Jackdaws

She leaned over Gilberte to look at the fourth corpse. It rose up from the floor in a swift motion. Before she had time to scream, it grabbed her by the hair and thrust the barrel of a gun into the soft flesh of her throat.

It was Dieter Franck.

“Drop the gun,” he said in French.

She was holding the submachine gun in her right hand, but it was pointing up and, before she could aim it, he would be able to shoot her. She had no choice: she dropped it. The safety catch was disengaged, and she half-hoped the impact of its fall would fire the gun, but it landed harmlessly on the earth.

“Back away.”

As she stepped back, he followed her, getting out of the car, keeping the gun at her throat. He drew himself upright. “You’re so small,” he said, looking her up and down. “And you’ve done so much damage.”

She saw blood on the sleeve of his suit and guessed she had winged him with her Sten gun.

“Not just to me,” he said. “That telephone exchange is every bit as important as you obviously believe.”

She found her voice. “Good.”

“Don’t look pleased. Now you’re going to damage the Resistance.”

She wished she had not been so fierce in ordering Paul and Ruby to wait in hiding. There was now no chance they would come to her rescue.

Dieter shifted the gun from her throat to her shoulder. “I don’t want to kill you, but I’d be happy to give you a crippling wound. I need you able to talk, of course. You’re going to give me all the names and addresses in your head.”

She thought of the suicide pill concealed in the hollow cap of her fountain pen. Would she have a chance to take it?

“It’s a pity you’ve destroyed the interrogation facility at Sainte-Cécile,” he went on. “I’ll have to drive you to Paris. I’ve got all the same equipment there.”

She thought with horror of the hospital operating table and the electric shock machine.

“I wonder what will break you?” he said. “Sheer pain breaks everyone eventually, of course, but I feel that you might bear pain for an inconveniently long time.” He raised his left arm. The wound seemed to give him a twinge, and he winced, but he bore it. He touched her face. “The loss of your looks, perhaps. Imagine this pretty face disfigured: the nose broken, the lips slashed, one eye put out, the ears cut off”

Flick felt sick, but she maintained a stony expression. “No?” His hand moved down, stroking her neck; then he touched her breast. “Sexual humiliation, then. To be naked in front of many people, fondled by a group of drunk men, forced to perform acts of grossness with animals..

“And which of us would be most humiliated by that?” she said defiantly. “Me, the helpless victim… or you, the real perpetrator of obscenity?”

He took his hand away. “Then again, we have tortures which destroy forever a woman’s ability to bear children.”

Flick thought of Paul and flinched involuntarily.

“Ah,” he said with satisfaction. “I believe I have found the key to unlock you.”

She realized she had been foolish to speak to him. Now she had given him information which he could use to break her will.

“We’ll drive straight to Paris,” he said. “We’ll be there by dawn. By midday, you will be begging me to stop the torture and listen to you pour out all the secrets you know. Tomorrow night we will arrest every member of the Resistance in northern France.”

Flick was cold with dread. Franck was not bragging. He could do it.

“I think you can travel in the trunk of the car,” he said. “It’s not airtight, you won’t suffocate. But I’ll put the corpses of your husband and his lover in with you. A few hours bumping around with dead people will put you in the right frame of mind, I think.”

Flick shuddered with loathing. She could not help it.

Keeping the pistol pressed to her shoulder, he reached into his pocket with his other hand. He moved his arm cautiously: the bullet wound hurt but did not incapacitate him. He drew out a pair of handcuffs. “Give me your hands,” he said.

She remained motionless.

“I can either handcuff you, or render your arms useless by shooting you in both shoulders.”

Helpless, she raised her hands.

He closed one cuff over her left wrist. She moved her right toward him. Then she made her last desperate move.

She struck sideways with her handcuffed left hand, knocking his gun away from her shoulder. At the same time she used her right hand to draw the small knife from its hidden sheath behind the lapel of her jacket.

He flinched back, but not fast enough.

She lunged forward and thrust the knife directly into his left eye. He turned his head, but the knife was already in, and Flick moved farther forward, pressing her body up against his, ramming the knife home. Blood and fluid spurted from the wound. Franck screamed in agony and fired his gun, but the shots went into the air.

He staggered back, but she followed him, still pushing the knife with the heel of her hand. The weapon had no hilt, and she continued to shove until its entire three inches had sunk into his head. He fell backwards and hit the ground.