The door flew open and Marie half fell into the room. ‘There’s a house to house search taking place in the village,’ she gasped, her bosom heaving, her face white. ‘They’re looking for a British pilot who made a forced landing outside Vierville two weeks ago!’
The skin tightened across Elise’s cheekbones. ‘Will they find him?’ she asked tersely.
‘Who knows?’ Marie’s arthritic fingers plucked agitatedly at the hem of her apron. ‘If they do there will be arrests. Deaths. Someone will talk, and then someone else will talk, and then where will we be?’
Elise cracked an egg savagely into the omelette pan. God willing no one would talk, but if there were arrests the price of silence would be high.
Dieter slammed the telephone receiver hard down on its rest. An hour ago General headquarters had woken him demanding that he instigate a full-scale search of Sainte-Marie-des-Ponts. An arrested Resistance member, under interrogation at Gestapo headquarters in Caen, had given information. An airman was being hidden at a safe house in Sainte-Marie. Dieter had curtly demanded that he be given more details, but had been told that the informant had died under questioning.
‘Imbeciles!’ Dieter had snarled to himself, dressing and issuing orders in cold fury. Their brutality sickened him. Subtle and intelligent questioning might have taken longer, but would eventually have yielded far more.
‘Beer hall Nazis,’ he muttered savagely as he slammed out of his room, knowing full well that he would have to go into Sainte-Marie himself to supervise the search.
‘Good morning, Major,’ the Comtesse said politely as their paths crossed at the foot of the stairs. ‘Everyone seems to be awake exceptionally early today. Lisette is already fretting for Dr Auge’s arrival.’
He paused. His car was waiting in the drive. His presence was needed in the village. ‘Perhaps I could see her before I leave the chateau?’
The question was purely rhetorical. The Comtesse froze and then said stiffly, ‘If you wish, Major Meyer.’
He had already turned on his heel and as he took the stairs two at a time the Comtesse fought down a surge of panic, hurrying towards her husband’s room, more than ever disturbed by the Major’s presence in her home.
Dieter knocked sharply on the bedroom door and entered, relishing Lisette’s expression of disbelief and pleasure. ‘Did you sleep well?’ he asked, striding towards the bed.
Beneath her nightdress the soft curves of her body were clearly visible.
‘Yes… I …’ Anything else she was about to say was left unsaid as his lips silenced hers. It was a long, deep kiss. Fierce and hungry. Infinitely satisfying. When at last he raised his head from hers, there was heat in his eyes.
‘So this is how you look first thing in the morning?’ he said huskily, lifting her tousled hair away from her face.
Her smile was happy, sensuous. ‘What an unfair way to find out. Are you disappointed?’
A dimple lurked at the corner of her mouth and he kissed it. ‘No,’ he said, pushing the bedclothes aside and easing her legs to the floor. ‘I doubt I will ever be that.’
He drew her to her feet, pressing her lithe young body hard against the length of his. Desire rushed through her so strong and urgent that she gasped aloud, standing on her toes to fit herself more perfectly against him. His fingers tightened in her hair, his happiness so deep-founded that it filled him with amazement. Love had struck him when he had least expected it. In the middle of war, and in an enemy land.
‘I shall speak to your father tonight,’ he said, his voice smoking across her senses, brooking no argument. She trembled and he half lifted her against him, breathing in the sweet, clean fragrance of her hair and skin, kissing her with a passion that blinded all reason. The early morning sun streamed in around them, bathing them in golden light, and as he raised his head from hers, looking down into the perfection of her face, he knew it was a moment that would remain in his memory for ever.
‘I love you,’ he said fiercely, stunned by the truth of his words. ‘Never forget it,’ and then he turned on his heel, striding swiftly from the room, wrenching himself back to his duty and the distasteful task awaiting him in Sainte-Marie-des Ponts. She was still standing in the centre of the room when Dr Auge entered. He had passed the Major on the stairs and, mindful of the situation in the village, had fairly scampered along the corridor and into the comparative sanctuary of Lisette’s bedroom.
‘Whatever is the matter, Dr Auge?’ she asked, as he loosened his waxed shirt collar, his forefinger trembling convulsively.
‘The village has been sealed off,’ he said, looking over his shoulder nervously to make sure that no one was listening behind him. ‘The Boche are conducting a house to house search for an Allied pilot. God knows what will happen if they find him.’
She stared at him, stunned, the happiness draining out of her. ‘How long have they been searching?’ she asked, feeling cold, and empty, and sick.
‘Since dawn.’
Ice seeped down her spine. While she had been in Dieter’s arms the Germans had been rampaging through Sainte-Marie. She wondered if he knew of the search and knew that he must. That was where he had gone now: to the village.
‘Excuse me,’ she said to Dr Auge, pushing past him, running for the door. She had to see him before he left the chateau. She had to know.
‘Mademoiselle!’ Dr Auge called out in protest. She ignored him. She ignored the throbbing pain in her leg, the fact that she was wearing only her nightdress and had not even a robe around her shoulders. She could hear cars screaming to a halt. Voices raised, loud and harsh. She felt as if she were drowning. As if the very life was being squeezed out of her.
‘What on earth …’ she heard her father exclaim from the hallway and then she was at the curve of the stairs and Valmy’s massive oak door burst open and all her hopes and dreams shrivelled and died.
The Germans had captured three of them: a weary, gaunt-faced young man she had never seen before; Paul Gilles, his face bloodied, his spectacles smashed; and André Caldron.
She gave a strangled, inarticulate cry.
‘We’ve got them, Major,’ one of the soldiers said and thrust them forward so that they fell, hands tied behind their backs, at Dieter’s feet.
Chapter Five
Silence thundered in the ancient, sun-dappled hall. Henri de Valmy had wrenched the library door open, intent on running to the scene of the disturbance. At the sight in front of him he froze on the threshhold, his eyes widening in horror.
The soldiers stood to attention, young and broad-shouldered, prime specimens of Aryan manhood as they waited for acknowledgement from their commanding officer for a mission speedily and satisfactorily accomplished.
Paul and André had been thrust forward with such force that they sprawled before Dieter full length. Only the airman had retained his dignity. Forced to his knees, he regarded Dieter with insolence and then turned his head, looking up the graceful sweep of stairs to where Lisette stood in her ivory silk nightdress, her face ashen, her heart slamming as she fought for breath and strength. There was no fear in his eyes, only curiosity, and then Dieter moved and the tableau was broken.
He walked to the foot of the stairs, his face a sculpted mask. Her fingers slipped and slid on the polished wood of the banisters. She tried to speak, to move towards him, and could do nothing. It was as if her very life were being counted away in seconds. Hopes and dreams running out with the sands of time, leaving a dark, immeasurable void in their wake that nothing would ever fill.
He lifted his head to hers and in his eyes she saw reflected her own all-encompassing despair. There could be no more compromise. No further pretence.
He halted, one foot on the bottom stair, his body so taut that the tendons in his neck were clenched into knots. The sun shone on his blond, cropped hair. She could see the white line of the scar that ran through his eyebrow and that her finger, only a little while before, had so lovingly traced.
‘Let them go,’ s
he whispered, leaning her weight against the bannister, sliding down weakly against it until she, like the men in the hall, was on her knees. ‘Please, for me… for us.’
A nerve throbbed at his jaw line. A spasm of pain, so devastating that she wanted to cry out aloud, flared through his eyes and then he turned away from her and she knew that her plea had been in vain.
‘Take the Englishman to Caen,’ he said curtly.
‘No! Please, no!’ she gasped, horror deepening and multiplying.
‘Immediately!’ he snapped to the officer, ignoring her. It was a sentence of death.
The Englishman was wrenched to his feet and for a brief moment he looked once more in her direction and there was a glimmer of a smile about his mouth. ‘Thank you, Mademoiselle,’ he said, inclining his head before he was savagely hustled away.
She heard her father’s hopeless protest, Marie’s strangled sob, and then Paul and André were dragged to their feet. The blood drummed in her ears and pounded behind her eyes so that she could no longer see or hear clearly.
‘Paul!’ She hauled herself to her feet, stumbling down the stairs, oblivious of her naked arms and shoulders and the revealing thinness of her nightdress.
‘Stop her!’ Dieter snapped to her father, his face chalk-white.
Henri de Valmy moved swiftly, taking the stairs two at a time, wrapping his arms restrainingly round her.
‘Paul!’ she gasped again, struggling futilely.
He turned his head to hers, his face pale, his eyes expressionless.
‘You can’t help them this way,’ her father hissed, his fingers tightening their hold on her. ‘We must speak to him on his own. Not in front of his men!’
‘Take them away,’ Dieter rasped, his jaw clenched, the skin tight across his cheekbones.
They were led away and she heard a harsh, strident cry of pain and knew that it was her own.
‘Come along,’ her father was saying urgently. ‘He’s not sending Paul and André to Caen until he has interrogated them himself. There’s still time.’
The sound of Paul and André’s feet drumming on the cobbles as they were dragged away reverberated on the still morning air. He was alone in the hallway. Slowly he turned his head and looked up at her, his eyes revealing the enormity of his rage and frustration and defeat.
She was sobbing, the tears rolling mercilessly down her face and on to her nightdress. He wanted to seize hold of her, to kiss away her tears. To blind her to reason and reality.
‘Free them,’ she pleaded again, her desperation so naked that his heart twisted in his breast. Her plea was not just for the lives of Gilles and Caldron; it was for their own lives; their own future.
His eyes were black pits of despair. They had no future. He was a German and an officer and he could not do as she asked.
‘Take her to her room,’ he said bleakly to Henri de Valmy, and then he turned and walked into the grand dining-room and the hall was once again empty, save for the sunbeams and the dancing motes of dust.
She stared after him for a long, disbelieving moment, and then, half blinded by tears, she began to stumble back up the stairs. She had to dress. She had to make him change his mind.
Dr Auge started fearfully as she rushed into the room. He had heard the disturbance and seen first the Englishman being led away, and then Paul Gilles and André Caldron. ‘What is happening?’ he asked in panic. ‘Is the village safe? Are there to be reprisals?’
‘They have arrested Gilles and Caldron,’ Henri de Valmy said heavily. ‘There’s no telling what will happen next.’
Dr Auge mopped his perspiring forehead with a large handkerchief. Executions were what could happen next and the Boche had a habit of selecting their victims with terrifying impartiality.
Lisette pulled on a skirt with trembling hands. ‘I’m going down to speak to him,’ she said feverishly. ‘He must let them go, Papa! If he sends them to Caen they will be shot!’
Deep lines scored Henri de Valmy’s face from nose to mouth. ‘No,’ he said, feeling old before his time, ‘that is my responsibility, Lisette.’
She pulled her nightdress over her head, dropping it to the floor, hurriedly pulling on a lavender wool sweater. ‘No, Papa,’ she said, her voice queerly abrupt. ‘It’s mine.’
Her father shook his head. ‘My dear child, how can it possibly be yours?’
She slipped on a pair of sandals and then slowly faced him, her eyes dark with pain. ‘Because, until an hour ago, I was going to be his wife.’
She saw the shock in his eyes. The disbelief. And then the disbelief faded and she moved swiftly away from him, opening the door and stepping out into the corridor, not wanting to see the expression that followed.
She hurried towards the head of the stairs, forcing herself not to think of him. It was Paul and André that she had to think of. Paul and André that she had to save from execution.
The Englishman was beyond her help. Dieter had sent him to his death as surely as if he had shot him in Valmy’s courtyard. How many other deaths was he responsible for? How, until now, had she managed to close her eyes to the reality of his uniform? How could she possibly have envisaged sharing his bed? Bearing his children?
The answer seemed to scream at her from the walls and she pressed her hands over her ears in an attempt to blot it out physically. It was because she loved him. Because she would always love him. But love was no longer enough. Not now. Perhaps not ever.
As she crossed the hall towards the sentry-guarded door of the grand dining-room, Elise stepped out of the library, carrying a tray. Her small, pointed face was white but her hands were steady. Their eyes held, speaking untold volumes, and then she hurried away towards the kitchen and Lisette approached the sentry, saying with fierce determination, ‘I would like to speak to Major Meyer, please.’
‘Nein,’ the sentry said, not deigning to look at her. The grand dining-room was sacrosanct. Not even officers went in there.
Panic bubbled up in her. She had to speak to him before he ordered that Paul and André be taken to Caen. ‘I insist,’ she said, her eyes flashing, her chin tilting defiantly.
‘Nein,’ the sentry growled again, barring her way with the butt of his rifle.
Two of the soldiers from the party that had captured Paul and André tramped into the hall.
‘Schafft sit fort’, the sentry said to them bad-temperedly. ‘Take her away.’
The men laughed, seizing hold of her with ribald comments.
‘Let me go!’ she shouted furiously, and then louder and in desperation, ‘Dieter! Dieter!’
The door was pulled open with such ferocity that the soldiers staggered backwards. He stared down at her, his lips bloodless. He had known that she would come but even now he was not prepared for the things they would have to say to each other.
‘Inside,’ he said to her curtly, and then, to the disconcerted men, ‘Genug!’
Very little had changed in the high, hammer-beamed ceilinged room. The beechwood floor still gleamed as sunlight streamed in from the stained-glass windows. The huge stone fireplace was still decorated with polished brasses and heavy iron fire-dogs, and the twenty-foot dining table around which countless generations of de Valmys had feasted, still stretched away down the centre of the room. Only now there were no silver candelabras on its polished surface. Instead there were maps and sheaves of paper, and a workmanlike desk lamp.
The door closed and they were alone. Slowly she turned and faced him. He was the same person who, only an hour earlier had taken her in his arms and told her that he loved her and that he would marry her. She knew that he still loved her and that there would never be any marriage. They had thought that they were stronger than the war and the circumstances of their lives, and they had been proved cruelly wrong.
‘You should have stayed in your room,’ he said, his voice raw with the bitterness of their defeat. ‘You shouldn’t have seen what happened. You shouldn’t have known about it.’
He didn’t
move towards her or try to take her in his arms and she was grateful.
‘I have known Paul Gilles and André Caldron all my life,’ she said, her voice throbbing with the emotions warring within her. ‘There is no way that I wouldn’t have found out what happened.’
‘It needn’t alter anything,’ he said savagely, his eyes blazing. ‘Mein Gott! Why should an Englishman and two damned Frenchmen destroy our future? It’s insane!’
She shook her head, feeling suddenly older than he, and wiser. ‘It’s not insane,’ she said, her eyes brilliant with unshed tears. ‘It’s reality.’
‘Gott in Himmel!’ he cried, his fist slamming down hard on the table, ‘We’re at war! I had no alternative but to send the Englishman to Caen!’
‘And Paul and André?’ she asked, her eyes burning into his. ‘What will you do with them?’
She looked so delicate, so fragile, and yet he was more than ever aware of her core of inner strength. She had dressed hastily. There was no comb in the glossy black sheen of her hair to push it away from her face and it dipped forward at her cheekbones, falling to her shoulders in a long, smooth wave. The soft wool of her sweater clung provocatively to the high fullness of her unbrassiered breasts and he felt his manhood harden and swell. He wanted her and he’d be damned to hell before he would allow the events of the morning to rob him of her.
‘Paul Gilles and André Caldron knew the risks they were taking when they sheltered the Englishman,’ he said, and she could see the heat in his eyes and his naked need of her. ‘Forget them, Lisette. Forget that it ever happened.’
He moved towards her and she stepped backwards, her bare legs and sandalled feet making her look as vulnerable as a child. ‘Let them go,’ she pleaded. ‘Isn’t it enough that you have the Englishman?’
She could retreat no further, her hands were pressed against the panelled wall.
Lights danced in her hair and his senses were filled with her natural fragrance. ‘They are members of the Resistance,’ he said, his voice thickening as he leaned his weight against her, pinning her against the wall. ‘They have to be questioned.’
Never Leave Me Page 9
