More shouting came from well off to the left. ‘Hey, Cecile, over here, my sweet little rocket. Let us have the challenge match!’
‘Together, Cecile, a marriage of our racers, with no holds barred.’
‘Marie, he wants to contest his little bit of sandpaper with our goddess of the ice!’
‘Every year it is the same,’ grumbled the bishop. ‘Shut up, you bunch!’ he shouted violently. ‘You are to leave the hill at once!’
Dead silence followed, then giggles, after which came laughter and a few catcalls. ‘A meeting!’ shouted Dufour angrily. ‘An important conference is in progress. The … the fate of the city …’
Rumble, rumble … bump … bump! Rumble, rumble … Ah merde, the first bend in the Stations of the Cross … A shriek! A cry …
Then cheers as the racers flew past others in the darkness.
‘Unless we have the truth, Bishop. The truth!’ leapt the Surete. ‘Mademoiselle Charlebois made a tragic mistake. Once committed, she had no other choice but to follow through.’
‘What mistake?’ demanded Charlebois.
Stung, Louis turned on him. ‘Please do not interrupt a police officer in the exercise of his duties, monsieur. A mistake compounded by a history of your abuse! Now I must have answers from you both!’
‘What abuse?’ asked Dufour, his suspicion all too clear.
Others had arrived. ‘Not physical, but mental,’ said Madame Rachline. ‘Admit it, Henri. You have always wanted Martine for yourself and to protect her purity. Oh not to love in a sexual way, Inspector-she would never have agreed to that-but to keep from others who would only violate her.’
‘Hermann …?’
‘Louis, I’m over here.’
‘Good! Prefet, this man is to be placed under arrest.’
‘Now wait a moment, Louis. Monsieur Charlebois …? Pah! It’s impossible. You must be out of your mind. You expect me to put the bracelets on him for what, please?’
Guillemette had always been difficult.
‘For the murder of Robichaud?’ snorted Charlebois.
The antique dealer was breathing quickly, but was it the moment to pounce? ‘Three people were involved in the cinema fire, monsieur …’
‘Three, Louis?’ demanded Guillemette. ‘Don’t tell me our Salamander is three women and if so, hah! how does that explain your inclusion of Monsieur Charlebois?’
Hermann had best be working the shadows. If only the bob-sleighs would cease their torment again. ‘Madame Rachline, did you go to that cinema with Claudine Bertrand?’
It was all coming back to haunt them. Concarneau and the beach, Henri and his little sister. ‘I did not, Inspector. There are several who were at La Belle the night of the fire. Any or all of them, if necessary, will tell you I was at the house over the supper hour and left it to cross into my own house at about 9 p.m. to be with my children.’
‘Good. Then please tell us, madame, when Claudine came to your door, having lost one of her shoes, did she come in tears? Was she distraught?’
‘She’s dead, Inspector. It cannot matter,’ came a woman’s voice in German.
‘Ah, Frau Weidling, I am glad you are here at last. Leiter Weidling, Obersturmfuhrer … we are all now gathered before a city in darkness and fear,’ said Louis in German. ‘Was she distraught, Madame Rachline?’ he asked in French, only to translate so as to bring it home to the others.
The time had come, and she had known all along that it would. ‘Yes. Claudine was in very bad shape, Inspector. She had been scared out of her wits but more than this, was terrified she’d be killed.’
Rumble, rumble … bump, bump … bump! Rumble … rumble …
‘She was certain Frau Weidling had been involved in the fire, Inspector, and that the woman would … would see to it that she …’
‘Ange-Marie, be careful what you say.’
‘Henri, why should I, with two police officers beside me?’
Klaus Barbie would be translating for the Weidlings. Charlebois waited. Perhaps he held his breath in impatience, perhaps he was figuring out what to do.
Louis told Madame Rachline to continue. Klaus Barbie said in French, ‘Yes, please do. I’ve a prior engagement I must attend.’
Another visit to the favourite brothel, eh? snorted Kohler, hugging the deeper darkness of the Basilica.
‘Yes, please continue,’ said Frau Weidling in brittle German. ‘Am I a suspect, Inspector? Johann, ask him if I am.’
‘You most definitely are, Frau Weidling, as I believe you are only too aware. You were at those other fires in 1938. In each, it would not surprise me if you-’
‘Ah no, of course,’ said Madame Rachline. ‘Why could I not have seen it before? Another cinema, a crowded lecture hall …’
Was she being clever, wondered Kohler, or honestly blaming herself?
Again the bobsleighs took to the ice. Again there was the rapidly dwindling rumble of their runners, the bump, bump, bump as they went down over steps, then the awful gaps in sound, the sudden pauses as the sleighs took wing …
‘Herr Obersturmfuhrer, this is preposterous. I must insist that we return to the hotel. My wife is very tired and I must go back to the theatre if I am to search it thoroughly,’ said Weidling.
‘Your wife,’ said Louis. ‘Herr Weidling, tell us how the two of you met.’
‘That’s none of your business nor does it concern us here.’
‘Is it that you wish me to tell them?’ demanded Louis. ‘Come, come, Leiter Weidling. She was a prime suspect in the Lubeck fire. From there, you followed her to Heidelberg-is that not right?-and then to Koln. She was in those cities as were Martine Charlebois and her lover.’
‘Her fiance …’ said Madame Rachline. ‘And … and Claudine, Inspector. Claudine asked for some time and I gave it to her. A little holiday, she said, a few addresses we all knew about, oh bien sur. Martine was in the Reich on a student exchange. Claudine said that Henri wanted her to … to check up on his little sister, that Martine had … had found herself a lover.’
‘Louis …? Louis, one of them has left the terrace.’
‘Hermann! Why did you not stop him?’
He’d been there and then he’d not been there, but was he still close and was he really the Salamander?
Rumble, rumble, rumble … bump, bump, bump … ‘Johann … Johann, do not leave me now! Please, my liebling, I beg it of you.’
St-Cyr grabbed the prefet and told him to make certain Frau Weidling was not let out of sight. Then he shouted to Hermann and began to run, to slip and slide and almost end up on his ear! Ah merde, the ice! ‘Hermann, where are you?’
‘Over here, Louis. Here!’
A small incline, nothing much-the grand slide perhaps. Silhouettes standing around, objecting. Hermann shouting, ‘Gestapo. This sleigh has been requisitioned!’ Teenagers … teenagers … Ah no.
‘Get on, Louis. That’s an order.’
‘But … but …’
‘The girl, idiot! The sister. She must be hiding at the shop!’
Rumble, rumble … Rumble, rumble …
‘Push, Louis! Heave! Ah Gott im Himmel, idiot. Give it a run and leap on or stay behind!’
They bolted down the hill. They took the bends, shot out over something. Hit the ground only to lift again. Ah mon Dieu, mon Dieu …
Hurtling through space, the sleigh crashed on to a street, crossed over, bashed sideways into a wall … the hands … the hands … ‘Hermann!’
‘Hang on, Louis!’
Bump, bump, bump-rumble, rumble, rumble … Ah no, the montee des Chazeaux …
Streaking past a foot patrol, they turned onto the rue de la Bombarde, shot past the Palais de justice and downstream along the quais, across the pont Bonaparte and across place Bellecour.
Coasting to a stop, they ended up in front of the shop of Henri Masson, Fine Antiques.