road and by lunchtime Guy Florian had seen both documents. At three in the afternoon Soviet Ambassador Leonid Vorin, who had lunched with Alain Blanc, arrived at the Elysee, talked briefly with the president and then hurried back to his embassy in the rue de Grenelle.
Returning to Colmar aboard the turbo-train from Strasbourg at seven on Sunday evening, Lansky hurried the few steps from the station across the place to the Hotel Bristol where he found his two companions waiting impatiently for him in Vanek's bedroom. He told them how he had dealt with Noelle Berger and Vanek was relieved. 'It means Philip is now alone in the house and we may be able to turn his girl's disappearance to our advantage, but we must advance the time of our visit…'
`Why?' asked Lansky. 'Late on a Sunday night would be much safer. ..'
`Because,' Vanek explained with sarcastic patience, 'Philip will soon begin to worry about what has happened to her. If we leave him to worry too long he may call the police…'
While Lansky had been away in Strasbourg the other two men had continued their research on Robert Philip, each of them taking turns to watch No. 8 from a small park further down the Avenue Raymond Poincare while they pretended to feed the birds or to be waiting for someone. And it was because it was difficult to keep Philip's villa under observation from a closer point-and a tribute also to their skill-that they escaped the notice of the occasional patrol-car which came gliding along the avenue while the officer behind the wheel checked on the same villa.
At three in the afternoon, throwing bread for some sparrows, Vanek saw Philip emerge from the house, come down the steps and walk to the gate which he proceeded to lean on while he smoked a cigarette. Slipping behind a tree, Vanek used the monocular glass he always carried to study the Frenchman close up. Under the flashy, camel- hair coat he wore, Vanek noticed between the railings that the Frenchman was still clad in pyjama trousers. On Sundays Philip rarely dressed; slopping about the house in his night-things was his way of relaxing. And also, he was thinking, that when Noelle returned it would be so much easier to flop her on the bed when all he had to divest himself of was pyjamas. Left alone in the house, Philip was lusting for his latest mistress.
`That could be a bit of luck, too,' Vanek informed Brunner later, 'bearing in mind the method we shall adopt…'
It was close to nine o'clock when Brunner walked up the steps leading to the porch of No. 8 and rang the bell. At that hour on a Sunday the snowbound Avenue Raymond Poincare was deserted and very silent. Lights were on behind the curtained bay window at the front and Brunner's ring on the bell brought a quick-but cautious-reaction. A side curtain overlooking the porch was drawn back and Philip stood in the window, still wearing his dressing-gown over his pyjamas. Holding a glass, he stared at Brunner suspiciously, then dropped the curtain. A few moments later the door was opened a few inches and held in that position by a strong chain.
`Mr Robert Philip?' Brunner inquired.
`Yes, What is it?'
Expecting to see Noelle Berger laden with packages, Philip was taken aback by the arrival of this stranger. Brunner presented the Siirete Nationale card he had carried since the Commando had left Tabor.
`Surete, sir. I am afraid I have some bad news about an acquaintance of yours, a young lady. May I come in for a moment?'
Worried as he was about his mistress, Philip was a wary man who had not survived all these years in the half-world of gunrunning by accepting people or identity cards at face value; in fact, he himself had more than a nodding acquaintance with false papers.
`I don't know you,' he said after a moment. 'And it just happens that I know most of the police in Colmar…'
`That doesn't surprise me…' Brunner made an impatient gesture. 'I was transferred here from Strasbourg only last week…'
`Wait there while I get some clothes on…' The door slammed shut in Brunner's face. Inside the hall Philip frowned, sensing something odd about this unknown visitor. He reached for the phone on a side-table and something hard and pipe-like pressed against his back, digging through the silk dressing-gown as a voice spoke quietly. 'If you make a sound I shall shoot you. Take your hand away from that phone. Now, face the wall…' While Brunner was distracting the Frenchman's attention, keeping him at the front of the house, Vanek had gone round the side-path to the back of the house. He had followed the same route earlier-soon after dark when Philip had drawn the curtains over the front windows-and had found the french doors which were locked and without a key in the hole. Now, using the skeleton keys, he had let himself inside and come into the hall while Philip was talking to his unexpected visitor.
`Don't move… Vanek pressed the Luger muzzle against Philip's back again to remind him it existed, then he turned the key in the front door, drew the bolt and removed the chain. Brunner himself turned the handle, came inside and closed the door quickly. 'Fasten it up again,' Vanek ordered. 'No one saw you? Good…'
Prodding Philip up the staircase ahead of him, Vanek waited until they were on the upper landing, then handed the Luger to Brunner and quickly explored the first floor. All the curtains were closed in the darkened bedrooms and he found what he was looking for leading off a large double bedroom at the back -a bathroom. Switching on the light, he studied the room for a moment and then nodded to Brunner who prodded Philip inside his own bathroom. 'What the hell is going on?' the Frenchman blustered. 'The police station is just round the corner and..'
`The Police Nationale headquarters is in the rue de la Montagne Verre which is well over a kilometre from here,' Vanek informed him quietly. 'Now, take off your clothes.'
`My brother and his wife will be calling…'
`The clothes…'
Brunner rammed the Luger barrel hard against him. Philip stripped, taking off dressing-gown and pyjamas until he was standing gross, hairy-chested and naked. Frightened by the coolness of Vanek, he still had some spirit left as he asked again what the hell this was all about.
`Haven't you heard of burglars?' Vanek inquired. 'It is a well known fact that a man without any clothes on is in no position to run about the streets seeking help-especially on a night like this. And before we leave we shall rip out the phone cord. Standard practice. Don't you read the newspapers?'
Telling him they were going to tie his feet to the taps, they made him lie down inside the bath and then Brunner turned on both taps, mingling the water to a medium temperature. The Frenchman, growing more frightened every second, for the third time asked what the hell was going on. It was Vanek who told him.
`We want to know where the safe is,' he said. 'We have been told you have a safe and you are going to tell us where it is…'
`There is no safe…'
`If you don't tell us where it is my colleague will grab hold of your feet and drag you under…'
`There is no safe,' Philip screamed.
`Are you sure?' Vanek looked doubtful, still aiming the Luger at Philip's chest. The bath continued to fill with water at a rapid rate. 'We wouldn't like you to lie to us,' Vanek went on, `and we shall be very annoyed if we search the place and find one…'
`There is no safe! There is money in my wallet in the bedroom-over a thousand francs…'
Brunner switched off both taps and stared at Philip who was now sweating profusely. Bending down, the Czech took hold of the Frenchman's jaw firmly, then pushed his face close to Philip's. Vanek moved to the other end of the bath and took hold of both the Frenchman's ankles. Half-sitting, half-lying in the bath, Philip braced himself, prepared to be dragged under, still protesting there was no safe in the house. Suddenly, he felt the grip on his ankles released as Vanek, in a resigned voice, said, 'I think perhaps he is telling the truth…' Philip relaxed. Brunner jerked the jaw he held in his hand upwards and backwards in a swift, vicious movement and the back of Philip's head struck the bath with a terrible crack. 'He's dead,' Brunner reported as he checked the pulse and then Philip slid under the water and his face dissolved into a wobbling blur.
`The correct sequence,' Vanek commented. 'The medical examiner will confirm he died by striking his head before he immersed himself. Get finished quickly…
Vanek checked the large double bedroom, looking under the bed, on the dressing-table, inside the wardrobe. The few feminine clothes confirmed to him that the girl who had been followed to Strasbourg by Lansky was only a brief visitor, so he set about removing traces of her presence. Taking a suitcase engraved with the initials N.B., he piled in her clothes, her night-things, her cosmetics and six pairs of shoes, her lipstick-stained toothbrush from the bathroom shelf and two lace-edged handkerchiefs from under a pillow. There would still be traces of her presence in
