Red Rainbow by G Johanson (best e reader for academics txt) 📕

adept escapologist, so burial was a better choice for him. He asked her, “Which method should I choose to be different?”

“Worry about that later when we’re free,” Patience said with a smile. She hadn’t seen Maurice since her father’s wake, but they still instantly clicked. Her parents were gone, her extended family distant, mostly in location, some in connection. She had friends her own age and thereabouts (she was 28, her friends in their late 20s and early 30s). Still, she missed that nurturing element that the older generations often demonstrated – the non-fascists – and her father’s old circle were resolutely not that. They were the subversives, the anarchists – the occultists. Neither Deveral nor Maurice had any powers (Maurice’s speciality act had been a silent magician routine, his silence a selling point he never deviated from) and still shone amongst those who didn’t need tricks to levitate.

Florence got a better look at the two attendees as they exited the synagogue – she’d not guessed right with the girl either. She hadn’t looked like she was dressed for a funeral, a light dress visible underneath the dark coat.

“I know her. She was a maid at the theatre.”

“Theatres don’t have maids.”

“Cleaner, domestic, whatever. Laundress, that’s it, she handled the clothes.”

“My main trade for 35 years, nothing wrong with that. Was she a dresser, maybe?”

“It was a piddling little rep company, they had no shit like that.”

This was one of many of Florence’s habits that Hilaire didn’t like. She was quick to belittle others and their achievements, their lives. Hilaire possibly went too far the other way, viewing this young black woman and overpraising her achievement in succeeding in any facet of the theatre business, her colour surely making it harder for her in their fundamentally racist country. Her hair was not long, yet she could pull it off so much better than Hilaire, the volume and width of her shoulder-length Marcel waves hairdo apparent even by her rubbish mole eyes from a distance.

“Did she have a name?” Hilaire fancied the question was redundant as she asked it. Florence had clearly only paid her the absolute minimum attention.

“We could find that out. We don’t need to, do we?”

“No, probably not.” Approaching her would serve no purpose and would worry her needlessly.

“Who’s doing the honours then, me or you?”

“Sorry?”

“The flower seller. Are you going to make him fly or am I going to suck him dry? I’ll have to go closer for precision else I’ll take out some of the others.”

“We don’t know definitively.” He had been watching that part of the street a lot, but not exclusively. There was doubt. He hadn’t left his post to follow them.

“Nobody else has been around for the whole service watching the comings and goings. You had me fly through a window. Don’t get gutless now, that’s not you. I’ll do it myself.”

Hilaire followed her down the stairs, trying to reason with her. “We don’t know he’s Gestapo or a spy or whatever. You can’t just kill on instinct.”

“I can take him out of action, leave him silenced for months.”

“Isn’t that how you killed Ephraim? Taking a safe amount only to find it was too much.” Ephraim De La Roche had been Florence’s lover during her death feud with Hilaire – and Hilaire was able to freely admit that she’d envied her for that, Ephraim a fine-looking fellow. His death was a tragedy that should have changed Florence for life, not just for a little while.

“That wound isn’t as raw as you think it is,” Florence said, descending the next flight of stairs. It would take more than that to stop her, no sudden epiphany going to stop her from dismantling this trap.

“That’s scary that that’s passé, that you’re indifferent to murdering a loyal man who worshipped you. It makes me think your husbands are... I don’t know if you’re a heroine or a serial killer.”

Florence made it to the wrecked back door and turned to face Hilaire. “The only way to stop me is to use your powers. See where we stand now, see if you can still lift me.”

Hilaire spoke quickly, refusing to be drawn into a supernatural fight with her. Not because she thought she would lose, just because she didn’t want their relationship sliding back down to that. She was annoying as fuck – but sort of a friend. “You said up there nobody else but him had been watching the whole time. What about us? If we could be in a building watching it, one of us accurately guessing the attendees, one not, why couldn’t anyone else?” She could tell this was making her think, Hilaire following it up with, “A flower seller will usually be in the same spot if he has a stall. Yes?”

“We check in with her if anyone approaches her,” Florence said firmly.

“Okay. I’ll try and catch her,” Hilaire said, having seen the direction the laundress was heading in.

“No need. I may have taken a small drop from her earlier at the theatre. I can locate her. There’s more to her than you’d think, to look at her, energy wise.”

Hilaire shook her head, this gesture not noticed by Florence, who had gone back upstairs to locate her coat. She stopped at the first landing window and laughed. Hilaire stood at her side and spotted the source of her mirth.

“Fancy some free flowers?” The stall was unattended, which maybe meant nothing... or something. Perhaps they would have to check in on the girl after all.

Chapter 4

Wrong Place Wrong Time

Patience had been interviewed by the Gestapo the day after Deveral Meyer died. They had not mentioned exactly what happened at the theatre then but said enough that she knew they weren’t investigating his death. His plan had come to fruition. She’d been in touch with Charlotte since and heard that she’d been questioned too, routine stuff. That should have been her warning, though. The Gestapo are looking into it, no-show the funeral.