Getting down on his hands and knees, St-Cyr found the narrow slab of stone that formed the bridge, and crossed over what must be a chasm filled with water. Now the ground was flagged and he could feel the edges of each stone. He went on for perhaps twenty metres, perhaps a little more. A narrow fissure forced him to stand and squeeze sideways and only then did he realize a wall or several layers of rock must have slid sideways to all but close the passage. An earthquake perhaps. In Aegean times, or Roman.
Here time really had no meaning.
The fissure ended. St-Cyr sucked in a breath. Josette-Louise was standing on some rocks in the centre of a circular pool whose rim was only slightly raised. Sunlight fell on her from a hole high in the roof above, but all around her there was darkness.
Jean-Paul would be waiting for him. Then why … why did he feel he was so near?
Kohler dragged in a ragged breath and brought the stone down with all the force he could muster. The dog’s skull cracked. Blood shot from its eyes. ‘There …’ he gasped, too tired to fling the boulder from him in disgust. ‘I like dogs, damn it! Good dogs. I always had one when a boy.’
Kneeling still, he let his hands fall between his legs as he bowed his head in utter exhaustion. First one and then the other of the dogs had come at him. Unsteady … yes, yes, perhaps, but how was he to have known for sure?
Dragging himself up, he leaned against the wall and tried to still the aching in his head. Jesus, it was as if all the fireworks in China were going off inside him.
Blood still seeped from the damage Delphane had inflicted. Must he bear the scars of every investigation Louis and he got into? He wanted to rage aloud at the injustice of it all. He wanted to curse Himmler and the Fuhrer but knew it would serve no purpose. ‘Louis …’ he muttered. ‘Must get to Louis before that bastard does him in.’
‘Monsieur …?’
It was the weaver but she had not come alone. Two burly SS with Schmeissers stood on either side of her, and neither of them looked happy about the dogs.
Kohler raised a tired hand to signal that he’d seen them, and when she walked on ahead, he thought that maybe they might shoot her. The walls confined. There was a cleared space where blocks of stone had perhaps been quarried by one of the villagers to finish off a house or build one. She crossed this and then, suddenly, came up three simple steps and was standing before him.
He asked what had happened and she said, ‘I know the ruins, though not as well as my daughter. Jean-Paul might just be able to escape. Herr Munk has offered to let Josette go free if I will see that her father is stopped.’
‘Have they killed the boy?’
She shook her head and saw him nod – understood at once that this one had not wanted Bebert or any of them to have been taken. ‘Carlo’s dead. He tried to snatch a gun from one of the SS. Herr Munk could not have let him live.’
Kohler nodded grimly. ‘Questions … there’d have always been questions about the villa and who really owned it.’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes, that’s so, isn’t it?’
‘Come on. We’d better find them. Those two can follow if they want.’
He took her by the wrist and she let him do so, was glad of the gesture, but when they saw the arrow, she had to follow him down the steps. They were so steep. Darker, darker, and darker …
‘Ssh!’ he said. ‘Listen!’
The girls were calling to each other. ‘Josianne, why didn’t you tell me you’d found this place?’
‘Josette, I wanted to but then I could not control myself. I went all to pieces. A terrible fit. The worst one ever.’
‘That’s why you took your things up to the ruins and sat at the Window of the Gods. I just knew there had to be a reason for your sitting there like that so quietly.’
And from elsewhere, echoing also, ‘I would never have given you epilepsy, Josette. I would have shared Alain with you, just as we shared everything.’
‘Yes, yes, my sister, this I know. He loved us both. Hey, I found the beaker, Josianne! The Inspector has it in his pocket.’
‘It’s beautiful, Josette. It was to be a present for you but I could not dig it up again … again … She … she …’
Kohler felt for the weaver’s arm and gently tugged on it, signalling to follow him. The voices came from everywhere. Now, too, the sound of trickling water.
‘I’ve never been here,’ she whispered anxiously.
They crossed the chasm and came to the fissure. ‘Sideways,’ he said. ‘You after me. Don’t stay behind … behind … behind …’ Ah merde, merde, even whispers echoed! A loose rock fell. The sound of it was canyon-loud, and after it, there was the sound of someone running and then only that of the water.
‘Louis …?’ he whispered. ‘Louis …? Louis …?’ came the echoes.
‘Ah Nom de Dieu, Hermann. He has the revolver again pressed to my head!’
‘Don’t move, Kohler!’ shouted Delphane. ‘Josette, stop this at once. Josianne is dead.’
‘But I did not push her, did I?’
Ah no, breathed Kohler inwardly. Son of a bitch, the kid had cracked the ice of time. The weaver held her breath and he could feel her heart pounding against him.
‘Of course you pushed her,’ snorted Delphane and this echoed too.
‘Then why did you come up to the ruins, Uncle Jean? Josianne had had the bad convulsions. Terrible ones, don’t you remember? Anne-Marie said my sister, she would never get better. You … you came with her.’
Kohler tapped the weaver’s arm twice. Stay put – she knew that’s what he meant. Then he was gone from her and Josette was saying, ‘Anne-Marie walked on ahead of you, Uncle Jean – father, should I call you father? You knew what she was going to do and you let her!’
St-Cyr heard the weaver’s cry. It began deep within her and was ripped right from her. ‘No, Josette! No!’
‘Mother, it’s true! She pushed Josianne-Michele from the Window of the Gods and then she hit me and hit me and hit me until …’
Kohler wrapped a hand about the Lebel and bent it away from Louis, turning it towards Delphane until pressed against that one’s temple. ‘Go on, my fine. Pull the trigger. Don’t make me do it for you.’
‘Hermann …’
‘Louis, shut up!’
The bang was very loud. Flecks of blood and brains flew about and Kohler felt them hit his face and hands. The one from Bayonne collapsed. The gun fell and clattered on the stones.
‘There are two SS back there somewhere, Louis. It’s a pity this one couldn’t have told them what he knew.’
St-Cyr let a breath escape. ‘Merci, my old one. Merci. His contacts in the Resistance are safe.’
‘Don’t let it go to your head, Louis. I’m still on the other side, remember? This one’s yours. Now you owe me one.’
‘Of course.’
The war – the ‘Occupation’ – could only get worse and both of them knew it. The next time there could well be maquis in the hills, or Resistants hiding out in a place like this. Ah yes. Hermann the prisoner and his partner the what? asked St-Cyr. The moment of final decision.
‘Delphane killed the Buemondi woman, Louis. Don’t argue about it. Sure the boy will say it wasn’t so, but you know how these villagers are. One murder deserves another. Besides, it was a matter of the water rights and anyway, it must have been the dead girl who fired the arrow.’
‘Ah yes, Hermann. Without water there can be no life. “Drink and live for ever”, it’s on the beaker.’
‘Beaker …? What’s this about a beaker? Louis, the weaver and her daughter will have to come to Paris with us. Boemelburg won’t have it any other way. I’m going to insist on it.’