In at the Kill

by Alexander Fullerton

  ‘Didn’t send me. As your curé and your mother’s, I came, that’s all. What were you doing in Colmar?’

  ‘Oh – staying with a cousin. For – a rest… In fact near Colmar, not right in it. At home I’ve been looking after old Mama, you see – since a house fell on me, in Rouen…’

  ‘House fell on you: I like that. Not trying to amuse, either.’ A nod… ‘You’re an actress – as well as whatever else… So – a question you would not answer, if a German asked it. Are you a very experienced agent?’

  ‘Agent?’

  ‘You said I could ask questions.’

  ‘There are questions and questions, Father.’

  ‘Well.’ The cigarette – what was left of it – waggling between his thin lips, ash scattering over one lapel. ‘I’ll try a different approach. What drives you?’

  ‘Drives me?’

  A nod. ‘Question perhaps more to your liking. I thought – less technical, more personal.’

  She drew on her cigarette. ‘Still not an easy one to answer.’

  ‘I’d have thought you’d have had it settled it in your mind from the outset. You’d have volunteered – effectively to live and work under constant threat, extreme personal danger, twenty-four hours a day?’

  ‘You make it sound –’ She checked herself: ‘I mean, it’s not always—’

  ‘Is the driving force simply patriotism?’

  ‘I love France – certainly.’ She shrugged. ‘And I hate Germans. And they have to be defeated, so—’

  ‘Hate them for what they’re doing to France?’

  ‘Yes – and to us. Well – we are France.’

  ‘You don’t hate them simply for being German – like not liking cats…’

  ‘It does come down to that, though. What they do becomes what they are.’

  ‘Except some might only be doing what they’re forced to do, they’d be shot if they didn’t?’

  ‘Would you do disgusting things to people if you were told you’d be shot if you didn’t?’

  ‘I hope not. But if I came from an entirely different background – if I hadn’t been imbued from an early age with certain ethical standards, moral precepts—’

  ‘They’re supposed to have those standards too, surely. It’s one of the things that sicken me. They actually go to church, call themselves Christians!’

  ‘They’ve had other ideas drilled into them more recently. What they’d call patriotism and don’t see as conflicting with their religion. Well, of course, they’ve accepted the doctrine of violence and their own superiority far too readily – a defect that is in their blood, maybe – in your own view, what they are, therefore… Have you seen – you personally, Rosalie, at first hand – examples of the sort of brutality – what you called disgusting things—’

  ‘Very much at first hand.’

  ‘Really.’ He was following her example, squeezing his cigarette stub into the dashboard ashtray. This had been a very luxurious automobile, in its day. Dashboard of bird’s-eye maple, for instance. Glancing at her again: ‘You’ve faced torture, you mean?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And not given way?’

  ‘Actually, not. But on one occasion – to tell you the absolute truth, if it had gone on a minute longer—’

  ‘But it didn’t, and you did not give way.’ Looking at her: she’d shaken her head. He was watching the road again: ‘You can thank God for your strength then. Be proud of it, too – and my admiration is unlimited, Rosalie – but as I say—’

  ‘I would have given way. Another few seconds.’

  ‘What was at stake? It was an interrogation, obviously—’

  ‘They wanted names and addresses, mainly.’

  ‘Which you did have?’ He saw her nod. ‘Of résistants?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who’d then have been arrested, I suppose.’

  ‘Shot, or sent to the camps. Tortured first – for other names.’

  ‘I wonder if you would have given in.’

  ‘Yes, I would have. I’m not going to tell you what they were doing—’

  ‘My guess is you might not have.’ Looking at her again: several quick glances between her and the twisting road ahead. ‘I think it’s conceivable that you wouldn’t. With those other lives at stake – don’t you think – when the moment came you might have found you couldn’t – however much you wanted to?’

  ‘No. Much as I’d like to say “yes” to that. There’s a point at which pain – and terror of even worse pain – and mutilation – unless one’s lucky enough to faint, of course—’

  ‘Ah…’

  ‘Answer me a question, Father?’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘If a German – say Gestapo, but any of them – came to confession and told you of unspeakable things he’d done—’

  ‘It would depend on the genuineness or otherwise of his contrition. Of course you realize that fewer than half of them are Catholics – besides which, they have their own military padres—’

  ‘If this one said he was very sorry and he’d never do it again, tra-la, you’d give him absolution?’

  Tight-faced, staring at the road ahead. Working his jaw-muscles, she saw, like pulses. Glancing round at her then: ‘Give me another cigarette?’

  * * *

  Over a crest, a few kilometres after passing through another village. Then a left. The sun was high and hot: downhill now, the narrow road cut like a furrow into wide-open slopes curving down to blueish woodland. Cattle were grazing: further back there’d been sheep daubed with paint. In forest again then, the heavy green meeting overhead, shutting out the sky. The road was even more twisting than it had been, with several especially sharp bends. Near the bottom of this bit, Father Gervais told her, they’d be joining a road coming from the village that he’d avoided and bringing them to Schirmeck.

  ‘Where we turn west, to the Col de Donon. Steep drop then.’

  He hadn’t been talking much, in the last few kilometres. Might still have been grappling with her question about the granting of absolution to torturers: pondering either the question itself or perhaps her brashness in challenging him with it. He had – or was supposed to have – his cast-iron certainties, and she had her – all right, prejudices. Even if, to her, they amounted to certainties. And right now, he was helping to save her life. Which wasn’t a small thing. As she’d pointed out to the two airmen, Bob and Arnold, when they’d been grousing about being cooped up for so long, complaining that they might almost as well have just hoofed it, travelling by night and hiding by day in ditches, making towards Normandy and the Allied lines – she’d pointed out to them that if they were caught by the Boches, they’d only need to show their service identity discs and they’d suffer no worse fate than being shipped off to a POW camp, whereas any French man or woman caught helping them would be put against a wall and shot, or beaten to death in the course of interrogation, or consigned to some resort such as Buchenwald or Natzweiler. Also the fact that for every escapee who made it back to England via an escape line, an average of twelve to twenty French people would knowingly have accepted that risk.

  She hadn’t told the boys in blue who or what she was. To them she was only a French woman who happened to speak perfect English.

  Father Gervais was crushing the stub of his second cigarette. He’d just shifted up another gear: they were climbing again, after that long sweep down through forest. He glanced her way, found her eyes on him and cocked an eyebrow: ‘All right?’

  ‘Yes. But one thing I’d like to say – while it’s in my mind—’

  ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘Only that I’m very conscious of the risk you’re running – for a total stranger, at that. One tends to take such things for granted, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Should be able to. We’re on the same side, after all. Now I’ve got something to say too. We have Marie’s bread and cheese in the back there, but at the present rate of progress we’ll be in Dieuze by about midday. So we’d bet
ter eat lunch quite early. All right with you?’

  ‘Perfectly all right. We did start early, didn’t we? But do you and I separate at Dieuze?’

  ‘Yes. That’s the plan.’

  * * *

  In Schirmeck there was a road-block, at the junction. Striped poles blocked off the right-hand half of the road from each direction, with two French gendarmes at each barrier and a Wehrmacht truck with helmeted soldiers in it parked opposite the turn-off.

  ‘Don’t be anxious now, Justine.’

  ‘Well, of course not…’

  Except for a familiar hollow in the gut, damp palms, accelerated pulse-rate. Just normally accelerated, not going crazy. Despite the fact she’d been through about a hundred checkpoints before this, but never with papers as flawed as Justine Quérier’s. Also, desperate to adjust the headscarf, restraining herself only with difficulty from what might seem a display of nervousness. She had discarded her sling, thank God, pushed it under the seat soon after they’d started out. Father Gervais bringing the gazo to a halt – both front windows were already wound right down – and one of the pair of gendarmes from the barrier in front of them approaching the driver’s side. Checking the registration plate on his way.

  Stooping at that open window.

  ‘Your papers, Father?’

  ‘Of course. I should mention this vehicle is borrowed, not my own.’ Extracting his and presumably the gazo’s documentation from a wallet. A smile at Rosie: ‘He’ll want to see yours too, Justine.’

  ‘That’s a fact. I will.’ A small, polite smile revealed a gap in his front teeth. He also had a little moustache that might have been pencilled on, sticking-out ears and close-cropped hair greying at the temples. There was no traffic anywhere within sight or sound, no pedestrians either. This gendarme’s partner was leaning against the wall at the corner, picking his teeth or nose, and the other pair were chatting to the Boches in the truck.

  ‘What’s the purpose of your journey, Father?’

  ‘Collecting this young lady from relations near Colmar, bringing her home to Sarrebourg. Her mother’s very ill.’ He dropped his voice. ‘In fact, dying. And this one isn’t – well – isn’t entirely—’

  Facing this way, she could only guess at his expression, but the gendarme was looking sympathetic. Father Gervais accepting his papers back. ‘Now your papers, Justine.’

  The tone you might use to a child; but the gendarme cut in with, ‘We won’t bother with those.’ Quick shake of the head, and Father Gervais looking at him in surprise; Rosie with her papers already held out in that direction, not having heard what he’d said but suspecting the scarf had shifted, might have uncovered the scar over her ear – so obviously from a bullet – might also have revealed grey hair, while Justine Quérier’s age was shown in her papers as – what, twenty-seven. Father Gervais had put his hand on hers, pushing it and the papers back on to her lap: ‘He doesn’t want to see them.’ Nodding to the gendarme then: ‘Thank you.’

  Straightening, touching the peak of his kepi. ‘Drive on, Father.’

  * * *

  From Schirmeck to the Col du Donon was about ten kilometres, all of it at that high level: the village of Donon itself then, before the nose-dive to the plain, a drop of maybe a thousand metres in what seemed like no time at all. Several more sharp turns at the bottom put them on the road to the next village on Luc’s list – Abreschviller.

  ‘Sounds German.’

  ‘Not unusual, in these parts. But long before that, there’s a bridge over a river—’

  ‘The Meurthe?’

  ‘No. The Meurthe is – back that way. About twenty-five kilometres, I’d guess, to its nearest point. This is quite a small river – where the bridge is, anyway. May I think be a tributary of the Sarre. As in Sarrebourg?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Does the Meurthe mean something to you?’

  ‘I knew it was – hereabouts, that’s all.’

  Where the train had stopped and she’d made her short dash, where Lise might or might not have gone into the river. Somewhere – Rosie had worked it out with Thérèse – on the Nancy side of Baccarat, probably. But that question about Lise: she’d lived with it for a month, almost dreaded having an answer before much longer.

  Because it wouldn’t be a good answer.

  Father Gervais continuing, ‘Anyway – near that bridge might be a good place to stop and have our snack. And I can replenish with charcoal.’

  There was a sack of it, he’d mentioned, in the boot. Into which, incidentally, the gendarme hadn’t even glanced. Might have been full of Sten-guns – anything. Zeal fading, maybe, with Allied armies breaking out of Normandy? She touched bird’s-eye maple, asked, ‘How far to Dieuze?’

  ‘From Abreschviller –’ consulting his notes – ‘on the small roads we’ll be using – about forty kilometres. From here – say fifty. Hour and a half, maybe.’

  ‘And you remain there, do you – in Dieuze?’

  ‘No. You do.’ Quick smile: ‘Only as a staging-point, don’t worry.’

  * * *

  Heading near enough due north now, she guessed. They’d stopped at the bridge, got the bread and farmhouse cheese out and made manageable sandwiches of it, he’d topped up the charcoal burner, they’d each made a short promenade – in opposite directions – through the wood. Then got started again, eating as they drove.

  Abreschviller – after about twenty kilometres. Then Lorquin: and over a canal, taking a back road into Sarrebourg – which wasn’t as large a place as she’d expected – turning left in the centre of it, over the river Sarre and then out northwestward, another winding lane that seemed to go on for ever. Only farm traffic on it. He was staying clear of main roads of course, where checkpoints were more likely: was well aware – admitted it now, hadn’t earlier – that Justine Quérier’s papers wouldn’t have stood up to very close inspection.

  ‘But I keep them when you leave me in Dieuze?’

  ‘Might as well. Luc’ll get them back to me. By the way, I should apologise for giving that gendarme the impression that you might be brain-damaged?’

  ‘Perfectly all right. Might adopt the idea myself, in fact. As long as I’m looking as I am, anyway.’

  ‘As you are?’ Glancing at her curiously. ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘All scars. And tufty grey hair. Sort of – demented.’

  ‘But that’s nonsense. And I assure you, the scars aren’t as noticeable as you may imagine. And since your hair’s covered by the scarf – you dyed it grey, Marie mentioned…’

  He was looking at her mouth: and quickly away then, at the road ahead. Men did tend to focus on her mouth; Ben had referred to it once as her I’ll-eat-you-alive mouth. But in her present state – and from a priest?

  Marie might have told him that she was sensitive about her changed appearance. Morale-building exercise? Imagining that strange-looking woman murmuring to him, Look, Father, if you get a chance…

  Wouldn’t put it past either of them.

  Crossroads, finally, at a place called Espérance; they were turning left, westward, having been on that road from Sarrebourg for about twenty kilometres; it would be another ten from this point to Dieuze, he said. She put her head back, closed her eyes, thinking about Michel and Luc and the next stage, getting in touch at last with ‘F’ Section. Which would lead to Ben hearing she was alive – probably. If he’d been given reason to believe she might be dead… In any case a huge improvement would be that one way or another she’d be on the move, at last. A month had been far too long to be helpless, making virtually no decisions for herself. Not given to self-analysis, she hadn’t appreciated until now how much she needed to have the reins in her own hands – how she always had, until just recently.

  Well – for quite some time. Since Johnny had been killed, and meeting Ben, and joining SOE…

  ‘Rosalie?’

  Michel’s voice…

  ‘Uh?’

  Stirring: as a front wheel thumped jarringly
through a pot-hole. Not Michel’s voice, nothing like it. Father Gervais’s – telling her, ‘Dieuze. We’re here. Wake up, Rosalie!’

  ‘I was dreaming…’

  ‘I know you were.’

  But how could this be Dieuze already, when only a few minutes ago – or so it seemed—

  ‘River down there is the Seille. Rises near here, flows right up through Metz, in fact it joins in with the Moselle there… But I’ve turned off the road we were on, d’you see – that one continues west to Nancy. And here now, around this corner – oh, hold on…’

  Two Feldgendarmes, Boche military police, watched the gazo as it swung around the bend. Field uniforms, boots, caps not helmets, slung Schmeisser submachine guns. Watching all and any passing traffic, she supposed: or just sunning themselves, browning their pink-pig faces. Or even – for heaven’s sake – just waiting to cross the road. Out of sight now; Father Gervais muttering something to himself, perhaps a prayer of thanks. There was a church on a rise, rather isolated on this edge of the village – southern edge, the position of the sun told her – and below the road on the other side, the left, a view of the continuance of the river winding through pasture where cattle grazed. It looked cool down there.

  She hadn’t realized the church was their destination until they were pulling up at the gate in the iron railings.

  ‘You have that basket, haven’t you? I’ll bring it: you can have it in the pew beside you. All right?’

  ‘If that fits into the programme…’

  ‘We’re a little early, that’s all.’

  ‘This is your church, is it?’

  ‘No.’ He’d got out: she did the same; he took her basket out of the boot and joined her on the pavement. Glancing back towards that corner, but the Feldgendarmes hadn’t come this way. Answering her question: ‘No – I’m based in Sarrebourg. The priest here – he knows what we’re doing, there’s no problem – is Father Matthieu. Listen: you’ll be picked up either by Luc or one of his colleagues, who’ll know you as Justine Quérier. You’re to be in the seventh pew from the back, in the right-hand section. Your mother, as you know, is very seriously ill; it would be appropriate if you were kneeling. I – Father Gervais, from Sarrebourg – have arranged for you to be met here and taken to her. In Metz, by the way.’