“Yes, I am,” Flick said coldly. “If we have a shootout now, we’re finished-the mission is blown, whatever happens. Ruby’s life is not as important as disabling the telephone exchange. Put away the damn gun.”
Paul tucked it under the waistband of his trousers.
The conversation between Ruby and the Militian became heated. Flick watched with trepidation as Ruby shifted the three baskets to her left hand and put her right hand into her raincoat pocket. The man grabbed Ruby’s left shoulder in a decisive way, obviously arresting her.
Ruby moved fast. She dropped the baskets. Her right hand came out of her pocket holding a knife. She took a step forward and swung the knife up from hip level with great force, sticking the blade through his uniform shirt just below the ribs, angled up toward the heart.
Flick said, “Oh, shit.”
The man gave a scream that quickly died off into a horrible gurgle. Ruby tugged the knife out and stuck it in again, this time from the side. He threw back his head and opened his mouth in a soundless cry of pain.
Flick was thinking ahead. If she could get the body out of sight quickly, they might get away with this. Had anyone seen the stabbing? Flick’s view from the window was restricted by the shutters. She pushed them wide and leaned out. To her left, the rue du Chateau was deserted except for a parked truck and a dog asleep on a doorstep. Looking the other way she saw, coming along the pavement, three young people in police-style uniforms, two men and a woman. They had to be Gestapo personnel from the chateau.
The Militian fell to the pavement, blood coming from his mouth.
Before Flick could shout a warning, the two Gestapo men sprang forward and grabbed Ruby by the arms.
Flick quickly pulled her head back in and drew the shutters together. Ruby was lost.
She continued to watch through a narrow gap between the shutters. One of the Gestapo men banged Ruby’s right hand against the shop wall until she dropped the knife. The girl bent over the bleeding Militian. She lifted his head and spoke to him, then said something to the two men. There was a short exchange of barked words. The girl ran into the shop and came out with a storekeeper in a white apron. He bent over the Militian, then stood up again, his face showing distaste-whether for the man’s ugly wounds or for the hated uniform, Flick could not tell. The girl ran off, back in the direction of the chateau, presumably to get help; and the two men frog-marched Ruby in the same direction.
Flick said, “Paul-go and get the baskets Ruby dropped.”
Paul did not hesitate. “Yes, ma'am.” He went out.
Flick watched him emerge onto the street and cross the road. What would the storekeeper say? The man looked at Paul and said something. Paul did not reply but bent down, swiftly picked up the three baskets, and came back.
The storekeeper stared at Paul, and Flick could read his thoughts on his face: at first shocked by Paul’s apparent callousness, then puzzled and searching for possible reasons, then beginning to understand.
“Let’s move quickly,” Flick said as Paul came into the kitchen. “Load the bags and out, now! I want us to pass through that checkpoint while the guards are still excited about Ruby.” She quickly stuffed one of the baskets with a powerful flashlight, her disassembled Sten gun, six 32-round magazines, and her share of the plastic explosive. Her pistol and knife were in her pockets. She covered the weapons in the basket with a cloth and put in a slice of vegetable terrine wrapped in baking paper.
Jelly said, “What if the guards at the gate search the baskets?”
“Then we’re dead,” Flick said. “We’ll just try to take as many of the enemy with us as we can. Don’t let the Nazis capture you alive.”
“Oh, my gordon,” said Jelly, but she checked the magazine in her automatic pistol professionally and pushed it home with a decisive click.
The church bell in the town square struck seven.
They were ready.
Flick said to Paul, “Someone is sure to notice there are only three cleaners instead of the usual six. Antoinette is the supervisor, so they may decide to ask her what’s gone wrong. If anyone shows up here, you’ll just have to shoot him.”
“Okay.”
Flick kissed Paul on the mouth, briefly but hard, then went out, with Jelly and Greta following.
On the other side of the street, the storekeeper was staring down at the Militian dying on the pavement. He glanced up at the three women, then looked away again. Flick guessed he was already rehearsing his answers to questions: “I saw nothing. No one else was there.”
The three remaining Jackdaws turned toward the square. Flick set a brisk pace, wanting to get to the chateau as quickly as possible. She could see the gates directly ahead of her, on the far side of the square. Ruby and her two captors were just passing through. Well, Flick thought, at least Ruby is inside.
The Jackdaws reached the end of the street and started across the square. The window of the Cafe des Sports, smashed in last week’s shootout, was boarded over. Two guards from the chateau came across the square at a run, carrying their rifles, their boots clattering on the cobblestones, no doubt heading for the wounded Militian. They took no notice of the little group of cleaning women, who scuttled out of the way.
Flick reached the gate. This was the first really dangerous moment.
One guard was left. He kept looking past Flick at his comrades running across the square. He glanced at Flick’s pass and waved her in. She stepped through the gate, then turned to wait for the others.
Greta came next, and the guard did the same. He was more interested in what was going on in the rue du Chateau.
Flick thought they were home and dry, but when he had checked Jelly’s pass he glanced into her basket. “Something smells good,” he said.
Flick held her breath.
“It’s some sausage for my supper,” Jelly said. “You can smell the garlic.”
He waved her on and looked across the square again. The three Jackdaws walked up the short drive, mounted the steps, and at last entered the chateau.
CHAPTER 50
DIETER SPENT THE afternoon shadowing Michel’s train, stopping at every sleepy country halt in case Michel got off. He felt sure he was wasting his time, and that Michel was a decoy, but he had no alternative. Michel was his only lead. He was desperate.
Michel rode the train all the way back to Reims.
A doomy sense of impending failure and disgrace overwhelmed Dieter as he sat in a car beside a bombed building near the Reims station waiting for Michel to emerge. Where had he gone wrong? It seemed to him that he had done everything he could-but nothing had worked.
What if following Michel led nowhere? At some point, Dieter would have to cut his losses and interrogate the man. But how much time did he have? Tonight was the night of the full moon, but the English Channel was stormy again. The Allies might postpone the invasion-or they might decide to take their chances with the weather. In a few hours it might be too late.
Michel had come to the station this morning in a van borrowed from Philippe Moulier, the meat supplier, and Dieter looked around for it, but could not see it. He guessed the van had been left here for Flick Clairet to pick up. By now she might be anywhere within a radius of a hundred miles. He cursed himself for not setting someone to watch the van.
He diverted himself by considering how to interrogate Michel. The man’s weak point was probably Gilberte. Right now she was in a cell at the chateau, wondering what was going to happen to her. She would stay there until Dieter was quite sure he had finished with her; then she would be executed or sent to a camp in Germany. How could she be used to make Michel talk-and fast?
The thought of the camps in Germany gave Dieter an idea. Leaning forward, he said to his driver, “When the Gestapo send prisoners to Germany, they go by train, don’t they?”
