Single to Paris

by Single to Paris (retail) (epub)

  He’d leaned over to kiss her. ‘Whatever’s in store for us we’ll get through all right. But listen – detail now. Tomorrow I’ll be bringing back with me some extracts from the dossier I’m compiling. You need to know the basics of it so as to have a matching account which you can trot out when you have to. You could vary it or elaborate as you wish, as it may suit you, there’s nothing to say we mightn’t have some of the detail wrong. In fact an error or a blank area here or there is – characteristic, actually makes it more realistic. But for instance, the names of individuals with whom you were working, to whom you were passing your items of information: these come from other records, and the people concerned are either dead or would find it contrary to their own interests to contradict any of it.’

  ‘Clearing themselves by accepting that they were somehow involved with me.’

  ‘As you say.’ He added, ‘A point about the dossier, incidentally, is that you won’t know everything that’s in it, but the bits I’ll show you will then be in your memory and match it closely enough to be virtually indisputable. You’ll have had a tip-off that we’re on to you, and – panic, some escape route alerted, and you’ve vanished. Leaving me in an embarrassing position obviously – it being no secret that I’ve been romantically involved with you, despite which I’ve been doing my duty following up these allegations – on top of which your abrupt departure will have absolutely stunned me. Then I’ll be gone – maybe—’

  ‘Maybe?’

  ‘Unless I’m to be one of those who stays. In which case if I didn’t escape independently I’d become a prisoner-of-war in due course. This is pure speculation, and strictly between ourselves, but since all my working experience in the SD has been in France, and France now so to speak goes off the map—’

  ‘Or so to speak comes back on the map?’

  ‘There speaks the secret résistante.’ He leaned over to light her cigarette. ‘The gazo is here, I’m told.’

  ‘Oh, is it?’

  ‘Round at the back. We’ll have a look at it in the morning. But incidentally there’s another possibility now, something quite new, which at the moment I’d sooner not discuss with you, but – could be – marvellous, if—’

  ‘In what way?’

  He shook his head. ‘Tomorrow, chérie. I hope. I don’t want to raise hopes before I’m certain.’

  ‘All right. But – no word from Jeanne-Marie?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have, would I? She’s to contact you, remember? Oh, if or when she’s found the child. Otherwise she’ll be waiting to hear from us – from you – again. So tomorrow, with the dossier complete – and maybe this other business by then clarified—’

  ‘Changing the subject’ – reaching to him, to stroke his hand – ‘while it’s in my mind, don’t you think I should have a page of the dossier – some proof it exists? I know, you’ll bring extracts, but – a piece of it in its final shape that I can keep? Otherwise maybe it doesn’t come to light and I’ve no evidence at all – I’m investigated as a collaborator, I say, “Oh, I was working for the British” – hell, protestations alone as self-defence—’

  ‘Yes.’ He’d nodded while she was speaking. ‘You’re right.’ Pointing his cigar at her: ‘You’re absolutely right. In fact I should have thought of this. With the tip-off that’s put you on the run you’ve also been given this piece of paper – which will have scared you stiff – but you’ve hung on to it, and it would lead very conveniently to a search for the rest – which it would exactly match of course: could be a missing page…’

  Jacqui sent smoke pluming into the moonlight. ‘Seems I have to do all the thinking around here.’

  ‘You do it brilliantly, too. Although that point would have occurred to me, I think – when we’re going through the stuff tomorrow.’

  ‘Today, you mean.’

  ‘Ah. Of course. Perhaps more tired than I’d realised…’

  ‘So why not leave the damn cigar and come to bed?’

  Looking at her. Hand moving to find the ashtray, drop the quarter-smoked cigar into it. Eyes moving, examining her face… ‘From the most desirable girl in France – such an unsolicited invitation – my God, how can we still be sitting here?’

  ‘I was beginning to wonder…’

  * * *

  Would the Boches here surrender, she wondered? In which case, had she and Clausen made love for the last time? He was deeply asleep, she still wide awake listening to the distant rolling thunder of artillery. Bypassing Paris, he’d said – bypassing pretty damn closely by the sound of it, she thought! Leaving the city and its environs surrounded, anyway – maybe then cutting the roads and rail-lines leading east? Wouldn’t they have to surrender, then? She’d have asked him, but he was on his back and snoring, her body – sprawled half over him, his arms loosely around her. Straining her ears to hear the guns again. They seemed to have gone quiet. Why would one want to hear that far-off rumbling anyway, she wondered – while still listening intently for its resumption – when a much closer, startlingly loud racket broke out of – Christ, it could have been right out there in the street!

  Machine-guns?

  ‘That’s right here!’

  She’d said it aloud – or shouted it – squawked, as it echoed in her own ears now. Might have been dropping off, dreaming about listening to the distant barrage, blurting that out as she was jolted awake with a picture in her mind of gun-muzzles spurting flame – which certainly she could only have dreamt of. Hadn’t dreamt this, though – what sounded like screams – men screaming, amongst that gunfire. A pause, then more of it, bursts of high-pitched metallic reverberations from God knew where, but close. Machine-guns, or machine-pistols. Gerhardt had launched himself off the bed growling angry-sounding German: he’d rushed out as he was, stark naked. More of the shooting – short bursts, also single shots – and shouting, like a crowd at a prizefight but with that screaming in it; like pigs being killed, she thought – having lived on a farm at one time, years ago. Remembering it as she wrapped a negligée around herself and hurried to join him on the balcony.

  Nothing, now. Had suddenly all ceased; you were back in the quiet night, and the moon was showing.

  ‘Where, and – what, any—’

  ‘In the Bois, somewhere. Nothing to see – obviously, wouldn’t be. Two kilometres, I’d guess. Two to three. That’d make it – oh, Pre Catalan, Bout des Lacs – thereabouts.’

  ‘Sounded so close!’

  ‘That’s close enough – for sound, at night.’

  ‘I was listening to those other guns.’ She had her arms around him: the negligée open, pressing herself against him from behind. ‘I was hardly even breathing, trying not to disturb you. Listen, why don’t you always go round like this?’

  ‘Where would I put my sergeant’s stripes? No, now look, I—’

  ‘Right here of course!’

  ‘No.’ Moving her away. ‘I must telephone. Maybe a patrol got ambushed. Sounded like – massacre, or—’

  ‘Won’t have to go out, will you?’

  ‘No.’ He’d gone inside. Calling back to her, ‘I hope not.’ She heard him snatch the receiver off its hook.

  * * *

  Rosie had slept, but she thought not for very long: there was no sign of dawn smearing the darkness overhead, as yet. She’d been thinking of what might be Fernagut’s tactics in the Rue de la Pompe, she remembered. Keeping the brain working, and keeping it off depressing, frightening supposition as to what she was in for now, this coming day. Wednesday. Saying to Ben in her imagination – thinking again of his reference to what the Boches had ‘put her through’ – ‘Didn’t quite see it through, though, didn’t manage it, did they? Will now, probably; I think this Clausen’s going for the limit. Doesn’t want Jacqui kept safe for him in England, must have his own plans for her, damn him. Or none… Worst of it is they know now what a slippery customer I am, so they’ll make bloody sure of me!’

  Ben would be thinking they’d already made sure of it. In a way, one
could be glad of that – that he’d have got over the very worst of it, shed his tears and – knowing him – pulled himself together. As long as some message from Marilyn hadn’t reached him during the past week – while en route to Norway, or on the Norwegian coast, wherever – telling him that the reports of one’s death had been greatly exaggerated and that she sent her love. Please God might Marilyn have had the sense to leave things as they were, not jump the gun: or have been unable to communicate with him, say.

  But damn it – the allegation that she was alive would still get to him on his way back. Or when he was back. She could just hear his howls of premature delight.

  Wouldn’t be fair to him. Really, wouldn’t.

  Please, not?

  So you make sure of it. Stay alive – silly bitch rather than lie here as good as giving up the ghost before anyone’s said you’ve got to!

  Escape?

  Oh, fat chance…

  A shot at it for his sake, though? Christ, for your own sake too, you idiot! You have some small stake in the matter, don’t you?

  Well. Only need a magic wand – then action on the lines of ‘with one bound she was free’. Almost giggling in the dark: not quite, helplessness wasn’t anything to laugh at, not when the inadequacy was your own. By ‘inadequacy’, meaning panic. The sense of helplessness – reality of it – was actually suffocating, claustrophobic. ‘Almost giggling’ thus a symptom of hysteria?

  Thinking of magic wands, though – pictures in mind of the wands dangling from those Gestapo females’ leather belts. Riding-crop on Pinhead’s, truncheon on the weight-lifter’s. That was who’d be bringing one’s next sumptuous repast and escorting one to the delights of the toilette. Pinhead’s day off, no doubt, the other one’s turn of duty. Might call that one ‘It’. The truncheon would be the only weapon between the two of them: on top of which It would have been having regular meals, fresh air and so forth; looked like a rhinoceros anyway, wouldn’t be anything like easy meat. In fact, far from it. You’d go for her eyes and throat, naturally – as taught at Arisaig in Scotland during that rather tough part of the SOE training course – but it might be rather like going for the eyes and throat of a medium-sized rhino.

  This iron bed, she thought suddenly, might come apart quite easily. The horizontal framework supporting the mattress would be secured at each end by two bolts, two in the vertical head section and two at the foot end. If one could unscrew the nuts on those bolts – if there were nuts on them – at the foot end which, since it was lower than the other, would be less unwieldy. As she envisaged it, she’d be standing well back from the door – having rehearsed it, got the distance and angle right – with the iron framework up over her head; all right, you’d have it resting back against the wall, might have some time to wait – then when It came through the door, let her have it.

  Then what?

  Take the truncheon, make sure It was out for a good long count, and lock It in the cell. Having taken any other keys or weapons, obviously. Up the spiral stairs and through to the outer door. Looking out for Miliciens – outside, for sure, but even inside, maybe. Not likely to be more than one or two, she guessed – night shift, and only one prisoner in the whole place… Take It’s shoes, by the way, if they were wearable: and once up at ground level – well, a toss-up absolutely, but – having reached the street, say – get to a telephone and call Leblanc.

  No need to look further ahead than that, she thought. Might work, might not. Might get shot: or beaten to death by It. What the hell – might stay here, not lift a finger and get shot anyway. In any case, better make sure of being ready: start right away, see if dismantling the bed was feasible – which it bloody well had to be – then get in some practice. If It came at 8 or thereabouts – as she should – you’d have several hours in hand. Having detached that end of the bed there’d be a slope on it of course, foot-end resting on the concrete, but you could still lie on it – rest, conserve whatever strength remained.

  Not a lot, she thought. It wasn’t a body-building diet, exactly, and conditions generally weren’t conducive to vim and vigour. But rest was rest – even on this foul pallet, from which after this length of time one was foul oneself, the back of the raincoat damp and maybe the pullover and shirt dampish inside it.

  Anyway – get cracking. Feeling for the foot-end of the pallet and pulling it up, rolling it back. Not difficult: but when she thought that was far enough and let go, it flopped slowly back again. Have to sit or kneel on the wire mesh of the bed with one’s back or a shoulder holding the thing back out of the way, while finding the bolts – or wing-nuts, whatever…

  Didn’t work.

  Awkward position, and didn’t have room. Best to get the pallet right out of the way – pull this end off the bed, swivel the horrible thing cross-wise.

  It snagged. Sodden material ripping on something – wire – underneath. So stop again, and free it. Dragging the pallet up as far as the point where broken mesh had dug itself in, then feeling under there for which way to shift it to unsnag it. Even this wasn’t as easy as it might have been, but she managed it eventually and slid it off the bed.

  That had been the easy part. She was feeling for the bolts now: bolts with nuts on them, she imagined. Might be wing-nuts…

  They were ordinary hexagonal ones. Wing-nuts had been a bit much to hope for, she’d known it. As if they’d have chosen to make it easy for people in her position who didn’t carry spanners around with them. She wrapped her hand around this one and exerted all the strength she had: aware within a couple of seconds that it was rock-solid – or rather iron-solid – had been put on by someone with a spanner and muscles like It’s.

  There were three such nuts and bolts, one at each side and one in the middle. All three would have to be removed, of course. She’d located the other two after giving up on the first one and groping along the iron flange – with no confidence at all about being able to shift any of them.

  Still no grey up there. No hurry at all therefore, really could take one’s time. Telling herself this in order to calm down, lower the pulse-rate. Pause, reflect. To be stopped in one’s tracks by just three nuts and bolts, for God’s sake, was ridiculous. But not having iron fists…

  A slipper for a wrap-around hand-protector, maybe. Its soddenness might actually help. Gritting her teeth, straining at it. On her knees, working at this first one again. Slipper compressed tightly around the sharpish, palm-bruising nut, left hand reinforcing the other – trying to. Leaning over the job, getting all the muscle she had into it: grunting with the effort.

  Damn. For a second or two she’d thought she had it moving, but that had been the slipper slipping. Face it – was not feasible. And nothing else in the cell was movable, in any way usable. In fact there wasn’t anything. Sitting back on her heels, massaging that hand, recognising that even if she’d had days in which to work on this she wouldn’t manage it.

  Other end?

  No reason it should be any different, but it might be. Might even find there were no nuts at all, or that they were loose. Nuts in fact weren’t essential; the weight of the horizontal framework, let alone a body on it, would hold it all together. Stupid therefore not at least to find out.

  It would take a bit of handling, as a weapon. Bigger – taller – probably half as heavy again as the other. You’d need to be a weight-lifter. Manage somehow, that was all – if one could get it off.

  One couldn’t. Hadn’t taken long to find that out. Three large nuts as immovable as if they’d been welded to their bolts and to the flange.

  So that was that. Nice idea, but – shaking her head in the blackness, getting the pallet back on the bed, telling herself she couldn’t give up, just had to find some other way.

  Weaponless?

  Sitting, with her head in her hands. Not taking long, deep breaths the way she usually did to slow her pulse-rate: down here, deep breathing didn’t have much going for it. Hadn’t been anything like as foul as this at the time of her previous visit.
Georges’ crowd, of course. Probably not their fault, the way they’d been kept, herded in. Although they’d had access to the toilette, for sure.

  But – yes, weaponless. Hit her hard enough and suddenly enough, taking her by surprise as she blundered in – with her hands full, or anyway one hand full: oh, a torch in the other one, of course. Hit her maybe as she turned to put the mug on that shelf.

  Shelf?

  No. Forget it. It was screwed to the wall, and one had no screwdriver. Might wrench it off – but it would be fairly light, probably just boxwood, even if swung edgeways wouldn’t have anything like the flattening effect the iron framework would have had.

  Wrench it off the wall, split it somehow, make a dagger of it?

  No. So-called dagger would break on contact, you’d have wasted time and chances of success. Weaponless was the answer. Rest now, conserve remaining strength. Be ready for it – a few hours after the first show of light up there – allow the door to open, then hit her like a – well, flat out, going for the eyes and throat, knee-jab in the gut. She’d have thumped back against the wall or door-jamb, having to protect her eyes or fight you off before she could get the truncheon up, have room to use it. She’d jab at you with the torch, maybe. Go for the truncheon though before she’s recovered from shock and whatever initial damage – claws, teeth, the mug’s rim driven hard into her face…

  Rest, meanwhile. Feet up, Rosie, lie back, relax. Think about it, how you’ll do it – then when the time comes, not think at all, just go for it, bloody fly at it, maybe screaming, going for the eyes and throat.

  * * *

  She’d woken with a jerk: then immediate, crushing recognition of having blown her chances. Cell door already opening, a vertical crack of light widening: door right back then and torch-beams lacerating the darkness, centring on her, blinding her – torch-beams plural, in the hands of men - Germans – SS – crowding in, heavy boots on concrete. Dreaming this? She was up on her elbows, creature of the darkness part-blinded—