‘Happily?’
Was there laughter in her eyes, or the swiftness of cruelty? ‘Exactly how much do you know about me, Mademoiselle Arcuri?’
She unscrewed the thermos and filled the cap, which she handed to him. ‘Enough to know, Inspector, that your wife has run off.’
St-Cyr laid the cheese and bread on the knapsack and used his penknife to cut them. ‘I should ask, how is it that you know this, Mademoiselle Arcuri, but,’ he gave another shrug, ‘me, I don’t think you’d tell me the truth.’
‘Try me.’
She had such a nice smile, warm and sensitive and very quick. But was it understanding? Ah, how could one hope for such a thing?
‘The General Hans Ackermann?’ he said.
‘The Hero of Rovno and Berdichev, the Knight of Krivoy Rog. He telephoned us last night. We’ve been expecting you.’
‘Is the general a friend?’
It was her turn to shrug but she did so with complete innocence. ‘Of a sort, yes. One needs such friends these days, Inspector. Look, it’s nothing sexual so don’t get the wrong idea. My husband’s dead – he was killed at Sedan in 1940 but me, I’m still married to him and intend to stay that way.’
The coffee was good, not ersatz, and laced with cognac. The cheese was a chevre crottin, a small circle that had been dusted with dill and chives. Very dry and strong in flavour. Real goat’s cheese, three, maybe four weeks in the ageing.
The bread was crusty and, with the cheese, a meal. If only there’d been some of the chateau’s wine. He’d have liked to try it.
So she would stay married to a dead man? For love or money or some other reason? ‘Mademoiselle …’
‘Why not try calling me by my name? It’s easier.’
‘Gabrielle …’
‘That’s better. You’ve a son and I’ve one, Inspector, not much older than yours if what the general says is true.’
He passed her the coffee, turning the cap so that she might drink from the clean side. ‘Lovers kiss and think nothing of it, Inspector, but I appreciate the gesture. A singer has to.’
‘Mademoiselle … Look, I want to help.’
‘Don’t all cops?’
‘Why not tell me exactly what happened? As you see it. Leave nothing out, no matter how insignificant it might seem.’
‘Have you been an inspector long?’
‘The past seventeen years.’
‘And before that?’
‘A cop on the beat – Montparnasse and Montmartre. Whores and their pimps, bank robbers and their banks.’
‘A chief inspector. And the war?’ she asked suddenly. ‘The first one.’ She had to find out everything she could about him.
‘Signals Corps, as a sergeant. I was wounded twice. Once in the thigh, and once in the shoulder. My left side seems to be the vulnerable one.’
He could laugh at himself, a good sign. ‘Then you’ll understand how we feel about the Germans, Inspector. The sooner they’re gone, the better.’
‘Yet General Ackermann is a friend?’
‘He’s also a relative. A distant cousin of my mother-in-law.’
The bushy eyebrows lifted. The coffee was replenished. ‘I didn’t go to Fontainebleau with Yvette, Inspector. When she came back, she was in tears, tearing her hair, wanting to pray and yet so afraid of doing so. She knew the police would accuse her of the murder. She was convinced of this but … but when she found Jerome, he was already dead.’
St-Cyr asked the obvious. ‘How did she know where to find him?’
Mademoiselle Arcuri looked away. ‘She found the bicycle first, at the side of the road, and then the body. She tried to “wake him up”. She turned his head so that he’d be comfortable – you can imagine what it must have been like for her. Panic, terror – her brother, for God’s sake! She even placed his arms at his sides – tried to tidy him. Look, I didn’t kill him, Inspector. I swear I didn’t and neither did she.’
There was the shrug of the unconvinced and then the woeful eyes of the same. ‘If not you or she, then who?’
‘One of the monks, I think.’
‘One of the monks?’
Was it so incredible a thought? ‘Jerome hated the seminary. He was always getting into trouble – that’s why Yvette had to ask for time off and why I let her go home to look after things. If you ask me, Inspector, I think he spied on the other monks and when he threatened to expose them, one of them killed him.’
‘In Fontainebleau Woods?’
‘Yes. Isn’t that a good place for murders? I’m always reading about them in the papers.’
Never mind the necessity for a car – they went on bicycles perhaps. Never mind that there were plenty of closer and far better places, or that there’d been a diary in her purse, a record of liaisons and little tete-a-tetes.
St-Cyr finished the coffee and wrapped up the last of the cheese. ‘For now we will let it be, Mademoiselle Arcuri. Your revolver is safe from prying Gestapo eyes but I would like the return of mine. And if I were you, I’d put that shotgun safely away.’
‘You’re angry with me.’
Was that a pout? ‘A little, yes. Me, I had thought we might be square with one another since neither of us particularly likes the Germans.’
‘But your partner’s a German?’
‘War throws the strangest people together. Don’t be fooled by him. He’s far cleverer than he lets on. It’s a way with him. Munich and then Berlin, now Paris Central. A damned good cop.’
And a warning? she wondered. ‘I didn’t kill Jerome, Inspector, and I wouldn’t have killed Yvette. I chased after her, yes, but when I got there, she … she’d already been killed.’
No mention of the diary yet or of how she had known where to look. ‘So now it’s a time for some thought, eh? And a few tears. You can reach me at the Surete, number 11, the rue de Saussaies.’
Must he be so tough about it, so obviously disappointed in her? ‘Look, if it means anything, Inspector, I hope your wife comes back.’
‘So do I.’
Dwarfed by the courtyard and the enclosing walls of the chateau, Kohler stood waiting beside the car. He would leave the keys in the blasted ignition! A lousy habit the General Ackermann had been quick to take advantage of.
And waiting on generals – any of them – had always been a bind.
He glanced at his watch only to see that the time – now 11.18 a.m. – had advanced a mere three minutes since the last look.
Ackermann was letting him cool his heels. Perhaps he and the countess were having a good laugh about it. More likely the general had simply said, My dear, please allow me to deal with this.
Ah yes, you son-of-a-bitch!
Surprisingly there was no flagpole in the centre of the courtyard. If there had been, he’d have stood under it just for old times’ sake. Parade grounds and all that garbage!
When Ackermann, less his greatcoat, gloves and cap, stormed out of the chateau, the bastard walked so swiftly he threw the fear of God into one, and wasn’t it a marvel how generals could walk?
‘Your marching orders have been moved up, Kohler. If I were you, I’d return to Paris and pack your bags.’
He’d been on the phone to Boemelburg and to Berlin. Kohler knew he ought to shut up but this Prussian flame thrower with the hard eyes, this hero of whatever, had got under his skin.
‘General, neither you nor Herr Himmler will stop us from finding out who murdered that boy. I may be Gestapo, but long before that I was a cop. I always have been and I always will be.’
Slim, tall, straight at attention – a ramrod – Ackermann longed for his gloves. He’d have struck this bastard gumshoe across the face for such insolence! ‘Pretty speeches will do you no good, Kohler. Your revised orders are being signed by the Fuhrer himself.’
Oh-oh. ‘Spare me the invincibility of our illustrious Fuhrer, General. When von Schaumburg hears what I have to say, not even the Fuhrer will put a stop to our investigation.’
Ackermann sized him up. ‘How dare you …?’
The scars were twisted, the half-eaten nostril flared. There were furrows and gouges in the withered cheek.
‘I dare, General, because that’s my business. Now go and mesh heads with your lady friend but remember, please, she’s a suspect and so are you.’