Clash by Night (A World War II Romantic Drama)

by Doreen Owens Malek

  They rarely referred to their circumstances, preferring to imagine that their meetings took place in some neutral zone, some perfect universe where nationality didn’t exist and war did not affect them. They took the necessary precautions without discussing them. Becker was nothing if not careful, and the boy Hesse, who drove her, kept his superior’s secret with the stoic silence of the well trained soldier.

  It was almost time to meet the driver now; Lysette tucked the gift into her purse and draped her wool scarf about her neck, glancing around the bedroom for her coat. She donned it and passed through the sitting room with its overstuffed sofa and chairs, iron stove and sink in one corner, brick fireplace in the middle of the outside wall. Becker had never seen her cottage.

  She slipped out the door, her breath frosting the air, and glanced up at a winter sky littered with stars. The wind had died down and now there was an eerie stillness about the village, as if it lay in wait for something. Lysette hurried through the woodlot behind her house and crossed the fields leading to the main road. Keeping well out of sight, she waited in a grove of leafless elms for the staff car that would bring her to Becker.

  * * *

  Brigitte Duclos put her feet up on a chair and rubbed her calves. She was taking her dinner hour alone in the staff lounge and was grateful to be without company. She had some information, gleaned from an incident with Kurt Hesse, to give to Patric Thibeau. The break would give her time to figure out how to get it to him.

  It didn’t feel like Christmas though Lord knew it was cold enough.

  The tiny decorated tree on the sideboard did nothing to lighten her mood. That evening some school children had visited her ward and sung carols, and she found herself unable to join in with them. Holiday spirit was the last thing on her mind.

  A detachment of men was being sent from the barracks at Bar-le-Duc to build cement bunkers for the oil tanks at Chambord. Allied planes had been damaging them and the Germans wanted to protect their valuable store from future attacks. Kurt had made up the troop list and Brigitte had seen it. The tanks had to be destroyed completely before they could be sheltered from future air raids.

  Brigitte was off duty at eleven. She could make it to the Thibeau house before the family went to mass. After the destruction of the factory Michel had been sent to a labor camp at Essen, but Patric had been put to work locally, tending the livestock the Germans kept for their own use. The boy had an uncle in the Maquis to the south who would be able act on her information.

  Brigitte sighed and slipped lower in the chair, easing the pressure of fatigue on her spine. She dealt with her guilt over using Kurt Hesse by not dealing with it at all. She refused to consider that he loved her, as he obviously did; she refused to examine her feelings for him at all. She would not discuss her complicated relationship with the German boy with Laura or anyone else. She was getting the desired results, she would reply to all inquiries, and nothing beyond that mattered. But she had grown thin since the occupation, and quiet; the joy had gone out of her sunny personality with her loss of innocence. She would never be the same person again.

  She stood abruptly and straightened her cap. She had to finish her shift. Then the more important work began.

  * * *

  Becker uncorked the wine bottle and put it aside to let it breathe. The clock on his mantel chimed and he turned anxiously to look at the door. Every time he sent Hesse for Lysette he worried that she might be seen. The fact that they had gone undiscovered this long did not mean that they couldn’t run out of luck at any moment. The boy was clever and loyal but there were eyes everywhere.

  When the knock came he didn’t wait to dismiss Hesse before enfolding Lysette in his arms. He looked at his aide over her shoulder and nodded for him to go.

  The boy pulled the door closed behind him as he left.

  “Bonne Nöel,” Becker said to his mistress, kissing her lightly on the mouth. Lysette clung to him and the kiss grew passionate. When she was satisfied he drew back, removing her coat and draping it on a chair.

  “You look very pretty,” he said.

  She smiled. “You look very tired,” she replied.

  It was true. The lines around his eyes and mouth had deepened since they’d been together and the gray was more liberal in his black hair. Oddly, the changes served to make him more attractive. She thought she had never seen a handsomer man.

  “I don’t sleep very well when you’re not with me,” he said. “You know that.”

  “You don’t sleep much when I am with you,” she rejoined, and he laughed. She loved to hear him laugh, tried to think of things that would amuse him. He still didn’t laugh easily. But when she first knew him he didn’t laugh at all.

  “Some wine?” he said, lifting the bottle.

  She nodded.

  He poured for both of them and handed her a glass. “Fröhliche Weihnachten,” he said, extending his goblet.

  She repeated the German phrase for “Merry Christmas” and touched his glass with hers. They both drank.

  “It’s good,” she said.

  “Yes? Hesse found it for me. He’s a wonder, that boy.”

  “He never talks to me,” Lysette said, half smiling, as she sat across from Becker in one of his wing chairs.

  “He’s not supposed to talk to you,” Becker said gruffly.

  “But you must admit, all this time being chauffeured around in dead silence, it’s rather absurd.”

  “The less he knows about you the better,” Becker told her, sitting also.

  “Why?” she asked, her brow furrowing in concern. She put down her glass.

  He shrugged. “If things change.”

  “What things? What are you talking about?” Any suggestion that their situation might alter, that he might not always be with her, drove her into a panic.

  “Never mind,” he said. Best not to upset her. “It doesn’t matter.”

  But she was not reassured. “Did you hear about Kleinschmitt’s visit?” she asked him anxiously. The Standartenfuhrer’s “inspections” always left him silent, brooding with impotent fury, and she dreaded them.

  “Postponed. With the gains the Russians are making on the eastern front he has more serious problems than my ‘lack of cooperation,’” Becker replied.

  “You sound happy about it,” Lysette remarked. It was unusual for him to mention the progress of his army, or of the war in general, so she was curious.

  “What? The Russians?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  He stood and drained his glass. “Hitler is insane,” he said flatly. “The only hope for any of us is if Germany loses this war.”

  Lysette caught her breath. He had never stated his feelings on the subject so baldly.

  “I can’t believe you’re saying this,” she whispered.

  “Why? Do you think I am wrong?” he challenged her.

  “No, of course not. It’s just that…for you to wish that Germany would lose...”

  “Makes me unpatriotic?” he asked cynically.

  She shrugged, hoping that her reticence would end this uncharacteristic exchange.

  “Should I wish for my country to win and see the whole world plunged into chaos?” he demanded. “My loyalty is to Germany,” he added in a lower tone, “not to that lunatic house painter and his minions. They are ruining my country with a regime that will go down in history as the scandal of the civilized world.” He refilled his glass, forgetting that he didn’t want to upset her. “Do you know what the latest SS enterprise is?” he asked rhetorically, taking a deep swallow of his wine. “Lebensborn. Himmler’s pet project, I am told.”

  Lysette still said nothing. She didn’t know how to handle him in this mood.

  “Lebensborn,” Becker went on flatly, “is a plan for the future of the ‘Aryan race.’ They are now kidnapping children of the ‘right’ physical type, blond hair and blue eyes, from families in Poland and other occupied countries and sending them to group homes to be raised as proper little Nazis
.”

  Lysette stared at him. He set down his glass and began to pace.

  “In Bogorzno the mothers of these stolen kinder threw themselves in front of the train that was about to take their children away. The troopers set the dogs on them, and when they still fought for their children the women were shot.”

  Lysette looked sick.

  “It has obviously not occurred to Mein Fuhrer to look in the mirror and discover that he himself is not the right racial type,” Becker said sarcastically, talking to himself. Then he glanced at Lysette. “Do you know what is happening to your father’s people, the Jews?” he demanded.

  “They’re all gone,” she whispered. “Disappeared.”

  “Arrested,” he snarled. “Taken away to camps, their property confiscated. And do you know what happens to them in those camps?”

  “Stop it!” she said, standing up and covering her ears. “Stop it! Why must you go on about it when there is nothing we can do?”

  He grabbed her shoulders. “Lysette, I am afraid. I don’t know how much longer I can protect you.”

  Lysette closed her eyes, shutting out his face.

  He pulled her into his arms, crushing her against him. “I have enemies,” he said. “Kleinschmitt and others. If they were to find out about you...your father... I don’t care anymore for myself, but I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you.”

  She clung to him desperately. “You won’t stop seeing me?” she whispered, her terror fortifying her to say the words.

  “No, no,” he murmured soothingly, his lips in her hair. “But we must be careful, leibchen. We must be very careful.”

  They stood in silent embrace for a long time and finally Becker stepped back from her and looked down into her face.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, lifting her fingers and kissing them. “We promised ourselves not to talk of such things and I’m breaking that vow, on this of all nights. It is Christmas, we should be happy. Here, sit down.”

  She followed him back to her chair.

  “Would you like to see your gift?” he asked, as if speaking to a child.

  She brightened, not really lured from her concerns but allowing him to think he had distracted her.

  “Yes, where is it?”

  He smiled slightly and went into the next room, returning with a square velvet box. He had not wrapped it, but bound it round with evergreens in the German tradition.

  Lysette watched him as he knelt and put it in her lap.

  “Go ahead, open it,” he said.

  Lysette lifted the hinged cover and stared at a runic cross of dull blue metal, suspended from a thick chain of heavy links. She raised her eyes to Becker’s.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said.

  “Do you know what it is?” he asked.

  She shook her head.

  “The Blue Max,” he said proudly. “My father won it in the first war.”

  “A war medal?” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “From your family.” She knew how he revered his ancestry.

  “That is so.”

  “And you’re giving it to me?” she asked, stunned.

  “I want you to have it. I’ve been carrying it around with me for a long time and now it’s yours.”

  “But your children,” she protested, overwhelmed.

  “It would mean nothing to my children now,” he said. “You are the only one who holds any importance in my life. Keep it for me.”

  She bent her head and covered her face with her hands. Shocked, he saw that she was crying.

  “Lysette, what is it?” he asked, distressed. This wasn’t the reaction he’d expected.

  She looked up at him, eyes brimming. “Do you think I don’t know why you’re doing this?” she asked.

  He watched her warily.

  “You want me to have this for when you’re gone, to remember you,” she sobbed. “Is this piece of your past supposed to replace you?”

  He looked down, not replying. It had not been such a good idea after all. She could read his emotions and his motivations very well. He hadn’t realized until she said it that she was right.

  “I couldn’t live without you, Anton,” she said soberly, through her tears. “I couldn’t and I won’t.”

  “Shh,” he said, pulling her into his arms and covering her wet face with kisses. “Don’t upset yourself.” He found her mouth with his and she responded, never tiring of his lovemaking, as she would never tire of the man.

  “Come,” he said, standing, taking her hand and raising her up with him. “Come with me.”

  He led her into the bedroom and disrobed her gently, putting aside her dress and slip and under- things, kissing each part of her body as he uncovered it. Then she sat on the edge of the bed and watched him avidly as he followed the familiar pattern, removing tunic and blouse and shoes and slacks. But this time she would not wait and stood to press herself against him as he turned, naked, from his dresser. She rubbed her flesh sinuously against his, reveling in her power. She heard with satisfaction his swift intake of breath, felt his hard arms come around her like a vise, the quickening of his manhood.

  “Take me,” she murmured. “Take me now.”

  He lifted her with one swift surge, locking her body to his. She wrapped her legs around him as he entered her and found her ready.

  He gasped something in German and then said, in French, “You are amazing.”

  “Love me,” she said.

  “I will,” he muttered. “I do.”

  They fell onto the bed in a tangle of limbs as his mantel clock chimed the hour once again.

  * * *

  Kurt Hesse blew on his gloved hands and stamped his feet. It was just his luck to draw the late guard shift on Christmas Eve. After delivering the colonel’s lady he had returned to his barracks for a nap before reporting for duty. He yawned. It hadn’t helped much. He was still tired. And restless, and cold. Thinking of Becker, warm in bed with his little French pastry, only irritated him more. The privileges of rank were getting on his nerves lately. He had to sneak meetings with Brigitte in closets while Becker entertained his librarian in style, with wine and food and a bed with clean sheets. The widow came to him in comfort in a car, while Brigitte had to hide from her friends and make excuses to see Hesse.

  But he had to admit that all the subterfuge was worth it. He was besotted with the French girl. He wanted to marry her, not just to bed her. He wanted to spend his life with her.

  Brigitte wouldn’t even consider such a notion. She got annoyed when he mentioned marriage and refused to see him again until he promised to stay off the subject. But he was not discouraged. He was young and he had time. He could sense that she wanted him as much as he wanted her, but wouldn’t admit it. He would force her to see the truth and in the end she would follow her heart.

  He shifted his rifle to his other shoulder and began to plan their next meeting.

  * * *

  The church of Saint Michel Archange was one hundred and fifty years old. Its wooden floor was warped, its ceiling low, its pews rickety, the kneelers liable to leave splinters in the shins of the faithful. But it was much beloved by its devout congregation, who had financed what improvements they could over its long history. New statuary had appeared in the early thirties, and second hand vestments, still glorious in their rainbow colors and fine stitchery, had been purchased from a more affluent church in Nancy. The same source also supplied the altar vessels and linen, the chalice and pyx, patens, and lawn napkins—all the wares priests used at mass and other services. The result was that even though the town was something less than prosperous, especially in this time of war, Saint Michel’s could boast a Christmas midnight mass the equal of any other in the Meuse.

  Laura entered the church through the carved double doors and dipped her fingers into the holy water font on her right, blessing herself as she nodded to the familiar faces surrounding her. She genuflected in the aisle and slipped into a rear pew, clasping her hands
in front of her and bowing her head as if in prayer. But from beneath her lowered lids she scanned the church, noting the placement of the armed German guards, two at the back near the entrance, two more at the front on either side, one right near the sacristy. Her heart sank. She had been planning to go up in the communion line and then veer off to use the sacristy exit. Unless the guard moved she would have to march right past him.

  She raised her head and looked around the church for Lysette as she absently considered the problem. Her fellow teacher did not appear to be present but that wasn’t really a surprise. Lysette was in her own world these days. She hummed to herself and smiled into space, possessed of some inner peace that Laura observed and applauded, and also suspected that she understood. She hated to ascribe her friend’s contentment to the death of her husband but that certainly seemed to be the case. Laura had long suspected that the man was abusive, but Lysette was so private, so self-contained, that Laura had hesitated to talk to her about it. And now the occasion had been removed, by the war that had changed so many lives for the worse, but Lysette’s clearly for the better.

  The ancient, wheezing pipe organ in the choir loft favored the assembly with Gounod’s Ave Maria as they waited for mass to begin. The center altar was ablaze with lighted candles, flanked by eight foot evergreens and wreathed in holly. The ladies of the altar society didn’t mind mixing their pagan symbols with their Christian ones. The side altars featured life sized statues of Saint Michael crushing a serpentine Satan under his victorious heel and the Virgin Mary. She was robed in celestial blue, veiled in white trimmed with silver, cradling the infant Jesus in her arms. New brides and pregnant women often left bouquets at her feet. Some recent ones were still there, flowers shriveling, ribbons gone limp, testament to the hopes that outlived such earthly offerings.