Voices on the Wind (33 page)

She closed the door and immediately Paul Roulier came and sat beside Kate. He took her hand and held it. ‘I'm sorry she said all that. I couldn't stop her.'

‘It doesn't matter,' Kate answered. ‘You've really caught me, haven't you, Paul? You've done a wonderful job for her. I hope she pays you a fat fee.' She pulled her hand away.

‘Kate, listen to me. I know what I sounded like, but I had to satisfy her. If she thought I had any personal feelings she'd dismiss me right away.'

‘Personal feelings?' she repeated. ‘What kind of personal feelings can you have in a case like this – you're a professional, aren't you? You have a job to do and you do it. I am part of that job, that's all.'

‘It isn't all,' he said. ‘It was in the beginning, but it isn't now. Lawyers and doctors should never get involved with clients or patients. I set out to persuade you to come here and help in Eilenburg's defence. And it wasn't just for money, either. I don't like the English, I don't trust them and everything I discovered while I was investigating this made me more convinced than ever that they fought to the last Frenchman through the Resistance.

‘I had no view either way when I met you. But it changed. It changed during the days we spent together and I began to see the past through your eyes. Kate, will you believe me when I say this? I admire you. I understand you and I love you for being the woman you are. If you want to get out of this now, I'll take you to Nice airport and put you on the plane. Without any deposition.' He got up, fumbled for a cigarette.

Kate said quietly, ‘You'd be ruined. She'd see to that.'

‘She won't be in a position to ruin anyone if she goes through with this,' he said. ‘She's going into court to speak for him. She'll destroy herself to try and save him. And more than herself.'

‘What do you mean?'

He sat opposite her this time, his head low. ‘That's another thing you were never meant to know,' he said. ‘Her last husband was Alfred Vigier, the socialist millionaire. Friend and adviser to President Mitterand. Just imagine what the scandal will do to the government when she announces that she was the mistress of the Gestapo chief who murdered French Resistance heroes and that she is paying for his defence!'

‘The wife,' Kate corrected.

He shook his head. ‘It wasn't legal. I didn't tell her that; they went through some ceremony with a man who wasn't accredited mayor. She got to Switzerland and married a Swiss after being his mistress for some years. Then when he died she came home and met Vigier and married him. When she goes to court she could bring down the government!'

‘And that was another motive?' Kate said slowly. ‘She's unbalanced, isn't she, and you knew if you encouraged her to do this, what it would mean in political terms.'

‘Yes.' He looked directly at her. ‘I did, and I wasn't alone. Mitterand is a disaster for France. If we can help to bring him down by means of this trial, then it's our duty to do it. And we will. But you don't have to be a part of it. I don't want that any more. I don't want you at risk, and that's what's happened. Kate, go upstairs and get your things. She takes hours to dress; I'll bring the car round.' She stood up, finished the drink. She hadn't even noticed what was in it.

‘You're part of the Fascist Right,' she said.

‘I'm a French patriot,' he countered. ‘I shall come to England and see you. There's no reason why you should live alone.'

‘I'm twenty years older than you are,' she said quietly. ‘You could be my son.'

‘I could be your lover,' he said. ‘Think of that. I have; many times since we met.'

Kate went over to the table and said, ‘I think I'll have another drink. It doesn't take me hours to dress before dinner. I'll see you later, Paul.'

He went upstairs and knocked on Antoinette Vigier's door. She was fully dressed, reading from a thick file. She took off her glasses and said, ‘Well? Have you convinced her?'

‘She was upset,' he said. ‘For a moment I thought you had gone too far, Madame. Her private life is nothing to do with this.'

‘Oh yes it is,' she countered. ‘I saw her face; she hadn't been happy. She'd been cheated, and she knew it. Will she give the deposition? Will she give evidence?'

‘I think so,' he answered. ‘I'll try and get the deposition drawn up tonight and we can get it witnessed tomorrow. At least that will guarantee her safety.'

‘I'm not interested in her safety,' Antoinette said coldly. ‘She hates my husband. Only personal revenge will make her help him. I think she's influenced you, Paul. Has she?'

He said, ‘No,' and it was convincing. ‘She's a brave woman, and if you want her to help us, you mustn't antagonize her. That's my advice.'

She put on the glasses and picked up the papers. He was dismissed.

The evening was like a play; Kate felt as if she were on stage and an invisible audience was watching. Paul Roulier and Antoinette Vigier were fellow actors. The food was superb, the service silent and impeccable, there was candlelight and beautiful silver, with flowers on the table. The conversation was like dialogue written for the second act of a drama, before tragedy erupted. They talked about the weather, the garden, the shops in Antibes and the difficulty of getting well-trained servants; they discussed the merits of restaurants she'd never heard of, and Antoinette dismissed the Hôtel du Cap with a remark about it being full of Americans. Kate almost left the table when she said it. Oblivious, the other woman went on, ‘Of course it's not what it used to be; my late husband knew it well before the war, his parents used to stay there. It was very select then. It was a convalescent home for wounded German soldiers during the war.'

The convoy that had challenged Jean Dulac, with its quota of senior Abwehr officers.… London's reluctance to let him attack it. And the bitter opposition of Pierrot to the plan, which only changed to support when he knew that Dulac had been betrayed to the Gestapo. How much did the woman know about that? How much had Eilenburg discussed with her? The phrase came floating back through the tinkling voice of Eilenburg's mistress, reminiscing about her last husband's views on the hotel.

‘He destroyed the evidence we wanted … maybe that's why he was protected afterwards.…' In the turmoil she experienced at that meeting, she had heard something vital and overlooked it. What evidence had Pierrot, the traitor and double-agent, destroyed that so benefited the Allies that he was immune from justice? She leaned forward, and suddenly the air of play-acting disappeared. There was no stage, no artificial interlude. Everything was real again and charged with tension. ‘Madame Vigier, about the time our network was broken in May 1944, there was a changeover of the garrison at Antibes; some German officers were due to arrive at the Hôtel du Cap. Do you remember anything about them?'

Antoinette Vigier didn't hesitate. ‘Oh, yes. We were living here at the time; I remember Christian going up to the hotel to have dinner with some of them. There was a general he was interested in.'

‘In what way interested?' Kate asked her. She saw Roulier lean forward and put down his wine glass. He was paying very close attention.

‘He didn't believe he was reliable,' she said. ‘A number of the old Junker families were anti-Hitler. When he began to look like losing, of course. Christian hated them; he used to say to me, “We are from the ordinary people. These aristocrats only think of themselves. The Führer can't rely on them as he can on the SS.” He didn't trust the army, and of course he was right.'

She rang a bell and pushed her chair back. Kate noticed that Paul hadn't moved to help her. She could feel him watching her. ‘Let's go into the salon,' Antoinette said. ‘We can take our coffee there. And then,' she gave Kate a charming smile, ‘Paul can draw up your deposition.' She swept past them out of the dining room. Kate followed quickly, avoiding Roulier.

They sat together and coffee was handed them by the same manservant who had served dinner. Antoinette Vigier gave a little yawn. ‘I am tired,' she said. ‘Will you excuse me if I go up early and leave you together?'

When they were alone, Paul said, ‘You've decided to go through with this? Won't you think again?'

‘I've come this far,' Kate said, ‘and I'm not going back now. I'm not signing any deposition till I've seen Eilenburg again. When can you arrange it?'

‘You've got to tell me why,' he insisted. ‘Something she said about the German officers and the general – what did it mean to you?'

‘Nothing that's going to help your client,' she said. ‘But it might answer a very important question for me. I've got to see him again – God, I let it pass this morning without following it up. What a fool!'

‘Why don't you tell me?' he demanded. ‘We've worked together all the way on this – Kate, please trust me. What did Eilenburg say that you missed?'

She lifted the lid of the silver cigarette box. Gauloise. She lit one, and the strong tobacco smell evoked him instantly. The sensitive face with the very dark eyes, the lean body and the artist's hands. The pain of that memory brought a hand to her heart in the oldest reflex action of grief. How many times had he lit a cigarette and passed it to her, when they lay side by side?

And that other memory, jostling him out of the way, a man with bright blue eyes and white-blond hair, saying in his Germanic French, ‘He had no intention of betraying anything or anyone … especially where you were hiding.… So he threw himself out of the window.' No, she couldn't trust Paul Roulier any more. His motives and hers were not the same. He wanted a scandal, seeing a political advantage. She wanted the truth about why the man she loved and all her friends had had to die. She got up. ‘If you want me to sign a deposition, Paul, I'll do it after I've seen Eilenburg. Now I'm going up to bed. I'm tired too, as it happens. I'll see you in the morning. Good night.'

He stood in front of the door. ‘I told you; I don't want you to stay. I don't want you to be involved. Go home; let your people know you've withdrawn from all this, and there won't be any trouble then.'

‘I'm sure there won't,' she said quietly. ‘But I'm near the answer to a question that's got to be answered. What use I'll make of it depends on what it is. Good night.'

There was no sign of Antoinette Vigier the next morning. When Kate came downstairs there was an empty feel about the house. She wandered through to the salon, and everything was cool and shuttered, as if nobody had been there for a long time. She felt someone behind her and swung round, startled. It was the smooth old manservant, asking if she would like to breakfast in the conservatory.

She said thank you, and followed him. There was no one else in the pretty glass-walled annexe. ‘Where is Maître Roulier?' she asked.

‘He left early, Madame.' And Madame Vigier herself – she did not come down till midday, was the answer. Kate poured coffee, and pushed the fruit and croissants aside. She didn't feel hungry or rested, in spite of a deep sleep that was near to exhaustion. The conservatory was full of houseplants and exotics. She felt claustrophobic, as if the green growing things that climbed the walls were moving towards her.

The atmosphere of the villa was like the woman who owned it. Beautiful, lavish and distorted, an island of fantasy in the sea of real life.

And then there was the man so much younger than she was, who had brought her here, and was trying to persuade her to leave before the end and abandon the quest. He had said he loved her. ‘There's no reason why you should live alone.… I could be your lover.' It would be a poisoned love affair, as sick as the passion that motivated the woman in her room upstairs, who'd carried it with her through two marriages and forty years. As twisted as the love Pierrot felt for her, so that he rescued her from the fate he'd brought the others. And yet he'd also loved his crippled wife; she'd seen his tenderness towards her. Sexual desire for Kate hadn't altered his love for the other, helpless woman.

‘I've one more thing to do here, and then I shall be taking my wife to a safe place.' His wife had been alive in 1947, but that was so long ago. She hadn't been in the court when Kate gave evidence and he watched her from the dock. He had walked out a free man. And then died in a car crash eight years later. He was alone. She got up hurriedly, and went out into the passage and the large entrance hall. Through into the salon again, searching for a telephone. There it was, discreetly hidden on a side table near the sofa – one of the latest designs, unobtrusive in the midst of bronzes and porcelain and enamelled boxes. She lifted it and dialled enquiries. It didn't take long. A Madame Derain was listed in apartment C, 23 rue de Tivoli in Beaulieu. Kate said thank you, and put the phone back. Apartment C, 23 rue de Tivoli. It had taken her three hours to bicycle there from Nice. So early in the morning, just after curfew was lifted, when there was no traffic on the roads. There was a bell by the fireplace. She pressed it, and the manservant came in, wearing an apron and carrying a cleaning cloth. She got the impression that he resented being rung for by her.

‘I need a taxi,' she said. ‘Is there a taxi you use nearby?'

‘Madame uses her car,' he said. ‘I'm afraid I can't help you, Madame.'

‘Never mind,' Kate said briskly. ‘I'll find one for myself.'

It was a glorious day. She walked quickly down the well-kept drive, anxious to be out of the grounds, as far away from the villa as possible. She wondered whether Antoinette Vigier knew she had left and was watching from behind a curtain in a window above. She didn't look back.

Philippe Derain's widow was sitting with her back to the window. The bright sunshine made a halo of her white hair. She stared at the woman who had announced herself as Madame Alfurd, from England. Her voice was sweet and clear.