by David Leroy
Marc’s body flew up against the right side door of the back seat. The second man then flew in, striking him. Marie then collapsed upon him and the door slammed shut. The agent in the front seat kept constant watch upon them as the driver sped through the streets in the early morning hours.
Marc kept half an eye out on where they were driving. He realized they were going down Avenue Foch and then turned down Rue de la Pompe.
“This is a side of Paris you don’t see often,” Marc mumbled.
The agent barked, “Shut up!”
The car stopped and the driver and agent pulled them out one by one, taking them up to the house. Marc could see the number “180” near the door.
Inside, a woman dressed in a long, red satin evening dress, greeted the new guests.
“Oh my lovelies, how sweet you all look. Oh, they have mistreated you so much,” she said in a sugary tone.
“House rules are still the house rules, so everyone must strip, now,” and her tone turned harsh upon the last word.
Three men then started to forcefully strip the three prisoners, and just as they finished, another knock came at the door. The woman answered it.
“Just in time for the party, sweetie,” she said, as another agent then brought in the airman from the garden.
The four of them were then tied down to plush chairs, arranged in an outward facing square in the center of the room. A man then began to play classical piano.
Marie sat in the chair directly behind Marc, and she started to cry. Then the airman started to yell, and the other man whimpered, his voice sounded muffled. The woman came to Marc, and then started to cut his hands. She used a board with razors attached.
“Patty cake, patty cake, baker’s hands,” she said sadistically, as she cut open his palms. The music filled the room with an upbeat polonaise by Chopin. Then a second man forced Marc’s hands down deep into a plate of salt. His hands felt as if they had caught fire, and the music reached a crescendo. In the midst of the pain, the notion came to Marc that the key was A-sharp.
A wet towel, stained with blood, then was placed over his face. His knees could not help but strain against the ropes. He had lost all control of his body, and it seemed to now have its own consciousness, independent of his thoughts. His legs and torso shook violently.
The man next to him gurgled and gasped as water splattered over Marc’s shoulder.
Then Marc felt the cold water pouring down upon his own face. He struggled not to breathe, but his body reacted to the water and it poured through his nose and mouth, choking off all air. He began then to choke, and his esophagus burned of acid. The bright polonaise then slipped away.
He stood naked on the side of the Lancastria. All around him he could see young men getting ready to jump, and then he noticed the one man. He was completely nude, and he stared at Marc, a small smile on his face. Marc noticed that his skin had a golden hue to it, and he appeared to be the man who was sitting next to him just a few moments before. Just then, he heard from behind him, “Bling, bring-bling”, and he turned. John was riding the bike down the side of the ship, and then right up to Marc.
He took the bike and held it up to his eyes, and it transformed into glasses.
“I can see you,” he said to Marc, “and now you can see them,” and placed the glasses upon Marc’s face.
He then touched Marc’s shoulder, guiding him to look down on the plates of the ship, and just beyond the steel surface, he could see himself in the room, in the chair with a towel over his face.
His body was now on the floor and Marie was over him. The airman was also kneeling next to him.
Marc looked back at John. John then took his right hand and placed it on Marc’s heart, and he could see the words before they came to his ears, “Go back.”
In a rush, Marc fell through the ship, and back into the front room of 180 Rue de la Pompe. The music had stopped and he was throwing up water onto the floor. Before he could see anything, the two other guards had taken Marie and the airman to one side, as if they were still being tortured.
The woman in the satin evening dress pulled him up into the chair with another man, and started to slap him around. “You have had so much fun.” Marc continued to cough up water and gasp for air at the same time, while his body shook intensely.
After a few more moments, he regained some semblance of consciousness. His mental focus reasserted itself and he began to wonder if he should look.
They piled them all into the car waiting outside, throwing their clothes into their laps, but the other man did not follow. Marc recognized his face as the same face he had seen on the side of the ship. It sickened him that they had killed the man, and the thought crossed his mind that the two naked people next to him were not people at all, but just ghostly shells of humans, less real than the dream he had of the ship.
Chapter 37
The guards took the three of them from the natural-gas-powered, black Renault into the Gestapo prison, and put them into separate cells. Marc continued to cough up water, and his throat twitched with minor spasms. A complete sense of dread began to descend upon him, as each muscle in his body shook with tremors.
Sitting up, he fell asleep just for a second, or longer, but then woke up in a panic, fearing death. The door flew open, and a guard shouted at him to get up.
Walking down the hallway, his sense of time and space completely warped. It seemed as if it took a year to get out of the cell and down to the interrogation room, yet he had no memory of the year that had just past.
“Mr. Rémy, Winoc Rémy, how are you feeling?” the agent said in a very soft tone. Marc sat up, but his mind drifted into a timeless ditch of instantaneous sleep.
He awoke to a gentle slapping on his face. Marc was startled and wondered how much time had passed. When did she get in here? Marc thought as he saw Marie sitting next to him. Marc could not shake the nagging feeling she had been there for a while.
“You are Marc Tolbert. I know you are Marc Tolbert, and so do you, so let’s just stop entertaining that myth.” The agent moved to his desk.
“And Mr. Tolbert, it says here that you arrived in France on June 19, 1939, and that you were even on a diplomatic trip to see … what is this? I am impressed. You have had quite a tour of Europe.”
“And your cell name, or code name, is ‘the Weasel,’” the agent then said with a tone of confidence.
“Oh, Marie, you shouldn’t have,” Marc slurred out the words, like mud mixed with stones.
“I am sorry … I am sorry … Please, just tell them,” Marie pleaded. “They don’t want you, but ‘R.’ They don’t want me or you, Marc … please.”
“Marie, Marie … I told you … I told you …” he said with a mixture of tears and smiles, “and you swore you would never tell.” He shocked himself with the words. Marc felt amused that he had found the courage to hold her accountable at last, but then he crashed into a despair when he looked at the board and thought of all the times he had met at the Jackson home. His courage came too late for all his friends that she had betrayed before him.
December, 1941
Paris, France
“So, who is this man who can get you papers? I did know someone but he is now gone,” Dr. Jackson asked.
“Sylvia told me about him. I helped her shut down the store, and confided in her my opportunity to die. Don’t worry. She is trustworthy. I told her I had no idea where to get papers, and she told me of him,” Marc said.
“And you knew him?” Torquette said.
“Yes. I met him in 1939 at Fontainebleau,” Marc said.
“Is he a student?” Dr. Jackson asked.
“No, he is an instructor. I took life drawing from him, and then again in Paris. In fact, he is the one who introduced Marie and me back in 1939.”
“I do not believe we know this man,” Torquette said, looking at Sumner to confirm.
“Does he have a name?” Sumner asked next.
“Yes, but when I spoke with him b
efore making my decision, he asked to keep his name in confidence. He is only known by ‘R.’”
“Do you think he could join us sometime?” Dr. Jackson asked.
“I’ll ask him, but I believe he would. He is very good with papers, and has contacts with people who can get across into the free zone.”
June, 1944
Paris, France, Fresnes Prison
“Who is ‘R’?” the Gestapo agent asked. Marc almost fell asleep. Is this the same agent? Yes, it is the same agent, Marc realized.
“Marie, how long did it take you to line this one up?” He heard his own voice, but did not recognize it.
“I didn’t do it, Marc, I swear. Just tell him, please … they don’t want us,” she pleaded in a pathetic tone of voice.
“Oh, come on, Marie, I know … you can trust me. How much did they pay you this time?” His voice echoed in his own mind, and for a moment, he questioned if his words were just thoughts, or if he’d spoken them aloud.
“Please, please, oh my God, please, I cannot believe this is happening,” she started to cry. Marc started to laugh. The agent’s eyes never once left the drama.
“Oh, Marie, I love it when you cry. But more, please … you should cry a little more for this …”
“Marc, Marc, I had to. I had to do it. Please, I love you. I want a future with you. They don’t want us. They just want ‘R,’ they will let us go if you just tell them who ‘R’ is. I had to think of us. I just wanted to be with you, please, Marc, please. I just want things to go back to the way they were before. Do this, please, for me,” she screamed out between her sobs.
“You know, it was quite prophetic that night he posed us the way he did, you with the rope, and me as Gaul.”
“Fuck you, Marc,” Marie’s voice rained down on him like a bomb. The agent’s head snapped up and looked at Marie, his eyes bright and wide.
“Fuck you! How dare you judge me! Who the hell do you think you are? You’re just a little boy. You don’t belong here. You are not a solution. You are just another part of the problem, and the only one with a rope around your fucking neck is your own self-righteous self.”
“Marie, Marie,” the agent stammered as he rose from his chair.
“I am at least helping to build a new and stronger France. A France that does not go to war with horse-drawn cannons, or leaves its cities to be bombed. We became weak because of people like you. No more. Not any more.”
The agent walked toward her as he drew his hand to his mouth. He stopped and then turned to the door.
“How fucking dare you judge me, you lying sack of shit! What are you? Who are you? At least I am fighting for something, something strong and right, a new, united and stronger Europe, free of worthless garbage—a France where horses don’t run wild in the street over the bodies of children …” Marc’s eyes rolled to the back of his head as he passed out.
June 13, 1940
Orléans, France
“Marie, don’t be long! Meet us in the town square afterward,” her mother said to her.
“I won’t. I just want to check in with my friend and make sure everything is fine,” she said. Marie walked down the narrow streets of Orleans, leaving her family to go visit her friend from the art school. Finding the apartment building, she rang the bell.
“Annette,” she called from outside.
Annette opened the door. “Marie, I am so glad to see you. Come in! What are you doing here?”
“We are going south, maybe to Bordeaux, I think. We had to leave Paris. It is all very sad,” Marie said.
“It is shameful what has overtaken France. Just shameful,” Annette said.
“I know, I am sick over it, but we need to have faith.”
“Marie, open your eyes. We have been betrayed from within. Our own government of old fools has done more for the German army than Hitler. Can’t you see this?”
“I know, but it is not just that, Annette. We trusted the British again. They drew us into this war, and now they are running back to their island.”
“It is absurd, and I, for one, look forward to the end.”
“Don’t say that, please.”
“Marie, France is going to lose. How can we not? Just look at what is happening, right here in Orléans. The government tells everyone in the district to bring in the horses. What do they do? Round them all up in the town square. Does the army ever come to get the horses? No. Who will feed these horses? Who will give them water? Look at what our country has come to? We turned our back on God, Marie. The government kicked out the church from the schools and look—rot. We are as rotten as a fallen log in the woods.”
Marie’s mother, father, little sister, and brother came into the town square. Gathered all around were horses. “Mommy, I want to pet the horses,” the little girl said.
“Papa, are they giving rides?” the son asked.
“No, we are going to the market. We need to get something to eat for the long trip,” he said, as they made their way around the square to the other side, to where tents had been set up along a side street.
“There is no petrol. Are you walking? You should stay here in Orleans with us. It is safer than the roads. At least when they bomb here, there are shelters below,” Annette continued.
People in the market looked up, as they could hear the buzz of the planes from somewhere above. No one was quite sure of the direction. People in the market started to get excited, and Marie’s mother had let go of her brother and sister for just a second, not knowing they had walked back toward the horses.
The father looked up at the sky, and then back at his wife, who was trying to buy some fruit. Just then, the planes came down on the town square and the sound of their guns spit down upon them.
“What is that?” Marie asked.
“Oh my God, it is another raid!” Annette said. “Get away from the window!”
Marie left the window crisscrossed with tape, and ran for the door.
“Why are there no sirens?” Marie asked.
“See, I told you! It is a farce. We cannot even sound the alarms for the raids.”
The father spotted his two kids, just maybe forty feet away, not even to the town square yet. He ran for them as the planes then came in over the square, shooting into the horses. They went wild and broke free of their ropes.
A bullet got her father in the chest and belly. Another bullet got her mother in the back of the head. But the horses got Marie’s little brother and sister.
Marie ran from the flat, and had just reached the end of the small street that led back to the town square. The horses ran wild down the street past her as she hugged the side of a building. Once they had passed, she ran down to the market, where she found her family, just where they said they would be waiting for her.
May, 1944
Paris, France, Fresnes Prison
“You are worse than even the Jews. Soon France will be free of you Jews, foreigners, and Communists!” When will she stop? Marc wondered as he awoke. “What are you, Marc? You are just a coward running away from home, running away from death, always running away. You talk of price—what have you lost in this war? What price have you paid? You’re just a fucking rich Yankee kid, lost in France, pretending to be someone.”
The agent opened the door and called down the hallway for the guard.
“I bet you even pretended to believe in God just to get me. You are even less than the Jews, you piece of shit.” Marc slumped in the chair in a state near delirium.
A guard appeared in the doorway. “Take her out of here,” the agent told the guard.
“I will go, don’t worry. You will get your answers,” Marie said to the agent.
“You should have left Paris when you could, Marc,” she said hatefully, “and never come back.” The door slammed shut.
“Too much Au Jour d’Hui for her, or Action Français. Français, Français seulement,” Marc said with a laugh, in a mocking voice. He took a deep breath as he looked up at the agent and then pa
ssed out cold.
The agent fell back into his chair. He ran his fingers through his hair and closed his eyes in frustration. He looked up at Marc in front of him, out cold.
“Let’s take a break. Yes, I think a break would be good. Do you mind?” he asked Marc, slumped over unconscious in the chair.
The agent then studied the cards and the board behind him. He walked back and forth in front of the desk, his eyes scanning everything he had laid out. The answer is here, he thought. Then the idea struck him. He looked back at Marc slumped over in the chair.
“I will be right back. Please, make yourself comfortable. I promise not to take too much longer,” the agent said, smiling at Marc.
In just a few moments, he returned to the room with another woman, a guard, and a typewriter. He began to talk very fast in German and the woman translated it into English. He then motioned the guard to wake Marc with a glass of water. Marc woke with a violent thrashing.
“Please try to stay awake. This has been the fourth time we have tried to move through these charges. I need you to focus,” the agent said as he pounded his fist upon the desk.
Chapter 38
“French, Français seulement,” Marc spoke up, smiling and laughing. He felt a euphoric rush of energy once Marie had left the room. He was not even sure when she had left, but eternally grateful to the guards for his rescue.
“You are an American, and therefore our conversation must be in English,” the German agent said.
“I was born in Paris. I am a citizen of France as well as America. I have been here for five years and I want to understand what you are charging me with. Can you please read the charges in French?” he said in French. He sat up, as if prepared for a birthday cake to be brought to him, for his candles to be blown out.
The agent nodded and then began reading over the charges. The translator’s French was even better than her English.
“You are charged with conspiracy against Germany, aiding and abetting the enemy, distributing false papers,” and the list went on and on and on. The details were mind-numbing to Marc as he listened to them, from his job at the hospital to his relationship with Marie. How odd to include her, he thought, and realized then they had prepared this ahead of time. I think I might have just had a nap, he thought as he lost track of the woman’s voice.
