Jackdaws

She soon found out what it was. She looked again and saw him striding across the restaurant toward her, with four Gestapo types trailing him. The head waiter came after them, a look of panic on his face.

Keeping her face averted, Flick walked away.

Franck went straight to Diana’s table.

The whole place suddenly became quiet: customers fell silent in midsentence, waiters stopped serving vegetables, the sommelier froze with a decanter of claret in his hand.

Flick reached the doorway, where Ruby stood waiting. Ruby whispered, “He’s going to arrest them.” Her hand moved toward her gun.

Flick again caught the eye of the SS major. “Leave it in your pocket,” she murmured. “There’s nothing we can do. We might take on him and four Gestapo men, but we’re surrounded by German officers. Even if we killed all those five we’d be mowed down by the others.”

Franck was questioning Diana and Maude. Flick could not make out the words. Diana’s voice took on the tone of supercilious indifference she used when she was in the wrong. Maude became tearful.

Franck must have asked for their papers, because the two women simultaneously reached for their handbags, on the floor beside their chairs. Franck shifted his position so that he was to one side of Diana and slightly behind her, looking over her shoulder, and suddenly Flick knew what was going to happen next.

Maude took out her identity papers, but Diana pulled a gun. A shot rang out, and one of the uniformed Gestapo men doubled over and fell. The restaurant erupted. Women screamed, men dived for cover. There was a second shot, and another Gestapo man cried out. Some diners ran for the exit.

Diana’s gun hand moved toward a third Gestapo man. Flick had a flash of memory: Diana in the woods at Somersholme, sitting on the ground smoking a cigarette with dead rabbits all around her. She remembered what she had said to Diana: “You’re a killer.” She had been right.

But Diana did not fire the third shot.

Dieter Franck kept a cool head. He seized Diana’s right forearm with both his hands and banged her wrist on the edge of the table. She screamed with pain and the gun fell from her grasp. He yanked her out of her chair, threw her facedown on the carpet, and fell on her with both knees in the small of her back. He pulled her hands behind her back and handcuffed her, ignoring the screams of pain she gave as he jerked her injured wrist. He stood up.

Flick said to Ruby, “Let’s get out of here.”

There was a crush at the doorway, panicky men and women all trying to pass through at the same time. Before Flick could move, the young SS major who had been staring at her earlier sprang to his feet and grabbed her arm. “Wait a moment,” he said in French.

Flick fought down panic. “Take your hands off me!” He tightened his grip. “You seem to know those women over there,” he said.

“No, I don’t!” She tried to move away.

He pulled her back with a jerk. “You’d better stay here and answer some questions.”

There was another shot. Several women screamed, but no one knew where the shot had come from. The SS officer’s face twisted in a grimace of agony. As he slumped to the floor, Flick saw Ruby, behind him, slipping her pistol back into her raincoat pocket.

They both forced their way through the crowd at the door, shoving ruthlessly, and burst out into the lobby. They were able to run without drawing attention to themselves, because everyone else was running.

Cars were parked in a line along the curb in the rue Cambon, some of them attended by chauffeurs. Most of the chauffeurs were hurrying toward the hotel to see what was happening. Flick picked a black Mercedes 230 sedan with a spare wheel perched on the running board. She looked into the front: the key was in the dash. “Get in!” she yelled at Ruby. She got behind the wheel and pulled the self-starter. A big engine rumbled into life. She engaged first gear, heaved the steering wheel around, and accelerated away from the Ritz. The car was heavy and sluggish, but stable: at speed, it cornered like a train.

When she was several blocks away she reviewed her position. She had lost a third of her team, including her best marksman. She considered whether to abandon the mission and immediately decided to carry on. It would be awkward: she would have to explain why only four cleaners had come to the château instead of the usual six, but she could make up some excuse. It meant they might be questioned more closely, but she would take that risk.

She dumped the car in the rue de la Chapelle. She and Ruby were out of immediate danger. They walked quickly to the flophouse. Ruby rounded up Greta and Jelly and brought them to Flick’s room. She told them what had happened.

“Diana and Maude will be questioned immediately,” she said. “Dieter Franck is a capable and ruthless interrogator, so we have to assume they will tell everything they know-including the address of this hotel. That means the Gestapo could be here at any moment. We have to leave right away.”