by Kate Mosse
‘Giraud, is it?’ Authié looked up, then his eyes narrowed. ‘Have we met before?’
‘Bastille Day, July 1942,’ he said. ‘You came to talk to me when I was in hospital.’
Authié stared, clearly trying to remember. ‘That’s right.’ He looked back at the list in his hand. ‘Félix Giraud. Residing in rue de la Gaffe, quartier Trivalle? Is that still correct?’
‘It is, Captain Authié.’
‘Major.’
Giraud raised his hand in apology. ‘Major Authié.’
‘And your son is Jean-Marc Giraud?’
‘He is.’
‘Did they force you to help, Monsieur Giraud? If that is the case, the courts have it in their discretion to give a lighter sentence. Two or three years, at most.’
The old man’s eyes flashed with shock at the abruptness of the threat, but he kept his head.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, Major Authié.’
Authié gave a thin smile. ‘Did they really think they’d get away with it?’
‘They?’
‘Your son and his colleagues.’
‘There’s obviously been some mistake. My son is a doctor.’
‘A mistake? No, I don’t think so,’ Authié said, tapping the paper. ‘It’s all here. All the comings and goings, odd times of the night. It disturbs the neighbours, you see. They don’t like it.’
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ Giraud repeated. ‘He is a doctor. A good man.’
‘A doctor who helps the insurgents, patches up the terrorists so they can continue to maim and kill innocent people.’
Giraud managed not to react. ‘I can’t tell you anything. I don’t know anything.’
Authié stared. ‘Believe me, Monsieur Giraud, I can assure you that you will discover you have plenty to say.’ He smiled. ‘Although I hope it will not come to that.’
‘I’m a veteran. I live quietly.’
‘Yet you are a supporter of Général de Gaulle?’
‘I am a patriot.’
‘De Gaulle is a traitor. Whereas Maréchal Pétain has worked tirelessly for men like you.’
The old man’s face clouded in confusion. ‘I don’t . . .’
‘To bring home our prisoners of war, Monsieur Giraud. French prisoners of war. Your son amongst them. He’d still be in a POW camp were it not for the Maréchal. The “hero of Verdun”, I’m sure you called him that yourself once upon a time.’
The old man’s expression hardened. ‘That was then.’
Authié let his words hang in the air for a moment.
‘Tell me, Giraud, what do you think about the bombing of the tunnel at Berriac?’
Giraud blinked, struggling to cope with the sudden change of subject.
‘I don’t think anything about it. I don’t know anything.’
‘You didn’t hear about it on the wireless?’
‘I may have done. There’s no crime in listening to the wireless.’
‘What about your daughter-in-law.’ Authié made a show of looking at the papers, although he clearly didn’t need to. ‘Does Jeanne listen to the wireless?’
For the first time, concern flickered in the old man’s eyes. He said nothing. Confident that the threat had been heard and received, Authié moved on.
‘A veteran, yes. Highly decorated. France is – was – in your debt.’ He made another show of glancing at his papers. ‘You don’t belong to the LVF?’
Giraud met his gaze. ‘I do not care for organisations. I keep myself to myself. Live quietly, as I said.’
‘The driver of the Berriac train is in hospital, Monsieur Giraud, two broken arms, broken back. Even if he survives, he will never walk again. Lost the use of his eyes. That’s the reality of being a “patriot”.’
‘I have nothing to say.’
Authié leant forward. ‘Witnesses talk of seeing a young woman in the vicinity of the village of Berriac itself. That wasn’t your daughter-in-law, Monsieur Giraud?’
The alarm in his eyes intensified. ‘Jeanne was at home with me on Sunday night. She’s a good girl.’
‘Sunday night, monsieur?’ he said smoothly. ‘So you do know something about the incident?’
Giraud’s throat was dry. Authié’s questions were muddling him up. He didn’t know what he wanted, so was terrified about, somehow, saying the wrong thing.
‘It was on the wireless. Everyone knows when it happened.’
Authié sat back on his chair. Giraud was one of a dozen older men and women he’d ordered to be rounded up and brought in. None of them had done anything in particular. It was a random selection designed to scare Carcassonne and make it clear that things would be different now he was back.
The résistants and maquisards were skilled at avoiding patrols. Those who were captured mostly refused to talk. Authié considered the Milice – Schiffner’s men too – had failed to pursue tactics that would have delivered information more quickly to the intelligence services. The old Carcassonnais men and women had courage and they were steadfast, but they feared for their children as much as any young mother.
Authié got up and walked around the desk, to perch on the edge immediately in front of Giraud.
‘I don’t know anything about it.’
Authié’s eyes narrowed. ‘Nothing about all the visitors who come to the rue de la Gaffe?’
‘I’m an old man. I don’t get involved.’
Authié saw the old man’s gaze slip to the cross pinned on his lapel.
‘Do you believe in God, Monsieur Giraud?’ Authié said, jabbing him in the chest.
The unexpected physical contact caused Giraud to flinch, but he held Authié’s gaze.
‘My beliefs are my own business.’
‘Do you fear God?’ Authié continued. ‘Do you think God will save you?’
‘I believe men are responsible for their own fate,’ Giraud said with dignity. ‘Our lives are in our own hands.’
‘Do you now?’ Authié murmured. ‘A pity . . .’
‘What do you mean?’
Authié put his hand to his pocket. Giraud flinched, half expecting him to pull out a gun. It was only a photograph.
‘Do you recognise this man?’ Authié asked.
Giraud looked at the black and white image and relief flooded through him. It was not his son – nor any of the men or women who came regularly to the house – though there was something familiar about the face.
‘I may do,’ he said. ‘Who is he?’
‘A man called Raoul Pelletier,’ said Authié. ‘Do you remember, Giraud? That demonstration outside Saint-Michel. You were there. Your daughter-in-law was there.’
Giraud remained silent.
‘A boy died that day,’ he said. ‘Murdered by this man. I interviewed you then.’
‘It was two years ago.’
‘Perhaps you saw Pelletier detonate the bomb?’
‘You asked me then, the answer is the same. I saw nothing.’
‘Are you refusing to help the police, Monsieur Giraud?’
Giraud could feel fear churning in his stomach, but he held his head high and looked Authié in the eye.
‘I cannot testify to something I know to be untrue.’
Authié glanced at him for a moment longer. Then, without emotion, he drove his fist into Giraud’s face. The old man cried out with shock and pain, blood splattering down his shirt. As he put out his thin and frail wrists to break his fall, he heard Authié shout an order.
‘Bring in Jeanne Giraud. Perhaps she will be able to help us.’
‘No,’ Giraud tried to say, but the door slammed shut on his protest.
Chapter 125
Sandrine took off the high-heeled shoes and hid them in the bushes.
‘Good luck,’ Lucie said. ‘If anyone comes, I’ll whistle “Lili Marlene”. Appropriate, don’t you think? The girl under the lantern?’
‘Lucie, be serious,’ Sandrine warned.
‘I am serious,’
Lucie said, the lightness gone from her voice. ‘If you hear me whistle, stay out of sight.’
Sandrine looked up at the outer walls of the Cité. The huge searchlights, blind in the flattening heat of the late afternoon, were set at intervals along the outer walls. She could see Wehrmacht soldiers in pairs patrolling the battlements, but there were no signs of additional troops on this section.
From her hiding place, she counted the time it took for the sentries to walk from one tower to the next before turning back again. The question was how many extra men had been drafted in. Most of the Gestapo wore plain clothes, so Sandrine couldn’t be sure. She hadn’t caught sight of any miliciens, but it didn’t mean they weren’t there.
She wished she could talk her changed tactics over with Raoul. It just seemed obvious, now she was here, that she should act straight away rather than waiting for night to fall. It wasn’t that they weren’t watching now – there had to be some increase in security already – but the Gestapo would expect them to wait until it was dark, until close to the time Authié had been scheduled to arrive.
Motionless, Sandrine could hear nothing more than the usual sounds from the Cité. The soldiers’ boots on the rough stone surface of the battlements marching up and down, occasional orders shouted. It was calm. There was no sense of expectation, no sense that everyone was poised, waiting for something to happen.
Not yet.
For a fleeting moment, a snapshot of herself sitting in Coustaussa with Monsieur Baillard on the evening they had met came into her mind.
‘Evil has not yet won,’ that was what he’d said.
For two years she had fought to make that true. She and Raoul, Marianne and Suzanne, all of them. And, for all the hardship and the fear, they had succeeded in part. They had never given in, they had never allowed themselves to become people they would be ashamed to know. They had held true to their principles and a sense of right and wrong. No collusion, no compromise.
‘Now or never,’ she murmured to herself.
The next time the patrol turned, Sandrine ran. She covered the open ground and threw herself against the grey shadow of the outer wall. She stopped, held her breath, anticipating the wail of an alarm or Lucie’s warning whistle. But nothing happened. The only sound she could hear was her own heart beating, strong in her chest, and the roar of blood in her ears.
She made her way to the low door set in the thick stone walls at the foot of the Tour du Grand Burlas. She studied the padlock. It didn’t look as if it had been tampered with. Trying not to make a sound, she reached out, unhooked the lock and removed the chain, then went inside.
Everything was as they had left it. The device was still propped in the corner, the fuse sticking out like the tail of a mouse, waiting only for the flame to bring it to life. Sandrine gave a sigh of relief. Carefully, she removed the fuse and took the pipe packed full with explosives, as Suzanne had told her to do. It was a waste to leave the rest, but she couldn’t hope to conceal it.
The whole business lasted less than two minutes. She said a silent prayer to a God she didn’t believe in, then started to make her way down towards where Lucie was waiting. She almost tripped on the gravel path, keeping her balance with a gasp and holding the explosive tight against her chest. Just as she thought she was safe, she heard a man’s voice. Immediately she pushed herself back into the shadow of the walls.
‘You after a bit of company?’
‘No, thanks ever so much, I’m waiting for my friend,’ she heard Lucie reply in the same blowsy voice she’d used earlier. She didn’t sound frightened or alarmed.
‘You sure about that?’
‘Quite sure.’
‘That’s a shame . . .’ he said. ‘I could do with some company.’
Sandrine sighed with relief. He sounded drunk. Not a soldier, not Milice. She edged closer until she could just see them. He reached out an unsteady hand.
‘Come on, love.’
‘No,’ Lucie said sharply, taking a step back. ‘Thanks.’
‘I’ll show you a good time,’ he was promising. ‘The best. I know where a girl can get a drink.’
He dropped two heavy hands on Lucie’s shoulders.
‘Get your hands off me!’
‘Give us a kiss then.’
Lucie tried to pull away. ‘That’s enough.’
‘Keep it down out there!’ someone shouted out of a window.
‘Sshh,’ the drunk slurred, putting his finger to his lips. ‘Sshh.’
The man’s voice was getting louder and louder. Then he started to sing. Desperately Sandrine leant out and gestured at Lucie to go. Lucie’s eyes widened when she saw her and she shook her head, but Sandrine insisted. Lucie hesitated for a second or two more, then slipped away down the path towards the rue des Anglais.
‘Hey, come back here! Salope! ’
The drunk started to hurl abuse. Sandrine kept glancing up to the walls, praying the soldiers would not turn and see the man, hear him. She realised she was holding her breath, counting the seconds.
She pressed herself further back against the wall, the rough edges of the stone sticking into her back, until the noise died away. Finally, when she thought it was safe, she ventured out. She ran to the bushes to retrieve her shoes, then across the open ground, with the heels in her hands, into the cover of the trees.
Now all she had to do was return to rue Longue, change back into her other clothes, leave the pipe and fuse, and get to the Jardin du Calvaire to meet Raoul.
In her anxiety to get away, Sandrine didn’t notice the red glow of the tip of a cigarette in the shadows beneath the stone steps until a hand shot out and grabbed her arm.
‘My lucky day,’ said the same voice, though now it was stiff with anger. Before Sandrine could stop him, the drunk had shoved her forward into the wall and twisted her arm up behind her back. She forced herself not to cry out. He gave a savage jerk upwards.
‘That salope, all the chat. All I wanted was a kiss, but no.’ His voice was ugly with frustration now. He pushed her hard in the small of her back. ‘But now here you are.’
He was half leaning against her, he was so unstable, but the drink hadn’t robbed him of his strength. Sandrine didn’t dare cry out. She was more terrified of the soldiers hearing. The patrols on the wall, going backwards and forwards, it would only take one man to look down and see them. Come to investigate.
Then below, at the bottom of the slope, she saw a black Citroën slowing down and pulling in beside the church. A Gestapo car. Any moment, they would look up and see the two of them locked in this grotesque dance. Sandrine started to struggle, trying to pull herself free. The man hit her hard, on the side of the head.
‘Keep still,’ he threatened. ‘I’m warning you.’
Desperate now, Sandrine knew it was her last chance. It was a gamble, but she couldn’t see what else to do. She screamed. As she’d hoped, the man clamped his hand over her mouth and she bit down on his filthy fingers as hard as she could.
‘Bitch,’ he yelled.
He grabbed for her hair, but Sandrine was too quick for him. She ducked out of his grasp and ran, away down the steps and on to the path.
Behind her, she heard a whistle blow. Then the sound of boots on the cobbled stones and the beginnings of an argument. In the street below, windows were opened, a door.
The Gestapo shouted at the man to put his hands up. She heard the confused response, his bravado collapsing into self-pity.
‘Fumiste! Idiot! ’ the drunk protested. ‘I’ve not done anything.’
Sandrine didn’t turn around, just kept running. Her bare feet were being cut on the stones and the dry grass, her breath burnt in her chest, but she didn’t let up. Through the fields and heading down to the river. She heard the screech of tyres.
Had they seen her? Were they following her?
From her summer of helping with the vendanges, Sandrine knew the farms to the south of the Cité walls. There was a way out along the road. She ran until she reac
hed the wooden gate into the first of the fields of vines. She stumbled over, then through the rows of grapes, crouched down and struggling to keep her footing on the uneven earth. At the bottom of the field, the gate had rolls of barbed wire over the top, to keep thieves out. At her back, she thought the siren was getting closer.
She pushed herself on, her muscles as taut as piano wire, the blood pumping in her ears. Ahead on the Pont Vieux, she saw the vert-de-gris of the Wehrmacht patrol, but there was no sign of the black Citroën. She couldn’t possibly wade across the Aude in broad daylight. She dropped the explosive into the water and decided she’d have to brazen it out. Hope that the pass would still be good.
She straightened her skirts, pushed her dirty feet back into the high heels, and walked on to the bridge towards the checkpoint. She held her breath, expecting them to notice her high colour or that she was carrying no basket or bag, but they didn’t. They waved her through like before.
Weak with relief, Sandrine walked over the Pont Vieux, forcing herself not to break into a run. Only a few steps further, a few steps further, one more checkpoint, and she would be back in the Bastide. Then, behind her, she heard the siren, followed by shouting.
‘Halten Sie! ’
Sandrine blocked out the voices. Then again, in French this time. ‘Stop or we’ll shoot!’
She didn’t turn round, praying they weren’t speaking to her. Why would they be? But, seconds later, she heard the rattle of a semi-automatic, fired into the air as a warning, then the same order shouted once again.
‘Stop!’
Sandrine started to run. It was bright and the soldiers had a clear view of her, but she was banking on the fact that she knew the town better than they did. She ran past the tiny chapel, sharp right past the hospital, then swerved right again into the rue des Calquières, through the dark arched tunnel beneath the Pont Neuf and down on to the riverbank.
She could hear them on the bridge, shouting instructions in German to one another, as she continued to run. She knew her legs wouldn’t hold her for much longer. Here, on this forgotten stretch of river opposite the Andrieu distillery, there were several gaps where a person might hide, fashioned by the passing of time where the river had worked away the stones. Unless they struck lucky, she didn’t believe they would find her.
