from the side of the house, around the formal garden, and had moved so softly she had had no inkling of his approach.

  “Georges!” She let out a sigh of relief.

  “Sorry if I startled you. Scorpion said you wanted to see Philippe.”

  “Yes. Very much.”

  He smiled. “Good. Scorpion is using the telephone. I will take you to Philippe.”

  She followed him as he circled the garden to the side entrance, set into one of the ornamental round towers.

  “I’ve never been in this way before,” Alyssa commented.

  “It isn’t often used.” He ushered her inside the door and stood in a dimly lit stairwell. “The servants here are good Frenchmen, no Nazi spies, but the less anyone knows, the better.”

  Georges led her up a flight of stairs into a wing of the house she had never entered before. It, too, was dark, but Georges knew his way, and he led her down the hall. When they rounded the corner, they were in the main section of the second floor, an area with which Alyssa was familiar. The hallway was deserted. The door to Philippe’s bedroom stood open, and a small light burned within, casting a dim yellow square of light into the hall.

  Alyssa looked at Georges, and he smiled before walking away in his silent manner and disappearing down the main staircase. Alyssa’s heart pounded inside her chest as she crossed the hall to Philippe’s door.

  Philippe sat across the room, gazing out the window into the night. A cut-glass decanter and a half-empty glass of whisky sat on the small table beside him. He turned his head to stub out a cigarette, and Alyssa saw the darkening bruise on the side of his forehead. Her heart contracted with love and anguish.

  How hard it must have been for him! Hated by the woman he loved, despised by the very people he was trying to save, pretending to like people he hated, he had constantly walked the razor’s edge of danger for the past two years. It was no wonder he had seemed hardened and careworn. It must have been awful for him to be friendly to the Nazis, to see the things they did and even have to act as if he approved. Alyssa remembered how much she had hated her role in Washington, when she had had to pretend to like the enemy. There had been times when she had been hard pressed to continue—and she hadn’t had to face the scorn and hatred of her own people, as Philippe had. Nor had she had to live under that constant pressure for two years.

  She stepped inside. “Don’t you know you shouldn’t drink after a head injury?”

  Philippe whirled, leaping to his feet. “Alyssa! What in the name of God are you doing here?”

  Alyssa closed the door and turned back to him. It occurred to her that her hair and clothes must be a mess, and she wished she had on a little makeup. She wanted suddenly, desperately, to be pretty for him. “I came because I love you.”

  “Alyssa.” The word was barely more than a breath, and he crossed the room to her in a few long steps. He had been drinking and thinking of Alyssa all evening, and now her appearance seemed like a vision. A vision with leaves in her hair. Philippe smiled and plucked a curl of green leaf from her tousled mane.

  “I must be a mess,” Alyssa said quickly, her voice breathless.

  “You are beautiful,” he corrected. He dropped the leaf and cupped her face with his hands. His thumbs gently caressed her cheeks and chin and outlined her lips. When he touched her mouth, she kissed his skin. Philippe’s blood began to thunder within his veins.

  “I love you,” he told her hoarsely, and his mouth came down to meet hers. The kiss was tender and seeking. There was none of the harsh, eager desperation that had been between them this morning. Their physical thirst had been slaked. Now it was love that touched, tasted, lingered.

  His fingers trailed lightly down her back and smoothed over her buttocks, then slid back up her sides and brushed the edges of her breasts. Tongues teased and glided, wet and silken and pleasure
giving.

  Their loving turned bright and fiery, but it was still infinitely slow. Philippe undressed her, his eyes as hot as his fingers upon her skin, and Alyssa undressed him. They came together, skin against skin, his arms hard around her. He pulled her into him, and her breasts pushed against the hard cage of his ribs. They kissed, their mouths straining against each other, seeking every bit of sweetness. Alyssa dug her fingers into his hair, urging him even closer. Her fingernails skimmed down his neck and across the bunched muscles of his shoulders. Philippe shuddered. His arms were so tight around Alyssa that she thought she might break in two, but she didn’t care. She wanted him even closer. She wanted him inside her.

  Philippe swung her up into his arms and carried her to the bed, nuzzling at her neck and earlobe as he walked. He put her down on the bed and sat down beside her, gazing down at her body. Slowly he ran his hands down her, exploring her soft flesh. His mouth was full, his face heavy and flushed with desire. His eyes ate her up.

  Alyssa stretched, loving his gaze, loving his hands. They had been separated so long. She wished their lovemaking could go on forever. Her own hands went to his hard thighs and the smooth wall of his abdomen. He sucked in his breath at her touch, and his fingers tightened on her.

  Stretching out beside her on the bed, kissing her as his hand caressed her breasts. Philippe moved downward, sliding his lips over the tender skin of her throat to her breast. He kissed the soft, quivering flesh, and his tongue circled her nipple, turning it into a hot, tight bud. He moved to the other nipple, tracing and teasing until Alyssa trembled and arched upward, seeking the full pleasure of his mouth. His lips closed around her nipple, rubbing it gently, and at last his mouth pulled at her breast. She was flooded with warmth, liquid with the exquisite pleasure.

  Alyssa moaned his name, and his fingers slipped between her legs, so that the pleasure arced from her in two places, meeting in sizzling excitement in her abdomen. She could not keep still. She moved her hands restlessly over Philippe’s shoulders and back and slid them through his hair. His hair was damp around the edges, and she could see the faint sheen of moisture on his bare shoulders.