The Paris Agent(75)

“You’re following me,” I said, when we were deep in the laneway, sheltered from prying eyes. She scowled at me.

“I was just—”

“There’s no point lying. I know you were.” She stared at me defiantly, but there was also a glimmer of fear in her eyes. I released her arm and stepped back, bewildered. “Veronique. My God, relax, we’re on the same side. Why on earth are you tailing me?”

“What possible reason could you have to be going to Malgier Labelle’s building every day?” she demanded, raising her chin.

“What are you talking about?”

“Malgier Labelle. He works with the Abwehr.” The Abwehr—the German military intelligence organization.

“I’ve never even heard of him, Veronique! The only place I regularly go is Turner’s apartment.”

“You meet Turner at his apartment?” she repeated, raising an eyebrow. I felt myself flushing as I nodded. “But you aren’t going to his apartment for your meetings. Not regularly. That’s…”

“It is in keeping with our cover story!” I said defensively.

“I’ve seen you go to Labelle’s building,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.

“When?”

“Yesterday. The day before. The day before that!” If her effort that morning was any indication, my failure to notice her following me was an indictment that I’d become too complacent there in Paris, lulled by the regularity of my routine with Turner. “Yesterday you walked past the building at ten, but you only walked a few blocks away, stopped in at a café, and then returned. The second time you passed, you went inside.”

“You’re talking about Turner’s building.” I walked past at ten and the vase was not in Turner’s windowsill. I walked past again an hour later because it was almost always there by lunchtime, and it was. “Is this building on Rue Lapointe?”

Veronique suddenly deflated, the air leaving her lungs in a rush. She closed her eyes as she nodded.

“Before he disappeared, Mahaut told me he’d heard a rumor that Labelle lives in that building.”

“Mahaut is still operating. Turner has seen him!”

Veronique scowled at me.

“You are the only agent I’ve seen in weeks,” she said abruptly. “The whole reason I was tailing you was that everyone else seems to be missing. When César was here, I was working with three other couriers. In the last two months, I haven’t had a message from any of them. I knew of Mahaut, plus another w/t operator. Of course, we hide and we move and we shift, but we were all periodically in touch until Turner arrived.”

Suddenly I realized that her cool manner toward me had not been stress, or as I’d suspected, just her way. Now that we were face-to-face, airing all of this, I realized she was deeply suspicious of me. It was right there in her eyes as she weighed up how much more to say.

“You can trust me,” I said. “Some things have troubled me lately too. We can work together. I want to help you untangle all of this.”

“I went to the safe house of one of the other couriers,” she blurted. “It’s been ransacked. He’s gone. I have to assume he was arrested. And Mahaut. And Campion. I’ve sent the messages you’ve given me to send, but every message that reports a stable situation here in Paris is a lie.”

I was in the dark about so much and Turner himself was the common thread to all of it. I looked at Veronique, unsure if I should say as much, but just then she crossed her arms over her chest and demanded, “I’ve only seen Turner once since he arrived—just at the initial meeting. Is he really still here? Is he really still free?”

“You thought Turner had been arrested.” I sighed, sinking back against the wall. “You thought I was working with the Abwehr to feed you false information so you’d transmit it to London.”

“I had to wonder,” she whispered, casting her gaze down. “But if Turner lives in the same apartment block…”

“I’ve trusted him…”

“Just because he’s nice does not mean he is innocent.”

We both fell silent for a moment, pondering that.

“What makes you so sure Labelle lives in that apartment block?” I asked.

“It is only a rumor, but Mahaut shared it with me long before Turner arrived.”

If Turner was a traitor, my situation was beyond dire. Veronique and I were pawns in a game that we could not even begin to understand.

“Turner loves France,” I said. “This is his home. He wants, more than anything, to see it freed.”

“You obviously know him much better than I do,” Veronique said. There was still a hint of accusation in her tone, but she and I needed one another now. The very first thing we had to do was to establish some level of trust between us.

“Follow me to Turner’s apartment,” I told her. “I’m going to try to confirm if Labelle lives in the building, and I want you to go to the café opposite. Sit by the window. Stay there all morning if you have to. Sooner or later, Turner will leave. You’ll see with your own eyes that he is still here and he is still free.”

“I can tail him,” Veronique said. That was the logical way forward, but having seen her in action, I was concerned.