Paris Noir: Capital Crime Fiction (15 page)

‘Where are they going, Begg?’ murmured Dr Sinclair.

Begg’s own face was alive with wonderment. ‘I had heard of this… Sinclair, old friend, these people are walking the moonbeam roads between the worlds. Simply – walking across the multiverse!’

Klosterheim read the bewilderment in Taffy’s eyes. ‘Do not fear, doctor. You will soon have the whole of eternity to contemplate this puzzle. Now – move on. There are still more wonders to greet you…’

Bardot groaned, evidently believing himself feverish. He was the only one of the prisoners not to be bound. His arm hung limp at his side and his right hand staunched the blood from his wounded shoulder. He seemed dazed, unable to accept the actuality of these events. He looked up through the swirling, scintillating colour which filled the great ether, the shimmering lines of light cutting between them, the distant figures, the immense beauty of it all. Then he looked back at the grotesquely grinning uniformed men training their Lugers on the captured detectives. Behind them, removing the black diamond mask he affected, Klosterheim stood stock still. He had wrapped his great cloak around him, as if against a chill, though the temperature was moderate. From within the head the cold eyes shifted from face to face, offering no expression, no sense of any humanity.

To Begg’s certain knowledge, the former priest was virtually indestructible. Like Zenith, like Mrs Persson herself, he was an eternal, one of those whose longevity was considerably greater than that of an ordinary human being. He was accustomed to life in the semi-finite. Some said they sustained their long lives by dreaming a thousand years for every day of their ordinary existence and that what we witnessed were dream projections, not the actual person. That most of them lived forever was, in Begg’s opinion, debatable. Yet those who had encountered Klosterheim over the centuries came to believe that he had truly been one of Satan’s favourite accomplices, until the time when Satan himself sought reconciliation with their former lord. Then Klosterheim had turned against Satan, too. As he perceived it, he had been betrayed by the two mightiest masters in his universe. For all his well-hidden spirituality, Begg was not a man to accept superstition or supernatural explanation, but he could almost believe the stories as he stared back at Klosterheim. Begg’s own face was expressionless as he considered ways and means of turning the tables on their captors.

Step by remorseless step they moved along the opaque, silvery causeway towards that sonorous booming until at last the road ended abruptly, upon the edge of the void, its silver falling away like mist. For the first time a smile crossed Klosterheim’s thin, bloodless lips. And he looked down.

Begg was the first to follow his gaze.

The detective’s first instinct was to step back. He stifled a sound. There, immediately below them, its blade pointing down into the dancing, obscuring mist, he made out the shape of a gigantic black sword fashioned to resemble a balance, with a cup depending from either arm. Within the metal of the black blade scarlet characters writhed and twisted while the cups moved slowly, gleaming like jewelled gold. It was as if they measured the weight of the world’s pain. Multicoloured strands of ectoplasm swirled from the cups and Begg knew in his soul that he did indeed look upon the legendary Cosmic Balance, which regulated the entire multiverse, weighing Law and Chaos, good and evil, truth and falsehood, life and death, love and hate, maintaining all the equilibrium and therefore the existence of all man created matter.

In spite of the booming voice of the swaying arm, Klosterheim’s cold tones could be heard clearly. ’If the multiverse has a centre, then this can be said to be it. I have sought it for many years and across many universes. And you, gentlemen, will have the privilege of seeing it before you die. Indeed,’ and now he chuckled to himself, ‘you will always see it before you die…’

Now it was Lapointe’s turn to speak. ‘You are a dangerous fool, M’sieu Klosterheim, if you believe you can control that symbol of eternal justice. Only God Almighty has any way of altering the scales maintaining the balance between Law and Chaos. What you see is doubtless only one manifestation of the Cosmic Balance. Can you
control
a symbol?’

’Perhaps not,’ came the sweet, calm voice of Mrs Persson. She had turned up the collar of her long, military coat. Framed by her helmet of dark hair, her beautiful, pale, oval face shone with the reflected light of the great scale. Her indigo eyes were sardonic. ‘But the one who gives power to the symbol can sometimes control what it controls…’

Lapointe turned away from her with an expression of disgust.

Hitler, Hess, Goering, Röhm and Goebbels had crowded to the edge of the road to stare down at the great balance. ‘All we need now is to set into that hilt the Star of Judea,’ said the Nazi colonel.

‘Which you will not receive until next Saturday as I understand it,’ said Begg, genuinely puzzled. ‘Tomorrow is that?’

Hitler became suddenly alert. He turned questioning eyes to Klosterheim.

‘I brought you here, where Time has no end and no beginning, merely to show you why and for what you will die,’ declared Klosterheim. ‘A small offering to the Gods of Chaos who will soon be serving my cause.’

‘And what is the chief price you pay for their compliance?’ Begg enquired coolly. ‘The souls of four mortals could hardly be enough.’

‘Oh, they are scarcely ordinary mortals. Their crimes have resonated across the entire multiverse. Their souls have far greater weight than yours, Sir Seaton, certainly in that respect. Yet will the Balance accept them? We still await the one who brings us the Star of Judea. The
Hindenburg
docked an hour ago by his time and now stands ready at Eiffel’s great mooring mast.’ Klosterheim’s cold voice was almost amused. ‘With that great and ancient jewel, I will make my true offering and in return shall have control of the Balance.’

‘How could a mere jewel – any jewel – have value here?’ demanded Dr Sinclair, his eyes half-mad with what they had seen.

‘The Star of Judea is of immense value to the Lords of Chaos, Taffy,’ murmured Begg. ‘They’ll reward any being who brings it to them. It will even seem to give that being control of the Cosmic Balance. Meanwhile…’ He noted an opportunity and gestured, drawing the Nazis’ attention away from his friends…

Suddenly, a revolver appeared in Bardot’s left hand. Begg had anticipated this and deliberately and distracted their enemies, giving Bardot time to act. The Frenchman’s eyes were a mixture of contempt and pain. ‘You poor, unimaginative brutes could not imagine one of us owning a second weapon. Throw up your hands and drop your guns, gentlemen.’

The startled Germans swung round, staring into the barrel of Bardot’s serviceable Hachette.38. They looked from him to Klosterheim to Mrs Persson. Only the woman found some amusement in this reversal. Yet she did not move, either to comply or to resist.

At Bardot’s demand, Captain Hess drew his elaborate, ornamental dagger from the scabbard at his belt and cut the ropes binding the metatemporal detectives. His deep-set eyes were dreamy, as if he believed himself the victim of an hallucination. Constantly his gaze returned to the great scintillating scales moving gently in constant balance, their movement continuing to create the deep booming, like the heartbeat of the multiverse.

Klosterheim snarled. ‘How do you think you can defeat my plans now, merely by turning the tables on my servants?’ And then, without warning, he rushed at Hess, pushing the startled Nazi to the edge of the moonbeam road. Before the detectives could reach him, he shoved again and this time Hess’s arms flailed as he fought to keep his balance. He reached towards Klosterheim, yelling something unintelligible, and then he fell backwards.

They watched him drop, spinning and waving his awkward arms, like a scarecrow, falling, falling down towards the Balance, passing the swaying beam until he disappeared in the pulsing light coming up from one of the cups. They heard him scream, a high-pitched and terrible noise, and then he had been swallowed into the light which flared suddenly scarlet.

Klosterheim stepped to the edge and watched with an air of satisfaction. ‘A sign of my good faith, I hope.’

Colonel Hitler swore in German. ‘You killed him. You killed my closest friend!’

Klosterheim shrugged. ‘It’s disputable that he’s actually dead, but my master needs blood and souls.’ He shrugged then. ‘The Grail-’

‘That thing is not the Grail!’ growled Röhm. ‘There cannot be two grails!’

Now Klosterheim smiled. ‘Not in your mythology, perhaps. But one cup holds the stuff of Chaos, the other holds the stuff of Law. That is what regulates the multiverse. That is why they are in constant conflict.’

Still cursing, the Nazi colonel reached down and picked up his fallen Luger. In one movement he pointed and pulled the trigger, firing shot after shot into the mocking figure. Again came that cold, humourless chuckle. Klosterheim spread his arms and looked down at his unwounded body. ’I am not so easily killed, Colonel Hitler. How can you take away the soul of a man who has no soul?’

Still Una Persson did not move. It was as if she were waiting, perhaps to watch the opposed groups destroy one another. Still that enigmatic amusement filled her indigo eyes.

Only when Röhm retrieved his own automatic pistol and pointed it at her did she frown. Begg was sure, eternal though she might be, that she was not invulnerable.

’Arioch! Arioch! Aid me now!’
called Klosterheim in that strange voice which seemed to deaden the air it filled.

Begg acted. He knew he could not kill Klosterheim easily, but the Nazis would soon return their attention to the detectives. He raised his Webley and, taking careful aim, shot Röhm between the eyes. The captain’s expression changed from anger to surprise. And then he, too, lost his balance and fell, his body spinning downwards to stop suddenly, as if in the grip of some powerful magnetic force which held him spreadeagled and screaming silently in space above the Balance.

Another shot. And this time it was Lapointe who sent Captain Goering into the void, to hang in the air immediately above the cup which held the weight of Chaos.

‘No!’ cried Una Persson suddenly. ‘No! Don’t kill them! Not yet! You don’t know what you’re doing. There’s a plan-’

But Begg had no choice, for the malevolent club-footed Goebbels screamed something about betrayal and turned his gun on her. The Webley’s bullet found its target in Goebbels’ heart and another Nazi went down, whirling and shrieking, to come to a sudden halt just before he was swallowed by the cup which now boiled with smoky scarlet and black.

‘You fool, Sir Seaton!’ cried Mrs Persson. ‘No more shooting, I beg you. Don’t you realise you’re aiding Klosterheim? Their souls are already pledged to Chaos. They are the blood sacrifice they intended to make of you. One last action and he can use them to destroy everything. Everything!’

Begg was confused. He kept his Webley levelled at the remaining Nazi, the slavering, terrified Hitler, who whispered in his lisping Austrian: ‘She’s right. Nothing but harm will come from killing me.’

‘Then get on your knees and keep your hands above your head,’ snapped Begg. Slowly, every part of his body trembling, Hitler obeyed. Taffy Sinclair knew his old friend well enough to understand that Begg accepted that he had, inadvertently, done Klosterheim’s work. The beat of the balance changed subtly. Now it was as if they heard distant wildfire, like the crackling and snapping of burning timber.

Una Persson came to stand beside Begg. He stepped backward as if she threatened him, but instead her expression was one of mixed anger and fear. ‘I did not believe you could follow me,’ she said. ‘Oh, Seaton, your courage is now likely to lose us the fight – even perhaps destroy the multiverse! Do you understand what this means?’

And still the massive, sword-like balance, its cups swaying and groaning, continued to beat and pulse and the light around its hilt was like a golden halo surrounding metal of a blackness greater than the void. From somewhere below, Begg thought he heard the murmur of distant laughter.

Klosterheim’s voice joined in that laughter. It was the bleakest, most desolate sound Sir Seaton Begg had ever heard. He lowered his gun, looking helplessly from Mrs Persson, to Klosterheim, to the kneeling, gibbering Hitler and to his friends.

‘Oh, by Jupiter!’ he whispered as realisation dawned. ‘Oh, my good Lord! What have I done?’

The booming of the great balance had now taken on a different, arrhythmic note. Under its deep, masculine voice, Begg thought he could hear the thin screams of the Nazis. The gulf surrounding the not-dead men apparently boiled with blood and black smoke.

‘We would have mastered creation and moulded it in our desired image until the end of time,’ wept Hitler. Begg did not care that he now lowered his hands and buried his face in them. ‘Klosterheim! That was what you promised me!’

‘Like you, my friend, I have made many promises in my long career.’ Klosterheim’s toneless voice betrayed no emotion. ‘And like you, Colonel Hitler, I have broken many promises. I helped you and your followers because it suited me. Now you have failed me. It no longer suits me. Your actions brought my enemies to me and we have reached this pass. Only the blood and souls of your colleagues will compensate for your clumsiness.’ He turned to the metatemporal detective. ‘My master has his initial sacrifices, thanks to you, Sir Seaton. Now he will come to my aid, as he said he would…’

Begg could not disguise his own self-disgust. He was about to speak when a new voice, light and mocking, sounded from out of the scarlet mist behind them. He recognised the voice at once.

‘Oh, do not count on Lord Arioch turning up just yet, Herr Klosterheim.’ The newcomer’s tone held mockery, amusement, a kind of courage which could belong, Begg knew, only to one man. He looked in surprise back down the road which had brought them here. Strolling towards them, swinging his cane, for all the world as if he were still the insouciant
flâneur
of the Arcades de l’Opéra, wearing full evening dress, including a silk-lined cape and a silk hat, which emphasised the bone whiteness of his skin, the glittering crimson of his eyes, was Monsieur Zenith. ‘Good evening, gentlemen.’ He lifted his top hat. ‘Mrs Persson. This is not quite the scene I imagined I would find. Where, for instance, are Herr Hitler’s friends?’