‘Is a heartbeat.’ Voice close above her, and a hand inside her blouse, on the ribs under her left breast. The voice of the so-called ‘patron’ she thought. ‘Definitely… Not strong, but – Luc, go find Thérèse. No – I will…’
‘Bloody dog’s already letting her know we’re here!’
‘Only doing its job, poor brute…’
Barking, and rattling its chain. By the sound of it, flinging itself against it, its ambition being to get at the intruders. Rosie wondered how they’d got her chain off – the locked iron cuffs off her wrists, with no key. She’d become aware of their having been removed – hadn’t realized it earlier – when she’d cautiously moved her right hand up to that side of her head above the ear, to feel the already crusting groove made by a rifle-bullet, which if it had been as much as a couple of centimetres to the left would surely have killed her. By the feel of it you could have laid a pencil in it. She’d only probed it with a fingertip – very very lightly: lying on her back, having tried other postures but found that any bodily movement provoked bloody agony – as indeed had the lurching and bumping of the van.
Left shoulder must have a bullet still in it – she guessed. Grating against bone, probably against (or in) bone it had smashed. On the other hand, the throbbing pain in front – the front of the shoulder, so to speak, not far above that breast – suggested an exit wound. And a bullet would have gone right through, surely – fired from such close range.
Taken smashed bone with it, maybe?
A woman’s voice then, shouting at the dog to shut up. And the older man’s as he came across the yard with her. ‘Like to get the van in under cover right away, Thérèse. Into your barn there? Be light soon, and if they had a spotter plane – which as you’d know they tend to do—’
‘All right. Then get the girl out. You’ll be staying a while – right?’
‘A few hours, only. If we may stay that long?’
‘Leaving her with me, then?’
‘Please. And bless you… God knows what, otherwise. She’s going to need – as I said, a bit of looking after. Could still be a bullet in her, incidentally.’
‘I suppose she’s – you’re sure of her, who and what—’
‘All we know is the Boches had her on a train heading east, when it stopped she made a run for it, and they shot her. Good enough credentials, wouldn’t you say?’
‘You’d better get the van inside.’
‘Yeah.’ Voice raised, calling across the yard: ‘Luc – van goes in the barn. Back it in, leave room behind the doors for getting her out, uh?’
‘Bien sûr.’ Rosie heard him repeat as if to himself as he got back in, ‘Bien sûr, mon commandant…’ The van swayed under his weight, and a door was pulled shut. Rosie thinking commandant – major. French military – presumably. Unless that had been sarcasm. One knew nothing, except that one was in the hands of total strangers. This one’s voice quietly again: ‘Not awake back there, are you, by any chance?’
‘Yes. As it happens…’
‘Ah. Great.’ Then – leaning out, she imagined – ‘She’s conscious, spoke to me!’
‘Straight back now…’
Reversing… Telling her, ‘You’ll be all right now – whoever you are. Madame Michon’ll look after you, you can count on that.’ Heavy bump – over some kind of step or sill, perhaps a drop from brickwork on to dirt. Invading waft of manure, horsepiss, chicken-shit. Perfume – compared to the reek in the cells at Fresnes. The bump had jarred her shoulder, she’d let out a squeaky gasp. Head wound didn’t seem so – noticeable. Her head hurt internally, and the shoulder – whole left side of her torso – throbbed with pain, but she felt the week-old whip-cuts in her back more than she did that bullet-graze.
Thirsty…
He’d switched off. Pitch-dark in here: still was outside, as far as she knew. Seeing nothing, living through one’s ears. But the other one had said daylight was coming. Well – on the floor of a closed van…
Rear doors opening. The woman’s voice: ‘All right, you inside there?’
All right?
She reminded herself: Yes – compared to Edna. Maureen. Daphne…
Lise?
Vision of her body in that river. Lise’s short, dark hair just awash, like weed floating…
The woman had waited for an answer, hadn’t had one, tried again now, asking in rather gutturally accented French, ‘Ready for these two to bring you in?’
German accent?
‘Yes. Please. At least—’
‘Michel?’
‘Here we are.’ A hand by way of warning on her foot as he leant into the back: and the Gauloise smell. A cigarette mightn’t be so bad: but you’d need a drink first. The man was saying – addressing her, she realized – ‘My colleague here will do most of this, mam’selle. He has two arms: regrettably I mislaid one of mine. One question, though – forgive me, but we’re – curious, you know… Who are you – and from where? Résistante, no doubt?’
‘I’m an agent of SOE in London, “F” Section.’ Whispering. ‘If that means anything.’
‘Means plenty. But – you’re French?’
‘Yes.’
‘And the train you were on?’
‘I think we were going to Ravensbrück. I and others. We’d been in the prison at Fresnes.’ She paused. ‘And you?’
‘We are from the Third French Parachute Battalion, detached to work under the command of Etat-Major of Forces Françaises de l’Intérieur. Liaison with Maquis groups – in preparation for when this area becomes a battlefield. Which can’t be long delayed now – please God. We wrecked the train ahead of yours – an exercise, mostly to show them how it’s done – and some who were in the woods to observe what might happen when your train arrived reported there’d been shots fired. So – when the coast was clear, as you might say—’
‘I owe you my life, anyway.’
‘To pure chance – and our curiosity…’
‘There was another girl trying to escape – the other side, the river. I was creating a diversion for her, nothing else. I suppose your friends didn’t see any – shooting in that direction, or—’
‘No such thing was reported.’
‘How did you get the chains off my wrists?’
‘Chains?’ In the dark, vaguely the movement of a shrug. ‘There were no chains. I suppose – I’d assume the Boches – if you were unconscious, as you were when we found you—’
‘Then they’d have seen I was alive.’
‘Obviously did not. Now – Luc will be as gentle as he can.’ In a lower tone then, aside: ‘We gave her a shot of morphine when we picked her up. She was mewling like a cat.’
‘Poor creature.’ The woman… ‘Listen – I’ll go up, see to her bed – in the attic, Michel.’
He’d grunted: ‘Luc – you come here, I’ll go the other side…’
Faint light overhead – she thought. The pain was – bearable. Except at certain moments… The dog whining now instead of barking: the rattling of its chain reminded her of similar sound-effects when she and the others had been clanking under close guard through the Gare d’Est in Paris. About – twenty hours ago? Hours, or years?
She was being carried through a low doorway into a farmhouse kitchen. Yellowish glow of an oil-lamp, the stooped and burdened Luc throwing a hunched shadow as he edged in sideways. Doing his best: she knew he was. There was an odour not only of lamp-oil but also – she thought – bacon. Having had nothing to eat for a day and a night, and not having been fed anything like adequately for about three weeks before that, she found herself acutely sensitive to that aroma, had her thoughts on it almost exclusively while they were first clumping up a narrow staircase and then manoeuvring her up a ladder – near-vertical, awkward ascent via a small trap-door into roof-space lit by another lamp – hurricane lantern – on an old chest of drawers near the head of an iron bedstead. The woman had been waiting for them, was helping Luc. Mutters of ‘Easy does it’, ‘Careful, now’, ‘Oh, mind that beam’… Feather mattress, Rosie discovered, as they eased her down on to it. And cool. Shoulder burning hot and pulsing. The cold smoothness of a rubber sheet or mattress-cover, and for a few seconds then a view of the older man’s strong, darkly unshaven face. Big nose, and as the light was striking across his face, wide-set dark pits for eyes. Stiff crewcut hairstyle. Burlier than Luc. One-armed? She hadn’t seen, or thought of it, and he wasn’t in her field of view now, but that was what he’d said, or implied. A paratrooper with only one arm? She supposed it was possible. Well, he’d said it. In any case that was only one surprising detail in all that was happening around her, to her.
If it was happening…
Maybe it was going to be OK, not having said goodbye? One day, a chance to say hello?
Luc’s voice through a wave of dizziness: ‘I’m sorry – I was clumsy—’
‘No. Weren’t at all. I thought it would be bad, but—’
‘You’re very kind, but—’
‘And now you can kindly leave her to me.’ The woman, cutting in. Rosie had barely seen her at all yet, she was no more than a rather bulky, womanly presence. Strong, thick arms and a smell of farmyard. ‘Both of you. Except – Luc, bring me a jug of warm water, please? From the stove, you’ll see a big enamel jug – under the tap, probably.’
‘OK…’
‘If I could have a drink – anything, water or—’
‘Of course!’
‘Were you cooking, when we arrived? That smell of bacon? Is there any possibility—’
‘Sounds like famished as well as thirsty!’
‘Yes.’ Thérèse – head down close to Rosie’s, and a hand on her undamaged arm – ‘How long since you had anything to eat?’
‘Oh – days. Prison food then, so—’
‘Luc, wait.’ He was on the ladder, halfway down it. She told him, ‘There’s a pot of soup on the back of the stove – she’s right, bacon in it – and bread in the corner cupboard. And we’ll need a spoon for the soup. Fill a bowl from the iron pot – bowls are on the shelf.’
‘Don’t want your hot water yet, then?’
‘Put it on so it’ll be heating, yes. But the soup up here first – please.’
‘D’accord…’
‘Better not fill up with water. If soup’s what you want anyway. Unless you really want water first?’
‘Soup – lovely…’
Moving shadows, scrape of boots on plank floors, soft spread of lamplight – too soft for her to have seen more than Luc’s general outline, when he’d been on the ladder there – at no distance at all, and facing this way, towards her, but still no more than a dark shape. Civilian clothes, she thought – rough, working clothes. All right – working with the Maquis, dressed as labourers – cultivateurs, whatever. She was exerting herself to ward off recurrent spells of dizziness and keep her mind from blurring. There’d been a square of pinkish dawn light, a small window in that end wall, but the woman had just gone to it and hung something over it. Returning, telling Rosie that she’d provide a more substantial meal after she’d bathed and dressed her wounds; she only felt it was important to get sustenance of some kind into her, and the broth happened to be available right away. Should have thought of it before. Rosie’s thought was that she might well have had a glass of water by this time: she could imagine it, the cold, clean taste and the trickle of it down her throat. Things seemed to be happening very slowly: she warned herself, Seem to be, but maybe aren’t… Acceptance was the order of the day: compliance and gratitude for huge mercies. Michel joining in then – behind her somewhere, she’d thought he’d gone down but he hadn’t – expressing agreement with the idea of food as the priority, and adding that he had a first-aid kit in the gazo, its contents including morphine – ‘If it should be needed.’
‘Probably will. There’s a large exit wound, at least no bullet to dig out.’
‘Can you handle whatever does need doing?’
‘Yes. That’s to say, some, but I’ll have help—’
‘A doctor?’
‘Too far – and not safely. No – our sage-femme—’
‘That’s good. Fine. But we also have a powder I’ll leave you, what they call a sulphur drug. It’s a new thing – miraculous for healing wounds, really magical. When you have the wounds cleaned, Thérèse, you just sprinkle it on – or in – and it forms a crust, under which—’
‘Lend us a syringe – hypodermic – can you, as well as the morphine? Michel, listen – you and Luc must be hungry too. Help yourselves down there, if you want. Otherwise – when I’ve got this done… If you’re still here by then, of course. D’you have far to go?’
‘Well—’
‘You said – what, a few hours—’
‘Two hours, say. Then we’ll arrange for ourselves an alibi with the Destiniers, I thought. We’ll have fixed that old tractor that’s always giving up the ghost, and be heading back north. If we’d been spotted as we were going – at this hour especially – we’d have been coming from the scene of the night’s action, d’you see.’
‘Sooner not know or see… Can you bear to remain upright as you are, child – for a little while?’
She could – with her right hand grasping the bedhead railing. In fact it was a less uncomfortable position than any other. Whatever she did, her shoulder wasn’t going to stop hurting: shoulder, also her front here above her left breast. Exit wound: and like a pulsing spear right through… What she couldn’t do was keep her thoughts off the other women prisoners: visualizing them in some stinking cattle-truck, hour upon hour of utter misery before the halt at Fürstenberg and from there – cattle on the hoof, then, driven…
To the abattoir.
Lise among them? If the guards hadn’t killed her, only recaptured her?
‘Listen – would it be easier lying flat? On your face, I mean?’
‘I don’t think so.’ She must have groaned, or something – muttered to herself… She explained, ‘Thinking about friends who—’
‘Lean against me. Here. That’s it.’ A snuffle of humour: ‘Plenty of me to lean on – huh? But my dear, listen – try not to dwell on – whatever, any of it – or them. Thinking about them now won’t do them any good – only weaken you… Save it for when you’re stronger. I’ll tell you – here’s what we’ll do now. You hearing me? Fine. Soup first – to warm you, warm your heart. It’s good, I promise. We don’t do badly here for food, we’re very fortunate and there are tricks to play, of course. Have to, or they’d swipe the lot, we’d starve. Mind you, we’d be lined up and shot if—’
‘Where is this place?’
‘East side of the Vosges Mountains. A place called Thanville isn’t far – and further south a larger centre, Sélestat. And to the northeast, Strasbourg.’
‘Right on the Boche border.’
‘Close enough to it. But to them, Alsace is part of the bloody Reich now, they’d tell you that’s the former border.’
‘Southwest of Strasbourg… Close to the Natzweiler camp, are we? Struthof-Natzweiler?’
‘It’s not far.’ She wasn’t looking at her.
‘Extermination camp.’
A sigh… ‘So one is told.’
Shaking her head. Rosie thinking, the only extermination camp on French soil – and I hole up in spitting distance of it… Thérèse was telling her, ‘Alsace-Lorraine was Boche territory, for – oh, about forty years – as you would know, I’m sure. In 1871 they seized it and a lot of our folk of French origin moved west. As I said, they don’t think of it here as France now, to them it’s land they’ve re-occupied. The French language is verboten – it’s Alsatian only – or German, of course. In public, anyway – the village street or shops, for instance, if you did speak French the bastards’d hear about it quick enough. They conscript our boys as if they were Germans – into the SS, even. Parents who’ve tried to prevent it – you know, hide them – have been sent to the camps. Imagine – decent, decently brought-up Alsatian boys forced into that… But – what I was saying – soup first, then I’ll get these bloodstained rags off you, clean you up – we’ll try some of Michel’s magic stuff, eh? Then I must give them a hand downstairs, I suppose. Porridge might be best for you, the next stage… One thing I should mention – if there should come unwanted visitors, we take the ladder away and shut the trap. It wouldn’t be the first time. But another thing is I’ll send my nephew – Charles, he’s only thirteen but he helps me out on the farm, and he’ll be here as soon as it’s light – he’ll take a message to a friend of mine and my late husband’s, she’s the sage-femme of this district.’ Boots clumping on the ladder: Thérèse murmuring and whispering on, babying her, ‘Lotte knows as much as any doctor. Her husband was a German, she was born Alsacienne – like me – but – oh, Luc, that’s good, thank you.’ The bacon smell suddenly, overwhelmingly enticing. At last…
‘When the water’s hot, Luc—’
‘Won’t be long. Bon appetit…’
She still hadn’t had more than a vague impression of him – even though he’d carried her up here. And Thérèse was now between them – getting the bowl and the bread, which he’d put on the chest. The impression she had was that he was tallish, thin, and had light-coloured eyes – or that could have been just a reflection of lamplight in them. Who cared, anyway – it was the soup she was really eyeing, dying for… But Luc pausing now, a few rungs down on the ladder, in that shadowed area: ‘Is there a name we could call you by, mam’selle?’
Names, plural. Code-names, field-names, one had got through a lot of them pretty fast. Suzanne, Zoé, Béa, Angel; Jeanne-Marie, at one time…
‘Rosalie do?’
‘Rosalie. Now that is a name!’
Slight juddering of the ladder as he went on down. Rosie already wondering what had persuaded her to give them her real name – the one she’d been christened with in Nice nearly twenty-six years ago. It was an unheard-of thing to have done, on service in the field: but too late now, she’d done it… Thérèse was back beside her with the soup, bread in the same hand, spoon in the other. ‘Now then – Rosalie. He’s right, it is a pretty name. Here, now—’
Heaven. The most marvellous thing ever. Swallowing, with her eyes shut, thinking I’ll remember this all my life…
However long or short that might be. The expression ‘borrowed time’ came to mind, but stolen seemed closer to the mark. And a sense of unreality: as if it wasn’t hers, she had no right to it. Wouldn’t last, therefore? At least one daren’t count on it. Another thought was that if she’d been granted one wish, it would be nothing at all to do with her own living or dying, only that Lise should be alive and on her way. Pray for that. If necessary, die here praying for it. Dying at least in a degree of peace and comfort – which was a hell of a lot more than those others – or poor darling Lise—
The water Luc brought was much too hot, almost boiling, would have to be left to cool a little. Thérèse shaking her head: ‘Being silly, trying to do everything at once. And Lotte’ll say I should have seen to your wounds before anything else… It has done you good, though – hasn’t it?’
‘Definitely. I feel much stronger. Fell asleep, I think… Who’s Lotte?’
‘Our sage-femme. I told you about her.’
Sage-femme meaning midwife. But they often tended to act like district nurses, especially in remote communities. In ancient times, witchcraft and black magic had been attributed to them: doctors who’d seen them as competition had conspired to have them denounced as witches, burnt or drowned. Thérèse was saying, ‘If you can bear it, Rosalie, I’m going to leave you for a few minutes – show them where things are, then they can look after themselves. After all – grown men, soldiers at that…’
‘The older one – Michel – only one arm, and he’s a parachutist?’
‘Believe it or not, he is.’
The man himself, coming up the ladder. ‘Am I intruding here?’
‘At the moment, no, but—’
‘I’ve brought the Sulphanilamide. Just sprinkle it on. Also morphine, and a syringe. But yes, Rosalie – a one-armed para, you see before you. I’m not the only one. I may say – we have a very senior commander – a general, no less—’
‘Generals surely don’t jump out of aeroplanes?’
‘Ah, this one does!’
Thérèse cut in: ‘I’m going down to show Luc where things are, so you and he can feed yourselves while I’m attending to this one’s wounds. You can keep her company now, but after that—’
‘Keeping Rosalie company will be a pleasure.’
He stood aside, Thérèse squeezed herself down through the hatch, and he turned back to Rosie.
‘Well… In your SOE career, did you ever have to parachute?’
‘Oh, yes. Part of our training. And I went in by parachute on my first deployment – dropped near Cahors, to join a network in Toulouse. Didn’t last long, I may say, that réseau had been infiltrated even before I arrived. I got out over the Pyrenees. You know, I can hardly believe I’m not dreaming this?’
‘Dreaming what?’
‘Being here – alive – looked after!’
‘Well, it’s how it is. Obviously you have a strong constitution. Over the Pyrenees, God’s sake… But other deployments since then too?’
‘Second one was Rouen – went in by sea. And then this one. In by Lysander, to do a job in Brittany. Had to run for it yet again, and there was a car smash -’ she touched her forehead and her left cheekbone – ‘which is what caused these scars – and I woke up in hospital at Morlaix, under Gestapo supervision. From there – Fresnes, the prison. And a visit – a week ago exactly – to Gestapo headquarters in Rue des Saussaies.’
‘They hurt you?’
‘Whipped me. Luckily I fainted – but my back’s all cut up. In fact, if there’s enough of that magic powder of yours—’
‘There will be. What better use…’ He ran a large hand over his jaw: wide jaw, and a grim, straight mouth. Grim at this moment, anyway. Shaking his head: ‘They’ve plenty to answer for. And please God they will – damn soon, at that!’
‘Please God…’
She remembered a similar comment just a few weeks ago – a man by name of Lannuzel, a Resistance leader in Châteauneuf-du-Faou in Brittany. He’d said, ‘Christ, they’ve a bill to settle, when the time comes!’, and she’d agreed: ‘On ropes from lamp-posts – and not too quickly…’
In the immediate sense it might be a far-fetched hope, but it was deeply satisfying as a daydream – to those who were terrorized, imprisoned, humiliated, tortured. And in the long run – please God – might be attainable… Visualizing one individual in particular: swollen-faced, kicking on a rope. Young – about her own age – dark-haired, swarthy. A Frenchman, not a German: in fact half French, half British.
Michel had sat down – carefully, at the bed’s other end. A big man, shabbily clothed. The musty odour of old working clothes, she realized, that she’d noticed in the van. Cigarette odour too. It was a long time since she’d smoked. Michel cleared his throat: ‘Listen now, Rosalie. We’ll be off soon, but I’ll be back – I expect – in two or three days’ time. After that – well, no matter, here and now let’s agree a plan of action – namely to get you (a) fit, (b) on your way back to London. OK, so this could be overtaken by events; but assuming Thérèse can get you on your feet in reasonably short order – well, we have our own base – I don’t mean militarily a base, it’s the home of one individual, ostensibly a business associate. We’re supposed to be mechanics, d’you see, we repair and maintain farm machinery, especially tractors – and this fellow’s in that line of business, we do the field work for him. Well – through him, we’d have no problem contacting your people, to arrange a pick-up. Or for that matter you could set it up yourself – once you’re fit and mobile, he’d put you in direct touch with his own SOE contact. That’s for sure – at the moment it’s our own communications link, you see – courtesy of this SOE person’s radio-operator. “Pianists” d’you call them?’
‘I’m one myself.’
‘Are you indeed. What a shame you didn’t think of bringing a transceiver with you!’
‘Wasn’t it thoughtless.’
Smile fading. Shake of the head then; looking into her eyes. ‘We’ll make them pay for the things they’ve done, Rosalie.’
‘Yes. I hope—’
‘We will. But listen – do you agree that should be the programme?’
‘Certainly – and gratefully. Owe you so much already—’
‘Owe me nothing. Another question, though – you’re French, how come you landed in SOE?’
‘My mother’s English. Father died – in 1930 – and she dragged me back – to England.’
‘Dragged – against your will?’
‘France was my home since birth, England a place I’d been taken to only once or twice for visits. Fact is I don’t get on with Mama too well. Although I have an English uncle – her brother – whom I adore. Cousins too – one Army, one RAF. Have you and Luc been on the Maquis-liaison job long?’
‘About six weeks, here in the field.’
‘How did you come to know Thérèse – Madame Michon – as well as you do?’
‘Through the person I just mentioned. He’s a king pin in the Resistance, with links to Maquis groups and so forth. He arranged for our reception, when we parachuted in, and then of course put us in touch with – well, such people as Thérèse. You can have complete faith in her, incidentally. Seems a little scatty sometimes, but – heart of a lioness. Now – on the subject of getting you back to England – obviously it must depend on the speed of your recovery. So I’d advise you should lie low, recover your strength, and – as I say – when the time comes we’ll put you in touch with local SOE. OK?’
‘OK.’
‘At least, someone will. It’s unlikely I’ll be remaining in this area much longer, so probably someone else – Luc, maybe – but don’t worry, it will be set up for you… And meanwhile, you aren’t desperate to put your London people’s minds at rest on your own account—’
‘Not – desperate, no. But—’
‘We could get a message sent to London for you – if you wanted. Snag is that until you can handle things yourself – well, my man wouldn’t be too pleased if it resulted in a stream of stuff to and fro. Which it might – uh? Communications between him and ourselves already present us with certain problems. SOE’s help has made a lot of difference, but frankly it would suit us best to wait until you can handle it.’
‘What we’d better do, then.’ She paused for a couple of long, slow breaths. Dizzy again: letting it pass over. Then: ‘I think I did tell you – unless I was dreaming – that when I ran from the train it was so that another girl—’
‘You did tell me.’
‘Ah. Well… The guards had taken off my leg-irons – put them on someone else who’d tried to escape, earlier. So it was up to me – do the running, the diversion. This other girl and I had – have – information London must get. A traitor – SOE – and certain réseaux in which the pianists aren’t to be trusted – because of him. Ones he used – he never had his own pianist, used these others. Am I making sense?’
‘Enough. Go on.’
‘He’s now working with the Gestapo, so odds are those radios are being operated by Boches.’
‘Perhaps even the link we have access to?’
‘Doubt it. He was based in Paris, he’d have used networks around that area. But you see – if my friend made it – gets clear away—’
‘London will get to know about the traitor without your further help… Is it hard for you, this talking?’
‘It’s all right. Is now, anyway. But – talking about this other person – her name’s Lise – I’d hardly dare hope—’
‘Is she – resourceful?’
‘Very. But that’s another thing – if she’s survived, she’ll have to hide out somewhere – find some kind of a Thérèse of her own, then make contacts like you’re offering me just on a plate… She’d look for résistants for a start, I suppose.’
‘She could be lucky. On the other hand—’
‘What I’m asking is that if you hear any rumours of such a person—’
‘Of course. Of course.’
‘Thank you. I told her – before I started running – find a farm or something, offer money from London. Now people can see the Boches aren’t going to win, there might be some chance she’d get help?’
‘You’re right, that’s how they’re thinking. Why they’re flocking to join the Maquis too. But another question, Rosalie – about this traitor – have your people in London had no suspicions at all of him?’
‘They have had. He was being brought back to answer charges made against him. Then – on the face of it – got himself arrested – which of course was phoney, and which they’ll be aware might have been phoney.’
‘So won’t they be taking adequate precautions now?’
‘Yes. You’re right…’
‘Which might reduce your own anxiety a little?’
‘Yes. I suppose—’
‘Another aspect of it, Rosalie, is that with any luck we’re looking at a very short-term situation here. Although the Allied armies’ break-out from Normandy is regrettably overdue – by the way, are you aware of the war situation generally? How the invasion’s been stalled in recent weeks?’
‘No. In Fresnes – only rumours and propaganda. The landings began June 6th, didn’t they – that was the day before they took me out of the Morlaix hospital. And today is—’
‘July 1st. Saturday. But in a nutshell – a couple of weeks ago the weather broke. Very bad for a while – nothing could be landed, and the two artificial harbours were pretty near wrecked. The Boches meanwhile – their 7th Army, mostly – have stood firm, and in the process sustained huge losses. In contrast to which the Allies have consolidated on the ground and achieved almost total mastery of the air. So – any minute now, the breakthrough. Break-outs – the most crucial being to drive through at Caen, where the fighting’s been especially hard, by the sound of it. Then we’ll have them on the run – any day now, we’ll hear of it.’
‘What about flying bombs on England?’
‘Oh. Well – as much or little as I know – they’re firing them off mostly from the Pas-de-Calais and thereabouts – a long way out of reach of the present battle-lines. Air forces will have been doing their utmost, obviously—’
‘England’s not devastated, on the point of surrender?’
‘Surrender?’
‘The traitor I was telling you about – SOE code-name “Hector” – he told me so, in Rue des Saussaies, before the whipping started. He wanted to persuade me – no hope – tell them whatever they wanted. He said the invasion was bogged down and we were about to be driven back into the sea!’
‘He was actually present, in the Gestapo headquarters? When they had you—’
‘Came into the room where I was awaiting interrogation. The whip they were going to use on me was lying on the table. We – discussed it… Imagine. SOE agent – me – about to be whipped, and this SOE – supposedly SOE, he was our Air Movements Officer – imagine, he’s there, free, working for them!’
‘Almost – unbelievable.’
‘But a traitor’s a traitor: steps over that line, he’s over it, he’s—’
‘Garbage.’
‘He’d turned up before too – at the Morlaix hospital. Gestapo expected him to identify me – but he couldn’t, we’d never met. I only guessed who he was. They did identify me, though – from my earlier deployment, when I’d had to kill an SS officer—’
‘You had to kill—’
‘– result of which I was already under sentence of death. Soon as they realized that’s who I was – well…’
Dark eyes on hers. The silence extending until she wondered if he was only waiting for more from her: but he’d grimaced slightly, gesturing with his one and only hand… ‘Should be a death sentence on this “Hector”, I’d say.’
‘Yes. There should. My own thought, a minute ago. Been in my head in any case. Speaking of hangings from lamp-posts—’
‘What?’
‘We weren’t, were we.’ Off-beam again… ‘That was – another time.’ Another time, another place, another man. ‘But – Michel, you’re right.’
‘But how you’d get to him…’
He’d put his hand up again, to his stubbled jaw. Right hand, the nearer one. Rosie watching him in some degree of surprise at that last conjectural mutter, how you’d get to him – seemingly instant acceptance of that concept, ‘getting to him’ as a practical proposition, course of action – by her… Another gesture with that raised hand: ‘You can bet that when our lads march into Paris he won’t be there. Or many others of that stamp, I dare say. Your people would issue a warrant for him, I suppose, but –’ an eyebrow cocked – ‘Does one know anything of his background?’
‘Yes.’ Her voice was scratchy, mostly whispering. Barely her own voice at all: but the memory behind it unimpaired – surprising even to herself. ‘Name’s André Marchéval. He was a pilot, damaged his back in a plane crash – before he joined SOE. It meant he could never parachute, but he was – bilingual. University in England – father French, mother British – Scottish I think, living in Scotland now, and the father – engineering business, south of Paris.’
‘You know a lot about him.’
She’d nodded slightly.
‘How come? He tell you?’
‘No. He was – I said, coming back to London. Being picked up, so it happened, by the Lysander taking me in. This last deployment. And – at my departure briefing, the – presiding officer, might call him – a man who’s known “Hector” a long time, expressed certainty that he could not be a traitor. He said they were bringing him back only to scotch rumours – allegations by other agents in the field. Oh, and he had a story to account for all that – malice arising from “Hector” having pinched someone else’s girl. Then – big surprise, the bastard wasn’t there, at the Lysander rendezvous, and a day or two later I heard he’d been arrested – very publicly, wool over London’s eyes, it’s obvious…’
‘This presiding officer as you call him – any doubts of him?’
Of Bob Hallowell: who’d been so certain of Marchéval’s probity… Rosie picturing him in her mind. She remembered having thought he looked ill. In his forties, grey-haired, grey-faced… Staring at Michel: her own one good hand up, fingertips on the scarred cheekbone: thinking, Christ…
Feet scraped on the ladder. Thérèse. A lot of blondish hair, Rosie saw, as she came up through the hatchway – having to twist around to squeeze her wide hips through. The blanket or whatever it was she’d hung over the window at the end must have slipped off, daylight of sorts was seeping in. Thérèse had thrown down a towel and some other things; telling Michel in her Alsatian-accented French, ‘You’re making her talk too much. We want her rested, not drained. And I’m going to see to her injuries now. If this water’s still warm enough. Yes, it is. So she’s going to undress. And you, Michel – incidentally, Luc’s making a very large omelet with cheese. That ought to tempt you down. And my nephew Charles was here, Rosalie, I’ve sent him off to ask Lotte Frager to come when she can. It’s me that’s supposed to be unwell, of course. Anyway – Michel—’
‘The omelet calls.’
On his feet, stooped under the low roof, reaching as if to take Rosie’s hand but then thinking better of it. For fear of hurting her, she guessed. But he’d ducked his head, kissed Thérèse; telling her, ‘We’ll leave without bothering you again. I’ll just call up, let you know… Many thanks. As always, you come up trumps. But take care, eh? There’ll be a search, conceivably it could extend this far.’
‘Even though they must have believed they’d killed her?’
‘So where’s her body? Who’d have made off with a corpse? But there was another, too – at least, another attempted escape. Rosalie’ll tell you. When she’s stronger. And if that one did get away—’
‘You’ll be back in a few days, you think?’
‘Think – yes. After that – no idea… Rosalie—’
‘Goodbye, Michel, good luck. And thank you.’
‘For nothing. A thing happens, one reacts to it, that’s all… But listen. If you’ve no objection, I’ll have enquiries made. Marchéval – engineering business, south of Paris. Wouldn’t be more than one with that name, I’d guess. Might not go under the family name either, of course. But even then, proprietor by that name – and our man’s in the engineering business, he can put his ear to the ground. Worth a shot, eh?’
‘Could be – I suppose—’
‘You don’t see it?’
‘Well – yes, anything one knows about him—’
‘But think, girl. When it all hits the fan, isn’t his father’s place where he’s likely to show up?’