The mother cut in hastily, ‘Non, monsieur, je vous en prie —!’ Her words were broken off by a loud thud from outside. They all looked at the windows. Men were running across the apron, away from the Caravelles. The CRS motorcycles snarled out from under the wings and two men leapt from the driver’s cabin of the Total fuel convoy.
White smoke was drifting along the belly of the ‘La Princesse d’Aquitaine’, crawling up the sides of the fuselage close to the jets. In the lounge somebody screamed. There was a movement, shouting, pressing round the windows.
Neil was halfway across the floor when it happened: a roaring boom, followed by a crack that shook the plate-glass. The slim silver body of the Caravelle had burst into black billows of smoke that opened into swelling cauliflowers of orange flame, spreading across the runway, covering the second and third Caravelles, while the sirens started up and bells began to ring inside the terminal. The seductive girl’s voice purred from the ceiling, unobtrusive, undisturbed: ‘Tous les passagers munis de cartes de police numerotées —’
They were ordered back to the main hall. The little girl was trotting after her mother, still whining about the doll. The mother turned at the door and slapped her, and the child set up a high artificial scream of pain that wailed down the corridor towards the departure desks.
Neil took a last look across the lounge and wondered if he would ever see it again. Perhaps in another hour, two hours, after nightfall. He saw the little old man stumbling across the floor with his Empire clock, at the heels of the black-haired fishwife who led the way with her pile of parcels held aloft, like some ludicrous offering to the gods. To answer what prayer? Neil wondered, walking slowly, drunkenly, wanting to curl up in a corner and sleep.
He passed the three CRS at the departure desk and asked wearily, ‘Have you any idea at all when we’ll be leaving?’
One of them grinned: ‘Next year perhaps — if it goes on like this.’
Neil walked on into the main hall, between the hunched waiting crowds; and he wondered how long the end would now be, and how it would come, and who would do it.
CHAPTER 3
The sun went down and Colonel Broussard sat up in his cramped rented flat, smoking opium and staring at his reflection in the table varnished like a dark mirror. In his left hand he held a long-stemmed pipe of china clay; in his right, in the closed palm, lay the 100-sestertii piece that had once paid off Brutus’ troops in Egypt.
Across the table sat two para troop captains, their adjutants, and Broussard’s personal bodyguard and chauffeur, Serge Rassini — the big black-haired Corsican with the bandit moustache. They had been in conference all afternoon, passing orders on the heavy transmitter concealed in the metal box that Broussard had carried on Atnos. After Guérin’s arrest Broussard had taken command of the Secret Army, organizing first the defence of the barricades, and later the dispersal of the combat units, hiding of arms and explosives, and regrouping of the commando units.
He had first learnt of the surrender of the barricades on a transistor radio inside the Préfecture. The broadcast, seven hours ago, had been shrill and confused, on a pirate channel operating from the Cité de l’Université. The collapse had come almost before any resistance could be given. He had known that the students would be the first to break, but had hoped that the paras and the legionnaires would hold out at least until nightfall, when the Army might come over to their side.
But the Army had not come over. Instead, the students had panicked, allowing the Gardes Mobiles to storm the Cité de l’Université with heavy artillery, battering through whole buildings, leaving lanes of rubble, trailing tram-wires, buckled lamp-standards and bodies bleached with dust and plaster. The assault had taken even the paras and Foreign Legion units by surprise; they had pulled back in confusion, dispersed, fought sporadic gun-battles through cellars and across rooftops, and finally followed the students in a chaotic surrender.
Broussard had fled through the back of the Préfecture and set up headquarters in his flat, where he had sat at first bitter and dejected, cursing the students for their cowardice, cursing the treachery that had delivered up General Guérin, knowing that it was Guérin’s arrest, and not the guns of the Gardes Mobiles, which had really broken the barricades. The opium had gradually soothed him. The conference was now almost over. There remained only one thing to be settled: the affair of the Englishman who had betrayed Guérin.
Broussard sucked at his clay pipe, breathing out a sweet smoke that filled the room like incense. The bowl of the pipe was small and shallow as a salt-spoon, holding the shrivelled kernel of burnt opium which bubbled slightly as he inhaled.
The paratroop officers folded their files into briefcases, stood up and saluted, the door held open by their adjutants. Broussard saluted them with his closed fist holding the gold sestertii coin. His mind was dulled, his nerves rested, the machinery of thought working slowly, pleasantly, clear in purpose, knowing precisely what must be done. His power remained, orders and responsibility had been delegated. He smoked in silence.
Only Serge Rassini stayed seated opposite him across the polished table, checking the latest report from the airfield.
Anne-Marie came in with a pot of coffee and placed it on the table between them. Broussard made a faint motion with his hand and murmured, ‘Stay a moment!’ She sat down
