The Hidden

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by Mary Chamberlain


  ‘I don’t have much time left,’ he said.

  ‘That’s not fighting talk,’ Joe said. ‘You’ve got thirty more good years.’

  That had always made Geoffrey laugh, but he didn’t smile now. It would mean the world to him to see Dora one more time. What would they say to each other? Where would they begin?

  Geoffrey’s brown eyes had clouded with time, become rheumy and lavender. He pulled out a handkerchief, and wiped them. ‘Will you write again?’ he said.

  Joe pulled out the pad of writing paper, Dear Mrs Hummel…

  Finally there was a reply. The postman brought it up on Friday morning and handed it to Joe. He’d just finished the milking, was about to clean himself up in the caravan. He took the letter, turned it over. The postmark was English, from Richmond. Well, Joe thought, she gets around. He opened the letter.

  I must apologise, but I was called away on business. She had no idea of the turmoil she’d caused, otherwise she wouldn’t be so casual. I would still like to talk to you, if possible, and will be returning to Jersey in the near future, although at this stage am unable to give you precise dates. In the meantime, I have another photo relating to this time and wondered whether you may be able to throw some light on this also?

  Joe felt it with his fingertips, clipped to the back of the letter.

  I do appreciate that the subject of the German occupation is still very sensitive in Jersey and the Channel Islands, so forgive me if I tread on toes. The photograph is that of a German nurse. I can find no trace of her in the records in Germany, though they are incomplete for the Channel Islands. I need to know, however, if she was in Jersey during those years and wondered whether you may have seen her round and about? I quite understand if you cannot remember that far back, or if I am stirring up unwelcome memories of that time, which, I understand, were painful for so many islanders. I am already asking perhaps too much of you. Thank you for your time.

  Joe pulled the picture free and Trude’s plain, round face stared back at him across the years.

  Jersey: May – June 1943

  Joe watched the boys file out, their faces hot and sweaty.

  ‘Now, mind you do those sit-ups,’ he called after one. ‘Work on them. Fitness is the key.’ Nodding at another. ‘Mind the footwork.’

  Pierre was waiting behind the ring, stepped forward as the last of the boys went out.

  ‘Are you all right, Father?’ he said.

  ‘And why wouldn’t I be all right?’ Joe looked around the room, making sure the boys had left nothing. Some of them would leave their heads behind if they weren’t screwed on.

  ‘Only you’re working those boys too hard.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ Joe said, picking up a boxing glove from the floor. He took off his jacket and slipped the glove over his right hand, clenched his fist and lunged at the punching bag hanging from the beam. The force jarred his wrist. Joe swung his left arm, bare knuckles into the bag so the canvas scraped the skin. Right, left. Right, left. Dancing back, light on the toes, pummelling hard, hard, hard. He could feel the sweat building up, the adrenalin surging. He knew the damage it could do, a boxer’s fracture or a sprained thumb, twisted joints or tissue damage. Boxing had helped him before. Why shouldn’t it help him now? The agony would kick in later as he lay in bed at night, releasing the hurt within, as if the tortures of his flesh could soothe the lash of his conscience.

  ‘And Sister Benigna said you broke down at mass this morning,’ Pierre went on.

  Joe saw Trude’s face in every woman he passed, heard her song-thrush laughter in every breeze and felt her gentle hands stroke his own. He had begun to smell her in the convent chapel, the clean, starched apron scent of her as he said mass and took the chalice and wiped it clean with the veil.

  The bag went still as Pierre grabbed the sides and steadied it. ‘She says you’re not yourself. You’re moody. Silent.’

  Joe knelt down by one of the benches, sweeping his hand underneath. All manner of stuff found its home there. Gumshields. Socks. Shoelaces.

  ‘What’s going on?’

  Joe wasn’t sure himself what was going on, except that at night when he was alone he thought of Trude and felt his flesh ripple and his mouth go dry.

  But he’d taken his vows and he couldn’t see how to cast them off, even though they’d never fitted properly. He needed Trude, needed to talk to her. She would understand. She had precipitated this. Yes, that was the right word. Precipitate, as if he was standing on the edge of an abyss. She said she’d make him whole but instead she’d opened up a chasm inside him, a pit so deep he could see neither the bottom nor the way out, could feel only the vertigo of confusion, the demon that said, jump, jump.

  But she had gone. No word sent, even though he waited for her day after day. For sure, something terrible had happened.

  ‘Nothing,’ Joe said. ‘Nothing’s going on.’

  It seemed he had been forsaken by her, though it was a blasphemy to use those words.

  Joe waited again at their junction for half an hour the following Wednesday. Checked his watch over and over, looking down the road to see if she was coming. He didn’t want to be spotted loitering. It didn’t do to draw attention to himself, or the birdwatching glasses, in case they thought he was a spy. He’d been lucky, so far. Never stopped nor searched. He guessed his clerical collar gave him a licence to pass unmolested.

  Trude didn’t come. He wanted to write to her, but he didn’t know where to send the letter and didn’t want anyone to read it by mistake. But what could he say? What could a priest say? He loitered for as long as he could at the junction where they used to meet on Monday afternoons, then set off for La Ferme de l’Anse, just in case she’d gone there instead. He would have given anything to have Trude here with him. He had never been obsessed with another person before, but he recognised that’s what it was. Obsession. He should confess, seek guidance, but he couldn’t bare his soul, not for this. It ran too deep within. Too fast. Too twisted.

  The leaves were fresh and verdant, and the sun cast a dappled shadow on the narrow lanes. The hedgerows either side were tall and thick, the frail limbs of new growth grafted onto old dark twigs. He stopped, listen, look. He could hear life scurrying in the undergrowth, see a robin with a worm in its beak plunging into the interior. He’d need to keep an eye out for fledglings in due course.

  He pushed off again, turned right at the mill, wove his way up and down the by-lanes, until he reached Geoffrey’s field. Bike tucked safely behind the gate, binoculars hanging round his neck, he began to thread his way to the dell. He heard a soft, insistent twi-twi-twi-twi-twi and turned to see the yellowhammer squatting on the gatepost, head to one side, its saffron head and breast glinting in the sun. He smiled at it, hello little friend, wanted to wave, have you seen her? The oats were taller, swayed in the breeze like waves in the sea, and the grass had grown in the dell into clumpy hillocks.

  Joe lifted his field glasses. He’d train them onto the woody hillside first, start there before he’d focus on the shoreline. He caught Geoffrey’s farmhouse in his sights. Quiet and peaceful in the June sunshine, a bicycle against the wall next to the front door, an old iron shoe-scraper to its side. Listen. The chug-chug of a Kübelwagen broke the silence. He trained his glasses. The top road could be glimpsed through the copse and he saw a jeep driving along, followed by a second. They turned the corner, came into view along the lane. Joe watched as they drew up in front of the farmhouse and four men in the distinctive grey uniform of the Geheime Feldpolizei, two from each vehicle, spilled out. The secret police. Joe had heard of them. Everybody had. The first two hammered on the front door, the last two ran into the yard behind the house.

  No one opened the door, and the Feldpolizei at the front joined the others at the back of the building. Joe heard their shouts echo round the farmyard, the sharp splinter of wood. He stood, his glasses trained on the house, tasting the adrenalin from his stomach, feeling his heart race and his hands grow cold and clammy. S
omething terrible was amiss. They were taking their time inside the house. Why had they come? The farm was such an insignificant little holding.

  In time, the front door opened and Geoffrey stumbled out, his hands tied behind his back. Behind him came the nurse. She had lost her cap. Her hands were tied behind her, too. Two Feldpolizisten pushed them forward with their rifles. One grabbed the nurse and threw her towards the first Kübelwagen, another pushed Geoffrey towards the second.

  Two more men, arms pulled behind their backs, staggered from the house, prodded by the other Feldpolizisten.

  ‘Abschaum!’ Shoving them forward. ‘Russen!’

  The men wore tattered, grey rags. Labourers, from the OT gangs. Joe saw them squint in the sunlight, as if they were coming out of a cave. A Feldpolizist grabbed one, the shorter of the two, pulled out his pistol, placed it against his temple.

  The crack echoed round the farm and the man slumped to the ground, blood pumping from his head. The soldier aimed again at the body, and shot again. And again.

  The glasses slipped from Joe’s grasp and he stifled a cry. Picked them up and trained them once more. The body lay still now, blood blackening the cobblestones. The Feldpolizisten were busy securing a rope to the other prisoner, one end tied round his feet, the other attached to the Kübelwagen, pistol-whipping him as they did so, forcing the prisoner to duck and jump. No, Joe opened his mouth, no, but the words dried. He moved forward, pushing his way through the field.

  The Feldpolizisten clambered into the jeeps, started the engines, turned and drove away, dragging the second prisoner. He was jolted off his feet, head thumping the ground. He screamed. Once. They drove off through the farm gate.

  All was silent except for the chug-chug of the Kübelwagen as they climbed the hill, and the twi-twi-twi of the yellowhammer on the gate.

  Joe slumped in the middle of the field. Life snuffed in the puff of a gun, the jolt of a Kübelwagen, Geoffrey and his nurse, heads down, arms back, stiff as corpses.

  He pushed himself up. The farm was deserted now. He thrashed his way through the oats which tangled and dragged at his shoes, clambered over the lower gate, ran towards the body. The top half of the head was a mass of broken bone and slimy brain. His chest an open cave, shattered ribs cream against the blood. Fibres and strings had tumbled out in the gore.

  Joe leaned over and retched. The tangled corpse had been a man once. He looked again, at the frail, immature bones, the slender, scabbed hands strapped behind its back. Not a man. A boy. Perhaps no more than fifteen.

  A child. Perhaps the same lad he’d looked for once.

  Joe shut his eyes, spoke without thinking, ‘Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord.’ He couldn’t bear to look anymore. He had to do something. Tell someone. He’d heard talk of the Germans’ brutality. The executions. The cruelty in the camps. He’d never seen it, apart from the starvation, and that was too obvious to miss. Had he chosen not to? And may perpetual light shine upon him. The nurse’s bike was leaning against the farmhouse wall. He pulled it away, one foot on the pedal, pushed off. May the souls of the faithful departed. He had to find Trude. Tell her what they’d done. She’d be as shocked as him. Perhaps she could intercede for Geoffrey and the nurse, beg the Feldkommandant to show leniency. Through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

  He was blind to the road in front of him, heedless to the quivering in his gut, the stretch of his tendons and muscles. He had to find Trude. He knew she didn’t work at the general hospital because she’d told him that – couldn’t think where to look for her, who was in charge of the German nurses and doctors.

  Except the Feldkommandantur. They would know. They kept lists and records of everything. Everyone. Knackfuss. Colonel Knackfuss, the Feldkommandant himself. He would remember Joe, from the boxing match. He’d tell Joe where Trude was. He could talk to Knackfuss direct. He seemed a reasonable man. What had he said? We treat all opponents fairly. There’s surely been a mistake, Joe’d say. OT workers roamed the island, they must have broken into Geoffrey’s house. They were the guilty ones. They’d been punished. Killed, in cold blood. You have to be lenient, he’d say. Give them a chance. The penalties for helping runaways were too severe.

  He propped the bicycle against the kerb, ran up the steps to the Feldkommandantur headquarters. A Wehrmacht soldier stepped in front of him.

  ‘Business?’

  Joe hesitated a moment. ‘I need to find someone,’ he said. ‘One of your nurses.’

  ‘Why?’

  Joe thought. ‘It’s a personal matter,’ he said. ‘Her name is Trude.’ He did not know her surname. He had abandoned everything for her, flung caution to the wind for her, and he did not know her name. He was going to have to throw himself on her mercy now, and he did not even know her name.

  The soldier studied Joe under his brown tin helmet and narrowed his eyes. ‘A moment,’ he said. ‘Wait here.’

  Joe nodded, watched as the soldier went inside. He was shaky, knees trembling and weak. He felt dizzy. Sat on the steps. He would have given anything for a cigarette. He patted his pockets, although he knew they were empty. His binoculars were still round his neck, but he couldn’t leave them in the bicycle. Anyone could steal them. He’d left the case in his own bike at Geoffrey’s farm. If the soldier asked what he was doing with them, he’d be honest. I’m a birdwatcher. It’s my passion. That’s all I ever watch.

  The soldier had returned. ‘Come this way.’

  Joe stood up and followed him into the building, with its tiled floors and half-panelled walls. A large portrait of Hitler hung above the stairs, draped by two Nazi flags. The soldier’s heels clipped on the floor. He knocked at a large mahogany door.

  ‘Eintreten.’

  He opened the door, ushered Joe in. A plain man, in uniform, with spectacles and a small moustache, sat behind a large desk on which there were two telephones, a variety of rubber stamps and three trays filled with buff folders. Wooden filing cabinets lined the walls. The man looked up as Joe entered. He pointed to the corner.

  ‘Wait there.’

  He carried on reading from one of the folders, turning over each sheet of paper with studied order.

  Joe put his hands in his pockets, ran his fingers round the balls of fluff that had gathered in the corners, fished them out again. Rubbed his fingers together. Shifted his weight from his left foot to his right. He had no idea who this man was, or whether he was the man to see. Perhaps he was the secretary. He had that kind of indifferent air. Joe coughed.

  ‘Excuse me,’ Joe said. ‘Can you help?’

  The man looked up, glowered, said nothing. There was a large, round clock on the wall, the hours marked in grand Roman letters. Two o’clock. German time. One o’clock, old time. Dinner time. Joe wasn’t hungry, but he wanted the lavatory. Dared not ask the German at the desk, excuse me, may I use your WC?

  The telephone rang, jarring in the silence. The man looked up. ‘Go through.’ He pointed to another door.

  Joe nodded. He walked towards it, knocked quietly, went in.

  Colonel Knackfuss himself was standing there in the centre of the room. Hands behind his back, rocking on his heels. He was taller than Joe remembered him, beefier, too. He waited until Joe had entered the room.

  ‘You are enquiring about a nurse,’ he said.

  The timbre in his voice said it all.

  Joe rubbed his neck, fingers on the welt left by the strap when Knackfuss had ripped his binoculars off him. Tough leather, cutting into his flesh, sharp as a whiplash. Snapped like string. Knackfuss was holding the glasses up to the window, adjusting the sights.

  ‘Not bad,’ he said, lowering them and turning to Joe. ‘But not good, either.’ Threw them onto the tiled floor.

  Joe was about to say, Please, but Knackfuss was grinding his heel on the tube, pressing down with all his weight. Joe heard the lens pop free and shatter into tiny shards which spilled across the floor. He stared at the debris. The only possession he really cared about, had ever car
ed about. I don’t have use for these. Not now. Colonel Waring had taken his life a week later. He was still a young man.

  ‘I will ask you again, what business do you have with this nurse?’ Knackfuss said.

  Joe didn’t know what to do. He never thought he’d be interrogated, treated as if he was a criminal.

  ‘A friend,’ Joe said. ‘She was just a friend. I thought she could help.’

  ‘Help?’

  ‘With Geoffrey and the nurse,’ Joe said. Knackfuss raised an eyebrow, ran his tongue over his teeth, not interested.

  ‘You arrested them,’ Joe went on. ‘But they haven’t done a thing. You have to let them go.’

  ‘Your friend,’ Knackfuss said, ignoring Joe. ‘What did you do with your German friend?’ He emphasised the word, made it something dirty. ‘And those.’ He pointed at the broken binoculars.

  ‘Birds,’ Joe said. ‘We watched birds.’

  ‘Birds?’ Knackfuss kicked the broken glasses across the floor. He walked close to Joe, loomed over him. ‘You have to do better,’ he said. ‘Why would a woman be interested in birds?’

  Joe thought of Geoffrey’s words, Jerry wouldn’t take it kindly if they thought you were spying on them.

  ‘I wasn’t spying,’ Joe said. ‘If that’s what you think.’

  Or Trude. Did they think Trude was a spy? A traitor? She had that note in her basket making fun of Hitler. She’d been protecting Joe when she left him that last time. She knew she was being watched.

  ‘Where is Trude?’ Joe said. ‘What have you done with her?’

  ‘Trude,’ he said. ‘Trude. We have a name.’

  ‘What have you done with her?’ Joe was too small to throw his voice and he could hear it break as he shouted. ‘Where is she?’

  He knew how ruthless the Germans were now. Had seen it for himself.

  Knackfuss walked to his desk, picked up the telephone. He spoke in German, put the receiver down as the door opened and two Feldpolizisten entered. Knackfuss nodded. One of them came up to Joe, two large strides, clamped handcuffs round Joe’s wrist, tugged him away.

 

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