J. Janes - Clandestine

Squeezing round, he had a look through the armoured window. Cut open, the heavy grey bags had been scattered in haste, loose banknotes seemingly everywhere, the blue, green and white of the five-franc notes, brown of the tens and hundreds. But right on top of a wooden case whose straw packing had been scattered, was a round of what could only be Brie de Meaux. A bottle of Moet et Chandon had had its neck snapped off, the champagne downed in celebration probably, but why leave it standing upright near that cheese, why not throw it out the back since that door would have been open as it now was?

There was nothing for it but to have a closer look, and going round to the back, he climbed in and somehow found room enough to stand. ‘Louis, what the hell has really gone on here? They didn’t even go into lockdown.’*

Louis could take forever with a corpse and was still nowhere near. Two wedges of the Brie had been eaten and, since taking fingerprints was next to useless these days, as he cut into that velvety white surface, the aroma, when held closely, was magnificent, the taste like heaven. Yet case after case of the champagne had been left, six in all: two of the Moet et Chandon, two of the Taittinger and the same of the Mumm. And as if those were not enough, there were two open cases of a vin rouge and another two of a blanc de blanc , three bottles of the former having been taken.

Bought at 85 francs the litre, that wine would have sold in Paris for a good 500 francs, the champagne for 1,000, the bottle having been bought at 150 probably, and at 10 bottles to the case, a good 51,000 for the champagne, and 16,600 for the wine, for a total profit on these alone of 67,600 francs and not bad at all.

Certainly the two with the van hadn’t just been augmenting their wages. If each trip had been like this, they must have been planning an early retirement. There were even bags of cooking onions, unheard of these days in Paris and most other large cities and towns. Smoked sausage was in coils atop hams from Reims, at least twenty of those, and beneath them all, as if they were not enough, several sides of bacon, a good ten rabbits and two dozen fully plucked chickens. Obviously these boys had had deliveries to make as soon as they arrived back in the city and before returning to the bank’s garage. That bacon would have brought at least 250 the kilo, the chickens from 150 to 200 each and the rabbits maybe 50 apiece since most who could raised their own in the cupboard or on the balcony or roof, the citizenry having turned Paris, with all its vegetable pots and plots, into the largest farming village in the world.

Garlic hung by the necklace and would bring at least 35 francs the bulb, whereas before this Occupation it would have cost 50 centimes at most, but when he uncovered black truffles, he really had to pause, for these were of the winter variety and would bring at least 5,000 a kilo, maybe even 7,500, the summer ones a hell of a lot less, but it all depended on who the customer was and how much was on offer; other things too, like friends and friends of friends.

Merde , but there were sardines in tins from as far away as Marseille. At eight-five to ninety the tin, they would originally have cost maybe three, if that, before the Occupation. Butter was now at 120 the kilo, and there were four crocks of it, another four of eggs submerged in water glass. The eggs, bought at sixty francs the ten, could bring twenty each if sold individually for something that would originally have cost from five to seven for the ten back in 1939, and with wages stagnant at generally 1,000 to 1,500 a month, or lots less, prices had simply climbed and climbed.*

There was even coffee, but had these boys had access to one of the warehouses of the Vichy food controllers? Coffee was like gold, the ersatz simply horrible, so at least 500 the half-kilo for the real.

‘This has to suggest someone big, mon vieux ,’ he said, though Louis still hadn’t shown up. Moving on, he came to the topic of bread. It was one of those few things that couldn’t be bought on the marche noir , but flour could be and they had four fifty-kilo bags of that beautiful white stuff that would go for at least seventy-five the kilo, since birthday cakes, brioches, croissants and other such things had been judged ‘luxuries’ by Vichy and banned back in the late autumn of 1940.

Yet not only had the killer or killers left all of the provisions behind, they had seemingly left the bundles of five thousands, one thousands and five hundreds and had taken what they could grab of the small bills, the hundreds, twenties, tens and fives.

Placed as it was a goodly distance from the ruins of the monastery’s church and other buildings, and right near what had once been the two-metre high peripheral wall, with plenty of open land left inside, the second ‘herbal,’ felt St-Cyr, must have been a centuries-old throw bed and humus pile. Fully in sunshine, when available, its plants had flourished.

The other victim was lying face down and clearly visible from the ruins of the church, he having all but made it into the thickness of the encroaching forest, having run from the killer. Challenged from behind, he had thrown up his hands in surrender and had immediately been shot in the back of the neck. ‘The Genickschuss ,’ St-Cyr heard himself saying with that certain sense of alarm since it was a favourite method among the Occupier no matter which country they were in, especially the SS and Gestapo shy;, but the Wehrmacht also when Banditen-resistants- who had been caught were to be executed on the spot.

‘My partner will immediately think, as I now must, that the pistol was most probably either a Walther P38 or Luger and the killer German. But that doesn’t make much sense, does it, unless whoever fired that pistol was on the run and a deserter? We’ve had some of those coming through, now more since the Russian front is far from a picnic.’

In age this one was the younger, more strongly built and probably, at somewhere between twenty-five to twenty-eight, the assistant. Certainly all those background questions again needed to be asked, then, too. ‘Were you also a father?’ For killings like these always tended to hurt far too many.

As before, the pockets had been emptied. ‘Bien sur , identity cards and all accompanying papers can be doctored, and there’s a ready market for them, but why bother when you’ve a van loaded with cash?’

It made no sense, even though the price for used identity papers had gone from fifty francs in the autumn of 1940 to 250, the supporting documents extra.

‘This inflation of ours is terrible, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘Seventy percent since the autumn of 1940, with most wages frozen at prewar rates, my own included.’

Covering the victim, he added, ‘And now for the challenge, eh, especially as I’m all but certain your killer was the same as that of your boss.’

Left to itself, fennel could grow in great profusion and here it was so tall and thick, the dill was threatened as was the recovery of that cartridge casing. Down on his hands and knees, forcing his way into the thicket, he said, ‘There are limits to my patience, Hermann. Maybe you should be here instead of myself!’

Leaves, old stalks, the refuse of the forgotten years didn’t make the task easy. Taking a break, he went to harvest a little dill. Letting that wonderful astringency and aroma come, he again went down on the hands and knees, was now soaked through and with no easy way of getting dry.

The ground wasn’t just spongy. The knees sank in, the hands too. Sunlight, if God had granted it, would have made the job easier. In all it took an hour and by then he had, of course, repeatedly heard Hermann calling for him and at the last, a more vehement, ‘ Verdammt , Louis, where the hell are you?’