Clandestine Read online

  Clandestine

  A St-Cyr and Kohler Mystery

  J. Robert Janes

  MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Author’s Note

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  Historical Note

  This is for Mike Bursaw,

  of Mystery Mike’s in Carmel, Indiana,

  and for Steele Curry in Calgary, Alberta.

  Over the years, each in his own way

  has been immensely kind and supportive.

  Acknowledgments

  All of the novels in the St-Cyr & Kohler series incorporate a few words and brief passages of French or German. Jim Reynolds, of Niagara-on-the-Lake, very kindly assisted with both; the artist Pierrette Laroche, on occasion with the French. Should there be any errors, however, they are my own and for these I apologize.

  Author’s Note

  Clandestine is a work of fiction in which actual places and times are used but altered as appropriate. As with the other St-Cyr & Kohler novels, the names of real persons appear for historical authenticity, though all are deceased and the story makes of them what it demands. I do not condone what happened during these times, I abhor it. But during the German Occupation of France in World War II, the everyday common crimes of murder, arson and the like continued to be committed, and I merely ask by whom and how were they solved.

  To the old French saying, ‘Opportunity makes the thief,’

  must be added, ‘Murder has its reasons, death its answers.’

  1

  L’Abbaye de Vauclair, thought St-Cyr, and here he was facing it again but in an entirely different way.

  Down through the encroaching forest, up against the ruins­ of the monastery and definitely not where it should be, an armoured­ Renault van with open doors awaited. Even from a distance and through a heavy downpour they could read the necessary: BANQUE NATIONALE DE CRÉDIT ET COMMERCIAL, SIÈGE SOCIAL, 43 BOULEVARD DES CAPUCINES, PARIS.

  A difficult address, given the implications such could have these days, but an even more formidable crime if given the needs of the Résistance, considering that only two days ago Dr. Julius Ritter, Gauleiter Fritz Sauckel’s forced-labour man in France, had been shot dead as he stood on the corner of the rue des Réservoirs in Paris’s 16th arrondissement, home and/or office space to so many of the Occupier.

  ‘Oberg’s going to scream his head off, Louis. Boemelburg will be in a rage, Berlin on the line again and blaming them both for not having kept “order”,’ said Kohler.

  Lately Hermann’s bosses had caused him to worry more than usual and with good reason. Karl Oberg was the Höherer SS und Polizeiführer of France, Walter Boemelburg being its Gestapo chief. It was a Friday. Sometimes those could be good days, if a Saturday half-day and Sunday break could be allowed, though now, it being 1 October 1943, that was highly unlikely. But since the bodies were not with the van and there was no immediate rush, they could take their time and he could fill Hermann in on the ruins and everything else.

  ‘Why us, Louis? Why when we damn well know the end is in sight and that idiot of a carpet-biter is still bent on destroying everything?’

  Hermann never missed an opportunity to nail the Führer with the latest descriptive. Like a lot of other things from home, he had ways of finding such and conjuring them when needed, but ‘spring’ really was coming, an Allied invasion all but certain since the war in Russia was going very badly for the Wehrmacht, and Berlin and lots of other cities in the Reich were persistently being bombed by the RAF at night and the USAAF during the day. It would be wise to take his mind off things and focus it on what was needed. ‘Ah bon, mon vieux, Rocheleau, the local garde champêtre, awaits. Somehow he has managed a small fire and will be warming us a welcoming cup of le thé de France.’

  Lemon balm! No sugar, of course, but no saccharine, either. Just the herb water and a few bits of leaves. The rural policeman.

  ‘Hermann, the nervousness you continue to exhibit requires the calming that tea will bring. Be your generous self. We may not just need what he will begrudgingly tell us, but everything else he will attempt to hold back.’

  After an initial gust of flame to start the fire, that thin pillar of smoke had continued to rise well beyond the van and was now all but lost among the ruins. ‘He’s in what remains of the refectory,’ said St-Cyr. ‘That’s appropriate, where the monks used to take their meals. Corbeny, his village, is but five or so kilometres to the east. Rocheleau will know the ruins well.’

  Longing for a cigarette if one had it to light and could do so in such a deluge, Kohler held this partner of his back a moment. ‘Now be so good as to tell me how you even knew it would be lemon balm?’

  It was a logical enough question, given the state some of the Occupier had got themselves into, though Hermann wasn’t really one of those, not with the past three years of their having worked together day after day solving common crime and doing so honestly in an age of rampant dishonesty. ‘Ah, because the monks left a herb garden that has not only maintained itself over the forgotten years, but peacefully conquered the adjacent land.’

  ‘Peacefully? Bitte, mein Lieber, don’t rub it in. You’ve been here before.’

  ‘First in September 1914, but that was a little before your side decided that the only way to hold Falkenhayn’s line after the First Battle of Ypres was to invent the abominable trench warfare that would tragically dominate the next four miserable years of that other war you people caused us to declare.’

  Credit given where credit was due, eh? ‘The Great War, was it, and not the Franco-Prussian?’

  ‘Both, but the later one, of course. Now take a few drags of this reserve I’ve kept hidden. Let me cup my hands over the match you will have to light.’

  ‘I’ve run out. We’ll need his fire. And that second visit?’

  They were both edgy, and with good reason, for the SS of the avenue Foch and Gestapo of the rue des Saussaies could be far from calm and the partnership would be blamed no matter what. ‘April 1917 when, in five days, 29,000 of our boys were killed, myself having been spared due to the sniper’s bullet that nearly took off my left shoulder. Nivelle had ordered Mangin “the ferocious” to attack that ridge behind me. Nivelle’s plan was simple. After all, he was a general. In the first three hours we were to take the entire 3,000 metres of the steep and heavily wooded limestone scarp that forms the other side of that ridge, and never mind the natural caves, the ancient and more recent quarries, and even the German trenches, entanglements of barbed wire and machine guns we had to face. In the second two hours we were to cover this side—it’s easier going downhill, isn’t it?—therefore an additional 2,000 metres of the flat valley floor in which these ruins lie were called for. Though the official casualties were 130,000, and of yourselves some 163,000, the French figures should, I think, rightfully be 187,000 with 40,000 dead before that “engagement” was broken off. Nivelle went out in disgrace, Pétain came in, and now we’re still stuck with that pitiful octogenarian.’

  Who had all but elected himself prime minister of France in June 1940 and had settled the government in that playground of the Empress Eugénie, the spa town of Vichy which the partnership knew only too well, having been there early last February.

  ‘Travail, Famille et Patrie, Hermann.’

  Work, Family and Country, not Liberté, Égalité and Fraternité.

  ‘Traison, Louis. Famine et Prison, that’s what the graffiti artists recently slapped on the boarding tha
t surrounds the Palais du Luxembourg to keep away the grenades someone might throw at the headquarters of the Luftwaffe here in the West.’

  In June 1940 Reichsmarschall Göring had taken it over and had had that fence put up when so few would even have thought to throw such, but now … ?

  ‘That ridge is the Chemin des Dames, Louis, with the “walk” your Louis XV made atop it for his daughters when they went to visit the duchess of Narbonne at her Château de la Bove. There are strategic viewpoints along its thirty-five or so kilometres and it separates the valleys of the river Ailette, here to the north, from that of the Aisne to the south. We’re probably a little less than 150 kilometres to the northeast of Paris, maybe 35 north from Reims and 15 south from Laon.’

  Good for Hermann. He was now prepared to focus on the job at hand. ‘Just don’t “Chief” me in front of Rocheleau. I prevented him from throwing his weapon away and running but foolishly failed to report him to his superior officer.’

  ‘Must you continue to attract old enemies I then have to put up with?’

  ‘Detectives always do, Hermann. It’s part of the job. We’re just not paid for it.’

  Founded in 1134 at the request of the Benedictine bishop, Barthélémy du Jur, l’Abbaye de Vauclair had been extremely successful for over 600 years only to then be auctioned off for next to nothing after the Revolution. Turned into a farm, its substantial church had become a barn, the whole of its buildings being used and decaying to then be put up for sale a last time in 1911, only to be reduced to the present rubble during the offensive of April 1917 and subsequent battles, for the oft-stagnant front had run right through here.

  ‘Come on, Hermann. It’s time these two old soldiers, one from each side of this present conflict and the last one, met our garde champêtre.’

  ‘I’ll let you ask the questions. That’ll put him on edge.’

  Hermann generally needed to have the last word but this wasn’t one of those times. ‘Then I’ll start by asking him why Joliot­, the coroner from Laon, is not present.’

  Rocheleau, felt Kohler, was a little man with damned big glasses­ whose black Bakelite rims made him look like an owl that had just been surprised while tearing apart a chicken it should never have touched.

  ‘Rocheleau …’ began Louis.

  ‘Sergeant St-Cyr! Ah, the years they have taken their toll, but the mind will be as nimble as ever. I knew when I heard the car that you would have seen the smoke and found me. A deluge like this brings back memories of the battle, n’est-ce pas? I’ve placed stones here near the fire for yourself and Herr Kohler. A little warmth for the soul. Le thé de France and the ersatz ham in welcome.’

  Like the rifle with its pig sticker’s lance that was leaning against the ruins, the tin mugs were antiques, felt Kohler: dented, banged back into shape and still imprinted with their French Army logos­. The bugger even had a poilu’s rucksack and wore boots of the same, since the French never seemed to throw out anything. No medals, of course. Just the dark blue of a somewhat untidy cop’s uniform and a bicycle, the rain gear having been hung aside and the arch of stone above looking solid enough.

  ‘Ah bon, Inspectors,’ went on Rocheleau, ‘the steaks will soon be ready. One for each of us to bring a little warmth of their own.’

  Thumb-thick slices of rutabaga, felt Kohler, were being fried in lard when, having come from a farming community, Rocheleau should at least have had potatoes with a few eggs and rashers of bacon. Reaching for some sprigs he must have gathered, the cook tore off bits to sprinkle over the repast.

  ‘A little thyme and oregano, to better the flavour, eh, Herr Detective Inspector Kohler? Don’t burn the fingers. Bon appétit.’

  And why was he serving up even such?

  The answer came quickly enough. ‘Food is the great leveller, Hermann. It lubricates even those matters that are less than obvious. Rocheleau, our sincere thanks for such a consideration but please be so good as to tell us when you arrived, what you found and why Coroner Joliot, an old and much valued colleague, is still not present?’

  There must be no hesitation, not with this former comrade in arms. ‘At 0900 today I received instructions by motorcycle courier from Laon to come here, touch nothing and keep everyone else away but yourselves. I was even brought the rifle with its bayonet and six cartridges.’

  While Boemelburg must have sent word that they would be in charge, that motorcycle alone would have meant the Wehrmacht whose local Kommandant would have been duly notified by the Préfet of Laon or vice versa, the former being the only one who could have sanctioned the rifle. But Hermann would already be thinking the investigation was only going deeper and deeper. ‘And did anyone else attempt to intrude?’

  With St-Cyr it would have to be said. ‘Father Adrien, our village priest, insisted on blessing them before consigning their souls to heaven.’

  ‘And was curious, Hermann. Our priests always consider it a duty to find out as much as possible about what has happened in their parishes and what might still be happening. He touched the victims, did he, Corporal?’

  Ah merde. ‘Only with his cross and maybe sprinklings of holy water from his little bottle.’

  ‘In a deluge like this?’

  ‘Should that matter?’

  ‘Of course not. Now be so good as to tell us that you covered the bodies with the tarpaulins that courier had instructed you to bring along from Corbeny.’

  Bon! St-Cyr hadn’t asked about Father Adrien’s other bottles. ‘I did, yes.’

  ‘And while you were busy, did the father duck his head into that van or did he step right into it to have a better look?’

  Sacré nom de nom! ‘Me, I was not nearby but he wouldn’t have touched anything. When I returned, he said that God would find it hard to forgive the killers. Then he rode off on his bicycle.’

  ‘Killers?’ asked that Sûreté.

  ‘Oui. Since the bodies were not lying together or even beside the van, Father Adrien concluded rightly, as I also did, that the shots must have come from two assailants.’

  ‘And where, precisely, did he find the bodies?’

  And never mind who had first been busy hauling that canvas, thought Kohler.

  ‘Both were some distance from the van, Chief Inspector, the one not among the herbs that are nearest to the ruins of the kitchen­, but nearer the distant remains of the boundary wall and in what must once have been another herbal, the other in what little remains of the chapter house which is right next to what was once the sanctuary and main altar but has more walls.’

  A mouthful, but Louis wasn’t going to let him off.

  ‘Father Adrien was summoned by yourself, was he?’

  ‘That is correct. Whenever there is a death, I always summon him.’

  ‘Now tell us why such a van would even have been here?’

  ‘Robbery. Hijacked on the road from Reims to Laon. That bank regularly does collections from Reims to Laon, Soissons and Senlis before returning to Paris.’

  ‘And is that all that Father Adrien told you?’

  L’espèce de salaud! ‘He said that it had to have been the Résistance from Reims, that they would have known the schedule far better even than the victims.’

  And wouldn’t you know it, thought Kohler. Reims instead of Laon which was much closer to Corbeny. The steaks were woody, the lard a trifle off and the tea as thin as usual.

  Snapping his fingers, Hermann demanded the reserve cigarette, and carefully cutting it in half, lit both at the fire and passed one to the corporal before sharing the other with this partner of his.

  It was Louis who told Rocheleau to keep the fire going and the tea warm. ‘We’ll have a look.’

  When well away, it was Hermann who said, ‘That was one of the old Lebel Modèle d’ordonnance 1886, eight millimetres.’

  And the first to have used the ‘new’ smokeless powder a
nd find itself in the Great War and then during the Blitzkrieg of this one. ‘A museum piece, Hermann. The bolt sticks out like a sore thumb and catches on everything, and the spare rounds that have been patiently fed into the forestock’s tubular magazine insist on taking their time.’

  ‘That needle of a pig sticker’s lance is a good fifty centimetres long.’

  ‘He’s hiding something. Me, I still don’t know what it is but assume there’s got to be more than meets the eye.’

  ‘Another piece of canvas for starters. It was tucked behind the rubble he had leaned that beat-up old blue chariot against. If you’d been observant and using the cameras of the mind that you repeatedly insist on, you’d have seen it.’

  ‘Ah bon, mon vieux, you did see it. Me, I’m gratified. The lessons I’ve been trying to teach you are finally coming home. Keep up the good work.’

  ‘Laon may have lots of réseaux, Louis, but that priest of his was smart enough to point us in the opposite direction.’

  ‘But was the poor box of his church alleviated?’

  Since it was a bank van. ‘Meaning that even priests might be tempted?’

  ‘You said it, not myself. Me to find the bodies, you to look over the van. It’ll be drier.’

  ‘Then take this with you.’

  ‘I’d no idea you were so light-fingered.’

  ‘Stores at the rue des Saussaies would just have sold that flask on the marché noir, and you know that as well as I do.’

  It even held an eau de vie de poire.

  ‘The Williams pear, Louis, the same as what’s called the Bartlett in America. Giselle got it for me. The bottle’s in the boot but it doesn’t have a label so it’s just one of those from a travelling still that goes from farm to farm and holds a good deal back because of that same black market and in spite of all the red tape your Vichy food controllers have thrown up against such necessary things.’

  Giselle being one of the two women Hermann cohabited with when he had time and was in Paris and not busy, the girl having returned to live with him, Oona also. ‘Enjoy yourself.’