IT WAS AFTERNOON. The farmer Marquet sat on the plank seat of his old-fashioned cart, with wooden slats sloping outward at the top, filled with thick, oozy seaweed—fertilizer for his land. Years of harsh work had made him seem older than he was. But his horse, although thin like every living thing after four years of occupation, had a cared-for look.
The farmer’s home was an ancient stone house in a hamlet called La Roye, beyond the dunes in back of town. His wife was long since dead, one son had been killed in the campaign of 1940, another, Pierre, was a prisoner of war in Germany. He lived alone and the people of Nogent-Plage considered him slightly mad, because he had a habit of talking to himself. Twice each year he took the long road around the dunes to the coast for fertilizer.
His only companion was his horse whose name was Sebastian. Why Sebastian? Nobody ever found out. But between them was a bond of affection. The animal seemed to understand his lonely master’s needs. And the farmer cared more for the horse, perhaps, than anything save his land, for which he had the fierce possessiveness of the peasant. Between them they would manage to keep the soil nourished and the fields cultivated until the day when his boy would return from Germany.
Slowly the horse pulled the heavy load, up the hill, past the blockhouse, and into the village. Half a dozen young soldiers, stripped to the waist, torsos tanned, towels over their shoulders, picked their way down the cliff to the sea, carefully avoiding the mines and barbed wire. The old man watched with a passionate hatred. How much longer, he wondered, shall we have to look on these well-fed barbarians?
As the cart entered the village, the door of a house at which two sentries were stationed opened and a bespectacled officer stepped out. On his breast was a double row of campaign medals and the Iron Cross. His boots, which reached to his knees, shone in the sun. He walked briskly, shoulders back, every inch of his small frame an officer of the Wehrmacht. From the cart, the old man observed that his gaze went from right to left along the street—he missed nothing. On he moved, the Grande Rue now empty save for a few soldiers at the far end.
As the farmer watched he heard a sudden report, like a shot from a hunting rifle, not loud like an army-weapon, being fired. At first he was not sure what had happened. To his amazement, one moment the officer was striding down the street, then he was stretched out on the pavement. As he crumpled, one arm fell behind in a peculiar gesture.
A siren went off. Soldiers rushed from a house, rifles at the ready. A tall, black-haired sergeant ran into the street as the siren kept screaming.
All around, soldiers appeared. By this time the farmer Marquet was near enough to see blood on the spotless tunic of the officer who lay, legs outstretched, on the pavement. Two medical corpsmen opened his blouse and listened to his heart.
The tall, black-haired man in charge was exploding orders, pointing first to one side of the street, then the other. A group of soldiers began working the left side. If the door of a house was locked, they pounded it in with rifle butts. From windows on the second floor, shutters opened and frightened faces of women appeared. The same words echoed back and forth.
“Pas possible!”
“Pas possible!”
Who could have done such a thing? “Impossible! And here in Nogent-Plage!”
Suddenly the farmer Marquet’s horse was stopped, and he was yanked roughly to the ground. Two helmeted young soldiers gripped him, two others searched him, but to his surprise did not ask for his Ausweiss. They merely hustled him across the road.
He tried to protest. “Voila, I only happened to be in town for the moment. I came in from my farm at La Roye for a load of seaweed, for fertilizer. M’ssieurs... for my land. I live... over there... back of the dunes....”
Not understanding what he was saying and not caring, they pushed him along. Quite plainly they were taking him someplace. A strange and terrible fear seized him, not for himself but for his horse. The horse was being left behind, his only friend, all he had. The beast realized his master was leaving him and whinnied loudly. Then the farmer heard that familiar clop-clop as the horse attempted to follow.
“Sebastian! Sebastian!” he shouted, twisting halfway around in the grip of the soldiers.
The horse, pulling the heavy cart, fell farther and farther behind, the reins dragging on the pavement.
“Sebastian!” shrieked the farmer, realizing what was happening and where, in all probability, he was being taken. In utter despair he cried out, “Ah, who will take care of Sebastian when I am gone?”