A hundred and forty kilometres, ninety-two-and-a-half miles: the figures clicking around in her head as she rode, encouraging herself with optimistic estimates of distance covered but having to make a couple of rather chancy detours to avoid the worst blockages of slow-rolling or actually stalled Wehrmacht transport. Those were in the first few hours out of Rouen – Louviers for instance, which she remembered from the day before as particularly bloody, and around Vernon, beyond which for a longish stretch she was blinded by the sun still low and in her eyes – and reluctantly accepting that rather than 92 miles it was going to end up as 100 at the very least. With, from time to time, rumbles of gunfire, she guessed at no great distance. Apart from that it was like a re-run of yesterday – could have been the same trucks, same exhausted-looking soldiery staring out grimly over their tailboards. Maybe grimmer, closer to the reality of their situation, fewer of the shouts and offensive gestures. She’d started out soon after first light, actually within minutes of curfew lifting – as advised by Ursule, who’d been up at cockcrow in her purple dressing-gown to provide a breakfast of porridge, ersatz coffee and an apple; she’d also sold her half of a large cabbage and a chicken – by no means cheaply, but that didn’t matter, as she had plenty of SOE money in the lining of her suitcase; it was a scrawny old bird that might have died of old age and/or starvation. She had those and her water bottle in the panier on the handlebars, wrapped in old copies of Le Matin and the more overtly collab paper Aujourdhui, which Ursule told her had ceased publication – as had several of the weekly rags including Au Pilori, Signal, Je Suis Partout and all those other filthy tracts with their savage anti-Jewish and anti-Gaullist diatribes. It was heartening to think of all those proprietors and editors on the run, vanishing (or hoping to) into the paysage – or the sewers, which might well be their rightful home. These week-old copies, though, she’d have had with her when she’d left Paris to forage in the countryside for sustenance for her little girl and the old woman, whom she’d left half-starving in some rented hovel in Montmartre. There was a café there, the Chien Bleu, which was where she had to meet her FFI contact, Georges Dénault, who had red hair and a limp and worked in the ticket office at the Gare de l’Est. It made sense to plant the child and its grandmother in that same district; until she got there they – and the chicken – would be her cover, notionally. And once she had got there, she’d be scouring the streets for them. It was an uncomplicated, believable and reasonably flexible cover story.
A third diversion pushed her into more of a detour than she’d expected. By way of Beynes, and southward then it seemed interminably, over a railway crossing to a place called Le Pontel where at last she was able to turn east again. At the intersection where she’d been forced to divert southward, Boche tanks had been deploying on both sides across the hayfields. If one had had a transceiver – and of course a battery for it, which travelling by bike one would not have had – might have stopped in some copse or ditch and told someone about it. Anyway… all of 10 or 12 kilometres to cover before getting to Le Pontel, which when she got there she found was yet another interlocked confusion of Boche transport – in which she had the best of reasons not to get held up, one being the strong possibility of air attack: and very much as she had at one stage yesterday she found another way out, a minor road leading – again – more or less east. This had turned out to be another wide detour though: as she began to appreciate when after another dozen or so kilometres she found herself passing St Cyr, not far short of Versailles. Needing, if she was going to make it into Paris by way of the Porte d’Auteuil, to head up northeastward – making more for St Cloud than for Sèvres. Anything to the left, therefore… Reason for entering via Porte d’Auteuil being that it would bring her in close to the Bois de Boulogne and the 16th Arrondissement, in which Jacqueline’s flat according to Estelle was in a cul-de-sac off Rue de Passy. She had a name for the house but no number, and there’d be 2 or 3 kilometres of road to search unless she struck lucky early on. The name of the house was Le Clos de Fretay, which sounded fairly grand. If the route she had in mind worked out – she’d studied it on the map by candlelight at Ursule’s this morning, a map published recently by the War Office and based on a pre-war street guide – she’d be starting at the top end anyway: Porte d’Auteuil, then Boulevard Suchet all the way to the Ranelagh Gardens, and from there due south. Should then be near enough on target. Intention being only to locate the house so as to be able to go straight to it later – tomorrow, early. Secure one’s base first – primarily, find the Chien Bleu in Montmartre and get in touch with Georges Dénault, Hyatt’s FFI man, and find some lodging – possibly that same pub. Pinpoint Jacqui and Clausen first, anyway, then to Montmartre – 7 kilometres as the crow flew, say perhaps 10 by bike.
And thereafter use the Metro? As long as it was running. Willoughby had said the last they’d heard was that on most lines there was a train about every 15 minutes when the power was on, on which you had to take your chances: an example of which was that the few theatres still open were using candles on stage, and cinemas had all shut. Re lack of Metro, though, in terms of the days ahead, to bicycle 5–10 miles when one had not covered 100 miles since dawn mightn’t be so terrible.
Think about that in the morning anyway. Having been stiff enough this morning. Mightn’t be able to bloody move.
After circling Versailles, she set a course north-eastward: facing about an hour of that. Thinking in terms of setting courses derived naturally from Ben, and brought him back to mind: not that he was ever far out of it. Wondering again what the rescue mission might be, in Norway; and how they’d let him, semi-crippled as he still was, go back to sea on anything, anywhere, in any capacity at all. Needing a stick just to get along a London pavement, how could he get around a motor gunboat crossing the Norwegian Sea?
I’m not dead, Ben. Won’t get to be, either, if I can help it. Mind you come back in one piece, you bastard!
(Epithet justified by a vision of the Stack woman also awaiting his return.)
Through lack of concentration towards the end of that hour she almost missed a further course-alteration to the right which would surely have brought her to the Porte St Cloud. Telling herself that she wanted Auteuil, not St Cloud; but seconds later – at the last moment – realising that would be the best way and swinging off too late, entering the turnoff pretty well in the middle of the road, even somewhat over on the left, having then to dodge back across a lot of horn-blowing and waving fists, probably screams of rage. It paid off anyway – a kilometre ahead, no more, she was coming to the great river and to a bridge. Pont St Cloud? Go left there, then: over the bridge and—
Damn. Control point. Poles on trestles, and Schutzpolizei stopping vehicles. All right, didn’t matter – thanks to her papers and the chicken. Which she’d noticed was beginning to smell a bit. Then as she got nearer she saw they weren’t stopping bicycles. Perhaps because they were all Schutzpolizei, had none of the usual back-up of gendarmes and were thus short-handed. She looked questioningly at one of them as she passed close to him, letting him see she’d be quite happy to stop and show her papers if he wanted her to. He didn’t, anyway; and she rode on through – then did have to stop, waiting to turn left; after which the river was on her left, and with this bit of the map in mind knowing that ahead of her was Longchamp and the Bois de Boulogne. Longchamp being on the great park’s western side. A kilometre or maybe two. Paris in front of her and the sun a glow of heat up there on her right. Chicken warm to the hand, inside its wrapping of newsprint. Traffic surprisingly thin here. Plugging on and keeping her mind on what mattered now – not making any more daft mistakes. Reminding herself that after passing Longchamp and turning left from Porte d’Auteuil, the steeplechase course would be about 3 kilometres ahead – eastern side of the Bois, so that by turning on to the Boulevard Suchet she’d then have it on her left all the way to Porte de Passy. Then right-handed, for a change – leaving Suchet, turning down into the Ranelagh Gardens, eastward down through the middle of them…
Getting towards 5 o’clock. Had been on the road therefore for 12 hours. Felt like it too. Pedalling slowly now, looking for culs-de-sac. Rue de Passy houses tended to be set well back from the road. As yet, though, not even one cul-de-sac. Several intersections and side-roads leading off at various angles.
There…
She’d passed it. High-walled and with tall double gates at the end of it, one of them standing open, the house creeper-covered and also tall, behind some kind of monument – statues, she thought, but had gone too far, had only caught a glimpse of it and was having to wait now to let a gazo van pass. Then, U-turn. Grey ivy-covered wall, and a thicket of trees on its other side, right up to the corner of the cul-de-sac into which she rode slowly. Looking for but not seeing any house name. On this one gate half of a coat of arms was visible, surmounted by half a coronet: the other halves of both were on the part that was open.
Dilemma: whether to accept that this was the house – so turn back out into the road and ride on, next point of aim Montmartre – or to nose around a bit, make sure.
The open gate inclined one to take a closer look.
Fine house. Light grey stone facade, beautifully proportioned windows, attractive wrought-iron balconies, slate roof with a graceful curve in it. A number of enormous chimneys. At ground level here, balustraded steps under an ornate porte-cochère leading up to double doors – what looked like mahogany. She was inside the gates by this time, still on the bike but stopped with one foot down on the gravel, seeing that the driveway encircled an area of grass with an ornamental pond and fountain which if it had been running would have been sluicing down on three nude stone girls grouped with their backs to it, arms linked and breasts uplifted.
If the fountain had been running, might have been tempted to join them.
Hold on, though. Beyond and to the right of that group – a dark grey Citroën Light Fifteen, close to the right-hand front corner of the house. The kind of Citroën that had always been Gestapo officers’ favoured form of transport. That colour, too, as often as not – grey or black. She’d seen quite a few of them in recent years, and if she’d spotted it sooner wouldn’t have come this far in.
So drift off. Unhurriedly but wasting no time. It would be Clausen’s, obviously; he must have come home early. He was SD, not Gestapo, but that made no difference; Gestapo and SD worked hand in glove, and it was the Gestapo chief Boemelbourg who’d delegated to Clausen the interrogation of those prisoners.
As soon as she’d seen the car she’d dismounted, was on the point of dragging her bike around in order to remount and take off – job done, this was the love-nest all right – when a voice called, ‘Allow me to drive out first, mam’selle?’
She’d looked round, startled. Gratingly high voice from a tall and – at first sight and at that distance of 15–20 yards – perhaps rather good-looking man. Fashionably cut light grey suit, trilby hat. Tall, wide-shouldered. But that awful voice… He was on the steps, descending slowly, watching her as she obligingly slanted across to the side of the drive that was blocked by the closed half of the gate, where she’d be out of his car’s way. Not that he was exactly hurrying to get into it – whoever the hell he was. He certainly thought he was something, was her impression. But two other men had got out of the car – must have been sitting there all this time, watching her. She’d seen enough of them in one glance to feel uncomfortable: they were thugs, bodyguards or somesuch.
The high voice again: ‘Have you come to the wrong address, perhaps? Can I direct you?’
‘No – thank you—’
‘What are you doing here?’
Challenging, even threatening expression. Definitely was French. Some Boches spoke the language well, but usually with some of the dregs of their own harshness in it. This one’s accent in fact was brashly Parisian, working-class. He certainly wasn’t hurrying to the car. The others were waiting beside it but he was approaching her.
‘Well?’
A Milice colonel, or somesuch? But he – they – would surely have been in uniform…
She shrugged. ‘Only visiting. Is there some reason for your interest, m’sieur?’
Whatever authority he carried or thought he carried, it was better to seem aloof than nervous or too respectful. On the other hand her own accent was definitely not working-class, and one didn’t want to seem over-conscious of that difference. The other two – one at the front of the car, the other holding a rear door open – were more roughly dressed and had coarser features. Both wore leather jackets. The high-voiced one had glanced round at them, now looked back at her. A smile: ‘Don’t worry, they won’t hurt you.’ He laughed – presumably at that would-be reassuring statement – like a dog-owner whose animals did frighten people at first sight. Then: ‘Visiting, you say?’
‘Yes. If it concerns you – looking for a friend who I believe lives here.’
‘Name of?’
‘Well.’ Instinct told her that it was actually important not to seem scared. Very much like facing untrustworthy dogs. She shook her head: ‘It need really be no concern of yours, m’sieur.’
‘Name of this friend?’
That had been a threat. A shout, and higher-pitched than before. Reminiscent of interrogations in quite different circumstances and surroundings; and it would be natural now to show – confusion, at least. Shaking her head again, bewildered: telling him with a quick glance at those others – who were alert now, if they’d been dogs they’d have been growling – ‘As you’re so insistent, m’sieur – it happens I’m looking for Mademoiselle Jacqueline Clermont. Who I’m sure you wouldn’t—’
‘I know her very well. And of course, if she’s a friend of yours – what’s your name?’
‘Jeanne-Marie Lefèvre. But is she—’
‘Up there.’ A gesture towards the upper part of the house, as he came right up to her. He’d been closing in towards her all this time. She didn’t like his face – rather long, pointed nose, small round eyes… Telling her, ‘Up two flights and there’s a bell-push.’ He put his hand out: she tried to touch it only lightly, but it closed on hers. ‘If you’re a friend of Jacqui’s – well…’ Smiling – his manner altogether softer, an implication of ‘then you’re a friend of mine.’ Asking her as she got her hand back, ‘Have you come far on that thing?’ A slightly humorous enquiry, perhaps faintly contemptuous, but with none of the previous bullying tone. And looking at her mouth – as men tended to. Damn him. She told him – giving him the story she had ready for Clausen – ‘From Nantes, to start with, and from there to Dijon, where some people I’ve been looking for might have gone, but hadn’t, so now it’s Paris.’
‘No difficulty getting here from Dijon? No military interference?’
‘Not really.’ Pausing, as if wondering why she was answering his questions. She shrugged: ‘In fact to come by this route I found my way round by way of Fontainebleau and – oh, Sèvres, then Porte St Cloud.’
‘Just like that. With the Americans as close as Rambouillet. Did you know?’
‘A truck-driver did warn me. Well – Rambouillet, no, I didn’t. I suppose that is close.’ Shake of the head: ‘Certainly I didn’t see any.’
‘But you got lifts along the way?’
‘Only that one – from Fontainebleau to Fresnes.’
‘Fresnes, huh?’
Where the prison was. Run by the Gestapo. She’d been an inmate not long ago. Looking now – she hoped – as if it meant nothing to her, Fresnes only a place she’d come through and which the truck-driver might have named. She was aware that this creature still hadn’t bothered to tell her who he was. Ask Jacqui – ask her, ‘Who’s that schizophrenic hanging around down there?’ A thought then – that he might be, that the other two might be not his bodyguards but his keepers. He’d been stooping over her, crane-like, during this exchange, but straightened now, checking the time.
‘We’ll meet again, perhaps. Jacqui won’t put you up, you know.’ Looking at her tatty suitcase on the carrier: having already given the old raincoat the once-over. ‘Do you have somewhere to stay in Paris?’
‘Yes. In Vincennes.’
‘Better hurry, then. If you want to be off the streets before curfew – which I’d advise.’
‘May I ask who you are, m’sieur?’
‘Oh, just a friend of Gerhardt Clausen. And thus also of Jacqui’s, naturally.’ A hand to his hat: ‘A pleasure meeting you – mam’selle.’
She wasn’t going anywhere near Vincennes. Had thought of it as a possibility during the Fawley briefing, through remembering two middle-aged ladies, sisters, whom she’d met on a train arriving in Paris a year ago, after landing in Brittany from Ben’s gunboat. Having elicited that she was a stranger in the capital they’d very kindly offered her a bed for the night and added after she’d made excuses, ‘Well – any time’, giving her their address and surname – which she’d kept in mind, thinking it might one day come in useful, and that it mightn’t be a bad idea to lodge with people who had no contact with anything illicit. But Vincennes was definitely too far out from the centre, especially if one couldn’t count on the Metro running.
She’d have to call on Jacqui now, though – since that man would most likely mention to her (and Clausen) that he’d met her. To have been here and not called in on her old friend, after coming so far out of her way to do so – well, Jacqui was no fool, and Clausen had to be fairly sharp. Brief call, therefore – make contact, break ice (if any) and arrange later meeting.
Not much later. Thinking of Léonie, as she settled the strap of Léonie’s bag more comfortably over her shoulder. She’d chained her bike to the iron balustrade under the porte cochère and taken her suitcase off it, to bring that up with her too. The chicken could take its chances. The Citroën had driven out – fast – its leather-jacketed driver either needing to make up time or showing off.
As either of those two might. That stupid look: brutes with the mental age of children. Tyres spurting in gravel would appeal to them. While as for the tall one…
Friend of Jacqui’s?
Very spacious hallway, marble-tiled and with small stained-glass windows that didn’t let much light in; beamed ceiling and wide central staircase. Climbing it, she wondered whether that one’s business was actually with Jacqui or with Clausen. Logic suggested the latter, but with no other car out there, Clausen presumably not at home…
Climbing: and feeling it in her legs. Two whole bloody days’ cycling – on top of a lot else, in recent weeks and months. At Fawley Court one hadn’t really foreseen the extent of it, with so much else to think about, as there had been. And in any case, really no alternative; plus the fact that on previous deployments one had made even longer trips.
The landing on the second floor wasn’t carpeted or furnished as the one below was. There was only a pile of empty wine-boxes near the top of the stairs, no doubt put there to be collected. ‘Saumur’, she saw stencilled on one box, and ‘Graves’ on another. The door from the landing to the flat was of plain, new-looking wood. On closer inspection, oak: and definitely new, with that sawdust smell.
Pressing the bell, she heard it ring – faintly, as at some considerable distance – and then no other sound. Jacqui did have to be in there, though; the man with the high voice would have had no reason to say she was if she wasn’t.
Might be in the bathroom – following his visit?
Nasty mind, Rosie.
But something stank, with that one. Merely to have that type of car – and manner.
Female voice, thin through the timber of the door: ‘Who is it?’
‘Jacqui?’
‘Who—’
‘Remember Jeanne-Marie Lefèvre?’
No answer. She tried again, after a pause: ‘Or someone called Rosalie?’
A bolt was withdrawn; then maybe another. A year ago she’d given Jacqui her own real name, Rosalie, as a password to be used by any other agent calling to pick up whatever intelligence Jacqui might have gleaned from pillow-talk in Amiens. A key turned, finally, and the door opened by about six inches, coming up against a chain.
‘Jacqui.’
‘I really will be damned…’
‘May I come in?’
‘Not stay long – unless you want to meet Gerhardt again?’
‘I can’t stay long.’ The chain was off and she was in. ‘Would he remember me, d’you think?’
‘Don’t know. But he has a good memory. And you haven’t changed at all, Rosalie.’
‘Haven’t I, indeed? Certainly you haven’t.’ Smiling at her darkly Mediterranean good looks. Her mother had been (or was) Italian. Lovely figure – in a green summer dress that hadn’t been designed to hide it; longish dark hair swept back, marvellous eyes and beautiful skin. ‘As ravishing as ever. Incidentally, though, I’m Jeanne-Marie, not Rosalie. Truly, Jacqui, you’re sensational.’ Susceptible to flattery too, she remembered. The door was already shut again, locked and bolted, Rosie asking her, ‘Is all that really necessary, even in the sixteenth Arrondissement?’
‘Anywhere, one needs to take precautions. Do you know there’ve been killings on the streets every day this week? I’m sure you would know. Unless – tell me where you’ve sprung from?’
‘You can guess, I’m sure.’
‘London, again?’
A movement of the head: neither affirmation nor denial. Asking her, ‘Colleagues of mine did visit you after I’d left, didn’t they?’
‘One did – three, four times. But then Hans was recalled to Germany. You must know all about that too, surely. I ceased to be of use to you at that point – uh?’
‘Actually I wouldn’t know, I was elsewhere by then – in fact from the day after I last saw you. Did – he, you know, the one I met—’
‘Gerhardt?’
‘Did he ever question you about me?’
‘Not that I recall. One knew that you might be back – selling your cousin’s perfume, all that… What are you here for now? How did you find me, anyway?’
‘One other question first: did you say anything to Gerhardt about Pierre Cazalet being my cousin, or that I worked for him?’
‘I’m sure not. As I said, you weren’t really a subject of conversation. Nor would Cazalet have been. We had only two days before Gerhardt was leaving for Berlin, you know.’
‘You had other preoccupations. May I sit down?’
‘Please. But if he comes—’
‘I’ve come a long way on a bicycle and my legs are – hell.’ Leaning forward, massaging them. ‘I’ve some distance to go yet, too, really do need to push on. If he does come, Jacqui, my story is that I’m in Paris to find my little girl. Remember, I’m a widow? I’d left the child with its grandmother and I believe they’re now in Paris, so—’
‘Why truly are you here?’
‘Well – Jacqui, do you still consider yourself as being on our payroll?’
‘Your – payroll?’
‘It was quite a large sum of money I gave you. Neither your fault nor ours that Walther was recalled, but—’
‘Haven’t had your money’s worth yet?’
‘Another part of the deal was that when the chips were down we’d confirm you’d been working for us, were not the collaborationist a lot of people would otherwise take you for.’
‘People like me, behind our backs they’re calling us horizontales now.’
‘I was going to say, what in fact they must still take you for, Jacqui. And soon not muttering it behind your back – screaming it in your face.’ She nodded towards the door: ‘Which naturally enough you’ve thought about – hence the new door, eh? Listen, you asked how did I know where to find you – but you know we have ways and means. Found you here as easily as I found you in Rouen. But for Gerhardt that answer plainly wouldn’t do, so – oh, let him think I got the address from your salon?’
‘From whom exactly?’
‘Well – whoever you’ve got working for you there.’
‘I have a manager, a Portuguese boy—’
‘He’ll do. I telephoned and asked for you, you were in Paris he said, and I got the address and a telephone number out of him.’ She added, ‘Best to say I tried the telephone but couldn’t get through.’
‘You’d have had a job persuading him. I gave very clear instructions—’
‘I convinced him it was to save your life. Which in fact may not be far off the truth. Will you meet me tomorrow?’
‘Tomorrow. Saturday. I don’t know—’
‘Jacqui – it could be only a matter of days before Paris blows up in our faces. In your case, if you’re still here you know what that could mean. They won’t only be calling you names, Jacqui.’
‘You’re proposing, then—’
‘Offering you protection. I’ve no money for you this time, but if you help me we’ll stand by you. Gerhardt will be on his way home to Berlin before the Allies arrive, won’t he?’
‘I—’ Looking down at her clasped hands. She’d coloured – darkened – slightly. ‘I don’t know. It’s real between him and me, you know. The real thing, as they call it?’
‘I’m glad for you. Fact remains, you’ll be on your own then, with a million résistants out there baying for collabo blood. And in Rouen the same. Jacqui – no misunderstanding now: what I’m promising is that if you help me, we’ll stand by you. As I promised before – remember? But that is an absolute condition.’
‘Help you in what way?’
‘Go into that tomorrow – with more time. Look – shall we meet for lunch? Where? I have to come all the way from Vincennes, so—’
‘Right here would be safer than any restaurant – for the sake of privacy as well as – all that other… Besides, I know quite a lot of people here now, French and German, and if Gerhardt heard of it – since I wouldn’t have told him I was meeting anyone—’
‘Like the one with the squeaky voice?’
‘What?’
‘I met him down there. He’d been visiting you – told me so. My only concern is that if I came here and he happened to blow in, then we couldn’t talk – and time’s crucial, I can’t waste it.’
‘You may be jumping to a wrong conclusion. He’s chasing me, I don’t even like him. I should tell Gerhardt, I suppose, but—’
‘Tomorrow, Jacqui, I’ll be all ears. See, if we met at a restaurant or café we might have just bumped into each other in the street. Then you could tell him I’m here, your old friend, and it’s above board if we need to meet after that – here, or anywhere. But tomorrow, Jacqui, say twelve-thirty – where?’
‘Ile de la Cité – know where that is?’
‘Just about. Does Gerhardt work on Saturdays, by the way?’
‘He does indeed. Nights are about all we have together. Not always them, even. But listen – the western end of Ile de la Cité – cross by the Pont Neuf – there’s a restaurant called Paul. Twelve-thirty? Let’s hope they have something we can eat, there’s not much in Paris now. Do you have a telephone at Vincennes – if I had to put you off or—’
‘No. Just don’t. If you want help from us, Jacqui—’
‘Well – just one thing to bear in mind, please. I won’t do the dirty on Gerhardt – ever!’
‘Nobody’s asking you to.’ She was on her feet. ‘May I use your bathroom?’