Chasing Ghosts Madalyn Morgan (free e books to read txt) 📖

she tell Officer Boucher about her and Mitch’s jobs in the war? She decided for the moment, not to. ‘As I was saying, Mitch was worried about our daughter if anything happened to me-- or both of us.’ Officer Boucher nodded sympathetically. ‘What worries me,’ Claire said, ‘is Mitch going into a hostage situation on his own with a Nazi killer and a woman who loves him - worships him - and I expect would do anything for him; a woman who might already have killed for him. That makes it a very dangerous situation and is more likely to get Mitch killed.’

Officer Boucher nodded, again. Claire couldn’t read what the nodding meant. She was wasting time by trying.

‘I’m going to Mitch’s father’s house. I am not having my husband risk his life with that monster Beckman when I know a sure way of helping him.’

Céline Boucher stood up and crossed to the door. ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Mitchell, my orders are not to let you leave the room.’

‘Then you’d better restrain me because if you don’t I will leave. Céline, I love my husband, we have been through a great deal together.’ She left her seat, walked over to the door and stood next to the officer. Careful not to stand too close in case she felt intimidated, Claire decided it was now time to tell Céline Boucher about the work she and Mitch had done in the war. ‘Mitch and I were members of the Special Operations Executive. We were dropped into German-occupied France and from forty-two to forty-five worked undercover with the French Resistance. Mitch was captured by the Gestapo and put in prison. Heinrich Beckman was the doctor in that prison. He will, if he gets the chance, kill Mitch. You see, Mitch recognised him and has exposed him. And Beckman knows, if he doesn’t get out of the situation he’s in, he’ll be taken back to France, tried for murder, and hanged.’

‘Good God, I--’

‘No one knows the relationship between my husband and Beckman except Chief Jacobs and your commanding officer.’ Claire returned to her chair and Céline Boucher followed. ‘I don’t want to get you into trouble, Céline, but I intend to leave here, with or without your help.’ Claire liked Céline Boucher and hoped it was going to be with her help.

Céline gave Claire a wry smile. ‘I know for a fact that my superior at St. Hubert, Captain Hillier, is in a meeting all morning. So, I am going to ring his office and when his secretary tells me he is in a meeting and is not to be disturbed, I shall apologise. When she asks me if she can take a message there will be a problem with the telephone. So, since I am the senior officer here and I can’t get in touch with my superior, whether you follow your husband or not is up to me.’

Claire reached out and took Céline Boucher’s hands. ‘You could get in trouble, couldn’t you?’

The young officer raised her eyebrows. ‘I’ll be court marshalled for disobeying orders, so you’ll have to overpower me and tie me up,’ she said, with a glint in her eye. ‘First, let me call my superior officer.’

Céline Boucher picked up the telephone on the table by the window and asked to be put through to St. Hubert Airforce base. When she was connected, she asked to speak to Captain Hillier and was put through to his secretary. ‘Miss Elliott, it’s Officer Boucher here. Would you patch me through to Captain Hillier? Oh, he’s still in the meeting, is he? What? Oh, but there’s--’ She looked at Claire and bit her lip. ‘Sir? Yes. I’m sorry to disturb you while you’re in a meeting, but Captain Mitchell’s wife has given me the slip. She-- Yes, Sir… No, Sir... Yes, straight away. Thank you, Sir.’ Officer Boucher put down the telephone, put her hand up to her mouth and giggled.

‘He said I was to go after you and when I caught up with you I wasn’t to let you out of my sight. “Stick to her like glue!” were his exact words. Well, what are you waiting for, Mrs Mitchell? If we’re going we’d better look sharp. We’ll hail a taxi in the street.’

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

The taxi dropped Claire and Officer Boucher off several streets away from Alain and Marie Mitchell’s house. It was the nearest the taxi could get. ‘Sorry I can’t take you any further,’ the driver said when Claire paid him. ‘Some guy has gone nuts and is holding an old couple hostage. Everyone around here has been evacuated.’ He offered her fifty cents change.

‘Keep it,’ Claire said. The two women made their way to Mitch’s father’s house. Claire had been there more than a dozen times during the three months that she, Mitch and Aimée had lived in Canada.

Claire was conscious of the heels of her shoes clip-clopping along the pavement of the empty streets. ‘It’s like a ghost town,’ she said. Turning the corner into the long road where her in-laws lived, she stopped. Fifty yards ahead armed officers and air force personnel were crouched behind a dozen police cars and military vehicles.

She quickly took the paved path to the back of the first house. Céline Boucher followed.

‘Damn! There’s no way I can climb over all these fences,’ she said, ‘it would take me forever to get to the Mitchell house.’

‘Look!’ Céline pointed to a narrow lane running along the side of the garden. ‘That, if I am not mistaken, is the beginning of a service road.’

Claire followed Céline out of the garden and turned right onto the narrow strip of tarmac. Keeping low, they ran until they were at the back of Alain’s father’s house. ‘Céline, I appreciate you coming with me, but now I think you should go,’ Claire said, ‘I’m going to try to