The Milliner's Secret (37 page)

She caught Una’s eye then, only to see her friend’s expression petrify. Four men stood at the edge of the dance floor. They were looking from couple to couple, as if crossing faces off a list. Tall and well-built, they were not typically French. Neither was the cut of their suits. Coralie saw them confer, then signal to Ottilia’s dance partner.

Coralie’s partner had seen them too. ‘They are officers of the Gestapo. It seems they wish to question your friend.’

‘They’ll have made a mistake. Otill— ’ She cleared her throat. ‘Ottilie is a bit dim, but she’s no danger to anyone.’ Ottilia was being led off the dance floor, towards the men.
Take your time
,
Coralie urged wordlessly
. You are a florist from rue de Madrid, enjoying a last night out in Paris before going to your aunt at Perpignan.

One of the Gestapo was less heavy-set than his fellows. He had a facial scar, and round spectacles that gave him the look of a scholar. Or even a cleric. A Homburg hat was wedged under his arm and he was taking off leather gloves, presumably so he could search inside Ottilia’s bag. She was proffering it meekly. There was nothing alarming in his demeanour.

He raised a succession of items up to the light. A lipstick, a pen, the gold cigarette holder. Finally, an ID card, which he inspected with agonising thoroughness.

When he gave the handbag back to Ottilia, Coralie let out her breath, but relief was short-lived. More questions, it seemed, and soon Ottilia was making the fluttering gestures that prefigured tears or sometimes hysteria.
You are Ottilie Dupont, who trained at a technical school on the Left Bank. You are unemployed because there are no flowers in Paris.

Had Dietrich summoned these men? Had he followed them, perhaps from the Bois de Boulogne or avenue Foch? Coralie looked at Arkady, a horrible thought stealing in.
He
might have been trailed to Ramon’s. The Gestapo might already have taken Noëlle and Ramon, Dietrich making good his threat . . .
Your child for my child
. Stop it, she ordered herself, or you’ll be in hysterics before Ottilia. Maybe somebody here had called in the secret police . . . Coralie’s gaze found Serge Martel, and he stared back at her for the count of twenty, then put his hand to his heart and gave a small bow.

The Gestapo had Ottilia surrounded.

‘Where will they take her?’ Coralie asked her partner.

‘The Gestapo have a place on avenue Foch, with prison cells and interrogation rooms.’ Ulrich put distance between them. ‘You went with that woman to the ladies’ room. You were gone a long time.’

‘We were fixing our faces.’ Her voice split. ‘Touching up our lipstick.’

‘But she
is
your friend?’

‘Not really. I hardly know her.’

There. Betrayal was so easy and she was no better now than Serge Martel or her father.
I have to be
, she told herself.

They were taking Ottilia towards the stairs, two Gestapo holding her arms. Four men, to remove a woman as slender as a wine-glass stem.

Coralie muttered an excuse to Ulrich, and, afraid he would try to stop her, ran as if to the lavatories. Changing direction, she cut behind some tables, keeping to the shadows. In her haste, she stepped out of one borrowed shoe, turning her ankle. Excruciating, but she mentally blanked out the pain and pulled off the other shoe. The club’s stairs were lit by tea lights, a candle on each step. Coralie climbed soundlessly, knowing the arrest-party was just ahead of her. Perhaps Ottilia had, belatedly, put up a fight. Coralie could hear her demanding her cloak in near-hysterical German. So much for being mild-mannered Ottilie Dupont.

Coralie had no particular plan and her only weapon was a hatpin. And even though it was a nice sharp one, it wouldn’t fell four trained policemen. There was just a chance that, as they left the club, she could slide between them and whatever vehicle they drove. If she could get Ottilia running, they might seize their one advantage: the streets of Paris. Coralie knew the back ways, the cut-throughs. If they made it as far as the Butte de Montmartre, she’d find the ancient, rustic lanes where no car could follow. She stepped forward. It was, literally, now or never.

A hand clamped hard over her mouth. Somebody had come noiselessly behind her. She tried to kick but was bodily lifted up the last few stairs, and shoved hard against the wall. A voice said in her ear, ‘Don’t fight me.’

Dietrich.

‘I can’t save you both. Kurt.’ Another shape loomed. ‘Take over and keep her quiet.’

Time to draw a breath, then a different hand covered her mouth. She heard Dietrich shout, ‘Major Reiniger, stop, please. I have new orders regarding the woman von Silberstrom.’

A challenge was given in answer, then Coralie heard Dietrich again: ‘I am Generalmajor von Elbing and I am to take this woman to Luftwaffe Headquarters. She is of great interest to the Reich and to my superiors. Hand her over, please.’

Coralie got a corner of her mouth free. Her man – had Dietrich called him Kurt? – had a softer grip and must have decided she didn’t need to be put in a wrestling hold.

She asked, ‘
Was tut er jetzt
?’

‘Pulling rank. Let him get on with it.’

Dietrich was challenged again. One of the Gestapo – Reiniger, presumably – demanded, ‘On whose orders, Generalmajor?’

‘On the orders of the commander in chief of the Luftwaffe. On Reichsminister Göring’s orders.’

‘He isn’t in Paris. I must know who gives you orders here.’

‘Reichsminister Göring.’ Dietrich remained polite, but with an edge. ‘Are you questioning the instructions of the man who answers directly to the Führer?’

Silence. Had Dietrich overshot himself? Coralie couldn’t see much, but she could hear Ottilia’s frightened breathing.

Dietrich tried a more conciliatory tone: ‘I suggest, Reiniger, you return with me to avenue Marigny and put your doubts to General Hanesse, my immediate superior. I should perhaps have explained that it was he who issued this order following a telephone call from Berlin.’

‘I know the general. We’ll take the woman away with us and call on him in the morning.’

‘But the general is leaving Paris early tomorrow.’ Dietrich made a thoughtful sound. ‘Here’s an idea. He will be dining at the Ritz, now, at his usual table. He won’t object too strongly to our disturbing him, I’m sure. Let’s go and find him.’

That seemed to be the secret code, the ‘Open, Sesame.’ Coralie heard the scuffle of shoes and at last saw a female shape in the darkness. The shape dissolved, but somebody moved fast towards it. A swing door bumped open and closed.

A car engine fired nearby. Ottilia was gone, but was she safe?

They waited, Coralie and the companion she had not yet seen. A muttered discussion took place among the Gestapo men, seasoned with profanities. At last, the swing doors bumped again, several times, and they were gone. The club’s majordomo, the cashier and the cloakroom attendant crept out of a side-room. A low-powered light came on.

Coralie glanced up and screamed. The man beside her possessed a face out of a horror film. Much of one cheekbone and the jaw beneath had been cut away, flesh stretched over bone. Scar-like sutures showed where it had been stitched. The eye above, the right eye, was covered with a black patch.

A sardonic smile suggested that her reaction was not new. ‘Oberleutnant Kurt Kleber, friend and colleague of Generalmajor von Elbing. And, no, I don’t know where he’s taking that lady, but I’m to conduct
you
to a safe house.’

That house turned out to be Ottilia’s place on rue de Vaugirard. Coralie recalled Dietrich saying that he’d moved into a place ‘special to us’.

Kleber helped Coralie from the staff car that had brought them from the club. Her ankle had swollen alarmingly.

‘This house is Luftwaffe property,’ Kleber said, misreading her hesitation. ‘The Gestapo will not force their way in.’ He took her arm. ‘You are all right? You are not wearing shoes.’

‘I turned my ankle, like an idiot.’

Kleber helped her inside to the lift. They ascended to the second floor, where she’d come so often with Dietrich in the summer of 1937. Preparing to hobble around packing cases, Coralie was astonished to find the flat bare, a pristine blue carpet covering the floorboards.

‘What happened to all the crates?’

Kleber helped her to a sofa. ‘Do you mean the art collection that was stored here? Generalmajor von Elbing shipped it out as soon as he moved in downstairs. I saw the last few crates being loaded up.’

‘Where was it sent?’

‘You will have to ask him.’ Kleber brought up a footstool and talked of sending for a doctor.

‘Cold water and cloths will do.’ When he came back with them, she asked, ‘Where has Dietrich taken my friend?’

‘I really cannot say. Is there anything I can bring you to make your stay here more comfortable?’

She felt like saying, ‘My daughter,’ but in the end requested an aspirin, toiletries, some garment to sleep in. Oh, and something to eat. She was anxious about Noëlle, Ottilia, Una and herself. Yet, somehow, ravenous. ‘Who lives in this flat?’

‘Nobody. I share the one downstairs with Dietrich. Two other personnel were here for a while, but they’ve been put back on active duty. I expect you could do with a drink.’ Kleber reached into a sideboard and brought out a bottle of pale spirit. ‘Kirsch?’

‘If it’ll help the pain go away.’

He handed her a glass, saying, ‘We have met before.’

‘I don’t think so.’ She’d have remembered.

‘Oh, we have. You came with Dietrich to the German pavilion at the Expo, though we weren’t introduced. You were wearing pink.’

‘I was. You’re right.’ And the shock of seeing Dietrich and two well-dressed men exchanging Nazi salutes had never left her. Neither stranger had looked remotely like this unfortunate fellow, however.

A smile moved one side of Kurt Kleber’s face. ‘I have changed, I hardly need say. I was caught in an explosion. Perhaps you will remember if I say that I was the elder of the two who met ¬Dietrich, the less handsome one.’

‘Is the other man here too?’

‘No, at war.’ Kleber topped up her glass and promised he’d telephone Luftwaffe HQ opposite, and ask for a dinner to be brought from the kitchens there.

‘What about the Corvets, the concierge and his wife? Don’t they still live here?’

Kleber looked blank. ‘German staff come in daily from across the road to clean. Apart from that, we look after ourselves. Never fear, there is a bed freshly made up. Shall I show you? No? Very well. I will bid you goodnight.’

He clicked his heels and left.

Coralie stayed on the sofa, emptying her glass sip by sip. Kurt Kleber had called this a ‘safe house’ but that could mean anything, depending on the motives of the people operating it. If Dietrich was really her enemy, she was in deep trouble, but she felt less afraid of him now. Serge Martel, on the other hand . . . an informant. A collaborator. A smiling enemy. As she knocked back the last of her drink, she tested her ankle. The cold compress had done some good and she made it to the bathroom. She wanted to wash away the smell of the Rose Noire, and all traces of the enemy’s touch.

CHAPTER 22

There is a particular sound a person makes when slipping back into a steaming bathtub. Coralie made that sound, then felt guilty. Noëlle might be awake, calling for her. Even so, she admitted, as she lathered soap into a flannel, a few moments’ bliss would not bring down the sky.

Curls wrapped in a towel turban, she was half asleep when the sound of a key turning in a lock roused her.

She heard, ‘
Guten Abend!
’ A man’s voice. Someone bringing her dinner? She’d assumed the domestic staff at Luftwaffe HQ would be female, but thinking about it, they were much more likely to be military stewards. She lay absolutely still, except that she pushed the big toe of her uninjured foot into the cold-water tap to stop its loud, giveaway drip.

There came a light rap at the door. ‘Take your time, Coralie. Dinner will arrive in half an hour.’

‘Dietrich?’

‘I’m leaving clothes for you, from Ottilia’s cupboard. She will not mind as you are such good friends now.’ He spoke French, rather haltingly. ‘Unless, of course, you wish to dine in that very revealing evening dress.’