Flykiller

Cold against the hand that clutched her bag and valise, she felt the metal of St-Cyr’s revolver. Three short, quick taps were given, three longer ones, and then, again, the first three.

An SOS. A warning.

Kohler knew he didn’t have much time, but Gott sei Dank, Madame Ribot had yet to toss off her wine.

Unaware of his presence, Ferbrave and the others had left the suite, even putting the lock on and closing its outer door. The woman reached to replace the telephone receiver only to find that this Kripo had slipped back into the room.

Beneath the palm prints and files she’d given them, she had earlier placed two photos, ready for a last glimpse. ‘The one is of myself,’ she said, ‘taken in the autumn of 1900, here in Vichy, when I was thirty-two and had been left with but a few sous and a two-year-old daughter; the other is of that daughter in the summer of 1922, at Royan. Last year I sent her to America, and every week since then she has both telephoned and written me two letters, though now they no longer reach me and she can no longer telephone.’

As of 11 November 1942. ‘And the girl who’s with her?’

The photo had been taken of them standing under the canvas tarpaulin of a rustic porch overlooking the Atlantic. Middy blouses, pleated skirts, bobbed hair, cloches and smiles. A homeward-bound sardinier was in the near distance, the sloop close in to the wind.

‘I think you know that is Noelle Olivier, Inspector. She begged me to let my Marianne accompany her and the twins, who were then nine years old, and I agreed, though I had my doubts. Noelle’s objective was not only to get away from Vichy and its vicious gossip, but to settle her mind and search out the meaningful in life. The children loved that holiday and grew even closer to her, and to my Marianne.’

‘And Monsieur Olivier, who disowned them three years later?’

‘Has never for a moment forgotten my daughter nor myself. It was he who arranged to get Marianne and her little family safely out of France. As for the twins and his disowning them, is it not now better for them that he continue to do so?’

A wise woman. Royan was at the mouth of the Gironde, about equidistant between the U-boat pens at La Pallice, near La Rochelle, and those at Bordeaux. Lovely in the summer of 1922, no doubt, but a far cry from what was to come.

The photo of Madame Ribot showed her in a wide-brimmed, tailored-suit hat, round whose crown was wrapped a matching ostrich plume. From under that brim, two dusky eyes gazed steadfastly to one side of the lens, the nose fine and long and a regular ski jump, the face a soft, clear oval whose lips, unpainted and unparted, were perfect.

A white silk neckerchief, pinned with a single stick-pearl, stylishly set off the hat and the plain black, seersucker dress. No earrings were worn – those had probably already been pawned. The auburn hair was pinned up under that hat. An extremely genteel and handsome woman who had just spent her last sou on a portrait to launch her career.

Magnificent, but he couldn’t let it influence him. Louis would only be fussed if he didn’t indicate the telephone. ‘That’s one of his pipelines, isn’t it? Keyed through the switchboard downstairs but elsewhere also – the old Poste, Telegraphe et Telephone building next door, eh? That’s why that little thumb-switch is on the base of the transmitter. When Laval comes for advice, the switch is thrown and the receiver left off the hook if possible; if not, you simply relay to Olivier later on what was said.’

A Gestapo would have dragged her from the room. This one hadn’t. ‘In 1900 I knew I faced an uncertain and difficult future, Inspector. In 1940 it could only be more so, but as for my being a conduit for anyone but my clients, I could not possibly say.’ She would replace the receiver now, Violette told herself, and then raise her glass in salute.

Ah damn the French and not just Louis. Must they constantly force him into choosing? ‘Don’t. Please don’t, madame. Prussic acid’s reaction isn’t pleasant to watch, and we’re on your side. Just keep it handy. Maybe it won’t be needed.’

The hand with the receiver gestured. ‘Then is it, Inspector, that you do not suspect Monsieur Olivier of having killed those girls, but have decided it was Charles-Frederic Hebert?’

Persistent. Mein Gott, but must she insist? ‘Since you’ve let the one know I’m still here, perhaps you’d ask him where he is.’

‘And give away the treasure of treasures?’

‘Just do it!’

‘I can’t. I hang up and take the acid!’

Kohler moved. The glass shattered as it hit one of the filing cabinets, the receiver was replaced, the line having gone dead.

‘Please, you must not lead them to Monsieur Olivier, Inspector. He has no one but himself, having warned the others to stay away and go to ground.’