Nell and the Girls

by Jeanne Gask

  ‘No, no . . . it’s not like that! It’s not like that at all, you liar!’ she would yell, ‘Our boys are going to win this war! See if they don’t . . .’

  Joyce was tried and hanged by the British at the end of the war.

  Jeanne’s place was by the radio. Being the smallest, she was squeezed between the table and the sideboard, and the all-important radio was by her on the sideboard. Sometimes, as the strokes of Big Ben reverberated down the street, they all shouted, ‘Jeanne . . .!’ and she hastily turned the volume down. There were heavy penalties for being caught listening to the BBC.

  These broadcasts were their daily treat. They hung on to every word. First, there was a short burst of Handel’s Water Music, then the V-sign was hammered out in Morse code: dot-dot-dot-dash, dot-dot-dot-dash. Then, ‘This is London. The French speak to the French.’ It never failed to send a shiver down their spines each time.

  Then came the news. Everyone in France was listening. This was the real news. They found out how the war was progressing in North Africa, or which German towns had been bombed during the night, and how many German or Allied planes had been shot down. There was absolute silence broken only by the occasional cheer. Jeanne wasn’t allowed to speak until the news was over.

  There would follow five or ten minutes of coded messages for the Resistance. These were entertaining and never failed to make them laugh. A solemn voice would say clearly, ‘Mimi loves her little Choo choo. I repeat, Mimi loves her little Choo choo’ Or, ‘The nightingale flies backwards. I repeat, the nightingale flies backwards.’

  ‘What does it all mean?’ Jeanne wanted to know.

  ‘Well,’ Marie explained, ‘they’re coded messages. “Mimi loves her little Choo choo” could mean “We’re dropping ammunition at twelve o’clock midnight tomorrow at the pre-arranged spot in the Douai area. Be ready”. And “The nightingale flies backwards” might mean “A plane will be picking up the four stranded Allied airmen from Soissons tomorrow at 2am. Be ready”.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Jeanne. ‘They’ve already agreed what the messages mean.’

  ‘Yes, that’s right. But, you know, the Resistance are doing dangerous work. If they’re caught, they’ll be shot. They are very brave people.’

  When the radio was switched off, Jeanne automatically turned the tuning knob. It was a reflex action, everyone did it. It wouldn’t have done for a suspicious German patrol to find the dial tuned to London.

  Listening to Radio Budapest or Bucharest in the evenings, Nell was very keen on a song that was played as the station signed off. She wrote to ask the name of the song and the answer came, Lily Marlene, sung in German by a singer called Lala Anderson. Soon, all the German soldiers were whistling it, and then the song was translated into French and played on the French radio. When the Allies turned up some time later, they sang it in English and claimed it as their song. Nell wondered how on earth the song could have changed sides!

  Next door at number ten lived half a dozen German men. They were civilians, not fit enough to serve in the army and who had been sent over to France to work in factories. Nell never found out what they did exactly and didn’t want to get involved anyway. The one called Frantz would sit at his bedroom window in the evening and sing and yodel, no doubt longing for his Tyrolean mountains. The good-looking one was Günther, all blond hair and blue eyes – a typical Arian. Hitler would have been proud of him!

  Any summer evening a rabble of French kids would stand in the street and call out ‘Brot, brot!’ begging for bread. Very occasionally a month-old army issue loaf would fly out of the window and bounce off the pavement right among them. Off they would run down the street fighting and arguing for possession. The next evening, a new ragged crowd turned up wanting ‘brot’ and the whole pantomime started all over again.

  One evening there was a real commotion outside number ten. A middle-aged Frenchman was shouting and arguing with Günther. He had to be restrained or he would have punched him. The man’s daughter’s name was mentioned and Nell put two and two together. Well, she thought, the young man might not be fit enough to fight on the Russian front, but at least there was nothing wrong with his male attributes!

  11. Holiday Days

  ‘I’ve got a surprise for you two.’ Nell was leaning over the table as Irene and Jeanne worked at their homework.

  ‘What sort of a surprise? Is it a good surprise or a bad surprise?’ Jeanne wanted to know. She’d rather not have been told if it was a bad one.

  Nell was bursting with pleasure. ‘It’s wonderful news. Madame Richemont down at the church says you two can go on holiday to a Protestant children’s camp. And it won’t cost a bean,’ she added gleefully.

  Jeanne was doubtful. ‘Is it far?’

  Nell looked at her eleven-year-old and sobered up. Of course, in the two years they had been in Cambrai they’d never left the town, not even for a day. No wonder Jeanne was feeling insecure. ‘Oh no, it’s not far at all. It’s near Avesnes-sur-Helpe. It sounds wonderful. There’s swimming in the river, and there’ll be good food, and you’ll make lots of new friends, and . . . and . . . you’ll see, you’ll love it!’ she added lamely. ‘Oh, I nearly forgot, Pere Lacheret’s running it. He’ll be there the whole time.’

  Jeanne’s face lit up. ‘Will he? Will he really? Oh well, that’s all right then.’ Pere Lacheret was her hero.

  Irene said sensibly, ‘But I thought we weren’t allowed to leave the town? Do you have to ask the Germans permission before we go?’

  ‘Oh, they won’t miss you for two weeks,’ Nell said airily. ‘They’re far too busy fighting their stupid war.’

  So it was settled. Irene and Jeanne were to have a holiday, just as they used to before the war.

  The Protestant children’s camp turned out to be a beautiful old house on the edge of a forest. It had been a French king’s hunting lodge and still bore traces of its former splendour. The large reception rooms with huge fireplaces and ornate ceilings were now crammed with long trestle tables and benches and used as dining-rooms for the children. Not an inch was wasted. Up the handsome sweep of the staircase, the once opulent bedrooms were stuffed with bunk beds, packing in as many small bodies as was possible.

  The French windows gave out onto a magnificent stone balcony, which led down stone steps on either side into a once splendid garden – now neglected. Jeanne tried to imagine the elegant, posing, crinolined ladies sedately taking the air and awaiting the return of their men in the hunting party.

  But now the garden was filled with excited children playing games and shouting and yelling at each other, Jeanne shouting and yelling the loudest, her ringing voice heard above all the others. She was having a wonderful time. Here she had space to run, scream and be almost as naughty as she wished.

  Recalling the holiday later, she remembered above all, the singing. Whatever they were doing, wherever they went, they sang. They were divided into groups, taking long rambles into the forest, singing. They learned to follow boar tracks and do bird watching. Deep in the forest, they even came upon charcoal-burners, who stopped their work to explain their ancient craft to the children. They also hunted other groups, using Red Indian tracking signs. They were taken to the river, singing, in a crocodile. The neglected pre-war inland beach, now deserted, still had a diving board and two dilapidated pedalos, badly in need of a coat of paint, moored by the water’s edge. There was nobody there. The little resort was waiting patiently for better days.

  Jeanne enjoyed swimming in the cool river, fighting against the flow of the strong current. Swallows skimmed the surface right in front of her. She even saw a kingfisher on the riverbank. He didn’t move as she swam past him, but he had seen her, his eye following her progress up the river. Then, when her arms and legs were tired, she turned towards the beach and let the current take her, resting her tired limbs. This was so different, so peaceful, after the overcrowded, noisy swimming pool back in Cambrai.

  They returned to the house in the evenings, raven
ously hungry, and after the meal there was more singing. One of the leaders, Poulain (Foal), stood on the ornate carved mantelpiece and divided the children into groups where they sat and taught them canons and part-songs. They nearly sang the roof off! When they went up to bed, they copied out the words of the songs they had learned into notebooks, each one repeating and remembering the words, and then they fell asleep, exhausted.

  One afternoon, when the weather was not good enough to go swimming, the girls were taken to the lawn at the front of the house where one of the leaders taught them some exercises, which they followed more or less enthusiastically. Suddenly the peace was disturbed by a commotion, someone came running up. ‘It’s Chevreuil (Deer), he’s fallen out of the tree!’

  Chevreuil was everyone’s favourite. Charming, delightful, funny, he was very popular among the leaders as well as the campers. He had the habit in his free time of climbing up one of the trees with a book, and would settle himself there comfortably for a quiet read.

  They all ran round to the back of the house. Chevreuil lay moaning quietly covered in nettle stings. The older girls cried, powerless to help their hero. A note was handed to Irene who was a trustee. She was told to run for the doctor as fast as possible.

  When she arrived, out of breath, the Doctor’s wife read the note and gave a little smirk. ‘All right, little one . . . Monsieur le Docteur will come as soon as he’s free.’ Funny woman, Irene thought as she ran back, wondering why she had smirked.

  When she got back, Chevreuil’s head had been bandaged in the approved criss-cross pattern. His left arm had been put in a sling, and they were now gently putting his right leg in a splint made of two lengths of wood and tied on with rags. The girls watched intently in silence as someone brought an old door from one of the outhouses. Chevreuil was lifted lovingly onto it and carried up the steps and they disappeared indoors. The girls hung around, not wanting to do anything except wait for news.

  Suddenly, after twenty minutes, the French windows of the sitting room were flung open and Chevreuil stood tall, bandages falling off him. ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘I’m better.’ It had all been a hoax – a lesson in first aid! Everyone laughed and peace and joy was restored.

  On the last evening, they had a campfire. The children were again divided into groups, and each group entertained the others. Jeanne’s group were ‘blacked-up’ as New Caledonian natives, sitting one behind the other to paddle a pretend canoe. They looked frighteningly fierce as they sung a native rowing song. Pere Lacheret was unrecognisable. He was bare to the waist, hair matted and his neck hung with beads. Most frighteningly fierce of all, he gnawed at a huge beef bone!

  Irene’s group danced a Spanish folk dance, wearing long skirts borrowed from heaven-knows where, and playing castanets.

  The next morning, everyone said a tearful goodbye, promising lifelong friendship and to write often, and Irene and Jeanne returned to their dull, claustrophobic life in Cambrai. Irene was asked to return to the camp as a helper – lucky thing. She had another fortnight there, looking after the younger children.

  Jeanne and her best friend Nicole sat by the swimming pool back in Cambrai. It was early August.

  Nicole said, ‘It’s the feast of the Virgin Mary soon, the fifteenth of August.’

  Jeanne replied absently, ‘Oh yes.’ She was watching a girl being thrown into the pool by two boys; one was holding her by the feet, the other by the hands. The girl couldn’t free herself, try as she might. But at the very last second she managed to grab hold of one of the boys’ ankles, and he went in with her, splashing into the pool on top of her. Jeanne laughed. She looked forward to being old enough to play such games.

  Nicole went on, ‘And there’ll be a procession in the streets, and we’ll follow a statue of the Virgin Mary. And we’ll all be wearing long blue dresses, and we’ll have flowers in our hair.’

  Jeanne heard her for the first time. ‘What? You’ll be in the street and you’ll be wearing a long blue dress? Protestants don’t do things like that, they say it’s . . .’ She searched for the right word. ‘Idol . . . idolaters. . . or some word like that. Anyway,’ she said dismissively, ‘we don’t believe in things like that.’ She added ruefully, ‘It’s a shame though. I’d love to wear a long blue dress . . .’

  ‘Why don’t you come too?’ Nicole goaded. ‘Nobody would be any the wiser. They’ve got loads of dresses to spare, and they never count us —’

  ‘Oh no, I couldn’t possibly. I just couldn’t . . .’ Jeanne fell silent. What harm could there be? Just for once? She said quietly, ‘Did you say you wear flowers in your hair?’

  ‘Yes, and you carry a basket of flowers too. Come on, it’ll be fun!’

  It was the basket of flowers that did it – Jeanne could just see herself going through the streets of the town in a beautiful long dress and carrying a basket of flowers. ‘Oh, all right then,’ she said.

  The morning of the 15th of August found her at a nearby convent. A nun looked her over. ‘There’s not much of you, is there? Try this one on, we’ll see how it fits.’

  The lovely pale-blue dress was made of shiny material. It slid onto Jeanne’s small frame, landing just an inch above her horrid old shoes. The nun looked at her approvingly, combed her short, fair hair, placed a diadem of paper flowers on her head and handed her a basket of similar flowers.

  ‘Yes, that’ll do. Now off you go, dear, and join the others in the yard.’ Luckily, Nicole was already there, waiting for her in an identical blue dress. There were about thirty girls, all similarly dressed, chattering and giggling. At the appointed time, they were guided out of the convent gates and joined, what seemed to Jeanne, hundreds of girls all in the same long blue shiny dresses, with diadems of paper flowers on their heads, and carrying baskets of flowers. They followed the statue of the Virgin Mary, carried through the streets on a plinth by six strong men, singing, ‘Ave, Ave, Ave Maria, Ave, Ave, Ave Maria’.

  Jeanne felt wonderful in her long dress. This must be how the lovely ladies in the films feel all the time, she thought. No wonder the incredibly handsome men sing to them and take them in their arms and kiss them.

  The procession came to a halt and someone blessed them. Jeanne didn’t understand what was going on as it was in Latin. Fortunately, she had Nicole to guide her. Nicole whispered the responses to her and told her when to cross herself and when to genuflect. Jeanne did as she was told although she thought it was all quite unnecessary, a load of nonsense.

  Suddenly, she froze. ‘Nicole, there’s Suzanne, my group leader from church. She mustn’t see me . . . she just mustn’t!’ As luck would have it, Jeanne was standing right beside a parked car. She quickly bobbed behind it and crouched down, holding her skirts up so as not to dirty them.

  It was too late. The procession had broken up. Suzanne bore down on her, and the wrath of Calvinist Protestantism fell about Jeanne’s shoulders. ‘It’s all right, if you want to join the Catholics, we can do without you. It’s entirely up to you . . . we only want good Protestants . . .’ And on, and on, and on she went . . .

  How could Jeanne explain that all she had wanted to do, for once in her life, was to wear a lovely blue dress that went right down to the ground, and to carry a basket full of paper flowers?

  12. Friendship Days

  Jeanne was sauntering along the pavement minding her own business, when a voice shouted at her from above. ‘Hey, kid, get me some fags!’

  A shower of coins fell at Jeanne’s feet. She picked up the money and bought the cigarettes in the café nearby. She then went up the stairs at the side of the café and found herself in a beautiful room. There were things such as she had never seen: two deep red velvet sofas facing each other, a doll sitting on the end of one of them, her skirts spread out. Mirrors, pictures everywhere, it really was a most beautiful room. The woman was sitting in the window wearing a sort of Chinese-looking dressing gown and her hair was beautifully done just like the ladies in the films. And there was a wonderful smell
in the room.

  Jeanne gave the ‘fags’ to the woman, who gave her a 50 centime tip. As Jeanne turn to go, she spotted a large photo of a German officer on a side table with the dedication: To my darling Mimi, love forever from your Fritz. Jeanne froze, then turned around to give the woman a horrified look. She scampered down the stairs in a hurry with the woman’s laughter following her all the way down the stairs.

  A few days after the Liberation, Jeanne was shown a photo of a group of prostitutes, heads shaved and with large Swastikas painted on their foreheads. They were all posing and laughing, and it made a very strange, gruesome picture. It is said that they were very well treated by their German clients, showered with presents, and they missed them when they went.

  Raymonde lived upstairs in the room at the back. She was a Frenchwoman, one of the First World War English army wives, and her husband was in the internment camp with Tom. She would come downstairs to Nell whenever she received a letter from George to have it translated. He wrote in English, but always finished with the same French sentence: George-who-loves-you-for-ever-and-ever, so George was not known as ‘George’ to the girls, but as ‘George-who-loves-you-for-ever-and-ever’. Raymonde was the victim of many of their jokes. The girls spent hours talking about her. It gave them something to do.

  ‘I saw Raymonde on her bike today,’ Irene would say. ‘She just looked like a witch on her broomstick.’ There was some truth in that statement. Perched high on her black ‘sit-up-and-beg’ bike, her tight peroxide-blonde curls peeping out from beneath her pixie-hood, glasses on the end of her nose and a forbidding expression, they didn’t feel like crossing her. She might have turned them into frogs or worse.

  Marie would say spitefully, ‘Have you seen her washing out on the line?’

  Irene would throw up her hands in mock horror. ‘Oh no, no! It wasn’t, it wasn’t . . . it couldn’t be . . . Was it? Bleu natier?’

  ‘Yes, it was. All of it, every bit, bleu natier!’ And they all three fell about, helpless with laughter.