The Darkest Hour: A Novel

by Tony Schumacher

  “Miles away.”

  “Where?”

  “Far away, that’s where, and you ain’t bleedin’ going there. Soon as I’m a couple of miles from ’ere, we’re splitting up, chum. Thanks and all that, but I don’t need to take a copper back home, especially one with a Jew kid.”

  “Pull over.”

  “I was going to do a few more miles—”

  “Pull over and stop the car now.” Rossett was looking out the window at the street ahead, and he reached for the steering wheel.

  “All right! Bleedin’ ’ell, don’t get shirty.”

  Chivers pulled the car to the curb and reached for the door handle, but Rossett gripped his arm.

  “Wait.”

  “Wait? I thought—”

  “Look.” Rossett pointed ahead. About a third of a mile down the long, straight road, there were two trucks parked at an angle to the curb. Almost as soon as Chivers leaned forward to squint at the trucks, the flash of a flare, the kind the police used for directing traffic when the smog was really heavy, sparked to life in the distance.

  “What is it?” Chivers leaned even farther forward, so far that his breath fogged the windshield.

  “A roadblock. Turn around.”

  The little Austin crunched a gear, then Chivers pulled a U-turn and started to head back the way they had come.

  “What if we run into Leigh and his mob?”

  “We won’t.”

  Rossett looked over his shoulder at the flares in the distance, and then down at Jacob, who stared back, calm and trusting, pale in the streetlamps.

  He couldn’t bring himself to look at the boy for long.

  “We need somewhere to wait this out, somewhere where we can get this car off the street.”

  Ahead in the distance, Rossett saw the flash of another flare. Chivers read his mind and took a sharp left turn down a side street.

  “Wherever we’re going, chum, you need to think quick, because they ain’t lookin’ for me. I can get out of ’ere anytime I like.”

  “They’re looking for whoever has been firing those shots. If you don’t live or work around here, you’ll be going with them.”

  They drove along the narrow cobbled street, which was starting to shade light blue as the sun came up behind the wet gray clouds. They were approaching a low railway tunnel as Rossett looked left and right before suddenly gripping Chivers’s arm.

  “Stop!”

  Chivers almost cried out and jabbed the brakes so hard that both Rossett and Jacob jerked forward. Rossett didn’t speak; he climbed out of the car and jogged under the tunnel, searching off to his right, gun in hand, then disappeared from view.

  Chivers selected first gear and briefly thought about driving away, but then remembered how loudly Jacob had screamed before and waited instead, chewing his bottom lip and glancing in his mirror.

  A moment later, Rossett reappeared, attracting Chivers’s attention with a low whistle. He beckoned him forward and gestured for him to turn a sharp right after the bridge. Chivers did as he was told and found himself in a narrow alley that ran adjacent to the raised railway line. Alongside the alley were open arches for the bridge that supported the trains. Rossett appeared at Chivers’s window and tapped on it.

  The window dropped into the door as soon as Chivers touched the handle, causing the old man to jump with fright.

  “Stick the car under this arch quickly; we haven’t got much time.”

  Chivers maneuvered the car under the arch, and before he had time to kill the engine Rossett dragged open the passenger door and pulled Jacob out.

  Rossett took Jacob’s hand and set off at a pace, in the opposite direction from where they had come from. The boy trailed behind him, while Chivers splashed through the puddles bringing up the rear.

  It was only when they reached the end of the alley that Jacob realized where they were.

  Rossett had brought him home.

  Chapter 34

  ROSSETT RAN, HOLDING the Webley against his leg. He felt Jacob speed up as they reached the end of the alley, so much so that when he stopped, the boy whipped around him and almost broke away from his grasp.

  He crouched down and pulled Jacob in close.

  “Wait here.”

  The boy shook his head. Rossett let go of his hand and gripped his shoulder, pushing him down as he did so, willing the child to take root.

  “You must wait. I’m going to check if it’s okay.”

  Jacob shook his head again.

  “I want to come.”

  “You must wait and be quiet, very quiet. I’ll come back for you. I’m only going over there.” Rossett gestured with the pistol to the alleyway opposite. “You’ll be able to watch me from here.” He tilted his head looking for a sign of agreement, and when it didn’t come, he looked up at Chivers, who had joined them, out of breath and struggling not to cough.

  The old man took hold of Jacob by the upper arm and nodded to Rossett, who, in turn, nodded to Jacob and held his index finger to his lips.

  “Sssh,” he said, before turning and looking out across the street.

  Dawn hadn’t quite broken and Caroline Street was empty. It struck Rossett that he’d been in the same place doing the same thing almost exactly twenty-four hours earlier, looking at the dirty brown house, which had then been full of cowering Jews hunted by the Nazis. Now the house was empty, and it was he who was cowering while being hunted.

  He stared at the house, with its darkened windows and drooping curtains hanging like old boxers’ eyelids, and wondered if it was fate that had brought him full circle.

  Then he remembered that he didn’t believe in fate, he only believed in himself.

  Rossett took a deep breath and jogged across the road, again holding the Webley against his leg. He stopped when he reached the other side and glanced back at Jacob and Chivers, the boy staring at him as Chivers looked around furtively. Rossett gestured for them to follow, and as they did, he looked up and down the road to check that it was still clear.

  In the distance, Rossett heard faraway traffic and the rattle of milk bottles on front doorsteps, and as Jacob approached he instinctively reached out and took the boy’s hand. He was pleased to see nobody had bothered to replace the officers he’d left standing outside the house the day before, who had by now long gone off duty. The only sign that the Jews had been evicted was a notice pasted to the front door at an awkward angle like a hastily slapped-on postage stamp.

  Rossett couldn’t read it from where he was, but he knew exactly what it said: ENTRANCE TO UNAUTHORIZED PERSONS STRICTLY FORBIDDEN, BY ORDER OF THE MINISTRY OF JEWISH AFFAIRS.

  He wondered who had pasted it up, aware that it was normally his job after the inventory had been completed and the property emptied.

  A calling card left on so many empty houses he’d lost count.

  “Where are we going?” Chivers whispered behind him.

  “Follow me,” Rossett replied, heading down the side alley until he reached the rear of the house. The yard gate was unlocked and the three of them slipped in quietly. The back door had the same notice stuck to it as the front, and Rossett noticed Chivers reading it as he jammed a piece of old timber against the back of the yard gate to slow down anyone who might follow.

  He moved past the old man and spun the Webley in his hand before using the butt to smash a small pane of glass in the back door. He reached through to turn the lock, pushed open the door, and surveyed the houses that overlooked them at the back; all seemed quiet. Somewhere in the distance he heard the milkman again. He looked at the houses opposite once more and then went inside.

  Rossett, Jacob, and Chivers entered the grimy kitchen, which smelled of cabbage and sour milk. The bare floorboards creaked as he walked through the house, and he had to reach down and put a hand on Jacob’s chest to keep him from pushing
past him and up the stairs once they reached the hallway.

  Rossett listened. All he could hear was the drip of a lonely tap somewhere in the house, and he glanced at his companions as they looked upward too.

  The sky was brightening outside and some light was elbowing its way past the small window in the top of the front door, allowing Rossett to see the dust and grime he’d not noticed that morning. Wallpaper was peeling away from the tops of the walls; it looked like blistered, moldy skin where the damp had discolored it and gravity had taken hold.

  Rossett looked up the stairs and decided the best place to be was above street-level windows that might attract nosy neighbors. He was aware that the price for privacy was being trapped on an upper floor with nowhere else to go should someone else come into the house. He decided a back room overlooking the low roof of the slightly extended kitchen might give them an option of escape—not much of an option, but an option at least. They could drop the ten feet to the ground from the kitchen roof, assuming the yard was empty and provided an escape route.

  He would have to hope that the posters on the front and back doors kept prying eyes away, and if they didn’t? Well, he would cross that bridge when he came to it.

  He started up the narrow staircase in the lead until Jacob finally broke away from Chivers’s grip, pushed past him, and ran up ahead.

  “Grandfather! Grandfather!” the boy’s voice echoed around the old house, and Rossett stopped to watch the child bounce up the stairs. Rossett looked back at Chivers and then followed slowly, suddenly tired and aware that he’d barely slept in two days. His body ached, he was hungry, and he needed a drink. He glanced back at Chivers and saw that the old man also looked exhausted, taking each stair by pushing down on one leg and pulling on the worn banister as he climbed.

  “You all right?” asked Rossett.

  “Have you looked in the mirror lately?” Chivers replied.

  They reached the third-floor landing, and Rossett led the way to the front bedroom, the place where he had first found Jacob. The door was half closed, and, as he pushed it open, he saw the boy sitting on the bed, crying.

  Rossett didn’t know what to do, so he did nothing; he just stood in the doorway, blocking Chivers from following him and watching as Jacob softly sobbed, sitting upright, hands folded neatly in his lap, looking at the floor.

  After a moment, Rossett felt a slight push in the small of his back and he turned to look at Chivers, who nodded his head toward the boy.

  “Do something. Don’t just leave him.”

  Rossett entered the room, reluctant and unsure. He sat on the bed next to Jacob and hovered his hand an inch above the center of the boy’s shoulder blades.

  “There, there,” he said awkwardly.

  Jacob shook his head.

  “Don’t cry.” Rossett looked up at Chivers as he spoke, feeling awkward, words clumsy and fumbled.

  “I thought my grandfather would be here. I thought you’d brought me back to him.”

  Rossett looked down at the boy and then at the fireplace where he’d first found him.

  “I’m sorry,” was all he could think of saying as he finally rested his hand on the boy’s back and rubbed it lightly.

  Jacob let go with a desperate choking sob and seemed to fold under the weight of Rossett’s touch, a little boy lost and alone and unable to keep it all in. His tiny body shook, and Rossett watched as the pale, thin fists balled tight in frustration and pushed up and into his eyes in an attempt to stop the tears that wouldn’t be stopped.

  Rossett knew how those tears could burn. He felt them now, too, brewing where his soul used to be, deep down, pressure building on his heart, making it feel as if it might break.

  He took the boy in his arms and held him close, trying to stop the pain.

  Chapter 35

  KOEHLER WAS IRRITATED. Irritated by the weather: it hadn’t stopped raining for two hours.

  Irritated by the condensation on the windows of the car.

  Irritated by the two children who had been sitting on the curb watching him for half an hour.

  And most of all, irritated by the occasional tuneless hum Schmitt kept emitting every five minutes, for no other reason that Koehler could see than to irritate him.

  They’d been sitting in a roadblock for nearly two hours after driving around the St. Katharine Docks area checking the lay of the land. The local police had been efficient in shutting down the area, and now, supported by some German troops and a larger number of HDT men, the traffic was slowly being allowed to leave the cordon.

  Koehler estimated they had locked down about two square miles of London, a considerable achievement, but he still knew that at some point that day, unless they got some major results, he was in line for a dressing-down he wouldn’t be forgetting for a long time, if at all.

  He rolled his head to relieve some of the tension in his neck and stared out the front windshield at the line of traffic that was creeping forward, one car, one truck, one bus at a time to freedom. He wondered if Rossett or the escaped resistance men were watching and laughing at his attempts to round them up.

  Schmitt started to hum again.

  Koehler looked at the back of the Gestapo man’s head and considered pulling his pistol and blowing his brains out.

  “Schmitt?” he finally said.

  “Yes?”

  “Would you stop that?”

  “Stop what?”

  “The humming, would you please stop the humming you keep doing?”

  “What humming?”

  “You keep humming a tune. You’ve been doing it for two hours now. Please stop.”

  As Koehler spoke, he stared, chin in hand, through the smeared condensation at the two urchins sitting, feet in the gutter, staring back.

  “I don’t think I’ve been humming,” said Schmitt, twisting in the front seat to look at Koehler in the back, his leather trench coat squeaking on the seat as he did so.

  “You have.” Koehler continued to stare at the children, losing the battle both inside and outside the car.

  “Have I been humming?” Schmitt turned to the Gestapo driver, who looked in the mirror and then at his boss.

  “I didn’t notice, sir.”

  “See? I’ve not been humming.”

  Koehler sighed and looked at his watch. Nearly midday.

  He wiped the window again and looked at the two gargoyles through the smudged water. After a moment, he fished in his pocket, took out some loose change, thumbed through it, then tapped the driver on the shoulder and passed him tuppence.

  “Here, get rid of those children.”

  The driver took the money, grabbed his black trilby from off the dashboard, and got out. Koehler watched as he walked around the front of the car, putting the money in his pocket, toward the children, who turned to look up as he approached.

  The driver aimed a kick at the nearest one and then shouted something in broken English. The boys scrambled away and ran off, shouting something about Hitler as they did.

  Koehler shook his head in disbelief as the driver walked around the car and got back in, smoothing his blond hair as he placed his hat back on the dash.

  “What was that?” Koehler asked.

  “Sir?” The driver looked in the mirror, confused.

  “The money. It was for the children, not you.” Koehler’s voice betrayed his confusion, and the driver stared back, equally confused.

  “I thought . . . I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t realize.”

  Schmitt looked at his driver and shook his head.

  “You thought the major was giving you a tip to get rid of the children?”

  “I . . . I . . . I didn’t . . .”

  “Jesus Christ,” Koehler said, raising his hand to cut the driver off. “Just be quiet, please, the pair of you. Just be quiet and remember . . . I have
a gun.”

  The car held its uneasy truce for a few minutes until Schmitt spoke.

  “Is he waving at us?”

  Koehler lifted his hand out of chin and looked up through the windshield toward the checkpoint. At the back of a bus a soldier was holding up his hand and pointing to them, and after a moment an HDT member came jogging up to the front passenger window, which Schmitt rolled down.

  “Yes?”

  “Sir, there is someone on the bus for you,” the Englishman said in halting German, then stepped back and saluted before pointing to the bus.

  Schmitt looked over his shoulder.

  “He said—”

  “I heard,” Koehler replied, already opening the door, glad of the distraction.

  Schmitt and Koehler walked toward the bus through the crowds of grumbling commuters who were being held up by the roadblock and being held back by the troops and police. Koehler boarded first, and a nervous-looking conductor on the platform at the back pulled his cap off his head and muttered a halfhearted “Heil Hitler” while looking at the ground.

  Koehler ignored him and looked down the bottom deck, at the one German soldier who was standing in the aisle, a submachine gun slung over his shoulder. The soldier fired off a rather more enthusiastic “Heil Hitler!” and sprang to attention before announcing that his colleagues were waiting for Koehler upstairs.

  Koehler climbed the stairs and, at the top, found a German with an unslung machine gun who saluted smartly and nodded his head down the bus. Koehler entered the top deck, followed by Schmitt, and made his way down the center aisle.

  The top deck was heavy with cigarette smoke and, aside from the rumble of the engine below, utterly silent. Koehler glanced at the faces around him, although few met his gaze.

  “I apologize for the delay, ladies and gentlemen. We’ll have you moving as soon as possible,” Koehler announced in impeccable English as he reached the HDT man, who was holding an identity card in his hands.

  “Heil Hitler!” the HDT soldier shouted so loud it caused Koehler to jump. “We’ve found this geezer, sir. He seems shifty to me, thought you should take a gander.”