Stefan Kuporovitch hung like a sack over the branch of a tree. With a painful effort he opened his eyes, but he was in complete darkness and for a moment he had no idea where he was or what had happened to him. Then, all that had occurred before he had lost consciousness slowly filtered back into his bemused brain.
The nursing-home had been raided while he and Gregory were in conference with Lacroix. The little Colonel had been smuggled out of his coffin. Just as the mutes were getting it into the hearse Major Schaub had appeared on the scene and demanded that it should be opened. Gregory had done what was undoubtedly the right thing in precipitating a gun-fight rather than allow their chief to be arrested. There had been a wild mêlée, in which a score of shots had been exchanged, and Kuporovitch himself had shot one of the Nazis through the head. Then he had dragged Madeleine back through the door of the nursing-home, slammed it to and bolted it.
Someone had said that the house was surrounded by the police, so, instead of making for the courtyard at its back, he had rushed Madeleine and Nurse Yolanda upstairs, with the idea of getting them away over the neighbouring roofs. Just as they reached the attic the trap-door in its ceiling had opened and a French policeman came plunging down the ladder.
Kuporovitch had shot him, but a volley of shots had then come spattering down from the man’s companions who were still out on the roof; so Kuporovitch had rushed the two girls out of the room again, locking its door behind him. As they hurried downstairs they heard the sounds of fighting below, which told them that the police had already broken in through either the front or back of the house and were in combat with some of Lacroix’s agents, who had been caught down in the dining-room. Kuporovitch had then pushed his two charges into a back bedroom on the second floor.
On looking out of the window he had seen no movement in the courtyard, and judged it possible that the police who had been detailed to approach the house from behind were now inside. It immediately occurred to him that if they were engaged in the fight that was raging below, and his own party could only get down to the courtyard, they might escape by way of it.
Dragging the sheets and blankets from the bed, with the aid of the two girls he had knotted the ends of the bedclothes together so that they formed a stout rope. Within three minutes of their entering the room they had one end of the knotted bedclothes tied firmly to the bed and the other dangling through the window within a few feet of the courtyard.
Madeleine had insisted that Nurse Yolanda should go first, and the pretty little nurse had swarmed down hand over hand, reaching the ground in safety. Madeleine followed, but was not so lucky. In their haste to make their improvised rope one of the knots had not been sufficiently tightly tied. When she was half-way to the ground the rope parted just below the window-sill, and she fell the last six feet.
It was already semi-dark, and as Kuporovitch stared down he had not been able to see very clearly; but enough to relieve his apprehensions for the moment, as through the grey murk of the winter evening he saw Madeleine pick herself up, and knew that she could not have hurt herself very badly.
Next second his heart had leapt to his mouth again. Dark forms had suddenly come running from the back of the house and with excited shouts seized upon the two young women. For a few seconds the Russian had remained there, leaning right out of the window. He dared not fire, as in the scrimmage it was just as likely that he would have shot one of the girls as either of their attackers; yet he knew that his only hope of rescuing them now lay in getting down to the courtyard. As the rope had parted just below the window-sill there was only one thing for it: the nearest branches of a big elm tree which grew in the courtyard were no more than ten feet distant from the window out of which he was leaning. Climbing up on to the sill, he launched himself with clutching hands into the now scanty autumn foliage, hoping that he would be able either to grab a branch or that some of them would at least break his fall before he reached the ground.
As he plunged forward he had felt the twigs scratching at his hands and face; then a terrific blow on the head as his forehead came into violent contact with the upper part of the tree-trunk. Stars and whirling circles had flamed for a second before his eyes, as he crashed downwards through the darkness, then he had been brought up with a terrific jolt that had driven the breath out of his body, and passed clean out.
When he came to he realised that he had fallen on to one of the main branches of the big tree and was still hanging there. Owing to their struggle with the girls, and the semi-darkness, the police had evidently not seen him when he had been leaning out of the window, or witnessed his jump from it into the tree. As they could not have known how many people there were inside the home to start with, there was no reason at all for them to search for him, and they had evidently gone off with their prisoners, imagining that they had netted the whole bag, while he was suspended in the tree unconscious.
He had the grandfather of all headaches from the blow against the tree-trunk which had knocked him out, and his middle was terribly bruised and sore from its violent contact with the big branch over which he was dangling. Very gently he raised himself up until he was spread at full length along it, wriggled back to the tree-trunk and cautiously lowered himself to the ground.
Sitting down there, with his back propped up against the tree while he recovered a little, he began to consider what he had better do.
Madeleine had undoubtedly been arrested, and by now was probably in a cell at the Sûreté or some other prison. The thought that she might be shot or sent to a concentration camp was absolute agony to him, and he knew that he must act quickly if he was to have any hope at all of rescuing her.
Having seen the hearse dash off, he felt reasonably confident that Gregory and Lacroix had got away, so his first thought was to set off for Vichy to secure the Colonel’s aid. But he had no papers which would enable him to pass the frontier between Occupied and Unoccupied France, and he realised at once that, lacking these, and with the difficulty of obtaining transport, it would probably take him days to make his way to Vichy; and even when he got there he might find that Lacroix had been captured after all. In any case, time ruled out that idea.
His next thought was to try to get hold of Lieutenant Ribaud. As he was still acting under the Nazis he should be able to find out where Madeleine had been taken and, as Lacroix’s principal agent in Paris, would undoubtedly give all the help he could. Perhaps he might even be able so to arrange matters that Madeleine could be rescued with a minimum of risk to herself and her rescuers.
Having decided on his line of action Kuporovitch got to his feet and tiptoed softly towards the house. A considerable sum of Lacroix’s money was kept by Madeleine in a secret hiding-place in her room against emergencies, and it seemed foolish to leave it there if there was any chance of getting hold of it.
The back door was not locked, and pushing it gently he crept inside. The passage was in darkness, but a light showed in the front hall, and he caught the sound of voices before he had advanced more than half a dozen paces. Evidently the police had left some of their people there to seize any of the agents who might come to the house, unaware that it had been raided. As he still had his pistol, in other circumstances Kuporovitch would have gone forward; but as Madeleine’s only hope now lay in his remaining at liberty he decided that at the moment he had no right to risk being captured, or a fight in which he might get shot. Turning round, he tiptoed cautiously back again, out into the courtyard and through an alley which led from it to a small side street a hundred paces from the back of the house.
It took him some ten minutes to find a telephone-box, but having got on to the Sûreté he was put through to the Lieutenant almost at once.
‘I’m afraid my name would not convey anything to you,’ he said, ‘but I have some important information which I should like to give to you personally, if it is possible for you to come out and meet me somewhere.’
Ribaud was too wise a man to ask any embarrassing questions from such a caller, and he replied: ‘I cannot get away from my office for about three-quarters of an hour, and after that I have a dinner appointment at which I must not be late, but I could see you for a few minutes, if you can arrange to be somewhere in the neighbourhood of the Palais Royal at a quarter to eight. How about the Café de I’Univers, which is right opposite, and adjoins the Hôtel du Louvre?’
‘That would suit me admirably,’ said Kuporovitch, and rang off.
Well before a quarter to eight, he was seated at one of the tables near the door inside the café. Soon afterwards he saw the short, tubby French detective come in, and made an inconspicuous signal to him.
At first Ribaud did not recognise Kuporovitch, as he had only seen him once before for a few moments in Major Schaub’s room on the night that he had been arrested; but as he sat down the Russian’s startling black eyebrows, which made such a sharp contrast to his grey hair, unlocked a cell in the detective’s memory.
‘So you got away,’ he said, beckoning to the waiter to take his order.
‘You knew about the raid, then?’ Kuporovitch said softly, when the waiter had left them.
‘Yes—I’ve just come from helping in the examination of some of our friends who were brought in.’
‘I take it Madeleine Lavallière was among them?’
‘Yes.’
‘I thought as much,’ nodded Kuporovitch sadly, ‘but how did you guess that I was one of the people who were using the home?’
‘I guessed it,’ smiled the detective. ‘The fact of a stranger who gave no name ringing me up at such a time, and then to find that it was you, Madeleine Lavallière’s old friend, was quite enough. How did you manage to get away?’
Kuporovitch told him, adding that as the police were still in the house he hoped that some measures could be taken to warn those of its occupants who had not been caught in the raid.
‘As far as is possible that has already been done, but was it that only about which you wished to see me?’
‘Partly that, but also on Madeleine’s account. I hope to God that those brutes are not ill-treating her!’
‘No, she’s all right for the moment, as she is still in the hands of our own police. But I wouldn’t care to be in the shoes of any of these poor friends of ours when they’re handed over to the Gestapo, as they will have to be.’
‘Can you do nothing to prevent that?’
Ribaud shook his head. ‘Unfortunately, no. All of us must stand on our own feet. We know what we’re risking when we enter upon the work upon which we are engaged. If we’re caught that’s just too bad, but no other member of our organisation must jeopardise himself by endeavouring to help friends who have fallen by the way. That is an order. Of course, if I could do anything without endangering my own position—just as I got Madeleine released before when there was no serious charge against her, and yourself put over the frontier—I would willingly do it; but it is necessary that we should place our organisation before sentiment. As our Chief’s principal hidden ear in the police service of Occupied France, it would be criminal in my own case to do anything which might cause myself to become suspect.’
Kuporovitch nodded. ‘I quite understand that, but my case is somewhat different. I’m just a foreigner who hates the Nazis and wishes France well. I have been playing my part among the French freedom-fighters with the greatest willingness; but now the safety and the life of the woman that I love are involved, and my first duty is to her. I am prepared to face any risk for the smallest chance of getting her out of the hands of the Gestapo. Can you suggest to me any way in which I might set to work?’
‘I only wish I could’—Ribaud spread out his hands—‘but their police system is virtually watertight. These Germans have an absolute genius for organisation, and, God knows, in the last few years the Nazis have had plenty of practice in seeing to it that their prisoners don’t escape. She will undergo preliminary examination here, then in the course of a few days she will probably be sent to Germany; but night and day she will be under guard. I fear your chances of saving her are extremely slender.’
‘At least you can tell me where she will be imprisoned while she remains in Paris,’ said Kuporovitch; ‘or will she be kept at the Sûreté?’
‘No. She will be transferred with the other women who were captured this evening to the Cherche-Midi. It is an old prison, and they are using it again now for female political prisoners.’
‘And Major Schaub?’ asked the Russian. ‘Can you tell me where he lives?’
‘He has a room at the Headquarters of the Army of Occupation in the Hôtel Crillon.’
‘You feel reasonably certain that Madeleine will not be moved from the Cherche-Midi for the next few days?’
‘Yes; but if you care to ring me up at any time I can always let you know if she is still there or not. Just ask me if the cigarettes have come in, and if I say they have not arrived you’ll know that she has not been shifted. If, on the other hand, I say that they have, you can suggest a time and place at which you propose to collect them, then I’ll meet you there and let you know what they’ve done with her. You must forgive me now, but my dinner appointment is for eight o’clock, and it is important that I should be on time.’
When the Frenchman had gone the Russian paid his bill and left the café. Crossing the road, he walked past the Théâtre Français up the Rue de Richelieu, until he came to a little restaurant, and, entering it, he endeavoured to revive his spirits a little with as good a dinner as he could get, while he thought over possible plans.
By the time he left it he was feeling scarcely less depressed, but he had the germ of an idea, and, turning it this way and that in his subtle brain, he set about finding some place where he could pass the night. It occurred to him that he would be less likely to be asked awkward questions about his having no luggage if he slept in a Turkish Baths, so he went into a café and made enquiries from a waiter. The waiter told him that the Hammam was quite near by, in the Rue des Mathurins, and gave him directions to it, although remarking that he had no idea if it were still open.
The Hammam was still open, but only for massage, as the shortage of fuel in Paris now made it impossible to keep the steam-rooms going. As Kuporovitch was cold, tired, and bruised about the body, he would have given a lot for a hot bath of any kind, but that being out of the question massage was better than nothing, since it would serve to stimulate his circulation and ease the strained muscles of his stomach.
Having undressed, he found that it was now black and blue from where he had fallen across the bough of the tree, but he told the masseur that he had tripped in the black-out and come crashing down across a low stone balustrade. After the man had been working on him for three-quarters of an hour he felt very much better. About half past ten, wrapped in blankets, he turned in, and, in spite of his gnawing anxiety about Madeleine, passed a reasonably good night.
As is so often the case, his brain continued to work for him while he slept, so when he reconsidered his plan the next morning he found that his fragmentary ideas had now fallen into place; but as a first step to carrying them out he required at least a ton of coal, and coal was now virtually unobtainable in Paris.
On leaving the Turkish Baths he telephoned Ribaud from a call-box and made known his requirement. Then, in order to cover the detective against anyone who might be tapping his line, he said that he had very stupidly made a bet the night before when he had had one over the odds, that by hook or by crook he would get hold of a ton of coal, and he must do his best to win it.
Ribaud played up to the line given him, laughed a lot at the rashness of the bet, chipped the Russian about having got tight, then said that he might try a Monsieur Lavinsky of 29, Rue Buffon, near the Gare d’Austerlitz. Lavinsky was a black market operator, and Ribaud indicated in guarded language that if Lavinsky refused his help Kuporovitch should exert pressure on him by telling him that the police knew what he was up to and would take action against him unless he was prepared to oblige Lieutenant Ribaud’s friend.
Kuporovitch got a bus which took him over the river and along the quays of the south bank; and getting off at the railway station soon found Lavinsky’s office. Lavinsky proved to be a fat little Jew, who, judging by the size of his warehouse, and the samples of many kinds of scarce goods which littered his office, was doing a considerable business. When Kuporovitch asked him for a ton of coal he almost threw a fit, rolling his eyes up to heaven and throwing out his short tubby hands with a despairing gesture.
‘A ton of coal!’ he cried. ‘Why do you not ask at once for a ton of gold? It would be just as difficult to get and hardly more expensive. Besides, you must know that it is rationed, and that to sell a single knob to anyone without a permit is now a serious offence against the regulations.’
Fixing him with his brown eyes, which could go so hard on occasion, Kuporovitch replied: ‘Let us not waste time, my friend, in talking hot air about difficulties and regulations. I know that you have the stuff, and I am quite prepared to pay you black market prices for it. What is more, I wish to borrow a horse and wagon from you so that I can deliver it myself.’
‘But you are crazy!’ the Jew expostulated. ‘I am an honest trader, who has his own customers to consider, and never would I handle anything by way of the black markets.’
‘Well, you’re going to this time,’ said the Russian firmly. ‘I was talking this morning with my good friend Lieutenant Ribaud …’
The Jew’s eyes suddenly narrowed. ‘You are from the police, then. I guessed from your accent that you were a German, monsieur, and, of course, I will help you if I must; but I assure you that in the ordinary way I would never dream of going against regulations.’
Kuporovitch did not correct the Jew’s wrong assumption about his nationality, as it gave him an even bigger pull, but said: ‘Lieutenant Ribaud informs me differently. In fact, if we cared to do so, we could bring quite a number of charges with heavy penalties against you; but if you’ll do as I wish I don’t think it likely that the police will bother you.’
Lavinsky had gone perceptibly paler, and he now began to rub his hands together as he stuttered out his anxiety to be of service. But when they got down to the price of the coal, in spite of his obvious fright, he proved a stubborn bargainer. Kuporovitch had to part with two thousand francs, which was nearly half his total reserve of cash, as the price of a single ton of very indifferent coal.
He then told Lavinsky that he wanted the coal loaded on to a cart with a horse already harnessed up, so that he could drive it away when he called again at four o’clock that afternoon; he added that he also wished a man or boy to accompany him and, later, to bring back the empty cart.
He now had only a few things to buy while he killed time until the day was sufficiently advanced for him to make his bid to rescue Madeleine; so he walked slowly through the Jardin des Plantes and up the sloping street towards the Luxembourg, stopping at various shops to make his purchases. These consisted of a small brown handbag, a white linen jacket, such as barbers wear, which he managed to find after visiting several second-hand shops, and a number of items such as scissors, clippers, brush, comb and towels, which are the implements of the barber’s trade. He then bought some rolls and some very indifferent sausage-meat which was mainly bread, and took them into the Luxembourg Gardens, where he sat down on a bench to make a picnic meal. Had he but known it, Gregory was that morning also killing time, in the Bois de Vincennes; but unfortunately neither of the two friends had the faintest idea where the other had got to; so, instead of being able to meet and cheer each other up, they had perforce to wander about alone and in considerable anxiety about one another.
At last the time came for Kuporovitch to make his way back to the Rue Buffon. On his arrival there he demanded a blank delivery slip, then Lavinsky led him out into the yard, where a loaded coal-cart with a young boy beside it was already waiting. Having handed over the two thousand francs the Russian proceeded to get himself up like a coal-heaver by tying an apron of empty sacks round his still sore middle, draping another like a pointed hood on his head, and smearing his face lightly here and there with coal-dust. The little Jew was eyeing these manoeuvres with the utmost curiosity, so Kuporovitch went over to him and said in a husky whisper: ‘This is Gestapo business, so keep your nose out of it, or you’ll find yourself in trouble. If you attempt to follow me, or have me followed, you’ll be getting a free ride to Dachau.’
With a nod to the boy, who clambered up on to the back of the cart, Kuporovitch mounted to the driver’s seat and, flicking his whip, drove the coal-cart out of the yard.
At a slow walk it trundled through the streets of Paris until they reached the tradesmen’s entrance of the Hôtel Crillon. Pulling up, he got down, and, leaving the boy to look after the horse, slouched across the pavement to the hotel doorway, where he told the goods porter that he had a ton of coal for him.
The man said that he knew nothing about it, so Kuporovitch shrugged and replied: ‘All right, then, I’ll take it away again. If you don’t want it there are plenty of people who do.’
‘No, don’t do that,’ said the man hastily. ‘I expect my boss forgot to tell me that a load was being delivered this afternoon. He’s off duty now, but I’ll show you where to put it.’
As Kuporovitch was about to follow the porter inside a German sentry stepped forward and roughly motioned him back, upon which the porter said: ‘You stay out in the street, chum. No one’s allowed in here except the staff. I’ll go down and unlock the cellar, and if you watch along the pavement you’ll see me push up the lid of the manhole; then all you’ll have to do is to shoot the stuff down out of your sacks.’
The Russian was in no way dismayed, as he had felt certain that no one would be allowed inside the headquarters of the German Army of Occupation except such members of the hotel’s original staff as had been retained for convenience, and that these would be under close supervision. A few minutes later he saw the lid of a manhole about fifty yards away tilt up out of the pavement, and walking along to it he lifted the lid right out, while beckoning to the boy to lead the horse and cart nearer.
Squeezing himself through the hole, Kuporovitch found that he was in a roomy cellar, where several tons of coal had already been heaped up against one wall. The light was on, and the porter was standing there. Pointing to the heap he said:
‘You’d best shovel it up on to that when you’ve got it down so as to keep the space under the manhole clear. I’ll have to lock you in, as these Germans are strict as blazes, and I’d find myself in a concentration camp if you so much as poked your nose out into the passage. Shall I sign for it now or come back when you’ve finished?’
‘I expect they keep you pretty busy, so you may as well sign now,’ Kuporovitch muttered, taking from his pocket the printed slip with which he had made Lavinsky furnish him, and a stub of pencil.
The porter signed the slip and locked the door behind him; then, climbing out of the manhole, Kuporovitch set to work to unload the wagon and shoot its contents down into the cellar. Having got it down, he shovelled it on to the big heap. The whole job took him best part of an hour and a half, as he had calculated it would; so by the time he had done darkness was already falling.
He now had to get rid of the boy and the cart, and he knew that this was a weak link in his plan, as if the boy was a Quisling and reported either to the porter or Lavinsky that he had left the amateur coal-heaver behind all sorts of unpleasant possibilities loomed ahead; but the Russian had been able to devise no other way of getting rid of the cart than to bring someone with him, and he could only rely on a judicious blend of bribery and fear to ensure the lad’s keeping his mouth shut.
Wriggling out of the hole again, he said to the young gamin: ‘Your master doesn’t know where I am delivering this coal, and I don’t want him to. He’s certain to ask you when you get back, but I suppose you wouldn’t mind telling him a fib, if I make it a bright smilewrth your while—eh? How about a hundred francs to say that we took the coal to the Soviet Embassy? You can tell him if you like that I’m not a German, as he thought, but a Russian.’
‘A hundred francs!’ chirruped the lad excitedly. ‘That’s all right by me, mister, if I ain’t getting into any trouble.’
‘You won’t—provided you keep a still tongue in your head. But there are strange things happening in Paris these days, and life is pretty cheap. I mean to stay behind here, and my friends know what I’m up to. If you breathe a word of that you’ll get a knife in your back one dark night; so you’d better be careful,’
The boy let out a frightened whistle, but he eagerly grabbed the hundred-franc note that Kuporovitch held out, and as the cart drove away the Russian was fairly satisfied that he had little fear from a betrayal in that direction. Lowering himself again through the coal-hole, he drew its lid back into place after him.
When making his plan Kuporovitch had imagined that if he could only get into one of the hotel cellars he would have access to the rest of the building, but that had not proved to be the case at all, as the porter had locked him in. However, one swift glance at the door had been enough to show him that in this case it was very much less of an obstacle to his plans to be locked in than to be locked out, as the cellar door had one of those old-fashioned square iron box locks, which was affixed to its inside where he could easily get at it. After taking off his coal-heaver’s sacking and cleaning his face as well as he could with lick and his handkerchief, he went over to make a proper inspection of the lock.
The slot into which the tongue of the lock disappeared was only affixed to the door-jamb by two rusty screws. Among the implements which were lying about in the cellar was a wood-chopper, and having forced its edge under the slot a good heave was sufficient to drag the screws out of the dry wood. There was nothing to hold the door to but its latch, so he could go out into the passage whenever he wished.
Picking up his small bag, he gently eased the door open and listened intently. Hearing faint footsteps in the distance, he closed the door again, and waited patiently until their owner had passed; then he opened it once more and gave a swift glance either way down the corridor. No one was in sight, so he stepped out, drawing the door to behind him.
As he did not know the geography of the building he had no idea what he would come to, whichever way he turned; but keeping his dirty hands concealed as well as possible, he set off at a brisk walk along the underground passage towards the side of the hotel that overlooks the Place de la Concorde. His luck held good, as before he had encountered anybody he spotted in a side passage the very thing for which he was looking; a lift. Slipping into it, he pressed the top button and was swiftly carried up to the sixth floor.
Knowing that the one thing which might arouse suspicion was if he should be seen tiptoeing around, or looking this way or that as though he did not know his way about, he stepped boldly out and walked along the corridor, as if in a great hurry. A German orderly passed him without a glance, and twenty paces farther on he saw a door marked ‘Bains’, which, again, was what he was looking for. On trying the handle he found that the room was not occupied, and, going inside, locked the door. Walking over to the fixed basins, he turned on the hot-tap and grinned to himself delightedly. As he had supposed, whoever else went without hot water in Paris, the German General Staff certainly would not. Turning on the bath, he proceeded to undress.
For the next half-hour he thoroughly enjoyed himself as he wallowed in the warm water, which eased the still strained muscles of his middle, and it tickled his sense of humour to think that, all unknown to the Nazis, one of their most inveterate enemies was making use of their quarters with impunity.
Having dried himself on his hand-towels, he shaved and dressed again, but this time put on the white barber’s coat, packing his own in the bottom of his bag under the towels and hairdressing implements. He then left the bathroom as boldly as he had entered it, feeling greatly invigorated and refreshed.
His next problem was to find Major Schaub’s room. He dared not go downstairs to the main hall and ask for it at the chief hall-porter’s desk, as it was almost certain that a German would have been installed there, who would realise at once that he was not a member of the hotel staff; and as he could not produce any form of special pass he would promptly be put under arrest. He thought it unlikely that the Major’s room would be up on the sixth floor, as that would be devoted mainly to orderlies, while junior officers would be accommodated on the fifth, and the real big shots of the German General Staff would have their rooms on the first and second. The probability was that an officer of the Major’s rank would have a room on the third or fourth, and he decided to try the fourth floor first.
Going down to it in the lift, he knocked on the first door he came to, opened it and smiled blandly at an officer who was sitting half-dressed on the bed, as he said: ‘Pardon, monsieur, I thought this was Major Schaub’s room. I have come to cut his hair.’
The officer flung a curse at him, but in a surly voice added the information that Major Schaub didn’t live along that corridor.
Bowing himself out, Kuporovitch tried another room, round the corner and some distance from the first. It was locked. He tried another. That was locked too. In the next a blue-eyed lieutenant was lying reading on his bed. He said quite pleasantly that he didn’t know Major Schaub and asked what regiment he was in.
‘He’s a Major of the Schwartz Korps,’ replied Kuporovitch quickly.
The young man grinned. ‘You can bet he’s got a good room, then. The S.S. people get the pickings everywhere. You’ll probably find him down on the second floor.’
Thanking him politely, Kuporovitch went down two floors and tried again. In the first unlocked room that he came to a shaven-headed Colonel was working on a large chart, spread out in front of him on a table.
‘Major Schaub?’ he said vaguely, with his mind evidently still on his work. ‘Let’s see. He’s not on this wing. I think his room is in the long corridor that runs the whole length of the front of the building—somewhere about two-twenty to two-twenty-six.’
Bowing himself out once more, Kuporovitch tried two-twenty-four. The room was occupied by a soldier-servant who was busily polishing the buttons of an officer’s feldgrau uniform greatcoat.
‘You got the number wrong, Frenchy,’ he said, looking up. ‘Major Schaub’s in two-eighteen.’
With a sigh of relief Kuporovitch closed the door and went along to two-eighteen. He knocked twice, but there was no reply, and on turning the handle he found that the door was locked. Pocketing his gun, he made his way to the nearest lavatory and, locking himself in there, sat down to wait.
At intervals of about twenty minutes thereafter he slipped out and tried the Major’s door again, but he had no luck until his fourth attempt, when in answer to his knock a sharp voice called: ‘Come in!’
Kuporovitch opened the door and stepped inside. The tall, chunky-faced Major was in his shirt-sleeves, standing in front of his dressing table. Turning round, he said with a quick frown: ‘What the devil do you want?’
Transferring his bag to his left hand, Kuporovitch pulled his gun out of his pocket, pointed it at the Major, and replied:
‘You! Put your hands up!’
‘Gott in Himmel!’ exclaimed the Major suddenly recognising him. ‘If it isn’t that damn’ Russian! How the hell did you get in here?’
‘That’s none of your business,’ Kuporovitch snapped. ‘Put your hands up, or I’ll fill your stomach full of lead!’
The German went a little pale, but did not do as he was ordered. He even managed to raise a faint smile, as he said: ‘Don’t be a fool! If you let that thing off you’ll bring a score of people running and be dead as mutton yourself before you know it.’
Kuporovitch shrugged. ‘I should be a fool if I didn’t realise that. It’s you who are the fool, Herr Major, because you do not realise that you’re facing a man who does not mind if he dies. At the moment I have nothing to live for. However, I’m here to see if we can’t alter that. If you’re prepared to do as I tell you I shall then have something to live for again. If not, then neither of us will leave this room alive.’
Major Schaub, in fact, was no fool at all, and his swift brain had already put two and two together. Ignoring Kuporovitch’s pistol, he sat down on the bed and said: ‘Then you’ve come here about that pretty little French girl you’re interested in, eh? The one you’d been dining with the first time we met, and you know that we pulled her in again last night. Not on suspicion this time, though: she’s facing a charge of conspiracy against the Third Reich.’
‘Whatever charge you’ve made against her—if she ever has to face it, you’ll be dead first!’ the Russian replied quietly. ‘Have I made myself clear?’
‘Quite clear,’ nodded the Major. ‘You’ve managed to bribe or smuggle your way in here with the idea of threatening me with death unless I’m willing to give you an order for the release of your girl friend?’
‘Exactly.’
Well, I’ll tell you here and now that you’re not going to get it. If you set no value on your skin you can shoot me if you like. If you do you’ll be shot yourself before you get ten yards down the corridor, and that won’t do your girl friend any good. Still, I’ve no wish to be shot; so if you like I’ll make a bargain with you. Go as you came, and I’ll give you five minutes’ start; but that’s all I’m prepared to do. Now take your choice!’
Kuporovitch realised that his bluff had been called, but as he was a completely ruthless person he had by no means exhausted the possibilities of the situation. Flicking over the safety-catch of his pistol, he walked quietly up to the Major and said: ‘It’s a pity that you’re not prepared to be reasonable.’ Then, without warning, he suddenly swung the hand that held his gun so that it struck the Major hard on the side of the face.
As the German’s mouth opened to let out a yell Kuporovitch dropped the gun and leapt upon him, burying his thumbs and fingers in the Major’s neck and forcing him back upon the bed.
Wolfram Schaub was a strong man, but he was no match for the weighty Russian. In vain he tore frantically at the choking fingers until red circles began to spin in the blackness before his eyes; then his adversary picked him up bodily and banged his head twice against the bedroom wall. Dazed by the blows, and with his cheek bleeding from a nasty cut where the pistol had gashed him, he collapsed in a limp heap.
Three minutes later Kuporovitch had him trussed up with the blind-cords and lightly gagged so that he could mutter, but not shout. Then, propping his enemy up on the bed against the wall, the Russian stood there, grinning with diabolical satisfaction at his handiwork.
‘Now,’ he said, ‘must I show you some of the tricks that the Cheka used to practise on their Czarist prisoners, or will you sign the order that I require?’
Schaub shook his head.
‘All right then. We’ll see just how much guts you really have. There was nothing particularly brave in calling my bluff just now. You knew very well that I should not be such a fool as to shoot you and bring half the Nazis in this huge rabbit warren running with their guns; but I have never believed that the Germans are a courageous people. The Russians, now, are really brave, and so are the British. It is one thing which the two races have in common—both of us are used to losing battles, but we fight on just the same, because we refuse to acknowledge it when we are beaten. That is why neither country has ever been defeated in a major war.’
The Tartar streak in Kuporovitch had now come to the surface. Time had ceased to exist for him, and the fact that he was alone in the citadel of his enemies had passed from his mind as he went on: ‘Even in the First World War you never broke the spirit of us Russians. It took two Revolutions, six months apart, before we were forced out of the game. But you Germans are different; like all other European races, there have been times when your country has been overrun and you have been compelled to sue for peace. You are great fellows—as long as you are victorious and fighting people who are not so well armed or organised as yourselves; but once things begin to go against you it’s a very different story. You throw your hands up in the air and yell ‘Kamerad!’ Now, will you sign the paper that I want from you, or must I give you a little of the medicine that you have been giving to other people?’
Again the Major shook his head.
‘As you wish,’ Kuporovitch grinned. ‘Quite honestly, I’m going to enjoy this, because I dislike you Nazis, and I’ve been waiting to get a crack at one for quite a little time. I wonder if you ever heard of a young woman called Paula von Steinmetz?’
On the Major making no sign Kuporovitch continued: ‘The little Paula was a friend of mine. She made a most delightful mistress, but whenever I think of the life you filthy Nazis forced that poor child to lead it makes me almost physically sick. Honest marriage suits some people, and recently I’ve come to feel that even in my own case there is much to be said for it. Free love I do not mind. What would we healthy fellows do without it? Prostitution is fair enough in a world that has not yet learnt to organise itself better. But you devils had Paula’s brother in a concentration camp. By a threat of torturing him to death you forced her to give herself to Norwegians and Dutchmen and Belgians—in order that she might recruit Fifth Columnists for you—and that I do not like at all. This comes to you from Paula.’
As he spoke the last word the Russian hit the Major a savage blow in the mouth with his clenched fist, but he did not stop there. He proceeded to lam into him, right, left, and centre, until both his eyes were closed, his face half pulp, and he was writhing in agony from terrific punches in the solar plexus.
Breathing a little heavily, Kuporovitch at length let up, helped himself to a cigarette, lit it and began to look through the drawers of the Major’s dressing-table until he found some sheets of official paper and a fountain-pen. Then he turned round and undid the now blood-soaked towel which he had used to gag his victim.
Schaub was still conscious, as, despite the ruthless ferocity of his attack, Kuporovitch had been careful not to strike him any blow that would have knocked him out. Taking him by the shoulder, the Russian dragged him up into a sitting position and shook him roughly, as he said:
‘Do you want a little more, or are you prepared now to do your stuff?’
The Major spat out a loose tooth, mumbled a stream of blasphemies, then murmured: ‘All right, you hell-hound. You win! But as sure as my name’s Wolfram I’ll get even with you for this—before you’re much older.’
‘The future will take care of itself,’ replied Kuporovitch, untying the German’s hands, and pushing him over to the dressing-table where he had set out the pen and paper. ‘No monkey-tricks now,’ he added. ‘I know that Madeleine Lavallière is in the Cherche-Midi, so I want an order from you to the Governor of the prison to hand her over without questions to anyone who may present that paper to him. If you try to double-cross me I’ll get back here somehow and skin you alive.’
The S.S. man had no more fight left in him. He wrote out the order, signed it, and handed it to his captor. Kuporovitch put it in his pocket and said:
‘I’m not giving you the chance to raise an alarm until I’m out of this place. Get back on the bed now; I mean to tie you up and gag you again.’
Obediently Schaub lay down and rested his aching head on the pillow; but before Kuporovitch inserted the gag in his mouth he managed one malicious twisted smile, as he snarled:
‘You think you’re mighty clever, don’t you? But he who laughs last laughs longest. The paper that I’ve written for you is all in order, but the Gestapo Chief at the Cherche-Midi would never give up one of his prisoners to a complete stranger, just on an order signed by me. He’d only do that if it were presented by one of our own people or a French official of some standing. So you see, as far as you’re concerned, it’s only a piece of wastepaper. I’ll tell you another thing. My batman will find me here tomorrow morning. Directly I’m free I’m going to do a job which will hurt you much more than you’ve hurt me. I’m going along to the Cherche-Midi personally to re-examine Madeleine Lavallière. I don’t mind if she talks or if she doesn’t talk, but during our examination I’ll have her nails torn off her hands and feet, and her eyes put out. Now think that one over, damn you!’
For answer Kuporovitch gave the Major one more heavy blow, this time an uppercut under the chin, which knocked him right out. Yet he was acutely worried now. He had a horrid feeling that Schaub had not been lying and that the paper he had been at such pains to get might, after all, prove valueless, and there was nothing more that he could extract from the German. Having tied him up and gagged him, he picked up his little brown bag and left the room, locking the door behind him.
Stepping into the lift, he went down to the basement, nodded casually to a man whom he found there waiting for it, and without a backward glance hurried down the passages until he reached the coal-cellar. Entering it, he pulled off his white coat, put on his ordinary one, collected his overcoat from a corner where he had left it, and pushing up the cover of the manhole climbed out into the street.
He had hardly reached it when a frightful thought struck him. Schaub had said that his soldier-servant would find him in the morning, but it was not yet eight o’clock; so it was almost certain that the servant would visit the room to tidy it up before the Major’s normal time of going to bed. He saw then that Schaub had naturally refrained from mentioning that for fear that if his attacker knew that he was likely to be released within the next hour or so he would have killed him to make certain of his silence.
Kuporovitch wondered then why the hell he hadn’t killed the Major, while he had the chance. For a moment he contemplated going back to do so, but a few seconds’ thought was enough for him to realise that he had been extraordinarily lucky to have spent the best part of two hours in the headquarters of the German Army of Occupation without once being challenged or asked for a pass that he had not got. To go back again would be to tempt the gods. Dismissing the idea, he began to run down the street, now half-crazy with the knowledge that it would almost certainly be useless for him to present the order for Madeleine’a release that he held, and that through his own act he had brought about the possibility that within an hour or two Schaub would arrive at the Cherche-Midi to have her dragged off to the torture chamber.