‘Coffee will be ready in a few moments, Madame, should you wish it,’ sang out the kid in deutsch from the kitchen.
No answer was given. The woman’s arms were folded tightly across her chest, her feet spread firmly for battle.
‘What reason?’ she demanded, her gaze fixed hatefully on him.
‘He got in the way. That husband of yours has been using relatives in the occupied territories to send him beeswax. The problem is, his collectors know nothing of honey-gathering or bees, and have been sending him squashed hives, buckets of mangled comb, and one hell of a lot of sick bees.’
‘Explain yourself.’
‘Acarine mites in Caucasian bees, some of whose honey may well have been used to augment the winter stores of Parisian bees.’
‘The sickness spreads …,’ she said and, losing herself to the thought, abstractedly added, ‘Candles. You mentioned a factory, but I do not know where it is.’
‘But did de Bonnevies ever mention it?’
‘Only to say that bundles of altar candles were being left regularly on the doorstep of a church. The one to which he belonged.’
And Father Michel, the parish priest, hadn’t told Louis a thing about them!
‘Your husband controls a precious-metals foundry. What else does he do?’
This one was not going to go away until he had something to chew on. ‘I’ve already told you Oskar is a businessman and that I know nothing of his affairs.’
Nothing about the trips to Switzerland you make for him? wondered Kohler, but this couldn’t be asked — he had the girl’s safety to think of.
‘Is he into real estate, do you think?’
‘I wouldn’t know.’
Maisons de passe? wondered Kohler, but he really couldn’t ask that one either. ‘The beekeeper had a son. Did he ever say anything of him?’
‘Lazy. Not like my Klaus. A coward who hid behind a Red Cross armband but was badly wounded by mistake, of course, during the blitzkrieg in the west. The boy was no good. An artist, a sculptor who made nude statues and drawings of his half-sister. Herr de Bonnevies said it wasn’t proper and that the girl should not have posed like that for the boy. Her one mistake, he said, was to trust her half-brother blindly and to encourage his every endeavour.’
That was two mistakes, but no matter. ‘Trust?’
‘Be the best of Kameraden.’
‘And the son, where is he now? Two metres under?’
‘Really, mein lieber Detektiv, you must already know where he is. Why, then, ask it of me?’
The woman hadn’t moved and still stood in exactly the same way. ‘Bitte, Frau Schlacht, just let me hear it from you.’
‘Oflag 17A, in what was formerly Austria,’ she said, gazing emptily at him.
‘And the boy’s mother? How does she feel about it?’
‘I wouldn’t know. He seldom spoke of the woman.’
Except to tell you he thought she was having an affair with your husband, thought Kohler, but he couldn’t ask it. ‘There was a sister,’ he hazarded. ‘Now where did I write that down?’
The Schweinebulle took time out to flip through the little black notebook he had been holding all this time. ‘Ja. Here it is,’ he said and showed her the entry. ‘The Salpêtrière, the house for the insane. Was he worried about this Angèle-Marie?’
‘I wouldn’t know, Inspector. Such family disgraces are best kept hidden, are they not?’
That bit about her not knowing of the sister was another lie but he’d best say something. ‘You’re absolutely right, of course. A disgrace. It was dumb of me to have even asked.’
‘Then if there is nothing more, it is time for you to leave.’
‘There is just one other thing, Frau Schlacht. Minor, you understand — you must forgive the plodding mind of a Detektiv. Always there are these little details, but one never knows when something might turn out to be important.’
‘Why not just ask?’
It would be best to give her a nod and to consult the notebook again. Any page would do. ‘Your husband is one of the Förderndes Mitglied, is he not?’
‘Verdammt! Just what the hell has the fucker done?’
Schlacht’s infidelities had wounded her, all right. ‘Nothing but what we’ve discussed, unless there is something else you’d like to tell me.’
You bastard, swore Uma silently.
One had best leave her with a little something to worry over. ‘Apparently he lost what the Reichsführer and Reichsminister Himmler took great pains to present. It might well have fallen into one of those pot-furnaces of his — maybe he was checking the melt — but I still have to think that badge is a problem.’
‘What problem?’ she asked and swallowed, blanching.
‘You see my partner and I tend to believe he must have left it somewhere and we’d like to know where and with whom.’
‘Idiot! I know nothing of his affairs. Ass here, ass there,’ she said and flung an arm out to emphasize the sweep of territory Paris presented. ‘Certainly he has had many, but …’
She actually managed to smile ingratiatingly.
‘But what is a forgotten wife to do, Herr Kohler? You’re married, aren’t you? You’ve left your wife at home, haven’t you? Well?’
‘My Gerda married an indentured French farm labourer after the divorce came through by special order, since a relative of hers had pull. But war’s like that in any case, Frau Schlacht. It splits couples apart and puts others together. German with French; French with German. Love — even carnal love — knows enough to find its greenest pastures in times of strife. I’ll be in touch if I need anything further.’
At the door Mariette Durand showed him to, the girl smiled wanly and whispered, ‘Merci, monsieur.’
‘Did she go to that brasserie as usual last Thursday evening, or did she come home hungry?’
‘Hungry, but … but why do you ask?’
Kohler put a finger to her lips and, giving her a fatherly kiss on the forehead, said softly, ‘Don’t worry, eh?’ and then sternly, and in deutsch Frau Schlacht would hear, ‘Remember what I said, eh, Fräulein? Behave yourself and do exactly as you’ve been told or I really will have to arrest you.’
And then he was gone from her and Mariette could feel every muscle in her body weaken. I must escape, she said to herself, and he has let me know I have no other choice but to pick my time and go.
The Brasserie Buerehiesel was full. There was hardly space to reach the bar. ‘A beer,’ shouted Kohler above the din. ‘Münchener Löwen, if you have it.’
‘We haven’t.’
‘Then give me another of what I had before.’
‘And here I thought you were a connoisseur.’
‘And you a barkeep with a memory? Merde! A Mortimer, Dumtnkopf!’
‘She tell you to keep your hands to yourself?’
‘Something like that, yes.’
‘She saves it for the husband she never sees. So, did she stick that steak knife into you?’
Taking it out, Kohler set it on the zinc. ‘We were too busy, but I found it in her overcoat. The thing had cut a hole in her pocket. You’re lucky not to have lost it, and should be grateful.’
‘Then what can we do for you, Herr Hauptmann der Geheime Stattspolizist?’
‘A bottle of Amaretto for my partner.’
‘No one drinks that stuff in here.’
‘I didn’t think they did. I only ask because I want to keep him happy. Pastis and that almond crap, he loves them both!’
‘Then try the one who’s selling the condensed milk. Maybe he can help you.’
It was now forbidden to even have condensed milk without a doctor’s certificate. Such as the supplies were, all of it had been confiscated during the past week. Laying five thousand francs on the bar, Kohler turned to fight his way through the crowd.
On the passerelle Saint-Louis, and in pitch darkness, he caught up with the man simply by calling out, ‘Halt! Was wollen sie?’ as a sentry would. Halt! Who goes there?