The Child Left Behind

by Anne Bennett

  Despite what she had said, Bridgette found that quite a shock. For a brief second she remembered Xavier wearing those same clothes. It was before war ripped their lives apart and they had both been in the town together. He had his arm around her and she suddenly remembered the feel of that arm and the light kiss as their lips touched.

  James saw her face and said softly, ‘I’m sorry. I changed because I have been wearing the same clothes for over a week, but I see how it has distressed you and I will change back immediately.’

  ‘No,’ Bridgette said firmly. ‘No, it’s me just being silly. Xavier would laugh at my foolishness. Of course you must wear his clothes. It is the most sensible thing to do. Leave your other things where they are and I will deal with them later. Now that my father and Georges are in the bakery, let’s go and have breakfast with my mother.’

  As they were eating breakfast, Bridgette asked James what he had been trying to find out. ‘Though I don’t suppose that you can tell us that,’ she added.

  ‘I shouldn’t tell you, it’s true, but as I am accepting your hospitality I feel it only fair,’ James said. ‘My brief was to check out the missile bases. Do you know of them?’

  ‘Missile bases?’ Bridgette repeated.

  ‘That’s what the Intelligence boys think they are,’ James said. ‘One is in an area called Watten, in the middle of the forest.’

  ‘Eperlecques Forest?’

  ‘That’s the one,’ James said. ‘It’s a gigantic concrete structure, a truly massive thing. The Allies have been bombing it relentlessly and it is damaged, no doubt about that, but some areas of it still seemed usable. I went first at night and though I couldn’t get close there was evidence that people had been at work there. Charles told me he had seen them, and the next day he took me to a place overlooking the site and I could see them myself through field glasses. I communicated what I had discovered to London.’

  ‘What about the one nearer here, which people are beginning to call La Coupole?’ Bridgette asked.

  ‘That was spotted being built, from a reconnaissance plane last November. It was easier to see from the air then than it is now. Most of it appears to be underground and there is just a giant mushroom over, which is effectively hidden by the foliage of the trees at this time of the year.’

  ‘There was a chalk quarry there before,’ Gabrielle said.

  ‘They knew that,’ said James. ‘It explained why it is so easy to dig down deeper. I think that very powerful bombs will be needed to penetrate La Coupole. They were working on that when I left.’

  ‘Don’t,’ Bridgette said. ‘We live very close, and the bombing has already been scary enough.’

  ‘I know,’ James said. ‘It must be really frightening, especially as you can’t take shelter in a cellar or anything, but we must knock out these sites, because they think the Germans are developing pilotless planes with war heads in the nose, and even rockets built the same way. If they’re right—and they usually are about things like this—then these places are where they will be manufactured, and they might later be using them as launching pads too. What about a few of those landing on British cities that have already taken a pounding? You have no idea what some of them have already gone through.’

  ‘I did know about the bombings,’ Bridgette said. ‘We would listen in to the BBC on the wireless. And you’re right: they surely have gone through enough already. And had you finished what you had came here to do?’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ James said. ‘My mission was finished but the route to get me out collapsed. The network was infiltrated in some way and some people were lifted. One or more broke under questioning.’

  ‘No one knows how they would withstand torture until it’s put to the test,’ Bridgette said. ‘And it’s even worse, I think, when your loved ones are punished along with you. That was one of the reasons I gave up the work when I knew I would be caring for Maman.’ She turned as she spoke and saw that her mother had fallen asleep, even propped up as she was.

  ‘When did she go to sleep?’ she asked James.

  ‘I don’t know,’ James admitted. ‘I only just noticed it myself.’

  ‘She has hardly touched her breakfast,’ Bridgette said, as she removed the tray. ‘But then she eats very little. Will you help me lift her down the bed so that she will be more comfortable?’

  ‘I’ll do that with pleasure.’

  It was as they bent to the task that their eyes met and Bridgette was totally amazed at the jolt that ran through her body. Since Xavier had died, she had never ever thought of any other man in that way, and nor had she wanted to for she knew that no one could take his place. She was annoyed with herself that she had allowed this unknown Englishman to unlock feelings she thought dead and buried.

  She saw that his eyes too were slightly puzzled, but neither spoke of it. They lifted Gabrielle down the bed and Bridgette arranged the pillows without another word being spoken.

  To break the silence, before it should become too awkward, she said, ‘Tell me about yourself, James.’

  ‘What do you wish to know?’

  ‘Oh, where you come from, your family. The usual stuff.’

  ‘I am a very ordinary chap,’ James said. ‘As I said, I lived in a place called Sutton Coldfield. It’s a royal town, given to the people of Sutton by Henry the Eighth. We lived near a large park, so large that there are five sizeable lakes in it and streams running all through the park to feed those lakes. When I look back it seems like every fine day all the kids from the area would be in that park, and what adventures we had there. I used to sometimes be mad if Mum made me take Dolly, my little sister, with me. I remember I seemed to spend a lot of time pushing her on the swings.’

  Bridgette saw the smile playing around his mouth and she asked, ‘Have you any other brothers or sisters?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ James said. His eyes suddenly clouded over and he said, ‘I had a younger brother, Dan, as well. He was killed in action in the summer of ’41, along with Dolly’s fiancé.’

  ‘Oh, James!’ Bridgette cried. ‘You must have barely got over the loss of your wife. Were you close to your brother?’

  James nodded. ‘As the Yanks would say, we were real buddies. We were all very cut up about his death and that of Dolly’s fiancé, Stuart, too. He was a fine man and got on well with us all. I volunteered to undertake this sort of work the following year because, to be honest, for a long time I didn’t care whether I lived or died. I felt as if I had lost so much—first Sarah and then Dan and Stuart.’

  ‘I took up Resistance work for the same reason,’ Bridgette said. ‘To avenge the deaths of my husband and baby.’

  ‘And has it helped you feel better?’

  Bridgette nodded. ‘When I kill Germans it does. That’s strange in a way because all my life I have disliked violence or even unpleasantness.’

  ‘Was there a reason for that?’

  Bridgette hesitated. She didn’t know James well enough to tell him just how awful her earlier life had been, and so she contented herself with saying, ‘Well, I never really saw eye to eye with my father, and Georges is my half-brother, and we have never got on either. However, I have a lovely aunt in Paris, Yvette. She is Maman’s sister but I haven’t told her how sick Maman is,’ Bridgette said. ‘I will do so, though, as soon as they get something organised for you.’

  ‘Let’s hope that it’s sooner rather than later then,’ James said.

  ‘I hope that to,’ Bridgette said. ‘Until then, we will just have to cope.’

  Later that day Bridgette said to James, ‘Marie and her daughter will be here tomorrow. They come every Saturday afternoon, because Lisette is not at work and Marie shuts the shop up. There are very few customers these days. In fact, any trade comes mainly from the Germans.’

  ‘Why is that?’

  ‘There’s no money about,’ Bridgette said. ‘A lot of the food is sent to Germany, so what little is left is expensive. When I lived with the Laurents I helped in the shop and also worke
d in a bar, and before Lisette got the job in the factory we were always hungry. Few of these shortages affect us here, though, for anything we are running out of is replaced by my father’s German friends just as soon as he tells them about it. It bothers me, but what can I do? And I suppose it is better for my mother to have the best food available for all I nearly choke on it sometimes when I know how sparsely most people are living.’

  ‘In the short time I have been here I have seen the suffering of the French people,’ James said. ‘I felt sorry for all of you, and all the other countries under Nazi control.’

  ‘It’s not for ever,’ Bridgette said. ‘I must say I am surprised at Britain. I thought you would sink as well, one more notch to Hitler’s belt.’

  James smiled. ‘To hear the Americans, it was their intervention that saved us.’

  ‘Does that annoy you?’

  ‘No,’ James said. ‘It’s just their way. Most British people are brought up to think that it is extreme bad manners for a person to blow their own trumpet.’

  ‘Blow their own trumpet?’ Bridgette repeated questioningly.

  ‘It means boasting, bragging about what you can do,’ James said in explanation. ‘And let’s face it, their involvement didn’t do us any harm.’

  ‘Are you always so easy-going?’

  ‘I suppose,’ James said. ‘I don’t see the point of getting worked up over little things.’

  Bridgette sighed and said, ‘I find that attitude very restful.’

  He smiled. ‘I’m glad of that.’

  Once again there was that tug in her stomach and she busied herself doing things for her mother so that he wouldn’t see how that smile had affected her.

  That same day, storm troopers began searching the town for James and had reached their street by the afternoon. Bridgette, watching through her mother’s bedroom window, felt as if her heart was in her mouth and, as they drew nearer, her spine began to tingle. She saw the brutal way they dealt with any who protested: they were thrown unceremoniously out onto the cobbled streets, and she heard the shattering of glass and the splintering of wood, and heard the cries and sobs of the distressed people.

  Then, Bridgette felt as if her heart had stopped beating altogether for they had reached the bakery and she heard the bell tinkle as they entered the shop. Gabrielle read the naked fear in her daughter’s eyes for both of them knew there was nowhere in the house or shop where James wouldn’t be found.

  James too was distraught, and not for himself alone, but also for Bridgette. He knew that her mother might be spared, not only because of her illness but because it was such an infectious illness, but they would take Bridgette. As the soldiers’ boots were heard pounding up the stairs he slid under the bed, even knowing it was futile. Bridgette decided that she would not cower in her mother’s room and went out to meet them with her head held high to see her father coming out of the bedroom he shared with Georges, roused from his slumber by the commotion.

  ‘What is this?’ he demanded of a German officer pushing past the troopers lining the stairs. ‘I thought we had an agreement.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Bridgette heard the officer say to her father. ‘There has been a mistake,’ and he gave a curt order to the storm troopers, who turned and went back down the stairs.

  Bridgette let out the breath she hadn’t even been aware that she had been holding and felt almost light-headed with relief. Without a word to Legrand she went back to her mother.

  ‘Charles was right. This house is not to be searched, and while I am more than glad about that, my worry now is that that might appear odd to our neighbours.’

  ‘They’ll know why,’ Gabrielle said. ‘Don’t worry, Legrand has marked his card very well.’

  Bridgette hoped they were right because the whole thing had shaken her up more than she thought it would.

  Marie, when she came the following day, agreed with Gabrielle that the townsfolk would know why the bakery had been spared a search. ‘You should be grateful anyway,’ she said. ‘At our house they ruined bales of cloth, and took two pictures from the wall and smashed them to pieces with their boots.’

  ‘Did you say anything?’

  Marie shook her head. ‘My energies were taken up trying to stop Maurice saying anything,’ she said. ‘I’ve heard since from men who did that, and after the soldiers had beaten them up, they trashed the place. As it was, it took me hours to clear up after they had all gone.’

  Marie and Lisette were obviously interested in James Carmichael, though he had been a little nervous about meeting them, or anyone really, because Charles had impressed upon him the need for secrecy. However, he trusted Bridgette’s judgement and found he liked both women and he relaxed a little, especially when Bridgette told him that Lisette’s husband, Edmund, survived Dunkirk and was one of those rescued from the beaches and had been taken to Britain.

  ‘Does she know where he is now?’ he asked.

  Bridgette shook her head. ‘Nothing definite, though Lisette feels certain that he would have joined the Free French army under de Gaulle.’

  ‘She’s probably right,’ James said. ‘A good few Frenchmen did that.’

  Bridgette translated this to Lisette and her mother as she translated anything they said to James, and when they had gone home later that day, James asked if Bridgette would teach him to speak better French.

  ‘To be able to understand what people say would be a great advantage. I watched you today and you must be worn out.’

  ‘Not really,’ Bridgette said. ‘Though it might be a good idea for you to learn anyway. Of course we don’t know how long you are going to be here and you might be moved on before we have got very far, but we can make a start at least.’

  The next day, as Bridgette approached the cathedral before Mass, she was accosted by Madame Pretin. Bridgette hadn’t a great liking for the woman, who she thought must love grumbling and complaining as she did so much of it.

  That morning she fixed her gimlet eyes upon Bridgette and they glittered with malice as she said, ‘What I want to know—what many want to know—is the reason why your house wasn’t searched the day before yesterday like everyone else’s in the town?’

  Bridgette looked at the knot of women standing a little way from them and thought that Madame Pretin had put into words what they were thinking. They might have all being discussing it before she arrived.

  She lifted her head a little higher and said stiffly, ‘I have no say in what the Germans do. Maybe they didn’t search our house because Maman is so ill and they knew they would find nothing anyway.’

  ‘You’re hand in glove with them, that’s the truth.’

  ‘I am hand in glove with no German.’

  ‘So you say,’ one woman spat out. ‘But I remember the way you behaved with them stationed in the town and that was only a little while ago.’

  Bridgette knew that was the time she pretended to like and even at times flirt with the German soldiers so that she could get across the town unmolested by them with the vital messages she had hidden in her beret. She couldn’t say this, though, but what she did say was, ‘I really don’t know what you are talking about.’

  ‘Oh yes you do,’ the older woman said. ‘I was not the only one to notice.’

  Bridgette’s eyes flashed with sudden anger and she snapped out, ‘I am surprised that one person notices with such interest the actions of another. My life is too busy to do that. Maybe you should think of doing more with your own life and keeping your nose out of other’s business. In fact,’ she said to the other women watching the exchange, ‘maybe you should all do the same.’

  She walked away before Madame Pretin or any of them could make a reply and all through Mass she could almost feel their affronted eyes boring into her back. As Mass finished she was out of the door in an instant and hurried home without stopping to speak to anyone, though she had seen Marie and Lisette in the congregation.

  She regretted losing her temper. Despite what her mother and
Marie had said, she knew many of the congregation would be unaware of her father’s relationship with the German officers in the town. It was not something he broadcasted. And so, people being people, would probably assume her house had been spared because of favours given and this would be compounded by the way she had reacted. She should have held her tongue, though she feared the damage was done now.

  Life at the bakery with James in residence assumed something of a pattern over the next few days, although they never took chances or dropped their guard. And yet, despite the danger, Bridgette realised that she liked having James around. He was a good, kind man and she loved him for the way he was with her mother. He would do anything for her, however distasteful, without the slightest hesitation, and he would entertain her when Bridgette was busy. If Legrand and Georges were away in the bakery and there was no danger of hearing the timbre of his voice he would talk to her or they would play cards together.

  Each day, Bridgette made an early lunch for everyone and when she had eaten hers, she went downstairs to relieve the girl in the shop so that she could have a lunch break too. She had told James that if her father was going to look in on Gabrielle, he usually did it on his way to bed after the midday meal and so James went into Bridgette’s room where he hid under the bed until Bridgette came to fetch him. Then she’d take him into her mother’s room because it was further away from the two snoring men than her own was, and she would give him his French lesson.

  James was making excellent progress, as he proved the next time the Marie and Lisette came. He found that he could understand a lot of what they said, although he was still wary of talking in French, certain that he would make a fool of himself. Bridgette was really pleased for him, though she knew when James eventually left them she would miss him enormously.

  After the encounter with Madame Pretin, Bridgette didn’t risk going back to the cathedral to Mass on Sunday mornings, using the excuse to the priest and to Marie and Lisette, that she didn’t like leaving her mother so long. Even the priest accepted that because he knew that Gabrielle was very ill, though Marie and Lisette both offered to sit with her mother so Bridgette could attend Mass if she wanted to.