Three Hours in Paris

by Cara Black

  “And officers continue to search. So far no rifle’s been discovered.”

  And it wouldn’t be until he’d had it thoroughly examined for evidence.

  “Again, why are you here, Roschmann?”

  “Kostoff ordered me to join you in questioning the parachutists. Your delay caused—”

  “I’m here now,” he interrupted. So Kostoff wanted to keep his finger in the investigation. Gunter waved for Roschmann to leave. “Given the delicacy of the situation, I’ll handle the questioning.” And discover the link between the British parachutists and the woman at the café, he hoped.

  He couldn’t read Roschmann’s face in the shadow.

  “Whatever held you up, I hope it was worth it. They chewed suicide pills.”

  He was too late.

  “Where are they?”

  “We put the bodies in the last interrogation room.”

  Gunter shot up out of the chair and hurried down the damp corridor, past the peeling paint and the screams. Roschmann’s boots echoed as he followed.

  Four bodies lay on stretchers covered by stained sheets. The ceiling lamp cast a wan yellow glow. A smell of voided bowels filled the room. Two Feldgendarmerie officers stood guard. Based on the orange mess in the corner, the officer with the pale face must have vomited. Gunter opened the small window to let out some of the stench.

  “Why weren’t these men searched completely?”

  Roschmann pointed to the first officer. “Answer him.”

  “Of course we did cavity searches, sir,” one said.

  Gunter took a pair of rubber gloves from a shelf on the wall. Handed a pair to Roschmann, who was covering his nose.

  Gunter knelt and removed the first sheet. The young man’s face was contorted with the rictus of death. Leaning close, he caught a faint whiff of bitter almonds. Cyanide. Death might have taken only seconds. The smell disappeared, overpowered by the reek of urine. Gunter removed the sheet from each one, checked their stained uniform pockets. Nothing. Then their hands.

  “Fingerprint the corpses before taking them to Hôpital Lariboisière, Roschmann.”

  “Going to check the prints against a rap sheet?” Roschmann laughed, recovering his bravado.

  No, against the Lee-Enfield he’d found at le Bon Marché. “I follow procedure.”

  Gunter ordered the Feldgendarmerie to remove the British men’s dog tags, log in their numbers. Then he pried open the mouth of the corpse he recognized by the dog’s tooth marks in its arm.

  He found tiny white shards under the stiff tongue.

  “Next time, check their back molars for false caps. Like this one.”

  He lifted up a sliver of false tooth.

  The Feldgendarmerie officers exchanged a look. Ashamed, Gunter hoped.

  “So you’ll be heading back with another feather in your cap, eh, Gunter?” said Roschmann, a tinge of jealousy in his voice. The man breathed ambition. “Case closed, eh? Nice and neat.”

  As if any of this would make Gunter look good. But Roschmann was ignorant of the assassination attempt; he couldn’t guess all the implications.

  “The investigation’s ongoing, Roschmann.”

  He wouldn’t be able to keep this from Jäger long. The clock was ticking and he had to catch the sniper. He stood, pulled an evidence bag from his pocket and dropped in the bit of false tooth.

  “Done, as far as I see. You’ve got their corpses, the rifles . . .”

  For once Roschmann was right. Within Gunter’s grasp lay another way out. He could make it easy on himself. Apart from Volke, only he knew about the fired rifle. He could substitute that rifle for one of the four from the dead men. Pick one as the “sniper” and submit the findings in his report. He’d accomplish his mission ahead of the deadline, get Jäger off his back and satisfy the Führer. His family would be safe.

  Yet the easy way out stood against everything his uncle had taught him. Against the very reason he’d joined the police, against what he worked for every day—an honest investigation. It was the reason he could sleep at night, why he kept at it despite all the Roschmanns who brutalized and followed no law. Someone needed to do the right thing. Despite his dislike for the Führer, a crime had been committed. He would uphold his own integrity. He would not take the easy way out.

  And what if she struck again?

  Whatever it took, he’d find her.

  And face it—he relished the hunt.

  “As you know, I’m investigating on the Führer’s orders,” said Gunter. “The case is closed when the Führer says it’s closed. Remember that.”

  “You wouldn’t be threatening me, Gunter, would you? That’s not a smart idea.”

  Tiresome and dangerous, this big lout. Nothing penetrated his thick Aryan head.

  “Let me spell it out. We’re not in a pissing contest. But if we were, you’d be on the Polish front.”

  He hurried out of the reeking room, down the stairs and into the car where Niels waited.

  Thirty-one hours and thirty minutes.

  Sunday, June 23, 1940

  Near Canal Saint-Martin, Paris | 2:30 p.m. Paris Time

  Hans strode out of the bedroom, following Gilberte, who was murmuring something about a café. The last thing Kate saw of him were his knee-high black boots. The front door shut behind them with a loud bang.

  Philippe put his finger to her lips. Listening. Footsteps faded down the stairway. From outside the window a car engine started up.

  How much time had Kate bought herself? Maybe half an hour—time to clean up, change into one of Gilberte’s dresses and leave?

  “You can get off me now,” said Kate.

  But he didn’t move. Or put the pistol down. Yellow cream light filtered through the lace curtain. “Why should I?”

  Pinned down in his arms, his eyes inches from hers, she tried not to blink. Or respond to the shiver of fear, the heat of sudden wanting. “I smell like a barnyard.” His hot skin burned through the thin cotton dress clinging to her thighs. She needed to focus.

  “You’re not a country girl.”

  “But I am.” Caught herself before she said ranch fed and bred—one of the last things she’d joked about with Dafydd. “To the core. And you?”

  “As provincial as they come,” he said. He grinned. He stroked her hair. His fingers came back with her ponytail band. For a moment she didn’t want him to stop. “They won’t be back for a while.”

  “Seduction with a gun in my thigh?”

  He propped himself on his elbow. “Need a formal introduction?” Amusement glittered in his amber eyes. Amber with a sparkle, like fool’s gold in the rocky foothills of the Cascades. She wouldn’t trust him a second.

  “Let’s keep it simple,” she said. “No names.”

  “But you know mine.”

  “Okay, Jane Doe,” she said, doubting Gilberte had used his real name.

  “Enchanté, Jane Doe.” He pronounced it Chanedough.

  “How many lovers does Gilberte have besides you and the German?” She was no prude but she couldn’t help wondering what Gilberte’s neighbors would think if they knew who she consorted with.

  “Never say that. She’d be offended,” he said, his voice turning serious. He sat up, set the gun on the nightstand and pulled his trousers on. “Her husband, François, got shot in our escape from the POW camp.” His eyes darkened. “François didn’t make it. But I will.”

  A moving story. Could she believe him?

  “Gilberte’s got a big heart. Too big.”

  She guessed he meant helping spies and refugees. Kate had been given Gilberte’s address, after all. Maybe Philippe had, too.

  “What’s your plan?”

  “Plan? Get to London, of course.” Philippe threaded a belt through his trouser loops. “She’s putting me up until I can join the Free French
Forces.”

  So he was on the run, along with a fishmonger’s basement full of stranded Brits. Don’t get involved. She was reminded of Stepney’s words.

  Another thought swirled in her mind—she couldn’t count on Stepney’s knowing she’d survived. She needed to relay word to him.

  “I need radio contact with London.”

  Philippe’s shoulders jerked. “Why?”

  To get the hell out. But she kept that to herself. She’d be lower priority than the stranded Brits. “Long story.” Her sweat- dampened hair stuck to her neck. “Look, Gilberte’s contact understands. He gave me her address. Indicated there’s a way to send a message.”

  The last part she’d made up.

  He shrugged. “Then you know each contact only knows the next.”

  What Stepney called a cutout. Or did he know more than he let on?

  The Bakelite clock on the nightstand ticked. He pulled on a shirt, buttoned it. “I’ve got to go.”

  “Where?”

  He grinned. “See, known me five minutes and already you’ll miss me.”

  The way he teased her reminded her of her older brother. “You wish.” She averted her eyes as he unzipped his trousers and tucked his shirt in.

  “You’re on your own, chérie.” And with that he’d gone. The door shut, and again, she heard footsteps fading down the stairs. Only his muskiness remained.

  She didn’t have much time. And she reeked.

  She entered the salle de bain and gasped. A real tub, bath salts, a pink towel. Heaven.

  A quick bath, that’s all.

  She turned on the chrome faucets, dumped in bath salts and lavender oil and lowered herself in the warm luxury. As the steam rose, she checked her stomach. No more stretch marks. Flat as a pancake. Her thoughts wandered—she could almost feel Lisbeth rubbing her tummy, splashing in their Saturday night bubble bath. Playing peekaboo, those sweet slippery chubby fingers, Lisbeth squealing in delight.

  The aching loss lanced her heart.

  She scrubbed until her whole body felt raw. Clean for the first time in weeks—those English country houses during training had offered nothing but lukewarm water in hip-high tin baths.

  A scum floated on the water. Worse than a cattle trough back home. She unplugged the stopper, reached for the used towel lying on the tiles to clean the dirty bathtub ring. She tugged but the towel was caught on something protruding under the tub.

  Getting out dripping wet, she got on her hands and knees. Strapped with tape under the claw-foot tub was a dark green handgun.

  A knock on the door.

  Fear nested in the back of her throat. Idiot. She’d let her guard down. Daydreaming about Lisbeth when she should have been escaping. That silly luxury of a bath when she was on the run. Hunted. Why hadn’t she left when she had the chance, stinky or not?

  She was ashamed, too, of the attraction, that shivering heat, that had gripped her at Philippe’s touch. It was the first time she had remembered that feeling since Dafydd. Guilt flooded her.

  The knocking on the door was loud now.

  How could she really trust Gilberte or Philippe?

  She couldn’t. She could trust no one. Stepney had pounded that into her head.

  Philippe might have been lying; Gilberte might sell her out to the Nazi. They might be on their way to arrest her even now.

  The draining water masked the scratching sound the tape made as she tore it off the bathtub.

  “I don’t care if you’re decent, open up.” Gilberte’s voice.

  The door opened just as she put the gun under the towel.

  “The sewer worker gave me your address,” Kate said, looking up at Gilberte from where she crouched on the floor, naked.

  “My other stupid cousin,” said Gilberte. “You can’t stay here.”

  Goose pimples popped on Kate’s wet skin. She stood up and wrapped the towel around herself, keeping the pistol tucked away under the towel. “Is your German here?” she whispered.

  “Hans? He’s not my German and he got called to some emergency investigation.”

  Emergency investigation? Looking for an escaped assassin? Kate covered up her nervousness. “What kind of emergency?”

  Bold as brass, she stared at Kate. “Everything’s important to the Boche. How do I know?”

  “I know about the hidden RAF pilots,” said Kate.

  “Big mouth, that’s Philippe.”

  “But I think you’re responsible for moving them on. That you can help me move on, too. I need your help.”

  “They’re not my problem. Not anymore. Nor are you.”

  A heaviness beat on her chest. She’d turned them in and now she’d turn Kate in.

  But Gilberte was saying, “The pilots got moved. If the sewer worker gave you this address . . . Well, be thankful I owe him. But you can’t stay here. We keep separate, for everyone’s safety.”

  If Gilberte had betrayed her, they wouldn’t be having this conversation. She had to go with her gut feeling and trust the woman. For now.

  “Please, just give me something decent to wear.”

  “Like anything would fit?” came Gilberte’s tart reply. She leaned close to the mirror, opened a pot of rouge and, with a few deft brushstrokes, now resembled a magazine cover. Wary yet fascinated, Kate examined slim and chic Gilberte. Soft curves encased in a rustle of silk, a flash of leg—she had it all.

  Next to Gilberte, Kate felt fat and dumb. She’d grown up wearing overalls and her brothers’ shirts. Her one best dress was kept for church and funerals.

  Still, they were close enough in body size. Gilberte was just being obnoxious because she resented Kate’s intrusion. Right? Kate had gotten this far; she wouldn’t give up. Somehow she had to gain the woman’s sympathy, get her to want to help.

  Water gurgled down the drain.

  “That man Philippe told me about your husband. I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry?” Gilberte’s gaze met hers in the mirror.

  Kate felt her calculating, deciding whether to believe her. “I lost my husband. My child, too.” Her breath caught. For a moment, that firestorm slashed through her mind. The smell of burnt flesh. “Do you have children?”

  Gilberte’s hand quivered as she held a lip pencil. “I promised my husband to keep our children safe. And I will.”

  Was that guilt in Gilberte’s voice? Kate met her eyes again. “Not for me to judge you, Gilberte.”

  “Aren’t you judging me? But I’ll do what I need to. We’ll survive.”

  Gilberte rolled with the punches. A bit like Kate. Didn’t she run a safe house, hide guns, smuggle stranded RAF soldiers?

  Trust no one, Stepney said.

  Kate noticed photos of Hollywood film stars pinned up over the lace lingerie filling the bathroom shelves. “You’ve got lovely things.”

  “I’m a corsetière,” Gilberte said, with a hint of pride. “Josephine Baker, Arletty, Mistinguette, you name it. Cabaret, theater, film actresses come to me. Now it’s the Fritz buying lingerie for their Frauen in Stuttgart. Or whoever.”

  “Sounds like a booming business.”

  “Even the haute bourgeoise, they all come to get fitted.” Gilberte paused to pluck a stray eyebrow with a tweezer. “I’ll keep Monsieur Claverie’s shop going any way I can. But my children need to eat.”

  Kate pulled the towel higher up around her.

  Gilberte pulled out a thin wand brush and moistened a black cake of mascara. Didn’t she have more to do than worry about her makeup?

  Gilberte noticed Kate’s expression. “I doubt you Anglo-Saxons understand,” she said. “Keeping up your appearance is a form of resistance. Why look dowdy to these uncouth men who secretly admire us? So jealous of our culture.” She brushed her lashes, lengthening and darkening them. “Always better to show we’re occupied, not v
anquished, and make them burn inside. C’est simple. Every Parisienne knows. Respirez. Breathe.”

  “Can you help me?”

  “I could alter something,” said Gilberte standing back and looking at her. “Something apricot to suit your coloring. But you’ve got to go.”

  “Where?” Kate said desperately.

  “Ecoute, I pass people on, that’s all. Ask for Dédé at le Mouton below Pigalle. Wait fifteen minutes and someone will give you an address. One night only.”

  “Merci, Gilberte,” she said. “It’s vital I get a message to London.”

  Gilberte shrugged. “Don’t tell me any more.”

  Before Kate could press her, she took a champagne colored silk slip from a drawer.

  “Here. And if you took something from under the tub, I don’t want to know that either.”

  Kate lifted the revolver from under the towel. Handled it and pulled the safety. Checked the barrel, cocked it.

  Gilberte was staring at her wide-eyed.

  “I’m taking this.”

  On the run, a step ahead of the Gestapo, getting caught with this would be death. Then again, it would come in handy.

  She handed Gilberte the blue Bon Marché cloakroom tag. “I’ll swap you for it. Bring this to le Bon Marché’s vestiaire. There’s a rifle checked there. Pass it to the sewer worker; he’ll know what to do with it.”

  Sunday, June 23, 1940

  The Latin Quarter, Paris | 3:00 p.m. Paris Time

  Gunter’s fingers drummed on the leather seat in the staff Mercedes. He watched Jeanne Albrecht pushing the baby buggy down rue Cujas. She was alone.

  He glanced down at the latest reports. Then at his watch. He didn’t like to think what would happen if his plan backfired.

  Gunter joined her in the café, his sleeves rolled up and jacket over his arm. He peered into the buggy. A pink cheeked infant blew whistles of sleep.

  “Where’s your contact, Jeanne?”

  “Going to order me a coffee?”

  Gunter signaled to the waiter, who was wiping his brow in the heat.