Flykiller (36 page)

She stamped a foot. ‘Of course I swore I'd kill Marie-Jacqueline Mailloux. That slut was always in heat.'

‘And those photographs, madame?' asked St-Cyr, his voice somehow remaining calm while hers had climbed.

‘Were taken by the photographer I hired to accompany us.'

Trust the husbands not to have mentioned it! ‘And the negatives?' he asked.

How good of him to worry about Alain André being blackmailed by the photographer! ‘For now I will keep them.'

‘No, madame. For now you will allow me that privilege.'

‘They're not with me.'

‘Then when we leave here, you will take me to them.'

‘They're at the clinic. I … I couldn't keep them at home. Alain André would … would only have found and destroyed them.'

Had she threatened to blackmail her husband into behaving? ‘Did Monsieur le Ministre tell you to come here?'

His use of the word Ministre had been deliberate! ‘What do you think? That to save his career and reputation he begged me not to and I compromised by saying I wouldn't give them to Herr Gessler who knows all about what went on here in any case?'

‘Madame, please just answer.'

‘Ménétrel, you
imbécile!
That bastard telephoned to say that it would be wisest of me to destroy them.'

Then she
had
threatened Richard and he had then asked Ménétrel to intervene.

‘If I could have tarred and feathered that slut I would have, Inspector. Instead, when I realized fully what was happening to my marriage, I was fool enough to take my troubles to Ménétrel who suggested I masturbate to relieve the tension!
Mon Dieu
I hate it here. I always have and always will. The hypocrisy of the Maréchal's return to family values. All women are chaste, all girls virgins, is that it, eh? Pah, what idiocy! And what about the husbands? The
fornicateurs
? And Pétain himself? A dancer? Well, he got what he deserved and so did she!'

Ah
merde
, her voice was echoing and she shouldn't have said that. ‘I … Forgive me. This room. The memory of it. You can see the state I'm in. Well, can't you?' she shrilled.

‘Certainly.'

‘Then
look
at the photos. See for yourself!'

‘I will, but first, madame, who informed you of the party on 24 October last, and gave you not only the appropriate time to strike but also the precise locations of the four pairs of lovers that you would confront and have your man photograph?'

‘My husband was the last we surprised. As to who helped us, I can't say.'

‘You'd best.'

‘Or you will arrest me?'

‘Just answer!' At last the inspector had been moved to raise his voice.

‘Mademoiselle Blanche Varollier.'

‘Hired to inform on her employers?'

‘It was she who first came to me, but yes, I agreed to pay her ten thousand francs.'

‘One hundred thousand?' It was a shot in the dark.

‘Two hundred and fifty.'

‘Then where were you, please, during the
cinq à sept
of Wednesday, 9 December last when Marie-Jacqueline Mailloux was drowned?'

The briefest smile of triumph was not reflected in the hardness of her eyes.

‘A dance recital at Thérèse Deschambeault's ballet school. Élisabeth de Fleury's daughter is very good and presently needs all the support we can give her.'

Merde
, this town, this investigation! ‘And was Céline Dupuis there?'

No hint of triumph passed her lips.

‘Monique de Fleury was her best student. A dance from the Ballet Russe. It was marvellous. Madame Dupuis played the piano.'

Sacr
é
nom de nom
, the acid of that put-down! But did everyone know everyone in this town? ‘And were Madame de Fleury's daughter and Céline Dupuis close, as a teacher and her prized pupil would have to have been?'

‘Very. So you see, Inspector, Céline did not just betray Élisabeth, but her daughter as well!'

The kid with the pigtails was uneasy and with good reason, felt Kohler. In November, when the Wehrmacht had suddenly taken over the
zone libre
, her boss had been recalled to Berlin. Urgent consultations, questions about his loyalties and loving the French and all things French too much. Abetz's wife, Suzanne, came from France's de Bruyker family and was a sensation when the couple had taken up residence in Paris in July 1940, never here.
Mein Gott
, who'd want to live near Vichy in a draughty old chateau in a winter like this when the City of Light beckoned? France and Germany together in happy alliance and marital bliss in the showcase of showcases. Reception after reception, designer dresses, jewels, champagne and all the rest, the races too. Abetz and Fernand de Brinon, that pedlar of
laissez-passers
and Vichy's ambassador to the Occupied Territories, had been old friends from the mid-thirties when Abetz had got de Brinon and other like-minded collabos to join his Comité France-Allemagne. A hotbed of sympathizers, some of whom had willingly spied on their own country and helped to place Sicherheitsdienst agents in France.

But now, as could happen with the most loyal of former drawing instructors – and Abetz had been one of those – there were doubts.

And this little
Mädchen für alles
, this
bonne à tout faire
, had been up to more than mischief and had realized he knew it.

‘Look, relax,' said Kohler and grinned. ‘All I want is a little information.'

‘
Sicherlich!
' – I'll bet! she swore and pulled away to stop in the corridor with her back to him. ‘I only did what I was told.'

‘
Befehl ist Befehl
, eh?' An order is an order.

‘All of us used to report to Herr Schleier who came from Paris once every so often, but now … now we have yet to be informed of who our new contact will be.'

Schleier – who was Abetz's assistant and, at forty-one, the embassy's oldest member and most senior Nazi of the 568 Paris staff, of whom 367 were from home – was now temporarily in charge.

‘
Ach!
don't worry so much,' he said, chucking her under a chin that could, no doubt, be soft and tender when necessary. ‘
Gemütlichkeit
prise useful information. Rudolph won't forget that such cosy friendship with the Occupied is useful and that your loyalty is beyond reproach. He's just busy.
Mein Gott
, doesn't he like uniforms, medals and official receptions even more than Herr Abetz? He'll delegate someone. Just give him a chance to put his glass down.'

‘They'll close this place and send us home. I know they will!'

To live like God in France had been everyone's dream, except that this kid was Alsatian and her bilingualism had been deemed useful.

‘Show me your room and tell me what went on.'

‘My room …?'

‘We've lots of time. That partner of mine's a bird-lover.'

As she stabbed at the photos, Sandrine Richard sucked in a breath and said, ‘A
bordel
, Inspector? A
maison de tolérance
? Oh for sure in such places these things go on, but here? Here in an official residence of the German Ambassador?'

‘Calm down, please.'

‘Why should I? Look, damn you! See for yourself what those bitches were up to with our husbands. Feathers … torn pillows? Does she have to pee? Is that why she holds a fistful of feathers against herself and also blows them from her lips?'

Jésus, merde alors
, Bousquet and Camille Lefebvre had been caught in a state of total undress and more than a little drunk, their laughter frozen by the camera's intrusion!

Deschambeault and Lucie Trudel were
tout nus
also, the shorthand typist stretched up on tiptoe, her wrists bound tightly together to an iron ring in the wall of a tower room or dungeon, the sous-directeur with the riding crop raised to fiercely strike her shapely but already welted buttocks. Fear, tension, excitement and apprehension – lust, that pent-up urgency for the
grand frisson
, the great shudder – were only too evident in her expression as, puzzled that her lover had paused, she had looked over a shoulder past him and into the camera.

Honoré de Fleury and Céline Dupuis had been caught on their hands and knees on a leopardskin throw before a roaring fire, the Inspector of Finance having taken the dancer and instructress from behind while tightly gripping her breasts, her hair in his teeth and her head thrown back as if in ecstasy.

‘Can you imagine how Elisabeth must have felt?' shrilled Madame Richard.

Céline's eyes were closed and there were tears, but it would be best to say nothing of them.

‘Monique de Fleury is fifteen years old, Inspector,' seethed Sandrine, ‘but now no longer wants to dance or strive for excellence in anything, her schoolwork especially. Endless tears for the mother who was betrayed; floods of them for herself because, like girls of that age, she adored her father and idolized him. Must Vichy corrupt everything? That child worshipped Céline Dupuis only to discover her father was fucking the woman!'

‘But surely she needn't have been told?'

‘Then you don't know Vichy and how crowded are the rooms in which we live! Madame Pétain, who is
présidente
of the Committee on which Elisabeth and I serve, has tried repeatedly to get better housing for us, but all our complaints only fall on deaf ears. “It's the Occupation and we must set an example.” Some example!'

Caught among the onlookers at the fight between this one and Marie-Jacqueline were several whom St-Cyr recognized from their photos in the Paris press and other sources. Léon Aubriet of Aluminium Français, the giant cartel that had been set up to guarantee the country's former position in producing the metal business and to supply the rapacious appetite of the German aircraft industry, was with the
Blitzmädel
who had guided Hermann and himself to this very room. That one had a pleasing figure and a lingering hand on Aubriet's bare shoulder. His arm was still around her naked waist. Antoine Chaudet, of La Samaritaine – the Paris department store which, with Le Printemps, Les Nouvelles Galeries and others, had entered into agreements with Karstadt, Erwege and Hertie, their German counterparts – was with a girl far less than half his age. Charles Lenoir of Matériel Électrique and Pierre-Denis Martin of the Compagnie Générale du Téléphone were there with older girls that had, no doubt, been brought in especially for them. So many prominent men were in states of undress and drunkenness, the girls with their garlands of ivy having slipped.

‘There's more!' hissed Sandrine Richard, finding a stark photo of Abel Bonnard, Minister of Education and Member of the Academie Française, whose tear-streaked baby cheeks were stained with mascara. Bonnard had frantically thrown up a hand to shield himself from the camera's flash. This little man with downy, snow-white hair, this asthmatic, part-time poet and collector of porcelain whose blatant love of high living was legendary, was with two naked schoolboys both of whom had obviously been recently fondled.

‘It's disgusting!' spat Madame Richard. ‘He takes care of them and they take care of him, and we have that on photo too!'

‘Ah
merde
, if I don't confiscate these and destroy the negatives, madame, all hell will break loose!'

Standing behind the crowd of onlookers, a head and shoulders taller than most and fully dressed, were Blanche and Paul Varollier. Both translator and croupier were withdrawn from the proceedings, their expressions passive and yet … and yet so much a part of things.

‘
Ich heisse
Ellinor Schlesinger, Herr Inspektor Kohler.'

The kid handed over her passport and ID as a good German maiden should. The room, in a newer part of the chateau and above the present kitchens, was plainly furnished but private, considering the crush in Vichy. The single, iron-framed bed, small desk, washbasin and jug, lamp and chair, armoire,
vase de nuit
and throw rug were neat as a pin.

Even the shrine could pass the stiffest of inspections. Crossed swastika flags flew over carefully laid-out knick-knacks. The stainless-steel Victory Rune of the SS; the Mann Rune, the sign of the German Women's Corps; the red lanyard, whistle and badge of an Untergauführerin, an under-leader of a group of BdMs, Bund Deutscher Mädel, the League of German Girls; sayings of the Führer on printed, unbleached cards in black Gothic script: Strength Through Joy; Blood and Honour; Learn to Sacrifice for your Fatherland; Who wants to Live has to Fight, and Whoever refuses to Fight in this World of Eternal Challenge has no right to Live.

‘In your Race is your Strength,' he read aloud, picking up the card as if impressed.

There was the usual portrait photo of the Führer under the crossed swastikas and he knew that this carrier of National Socialist dogma, this little Nazi, would stand stiffly to attention on waking to the cold light of dawn or clanging bell from Herr Whatever, the major-domo, to proudly say, ‘
Morgens grüsse ich den Führer
,' et cetera, and before bed – this bed – ‘
Und abends danke ich dem Führer.
'

In the morning I salute my Führer. And in the evening I thank him.

‘My boys grew up with this, too,' said Herr Kohler, having only glanced at her papers. He did not explain further, this giant with the cruel scar, but was, Ellinor said to herself, much saddened. Had he lost someone dear? she wondered.

He opened the little drawer of her bedside table but found no prayerbook or Bible, though the rest of her family were still staunchly Lutheran. He said, ‘I remember Strasbourg as being a lovely city. Number 42 rue des Hallebardes … the street of the pikes with the battleaxes at one end … It's near the cathedral, your home?'

What did he want of her? she wondered. He had such a way with him. Easy-going and then suddenly he'd be after something, but would sometimes come at it obliquely. ‘It's right in the cathedral's shadow, Herr Inspektor.'