The Scarlet Nightingale

by Alan Titchmarsh

  ‘After such a short acquaintance?’

  ‘Long enough. Especially in the current circumstances.’

  ‘And yet you want to go against his wishes and put yourself in danger in spite of the fact that he warned you not to?’

  ‘That was before Celine died. Before I knew I couldn’t just sit back and do nothing. It took me ages to make sense of it all, but then I realised that I’d been given a chance to make a difference – perhaps just a very small one, but a difference all the same – and that if I didn’t accept the challenge, I would always feel that Celine’s life had been wasted. This is my chance to prove that was not the case. Does that make sense?’

  Aunt Venetia smiled. ‘Perfectly. You must do what you feel you have to do, and I must learn to live with it.’ She sighed heavily. ‘You’re a brave girl, Rosamund. And I am very proud of you. But please take care. Do not put yourself at more risk than you have to. Promise?’

  ‘I promise.’

  Her aunt rose unsteadily to her feet. ‘Now then, we must get on. We have people coming to dinner.’

  ‘Again?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. You’re going to do your bit and I must do mine, though I have to say that I’m not much looking forward to this evening.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Tricky company.’

  Rosamund looked at her questioningly.

  ‘The Belgates,’ said her aunt.

  ‘Well, they’re not tricky; you like them.’

  ‘Yes, but they’re bringing with them someone who is notoriously hard work.’

  Rosamund laughed. ‘Oh dear, who’s that?’

  ‘General de Gaulle.’

  Rosamund’s eyes widened.

  Her aunt made to leave the room. ‘He’ll enjoy your company, I shouldn’t wonder – and he’ll be grateful to speak French, being stuck here in London away from his homeland. But if I were you, I wouldn’t mention your plans to him. He’s a suspicious sort and he might think we have an ulterior motive in inviting him. As it is, we just want to keep him on side.’

  Aunt Venetia left the room, and Rosamund was left alone with her thoughts. Not for the first time that day, she wondered what on earth she had let herself in for.

  I suppose it was a baptism by fire really. I reasoned that if I could keep my head that evening then I could at least prove to Aunt Venetia – and to Lord Belgate – that I had what it took. But throwing General de Gaulle into the mix was a cruel twist, not least because Aunt Venetia seated me next to him. She sat across the table to the right of Lord Belgate, whom I had not encountered since our meeting outside Bourne & Hollingsworth. I was sorely tempted to ask if he had managed to find any socks, but I resisted. Nor did I say anything about the note. He didn’t refer to it either, but I was aware of both him and Aunt Venetia frequently casting an eye in my direction to see how I was faring. There was also a French attaché – more personable than de Gaulle – Gaston Palewski his name was. Aunt Venetia told me he was a friend of Nancy Mitford – rather more than a friend as it turned out – and Patience Westmacott, a shrill-voiced, widowed friend of Aunt Venetia who was clearly there to make up the numbers.

  De Gaulle was quite chilly at first – wondering, I expect, why he had been seated next to a young girl rather than someone of greater importance (though Lady Belgate was on his right). He said little over the first course of egg mayonnaise and I wondered if he would bother with me at all. When he turned to me as the main course arrived, he said just one word – ‘Poulet!’ – and I wondered if that would be the sum total of our conversation. I remembered the story of an American woman being seated next to the American President Calvin Coolidge in the late 1920s. He was famously monosyllabic, and the American lady said, ‘Mr President, I’ve made a large bet that I can get you to say more than two words over dinner’, to which the President replied: ‘You lose.’

  I was quite convinced that I would find myself in the same situation, until I found the courage to reply ‘Oui. Nourriture des dieux.’ He sat back in his chair and smiled, and then the conversation took a different turn. We spoke in French for the entire meal, and he hardly turned to Lady Belgate. I noticed Aunt Venetia and Lord Belgate smile knowingly at one another and, to be honest, I felt rather proud of myself. Of course, I was careful not to talk about my plans, but we did talk about France, and how he missed being there, and how he was convinced that eventually he would return. He was clearly a great reader and asked what I thought of Victor Hugo. When I said that I enjoyed reading Zola, he raised an eyebrow. I think I must have shocked him. I suppose because of the fact that I made an effort, and because – without being boastful – my French was so good, he began to unbend a little. I remember how tall he was, and how imposing, and how haughty he looked when his face was in repose. But like many people who do not smile a lot, when he did, his face lit up and it completely transformed his appearance. He had little to smile about at that time, of course, and although he knew the British were supporting the French Resistance movement – at the behest of Winston Churchill – he could never accept that there was not some ulterior and subversive motive in our actions.

  After the meal we moved to the drawing room for coffee (another example of Aunt Venetia’s good fortune, since it betrayed not a hint of chicory). Here the general held a lengthy conversation with Lord Belgate, which seemed to involve a lot of Gallic shrugs. Aunt Venetia came across to me as I was sitting on the sofa next to Lady Belgate and smiled, nodding in the direction of Monsieur Palewski; he had something of a reputation as a ladies’ man but looked faintly uneasy, having been backed into a corner of the room where he was being grilled in appalling French by Patience Westmacott. Eventually Palewski pointed to his watch and gestured in the direction of the general, who grasped the situation and explained that they must leave, for he had a meeting the following morning with the Prime Minister. For one brief moment, I suddenly felt at the very centre of things, and that the decision I had made was the right one. I knew I was only a very tiny little cog, but surely that was better than being a spectator?

  The general bowed smartly to the assembled company then came over to thank Aunt Venetia for her hospitality. I wondered if he might kiss her. He did not, but took her hand and shook it quite formally, thanking her, in English, for the best meal he had enjoyed in quite some time. I eased back, hoping to slip into the shadows, but he looked up and leaned forward towards me. ‘Au revoir, mam’selle,’ he said. Then, with the faintest of smiles: ‘Jusqu’à la prochaine fois. En France.’

  I know that I blushed as I smiled back. But it seemed to my way of thinking that my plans now had some kind of seal of approval. Not for the first time in my life I felt – without meaning to sound melodramatic – that this was my destiny. The wheels had been set in motion and now there was no way of stopping them.

  A week later I found myself on the threshold of the next phase of my life. It filled me with apprehension and with fear, but I would be lying if I did not also admit that I found the prospect more than a little exciting. Oh, how little I knew of what was to come.

  Chapter 13

  SURREY

  SEPTEMBER 1941

  ‘Upon the whole it was an excellent journey & very thoroughly enjoyed by me; the weather was delightful the greatest part of the day … I never saw the country from the Hogsback so advantageously.’

  Jane Austen, in a letter to her sister Cassandra, 1813

  The journey from Guildford station was a short one. Sitting in the back of a staff car with her suitcase beside her, Rosamund looked for clues as to their destination. The car travelled along the Hog’s Back – that ridge in the North Downs that separates the sprawl of robust Aldershot from the more delicate constitution of Godalming – and then turned off the ridge and descended northwards to the tiny village of Wanborough. After many twists and turns along a narrow country lane, the car finally drew up at its destination.

  Doris Kilgarth had been pleased that Rosamund had agreed to sign up, and at a subsequent meeting whe
re very little had been given away as to the nature of her future task, she had explained that before anything else could happen, Rosamund would have to be assessed for her suitability for the job in hand. Speaking fluent French was clearly very useful, but there were many other attributes she would need in order to be of any use to ‘The Outfit’, as she called it.

  The Outfit, or The Firm, had several training schools, divided up according to which part of Europe those who successfully completed the two- or three-week training course would be posted. The French school was situated at Wanborough Manor, a rambling half-timbered house dating from the late seventeenth century. As Rosamund walked up the steps to the heavy front door, accompanied by her army driver, a sense of foreboding flooded over her. She looked up at the uneven agglomeration of chimneys and pointed roofs, stacked almost like playing cards, their dull orange tiles encrusted with moss and lichen, and felt that she was about to enter some hinterland of the underworld. In a way, she was.

  Wanborough Manor was staffed by a small number of Army Non-Commissioned Officers who would put the new recruits through their paces – a dozen or so at any one time. A smattering of general service soldiers were responsible for the day-to-day running of the establishment, and members of the sinister-sounding Field Security branch of the Intelligence Corps had the job of fending off nosey locals, explaining to them that the inmates of Wanborough were undergoing commando training. That was as much as they needed to know.

  The students themselves were told only a little more, the powers that be realising that many of them would fail to come up to the mark. They knew that their job would be undercover, that it would encompass deception, subterfuge, intelligence gathering and even, when occasion demanded, combat. That much was clear. But the less detail they knew when they were returned to wider society, the better for all concerned.

  The door of Wanborough Manor was opened by a soldier in battledress, and at that moment Rosamund realised there was no turning back.

  Up to that point, this undertaking had seemed, in prospect, like ‘an awfully big adventure’. Having weathered the profound sadness of losing my parents, and of Celine’s death, and of being parted from Harry and knowing that he was most likely in mortal danger, the prospect of doing something to redress the balance did, I admit, light some kind of fire in me. There were frightening moments in London during the Blitz, but this was something altogether different. I was handing over my life not only to fate, and to an ageing aunt, but also to outside agencies which would not be as well disposed towards me as my family and friends. If the deaths of those nearest and dearest to me had caused me to grow from being a girl into a young woman, then this was clearly the next step in my journey – that of facing something which would, in a completely different way, be supremely demanding. It would test my powers of physical and mental endurance to the limit. I knew that, and, to be honest, I questioned my ability to prove myself equal to the task. I was determined not to fail, but at the same time – deep in my heart – not at all sure that I really had the necessary steel to see it through.

  I passed the first test at least. For much of the day – and always at mealtimes – nothing but French was spoken at Wanborough, and from the moment I was greeted inside the door by a smart and businesslike female in a tweed two-piece suit, I slipped into my former way of conversing with Celine as though it had been yesterday.

  Every morning before breakfast, we underwent physical training – intensive exercise in the grounds of the Manor as well as cross-country runs, which I rather enjoyed. They gave us a chance to escape the confines of the building and breathe in the fresh air of the North Downs, which I loved. It was not Devonshire, but it was a refreshing change from the dust-filled wreckage of London.

  I was not at all sure about the combat, but I learned to look after myself, much to the surprise of the NCO in charge of our physical training. Wagstaff was his name – a wiry little man with a big nose and a thin pencil moustache. The sight of him was rather comical, but there was nothing amusing about his way of putting us through our paces. It was punishing. Having had rather a ‘soft’ life in London, it was some time before I felt less than completely shattered at the end of the day. Our basic weapons training involved the use of an assortment of firearms and target practice; there were life-sized paper outlines of men fastened on frames attached to the high wall in the garden, and we learned where to aim and how to keep our weapons – light automatic guns and pistols – in good working order.

  The breadth and intricacy of our learning over the two weeks had come as a surprise to all of us. We had expected to be schooled in the use of firearms and unarmed combat (we knew that we would need to be taught how to protect ourselves in extreme and often unexpected circumstances), and French classes were de rigueur for those whose grasp of the language was slight. And yet it was the more mundane, domestic knowledge that was equally important, if we were not to stand out as outsiders, interlopers and subversives. What did a French ration card look like, and what did it entitle you to? Was coffee available on this particular day in this particular café? Such local intelligence – tailored to the part of France in which a particular cell would operate – could turn out to be the difference between life and death.

  In unarmed combat, I think I amused Sergeant Wagstaff. I might have become a woman-about-town, but thanks to my early days of wrestling with stable lads, I seldom came off too badly. I noticed that after the first week, when I unfortunately kneed him in the groin, he avoided demonstrating on me and instead picked out a slender youth who departed the course shortly after. I felt rather sorry for him. There were eleven of us at the beginning of the course, and by the end of two weeks we had been whittled down to three.

  There were certain prevailing attitudes towards the women who were recruited to The Outfit. Those like Doris Kilgarth were treated with respect and caution, which usually manifested itself in avoidance of contact. Most men were wary of her, unsure of just how much power she possessed and knowing that she might well be involved in their final selection – or rejection. As for the female ‘rank and file’ recruits like myself, we were made aware of the need to be every bit as tough as the men (maybe not so much physically, but certainly mentally) and it was possible, in time, to earn the respect of one’s colleagues – with just a few exceptions.

  Some tasks suited men more than women, but all of us – regardless of gender – had things we were good at and things we found more difficult to grasp. That said, it was clear that a variety of aptitudes was needed in those who joined what I later realised was called the Special Operations Executive – the SOE. At the time, we never used the acronym; it was only after the war that we understood just how important it had been, and just how complex an ‘outfit’ it was. As far as I am concerned, I will forever be grateful that it taught me things I’d never known about myself – but it also highlighted weaknesses in my character of which I had been all too aware.

  I gradually got to grips with wireless operating, and worked hard at mastering codes – never my strong point, as I had explained to Diana.

  Then there were the lessons in demolition in a chalk quarry on the Hog’s Back. I could see that most of the men on the course were looking forward to this – males do seem to have an inbuilt desire to destroy. It evinces itself in early childhood and is then mercifully overtaken by a desire to build rather than demolish. But it is surprising how that facility comes to the fore once more when a man is given an opportunity to knock something down.

  Much to my embarrassment, I proved to be particularly adept at dealing with explosives and incendiaries. One or two of the recruits referred to me as ‘Miss Dynamite’, which had little to do with my sexual allure, and more to do with my ability to reduce buildings to rubble.

  There were attractive men there, of course, and men who occasionally ‘tried it on’, including one particular Frenchman – Thierry – who had a twinkle in his eye, the most disarming smile and a fine line in small talk of the flattering kind, b
ut the thought of Harry in Europe was never far from my mind. I had frequent pangs of guilt at going against his wishes and joining The Outfit, but it seemed to me that if I was doing nothing else, at least I was showing solidarity with him. I hoped that if he ever heard about it that he would – after the initial annoyance, or even anger, at my ignoring his plea – be proud of my intentions. I put out of my mind the thought that I might never see him again. That, more than anything, would be just too much to bear.

  All the while, we were aware that we were being monitored. Our abilities in all branches of combat, intelligence gathering, wireless operating and coding were constantly assessed and, rather like an Agatha Christie murder mystery, it was not unusual for us to come down to breakfast and discover that one or more of our number had disappeared – either moved to other work, or else sent home as ‘unsuitable material’. I remembered Mr Langstone reading me Treasure Island as a child, and half expected one day to find a piece of paper with the ‘Black Spot’ slipped into my hand.

  The dangers of being in occupied France were brought home to us on a daily basis. The Gestapo were ever present. The term was used to cover both the Abwehr (the German military intelligence service) and Himmler’s SS – of which the SD, the Sicherheitsdienst security service, had a reputation for brutality – especially the branch based in Lyon. Then there was the Milice, which operated against the SOE on behalf of the French administration in Vichy, plus the German military police (the Feldpolizei) and the Gendarmerie. The whole thing was a confusing minefield, but it made us all the more determined to keep ourselves to ourselves and to be very careful who we trusted, for it seemed that more were briefed to undermine us and expose our weaknesses than were there to encourage us.

  Wherever we were from, whatever our background, we were aware that we must always be on our guard. We had a brief social life in the evenings, but even then we knew that we were being watched and often plied with rather more alcohol than was good for us to see if we let anything slip. We were sometimes woken up in the middle of the night – one of the station supervisors would shake us awake to see if we said ‘Mon Dieu’ or ‘Good God’. If you blurted out the latter, you would probably find yourself on the next bus home. We needed to be French, not just act French.