Shout in the Dark (45 page)

Laura shouted in surprise. "Look, the
relic is still there!"

He felt sick with pain as he tried to
focus his eyes. "Father Josef said I had to destroy it rather than
let the Nazis get it."

"
If we could get in there to destroy it, we could just as
easily take it with us." Laura let out a long groan. "My head is
hurting badly."

"
I'm calling an ambulance."

"
We don't go near the authorities. They'll connect us with
Riccardo. Get us back to Rome and then we can think what to do
next."

Marco looked at the low iron railings
surrounding a nearby grave and noticed that one of the short
uprights appeared to be loose. "If we want the relic, you'll have
to help me."

Laura stood up unsteadily, supporting
herself on the high wall of the grave. Together they pulled the bar
free and placed it between the grill and the wall. Marco put his
weight against the end, using it as a lever. The grill came away
after a few attempts. He smiled in spite of the pain. Laura was
alive -- that was all that mattered. Laura was more important than
the relic.

"
I'm taking this. It might come in useful." He pushed the
iron bar into his belt. It would provide some protection against
the large neo-Nazi. He crawled forward to reach into the tomb, his
fingers closing on the ancient object.

The exhilaration gave him the strength he
needed. He gripped the cold metal and pulled the relic from its
resting place. The head of Jesus Christ was back in the hands of
the Church.

"
I love you, Laura." He pulled the bronze head into the
open. "I really do love you. I thought you were dead."

KARL SHOOK WITH anger as one of the
gendarmes
demanded some identity and then
had the insolence to search him. The other
gendarme
held his handgun in a threatening manner, and the
wire lanyard made it impossible to snatch.

The ivory handle of the Göring dagger
caused a predictable reaction, but it was blood-free, and without
the blade it was hardly evidence of being armed. Fortunately his
Makarov automatic was deep in the Seine, dumped on his way to see
the loathsome Zeta last night. His only hope of being allowed to go
free was to act the innocent tourist and co-operate with these two
clowns in uniform.

As he listened to the endless babbling in
French, shrugging his shoulders to make them see he was unable to
understand a word, he saw a movement amongst the graves. The two
Italians had survived and were making their way cautiously to the
entrance gates -- carrying his passport to recognition and
fame.

He wanted to shout. He wanted the
gendarmes
to turn and make an arrest.
Theft from a grave should be enough reason to detain them. The
woman must have missed death by some miracle. There was no way she
could walk far with a blade in her back. The man and the woman
looked his way but stayed silent. For some reason they were afraid
to call out for help. He watched them walk out of the cemetery with
the relic.

Total Training told him to wait until the
right opportunity came. These two bored
gendarmes
, looking for some excitement to brighten an early
morning patrol, were not likely to give him the right
opportunity.

JACQUES HAD TO admit that random
questioning rarely produced results. Incidents like this did little
to make the life of a
gendarme
interesting -- especially on a damp, drizzly morning. It
was all very well for Alain; he would be out soon on a good
pension.

Jacques felt he had received a rough deal
from life. Always unlucky and never in the right place at the right
time. Colleagues got special mention for their achievements. All he
got was the early patrol -- and unshaven skinheads to
question.

More than likely the German peasant had
been sleeping rough amongst the graves. He certainly looked
scruffy. Mercifully there wasn't a group of them to deal with. It
was easy to show contempt for one kid on his own. In a gang, even
with Alain to help, these skinhead troublemakers could be very
difficult to handle.

They had no option but to let the youth
go. He was alone and he'd not been making any sort of trouble in
the cemetery.

"
Allez vous en!
"

AT THE GREEN gates, Karl saw the silver
Alfa pulling away. If Sartini and the woman planned to drive
straight bac
k to Rome he
could make a phone call and get the vehicle stopped on the
autostrada
by sympathizers in Italy.
Phönix and his team would know how to call up the necessary help --
if he was brave enough to phone him.

Unarmed, and with nothing better than the
old Frenchman's moped for transport, he could do no more than try
to follow the Italians. It was already after nine, and Erich and
the gang from Düsseldorf would soon be here in Paris at the Gare du
Nord. They would just have to wait. He accelerated into the
boulevard Clichy with the silver Alfa still in sight.

MARCO SAID IT was out of the question to
drive the Alfa back to Rome
with their injuries, and Laura readily agreed to the train.
If they had any sense they'd be going straight for a medical
check-up, but some chief of
gendarmes,
sympathetic to neo-Nazi aims, could already be tipped off
that they had come to Paris with Riccardo. His men could be waiting
for them to turn up at a Paris hospital. The
zoticone
had been talking to the
gendarmes
in the cemetery, and they had
no idea what he had been saying. He could have been telling them
about his plans, and if the neo-Nazi network was as extensive as
Father Josef reckoned, anything was possible.

Marco still found it difficult to turn his
head. "I think there's a large supermarket bag behind my seat. Put
the relic in there."

"
In a carrier bag?" Laura sounded incredulous.

He tried to smile. "We have to keep it out
of sight on the train."

The agony in his neck persisted, making
driving extremely painful. The courtesy of the Parisian drivers
surprised him -- compared to the drivers in Rome at any rate. It
was pleasant to drive with occasional rather than constant sounding
of impatient horns.

He recalled that t
he Gare de Lyon was the main station for
the south. The Paris one-way traffic system seemed dreadful. Even
with the street map in the back of Laura's European road atlas,
finding the Gare de Lyon wasn't easy.

They left the Alfa in the open car park by
the side of the station. Laura said it would need to be recovered
within a few days, before the overstay fine became greater than the
value of the car. He told her not to worry; it was TV Roma's
problem. The huge clock on the tower outside the entrance said
nine-forty.

Laura climbed slowly from the passenger
seat. "I'm frightened, Marco. What do we do if the
zoticone
is already here?"

"
Get me the iron bar from the back seat. It should be strong
enough to break his skull."

Laura put her hand to her mouth. "You
wouldn't?"

"
I would -- if I had to." Laura's aversion to a bit of self
defense was unexpected, considering the violence that had
surrounded her in the past few days. "Just trust me. Anyway, the
skinhead wouldn't dare do anything in front of hundreds of
travelers."

At the ticket office a railway official said
a train to Rome was leaving in just under an hour-and-a-half. There
was no need to hurry.

Marco shook his head. They wanted to leave
at once, he explained.

The official said a train was leaving
shortly to the city of Lyon, and they could catch the Paris-Rome
train from there later. Marco agreed. He sighed with relief as
Laura's credit card was accepted, opening the way to Rome and
safety. Men were renovating part of the entrance hall, and the way
ahead was blocked off with red and white tape. For a moment he
wondered if this was a trap, then realized that all the passengers
were making a simple detour.

KARL BRAKED THE moped to a halt at the
station entrance just in time to see the two Italians going inside.
It was obvious the
Priester
and his
girlfriend were hurrying back to Rome, with the relic in a
supermarket carrier bag.

He would be able to carry out the killings
on the train, but he would plan it with more care this time. It
should be simple with all his experience. All he had to do was
eliminate the opposition and recover the Nazi property. Destiny
still held his hand.

While
in the line for his railway ticket his thoughts were on his
friends in the ADR who would be arriving at the Gare du Nord in
less than an hour, expecting him to be there to meet them. He could
forget meeting up with them and stay with the crazy couple. Phönix
would surely appreciate this initiative.

"
Cette carte, M'sieur!
"

"
Was ist los?
"

The booking clerk held the card behind the
glass partition, shaking his head with an exaggerated movement.

There was some sort of problem with the
card. To his surprise the man slipped it back through the security
glass. As Karl moved out of the line, the clerk was busy with the
next customer. He laughed to himself. The card was still his,
although from now on he could only use it for minor purchases where
checks would not be made. Even so, getting the card back had to be
providence, had to be a sign.

As he pushed through the crowd of
travelers he could see the priest and the woman already on the
platform, standing by a group of luggage trolleys and looking
indecisive. Karl grinned. No need to get on the train at all. He
moved in, regretting that he no longer had the knife or the
gun.

The Italian woman saw him and screamed. He
hesitated as the two ducked behind the high trolleys. Several
people turned to watch, but no one followed.

Behind the trolleys he would be screened
from prying eyes. He could deal with the pair quickly, with no
witnesses. As he pushed his way through, the woman appeared from
behind a pile of cases and stuck her foot out. He was too close to
avoid her and they both fell heavily. The stupid bitch should have
died in that cemetery.

Sartini threw the bag to the woman and
began to lash out with a metal bar. As Karl rolled sideways to get
to his feet, a hard blow crashed across his shoulders. He twisted
away in pain. Then another strike as he tried to get up. Escape
would soon be impossible. The
Priester
was so strong, a hit on the head could be fatal. The
woman's shoulder bag was on the ground. He rolled over and grabbed
it as he scrambled to his feet.

Two officials spotted him as he ran across
the lines, and they blew their whistles.

FABIEN TURNED wearily to his colleague in
the railway
police.
Something had happened amongst the luggage trolleys. It looked like
a bag snatch. A Code Twelve. They would not pursue the
hoodlum,
le
voyou
, across the track.
They had radios to communicate with Security Control. This way was
effortless as well as safer.

Railway security was all a matter of
following procedures. There were no prizes awarded for
over-exertion. Fabien made his Code Twelve report and returned to
the entrance hall to await instructions. Whatever had happened
amongst the trolleys, the passengers seemed calm again now.
The
voyou
with the
bag was already out of sight. Control should be monitoring his
whereabouts on closed circuit television.

Fabien lit a cigarette. It was someone
else's problem now, and he was overdue for a smoke.

MARCO AND LAURA came out from behind the
trolleys to find everyone staring across the track at the fleeing
skinhead. No one seemed to notice them as they boarded the train to
Lyon and found seats in an empty compartment. Marco looked at his
watch. Unless the railway
police delayed the train, they would be on their way in
about ten minutes.

"
You were fantastic, Marco. I didn't realize you had it in
you."

The admiration in Laura's voice made him
feel embarrassed. "I thought I was fighting a devil."

"
You were, and it's not over yet." She looked anxiously out
of the carriage window and began to tremble. "That devil can still
get on the train. He'll kill me. I know he will."

"
He won't dare come back. The railway police
are watching out."

"
He's got my purse."

Marco sank back in the seat, his neck too
stiff to turn. "But
we
have the
bronze head, and that's all that matters."

"
My credit card was in my purse."