The Paris Architect: A Novel Part 8

"You must miss them."

"I haven't seen them in nine months, but I get leave in a few weeks. I can't wait to see my daughter," replied the German with a sad look in his eyes. "I've collected many gifts to bring them."

Herzog put back the photo. Most parents would next start boring the h.e.l.l out of their guest by relating every school prize their kid had won in the last five years, but Herzog said nothing more.

Herzog held the bottle toward Lucien for a refill. "Your factory design was quite impressive. The horizontal bands of gla.s.s and the way they b.u.t.t into the concrete piers were magnificent."

Lucien emptied his gla.s.s and immediately it was refilled. A warm glow within his chest was growing warmer by the minute. "Thank you...Dieter."

"Those wonderful arches just soar through the s.p.a.ce, and they can support all those cranes and hoists. Excellent work."

There was nothing that Lucien-or any architect-liked better than flattery laid on with a trowel. Whether it came from a Frenchman or a n.a.z.i, it was just as satisfying.

"I think you'll be pleased with the next building," Lucien slurred.

"I like that your architecture reflects its function with pure form."

"Ah, I hope Colonel Lieber sees it that way."

"Don't concern yourself with Lieber. All he cares about is that the plants get built on schedule. And I'll see to that."

From the far end of the living room, a pair of paneled sliding doors parted, and a young German corporal appeared and stood at attention.

"Major, your supper is ready."

"Thank you, Hausen. You can go back to the barracks. Come, Lucien, a rack of lamb is awaiting us."

With a bit of difficulty due to all the cognac he'd already consumed, Lucien lifted himself from the Barcelona chair and joined his new soul mate for supper.

19.

"Sol, I think I saw a light at the gate."

Geiber knew his wife wasn't the hysterical type. In fact, he admired her for always being so calm and levelheaded. So the minute she said this, Geiber dropped his book and went into action. When Miriam saw him leap out of the leather armchair, she immediately did what she was supposed to do in an emergency. They had only minutes to act. If they hesitated, it would mean certain death for both of them.

Geiber first ran to the kitchen, located on the first floor at the back of the great hunting lodge. He flung open the rear door and tossed an old felt hat on the stone path to the garden. Leaving the door wide open, he then sprinted up the kitchen service stair as fast as a sixty-eight-year-old could. Outside the second-floor master bedroom, he met Miriam, who was holding the small leather bag, packed weeks before with their forged papers, cash, and a change of clothing for both of them. He looked straight into her dark brown eyes and stroked her rouged cheek.

"Are you ready, my dear?"

"G.o.d, I hope this works," said Miriam. Her hands were trembling terribly, and her knees threatened to give out at any second.

"Follow me," whispered Geiber.

They hurried through the master bedroom to a flight of four carpeted steps that led to a study, and knelt down as if they were going to offer a prayer before it. Geiber placed his hands on the edge of the bottom step and slowly lifted up the entire stair, which was hinged at the upper floor level. It took all his strength to raise it high enough so that Miriam could slip under it with the bag. She crawled in and placed her frail body at the very back of the cavity, parallel to the steps.

"Are you in?" gasped Geiber, straining to hold up the stairs.

"For G.o.d's sake, hurry, Sol."

Geiber slid under the stairway, letting it fall back into place with a heavy thud. Sliding next to Miriam, he fastened two bolts that locked the stairs in place. He was breathing so heavily he thought he would pa.s.s out. His back was against Miriam's chest, and he could feel her heart pounding. He moved the bag up by his chest, laid it on its side, and unlatched it. Miriam placed her arm over her husband's body and tightly grasped his hand. She hid her face against the back of his head. For just a fraction of a second, it made him forget about the approaching danger.

Such a warm, comforting feeling, thought Geiber, like they were back in their big bed at home snuggling under the goose down duvet. It was mostly airless and pitch black in the cramped s.p.a.ce under the stairs, but the mattress they were lying on was quite comfortable, and because the stairs were almost two meters wide, the Geibers could fully stretch out their legs. The underside of the steps was just centimeters from Geiber's face, so close he could smell the wood. They could do nothing now but wait, seconds pa.s.sing like hours.

"Our fate's in G.o.d's hands," whispered Geiber. "They'll be inside any second, and we can't utter a sound. But there's something I've never told you. And I've got to tell you now."

"Now, Sol?"

"The first time I saw you was at L'Opera Garnier. You were wearing a light blue gown; I couldn't take my eyes off you. After the opera, I had my carriage follow yours to your house. I bribed your footman to tell me your name, and I sent you a bouquet of roses anonymously the next day."

"You sent those roses. My father had a fit."

"Yes, it was me."

"I love you, you old fool."

There was an enormous crash at the front door, the sound of splintering wood, then shouting. Simultaneously, the couple's bodies jerked violently with fear. Men were running through the house yelling and cursing, their boots pounding on the wood planks of the lodge. They could hear furniture being overturned, tables cras.h.i.+ng to the floor, bookcases yanked from walls, and cabinets violently emptied of their contents. Then what sounded like a stampede of horses came rus.h.i.+ng up the main staircase. Men sprinted down the corridor and into the bedrooms. Miriam was so scared that she couldn't think anymore. Shutting her eyes tight, she began to silently sob.

Soldiers entered the master bedroom, yanking open the closet doors, rifling through the dresser drawers and the armoire, and flipping over the huge bed. After a few minutes, they ran out of the bedroom.

"There's no one here, Colonel," someone shouted.

"Impossible," answered a baritone voice. "Keep looking, they must still be around. Messier's never been wrong yet. Check the backs of the closets for a false wall; that's where we've found some before." There had been a pause in the commotion when the colonel spoke, but now it resumed at an even more furious pace.

Suddenly, someone ran back into the master bedroom and stomped up the flight of steps over Miriam and Geiber. The stairs sagged under the impact of the man's weight, almost touching Geiber's nose. A wave of panic swept over them. With superhuman effort, Miriam stifled a scream, squeezing the life out of her husband's hand. She felt her husband's body tremble uncontrollably as if he were having an epileptic fit. The soldier stayed in the small study, pulling all the books off the shelves that lined the walls from floor to ceiling, sending some of them cras.h.i.+ng down on the stairs. The Geibers flinched every time a book came down upon them. When the soldier finished with the books, he started ripping out the wooden shelving. He ran back down the stairs, where he was met by another soldier.

"Did you check behind the bookcase? They hide in s.p.a.ces behind those shelves, you know."

"What the h.e.l.l did you think I was just doing?" yelled the soldier.

"Where the f.u.c.k are those kikes? I thought this would be an easy detail. Marianne is waiting for me in town."

"Which one's Marianne? You never said anything about her."

"The one with the great jugs who stole that case of wine for me that time. You remember, don't you?"

"What wine? You had wine and didn't tell me?"

One of the soldiers sat down heavily on the steps. Geiber and Miriam could feel the stairs creak and sag directly above them. With a German's body just ten centimeters away, their fright was unbearable. Miriam had almost pa.s.sed out from fear and wished she would faint dead away to escape this torment. Both clenched their mouths shut with all their might. The tiniest sound would give them away.

"Christ, I'm beat running up all these G.o.dd.a.m.n steps. These houses are like f.u.c.kin' museums. Hold up for a moment."

"Better not let Schlegal see you sitting on your a.s.s."

"f.u.c.k him and all Gestapo b.a.s.t.a.r.ds."

"You better get the h.e.l.l up, or your a.s.s will be in Russia."

"Just let me catch my breath. Schlegal's downstairs, anyway."

"Hurry up. I'm going down the hall here to look again."

The soldier didn't move from his spot on the stairs. The Geibers could hear the strike of a match, then smelled the faint aroma of a cigarette. As they waited and waited for the man to leave, the stress was too much to bear. To his horror, Geiber realized that he'd soiled himself. After about a minute, a strong smell filled the s.p.a.ce. Then mercifully came the sound of a boot stamping out a cigarette b.u.t.t on the floor. The steps creaked as the soldier rose from his seat.

"Jesus Christ, are you still here? Schlegal's coming down the hall," said a soldier.

"Do you smell something? Like s.h.i.+t?"

"You're going to be s.h.i.+t if Schlegal sees you."

"No, wait...I-"

"Stauffen, you G.o.dd.a.m.n moron," a voice yelled out. "Get moving and look for those kikes! Did you check the attic?"

"No, Colonel, I was just-"

"a.s.shole. You should've done that first. Get the h.e.l.l up there now."

"Yes, Colonel."

The Geibers could hear more commotion down the hall and in the attic. After fifteen minutes, a group of soldiers congregated outside the master bedroom. The colonel's voice pierced the silence. "The back door was open. They must have gone out through the garden to a car at the rear of the property. But they won't get far. All of you fan out in the garden and sweep the area. Find the cesspool and see if they're in there. And don't shoot them, did you hear what I said? I want them alive."

The soldiers trudged down the main staircase and out the back door. There was complete silence, but the Geibers stayed where they were. The plan was to wait two hours before moving. It was like slowly waking up from a terrible nightmare, but it hadn't been a surreal dream created by their subconscious minds but a horribly real event. They were emotionally exhausted, completely drained. As their breathing slowly returned to normal, both could feel that their clothes were soaked through with sweat, as if they had jumped into a lake. Even the mattress was drenched. While they waited, their bodies began to ache from being frozen in the same position. Geiber was lying in his own feces, but he wasn't ashamed; all that mattered was that they had survived. He removed his hand from inside the bag and was relieved they wouldn't be needing the revolver. In hindsight, he wished he'd accepted the pharmacist's vials of cyanide.

20.

"Your draftsmans.h.i.+p is exceptional. My work was nowhere near as good as this when I got out of school."

Alain Girardet looked down at the floor and tried to suppress a smile. Lucien smiled at his response because the young man knew his work was good, but it was important to seem humble at this moment. He would've done the same thing. Architectural work of any kind was virtually impossible to get in Paris, so he knew Alain was determined to walk out of here with a job. They sat across from each other at a table in the corner of Lucien's one-room office that Manet had graciously thrown rent-free into the deal. It was more professional for Lucien to be able to meet with Germans at an office than at his own apartment. Plus Celeste would have had a fit if the Germans had set foot in her home.

"Thank you, monsieur. You're most kind. I worked very hard in school, especially on my drawing. After all, it is the soul of architecture, isn't it?" answered Alain.

The kid could really kiss some a.s.s, thought Lucien, but it won him over.

"Indeed it is," replied Lucien, realizing that at last, after interviewing a half-dozen candidates, here was the guy he wanted. He felt energized-and now asked the question all job applicants wanted to hear.

"If you were offered the job, when could you start?"

"Tomorrow," replied Alain, a little too eagerly. Lucien would've said the day after tomorrow to show that he wasn't so desperate. This kid must be dead broke.

Lucien flipped through the portfolio of drawings again to make sure that he was making the right decision. In the past, he'd hired draftsmen for his firm too impulsively and had regretted it. There was Michel, the middle-aged architect who'd come back after every lunch completely s.h.i.+tfaced. His line work, so beautiful when sober, resembled a four-year-old's in the afternoon. That's if he hadn't fallen asleep on his drafting table. Another memorable hiring choice was Charles, who had turned out to be the laziest b.a.s.t.a.r.d in all of France. It had taken him a month to draw a square.

With more factory work coming in, Lucien needed a draftsman to help crank out the drawings. He couldn't do it all himself, so he'd cajoled Herzog into upping his fee so that he could hire someone. Lucien knew he could get someone dirt cheap. And there was another reason a kid this age needed a job. Since the Occupation, thousands of young Frenchmen, who would have been eligible for military service if there had been a French army, were required to perform two years of mandatory labor for France. If a young man did not have a job, he would be "volunteered" into working in the Reich's war industries in Germany.

Lucien looked up at Alain to see if he could detect some visible character flaw. He seemed perfectly respectable, in his early twenties, of average height with sandy-colored hair and light brown eyes. He was also very fas.h.i.+onably dressed and still had nice leather-soled shoes, which made him presentable to the Germans. There was just one more hiring detail that Lucien had to attend to.

"Are your papers in order?"

"Yes, monsieur."

"May I see them?"

At all times, everyone in France had to carry their papers, an ident.i.ty card similar to a pa.s.sport listing all the personal details that the French bureaucracy and the German military found so important-date of birth, distinguis.h.i.+ng marks, physical appearance, and home address. An "exemption from conscription" certificate was inserted in the boy's ident.i.ty card, which surprised Lucien-he already was off the hook for compulsory service. That meant only one thing-that Alain knew someone of influence.

He handed the card back to Alain and smiled.

"I can give you two hundred francs a week to start, monsieur."

"That's most generous, Monsieur Bernard. I'll be honored to work for someone of such great talent. I want to learn from one of Paris's up-and-coming modernists," said Alain.

"That's fine," replied Lucien, who believed there was a limit to a.s.s-kissing. "You'll be working on the construction doc.u.ments for a factory that will make guns for the Luftwaffe." He pointed to the design drawings of the factory pinned to the wall behind him. "So you see, there's a h.e.l.l of a lot of work coming through the office. And there probably will be a lot more. So you'll become my right-hand man if things go well."

Lucien had always given this spiel to a new man. The whole process of hiring was always full of high hopes. But it had never worked out in his practice before the war. The difference this time was that Lucien was hiring a kid right out of the university. This one could be molded like a lump of clay into what Lucien had always wanted in an employee. Alain had all the skills he needed, especially an understanding of how a building was actually constructed. He could see that in his drawings, showing the construction details of a building. They were as precise and accurate as an experienced architect could have done. Most kids fresh out of school had their heads up their a.s.ses when it came to construction. They had no idea how a building was put together.

"I'm most anxious to start, monsieur. Will tomorrow be all right?"

"Of course."

"I'll be here at seven."

"I'll be here at nine. At the end of the week, you'll get a key to the office so you can come in anytime you like." Lucien always waited a week before handing out a key to make sure the new guy seemed honest. He'd learned that lesson from Hippolyte, who'd disappeared with all his drafting supplies the second day on the job.

Alain began to gather his drawings from the table and put them in his brown cardboard portfolio.

"So, I see from your papers you live quite near," said Lucien, hoping to initiate a little informal conversation.

"Yes, monsieur."

"Live with your parents?"

"Yes, monsieur."

Lucien could see this was a dead end, but he was confident that Alain was talented and that was all that mattered. He put his hand on his shoulder and guided him to the door.