Free 77 Rue Paradis by Gil Brewer Page A

coming to the law, but his mind drew a blank. He was here. It had seemed the right thing to do. Now he knew he must somehow get away.
    Again he left his chair, with Bette’s name flashing on and off in his mind like a red light. He went to the door and began banging on it again. They could not hold him like this. He had to get away, find somebody who would listen, and act.
    He began to see how things really were more and more clearly and he knew he had to get hold of himself. Gorssmann might, at this instant, be trying to reach him. The man who had been following him had probably by now reported his disappearance.
    He pounded still harder on the door. He could hear the frantic thunder of his own knocking. It reverberated through the nighttime emptiness of the old building, and above the knocking, like an old woman’s intermittent screams, the telephone rang and rang.
     

CHAPTER 8
     
    About a half hour passed and Baron felt himself slipping toward a very real despair. There had been no answer to his knocking on the door and the telephone finally stopped ringing. His own mental condition was a trap now. There were pitfalls he had to avoid. It was a battle to stay clear of them. The one thought that tortured him most was the memory of what Gorssmann had said about Bette. He could find no way of forgiving himself for coming to the police. He called himself every name he could think of as he paced the worn board floor of the detention room. Nothing helped.
    He did not hear the door open.
    “Monsieur?”
    He whirled as the commissaire spoke loudly.
    “Someone to see you, monsieur,” the commissaire said. He stepped aside in the doorway, brandishing a newly lighted cheroot, and a tall cadaverous man strode past him. The man came on into the detention room and stood looking at Baron across the large expanse of table.
    “This is Louis Follet,” the commissaire said.  
    For a long moment nobody spoke. The commissaire sighed abruptly, took another frantic puff on his cheroot, turned his back, and closed the door. Baron heard the distinct sound of the key in the lock, the click as the bolt shot into place.
    Baron was slightly disconcerted about Follet. He did not know who he was, but he was of that type seen hanging around water-front bars. His clothes were wrinkled, baggy, the gray suit well worn, the stringy tie raveled on one side. He carried a soft felt hat partially crushed in one hand. He was very thin, but large-boned, his cheeks sunken in a gray face that did not smile. The only lively thing about Follet was the probing look in his eyes.
    “Yes?” Baron said.
    Follet said nothing. He kept watching Baron with those bright-blue eyes that seemed to burn in his head like the blue flame on an alcohol lamp. The eyes did not waver. The eyes simply watched and watched and Baron began to feel the perspiration again.
    Follet placed his hat beneath the elbow of his left arm, probed his pockets until he found tobacco and cigarette papers. Standing there, watching, he rolled himself a fat cigarette with long curling shreds of tobacco. The shreds hung from the end of the cigarette as he lit it. From the time he lit the cigarette until it burned out close to his lips, Follet never took it from his mouth.
    “I am from the Sûreté Géneralé, Department of Air Intelligence,” Follet said at last. The cigarette jiggled between his lips as he spoke. Otherwise he did not move.
    Baron quit looking at the man. He went and slumped into a chair by the table, folded his hands on the table, and looked at them. He listened to Follet breathe and decided the man was consumptive.
    “You are now in the hands of the secret police,” Follet said.
    “Must we talk in code?”
    “You are bitter?”
    Baron started to explode, managed to stifle it. He heard Follet’s quiet chuckle, glanced up. Follet’s face hadn’t changed. The chuckle worked its way around the cigarette.
    “Would you mind very much telling me everything you told the