Loudly she demanded, "Quickly! For the monsieur, s'il vous plaît!"
Immediately, a cafe au lait in a Limoges cup and a bountiful fruit tray appeared.
"Compliments of the hotel," the manager said, almost scraping his chin on the table with a low bow.
"Merci," Hartmuth said, reaching for his cup.
She tried not to look at his hands. Tried not to stare at the pigskin leather gloves he wore. Most of all, she tried to hide her disappointment at not being able to lift his fingerprints. She decided to get to the point.
"Did you know Lili Stein?"
"Excuse me, who?" Hartmuth Griffe stared at her.
She noticed the creamy foam in his cup trembled slightly.
"Lili Stein, a Jewish woman maybe a few years younger than you." She paused.
"No." He shook his head. "I'm in Paris for the trade summit. I know no one here."
She sipped, watching his eyes as they met hers. His stare had grown glassy and removed.
"She was murdered near this hotel," Aimee said, slowly setting her cup down on the table. "Strangled. A swastika was carved in her forehead."
"I'm afraid I don't know that n-name," he said. He blinked several times.
She heard the stutter and saw his mouth quiver at the effort to stop it.
"Her family said she'd been very scared before it happened. I think she knew secrets." Aimee watched him. "But you've been to Paris before, maybe you met her then, non?"
It was a long shot but worth a try.
"You've mistaken me for someone else. This is my first time in Paris." He stood up quickly.
Aimee stood up also. "Here is my card. Odd bits and pieces lodged in one's memory tend to emerge after conversations like this. Call me any time. One last question. Why are you listed as dead in the Battle of Stalingrad, Herr Griffe?"
He looked truly surprised.
"Ask the war office. All I remember is seeing bodies stacked like cordwood in the snow. Mounds of them. Frozen together. Kilometers of them, as far as the Russian horizon."
Then Hartmuth stiffened like a rod, as if he remembered where he was.
"But go ahead, Mademoiselle Leduc, and pinch me, I'm real. If you'll excuse me." He clicked his heels and was gone.
She slumped on the velvet sofa. Did he wear those gloves to avoid leaving fingerprints? All she knew was that something was bottled up inside him. Tight and close to explosion.
Aimee finished the fruit platter; it would be a shame to waste raspberries in November. But she'd learned at least one thing. He was either an incredible liar or a mistake had been made. She opted for the former. After all, he was a diplomat and a politician.
HORDE S OF protesters chanting, "Not again, not again!" blocked her way to the Metro. Buses lined narrow rue des Francs Bourgeois, the air thick with diesel fumes and high tempers. Aimee wished she could get past the seventeenth-century walls, high and solid, hemming her and passersby in to the sidewalk.
Police encased in black Kevlar riot gear squatted between the Zionist youth and skinheads screaming, "France for the French." A light drizzle beaded in crystalline drops on the clear bulletproof shields of the police, who crouched like praying mantises.
Ahead, a polished black Mercedes limousine, stuck in the Hôtel Pavillion de la Reine courtyard, caught Aimee's eye. The driver gestured towards the narrow street, arguing with a riot-squad member. The smoked window rolled down and Aimee saw a veined hand stretch out.
"Phillipe, please, I want to walk," came the unmistakable voice. She remembered the last time she had heard it-on the radio after she discovered Lili Stein's body.
The highly waxed door opened and Minister Cazaux, the probable next prime minister of France, emerged into the stalled traffic. The plainclothes guards rushing to surround his tall, bony figure caught the crowd's attention.
"S'il vous plaît, Monsieur le Ministre, these conditions-" a bodyguard began.
"Since when can't a government servant walk among the people?" Cazaux grinned. "With the treaty about to be signed, I need every chance to hear their concerns." He winked at the small crowd around the car, his charm melting many of them into smiles as he moved among them shaking hands, totally at ease with the situation.
He smiled directly at Aimee, who'd become awkwardly wedged among the hotel staff. He appeared younger than he did in the media but she was surprised at his heavy makeup. "Bonjour, Mademoiselle. I hope you will support our party's platform!"
Cazaux grasped her hands in his warm ones, as she winced at the sudden pressure.
"Je m'excuse." He pulled back, glancing at her hand.
His charm was laserlike. Once appointed he would be prime minister for five years.
"Monsieur le Ministre," she said, stifling a smile, "you promote social reform, but your party sanctions this racist treaty. Can you explain this contradiction?"
Cazaux nodded and paused. "Mademoiselle, you've made a good point." He turned to the crowd, assorted skinheads, shoppers, and young Zionists. "If there was another way to reduce our crippling 12.8 percent unemployment, I'd be the first one to do it. Right now, France has to get back on its feet, reenter the global market, and nothing is more important than that."
Many in the crowd nodded, but the young Zionists chanted, "No more camps!"
The minister approached them. "Simple answers to immigration don't exist; I wish they did."
He embraced a squealing infant shoved at him by a perspiring mother. With all the time in the world, he rocked the young baby like a practiced grandfather. Then he kissed the cooing baby on both cheeks, gently handing it back to the beaming mother. "Discussion is the foundation of our republic." He smiled at the Zionists. "Bring your concerns to my office."
Cazaux was good, she had to admit. He worked the crowd well. Several photographers caught him in earnest discussion with a Zionist youth. By the time the traffic jam broke up, even the Zionists were almost subdued.
His guards signaled to him, then Cazaux waved, climbed in the limo, and shot down the street. The whole incident had taken less than fifteen minutes, she realized. His adept handling of potential violence triggered her unease. He'd manipulated the volatile situation almost as if he'd planned it. When did I get so cynical, she wondered.
Ahead of her stood an old man in a lopsided blue beret. "Just like the old days. Maybe they'll do it right this time," he muttered. His face was contorted by hate.
"There's blacks and Arabs everywhere," he continued. "My war pension is half what the blacks get. Noisy all night and they can't even speak French."
She turned away and stared straight into the eyes of Leif, the lederhosened skinhead from LBN. He stood by the entrance of a dingy hôtel particulier, watching her. Even in a red suit with makeup and heels instead of leather, black lipstick, and chains, she wasn't going to wait and see if he recognized her.
When she looked again, he was gone. Stale sweat and the smell of damp wool surrounded her. She froze when she saw his bristly mohawk appear over the old man's shoulder.
"Salopes!" the old man swore into the jostling crowd, Aimee wasn't sure at whom.
She was scared. In this narrow, jammed street, she had nowhere to go. She crouched behind the old man, pulled her red jacket off, and stuck a brown ski cap from her bag over her hair. She shivered in a cream silk top in the now steady drizzle, put on heavy black-framed glasses, and melted into the crowd as best she could.
"They laid my son off, but he doesn't get the fat welfare check those blacks get for nothing," the old man shouted.
Aimee felt groping fingers under her blouse, but she couldn't see who they belonged to. Leaning down, she opened her mouth and bit as hard as she could. Someone yelped loudly in pain and the crowd scattered in fear. Aimee darted and elbowed her way through the grumbling crowd. She didn't stop until she had reached the Metro, where she shoved her pass in the turnstile and ran to the nearest platform. Gusts of hot air shot from the tiled vents as each train pulled in and out. She stood in front of them until her blouse had dried, she'd stopped shaking, and had come up with a plan.