"McCammon, Robert R. - The Wolf's Hour" - читать интересную книгу автора (McCammon Robert R)

УI said sheТs all right,Ф Michael told the old woman, and this time he took the power of her stare. The two men had positioned themselves behind him, and Michael felt sure they had guns. One on the left, one on the right; an elbow in each of their faces if the guns came out. УIТll vouch for her,Ф Michael said.
УThen whoТs to vouch for you, Green Eyes?Ф the old woman asked. УThis is not the professional way.Ф She looked back and forth from Michael to Gaby, and her gaze lingered on the girl. УAh!Ф she decided with a nod. УYou love him, eh?Ф
УCertainly not!Ф GabyТs face flushed crimson.
УWell, maybe itТs called something else these days, then.Ф She smiled again, but thinly. УLove has always been a four-letter word. Green Eyes, I told you to take off that uniform.Ф
УIf IТm going to be shot, IТd rather it be done while my pants are on.Ф
The old woman laughed huskily. УI think youТre the type of man who does most of his shooting with his pants off.Ф She waved a hand at him. УJust do it. No oneТs going to be killing anybody. Not today, at least.Ф
Michael removed his overcoat, and one of the men accepted it and began to rip the lining out. The other man took GabyТs suitcase, put it on a table, and unlatched it. He started rummaging through the civilian clothes sheТd brought along. The old woman snatched the Stalingrad medal off MichaelТs chest and examined it as she held it beneath a lamp. УThis trash wouldnТt fool a blind tinsmith!Ф she said with a sharp laugh.
УItТs a real medal,Ф Gaby answered coolly.
УOh? And how do you know that, my little valentine?Ф
УI know,Ф Gaby said, Уbecause I took it off the corpse after I slit his throat.Ф
УGood for you.Ф The old woman put the medal aside. УBad for him. You take off your uniform, too, valentine. Hurry, IТm not getting any younger.Ф
Michael went ahead with it. He stripped down to his underwear, and Gaby undressed as well. УYouТre a hairy bastard,Ф the old woman observed. УWhat kind of beast was your father?Ф She said to one of the other men, УBring him his new clothes and shoes.Ф He went away into another room, and the old woman picked up MichaelТs Luger and sniffed the barrel. She wrinkled her nose, finding the odor of a recent shot. УYou have any trouble on the road?Ф
УA small inconvenience,Ф Michael said.
УI donТt think I want to hear any more.Ф She picked up the silver pocket watch, clicked the winding stem twice, and looked at the cyanide capsule when the back popped open. She grunted softly, closed the watch, and returned it to him. УYou might want to keep that. Knowing the time is very important these days.Ф
The white-haired man returned with a bundle of clothes and a pair of scuffed black shoes. УWe got your sizes over the radio,Ф the woman said. УBut we were expecting two men.Ф She motioned toward the contents of GabyТs suitcase. УYou brought your own clothes, then? ThatТs good. We donТt have civilian papers for you. Too easily traced in the city. If either of you are capturedЕФ She looked at Michael, her eyes hard. УI expect you to know what time it is.Ф She waited until Michael nodded his understanding. УYou wonТt see your uniforms or the car again. YouТll be supplied with bicycles. If you feel you must have a car, weТll talk about it. We donТt have a lot of money here, but we have a fortune in friends. YouТll call me Camille, and you will talk only to me. YouТre not to address either of these two gentlemen.Ф She motioned toward the Frenchmen, who were gathering up the German uniforms and putting them in a basket with a lid. УKeep your pistol,Ф she told Michael. УThose are hard to come by.Ф She stared at Gaby for a few seconds, as if evaluating her, then at Michael. УIТm sure you both have had experience in this. I donТt care anything about who you are, or what youТve done; the important thing is that a lot of lives depend on your being smartЧand carefulЧwhile youТre in Paris. WeТll help you as much as we can, but if youТre captured we donТt know you. Is that clear?Ф
УPerfectly,Ф Michael answered.
УGood. If youТd like to rest awhile, your room is through there.Ф Camille nodded toward a corridor and a doorway. УI was just making some onion soup, if youТd like a taste.Ф
Michael picked up the shoes and bundle of clothes from the table where theyТd been set, and Gaby closed her suitcase and hefted it. Camille said, УYou children behave yourselves,Ф and then she turned away and walked into a small kitchen where a pot boiled on a cast-iron stove.
УAfter you,Ф Michael said, and followed Gaby along the corridor to their new quarters. The door creaked on its hinges as Gaby pushed it open. Inside was a four-poster bed with a white quilt and a more somber cot with a green blanket. The room was cramped but clean, with a skylight and a window that looked out over the drunken pastel buildings.
Gaby put her suitcase down on the four-poster bed with solid authority. Michael looked at the cot, and he thought he heard his back groan. He went to the window and slid it open, getting a lungful of Paris air. He was still in his underwear, and so was Gaby, but there seemed no need to hurry about anything, including getting dressedЧor undressed, as the case might be. Gaby lay down on the bed and covered herself with a crisp linen sheet. She watched him, framed against the window; she let her gaze play over his muscles, his sleek back, and long, dark-haired legs. УIТm going to rest for a while,Ф she announced, the sheet up to her chin.
УBe my guest.Ф
УThereТs not room for two in this bed,Ф she said.
УOf course there isnТt,Ф he agreed. He glanced quickly at her, saw her long black hair, unpinned now that it was out from under the cap, splayed across the goosedown pillow like an intricate fan.
УNot even if I squeezed over,Ф Gaby continued. УSo youТll have to sleep on the cot.Ф
УYes, I will.Ф
She shifted her position, the goosedown mattress settling beneath her. The sheets were cool and smelled faintly of cloves: an aroma Michael had detected as soon as they entered the room. Gaby hadnТt realized how tired she was; sheТd been up at five oТclock, and her sleep had been restless at best. Why had she come with this man? she asked herself. She hardly knew him. DidnТt know him, really. Who was he to her? Her eyes had drifted shut; now she opened them and found him standing over the bed, staring down at her. So close it made her skin tingle.
Her bare leg had slipped out from under the sheet. Michael ran his fingers along her ankle, raising chill bumps. Then he gently grasped her ankle and slid her leg back under the fragrant linen. She thought for an instant that his fingers had burned their impressions on her flesh. УSleep well,Ф he said, and he put on a pair of brown pants that had patches on both knees. He started to go out, and Gaby sat up with the sheet clutched to her breasts. УWhere are you going?Ф
УTo get a bowl of soup,Ф Michael answered. УIТm hungry.Ф And then he turned and left, shutting the door quietly behind him.
Gaby lay back down, but now she couldnТt sleep. A heat pulsed at her center, and her nerves were jangled. It was the remainder of their encounter with the fighter plane, she decided. Who wouldnТt be unable to rest after something like that? They were lucky to be alive, and tomorrowЕ
Well, tomorrow would take care of itself. Like all tomorrows did.
She reached down, beside the bed, and pulled the cot a few inches closer. HeТd never know. Then, satisfied and growing drowsy in the embrace of goose down, Gaby closed her eyes. A few minutes passed, in which the shadows of airplanes and the sounds of gunfire played through her mind. Those things faded, like bad dreams in daylight.
She slept.


4

Michael dismounted, and the springs mewled softly. He leaned the rusted Peugeot bicycle against a street lamp at the intersection of the Rue de Belleville and the Rue des Pyrenees, and he checked his pocket watch in the yellow glow. Nine-forty-three. Camille had said the curfew began at eleven oТclock sharp. After that time the German military policeЧthe rough, hard-nosed bastardsЧroamed the streets. He kept his head down, studying his watch, as Gaby slowly pedaled past him, going southeast on the Pyrenees. The darkness took her.
Apartment buildings, most of them once elegant homes decorated with statuary, stood around him, furtive lights gleaming in some of their windows. The avenue was quiet but for a few velo taxis and a horse-drawn carriage or two. On their ride from Montmartre through the twisting streets, Michael and Gaby had seen many German soldiers, strolling the boulevards in rowdy groups or sitting in sidewalk cafщs like drunken lords. TheyТd seen, as well, a number of troop transport trucks and armored cars scuttling busily over the paved stones. But Michael and Gaby, in their new disguises, attracted no attention. Michael wore his patched pants, a blue shirt, and a dark brown corduroy coat that had seen better days; on his feet were the scuffed black shoes, and on his head a brown cap. Gaby wore black slacks, a yellow blouse, and a bulky gray sweater that hid the bulge of her Luger. They wore the outfits of regular, struggling Paris citizens, whose main concern was getting food on the table rather than the dictates of European fashion.
Michael gave her a moment or two more, then he got on his bicycle and pedaled after her, between the aged and sad stone beauties. Much of the statuary was broken, he saw. Some of it had been wrestled up from its moorings and stolen away, probably to grace Nazi dwellings. Michael pedaled at a slow, steady pace. A carriage went past, heading in the opposite direction, the horseТs hooves clopping on the pavement. Michael came to the sign marking the Rue Tobas, and he swung the bicycle to the right.
The buildings here were crowded close, and there were few lights. This district, once wealthy, had the air of decay and dissolution. Some of the windows were broken and mended with tape, and much of the carved masonry had either collapsed or been removed. Michael thought of a ballet dancer whose legs had become bloated and thick with veins. Headless statues stood in a fountain that held bits of trash and old newspapers instead of water. A stone wall screamed a black Nazi swastika and the painted words DEUTSCHLAND SIEGT AN ALLEN FRONTENЧУGermany Victorious on all Fronts.Ф WeТll soon see, Michael thought as he pedaled past.
He knew this street, had studied it well on the map. Coming up on the right was a gray buildingЧonce a stately homeЧwith broken stone steps sweeping up from the curb. He knew this building, too. He kept pedaling and quickly glanced up. On the second floor light crept through the blinds of a corner window. Apartment number eight. Adam was in that room. And Michael didnТt look, but he was aware of the gray stone building across the street, too, where the Gestapo had their watchmen. No pedestrians were on the street, and Gaby had already pedaled on ahead to wait for him. Michael moved past AdamТs building, sensing he was being watched. Possibly from the roof of the building opposite AdamТs. Possibly from a darkened window. This was a mouse trap, Michael thought. Adam was the cheese, and the cats were licking their whiskers.
He stopped pedaling and let the bicycle coast across the cracked pavement. His peripheral vision caught a flare of light to his left. Someone standing in a doorway, holding a match to a cigarette. The match went out, and smoke plumed. Meow, Michael thought. He kept going, head down, and he saw an alley coming up on his right. He guided the bike toward the alley, turned into it, pedaled about twenty feet farther, and then stopped. He leaned the Peugeot against a wall of gray bricks and walked back to the alley entrance, facing the Rue Tobas, then crouched down on his haunches beside a group of garbage cans and stared across the street at the doorway where the Gestapo man stood smoking his cigarette. A tiny red circle waxed and waned in the night. Michael saw the man, clad in a dark overcoat and hat, outlined in a faint blue haze. Seven or eight minutes crept by. A crack of light drew MichaelТs attention, and he looked up at a window on the third floor. Someone had just drawn aside a black curtain perhaps three or four inches; the curtain was held open for only a few seconds, then fell back into place again and the light was gone.
Michael reasoned that several teams of Gestapo men kept AdamТs apartment under watch all hours of the day and night. From that third-floor surveillance post they had a clear view of the Rue Tobas, and could see anyone going in or coming out of AdamТs building. They probably had listening devices in AdamТs apartment as well, and certainly had his telephone tapped. So the contact would have to get a message to Adam along his walk to work; but how was that going to be possible with the Gestapo dogging his trail?
Michael stood up and stepped back into the alley, still watching the cigarette smoker. The man didnТt see him; his attention drifted back and forth along the street in a relaxed, even bored, vigilance. And then Michael took two more backward steps, and he smelled it.
Frightened sweat.
Someone was behind him. Someone very quiet, but now Michael could hear a faint, raspy breathing.
And suddenly a knife blade was jabbed against his spine. УGive me your money,Ф a manТs voice said in French with a thick German accent.
A thief, Michael thought. An alley prowler. He had no wallet to surrender, and any struggle would certainly crash the garbage cans over and cause the Gestapo man to take interest. He decided what to do in the passing of an instant. He drew himself up to full height and said softly in German, УDo you want to die?Ф
There was a pause. Then: УI saidЕ give me yourЕФ The voice cracked. The thief was scared to death.
УTake the knife away from my back,Ф Michael said calmly, Уor in three seconds IТll kill you.Ф