Mayhem (38 page)

The battle-axe moved! He fired again, a screened shot that deflected off a sword, splintered a pike shaft and ricocheted around the room.

St-Cyr yanked the battle-axe free and threw it. Ackermann fired. The woman shrieked at him to save himself.

They made for the door at a run and St-Cyr headed after them. The Luger swung his way. The hammer came back. She fought with Ackermann. She tried to get the gun, tried to …

St-Cyr tore him from her and knocked the gun to the floor. He went in with his fists, hammering. A left to the chin, a right to the shoulder. One, two; one, two. Now step away, feint to the left and in with a left. Yes … yes that's it! ‘A bloodied nose, eh, General? Well, there's more of it, my friend. There's more.' He feinted left and left again, dodged and weaved, stepped in suddenly, then back and around, cornering, working, now a jab, now a withdrawal.

They closed and the general went down in a welter of blows they hadn't taught him at that fancy SS academy. St-Cyr fell on him like a stone and pressed both knees into his back. He gave a savage grunt as he whipped the handcuffs from a pocket and clapped them on the bastard. ‘Done! Ah-ha, my fine, it's done!'

‘Hermann …? Hermann, what has happened?' St-Cyr raised the lantern. He'd found Kohler outside the back door of the stables, a wreck and badly in need of medical attention.

‘Louis …? Louis, where's Ackermann?'

‘Locked up in one of the towers, with bracelets.'

Kohler wanted to say, Good work! Instead he had to say, ‘We're not going to get out of this, Louis. Jensen tried to kill me. His gun … You know how it was. The thing went off and hit Bocke twice in the guts. A stroke of luck perhaps, but not for us.'

‘I'll get a couple of blankets and cover them. We'll think about it, eh?' He'd never seen Hermann quite like this.

The Bavarian tore his one-eyed gaze from Bocke's body. ‘I've already thought about it, Louis. I had no other choice but to kill Jensen with a pitchfork. It was either him or me.'

A pitchfork! ‘Yes … yes, I quite understand. Shall I call Pharand or will you call Boemelburg?'

Kohler held his throbbing cheek. ‘I think you'd better call Boemelburg for me. Just tell him to come down here, Louis. Don't try to bugger about, eh? Words won't be of any use so leave them to me. Let's let him see this for himself.'

‘And the General Oberg, over on the avenue Foch, Hermann? What about him?' The employer of the dead.

‘Von Schaumburg, I think. Let the Kommandant of Greater Paris call him personally. Tell them all to come. We'll make a party of it and go out in style.'

‘Then we'd better include the préfets of Paris, Barbizon and Fontainebleau.'

‘
Yes … yes, all of them, Louis. Now get me to a doctor, will you? I think I'm going to pass out.'

The flame of a single candle lit the room. Ackermann sat on the only seat, a wooden stool from medieval times. The casket still lay open with its burlap sacks of rocks. A black-out curtain had been placed over the window and stuffed into the hole in the glass to stop the draughts.

It was the loneliest of vigils and the night was long. ‘You have the choice of honour, General,' said St-Cyr quietly.

‘Do you think I don't know that?' snapped Ackermann.

‘Burial with full military honours, General. A family name that is unbesmirched. No reflections on your wife and daughters. A hero of the Reich until the end of time.'

‘You and Kohler will die with me. This place will be sacked and burned to the ground. The countess and the others will be shot.'

‘A common grave, is that it, eh?'

‘
Yes
, that's it. I've won, St-Cyr. There's no possible way you and that Bavarian traitor can get out of it.'

‘Hermann is a man whose loyalties have been placed in confusion by events over which he had little control.'

‘It'll do him no good to say those two tried to arrest me.'

‘Then I will leave you with this, General. Until the dawn, eh? Let us hope the others arrive at first light. Me, I am anxious for it all to end.'

He placed a single 9 millimetre cartridge next to the candle, then laid the general's empty Luger beside it. ‘My apologies if I do not take the handcuffs off you, General. I will check in from time to time. Should you feel the call of nature, please do not worry. I will be armed, of course, and always there will be someone else both to lock me in here with you and to let me out when I knock.'

Ackermann smirked at him. The Frenchman nodded adieu, then went over to the door and rapped soundly on it.

The key turned, the door came open only with difficulty, and he stepped out into the hall.

It was Mademoiselle Arcuri, not the servant who had accompanied him. She locked the door again and left the key in the lock. ‘How's Hermann?' he asked. There was a torch in her hand.

They'd speak in whispers, their voices hushed. ‘Fine. There's always the danger of tetanus, but Dr Cartier has used much antispetic and has sewn up the cheek. Me, I have given your friend lots of brandy. He's now asleep.'

‘And René and the countess?' he asked.

He was such a sensitive man, this Jean-Louis St-Cyr. No cop she'd ever met had been quite like this. ‘Renè is fast asleep ‘ exhausted, poor thing. He … he has told me the truth of what happened.'

She looked steadily at him, didn't shy away from it. ‘Hermann had to kill Jensen, Mademoiselle Arcuri. There was absolutely no other alternative.'

‘Yes … yes, I understand but will your friend really do this for my son?'

He must be kind. There was so little hope. ‘He will, but you must pack some things for the boy and see that someone is ready to hide him at a moment's notice. The Germans, madame … Two of their SS are dead. Even if they had killed each other, someone else must pay the price. This we cannot avoid. I wish with all my heart it were different but …'

She stopped him with a look. ‘And Jeanne?' she asked.

‘Yes … Yes, the countess as well.'

Doubt showed. ‘Would it do any good for her to speak to Hans?' A last attempt.

‘No … No, I have already tried. I'm sorry. It… it was of no use.'

‘She won't try to sleep. She can't. She paces up and down and goes from room to room chasing memories and having a last look.'

‘That is as it should be, madame, and I am sorry I cannot offer more.'

‘Will they really send you to the salt mines?'

‘Silesia? Ah no, no, they will have a little something else in mind.' The firing squad.

Again doubt showed in the look she gave him. There was hesitation too, but this was quickly followed by resolve. ‘Then it doesn't matter, does it, if your wife should come back to you?'

‘Marianne …? Ah, I don't know what she'll decide to do. I haven't really had a chance to think about it lately. She'll either be there waiting at the house or she won't. My son Philippe as well, of course, but the Germans won't let me see them. Of this I'm certain, so in a way it really doesn't matter what she does since I won't know of it in any case.'

They both fell silent. Mademoiselle Arcuri hunched her shoulders against the cold and gripped the torch more firmly as its beam passed over the floor at their feet.

‘Madame, I …' He felt so useless at things like this.

She looked up suddenly. ‘Please, there is no need to say anything, Inspector.'

‘Until the morning then? Try to get a little sleep, eh? You'll need your strength. You'll have to be stronger than you've ever been.'

Just before dawn an icy mizzle drifted over the Vouvray area. One could taste the smell of wet, decaying leaves, of vines and ripe, fermenting grapes, of woodsmoke, fresh dung and distant coal-fired furnaces.

Thick and blanketing everything, it made greyer still the grey of the château's walls as the light began to grow.

St-Cyr waited. The fog was a nuisance. Would it slow Boemelburg and the others? Was it only a local phenomenon?

Boemelburg's Daimler purred from under the entrance arch, its headlamps unblinkered. A great, shining Mercedes followed – von Schaumburg was taking second place, or was that the General Oberg's car from the avenue Foch?

‘They've all come,' said Ackermann with a contemptuous snort. ‘So, a little something for them to witness.'

A third car entered – another German staff car – then a fourth, a black Citroën, the car of Osias Pharand.

The Préfet of Paris followed in the Peugeot the Germans had allowed him. Three men tumbled from it, and even at a distance, St-Cyr recognized the préfets of Barbizon and Fontainebleau.

Ackermann took off his cap and placed it carefully to one side on the walk. ‘There are some letters I would like delivered. One is to my Führer, explaining everything. One is to my superiors, and one to my wife and family. Please see that the General von Schaumburg receives them.'

Not the General Oberg. At the very end, Ackermann couldn't find it in his heart to trust the SS. ‘I will, of course,' said St-Cyr. ‘Is there anything else, General?'

A look, a last word, a prayer … They were standing right in the middle of the château's inner courtyard, right next to the central fountain whose stone greyhounds viciously leapt at a cornered stag.

‘No. No, there is nothing. You may go.' The fountain had been turned off and the pond drained for the winter.

The countess had come out of the front door to stand on the steps beside Mademoiselle Arcuri and her son; so, too, the parents of Jérome and Yvette Noel.

Hermann, walking as quickly as he could, had reached the first of the staff cars and had given the Nazi salute. St-Cyr turned his back on Ackermann – he'd have to take that chance. He began to walk diagonally across the grounds towards the cars and Osias Pharand.

The fog was everywhere. Ackermann would wait until he'd reached Pharand and had turned to watch him just like the rest of them.

‘Louis …?'

‘A moment, Chief. A general must do his duty.'

Ackermann looked so very alone out there, standing rigidly to attention in his black uniform and giving the Nazi salute like that.

St-Cyr began to count silently. The muzzle of the Luger went into Ackermann's mouth. No one moved. There was a hush broken only by the whirring flight of a small covey of pigeons.

The shot, when it came, tore the roof off Ackermann's head and echoed from the surrounding walls.

It was Hermann who led them to the stables and who said in all seriousness, ‘They tried to arrest him, Herr Sturmbannführer, and he killed them.'

‘With a pitchfork?' asked Boemelburg blandly.

‘With a pitchfork, Herr Sturmbannführer, and a pistol.'

Boemelburg studied this man who was an outright liar and a thief at times but a damned good cop.

Kohler took a chance and turned aside. ‘Offer the Generals von Schaumburg and Oberg a deal, Herr Sturmbannführer,' he said quietly.

‘A deal…?'

‘It's in the interests of all of us.'

‘Yours in particular, Hermann?'

‘No, Herr Sturmbannführer. The honour of the Reich.'

Boemelburg nudged the corpse of Jensen with a toe. The prongs of the pitchfork would have made a mess of the kidneys. ‘Proceed,' he said, indicating they should go outside.

‘The price of that honour has been paid and guilt fully admitted, Herr Sturmbannführer. Tell them the whole matter should now be forgotten. Berlin will want the trowel of racial purity to smooth everything over and hide the defective mortar.'

In other words, shut up about it. ‘Neither you nor I can tell generals anything, Hermann. What's in it for von Schaumburg?'

‘Peace, I think, with Berlin first but also with yourself and the General Oberg. Let's face it, Herr Sturmbannführer, all three of you must know you have to coexist somehow. No more taps on the General von Schaumburg's line. No more watching his men – especially those like his nephew of which nothing whatsoever will be said. It's really a very small price to pay.'

‘Steiner … Yes, yes, I can see that might help. There is one small matter for your tender ears, Hermann. Glotz was in charge of the investigation into that Resistance business with St-Cyr. He caught the lot of them and they're in the Cherche-Midi but will soon be transferred to Dachau and Mauthaussen. St-Cyr's pair of broken shoes proved useful. Louis will, of course, be upset.'

‘Is that all he'll be?' asked Kohler warily.

Boemelburg didn't flinch from it. ‘Glotz, being under Herr Himmler's patronage, was a little over-zealous, Hermann. They had uncovered a tripwire attached to the front gate but had failed to remove it or to defuse the bomb.'

Kohler swallowed hard and blinked his one good eye. ‘Louis's wife and kid?' he asked. In the name of Jesus, would this madness never end?

The Head of the Gestapo in France nodded. ‘Only pieces of them, Hermann. The house is a mess.'

Outrage came from deep inside him. ‘Did Ackermann and his boys wire it?' demanded Kohler, looking off towards the body which still lay out there in its no man's land. ‘That bastard would have said nothing of it to Louis in hopes the poor schmuck would go home and blow himself to pieces.'

‘Let's just say Glotz has been sent to Kiev, Hermann, filling the place you were to have taken.'

Then Glotz had left the bomb to pay them back. ‘I'll try to tell Louis when we pick up the monk's confession. I'll leave it for now,' said Kohler.

Boemelburg studied him. ‘Just don't become too friendly with your partner, Hermann. Louis is far too loyal a Frenchman. The girl with the shoes … Apparently Louis came face to face with her in a café. He told the proprietor that whole business with the Resistance was a terrible mistake.'

‘I'll watch him. I won't let him get in the way and I won't let him get into any more trouble.'