Resistance

by Christopher Nicole

  Resistance

  Christopher Nicole

  © Alan Savage 2003

  Christopher Nicole has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 2003 by Severn House Publishers Ltd.

  This Edition Published in 2018 by Endeavour Media Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Part One

  One

  Two

  Three

  Part Two

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Part Three

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Part One

  End of an Era

  ‘The grim wolf with privy paws daily devours apace.’

  John Milton

  One

  Happy Days

  ‘There,’ Captain Harry Watson said. ‘See what I mean, James?’

  Captain James Barron bent over the table and studied the photograph. ‘A lot of vehicles,’ he commented. ‘Could be tanks. Certainly motorized infantry.’

  ‘Well, sir?’ Watson turned to Colonel Barrett.

  ‘We know they’re there,’ Barrett pointed out. A short, heavy-set man who wore a moustache, he was inclined to bristle. ‘We have known they were there since Christmas.’

  ‘Yes, sir. The point I am making is that three days ago they were there, about twenty miles further back.’ Watson was thin and pallid: James sometimes wondered about his health. But he was always prepared to argue his point. Now he prodded another photograph, and then indicated the relative area on the map underneath. ‘Now they have moved, twenty miles nearer the border. And their place has been taken by another armoured division. Look here, sir.’ He offered a magnifying glass. ‘Those are tanks. That is a panzer division.’

  Barrett studied the photo. ‘You could be right. They are obviously expecting an attack.’

  Watson looked over his superior’s head at James, eyebrows arched, clearly seeking support. James was prepared to give it, but he was anxious to have the meeting close: he had more important things on his mind than odd German troop movements. A big, ruggedly good-looking man, who had played rugby for the army and come close to an England trial, he had thoroughly enjoyed being seconded from his regiment to the staff, if only because it had removed him from the boring business of maintaining the health and morale of his men while they had had absolutely nothing to do save change guard and square bash, as they had done for the last eight months, ever since landing in France in October 1939. That he was now serving in Military Intelligence he regarded as a justifiable tribute to his own intelligence. But he had resolved, last September, that he was not going to allow the war to interfere with his enjoyment of life, and right now that enjoyment was centred on Madeleine de Gruchy. So he contented himself with saying, ‘Perhaps his lordship might be interested.’

  ‘I’m sure Lord Gort has more important things to do than look at odd photographs,’ Barrett remarked. ‘These are not even of our section of the front. The Ardennes! Ha!’

  ‘Then you entirely discount their importance, sir.’ Watson was not about to give up.

  ‘I discount their importance to us. If you wish to send them along to General Billotte, by all means do so. But I imagine he has his own aircraft taking snaps.’

  ‘You do not consider that this steady build-up of enemy forces suggests that they are going to attack us?’

  ‘I consider that to be highly unlikely at this time, or in the immediate future. I will tell you why. Captain. Firstly, Hitler is fully committed in Norway. No sane soldier is going to fight two campaigns at the same time. Secondly, I don’t believe he intends to attack here in the West at all. He is looking for a negotiated peace. He has made this quite clear. The fact is, he dare not attack us. He’s got himself up against the best and strongest army in Europe, probably the world. The French have ninety-nine divisions. Add in their garrison troops and we’re talking about five million men. Add us in, and you have twenty-six more divisions, getting on for another million men. That is six million troops under arms, Harry. What has Hitler got? A hundred and three divisions, maybe three and a half million men, but quite a few of those are in Norway or on his eastern front. The French have two and a half thousand tanks; we have more than a thousand. Hitler has maybe the same. No superiority. The Freneh have eleven thousand guns; we have two and a half thousand. Hitler has seven thousand. The French have more than two and a half thousand planes; we have nearly two thousand. Hitler has about four thousand. Again, no superiority there. I won’t talk about the fleet strengths. Hitler doesn’t have a fleet. Facts are facts, laddie. And Hitler can understand facts as well as the next man. He thought our declaration of war was a face-saving device and that we’d accept the fait accompli after the fall of Poland. Now all he can do is make a loud noise and pray for us to climb down.’

  ‘That chap who came down in Belgium in January...’

  ‘When a German staff officer happens to crash land in a country supposed to be a target, carrying a complete set of plans for the invasion of that country, it has to be a plant. And that proves my point. Those captured plans clearly stated 17 January as the date of the attack in the West. Here we are, 9 May, and hardly a shot fired.’

  ‘You don’t think the attack was postponed, and maybe the plans altered, just because those original plans were captured?’

  ‘It doesn’t take five months to redraw a set of plans. No. No, that little escapade was an attempt to make us think we’re going to be attacked.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Watson said doubtfully.

  ‘And even if he did mean to attack, this apparent build-up of forces behind the Ardennes... My dear Harry, no one in his right mind would attempt to invade France through the Ardennes. It simply is not tactically possible to wage modern war in such wooded and uneven country. Send these photos along to Billotte and let us get on with our job.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Ah...’ James ventured. ‘If there is to be no war this weekend, sir, may I have it off? The weekend, I mean.’

  ‘You are not due for Blighty leave.’

  ‘I am not going home, sir. Just as far as Chartres. If I left this afternoon, I’d be back on Monday.’

  ‘Today is Thursday. If you wish the weekend off, you should leave tomorrow.’

  ‘Yes, sir. But you see, the wedding is tomorrow.’

  ‘Whose wedding? Not yours, I hope?’

  ‘No, sir. I’m a guest.’

  ‘These are English people?’

  ‘No, sir. They are French.’

  ‘And they’re friends of yours? From before the war, you mean?’

  ‘No, sir. I met them — well, her, the last time I was in Paris. At Christmas.’

  ‘Good heavens! Are you speaking of the bride?’

  ‘Her sister, sir.’

  ‘Hm. Well, you can have three days off, starting now. But I want you back here by Sunday night. Now, I have a lunch engagement. Good morning, gentlemen.’

  The door closed. ‘Only a madman would do this, only a madman would do that,’ Watson remarked. ‘I thought it was pretty well established that Hitler is mad. And if all he wants is peace, why did he start this show in the first place?’

  ‘The old man has a point about our numerical superiority,’ James suggested.

  ‘Oh, he had the facts and figures, but not the reality. We may have nearly two thousand planes, but only a quarter of them are in France. And we have only a couple of hundred tanks over here. Anyway, numerical superiority is meaningless. It’s morale and leadership that counts. Didn’t Alexander the Great beat the Persians at Arbela when outnumbered by more than three to one?’

  ‘You’re
not suggesting that Hitler is an Alexander the Great?’

  ‘I’m suggesting that we’re going to look a right set of fools if we sit back and take no notice and it turns out that he is.’

  ‘Well, I’m not going to worry about it until Sunday night. I have to move. There’s transport to the station in an hour.’

  ‘What’s this girl’s name?’

  ‘Madeleine de Gruchy.’

  ‘Sounds up-market.’

  ‘Very. So is she.’

  ‘And you met her in Paris, at Christmas. That’s damn near five months ago. You must have had an effect if she remembers you well enough to send you an invite to her sister’s wedding, five months later.’

  ‘Oh, she said she was going to. And she sent it two months ago. It just got misdirected, so I only received it this morning.’

  ‘Any sisters? Apart from the one getting married?’

  ‘I think there’s another one.’

  ‘Hm. And when you say up-market...?’

  ‘Wine. You must have heard of Gruchy wine. They own half of the claret country.’

  ‘But they live in Chartres?’

  ‘They have houses all over the show. Even one in England. And apparently getting married in Chartres is a family tradition. There’s a whacking great cathedral.’

  ‘Well, tell them that you have a devoted friend.’

  James grinned. ‘Do you want the bad news, or the good news?’

  ‘Oh, the good news.’

  ‘I’ll mention your name.’

  ‘And the bad?’

  ‘The third sister, the one who is not getting married, is the oldest.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘We’re talking about thirty plus.’

  ‘Ah.’ Watson was twenty-three. ‘I thought, in these aristocratic continental families, any chap who goes knocking has to take the daughters in strict order of seniority.’

  ‘This appears to be a liberated aristocratic family.’

  ‘Still strange that the eldest shouldn’t be married. Or is she the ugly one?’

  ‘I have absolutely no idea,’ James said. ‘I’ll tell you on Sunday night.’

  To reach Chartres James had to change trains in Paris. The last time he had made the journey to the capital, in December, it had been an exhilarating experience, certainly for an officer in British uniform. If most people even then had seemed to hold the same opinion as Barrett, that Hitler wasn’t coming for a while, if at all, they all appeared happy to see one of their allies in their midst.

  But this time he begrudged every moment of the journey, and not only because he had to wait half an hour for his train. This time there were no smiles, and even, he felt, some derogatory remarks; he didn’t know enough French to be sure. But he was seriously concerned when, while he sat on his platform waiting for the train, a company of poilits arrived to wait for their train, and were booed by the other waiting people. ‘Is that a punishment company?’ he asked the stationmaster, who he had discovered spoke English when he had asked for directions and train times.

  ‘No, no, Captain. They are off to the front.’

  ‘And for that they are being booed?’

  ‘Well, they are going to fight. Who wants to fight? Why should we fight? We fought the last time, and where did it get us? A million dead. A million widows. Several million orphans. Would it not be better to let the Germans get on with it?’

  ‘Because then Hitler would take over Europe.’

  ‘What can Hitler do to us that can be worse than a million dead? Do you want to light, Captain?’

  ‘It happens to be my profession.’

  ‘Yes,’ the stationmaster said grimly, and wandered off.

  As an officer in Military Intelligence, James felt he had to make a mental note of what he had seen and heard. Not, he supposed, that Barrett would be any more interested in French morale, or the absence of it, than he was in German troop movements.

  *

  At least the weather was fine, but apart from the attitude of the people — James could not imagine English soldiers being booed on Waterloo Station — Paris contained too many memories, which in turn contained too many uncertainties.

  He was no longer absolutely certain what Madeleine de Gruchy looked like. On pre-Christmas leave in the most exciting city in the world, he had felt utterly lonely as he was surrounded by people enjoying themselves with the hysterical awareness that they were trembling on the brink of an abyss. His sense of isolation had been heightened by his awareness that when the abyss opened, if these people were to find themselves tumbling in — in the event of a German victory, for instance — he would no doubt find himself on a ship back to the safety and sanity of England. Certainly neither his mother and father, nor his two sisters, would be at any risk.

  In desperation he had attended a tea dance being held at the embassy, and found himself chatting, and then dancing, with the most entrancing woman he had ever met — not that in the hectic seven years since he had left Sandhurst, both soldiering and playing rugby, there had been a lot of time for meeting women, apart from his sisters’ friends, and they had all been too much of the china doll variety to interest a romantic brought up on such classics as Beau Geste and Captain Blood.

  Madeleine de Gruchy had suggested a comparable amount of spirit, in her flashing eyes, her athletic movements. About five feet six he estimated, slim without being thin, with upswept dark hair, her features had been handsome rather than beautiful, but were dominated by her utterly delightful smile, as if she could switch on a brilliantly lighted bulb in her brain. She wore a printed brown calf-length georgette dress, fronted by a huge floppy bow on her bodice, matching court shoes and small hat, and grey gloves.

  As usual with him as regards women, he had got off to a bad start. ‘Is this a duty, or a pleasure?’ he had asked when they had been introduced.

  She had considered for a few moments, perhaps trying to decipher his French, before replying, in perfect English, ‘Why should it be a duty?’

  ‘I would have thought you would have more interesting things to do than entertaining British officers.’

  By then he had been holding her quite close as they danced, inhaling her scent, and when she had turned her head to look into his eyes their noses had almost touched. ‘Do you not find yourself interesting?’

  It was time to start again, even more disastrously. ‘What I meant was, how did the embassy get hold of you?’ He had looked around the room at the other well-dressed and attractive young women. ‘All of you.’

  ‘Do you suppose they dragged us in off the street? Or raided a few brothels?’

  Her directness as well as her use of a word not considered polite in mixed company in England made him feel at once foolish and excited. ‘Of course not. I...’

  ‘My father and your ambassador are friends. I cannot say the same for all the girls here, but most of them are friends of mine. Yes. I suppose it is a duty. But it is a pleasure also, to entertain the officers of our gallant allies.’

  Was she being sarcastic? ‘I owe you an apology.’

  ‘And I accept your apology.’

  At which moment the music had stopped. ‘Will you have a glass of champagne?’

  ‘Thank you.’

  He waylaid a passing waiter, and they seated themselves. Then he tried to regroup. ‘If my history is correct, Napoleon had a marshal named de Grouchy.’

  She sipped. ‘There are some who say he cost us the Battle of Waterloo by blindly pursuing the Prussians instead of marching to the sound of the guns.’

  ‘He was obeying orders, with which, perhaps, he did not agree. That can be the hardest part of soldiering, for an officer.’ She had given another sharp turn of her head, as if she had not expected him to have considered his profession so deeply. ‘Would he have been an ancestor?’ he asked.

  ‘We spell ours without the O. My family has always dealt in wine rather than bullets.’

  ‘Claret or burgundy?’

  ‘What you call claret.’ />
  ‘Of course! Chateau Gruchy.’

  ‘Do you like it?’

  ‘I’ve never actually tasted it. It’s a bit pricey.’

  ‘That is because it is the best. But it is terrible that you should never have tasted it. Our estate is close to Paulliac. Do you know it?’

  ‘I’m afraid not. I’d never been to France until last October. Do you know England?’

  ‘We have a flat in Sloane Square. Do you know that?’

  ‘Ah... I’ve passed it. Do you go there often?’

  ‘Only for shopping, really. Have you been a soldier all your life?’

  ‘Since leaving school. I went straight to Sandhurst.’

  ‘Your Saumur.’

  ‘Ah... yes, I suppose you could say that.’

  ‘Pierre went to Saumur.’

  ‘Pierre?’ The last thing he wanted to hear was that she had a boyfriend tucked away.

  ‘My brother. Do you have a brother?’

  ‘No. I have two sisters.’

  ‘Why. so do I. What does your father do?’

  The temptation to lie, or at least exaggerate, was enormous. And what the hell? He would probably never see this gorgeous creature again. ‘He’s a schoolmaster. A headmaster. Of an English public school.’

  ‘A headmaster! That is very important.’

  ‘Do you know what an English public school is?’

  ‘Of course. I went to Benenden.’

  She could slap him down on almost every subject. ‘With your sisters?’

  ‘Well, not all at the same time; Liane is six years older than I. I liked it very much. Better than Lucerne.’

  ‘You went to school in Lucerne as well?’

  ‘Finishing school. It was all right. But when I went, we had a bad reputation. Liane had been expelled. So Amalie and I were very carefully supervised.’

  ‘I can see that would be tiresome. May I ask why your sister was expelled?’

  Madeleine de Gruchy gave one of her enchanting smiles. ‘You may ask, Mr Barron, but I am not going to tell you. You will have to ask Liane herself.’