Flykiller

The photo showed them playing chess in the trenches, and for a moment Ines couldn’t stop her eyes from smarting, her fingers from trembling. ‘Could you let me have this?’ she asked, her voice unfortunately faint. ‘I … I haven’t many, and none like it.’

Jesus, merde alors, just what the hell was she hiding? ‘Later, when we’ve our killer or killers.’ The photos of Noelle Olivier as a cabaret dancer and with a grey gelding just like the one Lucie had kept were hardly noticed. ‘Now let me have that handbag of yours Albert was so interested in.’

‘You’ve already seen its contents. Would you scatter them in front of all these ladies and treat me as a common criminal, Inspector, when I’m most definitely not? Believe me, there’s nothing but the usual. A lipstick I seldom use because of the ersatz things they put in it. The key to my studio. My papers, I assure you, are fully in order. There are some tissues, a pencil and paper to sketch with if I wish …’

‘The phial of perfume. Let’s start with that.’

The Shalimar … ‘My aunt loved that scent.’

‘And so did the Marechal who gave it to Noelle Olivier and insisted she wear it.’

‘As did Celine and myself. A coincidence.’

‘And nothing else, eh?’ he snorted with disbelief.

Though he didn’t dump her bag out on the table, Herr Kohler found the phial and, unscrewing its cap, brought it to his nose, holding it there until satisfied. ‘Now tell me why the one with the almond oil isn’t here?’

But is it with the portrait mask, the blocks of beeswax and sculpting tools? Sticking plasters, too, and iodine with which to patch up battered detectives … ‘I simply tried the oil, Inspector, and finding it wasn’t what it was supposed to have been, put it in my case with my other first-aid supplies.’

‘Having spilled a touch of it?’

‘Yes, unfortunately, since I could, quite possibly, have used it for baking if … if I could have somehow managed to find the flour.’

‘Then tell me why that one has just brought your valise into the restaurant?’

Her back had been to them, but now the sculptress turned as she hesitantly got to her feet to look towards the entrance.

From her solitude next to the windows, Blanche Varollier had done the same thing.

Ines’s hand was limp. The kid didn’t even tremble. Too frightened and with good reason, thought Kohler, having stepped close to her.

Without a fedora, but with briefcase crammed under one arm and valise gripped in the other hand, Gessler stood with Herr Jannicke just inside the entrance, potted Kentia palms in dark blue jardinieres to their left and right, the ex-shoemaker short, broad-shouldered and bull-necked, the top button of the lead-grey overcoat undone; the other one tall, and with his black overcoat all buttoned up, the scarf loose, the black homburg in hand, his thick black hair receding and combed straight back off the high, wide brow.

Gessler’s expression was grim and sour, for he’d not liked the sight of all these ladies indulging themselves so frivolously when there was a war on, and for him there had always been a class war, ever since the days of the Blood Purge.

The big ears stood out, the eyes squinted with distaste, slanting downward to the left and right of a nose that had, no doubt, been bloodied by barrel staves more than once for the sake of the Party.

His tie was crooked; Herr Jannicke’s was perfect. Gessler’s moustache was grey, not brown like the Fuhrer’s, so he hadn’t dyed it like many did. The face was grey too, and wide, the close-cropped Fritz haircut all but reaching to Herr Jannicke’s right shoulder.

‘You let me handle this,’ breathed Kohler. ‘Don’t you dare disgrace me.’

‘My valise …’ It was all the kid could manage, for the two had now set out to join them. Gessler knocked against anyone who happened to be in the way. The gossip died as arrest seemed imminent until silence swelled to fill the void and all other motion had ceased.

Louis hadn’t got to his feet. Louis knew his revolver was in his overcoat pocket here at this table.

Heels didn’t clash, salutes were not given. The valise was set on the table, smashing things and causing the sculptress’s teacup to tip. Milk and cold tea flooded into the tablecloth.

They didn’t shout, didn’t shriek. They simply blocked any exit, Herr Gessler speaking rapidly in Deutsch, Ines trying desperately to fight down her sickness and pick out a word or two of meaning. Berlin … Kohler’s reputation as a … Slacker? she wondered, watching each of them closely, trying hard not to bolt and run but to remain still so as to fathom what was happening to her … to her!

‘Dieser Fliegentoter, Kohler. Ich warte schon …’ I’ve been waiting … For your report? Four murders and you arrest an Idiot and then let him go? ‘Was ist mit ihn los, Herr Jannicke?’ What is it with him?

‘Herr Oberstleutnant, I can explain.’