Three Hours in Paris

by Cara Black

  Gunter didn’t want to leave the Métro station until he could summon a search party.

  The Métro workers were arriving with pails and mops. The gates were creaking shut.

  “They’re closing the station, sir,” said Niels. “The station master says they clean and shut down the line for work in the tunnel.”

  “Instruct them to hold off,” he said.

  Niels ran toward the workers.

  Then Roschmann came flying down the stairs forcing the Métro workers aside with a contingent of soldiers. “The Kommandant sent orders for me to assist your search.”

  Glad, for once, to see the Vet, Gunter turned and stared into Roschmann’s eyes. “Alive. I want her alive, verstehen Sie?”

  Roschmann nodded.

  “I hold you accountable, Roschmann. She’s no use to us dead.”

  Gunter pointed down the Métro tunnel.

  Sunday, June 23, 1940

  In the Métro, Paris | 10:05 p.m. Paris Time

  Kate clung to the Métro tunnel wall on the narrow catwalk with one shaking hand, her other yanking at the taut wires connected to the control box panel. Electrical outages occurred all the time in the Métro system—short circuits, power failures. How often in that summer of ’37 had she sat in a dark train while the Métro crew fiddled with the fuses in the tunnel?

  C’mon, something had to happen. Lights flickered in the tunnel. She yanked harder, ripped out one, then another, then pulled on a red switch. A flicker, then the tunnel and platform plunged into darkness.

  Phew. She’d have a few minutes.

  Knees trembling, she stumbled ahead on the catwalk flush with the tunnel’s right wall. Her breath came in spurts. She tripped and fell down onto the greasy track, skinned her knee on the pebbled track bed. No doubt they heard her. Pulling herself up, scrambling and trying to avoiding the electrified third rail in the dark, she maneuvered back onto the catwalk. She squeezed herself against the wall, feeling her way, twisting her body to stay close and keep her balance. The catwalk was designed for workers repairing the tracks, not a getaway. She stumbled her way around a curve as best she could in darkness, her hands guiding her along the sooty wall. Don’t think, just move.

  The tramping of boots, shouts, then a buzzing and sizzling behind her. A zapping sound. A scream. Someone had stepped on the electrical rail, the death rail.

  Keep going.

  Sweat poured down her neck. Everywhere it was pitch black. Adrenalin coursed through her. There had to be a way out. That burnt metallic peanut-like smell from the heated oil for the wooden block used for braking layered the suffocating heat permeating the musty underground. Her pocket holding the diamond-encrusted scarf bounced against her hip as she hurried.

  Don’t let the bastards win. Run. Escape.

  Flashlight beams bobbed on the soot-caked Métro tiles. More shouts. The tramping boots were getting closer.

  Don’t look back. Don’t stop. Don’t let the darkness and fear take over.

  Her fingers doggedly raked the sooty wall and finally caught on metal. A ladder with iron rungs. Without a moment’s hesitation she climbed, pulling herself up, no idea where it led. And then she was in another tunnel, a branch line lit by blinking red signals and a sign pointing in the direction st-gervais.

  The swish of rat’s tails on metal pipes overhead didn’t faze her—they knew where to hide.

  So did the rats behind her.

  Run.

  Now she was beside a single track and there was no more catwalk, just a narrow concrete strip alongside. Feeling her way through the dark, trailing her black soot-stained hands on the wall, she ran deeper and deeper along the track into the tunnel and more darkness. Then another branch opened and she followed that toward distorted echoes of metallic screeches. As she approached, she could make out white-yellow sparks from blowtorches. Under portable lights men in coveralls and protective face masks were repairing a rail line.

  The close air tasted metallic and made her lightheaded. Afraid she’d pass out, she stumbled ahead. Climbed onto a short platform.

  The crew bent over their work, but one had noticed her, set down his torch and pulled up his mask. “The Métro’s closed. It’s off limits here. Dangerous.”

  Sparks flew and he walked toward her, shooing her away.

  “Please help me . . .”

  “Go back the way you came.”

  “I can’t.”

  “No one’s allowed here. The boss has orders to call the flics.”

  “So help me get out. I’m lost.”

  He ambled closer. “You’re not French.”

  Tears brimmed in her eyes. A hard lump sat in her chest. At the end of her rope, she didn’t know what to do.

  “Emigrée, eh?” he said. “Afraid my duty’s to report you.”

  “Please, no one has to know. Point me out of here.”

  One of the work crew shouted at him. “What’s going on, Lefèvre?”

  He turned. In that moment she hid herself behind the pillar. Saw the exit sign where the tunnel branched and forced her legs to move.

  She didn’t know how she made her burning legs climb the narrow metal staircase. The scent of fresh air had given her a second wind. Then she met locked metal gates.

  She used her lockpick set, replaying the Cockney burglar’s instructions in her head, fighting down her panic and impatience. Two minutes later, she stood on the street and breathed in the open air. Long breaths, again and again, until her mind cleared.

  Where was she?

  Sunday, June 23, 1940

  Section D HQ Somewhere in London | 10:00 p.m. Paris Time

  Stepney labored down the back stairs of the nondescript building, Section D’s covert headquarters, with a bulging case of files to read. Not only was his ulcer bothering him again, but so was that sinking feeling he was too old for this job.

  A wave of melancholy swept over him.

  Everyone these days was young, sharper-than-sharp. He knew asset material when he saw it.

  As he had with Kate Rees, the first moment he’d spotted her in the Orkney firing range.

  Antiaircraft searchlights swept the dark London sky above him. Barrage balloons bobbed over Westminster, and sandbags shored up the other anonymous buildings, hubs of defense strategy.

  Kate Rees hadn’t been the first agent he’d sent on a condemned mission. He’d do the same again for King and country.

  Yet he couldn’t believe Kate had gotten this far. And without contacts in his network.

  After the first war, Stepney’s French military comrades had joined the Sûreté and Deuxième Bureau. Due to his war injuries, Stepney had instead gone into military intelligence. But he kept those relationships going during the interwar years, building a network of shared intelligence that benefited both countries.

  He’d always been hands-on with his operatives, training and preparing them to be field ready. It would have been a crime not to. This fiasco with Swan illustrated what happened to a novice. No matter the mission’s outcome, he’d never deployed an agent without the necessary skills and tools. He lost sleep over the spies he’d sent to their deaths, whose patriotism put him to shame. No glory for them after the bloody war ended—no mention in the history books.

  He had promised his wife he’d retire, stay home. Angie, his childhood sweetheart, had deserved it after tolerating his schedule all those years. But in 1936 she’d been run over by a bus in front of his eyes as he went to meet her in Trafalgar Square. Too late.

  Stepney reached the staff car. A Wren opened the door for him. “Sir, I’ve received orders to drive you to Communications. You’re needed.”

  What had happened now? he wondered.

  “Carry on, then,” he said.

  Weary, he settled in his seat, taking the flask from his hip pocket for a stiff drink. He offered Kate a silent toast
as the car whisked him through the night.

  Sunday, June 23, 1940

  Rue du Faubourg Saint-Martin Near the Canal, Paris 10:15 p.m.

  Inside the Mercedes, Gunter cupped the listening device over his ears. Nothing but clicks and garbled voices on the line from the Kommandantur. And the damn heat hadn’t let up.

  “Repeat that, bitte,” he said, irritated.

  “Jawohl.” More static.

  “Can’t you get the line clearer?”

  A series of clicks. “The report filed five minutes ago . . . is that better? Can you hear, sir?”

  “Ja, ja, go ahead.”

  “This incident report of a sick . . . cleaning woman . . . wearing an apron . . . odd as reported.”

  “Odd? How do you mean?”

  More clicking.

  “I’ve changed the line, is this better, sir?”

  “Ja, much better.”

  “The report said she had no papers. A woman suffered an epileptic attack at the Grand Palais. She was driven by Oberleutnant Wiesen’s adjutant to a clinique. Highly unusual but done as a gesture of goodwill. The adjutant’s request for her papers brought no results. I thought you’d want to know after the all-out alert.”

  Moot point now.

  Or was it?

  “What time and location was this?”

  He wrote it down.

  What if . . . ? She would definitely have had time to make it here and shoot Max Verdou.

  She would have gone to the Grand Palais for a reason. A contact?

  Would she try to return?

  He’d trust Roschmann and the hundred men at his disposal to find her if she was somewhere in that Métro. Roschmann had too much riding on this to screw up again.

  “Where is Oberleutnant Wiesen’s adjutant?”

  “Unclear, sir.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “His unit is on duty but his whereabouts are unclear.”

  Of all times.

  “Search every brothel if you have to. Find him.”

  The real question was, if it had been her, what had she been doing at le Grand Palais?

  Sunday, June 23, 1940

  On the Right Bank, Paris | 10:30 p.m., Past Curfew

  Curfew.

  Kate had to get off the street. Out of sight. Away.

  Could she hide in a courtyard for the night, to avoid roving patrols? Risky at best. Or chance 124 rue de Provence, the address the doctor had given Philippe, if she could even find it? A risk, too.

  RADA.

  She’d shot an informant, German troops hunted her, if she didn’t get off the street she’d be dead, her only option was to go to the only address she knew.

  Now.

  She slipped off her torn sandals, ran while keeping to the shadows and studied the street names.

  Her pulse raced. The surrounding streets could hold checkpoints. Maybe a description of her had already circulated.

  Focus.

  Do the one thing that made sense. Get out of here.

  She dipped into an alley, the windows darkened with blackout curtains. Pigeons cooed from the rooftop. The pearlescent orb of the moon had risen in the cloudless, star-dusted sky. She knew the address was near the Opera and checked the compass. Better head south. Nothing for it but to steal the bike behind the potted plants.

  Kate now tied the scarf around her head, put on the tortoise frame glasses. Feeling guilty, she left fifty francs by the potted plant and walked the bike over the cobbles. She’d keep to the small streets to avoid a checkpoint or patrol.

  She scanned the dark street. Clear. Took a deep breath.

  Then pedaled as fast as she could.

  Twice she heard voices in German, checkpoints, and cycled away. She got lost. Terrified, she forced herself to read the street signs, orient herself. Somehow she made it to rue de Provence. She remembered this narrow street behind the grands magasins or department stores from 1937, when it had been filled with prostitutes. Even now, one or two peeped from doorways. No curfew for them.

  Cars pulled up at 122 rue de Provence, discharging men in suits, women in evening dresses accompanied by men in German uniforms. They pressed a buzzer and disappeared inside. The cars drove away. What in the world?

  Wary, she parked the bike next door. No. 124 was a glass and metal art deco door that yielded to her push. She crept up the staircase to the first-floor landing and saw chaumiere, the name the doctor had given Philippe, on the door to the left. Something told her to stash the scarf. She tiptoed down to the mid-floor WC. It stank. But she put down the lid, stood and felt around to find a crevice above the window. After stuffing the scarf with the diamonds inside, she took a pee.

  Back upstairs, she knocked softly and the apartment door drifted open.

  “Philippe?” she whispered.

  Blackout curtains shrouded the room. In the candlelight she made out a figure. A figure roped to a chair with a bandana in his mouth.

  Philippe.

  His eyes darted. He was trying to tell her something.

  Then the tip of a pistol was nudging her in the ribs. A black-haired man appeared from behind the door.

  To get this far and be caught like this.

  Furious, she whipped her elbow back and up to connect with his ribs. Crack. As he lost his balance, she stomped on the man’s feet. Hard. Again.

  Just like she’d learned fighting with her brothers.

  The man staggered back. Fell. She stomped the man’s wrist and heard a yelp of pain. His pistol skittered over the faded Turkish carpet and she grabbed it. Moaning, he tried to get up.

  She kicked his chin and threw him off balance.

  Not wasting any time, Kate struggled with the rope knots binding Philippe. Once free he pulled the cloth out of his mouth.

  “Nice reception committee,” she said.

  “For you, chérie,” he said, “I do my best.”

  She leveled the pistol as Philippe tied the groaning man’s wrists and ankles behind him, then stuffed the wet bandana in the man’s mouth. He rifled through the pockets of the man’s suit.

  “Bonny Lafont, or so it says.”

  Her shoulders ached, her feet stung and weariness dragged her down. But she couldn’t stay here. “Time to go,” she said. “The doctor’s a rat.”

  Philippe shook his head. “This mec followed me from the Métro.”

  “So we can’t stay here.”

  “You don’t understand. It’s something else. Personal.”

  Like she’d believe that?

  “This place isn’t safe.”

  “Au contraire. We’re right next to le 122, the fanciest bordello in Paris.”

  She’d seen the glittering crowd entering.

  “How can this place be safe?”

  “The Nazis and celebrities next door are otherwise occupied, you could say.”

  “Why’s this personal? What’s Lafont got on you?”

  Philippe pulled the groaning man up by the collar. “Questions later.”

  He dragged the half-unconscious man down the hallway into a closet. Locked it. Returned and parted the blackout curtain a crack. Seeming satisfied, he readjusted the curtain and walked over toward her.

  “That man recognized me in the Métro.”

  “Recognized you as what? A spy, an escaped POW? Tell me what’s going, Philippe.”

  A muscle in Philippe’s cheek twitched. “He’s my father’s employee, a gangster working for the government, the Germans, anyone like my father who’ll pay him enough.”

  The candle wax dripped. With the draperies and wall hangings the place felt like a museum. An ancient cocoon.

  “That explains nothing. What are you?”

  “It’s not your business.”

  Bone-tired, she’d had enough. “Fine. I’m
leaving and taking the pistol.”

  “Don’t do that. It’s safe here until the morning.” Philippe rubbed his forehead. “My father’s in the government. He wants me to join the military branch of puppet cowards.” Philippe shook his head. “We don’t get along. But I owe you.”

  And she believed him. Was too tired not to. “Call it even. Except for the bruises.”

  She saw a phone. “He might have called someone.”

  “He was about to before you came in.”

  “And I should trust you?”

  “Face it, you like me.” He grinned. “Don’t you, Chanedough.”

  She wanted to sock him. No denying his good looks, though, and he knew it.

  Stop it.

  He was trouble. With a capital T, like her Auntie Mae used to say.

  “You’ll have to get rid of your gangster.”

  “He’ll go out with the morning trash,” said Philippe. “Where he belongs.”

  “I’ll feel better if you make sure he’s tied up tight.”

  Philippe went back to check on the man in the closet.

  Reckoning that he couldn’t hear, she picked up the receiver. Nervous, she hesitated before dialing the number she’d memorized from the sewer man.

  RADA.

  The sewer man had said he’d make radio contact with London, but should she believe him? He’d been at both compromised locations. If Philippe was right and there was no chance for her to get on the barge she needed a way out.

  She dialed the number: PASSY 6014.

  Several rings before a voice said, “Oui?”

  She debated on how to identify herself. Simple is best, Stepney had said. “You gave me this number half an hour ago. Any news?”

  “Delayed until morning.”

  The line went dead.

  In the hallway, she saw Philippe pulling a table against the closet door where he’d stuck the gangster. Good thinking.

  Discouraged and stuck here until tomorrow, she dragged a heavy chair to barricade the front door. If someone moved it, she’d wake up. Afraid she’d pass out with tiredness if she didn’t sleep, she cradled the pistol, sat down on the Damascene embroidered gilt-edged recamier, kicked off her ragged sandals and put her dirty feet up.