To Catch a Thief Page 17

  “You’ll have to involve him now. If he’s your friend, why do you hesitate to trust him?”

  “I do trust him. I have to trust him. He could give me away any time. But trusting him and trying to explain to him are two different things.”

  “Why? You explained to me, when you had to.”

  The trend of the conversation, why did he do this, and why not that, and what was his reason for another thing, told him that she was inviting him to reveal more for her to criticize. Ever since their visit to Bellini he had been conscious that her attitude toward him had changed. He did not understand the change, except that it had made her antagonistic in a strange way, not so much of what he did, but of what he was, as a person. He gave her another opportunity to call him a fool.

  He said, “If I hurt your feelings again, it’s because you asked me to. Paul is honest in a way you aren’t. You’re not a thief, but you would have helped me steal your mother’s jewels. Maybe a touch of crookedness will help you understand why I feel a debt to Bellini and Coco and Le Borgne. It’s the only thing that kept me here from the beginning. I could have got away, but they were my friends, the only friends I ever had before I knew Paul. That they’re crooks doesn’t make any difference. I owe them my help. Paul could never understand that. I don’t know how to describe him except to say that he’s so honest himself he can’t even picture thieves and honest men in the same frame. You have to be one or the other, in his eyes; an honest man on the side of honest men, or a thief among thieves. He can understand me as one or the other. But for what I am, a crook who doesn’t behave like a crook and still won’t cross over—”

  He made a helpless gesture. He could not explain further.

  Francie said, “He should be able to understand loyalty.”

  “He’d argue that I don’t owe any to thieves, if I’m not one myself. I can’t make him see that being a thief is a state of mind. He’ll pin me in a corner and argue me blind, whatever I tell him or don’t tell him. I’ve got to keep him away from the gala, if I can.”

  “How?”

  “I don’t know. If I can’t do anything else I’ll have to try to explain, but I don’t want to.”

  “Any more than you wanted to explain to me.”

  “No.”

  “You’re even a bigger fool than I thought you were.”

  She said it just as she had said it before. It was neither an insult nor a joke, only a statement of fact.

  “You’ll convince me in time. Excuse me for a few minutes. I have to make a telephone call.”

  He left her before she could see his irritation, and wondered what had made him think he could explain to her. The growing antagonism between them was as tangible as a fence.

  There was a telephone in the hotel foyer. He called the domaine and was told that M. le Comte would not return before Monday. Paul’s housekeeper could not say if he had gone directly to the Combe d’Or. Because he knew of only one other place where he might hear news of Paul, he walked down the promenade to La Plage Nautique.

  Claude and Danielle were quarreling about something. Claude said, “Ah, flûte,” insultingly and walked away as John came down the steps. He did not bother to turn on his professional smile for Mr. Burns’s benefit.

  Danielle was flushed and angry. John said, “Have you seen Paul?”

  “He was here this morning. I don’t think he’ll ever come back. That pig Claude! I could kill him!”

  “What happened?”

  “He’s unbearable!” There were tears in Danielle’s eyes. “He—he insulted Paul. He called him an awful name.”

  “Why? What did Paul do?”

  “Nothing, really. But he’s been here every day since you brought him, and even Claude couldn’t help seeing how he feels about me. This morning Paul asked me to a weekend party at a friend’s house, a gala some Americans are giving—”

  “I know about it. I’m going myself.”

  “You know how respectable it will be, then. But Claude—oh, he said horrible things to Paul, swore at him, wanted to fight him.” She shook her head violently, so that tears flew from her eyelashes. “Paul is so clean and gentle himself. He doesn’t understand how anyone can behave like an animal.”

  “He’s made quite an impression on you.”

  “Of course he has. He’s the finest man I ever met.”

  She wiped her eyes on her wrist. John said, “Are you going to the gala with him?”

  “I can’t. I’d only embarrass him.”

  “If you mean because someone might ask questions, wonder who you are—”

  “It isn’t that.” She wiped her eyes again. “I’m sure he wants an opportunity to ask me what you thought he might ask. I don’t know how to answer him.”

  “Accept him. He’ll give you everything you have always wanted.”

  “I don’t love him, Mr. Burns. I like him a lot, but that’s all.”

  “I thought you had a practical attitude about those things, Danielle.”

  “Not with Paul. He’s too decent. And he was too much in love with Lisa. He told me about her. I can’t substitute for her. I can’t give him back what he’s lost. I’d only make him miserable, in the end. And myself.” She sighed unhappily. “I wish you had never brought him here.”

  “I’m sorry, Danielle. I didn’t know it was going to turn out so badly.”

  She could not tell him anything more, and he knew of no other place where he might find Paul except at the Combe d’Or itself. It was too late for him to do anything about Paul, either for Danielle’s sake or his own. Nothing remained for him but to go to the gala, and hope that he would be able to meet the problems there as they arose.

  The Château Combe d’Or was one of the showplaces of the Côte. It stood alone on the top of a hill above Cannes, commanding a view of the entire sweep of sea between the Esterel hills on the west and the Maritime Alps on the east. On a clear day, George Sanford could see from his front window the blue line of Corsica visible to the southeast. The Romans who colonized the Mediterranean coast had first recognized the advantages of the hill as a lookout point, and fortified it. Only the reinforcing wall of the circling road they had built to the hilltop still remained. The crumbling watchtower left behind by the backwash of the Roman Empire had been replaced in the fifteenth century by a stronger, higher tower crowning a stone castle that was part fortress, part pavilion for the favorites of the court. The château had collapsed in places over the centuries, but it had not suffered so badly that Sanford, with plenty of money and shrewd sense of property values, had been unable to see its potentialities.

  He was proud of the restoration he had made. An ancient growth of ivy climbing one side of the château to the tower top made the castle appear, from a distance, as medieval as it might have been originally. But part of the old moat that once surrounded it had been turned into an emerald-tiled swimming pool, the rest planted with shrubs and flowers, and the former barren square of the courtyard was now a clipped green lawn between the pool and a wide flagged terrasse where guests could dine or dance on a summer evening or drink their host’s good brandy and smoke his fine cigars. The château would accommodate fifty guests, and at least once a year it was full. No longer with a running moat and drawbridge to cut it off from the rest of the world, it still had an air of isolation, weather-beaten and ivy-covered, its tower rearing alone at the peak of the hilltop. The terraced gardens on all sides extended to the foot of the hill, where the Roman road began. George Sanford meant to have no neighbors who might build other houses to spoil his view. The Combe d’Or was a retreat for him and his friends.

  Most of the other guests had already arrived when the untalkative driver of Bellini’s big car brought John, Francie, and Mrs. Stevens to the château late in the afternoon. The swimming pool was full of bathers. Mimi Sanford came dripping from the pool to welcome them and invite them to change for a swim before the sun went down. But she was a good hostess. She would not urge them to do anything they did not want to
do, except enjoy themselves. She was delighted that Mr. Burns had been able to accept the invitation to her party, and did not make it necessary for him to explain why he could not accept an invitation to the swimming pool.

  He had already studied the floor plans of the château. Mapping the gardens had taken him two successive nights, but Bellini’s connections made it easy to obtain copies of the architect’s blueprints for the reconstruction. Bachelor guest quarters were in the west wing, one of two which extended from the main body of the building like arms embracing the terrasse. As he had expected, he was given a room in the west wing. Francie and her mother were lodged in the central building, the old castle keep. Since the kitchens, the huge dining hall, and service rooms filled the east wing, he could localize the area in which a thief might expect to find Mimi Sanford’s emeralds, the couturière’s collection, and the Princess Lila’s two-hundred-and-eighty-thousand-dollar string of pearls. He had asked Francie to gather as much additional concrete information about the location of guest rooms as possible. Otherwise they had not spoken to each other since leaving the hotel.

  The man who carried his bag to his room spoke only French. John thought it was safe for Mr. Burns to have learned enough of the language to ask if le Comte du Pré de la Tour had arrived at the château. The man went to inquire. While John was waiting he locked the door and took from his bag the building plans he had brought with him.

  He had not had time to spread them out for further study when a knock interrupted him. He hid the blueprints before he went to the door.

  It was Paul. He came in and waited until John had shut the door behind him before he said, “The valet told me you wanted to see me.”

  “I asked him if you were here. I didn’t expect him to send you.”

  “My room is just across the hall. What do you want?” Paul was quite calm.

  “I saw your name on the list of guests. I thought I’d better talk to you.”

  “If you knew I was going to be here, you shouldn’t have come.”

  “I had to come.”

  “You’ll have to leave, then. I’ll drive down to Cannes and telephone you so you can say you’ve been called away unexpectedly. It will take me about half an hour. You can make up your own story for Mrs. Sanford in that time.”

  “I’m not going to leave, Paul.”

  “I say you are.”

  “No. You have to trust me.”

  Paul’s calm broke. He said furiously, “Trust you? Stand by and let you rob my friends without lifting a finger to stop you? I can’t believe that anyone would ask it! Even a thief ought to have a sense of decency. To come this way, as a guest—You can’t do it! You can’t expect me to close my eyes to it!” Paul kept his voice down with an effort. “Get out of here. Make an excuse and go, or I’ll give you away. I swear it.”

  “You’ll send me back to twenty years in prison if you do.”

  “I’m giving you a choice. For God’s sake, John!” It was like a groan. “You don’t give me any at all.”

  “Will you believe me if I say I didn’t come here to rob anyone?”

  “Don’t talk nonsense!”

  “I give you my word.”

  Paul made a contemptuous silencing gesture. “Don’t say it. I have no faith in your word.”

  “Listen to me, Paul! I’ve got to convince you—”

  “I’ve done listening to you. You have half an hour to think of your excuse. If you haven’t left by the time I get back, I’ll expose you. Get out of my way.”

  He shoved by John, who stood between him and the doorway. John said, “Wait!” and put out his foot to block the door as Paul reached for the knob. Without hesitation, Paul hit him.

  All of his bitterness went into the blow, which landed solidly on John’s unprotected chin. It knocked him across the room. He did not lose consciousness until he brought up against the wall, but then the strength drained suddenly out of his legs. He felt himself falling.

  When his eyes focused again he was on the floor, his back to the wall. He did not know how long he had been sitting there. The door stood open. He shook his head to clear it, got up, automatically closed the door and locked it, then went to the window.

  The bathers were still sporting in the swimming pool. The fading daylight had not changed perceptibly. He knew he could not have been unconscious long, but he did not realize how short the time was until he saw Paul come out on the terrasse below and hurry across the lawn toward the rank of cars that were parked beyond the moat. He was almost running. Without once looking back he got into a car and roared away, faster than was safe on the narrow, winding road. Another car coming up the hill, a dusty Citroën with a buggy-whip radio aerial mounted on one rear fender, had to risk the extreme edge of the road to avoid a collision.

  He had seen the Citroën before. He watched it continue up the hill and pull into the parking space Paul had just left. Oriol got out.

  Although the sunlight was nearly gone, he recognized Oriol’s stocky figure immediately. He thought the second man who got out of the Citroën was Lepic, but he had seen Lepic only once, at night, and could not be certain.

  He watched the two men come toward the château, saw George Sanford leave a group of his guests on the terrasse and go to meet them, saw them talk together briefly. Sanford beckoned to a servant. The man went to the car in the parking rank and came back carrying a pair of suitcases. The whole group moved together toward the west wing.

  He had his door open a crack when they came by his room. It was not enough to let him see into the hall, but he heard George Sanford grumbling.

  “…don’t like it,” he was saying. “I appreciate your position, Commissioner, and I’m sure you know your business, but I’m still not happy about it. Now that you’ve disposed of this what’s-his-name burglar who was causing all the rumpus, I don’t see why we can’t relax and forget about jewel thieves. I have to tell you that Mrs. Sanford has been against the whole thing from the start.”

  Another voice said smoothly, “The Sûreté can never forget jewel thieves, Mr. Sanford. Our work never stops. The elimination of one criminal does not mean there are no others. The very fact that we have finished with one thief will invite others to expect us to be lax. That is why I have asked for secrecy. I assure you…”

  The voices faded as they moved down the hall. He could hear no more, only a mumble, then a door closing.

  The servant’s footsteps came back alone. He waited. A door opened again, he heard the mumble of voices, then words as they passed his room a second time.

  “…among my own guests?” George Sanford said indignantly.

  “Certainly not. Still, it will be easier for you to introduce us as guests than hide us, and we will remain as much in the background as possible. Our main reason for being here is to mount a guard during the night, the same scheme that was successful at the Souza villa.”

  “It’s a waste of time. The Combe d’Or is impregnable to a thief. And I won’t have any shooting, whatever happens. Damn it, Commissioner—”

  “No home is impregnable to a determined thief, Mr. Sanford.” The smooth voice went on. “I hope as much as you do that nothing will happen. But even if I did not feel a responsibility to protect Mrs. Sanford’s emeralds, I could not conscientiously…Princess Lila’s pearls…irresistible to any thief…international complications if…”

  The voices faded. John released the breath he had been holding, closed the door, and turned the key. His main feeling was one of relief that all his problems were now one, simple and elementary. Mr. Burns and Mr. Burns’s troubles were finished.

  He took off his clothes, the body harness, and the padded shoes and packed them away in his bag with the blueprints. The eyebrows would have to be soaked off with hot water. He did not have time for that, and they were not important. He put on a gray slipover and gray flannels, the glove-leather slippers, and buttoned his passport and his money in his hip pocket. Mr. Burns’s passport was worse than useless to him now, but he ke
pt it. If it served for nothing else, it was a tie to something he had hoped to have.

  Before he had finished his preparations, all but a few minutes of Paul’s promised half hour had passed. The room was growing dark, but he did not turn on a light. When someone came along the hall and rapped lightly on the door panel, he thought it was the call to take Paul’s telephone message, and waited silently for the man to go away.

  The rap came again. Francie’s voice said, “John.”

  He let her in. In the semi-darkness she did not immediately notice the change in his appearance. She said, “Why don’t you turn on a light? I’ve got the rooms located for you. Princess Lila is next to Mimi Sanford, Mother’s room is next, then mine—oh!”

  She had seen the profile of his body when he passed between her and the window to look out. The lights strung across the lawn and terrasse had come on, and the tiled pool, now illuminated by underwater floodlights, glowed like one of Mimi Sanford’s emeralds. Most of the bathers had left the pool to join other guests sitting on the terrasse. He looked for Oriol and Lepic among them, but saw neither man. He could not move safely until he knew where they were.

  Francie said, “What have you done to yourself?”

  “Tossed Mr. Burns overboard. He can’t make another appearance.”

  “What happened?”

  He told her about Paul, and of Lepic’s arrival with Oriol. He said, “I have a few minutes before Paul telephones. He’ll give me away if I don’t leave, Oriol will identify me if I stay, and Lepic is bound to be curious about anyone who disappears without an explanation. He’ll investigate when Mr. Burns can’t be found to answer an urgent telephone call, so be ready for questions. Let your mother do most of the talking. She won’t have to put on an act.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  He put his hand on her arm to silence her. Footsteps were coming down the hall again. There was a knock, another, a call, “Téléphone, m’sieu,” another, louder knock. In a moment the footsteps went away.

  “That’s it,” he said. “It will be a few minutes before they begin hunting for me. Better not let them find you near my room.”