Single to Paris

by Single to Paris (retail) (epub)

  He pulled a drawer open, took out some files like the one already on the desk. Glancing at the labels on their front covers. He kept two, put the others back, slid the drawer shut.

  ‘You have their names wrong. Field-names, no doubt. In fact he’s – Derek Courtland, and she’s Yvette di Mellili. French-Italian, by the sound of her. So happens, I’ve never set eyes on either of them.’ Eyes back on her, then. ‘Quite exceptionally important to you, they must be…’

  Chapter 17

  Rue des Saussaies. It was no surprise. There’d been a hint of it earlier, and she’d heard the SS man to whom she’d again been handcuffed give the order to the one who drove. Clausen had sent for them, giving brusque orders in German over the telephone, and she’d made nothing of that; he’d transmogrified into the stony-faced interrogator again by then – ex-interrogator, disinterested in her now the interview had been concluded, case wrapped up. She’d tried a sally or two and got nowhere, might as well have been talking to herself. Even in regard to Jacqui, who having featured so largely in their exchanges didn’t come into it now and – she supposed – didn’t have to. He’d got everything he wanted – truly had, she realised soon enough, having wishfully thought at first that maybe this was just an act. It hadn’t been: he’d barely glanced up when the SS had come to take her off his hands.

  She’d wondered whether the road-blocks would still be there, but they weren’t, the truck hadn’t even slowed: swinging to the right out of Place Beauvau, then slowing in its approach to number eleven. She’d been guessing at the route they’d been following – going by the turns and visualising the map: Avenue Marigny into Place Beauvau, she’d imagined. She’d been on the floor of the truck with her right arm raised uncomfortably, joined at the wrist to her SS companion’s; there’d been another of them beside him and two facing them. Plus the two in front, making six; two of the original eight must have been sent off to get their heads down. The last time she’d travelled on the floor of a truck like this one had been after the débâcle at Ardouval near Bellencombre, the Lysander rendezvous which Clausen had mentioned. That truck journey had been all the way from Ardouval back into Rouen, and to pass the time they’d given her a few kicks.

  Slowing. One wheel clipping the kerb as they turned into the courtyard and the two nearer the tailboard crouched over it, preparing to let it down.

  Might run into Georges, Patrice and company?

  She thought probably not. In that telephone call in which Clausen had shown little interest at first – and to which she hadn’t paid very close attention because she’d been at a point of crisis in fielding his questions – the number 34 had been mentioned, which was approximately the number of Georges’ group, whom they’d been holding here. This hadn’t occurred to her until the next bit. Clausen saying yes, he’d have one female for them in about an hour; her guess being then that 34 prisoners had been moved out, so they had room for her.

  Obligatory report to him, she guessed. To whom it might concern. An earlier inquiry maybe, if he’d been wondering where to put her. But by ‘moved out’, meaning released?

  Hardly, at this time of night. Send 34 men out into the streets with the curfew in force?

  Being consigned to 11 Rue des Saussaies would normally have been a depressing and frightening prospect. But as the alternative to being put straight on to a train for Ravensbrück – or Fürstenburg, which was the station for Ravensbrück – which she might have been, in which case they’d have dumped her under guard at Gare de l’Est. Where Georges had worked…

  ‘Raus!’

  Yanking her out, the iron bracelet biting into her wrist. Stumbling: one of them grabbing her arm, holding her up. A torch shone in her face. There were Miliciens all over the place, uniformly attired in breeches and boots, khaki shirts with black ties, black berets, pistols in holsters on their belts. Darnand’s devotees – one of their better-known slogans being Against Jewish Leprosy and for French Purity! French purity, for God’s sake. Come-uppances by the bucketful were long overdue, she thought: seeing their youthful faces and the hatred in them as they glared back at her. Her people, these – her father’s people: French…

  This woman wasn’t, though. If it was a woman – as the bulge of breasts did indicate. Bulge of biceps too, and black hairs on her chin. What looked like a policeman’s truncheon hung from her belt. Thick trousered legs apart, thumbs hooked over the belt – waiting just inside, in the entrance hall – the SS man hurrying Rosie in with him and this creature looking her up and down contemptuously: Rosie in her old raincoat, hair unkempt, on her feet the felt slippers she’d been wearing in the Dog for comfort. The SS escort had taken the handcuff off her; he gave the woman a card on which Clausen had scribbled some notes – essentially, she guessed, her name and the charge against her.

  Or – Don’t bother to keep this one alive?

  ‘Jeanne-Marie Lefèvre…’

  She nodded. She would also have admitted to being Suzanne Tanguy or Justine Quérier: submission and compliance being the thing in this place. She’d seen the woman before, she realised: on her previous visit – June, if that was when it had been. Recently as that? She’d thought of her, she remembered, as ‘the weight-lifter’. Another one – taller, scraggier – was coming now from the direction of where Rosie remembered the stairs were, remembered being dragged up them to an office where she’d been left for a long time strapped to a chair before being interrogated and, being non-compliant in the provision of answers to the man’s questions, whipped.

  A couple of months ago, was all.

  The new one, who had one of the smallest heads Rosie had ever seen on a grown person, asked a question in German, to which the muscular one replied, ‘Englander’ and added some further piece of information, after which the tall one said to Rosie in passable French, ‘Won’t have you with us long, then.’

  ‘Why d’you say that?’

  ‘Death sentences are not carried out in this building, that’s why.’ The weight-lifter cut in: ‘Down there. Move it!’ Rosie knew the way, shuffled in her slippers towards the head of the basement steps; the one with the head like a chicken’s calling after her, ‘You’ll love it down there, I bet!’ It was a joke, apparently – and even at the top of the downward curve of steps it was obvious what she thought was funny. The stink. Sharply, eye-wateringly ammoniac. Having to continue down into it though, step by step, with heavy grunting breaths from the thickset one who was following close behind with a torch-beam lighting the way ahead. Passing a level bit where on Rosie’s last visit there’d been a guard with a machine-pistol – as well as a man behind her with a rifle, who’d used its stock to drive her along in front of him. In relation to which the cosh on this woman’s belt wasn’t there only for decoration either, one knew she’d use it if she felt so inclined or if one gave her any lip or opposed her in any way. While if she, Rosie, was the only prisoner here, with Miliciens outside and only these two Gestapo creatures on the inside – and their knowing she was for the chop in any case…

  She thought she might be, too. That Clausen had simply tricked her into telling him what she’d come for, and that was that – her card was marked. He’d told her he hadn’t ever set eyes on Léonie/Yvette or Rouquet/Derek Courtland; perhaps he wouldn’t have to set eyes on her again either.

  The cement floor of the big cellar was slippery with urine. And not only urine. Her felt slippers would be soaking it up. She half-turned, gesturing around with one hand in the torch-light: ‘Why – like this?’

  You didn’t want to breathe. Didn’t expect an answer either, at least not a civil one, but surprisingly did get one – in clumsy, heavily accented French: ‘Pigs. Many, many. Toilettes blocked also. Men – résistants. Pigs!’

  One of the words she happened to know…

  ‘Have you released them now?’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘The pigs – résistants – you’ve let them go?’

  ‘Let go?’ A burst of laughter. ‘Ja – let go!’ That was a r
eal joke: she’d laughed again. They’d passed through the cellar now, were at the iron gate that led to an area off which there were individual cells. It wasn’t locked – had no one on that side of it of course – and Rosie pushed it open. The woman telling her in that tortured French of hers, ‘Not let go – never. Not for you go!’ Staring at her fixedly with the torch-beam in her face: Rosie having stopped and turned to face her, awaiting instructions as to which of the cells was hers: ‘You – here – before – uh?’

  She nodded. ‘Two months ago.’

  Otherwise – if she’d denied it, and there was some record in which the creature could have looked it up, she’d maybe have earned a beating. The woman asked, still with the torch on her – ‘So – was let you go?’

  Meaning presumably Did we let you go? Rosie shook her head. ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘Huh.’ A nod: as if that said it all, proved her point, everything was as it should be. Muttering to herself in German as she dragged the left-hand cell door open and shone her torch inside: swinging it back on Rosie then – stopping her in the doorway, Rosie having tried to move in quickly past her, to give her no excuse to throw her in: or – whatever else… She’d noticed with some relief that the cement floor looked dry, had a slope to it – she’d forgotten that – that the iron bed was as she remembered it but the foul-looking straw pallet was maybe a stage or two worse. There was a bare bulb – unlit of course – in a wire cage on the ceiling. The Gestapo woman’s stocky figure filled the doorway now, shutting out that glimpse of luxury; short, thick arm coming up, thick, short-fingered hand patting Rosie’s cheek: ‘Pretty. Very pretty!’

  She’d pulled back, physically unable to stand there and accept it: but aware that too violent a reaction, positive resistance, would only make it worse.

  ‘Ach! Ça!’

  Her watch. Actually Marilyn’s watch. She’d been surprised that Dubarque or the SS hadn’t taken it when they’d roughly searched her in the anteroom to Clausen’s office. Reacting to that gesture of affection, admiration or lust, she’d jerked her hand up to her face and the raincoat’s sleeve must have fallen back, uncovering it – and this creature wanted it, had the torch on it. Rosie took it off, held it out to her: next moment had been sent spinning into the cell, the door clumping shut behind her. Total darkness…

  * * *

  She’d kept the raincoat on. Had deliberated whether to do that or spread it like a ground-sheet on the mattress – or rather pallet. Had decided that keeping it on would be best: she’d had to lie down, even though the pallet was damp, stained and smelly, and having it on and wrapped tightly round her with the collar turned up did ensure that much protection; whereas if she’d lain on it and moved around much in her sleep it might have slid out from under her or become rucked up. There’d be lice in the straw, she guessed. Not wanting to have her hair in contact with the pallet – especially not wanting that – she lay on her back with her hands linked under the back of her head. Nothing like adequate protection, but some. After a while the position imposed a certain strain, but it was really the only way to lie and she made herself put up with it. She’d sleep all right, she thought: it had been a long, tiring day. The bike tour with Nico, the climb to Sacré Coeur and the incident in the Place du Tertre, long evening in the Dog and to cap it all the exhausting two-hour session with Clausen: only when it finished had she realised how exhausting that had been.

  Exhaustion might have been a major factor, she thought, in her state of depression and uncertainty as to what was going to happen next. Whether this was the end, at any rate in his intention was the end – end of her – allowing him to keep his brilliant reputation untarnished, while getting rid of her as an unwanted and possibly dangerous loose cannon in the next week or few days while he was making his plans for Jacqui. If indeed he was making plans for her – at any rate plans that were as clearly in her interests as she believed.

  If she did, as devoutly as she’d let it seem. In the restaurant on Saturday there’d been some hesitance when Rosie had questioned how strongly he felt about her: then as to whether he might take her back to Germany with him she’d said, ‘Possible but unlikely’ – suggesting it might be on the cards, although when they’d been together next day it had been clear that it was not.

  Proving what? Well – only that there were doubts where one would not have expected any. Doubts heightened now through his not having jumped at the offer she’d made him – virtually a guarantee of Jacqui’s safety.

  If he was as concerned for her as he said he was, wouldn’t he have fairly leapt at it?

  Faint greyish light was spreading across the concrete ceiling. She remembered from last time a small, barred window high up in her cell’s end wall – that one. If this was the same cell, which it might be, the grating on the outside would be at about ground level, must provide some small circulation of air in here which in the big cellar there would not be. Thinking of Georges, Patrice and thirty-two others in there: standing or squatting room only, probably called out one by one for interrogation. Then with that process completed, passed on to – execution, or a cattle-truck eastward from Gare de l’Est? The former, probably: at Montrouge, Mont St Valerian or the castle at Vincennes, the centres of hostage-slaughter. Simply to get rid of them would be the thing. Some truce, she thought. In pitch darkness and the latrine stench and one’s own condition generally, one saw it as nothing but stark reality, how it was…

  She could make out that ventilator now, just – the small rectangle of grey and the dark pattern of the bars. Dawn light – on Tuesday August 22nd: tonight, Leblanc and/or his ex-military colleague would be attacking the Milice armoury. Which, please God, would be successful. Then Wednesday, when she didn’t turn up to meet him at the Dog—

  But they’d know, of course, would have heard well before then from Adée. And might decide to go ahead without her?

  That thought about Clausen again: if he’d had any real interest in her offer to take Jacqui to England, wouldn’t he have enthused about it, there and then?

  He’d shown interest, but in a detached sort of way, not as one would have expected, more as if his real interest had been in the fact of her having made the offer, and her own motivation – why those two, Léonie and Rouquet, so especially? In reply to which – questions, comments starting with Quite exceptionally important to you, they must be – she’d said nothing about their special knowledge of FFI and/or Maquis dispositions in Alsace-Lorraine – in case that hadn’t registered, despite Cazalet’s report to SIS; she’d only told him that Yvette and Derek were friends of hers, that she owed them for help they’d given her at some earlier time, was in any case personally concerned for them, and she had persuaded the hierarchy in London to let her have a go – banking on her friendship with Jacqui and the generally confused state of affairs, approaching climax, here in Paris.

  * * *

  ‘You mean try to help them escape somehow?’

  ‘Delay their being sent east. Yes. And what I’m asking you now – the deal I’m offering—’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course…’

  Straight-faced, but she thought maybe laughing at her. Half-smiling anyway – rather smug self-satisfaction, in retrospect, as he’d replaced those two files in the drawer, glanced at the clock and double-checked on his own watch; that hand then moving on to rest for a moment beside the telephone, its fingers drumming… ‘So that’s about it, eh? Unless there’s anything else you’d like to tell me?’

  * * *

  He’d been clever on Sunday, she thought. Having had answers from Berlin that morning and knowing already that she was an agent of SOE, but giving her no reason to suspect he knew it. On his guard to the extent that he would have been anyway, even without that knowledge – being what he was, and she to all intents and purposes a stranger – but acting it cleverly, entertaining her with tag-ends of what might have been privileged information – in fact wasn’t, but might have lulled her into thinking he was accepting her as Jacqui’s friend in whom h
e could to that extent confide. The stuff about General Choltitz for instance, and the Lafont background – admitting his personal dislike of ‘Monsieur Henri’, all that.

  Actually she couldn’t imagine him and Lafont as buddies. Especially with the Jacqui complication. Which rather strangely he’d shrugged off. Assumed the leopard had changed its spots? That she’d changed them for him, no doubt: the lover she’d always wanted and never found. Except she had – and switched to the colonel of engineers. But maybe had very little choice, especially as he must have connived in it. She’d told Rosie on Saturday, I’m pro Gerhardt Clausen and pro me: his business is his own, my business is him. She’d have fed him that line. Might even have meant it. But if all that was mutually on the up-and-up – here we go again – wouldn’t he have grabbed with both hands at the offer of sanctuary in England for her?

  Theory-time. Exercise the imagination time. Think up some explanation that might improve morale, give grounds for hope. Lying still in the lavatorial-scented darkness, watching the slow spread of the coming day up there, guessing at the time – perhaps 4 am, 4.30 – and wishing that creature hadn’t taken her watch – which was luminous, would have been something of a companion, ticking away and glowing green… Clausen, though – a cold fish, by the nature of his job, must live to a large extent inside his own skull—

  Hang on…

  One possible answer coming through. Whether it might be that – well, his side of the deal would mean producing Léonie/Yvette and Derek – obviously. What if he wasn’t certain he’d be able to, if he might have to look into ways and means before he could take it any further? He’d said – surprisingly – ‘I never set eyes on either of them’ – which did suggest that Boemelbourg’s intentions might either have been misreported or overtaken by events.

  Conceivable?