CLAUDINE WAS NOW in her sixth month of pregnancy, and though there were still times when she felt listless and depressed, on the whole she was coping much better than she had in the earlier stages. She never allowed herself to think about François now, and had firmly banished from her mind the memory of that terrible day when she had told him she was pregnant. Instead she concentrated on Armand, doing everything she could to recapture the friendship they had had before the harvest celebration. Of course, things were different now, they both knew that. There were times when her need for his love, his kindness, his comforting arms, reached such a pitch that, but for the fact that they were careful never to be alone together, she would have been unable to stop herself touching him.
As news of her pregnancy spread people had started to come from the nearby châteaux to see her, and some even motored down from Paris. She was happy to see them, but knowing that their presence was a constant reminder to Armand of the great difference between their lives, she was always relieved when they left. And in fact she was never happier than on the quiet days, when she could drop in to see Liliane and relax in the rocking chair beside the fire, while the old lady chattered on and the early spring sunlight shone in through the open window.
Little Janette and Robert Reinberg always kept a look out for her car, and if they saw it outside the St Jacques’ house, would come bounding along the street to see her. Madame Reinberg’s tailoring business was now beginning to thrive, and Claudine loved the way Armand spent whatever time he could with the two children, trying in his own way to make up to them for the loss of their father. They adored him, and Janette, who had discovered that one coy look from under her outrageously long lashes could persuade him to do anything, used her charms shamelessly.
Whenever Claudine went to the village she invariably arrived at midday, knowing that Armand and several other men from the vineyards would come in soon afterwards for their lunch. Sometimes, as she watched Armand helping himself to food or tossing back his wine, the coarse golden hair on his arms glinting in the sunlight, his handsome face intent on the business at hand, she would imagine what it would be like if it were just the two of them there, safe and secure in their love, with their child growing in her womb. It was a fantasy which she knew would only distress her later, when she was forced to return to the reality of her marriage, but she couldn’t deny herself the happiness of those few minutes spent dreaming of how things might be. Sometimes, rocking in the chair, she fell into a doze; then feeling a hand on her arm, she would look up and see Armand standing over her, his eyes alight with laughter and love as he gently teased her for snoring through her dreams. How she managed to stop herself reaching out for him then, she never knew.
But there were days when Armand was bad-tempered and snapped at everyone. When he was like that, Janette and Robert would take themselves off, the meals would pass in silence and Claudine would watch him with a heavy heart. It was always when François was at home that he was like this. She came less often then, knowing that during those times it hurt him, rather than pleased him, to see her.
The night before her birthday was one of the occasions on which François was at home. He gave her a diamond and ruby necklace in a Mauboussin box – at least, he left it on the table in their sitting-room for her to find. She hadn’t realized he even knew it was her birthday, but of course Solange or Louis would have told him. When she opened the box, she gasped. The necklace was the most beautiful and unusual she had ever seen, with three ruby crosses of Lorraine hanging from a three-tiered diamond neckband. It must have cost him a fortune.
She had intended to thank him over dinner, but he was so engrossed in talk with his father – France was being torn apart between the Left and Right, they were saying, and Louis was highly critical of Léon Blum’s intention of forming a new Popular Front government – that she decided to leave it until the next morning. But immediately after dinner, François informed them that he must return to Paris that night.
She allowed herself no feelings about the fact that he wasn’t intending to stay for her birthday, though somewhere in the deepest recesses of her mind, she thought she was pleased. Perhaps she was at last beginning to overcome her obsession with him. And besides, if he had stayed she would have had to cancel the party she was planning with Solange and Monique, for his presence would have made it impossible.
The morning of her birthday was the morning the Germans finally marched into Austria. But no one at Lorvoire heard the news that day, for it was the day Claudine had her accident.
She was woken early by the baby, who was being even more active than usual, and laughing, she clutched her hands to her belly and started to scold it. Then, thinking of Armand and the day ahead, she felt a sudden rush of happiness. She got out of bed and strolled onto the balcony outside her room, where the branches of the forest were almost close enough to touch and the sun glittered through the leaves.
A little while later she heard the sound of the door opening and then Magaly’s gasp of alarm. It wasn’t the fact that she was outside that had dismayed Magaly, it was that she was wearing nothing more than a rapturous smile.
‘Madame!’ Magaly cried. ‘You will catch a cold! Think of the baby!’
‘I am,’ Claudine said. ‘It’s so restless this morning, it’s as if it knows it’s my birthday.’ She ran her hands over her swollen stomach and started to murmur softly to her child. ‘I wish I could walk like this through the forest, Magaly,’ she said. ‘It seems so right to be naked with nature when I am carrying a baby.’
By the time Claudine was ready for breakfast, she was so happy she felt she might burst with it. She could hardly wait for midday, for all the vineyard workers had been invited to take their lunch at the château today, and so too had the children who were too young to be at school, their mothers and grandmothers, Father Pointeau and Doctor Lebrun. Even Florence Jallais was coming, though only because Armand had agreed to drive her in his van. So, apart from her family, all her guests would be village people, and she was looking forward to it so much that the only thing that had come close to upsetting her was that she couldn’t find François’ necklace. Never mind, she was too excited to worry about that now. And she began to sail down the stairs in her crimson wool maternity dress, looking, as she had told Magaly, exactly like someone in a bell tent.
It was as she reached the second flight that she heard the noise behind her. Everything happened so quickly then that no one had the chance to shout a warning. Yet when she remembered it later, it was as if it was all happening in slow motion – the clatter of china and silver making her pause, then turn, then she opened her mouth to scream as the footman’s body came thundering towards her. As she hit the stairs she felt something sharp dig into her shoulder, then her body seemed to be twisting away from her as the chandelier above started to spin. The last thing she knew was a blinding, star-spangled pain as her head struck the bottom stair.
Hearing the noise, Solange and Louis ran out into the hall, followed by the servants. Monique and Magaly came flying down the stairs, and the instant Magaly saw her mistress’s inert body entangled with the footman’s, and surrounded by the remains of a breakfast tray, she started to scream.
‘Jean-Paul!’ Solange barked. ‘Find Marcel …’
‘I’m here, madame.’
‘Marcel. Go for Doctor Lebrun. Monique! Get away, don’t move her. Tilde, Fabienne, fetch some blankets. Louis, take your medication. Now!’
The footman started to groan with pain. ‘It’s all right, Philippe,’ Solange told him, bending down to take his hand. ‘Marcel’s gone for the doctor. He’ll be here soon. Just lie still.’
It seemed an eternity before the doctor arrived, but in that time Solange managed to ascertain that Philippe had probably broken his leg. There was also a deep cut on his jaw, and an angry swelling had started over one eye. He was conscious, though it was clear from the way his head kept rolling from side to side that he was dazed and disoriented.
However, he would live – as would Claudine, Solange told herself vehemently. But her daughter-in-law’s lovely face was so pale, and though she had been rubbing her wrists for some time, and wafting smelling-salts under her nose, Claudine showed no signs of coming round.
Monique’s hands were resting gently on Claudine’s stomach, and when she met her mother’s eyes she shook her head. ‘It’s not moving,’ she whispered.
After leaving the château the night before, François had driven straight to the avenue Foch. Almost two months had passed since Élise had told him of Claudine’s pregnancy, and her affair with Armand, and he hadn’t seen her again in all that time.
Élise had been uneasy at his prolonged absence, particularly since he hadn’t even telephoned to say where he was. She knew he was in communication with his courier, Erich von Pappen, but for once von Pappen had refused to divulge François’ whereabouts – and her other methods of finding out had, on this occasion, failed her.
By way of comfort, she had reminded herself that a great deal had been happening in Europe over the past couple of months to interest François. Adolf Hitler had pronounced himself Germany’s Supreme Military Commander, and Lord Halifax was now the British Foreign Secretary. Most important of all, perhaps – at least, as far as François was concerned – the Nazi plot to annex Austria had been made public. Though the exposé had obviously come far too late, Élise thought, because Erich von Pappen had told her that the Germans were poised to walk into Austria the very next day.
She wondered how many other people knew that – and how much von Schuschnigg, Austria’s Chancellor, had paid François for information on the Nazi plot. But that was the kind of detail François never disclosed to anyone, and in truth it didn’t really interest Élise. All that mattered to her, as she sat alone in her drawing-room, was that at last he had telephoned to say he was coming.
Beneath her oyster silk peignoir she wore nothing but a pearly-white basque and gartered stockings. Her wonderful golden hair was loose and curling around her shoulders; her pale, luscious skin glowed in the amber half-light, and her ripe lips glimmered a delicate peach-colour. She knew it was the way he would want to find her, she knew too that tonight after such a long absence, he would simply take her, with no thought for her pleasure or care for his own savagery. But the very fact that his body craved such a release was enough to inflame the desire in her own, even if she must wait until the following morning for total satisfaction.
He arrived just after midnight. Hearing his key in the lock, she rose to her feet and, checking herself quickly in the mirror, turned to watch him walk in. The instant she saw his face, her heart contracted so painfully that it was all she could do to stop herself running to him. She had tried so hard to pretend she hadn’t missed him; that she wasn’t afraid he was angry with her because of what she’d told him about his wife; that she wasn’t terrified she might be losing him. But she had been all of those things – and more. It was impossible for her to forget how much she loved him, or how vulnerable that love made her.
But what she did sometimes forget was the way the air, the light, even the temperature, suddenly seemed to change when he walked into a room, and though outwardly she gave no sign of it, inside she was already melting under the burning heat of his eyes. He didn’t have to touch her for her to feel him, he didn’t have to speak for her to know what he wanted.
Her hand trembled slightly as she poured him a brandy, but her voice was steady as she said, ‘It is good to see you.’
He nodded, then reaching inside his coat, he took out a Mauboussin box and put it on the table. She eyed it greedily, knowing that whatever trinket lay inside would be exquisitely expensive.
‘The child is mine,’ he said.
Startled, she looked up – she hadn’t expected him to mention it so soon after arriving. They held one another’s eyes, and in the dim golden light she looked more like a mythical goddess than ever, and he more like a demon. Slowly her lips curled into a derisive smile. ‘That’s what she told you?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you believe her?’
‘Yes.’
She handed him the brandy, then sauntered across to the sofa but didn’t sit down. ‘François de Lorvoire, the cuckold,’ she jeered in her deep, throaty voice. She turned to face him. He was watching her, his eyes as inscrutable as ever and his lips wet from the brandy. ‘That is what you are, you know?’
He inclined his head, then put his glass on the mantle-shelf beside him.
‘You’re going to let her get away with it?’
‘With having my baby? Of course.’
‘If it is your baby. And what about St Jacques?’
‘What about him?’
A quick temper flashed in her eyes. ‘He is her lover,’ she snapped.
‘Is he? And just how would you know something like that, Élise?’
He appeared unruffled, but she hadn’t missed the dangerous edge in his voice. But it was a question she was prepared for, and was amazed he hadn’t asked it before.
‘Because it’s the talk of the countryside,’ she answered disdainfully, ‘and fast becoming the talk of Paris. Céline has visitors down there at Montvisse, they’re not blind to what goes on under their noses.’
‘I should have thought you were above idle gossip, Élise,’ he remarked equably. ‘However, there is a little truth in the rumours. My wife is in love with St Jacques – or so she tells me.’
‘And knowing that, you’re prepared to accept that the child isn’t his? You’re a fool, François.’
All the time they had been speaking, he had been moving towards her. Now he took his hand out of his pocket and pushed her peignoir down over one shoulder, ‘Do you think so?’ he murmured, feeding his eyes on the ample softness of her skin.
‘Do you care what I think?’
‘The only thing I care about, Élise, is that the child is mine.’ And peeling the peignoir from her other shoulder, he watched it drop to the floor. She looked down at his hand as he trailed it gently over the fine lace of her basque, then watched as he hooked his fingers into a cup of the brassière and eased it down over her plump breast to expose the achingly distended nipple. She took a breath to speak, but his fingers closed over the nipple, and with his other hand he grabbed her hair and tilted her face back to look at him. For a fleeting moment he saw Claudine’s lips before him, red and full and trembling, and as his mouth closed angrily over Élise’s he released her nipple and started to unbutton his fly.
He took her there on the sofa, so urgently and so swiftly that he didn’t even bother to take off his coat. The second time he pushed her over the dining table and took her from behind. Then he led her into the bedroom where he finally removed his clothes and lay down on the bed.
For a while they talked about what he had been doing while he was away, then he flicked back the bedclothes and pulled her on top of him. She rode him with a mounting frenzy while he looked up at her, his hands clasped behind his head, his face expressionless. His climax took longer to achieve that time, but when finally his eyes closed and she saw the muscles in his neck start to tense, she reached behind her and pushed her hand between his legs. His hips suddenly jerked from the bed, and as the semen started to shoot from him, he circled her waist with his hands and slammed into her so hard that she screamed for mercy. When he had finished he let her go, and within minutes he was asleep.
When Élise awoke the following morning she found herself wrapped in his arms, her back pressed against his chest, her bottom resting on his thighs and her head nestling against his shoulder. She lay quietly for some time, listening to his breathing and feeling the warmth of his skin on hers. She knew it was unlikely they would leave the room much before lunch, and for her, lying here like this was the first part of the love-making that would keep them there. This morning he would devote himself to her pleasure, just as last night she had given herself to his.
The fact that he believed Claudine’s child was his still rankled with her, but she knew better than to broach the subject again. She would decide later how best to handle Claudine’s pregnancy – she had only refrained from interfering until now because she had fully expected François to believe that St Jacques was the father. If he had believed that, she was certain that in one way or another he would have ended his marriage.
For her part, she had no idea whether St Jacques was the father or not. All she knew was that The Bitch was stealing the hearts of everyone she met, and though there were times when Élise doubted if François had a heart to steal, she had only to feel the way he was holding her now to know that, if he chose, he was as capable of love as any man. She also knew that if The Bitch gave birth to an heir, her hopes and dreams of one day becoming the Comtesse de Rassey de Lorvoire, and the mother of the future comte, would be destroyed.
Deciding it was time to wake him she looked at his arm, stretched out across the pillow, and slipping her fingers between his she pushed back against him, gently wriggling her hips. After a moment she did it again, and this time she knew she had woken him.
She turned to face him, and taking his bottom lip between her own, she sucked at it gently. Eventually she pulled away and looked into his eyes. She saw his sardonic smile as she threw off the blankets, then pushed him onto his back so that she could watch him come to full erection. Already his penis was hard, but she waited until it was straining to his navel before lifting her eyes to his. For a while they simply looked at one another, until he lifted a hand and pulled her to him, moulding his lips around hers. It was a long, succulent kiss which seemed to last forever. He drew her body closer so that she could feel the strength of his desire, before, keeping his lips on hers, he rolled her onto her back.
It was as he lowered his mouth to her breasts that the telephone started to ring. Élise groaned and started to sit up, but he pushed her back against the pillows. Smiling salaciously, she relaxed again, and allowed her legs to fall open as his fingers stroked her thighs. Any moment now it would be as if she had left her body, as if there was no room for anything but the overpowering sensation of his touch. But as her eyes fluttered closed, there was a knock at the door. Again she groaned, but this time in anger as her maid called, ‘Monsieur de Lorvoire! It is the telephone for you, monsieur. Your father wishes to speak to you.’
François had been on the point of telling her to go away, but hearing that it was his father, he pushed himself quickly from the bed and unhooked the robe he kept on the back of the door.
He was back within minutes. Élise was sitting up in bed, the blankets covering her to the waist, her beautiful yellow hair tumbling over her breasts. She smiled as he came in, but as she saw his thunderous expression her face froze.
‘What is it?’ she breathed.
Ignoring her, he started to pull on his clothes.
‘François! What is it? What’s happened?’
He didn’t answer until he was fully dressed, then he rounded on her with a fierceness that struck terror to her heart. ‘My wife has had a fall,’ he snarled. ‘The footman dropped a breakfast tray, slipped and collided with her on the stairs.’
‘What? But … Is she all right?’
‘I don’t know. The doctor’s with her now. But you, Élise, had better start praying that she is.’
‘François! What do you mean? Where are you going?’
He stopped at the door, then swung round to face her. ‘I don’t know how much you know about this, Élise, but I’m warning you, have that man out of my home before I arrive there, or so help me, I’ll kill you both.’
The door slammed behind him and she was left kneeling on the bed, her exquisite face ashen and her wide green eyes leaden with fear.
There were four of them: General Rudolf von Liebermann, Max Helber, Walter Brüning and Ernst Grundhausen. They were at a secret address in Berlin, in the sleazy, garbage-strewn backstreets of the city’s red light district. Apart from the chairs they were sitting on, there was no furniture in the room, and the two sash-windows which overlooked the striptease clubs, the shady bars and the rancid market stalls four floors below, were smeared with the filth and slime of several years.
Von Liebermann, the eldest and heaviest of them, and also the most senior in rank, waited for the others to complete their perusal of the documents he had handed them on their arrival. It was his way to present his Komitee with a chronicle of recently acquired intelligence at the start of each meeting, which they were required to read, without comment, from beginning to end. Then, when they had finished, he would address them. On this occasion, however, he had information over and above what was contained in the documents, and as he sat waiting patiently for his men to finish reading there was a hint of a smile on his pale lips. How convenient that a meeting had been arranged for today – it had saved him the trouble of locating the men in order to pass on the news which had reached him in the early hours of that morning.
At last it was time for him to speak. Lifting a hand to his mouth, he cleared his throat, and with no reference to anything they had read, he said, ‘The Wine Supplier’s wife has had a fall.’
The three faces staring back at him remained bland, and he experienced a quick thrill of satisfaction that he had chosen his men so well. Then he raised his brows, an indication that they were now permitted to speak.
‘Did the child perish?’ Grundhausen enquired.
‘Possibly,’ von Liebermann answered.
‘Possibly?’ repeated Max Helber, the man sitting to his right.
Looking at Helber’s youthful face and thick, full-blooded lips, von Liebermann felt a gentle stirring in his loins. He ignored it, and said, ‘For the moment, all I know is that his wife took a fall on the stairs at the Touraine château yesterday morning.’
‘Was it an accident?’ Helber asked.
‘If one were to take into account the fact that Philippe Mauclair has sustained a broken leg and dislocated his shoulder, then yes, one could refer to it as an accident.’
‘Clumsy of him,’ Helber remarked. ‘Where is he now?’
‘He has been removed from the château to a nearby hospital.’
Helber started to speak again, but was interrupted by Walter Brüning. ‘Was Mauclair acting under the instructions of the Pascale woman?’ he wanted to know.
Von Liebermann rubbed his jaw. ‘No,’ he said, drawing out the word.
Brüning smirked. ‘Halunke’s?’
Von Liebermann nodded, and shifted his corpulent frame.
‘Well,’ Brüning said with a sigh, ‘whether she ordered Mauclair to do it or not, La Pascale will no doubt be pleased to learn of the accident.’
‘No doubt,’ General von Liebermann agreed. ‘And I am thinking that the time is fast approaching when one of our people should pay her a visit.’
‘The Wine Supplier won’t like that,’ Helber commented.
‘He won’t know about it. He is extremely valuable to us, but his allegiance is to none but himself. It has long been my intention to change that, to put our friend in a position where he can be persuaded to see the wisdom of placing the Nazi cause a little higher on his list of priorities. We may well be able to achieve that through the Pascale woman. We are fully aware of her ambitions where the Wine Supplier is concerned – we may be in a position to help her, if in return she is prepared to help us.’
‘Do we take it that Mauclair is no longer of any use to us?’ Grundhausen enquired.
‘Not as he is, but when he has recovered I think he could prove extremely useful in representing us to La Pascale. As we know, she believes herself to be his sole employer. It should come as something of a surprise to her to learn that she is not. Incidentally, Halunke informs me that de Lorvoire was at the apartment on the avenue Foch when he learned of his wife’s accident. Before he left, he ordered the Pascale woman to remove Mauclair from Lorvoire.’
‘De Lorvoire knew of Philippe Mauclair’s association with his mistress?’
‘It would seem so, Max, my friend. Let it be yet another lesson to us never to underestimate this man. However, I think we can remain confident that he knows nothing of our association with Mauclair, which is all that concerns me.’
Ernst Grundhausen spoke again. ‘In acquiring the services of the Pascale woman we shall presumably become obliged to arrange the death of the Wine Supplier’s wife – and child?’
‘The child may already have been taken care of,’ von Liebermann reminded him. ‘However, Halunke gave his instructions without authorization. I shall speak to him about it. It is of little concern to me personally whether the Wine Supplier’s wife lives or dies, but as it is of the utmost concern to the Pascale woman, I believe the wife should not be introduced to her Maker just yet. In other words, Élise Pascale will be more inclined to help us while she has something to gain.’
‘But if the Wine Supplier believes Pascale to be behind Mauclair’s “accident”, doesn’t that make life rather complicated?’ Brüning pointed out. ‘After all, the Wine Supplier wants – wanted? – that child.’
Von Liebermann smiled. ‘When Élise Pascale pleads her innocence, it is my belief that the Wine Supplier will know she is telling the truth. However, we must hope that the child survives, for he will feel better disposed towards his mistress’s pleas if it does.’
Inwardly, Helber shuddered. Since joining the Komitee he had encountered a great many unscrupulous men, but not one of them came even close to disturbing him in the way the French Wine Supplier did. If that child died, he most certainly wouldn’t want to be in Élise Pascale’s shoes. ‘Do we have any immediate plans for Mauclair?’ he asked.
‘Halunke advises that we leave him to the Pascale woman for the time being, and I am inclined to agree.’
‘Do we need to replace him inside the château?’
Von Liebermann shook his head. ‘Halunke informs me that the situation there has changed so much over the past few months that we no longer need an agent in situ. Of course the situation could change again – but Halunke will keep us posted. In the meantime he has devised a way to observe the Wine Supplier himself, and once we have Élise Pascale working for us, between them they should be able to keep us adequately informed of de Lorvoire’s movements.’
‘Have you a meeting scheduled with de Lorvoire?’
‘I have.’
Helber knew better than to ask when, and Grundhausen returned to the subject of the child.
‘In Mauclair’s last report he mentioned that there was some doubt as to the father’s identity,’ he said.
‘Halunke is satisfied that it is the Wine Supplier’s,’ von Liebermann answered with a smirk.
‘When do you expect the Pascale woman to be at our disposal?’ Brüning asked.
‘As soon as Mauclair has recovered and Halunke has had an opportunity to apprise him of our intentions. And now, gentlemen,’ von Liebermann said, sliding his own copy of the documents he had presented earlier out of his attaché-case, ‘I suggest we return to matters closer to home.’
An hour later, all four members of the Abwehr – the German Intelligence organization whose ruthlessness made the Gestapo’s seem like child’s play – rose from their chairs and dropped their documents in the fireplace. Grundhausen struck the match, and they waited until every inch of paper had been devoured before they prepared to leave. Von Liebermann went first, the others followed at intervals of an hour or more – which gave two of them time to avail themselves of the services of the prostitute on the floor below. Helber and von Liebermann would meet later at another secret address.
For more than twenty-four hours Claudine drifted in and out of consciousness, dimly aware of the worried faces looking down at her, and the hushed voices that floated around her but never quite reached her. She knew her baby’s life was in jeopardy, but it was as though it was happening to someone else – she was unable to focus her attention for more than a few minutes at a time. Once or twice she thought she heard François speaking to her, thought she could feel him holding her hand, stroking her face and whispering to her that it would be all right. But whenever she managed to force her eyes open, the room was empty.
It was another three days before she was able to sit up without feeling faint, and a further two before Doctor Lebrun dared to admit that it seemed the baby would survive. However, he refused point-blank to allow her out of bed; she must stay there, he told her, for at least another week. By now her strength had returned sufficiently for her to protest loudly at this ruling, but when François appeared at the door and informed the doctor that his wife would of course take his advice, she decided to give in gracefully. Arguing with François when her condition was still so delicate would be foolish in the extreme. She would simply wait for him to leave – as he no doubt would, now that the immediate danger had passed – and then she would vacate her bed as and when she pleased.
However, she soon began to realize that François had no intention of leaving just yet, and though he hardly ever came into her room, she could feel his presence as oppressively as if he were a gaoler.
‘As you are carrying my child,’ he said, on one of the rare occasions when he visited her, ‘you will do as I say. If you wish to exercise your legs, you can walk about the apartment, and if you want fresh air, the windows will be opened. But until Doctor Lebrun is satisfied that you are strong enough to leave this room, you will stay where you are.’
Afterwards, she heard him outside, telling Magaly that if he found out that his wife had disobeyed him, he would hold her responsible.
Magaly came into the room a few minutes later, having first made certain that François had left the apartment. When she pulled an envelope from her apron pocket, Claudine very nearly snatched it out of her hand.
She didn’t even wait for Magaly to leave the room before tearing the letter open, but when she read the few words it contained, she fell back against the pillows, tears welling in her eyes. I am thinking of you. She whispered the words aloud. ‘Oh, Magaly, this must be so terrible for him.’
Magaly walked back to the bed and took Claudine’s hand between her own. They had never discussed Armand before, but Magaly had known Claudine since she was six years old and didn’t need to be told what was going on in her mistress’s mind.
‘Would you like to write to him, chérie?’ she said. ‘I will take the letter for you.’
Claudine opened her eyes, and smiling through her tears, she said. ‘Do you think he knows that I love him, Magaly?’
Laughing, Magaly said, ‘I am in no doubt of it.’
But then Claudine’s face fell again. ‘What are we going to do, Magaly?’
Magaly gave her hand a comforting squeeze. ‘It is very hard for you now, ma petite, but one day you will find a way.’ Again she laughed. ‘When have you not?’ And taking a handkerchief from her apron pocket, she started to wipe away her mistress’s tears.
‘Stay and talk to me, Magaly,’ Claudine whispered. ‘Talk to me about him.’
It was dark outside by the time Magaly left. Claudine was at last sleeping peacefully, Armand’s letter tucked beneath her pillow. Magaly would deliver her answer the next morning – she had written the same as him, Je pense à toi.
She was still fast asleep when François let himself into the room just after midnight and stood at the foot of her bed, staring down at her with a hard, impenetrable look in his eyes. He had stood there like this every night since her fall, and he would continue to come until the doctor pronounced his child sufficiently out of danger for Claudine to leave her bed.
That happened ten days later, by which time Erich von Pappen had told François that his presence in Berlin was requested urgently. He waited another two days, during which time he provoked everyone’s curiosity by spending many hours with Liliane. Then, on the first morning Claudine was allowed downstairs, he prepared to leave.
Solange walked with him to the car, her arm through his. During the crisis she had behaved with perfect sanity, but now that the danger was past she had returned to her old eccentric self. What had happened, she told François as she stood with him by the car, her crazy hair wildly on end, was something they could now all forget about. It was an accident which, thank God, had done nothing more than shake them all up a little.
Her words stayed with him throughout the journey to Paris. She was right, it had shaken them all. But he alone knew how much; he alone knew that the very thing he had been dreading since Claudine first came into his life, had finally started to happen. Which was why he now wanted to get as far away from her as he could, for as long as he could – and why he would pray every day to the Holy Mother that he had done the right thing in talking to Liliane.
Élise hadn’t had to arrange for Philippe Mauclair to be removed from the château, Doctor Lebrun had done that for her. But, she had organized his transfer to a hospital in Paris just as soon as he could be moved, and from there to a clinique privée in the thirteenth arrondissement. It was there that she visited him, almost two weeks after Claudine’s fall.
‘Why?’ she seethed, the moment the doctor had moved out of earshot. ‘Why did you do it when you had received no instructions from me?’
Philippe gazed up at her with an expression of intense irritation on his face. He was still in pain, and could do without the tantrums of Élise Pascale. ‘I am feeling much better than I was, thank you for asking, Élise,’ he remarked acidly.
‘Don’t be clever with me!’ she snapped.
‘I thought you would have been pleased,’ he said. ‘Didn’t you want …’
‘Pleased! How can I be pleased when the baby is still alive and you are lying here strung up like a turkey?’
‘Yes, well, that wasn’t supposed to happen,’ he admitted.
She glared at him. ‘How can you call yourself a stuntman,’ she sneered, ‘when you can’t even fall down the stairs in one piece? And why the hell did you do it without talking to me first?’
‘I saw the opportunity, I took it.’
‘And broke her fall by letting her land on top of you!’
He looked at her with genuine surprise. ‘How do you know that?’
‘I’m asking the questions,’ she snapped.
He nodded. ‘François de Lorvoire. He told you.’
‘I haven’t spoken to François since the day it happened. I won’t repeat what he said when he left me, just suffice it to say he knows about you.’
‘Knows what about me?’ Philippe asked cagily.
‘That you were sent to Lorvoire by me, you fool.’
‘How did he find out?’
‘How the hell do I know? It must have been something you did or said.’ She waved away his attempts to defend himself. ‘I don’t care about that. All that matters is that you’re of no more use to me. Just thank God that baby didn’t die, or I should have lost François for good. And you, Philippe …’
‘But that was what you sent me there for – to get rid of the child,’ he snarled.
‘But since you let François know who you were working for,’ she snarled back, ‘it was just as well you didn’t succeed, wasn’t it? Now, you can start saying your prayers that when I tell him I knew nothing about the fall, he believes me – because if he doesn’t, I swear you’ll go out of this clinic in a coffin.’
His top lip curled in an ugly sneer. ‘Same old Élise,’ he spat. ‘But you don’t frighten me with your threats …’
His scream of agony reverberated through the corridors as she wrenched back the toes of his broken leg. ‘You’re finished,’ she hissed, as an army of nurses came running. ‘You’ll never work again, Philippe Mauclair, do you hear me? And if François wants to know where to find you, be in no doubt that I shall tell him.’
Still wincing with pain, Philippe watched her stalk out of the ward, and for a fleeting moment remembered the time when that proud, sashaying little rump had been exposed for his pleasure – his recruitment fee. But then her parting words came thundering back to his brain, and the throbbing in his leg became unbearable. He knew that his only protection from François de Lorvoire was Rudolf von Liebermann, and he hoped to God that the man sent someone soon. With equal fervour, he hoped it wouldn’t be that bastard Halunke.
When Élise returned to her apartment she found François waiting for her. He was standing at the window, wearing his heavy black coat and Homburg hat. His hands were stuffed into his pockets and his dark, aquiline face bore an expression of murderous, though carefully controlled, rage. He waited until the door had closed behind her, then turning from the window, he said, ‘There is a part of me that would like to kill you, Élise, and make no mistake, if my child had died I wouldn’t hesitate. I perfectly understand why you wanted to kill it, and I also understand that you hoped to deprive me of my wife at the same time. I will make you no threats – you know me well enough to appreciate the danger you have now put yourself in – but I do strongly advise you not to try again. And I give you my solemn vow, Élise, that no matter what happens to Claudine, you will never be the Comtesse de Loryoire.’ He raised his hand and slapped her hard across the face. ‘Never!’ And he walked out of the room.
It took a few moments for her head to stop spinning, but then, with surprising calmness, Élise crossed to the window. By the time François emerged from the building into the street below, a knowing smile had settled on her lips.
He’d be back – if for no other reason than that she knew too much about him for him to have her as an enemy. And as for his vow that she would never become the Comtesse de Lorvoire … Here her lips did tremble and a look of pain crossed her face. But once she had devised an efficient way of disposing of The Bitch, she could use her knowledge, to blackmail him into marrying her. François de Lorvoire was a traitor to his country, and she knew it, and would make good use of the power that knowledge gave her.
The following week, at four o’clock in the afternoon, François met Rudolf von Liebermann in the garden of the General’s Muncheberg home. Max Helber was there too, and since they had already exchanged perfunctory greetings, François came straight to the point. ‘It is my belief,’ he said, ‘that should the Führer wish to take the Sudetenland he will meet with little resistance from the Allies.’
‘Your belief?’ Helber repeated, with marked cynicism.
Von Liebermann put a hand on Helber’s arm. The Wine Supplier would never reveal his sources, and Helber should know by now that de Lorvoire always prefaced his intelligence reports in that fashion. ‘How little is little?’ he asked.
‘There will be a show of protest, naturally,’ François answered, ‘but it will be no more than that. Neither country wants a war – particularly France.’
‘Yet France has deployed a number of her factories for rearmament,’ von Liebermann pointed out.
‘She is also about to call up her reservists,’ François told him, unperturbed.
Von Liebermann nodded. He already knew that. ‘Do you have details of these factories?’
‘Yes.’
Von Liebermann glanced at his watch. ‘I have an appointment at four thirty. Afterwards I am meeting with the Foreign Minister. You will give the information to Max, who will bring it to me before I see von Ribbentrop.’
François nodded, then wandered on through the garden while von Liebermann took Helber to one side.
‘You have the information he requires in return?’ von Liebermann asked. ‘That is good. We shall see what he can do with it. My belief is, nothing.’
Helber smiled, and von Liebermann patted his arm. Turning to leave, he remembered there was something else he had to say concerning the Wine Supplier. ‘I have had a request from Halunke. He wants to make contact with the Pascale woman personally. I see no reason why he shouldn’t, do you?’
‘Is there any danger that she might recognize him?’
‘Halunke assures me not.’
‘Then I see no objection.’
‘Good. Give him the authorization.’
Helber waited until von Liebermann’s chauffeur had closed the car door before turning to follow François to the end of the garden. ‘Shall we go inside?’ he said affably.
François eyed him with distaste; he would have preferred to remain outdoors but he knew Helber would not allow it, so he nodded curtly and followed him into the dark, oak-panelled library.
Here, Helber handed over the documents he and von Liebermann had prepared as an exchange for the information François was about to supply. Helber’s cherubic face was smiling. He was afraid of the Wine Supplier, but would never let it show, and besides, being the kind of man he was, his fear only made what he was about to do all the more pleasurable.
He remained standing at the desk as François settled into a chair and started to read. Helber watched him, his body beginning to tremble with lust. He had never come across a man who exuded such potent sexuality as François de Lorvoire, and he had promised himself that one day, when the time was right, he would have him. But for now he had to content himself with taking his penis from his trousers so that he could fondle himself under the gaze of those darkly hooded eyes.
Knowing precisely what Helber was doing, François continued to read to the end of the documents before looking up and asking Helber to clarify several points.
Helber answered, and they continued to conduct their meeting as though both men were as composed as François. François knew that he would have to stay until Helber ejaculated, for it was Helber’s way to hold back a vital piece of information until he had climaxed. So he waited, watching the man’s fumblings with a cold detachment – if he turned away it would only lengthen the process. Sometimes, he thought, as Helber’s eyes began to roll back in their sockets and the sweat oozed from his face, the price of obtaining information was almost too high. But when Helber finally handed him the last paper, he was in no doubt that on this occasion it had been worth waiting for.