The Occupation

by Deborah Swift

  ‘Jérôme, your braces.’ The big man grunted a protest but took off his braces to tie my feet. I didn’t struggle and this made me ashamed. Stupidly, I wondered what would happen if I wanted to use the toilet.

  ‘Will they be looking for him?’ Jérôme asked.

  ‘Don’t think so,’ Antoine said. ‘My guess is they won’t find him gone until morning.’

  ‘Then we can dispatch him and dump him once we’ve got what we need.’

  I closed my eyes; the side of my head throbbed. The bone above my eye ached and made my right eye stream with tears. I thought of Vogt, his words that all Resistance men were fanatics.

  ‘Who are you?’ Félix stood in front of me, and even though he was short, my position made me shrink away.

  I swallowed. What should I tell them? Whatever I said, it wouldn’t look good.

  The hesitation produced a punch from him that set my head reeling. ‘They call me Édouard Vibert,’ I said. ‘But that’s not my real name. I’m from Jersey. I’m married to a Frenchwoman, Céline Dupont.’

  Antoine kicked the chair. ‘Liar. I heard you talking in German. You were sent to spy on me; that’s why you were hanging round the café. I should have guessed. It’s my mother, stupid woman, she can’t resist an intellectual, even if he’s a Nazi spy.’

  ‘I’m no Nazi. My name is Siegfried Huber. I’m German but I haven’t been back to Germany for ten years. Not until now. Not until I was told to join the German Army or go to prison. That’s the God’s honest truth.’

  ‘So why aren’t you in the army now?’

  ‘Because I speak French and English as well as German. They threatened my wife if I didn’t do as they said. I was caught, understand? I didn’t want this bloody war. I didn’t want to do any of it, but they’re not people you can resist.’

  They glanced at each other.

  ‘He gave a file of papers to the German officer who came,’ Antoine said.

  ‘What was in the files?’ Félix asked.

  ‘Translations. Transcripts of radio transmissions, German orders.’

  ‘Who for?’

  ‘Vogt at security headquarters.’

  Félix gestured at the others to go into another room. I guessed it was the kitchen. I heard muffled voices arguing in there. I guessed they were arguing about whether to kill me on not. I thought of Antoine disposing of that dead dog and shuddered. Only now did I wonder how many others he’d dispatched into the Seine.

  Whilst they were gone I tried to wriggle my way loose, but the tie was cutting into my wrists and was too tight to budge. Shouting for help would achieve nothing except more blows to the head. I was caught like a fly in a trap.

  Félix was first back in the room. From the others’ body language, I guessed he was the leader of the little group. His belligerent gaze raked over me as if I were a worm. ‘If you don’t tell us everything that was in that file, then you’ll not see the morning,’ he said.

  ‘And if I do tell you everything, then I still won’t see the morning. I’m not stupid,’ I said. ‘So it makes little difference. As far as I’m concerned, nothing’s changed. I sheltered Antoine — or Pierre, or whatever the hell he’s called — a man the Gestapo are looking for, and I didn’t give him up. I could have, but I didn’t.’

  Antoine snorted. ‘Pah. Only because you planned to let me lead you to my friends.’

  ‘No. Not because of the Gestapo. I took you in because Berenice was my friend. And because of her, I thought you were my friend. It wasn’t about the war, it was a simple act of kindness and respect for a woman who asked me a favour. That’s what the war has made us forget. The very thing that we’re fighting for, for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘Crap. Don’t believe him, Antoine,’ Jérôme said. ‘No one could be that naïve.’

  I shrugged. ‘Believe what you like. But I’d be a damned sight more use to you alive. I can get in the security headquarters. I’ve got access to all their papers. And I’m a chemist. Antoine wanted me to use my knowledge of explosives to build a bomb.’

  ‘What?’ Félix turned on Antoine.

  ‘He’s lying. I never said that.’

  But Antoine’s face flared red and Félix turned on him. ‘You damn fool. I’ll sew up that mouth of yours.’ He grabbed Antoine by the shirt. ‘What else did you tell him?’

  ‘Nothing, I tell you. I told him nothing!’ He wrenched himself away.

  ‘You plan to blow up the viaduct at Morlaix,’ I said.

  Félix shot another vicious glare at Antoine, put a palm to his forehead and sighed. ‘What a fiasco.’

  ‘I still say we should dump him,’ Jérôme said. ‘He’s not worth the risk. He could take us all down.’

  ‘Shut up, Jérôme,’ Félix said. ‘Let me think.’

  Antoine and Jérôme looked at each other warily. Although Félix was short, he had a dynamism in all his movements that made him unpredictable. By now my hands were going numb, and my back ached from my shoulders being forced back.

  ‘Whoever you are,’ Félix said to me, ‘you’re a coward. All along, you just took the easiest route. A single word in a German ear and you could be interrogated by the Gestapo. Think your head hurts? That’s nothing to their methods. They will pound your fingers to a pulp with a hammer. They will hang you from a bar and beat you with iron flails. That is what Vogt’s men do. So why should we show you mercy? They have none.’

  The sounds of the room at Avenue Foch came back to me, but I held my nerve. ‘You’re right. But if you want my information, then you’ll need me alive. I tell you, I could be useful to you. Who else can get in Vogt’s office?’

  ‘You could also be a liability.’

  ‘No, Félix, it’s too risky,’ Jérôme urged, with a warning look.

  ‘Can you get files out of there?’

  ‘I can try.’ God help me. I knew now what men under pressure would do — say anything for another day of life.

  ‘Blindfold him,’ Félix said.

  I heard Jérôme complaining under his breath as he fetched a cloth shopping bag from the kitchen and shoved it over my head.

  ‘Take him back where you found him,’ Félix said to Antoine.

  ‘You’re letting him go?’ Jérôme was incredulous.

  A prod in the back. ‘I’ll risk it for one week. If a single word gets out about us from you, you’ll be finished.’ A thump in the chest. ‘You will copy every file you receive and give it to Berenice at the café. From now on we own you, Vibert.’

  By the time I was back inside my room and had taken the wretched bag off my head, the whole thing felt unreal. Everything was the same as it had always been. The silence seemed to be asking me questions. Whose side was I on? If I were to run, what then?

  The answers were not encouraging. If I ran, I’d have both Antoine’s mob and the whole German Army after me. If I stayed, I’d be liable to be executed by one or the other as a traitor. I had liked Antoine, but now I saw another side of him. The men in that house were ruthless. They were probably all killers. But what was an army, other than trained to kill?

  I could make no sense of it. All I knew was, like a puppet, to stay alive I had to somehow find the courage to dance to two different tunes.

  CHAPTER 18

  Céline

  Time creaked by, with more rationing and stricter enforcement by the Bailiff in his determination for a peaceful occupation with no trouble. Arrests were made of anyone chalking ‘V’ for Victory signs on walls or promoting anti-German propaganda. Meetings of the Women’s Institute or any sort of groups that could be used for resistance were banned. Rachel and I grew closer as life grew tighter and meaner.

  Initially, the Germans seemed content with our details from the Bailiff, but recently they had become more stringent about knowing exactly who, and where, everyone was. On the autumn day the Germans came to register me, I knew they were coming because they’d been to Flanders Farm earlier, and I’d seen the list of occupants nailed up inside Mrs Flanders’ front door.
She had several older men staying at the farm, and some young school-leavers who helped with the hard labour of ploughing and digging up the beets, potatoes and turnips, which were now our staple diet. It made me shiver to see the piece of paper with names, ages and nationalities scrawled there. Everyone was listed, and if you weren’t, there would soon be nowhere to hide. Immediately I feared for Rachel. What would she do?

  The men who came to the bakery were polite in the distant way of all officials. Up until that time, I had never had to reveal to any German my married name. Now, two of them were in my sitting room, one with a ledger in front of him and the other with a box camera slung around his neck.

  ‘Name?’ Oberstleutnant Fischer paused with his ledger open on his knee. He was a thin, tough-looking man, who squinted at me as if I were a specimen in a museum.

  ‘Céline Huber.’

  ‘Huber? A German name. Are you of German descent?’

  ‘No. I was born here. My husband is German.’

  ‘Really?’ He glanced sceptically to his younger friend with the camera, who looked embarrassed and tried to shrink further into the chair. ‘And where is this German husband now?’

  ‘Somewhere in France. He was conscripted into the German Army.’

  ‘He is fighting for the Reich?’ Fischer’s eyebrows shot up.

  ‘Yes. We met in Vienna before the war.’ Just the talk of Fred made a lump form in my throat. I struggled to maintain my composure. ‘But I haven’t heard from him for more than six months, and then only a brief note. Perhaps the mail isn’t getting through.’

  ‘Excuse us, Frau Huber.’ Fischer beckoned to his comrade and they had a whispered conversation in German in the shop.

  When they returned, Fischer bowed and said, ‘We are sorry to distress you. We will tell the Feldkommandant and make him aware of your husband’s service for our country. It is a difficult situation, no?’

  ‘Have you a photograph of him?’ Müller, the younger man with the camera asked. I could hardly refuse, so I fetched our album with proof of our stay in Vienna and turned the pages, although my stomach was churning. Me, on the beach at St Helier, sun-hat in hand, smiling. Fred standing in front of the Donnerbrunnen fountain in Kärntner Strasse, posing like Neptune. It made my chest hurt and my eyes prickle to think of our two countries at war. Such good times we’d had.

  ‘Your husband — he is very handsome man,’ Müller said in broken English.

  ‘Yes, yes he is,’ I said, feeling my eyes tear up again. I thudded the book shut.

  Oberstleutnant Fischer supplied me with a handkerchief. It was large and starched, and smelt of tobacco.

  When they’d taken my photograph, they went.

  ‘I am sorry,’ whispered Müller as he left. ‘Sorry to intrude.’

  I just shook my head. Keeping the white handkerchief bothered me. I’d seen them hanging from people’s windows, and it seemed to me to be a symbol of Jersey’s surrender. So I burned it on the oven flame until it charred to ash, feeling guilty. Fred would have called me stupid. I looked at our wedding photograph on the mantelpiece for a long time afterwards, my mind full of thoughts of him. Would he have agreed with what the Germans were doing? Was he doing the same thing in France? Too many questions that couldn’t be answered.

  A week later we were issued with identity booklets, which we had to carry with us at all times. Somehow, these small bits of cardboard made us all feel more like an oppressed people. When I opened mine up, the left side showed my photograph, which was deeply unflattering. It had seemed traitorous to try to make myself attractive in front of those Germans, so I was immortalised as a woman in a threadbare summer blouse with untidy wisps of hair. My eyes stared out widely.

  On the right of the card were my Particulars — Nähere Angaben. These included colour of hair: brown; colour of eyes: blue; and a section for ‘Besondere Merkmale’, or special physical features. I was glad this section said ‘None’.

  We were told we could be arrested if we couldn’t immediately produce these cards, and as time passed many forgot to carry them, and the newspaper became full of people who’d been caught out and imprisoned. Complaints to Mr Coutanche, the Bailiff of Jersey, fell on deaf ears.

  One breezy autumn day, I was helping with the milking when Mrs Flanders brought the paper and waved it in front of me.

  ‘It’s not right,’ she said, giving me no time to read it. ‘There’s thousands of English people here. And now they’re deporting them.’

  My heart gave a flip. I grabbed the paper. ‘Who?’

  ‘Anyone of English descent. Not just soldiers, but women and children. And people with a criminal record, and anyone Jewish,’ she said. ‘But I don’t mind getting rid of them. Look.’ She pointed out the passage to me. Undesirables on Jersey were to be deported to Germany, according to the notice, which was signed by Feldkommandant Knackfuss.

  Thank God. It wasn’t me. I was a Jerseywoman through and through. But Rachel wasn’t. If they deported her to Germany, who knew what might happen to her after that?

  ‘They’ve got twenty-four hours. Look.’ Mrs Flanders leaned over my shoulder to stab an arthritic finger down on the small print commentary below.

  Twenty-four hours? It was impossible. A welter of emotions flooded through me. Fear, for Rachel, and guilt, that it was somehow Fred’s fault, and, by extension, mine. ‘Mrs Flanders, excuse me, but I have to go.’

  ‘What? You’re not English are you?’

  ‘No. But I’ve a friend I want to see … to ask if I can help.’ I’d already thrust away the milking stool and was rushing to the house for my coat, with Mrs Flanders hurrying after me, still in her milking overall.

  ‘Céline! You can’t do this,’ she shouted. ‘You can’t just run off and leave me with all the milking to do!’

  ‘Sorry, Mrs Flanders,’ I called as I shrugged my way into my gabardine and leapt onto my bike.

  The streets of St Helier were full of hurrying anxious-looking women. I passed what used to be a high-class man’s tailors and saw a notice taped to the window: Juedisches Geschaeft — Jewish Business. The window was smashed and no stock remained, just a tailor’s dummy, nakedly leaning. My feet grew leaden. So it was happening here after all.

  At the bank there were queues stretching out of the door. What is it with war that it seems to produce such queues? In front of me, a well-dressed man clutched a cardboard box obviously full of the family silver. Two candlesticks poked out, and what looked like a gold clock.

  I peered over the line of people. There was only one cashier, and it wasn’t Rachel.

  I dashed out of the door and down the road to where I’d chained my battered Raleigh to the railings. When I got to Rachel’s, I propped it inside the gatepost and hooked the chain around it. Her house still had boards at the windows to keep out the rain; there were so few tradesmen left to do any repairs. The downstairs door, its blue paint peeling, stood open, so I took the stairs two at a time.

  Voices. As I looked up to the landing outside Rachel’s apartment, I saw two men, in grey-green German uniform, forcing the door.

  I froze. They hadn’t heard me. As I held my breath, I saw one of them give a great kick with his boot, and Rachel’s door sprang open. I knew I should run, but I wanted to know what they would do, so I stayed where I was. A scrape of drawers being opened, of cupboards slamming shut. The rattle of china, followed by heavy thuds.

  ‘Nichts. Sie ist weg.’ She’s gone.

  The boots came out of the door, and I fled down the remaining stairs. ‘Fräulein! Stehen bleiben!’ The voice called after me, but I didn’t wait. I unhooked the bike and was on it in three seconds, pedalling for all I was worth towards the town centre, along York Street and Union Street, wiggling past the parked cars outside Ahier’s the newsagent. Only when I was past the library on Beresford Street did I dare to look behind me.

  A pair of German soldiers were strolling there, in the middle of the road, as if they owned it. As I whizzed past them, one whistle
d and called out something, and both men laughed, but I pretended not to hear. Once out of their sight, I jumped off the bike and began to push it down towards the beachfront at Havre des Pas.

  All the time I was walking I passed men and women with suitcases and hatboxes. Everyone seemed in a great hurry, but no one smiled. Instead, the air around them bristled with tension.

  When I got to the outdoor bathing pool, it was closed and barricaded with barbed wire. I found a green-painted bench nearby and stared out to sea, where, instead of white-sailed yachts, German military vessels blotted the horizon. Seagulls wheeled and dived, squalling with hoarse cries over the water. Was Fred calling out or wolf-whistling at the French women where he was? I had received only a few letters from Fred in the years he had been gone, and they were all heavily censored; it seemed he was allowed to tell me nothing of what he did, except that he was now in Paris. His letters consisted of lists of his meals and details of his daily walks. Everything else had been blanked out by the censor.

  The thought of it made me angry. Was my husband putting the fear of God into the French the way the Germans put the fear of God into me? Now post from outside the island was forbidden, unless it was for the Germans. How I hated that word, ‘verboten’. So much was verboten now.

  I stared at the glistening blue water and thought of days gone by, when Rachel and I had picnicked on this beach. Wherever Rachel was now, she wasn’t at home, and life for her looked precarious. Had she volunteered for the boats? It didn’t seem likely. Why would she, when we knew how it was for Jews in Germany? But I knew she wouldn’t have been given the choice, and my heart grieved.

  CHAPTER 19

  The next day I was explaining to old Mrs Hedges, over her stout leather handbag that rested on the counter, that she’d already had her four pounds and ten ounces of bread ration for the week, and she couldn’t have more. It was becoming rather heated when the shop door swung open and the tiled floor filled rapidly with German soldiers. Mrs Hedges let out a little cry, as the sheer bulk of so many men with rifles seemed to suck the air from the shop.