Shoulder to shoulder and crowded, they formed a phalanx behind their cook and Otto Baumann and the Second Engineer.
Though pissed to the gills and still clutching bottles, they were rapidly sobering.
‘You’re blocking the road,’ said Death’s-head.
Kohler wanted to wipe that stupid grin from the lark-eyed bastard and saw again in memory that poor girl’s head face down in a toilet.
Rain soaked the Kaiser moustache, causing it to droop, and poured from the black peak of Otto Baumann’s forage cap.
‘Why aren’t you fellows sleeping it off in Quiberon?’
Was Herr Kohler serious? ‘Duty calls,’ said Baumann. ‘U-297 has to be stuffed, Inspector. She wants it in her. She’s greedy for it. All hands are to help. Our C.-in-C, Herr Freisen, waits for nothing and no one.’
So be it. ‘Then what about Paulette Trocquer, eh, and what about her mother?’
The rain stung his face but did not seem to bother them at all.
It was Death’s-head who, the grin vanishing, said, ‘She went home, I suppose. Our loss is her gain, perhaps. Who’s to say?’
‘As for the mother, Herr Kohler,’ said the Second Engineer, ‘why do you ask us? An old hag in a wheelchair?’
‘Fine. I’m arresting the three of you and the boy for the murders of Paulette le Trocquer and her mother.’
He was really serious about it. ‘And that of the shopkeeper?’ asked the cook. The others stared at the Gestapo’s loneliest detective.
‘You boys let the Captain out of jail. I saw him in his car at the shop after I found the mother.’
The surprise was genuine — or was it? The lark’s touch of insanity leapt into Schultz’s dark eyes. ‘But Vati is in the lock-up. Otto, here, has the key.’
‘Then why isn’t he with him?’
‘Because our Dollmaker sleeps and whoever takes the lorry back will be bringing him his breakfast.’
‘You’re lying.’
An angry murmur went through the crew. They pressed closer. Baumann held them back with outstretched arms. ‘Where is your partner?’ he asked.
Was the party about to get rough? ‘Not at the pianist’s house. I’ve been trying to find him.’
‘What about the woman?’ asked Death’s-head. The grin became a leer.
‘What about her?’ asked Kohler evenly.
‘Nothing. We only wondered how she was getting on without our Vati’s cock.’
The bastard. Hadn’t they had enough?
‘The child,’ asked Baumann, ‘and the father, please, Herr Kohler. Where are they?’
‘With the Préfet, I think. The woman, too, and my partner.’ He damn well didn’t know where they were, but what the hell, there was no harm in trying, or was there? ‘Kerjean did say something about looking for the husband in one of the tumuli.’
One of the passage graves. ‘Which one?’
This had come from the Second Engineer. ‘Look, I don’t know, do I? I sent Kerjean home to Vannes but he must have gone to the house instead. Oh, that reminds me. Hang on a minute. I’ve brought your cook a little present.’
‘Don’t think of leaving,’ cautioned Baumann. ‘Not now. Not when you’ve just accused us of murder.’
‘I won’t. I’m only going to the cab. It’s on the seat.’
‘And this, my friend, is pointing right at your guts. It’s loaded,’ said Baumann. ‘Please don’t make me guilty of murder.’
At 7.30 a.m. Berlin Time, it was very dark and cold in the rain, and the hammering of the droplets on the backs of St-Cyr’s bare hands stung so much, the uneasiness within him only increased.
For some time now Victor Kerjean had remained silent. That he wanted his gun back and felt betrayed was all too clear. Now he poured gasoline into the Renault’s fuel tank while the Sûreté, who had his gun in a pocket, cupped hands about the nozzle and the opening so as to keep out the rain if possible.
There had been three jerry cans crammed into the tiny boot and only one of them had been full.
‘Jean-Louis, Hélène will only tell the Nazis about my son — they’ll make her. She’s done for anyway, isn’t that so? Let us take her back to the house. She can write a farewell to her husband and the child. Please, I beg it of you. The lives of too many others are at stake. Our work … The Germans won’t be staying long. The invasion will come.’
The refuelling came to an end. Hélène Charbonneau heard St-Cyr desperately trying to fit the gas cap on. At last he succeeded, then the two of them stood out there while she sat alone inside straining to hear what they were saying about her.
‘Victor, I have a murder to solve and until that is done, I cannot …’
‘You cannot? You who call yourself a patriot? Oh mon Dieu, mon ami, don’t try to play the pious, big-city detective with me. Give me back my gun and let me present the truth to her.’
The jerry can was heavy and as a weapon it would be eminently suitable. Kerjean was quick, tough and muscular. The blow that had knocked him out had been lucky and totally unexpected.
Now it would not be so easy. ‘Potassium cyanide? How, please, did she come by it, Victor? Rat poison, is this what you are thinking as a way of explaining the coroner’s report which will have to be done?’
‘No one will care. Do you think Kaestner will? Hah! he wants her dead.’
‘And you, Victor?’
Why must Jean-Louis make him say it again? Was Hélène listening? Was that it, eh? ‘Me also, of course. There are my wife and my daughters, yes? And my grandchildren — I’ve eight of them, did I tell you? Eight. Four boys and four girls and two more on the way.’
‘Let us be patient.’
‘Patient!’ The jerry can slammed against the car and rang hollowly. ‘You ask for patience when time waits for no one?’
‘Kaestner may believe she has already taken the cyanide. To him, she has no other choice, and this may well be our only chance. But there is also my partner, Victor. Hermann will certainly have come up with something and until I have a chance to talk with him, no one is taking cyanide or shooting themselves, and that, my friend, is final.’
Kerjean turned abruptly away and in the darkness and the rain, and with his dark overcoat and cap, it was so very difficult to see him. St-Cyr hesitated. He heard the can hit one of the others. The tyre iron? he wondered. Was Victor reaching for it?
There was only the sound of the rain. Hélène Charbonneau held her breath for as long as she could. What were they doing out there? she asked herself. It was not fair — nothing was. Victor had been a good friend but now … now. Yvon knew things the Germans would want to know — Angélique did too — and what was Victor to do about the two of them? Kill them? she demanded.
Ah damn that lousy shopkeeper, she cried and clenched her fists. Ah damn Paulette. Why could that girl not have tried to understand that things weren’t as they seemed, that Angélique had been upset but hadn’t realized the truth?
She pressed the back of her bandaged left hand hard against her lips to steady herself. Victor was right. She should kill herself. It was the only solution. Dead, there might be a small chance for Angélique and Yvon. She had to think of them and that was what Johann had tried to tell her.
‘Victor …’ she heard the Sûreté saving. ‘Victor, please don’t try anything foolish. Let us find the husband and the daughter, then let us see where things lie.’
Only the rain gave answer, and when she rolled the window further down, the droplets struck her face.
‘Jean-Louis, I am warning you. As a section head of the Front de la Libération de la Bretagne, I cannot fall into their hands.’
‘You won’t. If I have to, I will shoot you. You have my word on it.’
The boot was closed.
‘Then let us find the father and hope the Captain is looking for him too, and will have the child with him.’
They got into the car but now Victor sat behind the steering wheel and the Sûreté was forced to get into the front beside him and she had to think, was it clever of Victor to have done this? And she had to sadly nod and say, Yes … Yes, it was.