Breathlessly Lise stopped short at the end of the street.
She had managed to catch up with Soustelle after leaving her place, but in the dark, both staying with him and avoiding his detection was not easy. It did not take long for her to realize that he was heading directly for Michel’s. She would literally have had to fly in order to outdistance the ill-intentioned Frenchman and warn Michel before his arrival, even taking paths his auto could not traverse. So she contented herself to follow as closely as she dared. She only hoped some way help would present itself. Now she was almost to Michel’s apartment.
Soustelle braked his Renault and stepped out. Lise could proceed no farther because her prey had not gone directly to the building. Instead, he had crossed the street and was now conferring with two agents—either Gestapo or S.D., she couldn’t tell from where she stood—who had been hiding in the shadows directly across from the building. Soustelle was not in this alone; the suspicions must be more widespread than she thought if they had the whole place under surveillance!
Lise waited where she was and watched.
After his brief conversation with his comrades, the French detective turned toward the building. Michel cannot possibly have returned by now! she thought. In desperation she had phoned him ten minutes ago, nearly losing Soustelle as she had paused at a phone booth. But by then she had been sure of his destination and decided to risk the delay. In any case, there had been no answer. What was Soustelle up to? Did he plan to wait for Michel inside the building?
While she was puzzling over what to do, suddenly Lise saw Logan approaching from the opposite end of the street. He was already closer to the building than she, unaware of the two agents watching opposite, who had ducked out of sight at his approach. Lise couldn’t call out a warning now without alerting the enemy too, and there was no telling how many agents Soustelle had posted about the place.
She had to warn Michel of the trap awaiting him!
While the watching agents were hidden, Lise, now on foot, darted across to the same side of the street as the apartment, edged her way closer, trying to keep out of view. By now Logan had already entered the building.
Lise hastily scrambled her way around a corner and to an alleyway she knew. There was only one thing for her to do now—she had to try to get to Michel inside the building, and before Soustelle got his hands on him. If only she wasn’t already too late!
Once out of sight from the front, Lise tore down the alley and to a side entrance to the building she and Michel had used several times. Once inside she quietly ran along the corridor to the main staircase, turned, and sneaked hurriedly up the stairs toward Michel’s apartment.
———
Logan’s senses were keenly enough honed that he should have sensed his danger, even if his eyes did not see it.
But it was four in the morning, and he had been on his feet for twenty-four hours. All he could think of was a hot bath and a few hours sleep.
He turned in to his building, unconscious of all the eyes upon him, and trudged up the stairs to his second floor flat.
He unlocked his door, pushed it open, and entered.
Suddenly his dull senses sprang to life. A faint whiff of something lingered in the thick, dark air . . . a strange odor he had noticed on one or two other occasions. Where had he been when he had detected it before? Hadn’t it been when he and von Graff—
But the moment Logan remembered, and thus recognized his danger, it was too late.
Licorice!
In the very instant of the realization, suddenly the large hands of Arnaud Soustelle grabbed him from behind, wrapping a vise-grip around his shoulders and neck.
“So, Anglais!” he growled menacingly. “We meet again! But this time it is I who seem to have the advantage.”
Logan struggled to free himself, but he was no match for the overpowering bulk and street-trained skill of the Frenchman. Soustelle laughed scornfully at the attempt, then threw him crashing up against an adjacent wall, twisting Logan’s arm up mercilessly behind him. The moment Logan felt the cold steel of a blade against his throat, he ceased his writhing to get loose.
“I would like to save you for the Gestapo,” rasped Soustelle, panting from the effort of his attack on Logan, “but it would grieve me not the least to slit your throat here and now!”
“What do you have against me?” asked Logan, his voice choking from one of Soustelle’s muscular arms.
“Nothing I do not share against all Englishmen!” replied Soustelle, hatred oozing from his tone.
“I thought we were on the same side, Soustelle!” said Logan, though all his instincts told him the charade was over.
“I know all about you, MacVey, or Tanant, or Trinity, or whatever your name might be.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“It’s all over, don’t you understand? I know you are a British agent!”
“Even von Graff knows that! Why do you think I’m so useful to him?”
“You are through playing games with me!” sneered Soustelle. “It’s over, I tell you. You’re still a British agent, through and through. And I think I can also prove that you are L’Escroc.”
“That’s absurd, Soustelle! Wait till I tell von Graff that you—”
The Frenchman pressed the knife against Logan’s skin. “Shut up, you miserable Anglais! You may swindle the stupid Germans, but the game is up with me. Perhaps you would like to confess now, and save us the trouble of interrogation, eh?”
Even as he spoke, Soustelle began to drag Logan toward the door of the apartment and onto the landing. Once there, he didn’t much care whether the Anglais went voluntarily or if he had to kick him tumbling down the stairs. He had him now!
“So, how did von Graff find out?” asked Logan, trying to buy time.
“Von Graff, bah!” spat Soustelle as he kicked open the apartment door and began dragging Logan toward the head of the stairway about ten feet away. “As far as that witless Nazi is concerned, you are still his little pet!”
“Well, I’m impressed, Soustelle,” taunted Logan. “I never thought you had it in you.”
“Why you filthy—!” Soustelle raised his knife ominously into the air. “I’ll kill you now—”
All at once a shot rang through the quiet corridor.
The first thought that raced through Logan’s bewildered brain was that the Frenchman must have an accomplice. Then the heavy body of his attacker slumped, and he felt the grip of his arms loosen before the ponderous heft of the ex-detective collapsed lifelessly to the floor.
The next instant, before he had a chance to collect his wits, the door below burst open and the building was filled with shouting German voices.
“The shot came from upstairs!”
“Follow me!”
“Two of you, around back!”
Logan had no time to think. He could only react as the sounds of booted feet clamored onto the stairs and toward him.
He ran hastily back into his apartment, pausing only long enough to bolt the door. Then he turned, ran to his window, and climbed out onto the fire escape.
He could hear shouts and attempts to break in the door as he scrambled down, leaping to the hard cobbles only a moment before the Gestapo agents reached the alley.
Meanwhile, upstairs two other agents bent over Soustelle’s body, one pressing two fingers against the dead man’s carotid artery. He looked up and shook his head.
“What was the fool up to anyway?” he said, “coming in here by himself?”
“He probably didn’t think the suspect would resist,” answered the other.
“More likely he overestimated his own skill.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time.”
“And now he has a bullet in his back for his foolhardy independence.”
“What was he after, anyway?”
“He said nothing to me. Just wanted us to watch the building.”
“I’ll find a telephone; you see how the others are doing.”
———
While both men exited and walked back into the street, a slim figure stirred from a dark recessed corner of the upper corridor.
Still trembling, she rose, dropped the warm revolver into her handbag, and crept from her hiding place. She stole to the landing, stepped over the massive body, and tiptoed down the stairway, now deathly silent.
She tried not to think of what had just happened. Like Logan, before this moment she had never killed. But though she felt the same revulsion at taking another’s life, Lise experienced no tormenting self-recrimination.
There would be no regrets for her. She had done what she had done for a worthy cause. And she had saved the life of the man she now knew she cared more about than anyone she had ever met.