by Milly Adams
She gripped the top rope now; it swayed. She took the first sideways step. In France her life had been perfect, free of her family, in charge of two small children. Derek and she had stayed together in the cottage, her quarters in the grounds of the chateau. There had been no sex of course, just in case. But after the wedding, children had never happened, which is why they had taken Lizzy.
She shook her head. She must focus. She must concentrate on the important things. She had to remember to be Gabrielle, not Sarah. The sergeant bawled, ‘Do I have to come up there and push you off?’
‘No, Sarge.’ She slid her hands along the top rope and side-stepped along the bottom one, her mind emptied of everything but survival. There were no safety nets, just as in life. The top rope swung one way, the bottom another. She gripped tightly, kept going, reached the other tree and climbed down. At the bottom she bent over and vomited, again and again, and while she did so, Darcel climbed and reached the rope, but couldn’t move; she returned down the same tree. Bernard, however, almost ran up, and slid along the rope and down the other tree. He passed Sarah, slapping her on the back just as she was thinking she couldn’t possibly be sick again. She was.
They had to run up the next hill and, as dusk settled, they had to sleep out under the non-existent stars, without blankets or food. They had been shown how to catch and gut rabbits, but food was not on their agenda; just sleeping off the gin, and the worry about Darcel. Would she be flung off the course?
The next day they were taken to some old buildings. Their task was to jump from one roof onto the other. Bernard jumped first, and Sarah stood with Darcel. ‘I will, if you will,’ Sarah said. ‘I don’t want to go on without you.’
Darcel looked at her, the light Scottish summer night showing her fear. ‘I can’t,’ she said.
‘Yes, you can. You need to.’ Somewhere she had heard an echo of those words. She couldn’t remember where …
‘Please, Darcel. You look so lovely.’ She stopped. Darcel looked at her, puzzled, as well she might. Sarah said, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know where that came from.’ Then she remembered. Kate had said, ‘Yes, you can, you need to. Please, for me, for Derek. You look so lovely.’
It was when she was to be married, and her father told her the neckline of her wedding dress was too low and she looked like a trollop. She had faltered until Kate said those words. They had made Sarah draw herself up and walk down the aisle towards her love.
Darcel still paused. Sarah said, ‘Someone said something like that to me – “Please, you look so lovely” – because I was hesitating about doing something. I can’t tell you what, because I am not my true self, I am Gabrielle.’
Darcel half laughed. ‘Well, I will pretend I look lovely.’
‘Don’t pretend. You do.’
Darcel ran and jumped. The instructor bawled, ‘Welcome to the party, Darcel.’
Sarah followed, landing on all fours like a cat, not even winded. Darcel patted her shoulder, but Sarah backed away, feeling ashamed of her old self. They leapt back over to the other building but, as she landed, she remembered Kate’s dreadful self-serving lie, just to protect herself and the father of her child, who had left with his tribe. It was a lie that could have ruined the best of men. Sarah’s shame faded as they jumped down to the ground and sprinted off onto the moor, and she was grateful for the exercise and tried to pound away the anger that she still felt towards her sister and the whole sordid business.
All three trainees were passed through to the next stage and took the train to Manchester, where they clambered into yet another lorry, which would take them to the parachute school.
Once there, Sarah examined her pigeonhole. Yes, there was a letter from Lizzy, with a footnote from Kate. In her room, she tore open the envelope.
Hello Mum
When Aunt Kate writes the envelope, it makes me laugh that you have a PO Box address. It makes me think you live in that little box. We are very well. We went to the river to play Poohsticks, and Fran Billings came too (she lets me call her Fran because the children in her street in London do) with Sandra, Milly and Tim. Sandra had a birthday party and so I had mine with her. I’m nine now, but you know that. Thank you for the present you left. I like the doll.
Mrs Whitehead gave Aunt Kate an egg from her hens, so we could bake a cake. We were very surprised because she hasn’t been friendly to Aunt Kate, but now she is. The cake was all right, but not very sweet. Mrs Whitehead came to the party because she had given us the egg. Mrs B didn’t. She said she was busy. I don’t think she was, but she just seems very cross all the time, doesn’t she? Aunt Kate said I had to think of her with kindness because life isn’t always as it seems.
The vicar is still leaving the long grass and the flowers in the cemetery. Perhaps that’s why Mrs B is cross. She thinks it’s a bad idea. He says bees are important. He told us a story about bees in Sunday School. Miss Easton’s fiancé is missing. She had one of those telegrams, like ours. She’s very sad, but thinks he’s a prisoner, like Dad.
I’m glad you are in the FANYs and will be safe. I suppose it is safe, because the bombing is getting better. I love you, Mummy.
Your daughter, Lizzy.
Hello, Sarah. Everything is fine here. The harvest is in. The Fletcher boy has started coming to church. Mrs Whitehead has softened. Lizzy is being a very good girl. I am too. Be careful, and I say that from the bottom of my heart.
Sarah folded the letter. On the other bed, Darcel was reading hers. Darcel’s mother also thought she was dishing out teas on station platforms, in her smart FANY uniform. Lies, damned lies. Who had said that? She didn’t care, because her lies were for the good of the country.
Sarah wrote a letter full of nothing, because it had to be. She would find the time to write other letters, which were equally bland and date-unattributable. They would be posted in her absence. In the meantime she had to continue to try and leave her own life behind and focus on being Gabrielle.
The next day they were tasked to learn to fall, as though from an aeroplane. They had done some preparation in Scotland, but this training was urgent and focused. ‘Keep yer ’ands in yer pockets,’ roared the instructor, who always wore singlet and shorts.
Darcel murmured, ‘With legs like that, who needs hands?’
‘For that observation you will show us, Mademoiselle Darcel, how to do it properly.’
She did, but Sarah felt anxious, because this was very much on terra firma. What would happen to Darcel from any sort of height?
The next day they strapped on a parachute harness and practised falling again. Finally they climbed up to the gallery, erected high in the hangar. A cable was attached to them. Darcel was pale but composed as she handled the harness and landed, knees bent and together. Sarah did too.
The next day they were promoted to a tower, and then to a platform attached to a barrage balloon 900 feet up. Sarah expected Bernard to yell ‘Geronimo’, which was what some of the American parachutists shouted as they left an aircraft, their instructor had told them. He’d added that he’d have their guts for garters, if he heard even a whisper of the word. Darcel said nothing, but landed neatly.
Finally it was the Whitley bomber that awaited them one morning. They clambered in and Sarah’s stomach turned somersaults, not just at the thought of jumping out of a real moving plane, but at the smell of oil, metal and something indefinable; perhaps it was just the fuselage. There were other parachutists there that she didn’t know. No-one spoke. She kept her gaze fixed on Bernard’s hands as he sat next to her. They were strong and absolutely still on his lap. This man had no nerves. Sarah saw that Darcel, who sat opposite, was also watching, her lips set in a thin line, sweat beading her forehead.
The first to jump made his way to the hatch. He swung his legs over, staring down at the countryside, knowing that he was to land in a field marked with sheets spread on the ground. He hesitated, and the RAF sergeant despatcher patted him on the back and gave a push. Out he went. It was now Sa
rah’s turn. She felt and heard the wind, seeing the tiny fields and the one with white patches. Legs down, head down. She steeled herself, took a deep breath and thought, ‘I can do this. I am Gabrielle, not Sarah, and Gabrielle is brave.’ A tap, and out she went.
She turned a somersault, a static line tugged the ’chute open and she felt the jerk switch her from a tumble into a descent. Down, down, she was floating; the wind was light and there was a slight drizzle. She drew closer to the earth, closer, and then it was rushing up. ‘Bend the knees,’ the instructor’s voice echoed in her head. She did; the thwack as she hit the ground ricocheted throughout her body. She rolled, before struggling to her feet, tugging at the parachute, which was threatening to drag her along the ground.
She dug in her heels, but over she went, the parachute billowing and pulling her along. She twisted and turned until she was rescued by an instructor. By then she was covered from head to foot in dirt, her cheek was grazed and sheep-poo stained her uniform. She stank.
Bernard was waiting. ‘Fragrant? I don’t think so.’
Darcel was nowhere to be seen. ‘She’s safe,’ the instructor said. ‘But you won’t see her again.’
Soon those who were left went on to the more psychological aspect of their training. Again, they were grouped together by nationality. Their group contained seven men and Sarah. Bernard and she sat together, bound by joint experiences. They were inducted into the rules of the German occupation of France; the differences between the military police and the Gestapo; the need to remain vigilant but unnoticed, because there was no way of knowing who was friendly and who would sell you for a bar of soap. They also learned about Vichy France, which was established after France surrendered to Germany on 22 June 1940 and took its name from the government’s administrative centre in Vichy, south-east of Paris. While officially neutral, Vichy actively collaborated with the Nazis, and the trainees had to beware of its officials, and also some of its civilians.
They examined bus timetables, destinations, what was on ration, what was not, and how to avoid ordering the wrong thing, in the wrong way.
They were given yet another identity. Sarah now became Cécile Lamont and was given her new background, including job experience. They were taught to act convincingly so that, if questioned, information could be given realistically. She remembered how Kate had loved to act and always wanted to go on the stage, and how their mother had helped her learn her lines for the school Christmas play, sighing and confessing that she had always wanted that life for herself.
Sarah’s instructor called her back to the task in hand, testing her and coming at the subject of her past from other angles. She was Cécile Lamont from Limoges and had worked in a butcher’s shop, a boucherie, in Poitiers. She had to learn cuts of meat, and the cooking of them. Soon Sarah became Cécile, in her innermost core and, at night, as she fell asleep, she wondered if this was what Kate had been seeking after their mother’s death? Was the wildness just some escape from being Kate Watson, daughter of a dead mother and a strict father, owner of a dead dog, friend of a missing Melanie, and sister?
Sarah opened her eyes wide. Had Kate lived so much in another world that she had forgotten what was true and false? She could see how that could happen. Sarah willed herself to sleep, because she refused to go over the same ground again. She was now Cécile from Limoges. Limoges is known for its medieval and Renaissance enamels on copper. Limoges is known for its nineteenth-century porcelain. It is known for its oak barrels, which are used for Cognac and Bordeaux production.
She was Cécile walking along the lanes in the countryside outside Limoges to which her parents had moved, living in a small hamlet. She was stopping to look at the orchids growing in the grass verges sheltered by the hedgerows. Perhaps she was taking just one back to her mother and father, who was a cobbler. Her mother made excellent boeuf bourguignon. The clouds were scudding and the geese were squawking in Monsieur Hollande’s wired pen. They were bred for the Christmas trade, sadly depleted now that they were occupied, but the Germans still liked a good Christmas Eve dinner.
Limoges, yes, she loved Limoges, but she had to go to Poitiers to work in a new boucherie, because Madame Broussard had to close hers when she became too old. She was waving goodbye, and rode her bicycle to her parents’ home, along a rough track. It rattled the handlebars; her grip tightened, but she was being shaken and tossed from side to side. She woke, shouting in French, ‘What is it? What?’
The men shaking her were in uniform. It was the Gestapo; but she wasn’t in France, she was training. How? Who? What?
They were shouting at her in German. She responded in French.
How?
Then Sarah woke completely. They were not Gestapo; they were acting, and she must be Cécile. She was hauled from bed and dragged, pushed and prodded into a dark room, then flung onto a chair. Her feet were cold.
‘What?’ she said. ‘Why am I here? I need to work, I need some sleep.’
‘Where do you work?’ She gave the name of the Poitiers boucherie, because a Cécile Lamont had indeed worked there. That Cécile had left on the outbreak of war, after breaking her leg in a fall, and had lived in England. ‘Why there?’
‘Because that is where I found a job; there were none near my home.’
‘Where is this butcher? Describe the street.’ Sarah did. In reality Cécile Lamont had died in a car accident after she had moved to Sussex.
On and on the interrogation went. Sarah grew tired, but she was always Cécile.
‘You can relax now,’ one of the Gestapo said in English.
‘Thanks,’ she replied in English.
He said, ‘Bang, you’re dead.’ He cocked his finger and shot her.
Again and again they were tested in this way. Often they failed, but then, slowly, they began to get it right. Bernard, of course, got it quicker than anyone. She and he would sit in the mess in the evening, playing observation games, testing one another, just as the other three who remained were doing. It was relentless, but it would save their lives.
Only when they returned to their beds in the small hours did Sarah think that soon this would be real. Soon they could be in a Gestapo cell under torture. Soon, on the other hand, they could be doing some good, as long as they stayed insignificant, checked for people shadowing them, double-backed when walking, jumped off buses to shake a tail, stared in shop windows to study the reflections of those around them. Yes, they might do some good, as long as they remembered to shoot straight and hit someone only when strictly necessary; to trust no-one – no-one at all – and never relax. Never. Yes, they might do some good, as long as she took part in exercise after exercise that showed her how to make contact with those who would help set up groups within circuits; circuits that would operate now or that would sleep, to be activated when, not if, the allied invasion actually took place.
As long as she learned, by heart, messages that needed passing, and diagrams that could be transcribed for a group. As long as she could leave a written coded message in a drop, or perhaps handed to a shopkeeper or waiter, or written on the margin of a newspaper. As long as, as long as …
Chapter Twelve
At Little Worthy the fields had been ploughed, and some sown, and Kate sat at the kitchen table in the waning evening light on a Sunday evening in September, darning a pair of Lizzy’s winter socks. She had found her mother’s green wooden darning mushroom and her pincushion in Sarah’s workbox. She remembered pushing the pins down into the soft cushion, and her mother would tap Kate’s hand. ‘Leave that, darling,’ she would say. ‘Watch while I show you how to darn.’
Kate had thought darning was just like weaving, and had said as much to her mother. It was something Lizzy had said too, the previous evening, her finger pointing to the interwoven wool. Kate just managed to stop herself from saying that Lizzy was so like her. Instead, as Lizzy swished her hair over her shoulder, Kate had said, ‘My word, you smell of lavender.’
‘That’s because you rinsed i
t with Mum’s special conditioner, don’t you remember? But then old people don’t, do they?’ Lizzy’s look was the height of innocence, but her giggle gave her away. Kate had wanted to kiss her, like her mother had done to her that day so long ago, but Lizzy had danced away, her thoughts already on other things. It was best because, one day, Kate would leave to take up her place onstage somewhere, and Lizzy would remain here, with her mother.
Kate forced herself back into the moment, here, this evening, the darning mushroom in her hand, with only her memories of her mother to the fore, as she had said, ‘You notice so much, little Katie.’ But then Kate had remembered her father snapping, ‘Time she was doing it herself. And sit up, child. Stop wriggling.’ Her mother had squeezed her hand and murmured, ‘It’s a lovely evening, Reggie. She’d be better outside.’
Instead, her father had taken up his golf clubs and headed out, picking up Dr Bates as he went. Somehow the house relaxed when he was absent. Kate looked out of the open back door into the garden, where Lizzy was now swinging herself high on the seat they had cleaned up last week. The swing hadn’t been used for years and had had all sorts of wooden planks resting against it. Kate had carted them to the end of the garden, insisting that Lizzy took one end of the lighter ones.
‘If you want something badly enough, you must make it happen,’ she had nagged. It’s what her mother had often said.
