Michael glanced back at one word: opera. “Adam attends the Paris opera?” he asked.
“All the time,” McCarren answered. “He doesn’t have a lot of money, but he spends most of it on that caterwaulin’ nonsense.”
“He shares a box at the opera house with two other men,” Gaby said, beginning to see what Michael was driving toward. “We can find the exact box, if you like.”
“Could we get a message to either of Adam’s friends?”
She thought about that for a moment, then shook her head. “No. Too risky. As far as we know, they’re not his friends, just civil service employees who rent the box with him. Either one of them might be working for the Gestapo.”
Michael returned his attention to the photographs of Adam and made sure he knew every inch of that bland, expressionless face. Behind it, he thought, something very important was locked away. He could smell that now, as surely as he could smell the Burgundy on Pearly McCarren’s breath and the musky scent of gunsmoke on Gaby’s skin. “I’ll find a way to get to him,” Michael said.
“In broad daylight?” McCarren lifted his shaggy, flame-colored eyebrows. “With the Nazis watchin’?”
“Yes,” Michael answered, with authority. He held McCarren’s gaze for a few seconds, and the Scotsman grunted and looked away. How he was going to fulfill his mission, Michael didn’t know yet, but there had to be a way. He hadn’t jumped out of a damned airplane, he reasoned, to call it quits just because the situation appeared impossible. “I’ll need an identity card and the proper road passes,” he said. “I don’t want to be picked up before I get to Paris.”
“Follow me.” McCarren motioned him through a corridor into another room, where a camera was set up on a tripod and a couple of men were working at a table, carefully inking in the last touches on forged Nazi passes and ID cards. “You’ll get your picture taken and we’ll make your cards look well used,” McCarren explained. “The boys here are old hands at this. Come on, through here.” He went on into the next chamber, where Michael saw racks of various Nazi uniforms, bolts of field-gray and green cloth, caps and helmets and boots. Three women were busy at sewing machines, stitching on buttons and insignias. “You’ll be a communications officer, in charge of keepin’ the phone lines workin’. By the time you leave here, you’ll know everythin’ about the Germans’ wire systems, and you’ll be able to recite your units and their locations in your sleep. That’ll be two days of intensive study. Also time for the Jerries to settle down upstairs. You’ll go to Paris with a driver. One of my Andres. We’ve got a nice shiny staff car hidden not too far from here. The big chief says you know your German, so startin’ at oh-eight-hundred hours that’s all you’ll be speakin’.” He dug out a pocket watch and flipped it open. “Which gives you about four hours to wash up and get some sleep. I expect you’ll need it.”
Michael nodded. Four hours was more than enough sleep for him, and he wanted to get the war paint and dust off his face. “You’ve got a shower down here?”
“Not quite.” McCarren smiled faintly and glanced at Gaby, who had followed them in. “This place was built by the Romans, back when Caesar was a big chief. They liked their baths. Gaby, will you take charge of our friend?”
“This way,” Gaby said, and started out of the chamber with Michael a few paces behind.
“Gaby?” McCarren waited until she’d stopped and looked at him. “You did a damned fine job out there.”
“Merci,” she answered, with no hint of pleasure at being praised. Her sapphire-blue eyes, stunning in her dusty, chiseled face, focused on Michael Gallatin. They regarded him with nothing but cool, professional respect. One killer to another, Michael thought. He was glad they were both fighting on the same side. “Follow me,” she told him, and he did, through the chilly underground corridors.
3
“There’s your tub,” Gaby told him, and Michael stood looking at a stone vat about fifteen feet across and four feet deep, full of water in which a few dead leaves and grass floated. “Here’s your soap,” she said, and tossed him a hard white brick from a wooden rack on which were also several ratty-looking but clean towels. “We just put the water in a couple of days ago.” She motioned toward a large stone spout that emerged from the wall over the vat. “I hope you don’t mind bathing in water that’s already been used.”
He put on the best smile he could manage. “As long as that’s all it’s been used for.”
“No, we’ve got somewhere else for that.”
“The comforts of home,” Michael said, and suddenly Gaby pulled off her dusty sweater and began to unbutton her blouse. He watched her undress, not knowing how to respond, and she looked at him as she took her blouse off and her bra was exposed. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said, without pausing as she reached back and unhooked her bra. “I’ve got to wash, too.” The bra fell away, and her breasts were in full view.
“Oh no,” Michael said. “I don’t mind at all.”
“I’m glad. Even if you did, it wouldn’t matter. Some men are… you know… shy about bathing with women.” She took off her boots and socks, and began to unzip her slacks.
“I can’t imagine,” Michael answered, more to himself than her. He took off his cap and unbuttoned his jumpsuit. Without hesitating, Gaby removed the last of her underwear and, totally naked, walked to a set of stone steps leading down into the water. She descended them, and Michael heard her catch her breath as the water crept up her thighs and reached her stomach. Spring water, he thought. Drawn through an ancient Roman system of pipes into what served as a communal bath, possibly in a temple of some kind. Gaby took the last step, the water just over her breasts, and finally released the air she’d been hoarding. It was chilly enough down here without wet skin, but he didn’t care to go to Paris without bathing for the next two days. He stepped out of his underwear and walked down the steps. The cold water shocked first his ankles, then his knees, then… well, it was an experience he was not likely to forget.
“Bracing,” Michael said, with gritted teeth.
“I’m impressed. You must be used to cold baths, yes?” Before he could answer, she walked to the center of the pool and ducked her head under. She came up quickly, and pushed her thick black hair back from her face. “The soap, please?” She caught it when he tossed it to her, and began to lather her hair. The soap smelled of tallow and oatmeal, definitely not a brand bought in a Parisian boutique. “You thought fast back at Bazancourt,” she told him.
“Not particularly. I just took advantage of an opportunity.” He ducked down to his neck in the water, trying to get accustomed to the chill.
“Do you do that often?” she asked, her hair dripping suds. “Take advantage of opportunities?”
“It’s the only way I know.” The wolf’s way, he thought. One took what was offered.
Gaby soaped her arms, shoulders, and breasts, her movements fast and efficient instead of slowly seductive. Nothing was being offered here, Michael thought. Gaby was simply getting a job done. She seemed to be totally unconcerned about the fact that her tight, supple body was less than seven feet away from him, and that lack of concern-her confidence that she could deal with whatever problem that arose-intrigued him. But the chill water permitted only twitches, no arousal. Michael watched as she soaped as much of her back as she could reach; she didn’t ask him to do the rest. Then she lathered her face, ducked underwater again, and came up rosy-cheeked. She tossed him the soap. “Your turn.”
Michael scrubbed the camouflage paint off his face. The harsh soap stung his skin. “The lights,” he said, and nodded toward the two bulbs that hung on wires at the wall. “How do you get electricity down here?”
“We’ve spliced into the lines that feed a chateau about two miles away,” Gaby said. She smiled faintly, suds still in her hair. “The Nazis are using it as a command post.” She rinsed her hair once more, getting the rest of the soap out; the suds floated around her like garlands of lace. “We don’t use the electricity except between midnight and five A.M., and we don’t drain enough for them to notice.”
“Too bad you don’t have a water heater.” Michael doused his head under and wet his hair, then soaped it and washed the grit out of it. He scrubbed his chest, arms, and face again, rinsed himself off, and caught Gaby staring at his uncamouflaged features.
“You’re not an Englishman,” she decided, after a few seconds of studying him without war paint.
“I’m a British citizen…”
“Perhaps you are… but you’re not English.” She stepped closer to him. He smelled the natural fragrance of her clean flesh, and he thought of an apple orchard blooming white under a springtime sun. “I saw a lot of
