Again he left it unsaid. There were several evening gowns – all neatly pressed, nothing rumpled. The everyday dresses would have come to mid-calf length. Wools, cottons, two of corduroy for rough wear. A pair of brown leather driving gloves, a pair of Swiss hiking boots.
The gloves had been stuffed into one of the boots. Bits of oak leaves clung to the mud that was lodged between the rubber treads.
‘Fontainebleau Woods?’ asked Kohler.
‘Perhaps,’ said St-Cyr, ‘but if so, then …’
‘I’ll check the maid’s closets. Maybe the shoes will be there.’
St-Cyr waited, and when the Bavarian had left the room, he closed the closet door and moved over to the bureau, a sumptuous piece of inlaid mahogany that had been painted a pistachio green.
A rebel? he asked, or one so positive about the decor, she could ruin a valuable antique and think nothing of it.
Underwear – slips, brassieres, chemises and camisoles – lace again, but sensible things as well.
He lifted a stack and felt beneath it. Nothing.
When he found the revolver he let out a stifled gasp not just because it wasn’t expected but because the hiding place was so stupid and the gun far too big for a lady.
A mirage.
It was a French Army Lebel six-shooter, one of the original 1873 models. It even had its lanyard.
Using the stem of his pipe, St-Cyr carefully fished the weapon out and brought the muzzle up to his nose. The weapon hadn’t been recently fired. In fact, he had the thought it hadn’t been used in a very long time. Not since the last days of the Defeat.
Breaking the cylinder open, he saw that the gun was fully loaded. He flicked a glance towards the bedroom door, didn’t hesitate. Stuffing the gun into the waistband of his trousers, he buttoned up the overcoat.
When he moved towards the bed, St-Cyr imagined Gabrielle Arcuri stretched out on it, lounging with a book perhaps. Silk pyjamas – a soft, coral pink. The smell of her perfume …
A tall and very beautiful woman in that sanctuary of sanctuaries, her bedroom. With a loaded revolver but a few steps away. Why the gun? he asked and answered, Why unless she’d been afraid for her life.
‘Louis, have a look at these.’
Kohler thrust the snapshots at him. All were of the boy – two showed him sunbathing in the nude.
He had a dreamy look in his eyes, was smirking up at the camera. No attempt had been made to cover himself.
St-Cyr gruffly said, ‘Ah!’ and stuffed the photographs into a pocket. ‘Now take a look at this, my friend.’
The portrait photograph, in its silver oval, was of a French officer – quite handsome, quite the gallant, about thirty-six or so years of age, with a distant look in his warm and sensitive eyes. A dream.
‘There’s a son, also, Hermann. A boy of about Philippe’s age.’
‘And a map,’ breathed Kohler, sliding open one of the bedside table drawers. ‘A kid’s drawing of the chateau and its grounds, Louis. In crayon.’
At sounds from the hall – at an argument of some sort – St-Cyr snatched the child’s sketch from Kohler and tucked it away in a pocket.
‘The living-room,’ he hissed. ‘We’ve company.’ Merde! Could nothing be done in private? Just when he was getting a feel for the woman, an interruption …
‘Your names?’
‘Kohler. Gestapo Headquarters Paris, General.’
‘St-Cyr, of the Surete.’
‘Your search warrant?’
The black-gloved fingers were bared and then snapped.
‘We have none,’ said St-Cyr, watching him closely. Such a man …
‘Then get out!’
It was the general from the balcony at the club. ‘General, could I ask why you’re here?’
The French! ‘Don’t be impertinent. Your superiors will hear of this.’
‘They will only ask me the same question, as will the Sturmbannfuhrer Boemelburg.’
The man swore. ‘Her maid’s been found. I thought she’d like to know.’
‘Where?’ asked St-Cyr, holding his breath.
‘Fontainebleau Woods. Now get out of here, the two of you, and find her killers.’
Kohler went down the stairs first, then St-Cyr, then the woman and lastly that piece of Prussian SS glass with its black-gloved hands and once handsome face that was now such a mass of scars.
As they passed the concierge’s room, St-Cyr stopped suddenly. ‘Is that the morning’s mail, madame?’ he asked, ignoring the general.
‘But yes …’ she began.
‘Permit me, please, to examine those two little parcels.’
‘I thought I said …’
‘General, we’re on a murder case – expressly on orders from Berlin,’ said Kohler. ‘When my partner sees something, it’s usually of interest.’
‘Very well, but I must warn you …’
St-Cyr broke open one of the parcels – it was no more than ten centimetres long by perhaps two in width and height.
The woman sucked in a breath and gripped her heart as the little black coffin was exposed.
‘The Resistance,’ breathed Kohler. ‘Louis, what the hell’s going on?’
‘One might well wonder, Hermann. It appears the Resistance have chosen to make an example of Mademoiselle Arcuri.’
‘And her maid,’ breathed Kohler.
‘Fontainebleau Woods.’
‘The house first, Hermann, and then the woods. I must pick up a heavy sweater and my hiking boots.’ And hide a certain weapon.
It was only after they’d got into the car that Kohler told him, ‘Louis, it wasn’t me who said Fontainebleau Woods just then.’
St-Cyr nodded but said nothing.
Madame Courbet had been in to tidy up. The geraniums even looked better. She had put the day’s mail on the kitchen table. St-Cyr fished through it searching for the negative of him and Kohler on safari and when it wasn’t there, he began to worry.
It was raining when they got to Fontainebleau Woods and that didn’t help. The Gorge of the Archers was south of the road that ran from Fontainebleau town to Milly-la-Foret on the western edge of the forest.
One went in by a bit of rough gravel, but only so far. From a small clearing, a footpath led up into the gorge.
The flics in blue from Barbizon and Fontainebleau were everywhere and viewed their intrusion with hostile eyes.
‘A classic Resistance killing,’ snapped Beauchamp, the Prefet of Barbizon. A ferret with nasty looks and a manner that silenced.
‘One through the back of the head,’ added Cartier, the Prefet of Fontainebleau, a big man who enjoyed his soup. A father of ten, and strict about it. ‘So, we can wrap things up, eh? Now that you two have seen all there is to see.’
‘A moment, please, Commissioner. Allow us the privilege of assisting you,’ said St-Cyr, water pouring off the brim of his fedora. They’d both get pneumonia.
Yvette Noel’s wrists had been tied tightly together behind her back. She’d been dragged from a car and hustled up the footpath into the gorge, then thrown to her knees.
There were powder burns on the back of her head. Blood had run from her nose and mouth but with the rain, most of this had been washed away.
St-Cyr crammed his hands into the pockets of his overcoat. She’d been a little thing and so afraid. After hitting the ground she had tried to crawl away and her assailant had grabbed her by the wrists, dragged her back to her knees, and forced her head forward. No time to say her prayers. No time for anything.
‘Time of death?’ he asked.
‘Does it matter?’ snorted the Prefet of Barbizon. He’d show the SN.
‘Yes, as a matter of fact, it does.’
‘Our coroner has the flu.’
‘Then get someone else to have a look at her!’
The ferret hit his forehead with the heel of a hand and swore. ‘Another doctor, he wants! Georges, did you hear that?’
‘I will send Lauzon for Dr Dandelin. He’ll do a job for us,’ said Georges.
‘That drunk?’ snapped St-Cyr.
‘Ah yes, that drunk. He’s very good with corpses.’
Something passed between the two men. Both St-Cyr and Kohler had a good idea what it was.