Folly Du Jour

His voice hardened. ‘I’ve seen his handiwork. Somerton’s head was damned near severed. A youth of sixteen had his living lips stitched together. His sister had her neck broken and her mouth stuffed with banknotes because someone thought she’d spoken to me. Three deaths in as many days! You’re sheltering Evil, Alice!’

‘By God! You haven’t had time to put all this together! Who’ve you been talking to?’ She looked wildly around the room.

‘You’ll be safer with me in my handcuffs, so stop looking at the bell. Every street urchin, every tramp under the bridge will know by this evening what you’ve been up to. It’ll make the morning editions. The authorities may turn a blind eye to whoring but they still disapprove of murder. From this moment, you’re a liability. Perhaps if I left you ru

She was looking at him in horror. Distanced. Shocked. But still calculating. ‘Safer with you? You’re mad!’

‘Possibly. Leaves you with a narrow choice, Alice. You walk out of the front door with a mad puritan and negotiate your future career or stay behind with a mad sadist and die. Which is it to be?’ He looked at his watch. ‘A taxi arrived just a minute ago in front of the jazz club. I expect your sharp ears picked it up?’

She turned her head very slightly to the window. The thick cream and black curtains and closed shutters reduced the traffic noise on the boulevard to a low murmur.

‘It’s sitting there with the engine idling. We can be inside it and away into the night in thirty seconds.’

Alice had never been indecisive. The last decision he’d seen her take had been witnessed by him down the barrel of a gun. A gun trained on him.

‘Top left drawer of the sideboard,’ she said. ‘There’s a Luger in there. 9 mm. It’s loaded. Eight rounds. Safety’s on. You’re going to have to use it.’

Chapter Twenty-Two

‘Your guard dog’s standing right outside, isn’t he?’

‘Yes. He’s as tough as he looks and he understands English. That’s why I lured you down to this end of the room. Laugh a little, Joe. If you go on snarling at me, he’ll come crashing in.’

She gave a peal of laughter that sounded genuine enough but he couldn’t bring himself to join in. ‘You won’t be allowed to leave here alive, you know. I don’t think we ever expected you’d come here . . . just walk in. Flavius will have sent a message by now . . . To the boss. I’ll be expected to entertain you – to keep you on the premises until he gets here. He’ll want to think up something original for you. It’s high time the police had a warning shot across their bows.’

Joe decided to ignore her bluster and concentrate on the present danger. ‘Tell me about him quickly, your Flavius. Is he a one off or is he at the head of a pack?’

He looked again at his watch.

‘He’s from the south. Not bright but quick enough. Vicious. Ex-Foreign Legion. Knife or gun, he doesn’t mind. He’ll have one of each in his hands at the moment. He’s right-handed. He’ll use the knife if he can – we like to avoid noises up here – but if he has to, he’ll shoot you with his pistol. It’s fitted with a silencer. He’s top house dog but there’s a security staff of four more always on the premises. They are wolves. Two North African, two Parisian. Armed. They have discreet house guns for indoor work. Beretta 6.35s. Last year’s model. At the first sign of trouble, two will go out through the back exit and circle round. Two will come straight down the main corridor to back up Flavius.’

‘Where are they all at the moment?’

‘Flavius is right there, as you guessed, at the door. The others?’ She shrugged. ‘Playing cards in their room. It’s ten yards down the corridor to the left. Playing with the girls, given half a chance. They won’t be expecting trouble at this early hour and the girls won’t be busy. We like to keep the staff sweet.’

Joe went to the sideboard. ‘More champagne, m’dear?’ he asked in a louder, drunken voice. ‘Jolly good drop of fizz you keep! What?’ He clinked a glass against the bottle at the moment he pulled open the drawer. It opened silently. He took out the Luger.

‘It’s fully loaded. I did it myself,’ she mouthed.

Joe checked it anyway.

She shuddered as he reached behind his back and took a pair of handcuffs from under his jacket. ‘I borrowed these from a colleague,’ he murmured. ‘I think I can make them work. Do I need to put them on you?’

‘No. I’ll be more use with my hands free. And don’t forget we have to get out through the club. They’re not used to seeing women in cuffs. And they’re not very fond of the police. They might object.’

He slipped them back through his belt.

‘Come closer to the door but stay well to the side. I don’t forget he’s got my Browning. If he fires that into the room the bullet won’t stop until it hits the towers of Notre Dame. Remind me – which way does the door open?’

‘Inwards.’

‘Listen! When I nod, you’re to squeal. Not loudly. Enough to encourage him to come in to investigate. Okay?’

‘Ready.’

Joe took a deep breath then nodded.

Alice squealed.

Joe waited one second then blasted the door with four rounds. The wood splintered as the bullets tore through the flimsy structure. A lozenge pattern of blackened holes marked out a target area two feet square which would reach from throat to abdomen on a six foot two inch man standing at the door.

If, indeed, he had been standing at the door.

Joe heard no scream or oath. Not even a grunt.

Crouching to the side, he listened. Not a sound. No time to wait. The wolves would be slamming down their cards, saying, ‘What the hell was that?’ or murmuring ‘Excuse me, ma’am’ and unsheathing their Berettas. Covering the door space with his gun, Joe reached out, turned the knob and flung the remains of the door open into the room.

Alice made a little wuffling sound in her throat.

Flavius was utterly silent. His huge body lay collapsed, sandbagging the doorway, still pumping out blood from at least two wounds. No screams because the highest and first of the bullets had shot out his throat.

Alice was faster than Joe. She leapt straight at the obstacle, scrambling in high satin heels over the twitching body. Joe followed. As they reached the door to the stairs Alice fiddled with the bolt and double lock and a gathering roar rumbled down the corridor after them. As the door yielded, Alice took off down the stairs.

Joe turned and raised the Luger. He watched the door Alice had mentioned, waiting. The door creaked open and the snub-nosed barrel of a pistol started to slide out. Joe fired. The gun crashed to the ground. Someone howled in pain. Joe fired again blindly through the wood. Two bullets remaining. He waited a heartbeat and fired them off, warning shots down the length of the corridor, then wiped the gun and threw it back towards Flavius’s body. He turned and leapt, three steps at a time, down the stairs. Alice had already disappeared.

When he reached the entrance to the jazz club he paused and listened. The music had stopped, women were shrieking, men shouting. He was in greater danger of being torn apart in a mêlée of angry jazz fans, he calculated, than by the wolves.

He turned and backed into the door, bumping it open. He held up both hands, clearly unarmed, and gestured with a hand towards the stairs, a soldier indicating an enemy position. He yelled, ‘Au secours! Help!’ He looked over his shoulder, eyes wide in alarm, and shouted into the horrified silence: ‘Hell! A feller goes to the john and World War Two breaks out over his head! What sort of joint is this?’