by Larry Loftis
“You are not the sort of person who would wear dirty clothes,” he said. “Do let me have one of your blouses and I will get it washed for you.”
Henri’s words seemed sincere but Odette remained cautious. No favors. She shook her head.
It was a gentle rebuff and Henri took it in stride. He was forced to arrest her, he said, to save her from the clutches of the Gestapo.
“I remember how you told me that you arrested Marsac for the same altruistic motive. The number of persons you claim to have ‘saved’ from the Gestapo would fill a landing at Fresnes. Abwehr or Gestapo, steel trap or foxhound, the end appears to be much the same.”
Henri leaned forward. “Yes, but there is no need for you to stay here, Lise.”
“No?”
“No, Lise. It is in my power to get you out of Fresnes, to restore to you a life of human dignity.” He fingered a paper and brooded over it several moments.
“I see that you spent a week in jail at Annecy and were interrogated by the O.V.R.A., by the Italian Secret Police. You told them nothing. Then you were taken to Grenoble and to Turin where you spent a night in a cell with two prostitutes. After Turin came Nice for ten days, Marseille, Toulon and now Fresnes. It has not been a pretty grand tour, and it is time it came to an end.”
Odette said nothing. This was like negotiating with a psychiatrist. If Henri really wanted to save her from the Gestapo, and now from the indignities of prison, he didn’t have to arrest her. And if he did—simply to deceive the Gestapo watchdogs—he could have offered the release in Annecy that he was now offering in Paris. And what of Peter and Marsac? Was Henri’s altruism reserved only for young, attractive women?
“Does the possibility of freedom amuse you?” he asked.
Odette frowned. Henri’s every word was a shiny lure, flashed and flaunted, hooks tucked neatly under the cloak of liberty.
“I was wondering what bargain you were going to suggest,” she said. “I am afraid that I can’t offer either a radio set or a bomber pick-up from here.”
“I have no bargain to offer. Here are some facts. Here in Fresnes you are under the name of ‘Madame Chambrun.’ It is not your real name. You told the Italians that you and Raoul were married and that your real name was Mrs. Peter Churchill. That is also untrue. I know a great deal about you, far more than you think. I know that you are the mother of three small daughters, that you are a member of the French Section of the War Office, that your headquarters are in Baker Street, London, and that your chief is Colonel Maurice Buckmaster, a tall, alert man, clean shaven, educated at Eton, speaking perfect French and good German.”
Odette remained impassive, Henri’s intel duly noted.
“You are a mother,” he went on, “and your duty in this chaotic world is to your children. It is not to a collection of amateur spies and saboteurs from the French Section of the War Office. Do you really think for one moment that your friends Arnaud and Roger—even your so-called husband Peter Churchill—would do as much for you as you seem to be ready to do for them?”
“Yes, I do. But the point is unimportant. I do not barter loyalty against loyalty. I am no shopkeeper, Monsieur, and I sell nothing by the pound. If these ‘amateur spies and saboteurs,’ as you call them, were indeed prepared to betray me—which I don’t believe—that would not influence my decision in any way. I am only responsible to my own conscience.”
Henri paused, and then said: “You told me in St. Jorioz at our first meeting that you cared for music. I heard, the night before last, Mozart’s divertissements for string quartet and two horns. It was quite enchanting. It would give me great pleasure to introduce you to some of the almost unknown masterpieces of Mozart. At his best, he is exquisite, at his laziest, he is always lively and delicate and charming. There is a symphony concert in about a fortnight.”
Odette knew that Henri wanted an answer so she didn’t give one.
He collected his dossier and stood. “It still grieves me to see you here, Lise. I shall visit you again—very soon.”
The guard returned Odette to her cell and she pondered what had just happened.
Symphony or isolation? Mozart or bastille?
Only in Paris.
In the morning a guard brought the Fresnes version of coffee—brown water—and later a bowl of thin soup and small piece of bread. It was insufficient for basic sustenance and as Odette caught glimpses of other prisoners, she noticed one thing in common: they were all starving.
* * *
TWO GUARDS, ONE GERMAN Shepherd. Thirty-foot wall.
It was possible, Peter thought, peering from the broken pane in his cell. Difficult, perhaps suicide, but possible.
Fresnes was indeed a fortress. One F Section agent had tried to escape and had come surprisingly close. Henri Peulevé, organizer of the AUTHOR circuit, had just returned from an interrogation at Avenue Foch and seized upon a rare opportunity. A group of visitors was leaving the prison just as he was entering and he managed to mix in with the crowd. When he came to the main gate, he handed the sentry a blank piece of paper instead of the visitor’s pass and ran. The guard sounded the alarm and Peulevé was shot in the leg and recaptured. He was returned to his cell and left without medical attention.
He dug the bullet out with a spoon.
Just then Peter heard someone at his door and he stepped away from the window. The colonel came in and offered Peter a cigarette and sat on the bed.
“What would you say to the idea of being exchanged for Rudolf Hess?”
Peter laughed. “A wonderful idea, Henri.”
“It seems reasonable to suppose that Winston Churchill would be glad to give up a person of so little real importance to get his nephew back.”
Peter expressed doubt that the prime minister would go for it based on the distance of the relationship, to which Henri replied, “Don’t forget that the closer your relationship with Winston Churchill, the further your distance from the firing squad.”
Well, well, well. Odette’s plan had worked after all.
Peter said it was all right by him if Henri could get it past the Gestapo.
“I’m sorry to see you in this plight, Pierre. Now that I’ve captured you I should like to do everything possible for your comfort. I was a prisoner in similar circumstances during the ’14–’18 war and the British treated me very decently.”
Henri’s concern seemed sincere, and he may have been working behind the scenes to ease Peter’s and Odette’s discomfort. It was not uncommon at Fresnes for prisoners in solitary confinement to be manacled and chained by their feet in their cells. Thankfully, they were spared such treatment.
“You’ll be interrogated fairly soon,” Henri added in closing, “but in the meantime what can I do for you?”
“Arrange for me to meet Odette as often as you can.”
“That will be a little difficult but I shall manage it somehow, and you shall see her next time I come.” Henri tossed a pack of High Life cigarettes on the bed and stood.
After Henri left, Peter considered the meeting for several minutes. The German was being awfully nice.
* * *
THE FOLLOWING DAY A guard came by and escorted Odette again to the interrogation room. Charming Henri stood and again offered a cigarette. This time she took it and Henri lit it. Puffing once, she stubbed it out.
He asked why she did that and she said it was for a friend.
“But how do you give it to a friend if you are in solitary confinement?”
She slipped the cigarette into her pocket. “I have nothing to say.”
Henri had hoped for a basic level of trust by this time but respected Lise’s zipper-lipped approach to unnecessary disclosures. “I have been to see Peter Churchill,” he said. “He is in cell number 220, in the Second Division.”
“I know.”
“How do you know? You have only been here for three days, and it is impossible for you to know.”
Odette shrugged.
Henri told her that Pet
er was well and sent his love, and that Henri was working on negotiating a trade: Peter for someone in England. But the reason he came by, he said, was to once again urge her to leave with him. “If you choose to stay here in Fresnes,” he said, “the Gestapo will send for you. They want to know the whereabouts of your wireless operator Arnaud and of the British officer called Roger . . . They know that you have this information and I frankly fear for you if you go to number 84 Avenue Foch. They are not excessively scrupulous in their methods, Lise.”
84 Avenue Foch.
Some returned; some didn’t. Of those who did, some retained a dram of dignity; others came back a shell of their former selves—physically, mentally, emotionally. Everyone has a breaking point and the Gestapo were professionals. The weak could be broken through hunger, hence the Fresnes starvation. Simpletons could be broken psychologically, repetition-to-attrition the favored technique.
We know you are a spy. Who is your contact?
Searing light, heat.
Your so-called friend betrayed you! Who is your contact?
Table slamming, barking.
No one can help you now, don’t you understand? Who is your contact?
Good cop, bad cop.
Who is your contact?
With SOE operatives, however, this rarely worked due to extensive training and practice. Beatings were usually stage one for the difficult cases. Sorry, but you brought this on yourself. Are you ready to talk now? Stage two brought a variety of options: sodium thiopental, knife, cigarette, electrical shock, wet canvas. “Whatever happens to amuse the Gestapo.”
Odette was unmoved. “Tell me, Henri, are you about to save me from the Gestapo again?”
He said he was.
“I am not sure which role I admire most—that of international airborne peacemaker or Teutonic St. George.”27
Henri ignored the sarcasm. “If you have to go to the Gestapo, you will regret it. I can get you out of here, and I am prepared to do so—without onerous conditions attached. I am a reasonable judge of character and I know that I would be wasting my time in asking you either to give away your friends or to work for me.”
“Then why do you want to get me out?”
“I don’t want you to have to go to the Gestapo, Lise.”
* * *
27. Saint George of Lydda was a Greek-born soldier serving in Emperor Diocletian’s royal guard. Sentenced to death and martyred for refusing to recant his Christian faith, George became a venerated saint in the Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, and Lutheran traditions.
CHAPTER 12
TICK, TICK
The silence hung.
“Why don’t you want to leave this place?” Henri asked, frustration rising.
It wasn’t that simple, Odette said. She wasn’t comfortable leaving the prison under his protection and trying to keep her silence and self-respect, while others languished in their cells. She would stay.
“I impose no conditions, Lise.”
“No, but I do—on myself. Do you think I could ever go back to England and look my friends in the face and say, ‘I was captured but they let me out again and I had a fine war—under the benevolent wing of the Abwehr or the Gestapo’?” She stood. “You will forgive me if I ask that this interview now come to an end.”
He asked if she was hungry and she said, yes.
“I could order you extra food.”
Did other women receive extra?
“Some,” Henri said. “Those who work for us do, the Kahlfaktors, the women who push the food trolley round and that sort of thing.”
Odette said she would pass.
Henri asked if there was anything he could do for her and Odette said there were notices in German on her door; what did they say?
They walked back to her cell and Henri began reading: “That one means that you are ‘grand secret’—most secret. Then these say ‘no books,’ ‘no showers,’ ‘no parcels,’ ‘no exercise,’ ‘no favors’ and that sort of thing.” They also said that she was to have no contact with anyone, that her door was never to be left open, and that her food must be inserted through the trap door.
Henri left and Odette returned to her favorless secret life.
* * *
MEANWHILE, PETER LANGUISHED IN his cell. Boredom and the pangs of hunger were driving him mad. Things that he had always taken for granted—food, drink, cigarettes—were now precious luxuries. He measured his cell: fourteen by eight. He asked a guard when he could visit the exercise yard and the answer was sometimes once a week, sometimes once a month, depending on the mood of the guard on duty at the time.
That evening he conjured up thoughts of visiting Odette in her cell, projecting that he was there. For an hour he imagined conversation with her. He could see her face clearly and happily received the waves of strength she radiated. Her fortitude, he thought, was enough for two.
* * *
A FEW DAYS LATER Henri escorted Peter to the interrogation room for another visit. While they smoked, Henri warned that Peter’s interrogation with the Gestapo was coming, and that they were putting their best man on him. It was a kind gesture and Peter knew he’d have to make his answers and rebuttals—and red herrings when possible—pick-proof. Henri also said that Berlin had forwarded the exchange proposal to London.
The conversation came to an end and Peter asked if he could see Odette. To arrange it would have been a direct violation of the Gestapo’s orders and if they found out that Henri had done so, there would be significant repercussions. Nonetheless, he agreed, quietly telling a guard that he needed to interrogate Odette.
Moments later she was at the door, immaculate from head to foot, Peter thought. She was wearing her charcoal suit, a spotless blouse, silk stockings, and her square-toed shoes. Her thick brunette hair framed her slim neck and rested peacefully on her shoulders. She looked beautiful.
He jumped up to embrace her and for several moments they held each other. As they did, Henri was polite enough to move to the window to give them privacy.
Peter looked awful, Odette thought. Either he had been tortured or he was still suffering from his injuries at Annecy. Peter, in turn, was worried about Odette, telling her that she looked pale. Odette suggested that perhaps they should discuss other things.
Henri was gracious, giving them endless time to talk. After an hour or so he joined the conversation, almost as a friend, telling them again that he had been a POW in the first war and that the British had treated him very well. He was sorry, he said to Odette, that the Gestapo would allow her no books or exercise, and asked if he could do anything else for her.
From what Odette could tell, he was sincere. Henri was, for the moment, truly a Teutonic St. George. And yet she and Peter could never relax because Henri was cunning enough—as Marsac had learned—to play any part needed to extract information or gain advantage.
She said there was not, and Henri indicated that it was time for them to return to their cells. The “Churchills” parted with sweet sorrow, but the two-hour interlude was a precious milestone, Peter thought, that he could relive in the quiet solitude of the dark days to come.
* * *
IN HIS CELL PETER considered Henri’s warning about the interrogator. It would all come down to one interview—a tribunal, the Germans liked to call it. Whether he lived or died, was tortured, or would ever see Odette again, would hinge on that meeting. What the Italians had done to him after the escape attempt was nothing; those were beatings, somewhat deserved, by amateurs who would later shake his hand when he left. The Gestapo were intellectual and ruthless surgeons.
It was bad enough that he was up against their best, but they now had countless sources: reports from Henri, the Italians, Marsac, Roger Bardet, Carte’s family, and others in or around the SPINDLE network. The interrogator would ask questions to which he already had answers, and he would bluff about facts he thought might be accurate but needed Peter’s confirmation.
Torture was a distinct possibility, if not certai
nty. Worse, the Gestapo had the ultimate trump card: Odette. What would he do if they threatened to torture her? His rage would take over and two bullets later the unmarked van would take delivery through the back.
On the other hand, they could simply execute him as a spy. Peter had committed the crime and the punishment was established by international law. He was Dostoyevsky’s Rodion Romanovitch: guilty as charged, clinging to a cross supplied by the woman he loved, and about to pass from one world to the next.
He tried to think of historical figures who had gone through similar ordeals. The Apostle Paul, he remembered vaguely, had undergone a multitude of trials but that provided little relief; Peter couldn’t remember the details and wasn’t a religious man anyway. Yet with death at the door, he welcomed any and all spiritual enlightenment.
It was time to invoke God’s help. Up to this point he had always seen himself as a self-sufficient atheist. Cambridge man. Hockey star. Diplomat. Commando. The feeble could bolster themselves with prayers to the Almighty, but such weakness was not for him. Imprisonment and impending death, however, changed that. He had joined the ranks of frail and mortal humanity.
He gave thanks to the Lord for the lesson and tried to work through his helplessness and despondency. Though the thought of God as a person was beyond him, he considered and admired the life of Jesus. Christ’s voluntary sacrifice, his human temptations, his cry “Take away this cup from me” suddenly took on real meaning for the first time. Surely this was a man who had passed through it all and faced it well, Peter thought. Surely this was a hero one could worship with admiration, a Deity who would listen to one’s prayers with understanding, for had he not passed that way himself?
Peter had never been a man of prayer, but this was as good a time as any to start. “God give me strength,” he prayed, “courage, patience, and good judgment.”
