For King and Country

by David Monnery

  He spent the next couple of days telling himself that it was absurd, that he didn’t know anything about her, that his behaving like a lovesick idiot could get them both killed, that this was just four years of celibacy catching up with him. But he could hardly wait to see her again.

  The bus was about half an hour late reaching the Raves crossroads and not surprisingly, given the withdrawal of trains, close to full. Equally astonishing, given the number of healthy young males on board, she had managed to keep the seat beside her vacant. He sat down, feigning surprise at meeting an old friend unexpectedly, and they kissed cheeks. She was wearing the same pale blue dress as before, and a perfume redolent of spring flowers – lily of the valley, he thought, without knowing why.

  As agreed beforehand, they didn’t talk. She looked out of the window, and he did the same, though often his eyes would flicker back to her face, or the way her blonde hair seemed to float on her shoulders.

  It was a bright and sunny day, warm enough to qualify for summer. For the first five miles the bus climbed an increasingly tortuous road up a narrowing valley, finally reaching the watershed in the small town of Saale. From there road and railway slowly descended the valley of the Bruche in a north-easterly direction, crossing and recrossing both each other and the river with a dizzying regularity. Farnham started taking mental notes of sabotage-friendly locations, but soon abandoned the task – there were just too many. An efficient raiding group operating in the forested hills above would have little trouble shutting down both road and rail traffic for weeks on end.

  As this thought was taking root in his mind, a long troop train steamed past in the opposite direction. Bareheaded Wehrmacht soldiers were leaning out of the windows smoking cigarettes, and no doubt wondering whether they’d ever see Germany and their families again.

  Fifteen miles more and they were entering Schirmeck, a small town built in the space where two valleys converged. They had not passed a single German vehicle on the road but here they seemed to be everywhere – a troop lorry and two staff cars drove past as they walked the fifty yards from the bus stop to the small square at the centre of the town. Farnham wasn’t sure whether or not he was imagining it, but the streets seemed unusually empty for a weekday afternoon, and those people that were out seemed almost uniformly eager to avoid eye contact.

  Madeleine took his arm and guided him up a steep and narrow street of old two-storey houses. The sixth or seventh was a solicitor’s office, and after one quick look back down the street she ushered him inside.

  A small, balding man with bright eyes and a bushy moustache greeted them with a smile. ‘Ah, you are here. Good. I was half afraid you would go straight to the inn, but I didn’t want to risk waiting at the bus stop…’

  ‘It was arranged that we should come here first,’ Madeleine said, as he shook hands with Farnham.

  ‘I know. I was just worried. The Germans have taken to checking all the local inns lately, sometimes more than once on the same day. So I think it would be wiser if you stayed here with me. There’s a small attic room which you can sleep in,’ he told Madeleine, ‘while our friend here is roaming the hills.’

  ‘This will not be safe for you,’ she objected.

  He shrugged. ‘You’re here now, and they might see you leave. There’s no telling, so you might as well stay. Come,’ he said. ‘And don’t let any signed photographs of De Gaulle slip out of your pockets,’ he added with a grin. ‘My name is Marcel, by the way,’ he told Farnham, as they started up the narrow staircase.

  The attic room was reached by a ladder, and had obviously been used for guests before. Two camp-beds faced each other across a threadbare carpet, which looked even more faded than it was in the sunlight pouring through the dormer window. The house faced west, Farnham noted, his eyes straying to the well-thumbed books which sat on the window-sill.

  ‘I shall have to leave you for a while,’ Marcel was telling Madeleine, ‘to check on our friend’s guide for the night. It should be dark in a couple of hours, and I think it would be wise to pull the curtains if you wish to turn on the light.’

  ‘Of course,’ she said.

  He waved them both goodbye and disappeared down the stairs.

  Madeleine took off her jacket, sat down on one of the camp-beds and slipped off her brogues. After massaging her toes for a moment she drew her legs together and encircled them with her arms.

  She looked worried, Farnham thought, and said as much.

  ‘No more than usual,’ she said with a faint smile. ‘I never liked this town,’ she added. ‘Even before the war.’

  ‘Why not?’

  She shrugged, and pushed her hair back behind her ears. ‘I don’t know.’ She grinned suddenly. ‘My first boyfriend went off with a girl from here, so maybe that was it.’

  He found it hard to imagine anyone leaving her willingly. ‘When was that?’

  ‘I was fourteen. Half my life ago.’ She shook her head. ‘Let’s talk about you. Were you a soldier before the war?’

  ‘Yes. Just. I was commissioned in the summer of ’39.’

  ‘Why?’ she asked with disarming frankness. ‘You don’t look the sort, though perhaps that’s because I don’t know much about Englishmen.’

  ‘Maybe. I didn’t join up because I was aching to fight anyone, I’m afraid.’ He looked at her, and decided there was no point in anything but the simple truth. ‘Looking back now, I think I was probably just trying to make my father understand that I didn’t want anything to do with his world. There were probably other ways of doing that, but…well, then the war came along, and everything else went out the window.’

  ‘You don’t like your father?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And your mother?’

  ‘My mother died when I was young. I have a stepmother, but I can’t pretend I like her any better than my father.’

  ‘That is sad.’

  He shrugged. ‘I have a sister – she’s sixteen, almost seventeen, and she’s wonderful. She keeps me on my toes though.’ He told Madeleine about their last meeting, and about the work Eileen was doing in the East End.

  ‘It sounds like you love her very much,’ the Frenchwoman said.

  ‘I do,’ Farnham said simply, and for a few moments they were both silent.

  ‘Are you married?’ Madeleine asked eventually.

  ‘I was. She was killed in a bombing raid. In 1940. A long time ago.’

  ‘The look in your eyes says it was only yesterday,’ she said softly.

  ‘I…’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘People are always telling me I am too plain-spoken.’

  ‘No, no…are you married?’ he asked.

  ‘I am a widow. My husband was killed in the same year as your wife.’ She smiled sadly. ‘Now there’s a coincidence. One that we share with about a million others.’

  ‘Was he killed in the fighting?’

  ‘Yes, somewhere near Sedan. But I’m sure he didn’t die with the “Marseillaise” on his lips. He was a communist, and he had no more time for this country than he had for any other. That was all before the attack on the Soviet Union, of course. He would have been happy in the Resistance after that.’

  ‘Why did you join?’ Farnham asked.

  She considered the question, as if it was a strange one. ‘Not to avenge anyone,’ she said at last. ‘And not for France. All countries have things to be proud of and things to be ashamed of. At first I persuaded myself that what I most hated about the Nazis, and what gave me a reason to fight, was that their only idea of the future was to drag everyone back into the past. You only have to look at their rallies, their architecture – it’s Rome and Greece, not the twentieth century. And the way they insist on women being good housewives and mothers and nothing else, and the way they hate jazz…I love jazz.’ She looked at him. ‘I still believe all these things, but I know that this is not why I am involved in the fight. I am involved because that’s what life should be – involvement. I can’t just sit and
watch. I have to be part of it.’

  ‘That sounds a better reason than most.’

  ‘I think it is. Just sometimes I wonder how many Germans there are feeling the same way, and I remember how Jacques – my husband – always had to know what was right.’

  He smiled wryly. ‘Maybe we’ve struck lucky with this war, and found ourselves on the right side through no fault of our own.’

  She liked that. ‘Tell me,’ she said, ‘as a soldier, do you think the Germans can still win the war?’

  ‘No,’ he replied.

  ‘So how long will it last? I listen to your BBC, but I never know whether to believe everything I hear.’

  ‘It’s impossible to tell. If the invasion is a success, then…’ He shrugged. ‘The Germans will have three fronts to fight on, and they must be running low on war matériel. I can remember someone forecasting that they’d run out of oil in 1942. And the bombing must be doing a hell of a lot of damage. But there’s just too many imponderables. What the Russians are going to do, the Japanese, these secret weapons we keep hearing rumours of…?’

  ‘What are they?’

  ‘Pilotless planes are the favourite. Flying bombs. But who knows? The war could be over by Christmas, or it could last another five years.’

  It was getting dark now, and they could hardly see each other’s face. ‘I don’t think we should turn on the light, even with the curtains drawn,’ she said. ‘Not until Marcel comes back, anyway.’

  He was about to agree when they heard the door open downstairs, followed by the sound of footsteps. ‘It’s me,’ Marcel shouted, and they breathed out in unison. Their host had another man with him, one not long out of his teens, whom he introduced as Lucien. As far as Farnham could tell Madeleine hadn’t met him before.

  ‘We should leave soon,’ the young man said. Ordinary farm clothes adorned his thin frame and a soft, peaked cap sat on his head. ‘In another hour or so there will only be Germans left on the streets.’

  ‘I’m ready,’ Farnham said, reaching for his jacket.

  ‘Take this,’ Marcel told him, handing over an ancient but formidable-looking handgun. ‘It was my father’s pistol in the last war,’ he added. ‘It still works.’

  ‘I have food for two,’ Lucien said, reminding Farnham he hadn’t eaten since morning.

  Madeleine wished him good luck, offering him her hand.

  He shook it gravely. ‘You’ll be here when I get back?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He turned and followed Lucien down the stairs. The street outside was in darkness, the main road below not much brighter, but the young Frenchman led him up the hill, and within a couple of minutes the houses were coming to an end, the road turning into a dirt track which wound up through a couple of steeply sloping fields before plunging into the forest.

  Once they were among the trees Lucien slowed his pace and allowed himself the luxury of conversation. It was only about two and a half miles on the road from Schirmeck to the Struthof camp, he explained, but Farnham’s need for a lengthy period of observation had been explained to him, and for this they would have to climb around and above the site, which would more than double the distance they needed to travel. And since they would have to stay well away from the German-patrolled paths the going was not likely to be easy. If they arrived at the chosen spot before midnight, Lucien concluded, then he would be much gratified.

  Five hours of struggle followed, most of it across dark and densely wooded slopes, and as he trudged after his nimble guide Farnham found himself feeling nostalgic for a life lived in daylight. He imagined himself strolling round the Serpentine in the summer sunshine, preferably with Madeleine on his arm.

  It was soon after ten when they heard dogs barking in the distance, and Lucien immediately signalled a halt. The two men crouched beneath the trees for a quarter of an hour, half expecting to hear another bout of barking or even the sudden sound of men running towards them through the forest, but nothing else disturbed the silence, and they cautiously resumed their journey.

  Just before midnight they reached the spot Lucien had in mind, and after so many hours of walking blindly through the thick forest, Farnham was gratified to see just how well the young Frenchman had chosen. The hill they were on, like the one on which Yves’ Maquis camp was pitched, had a bald spot, and from the shelter of trees they could look out across a wide swathe of countryside below. Almost directly in front of them, about a mile to the west and some six hundred feet below, the camp sat astride a humpback ridge. On either side of this ridge narrow valleys ran down to join the Bruche above and below the town of Schirmeck, which was itself hidden by the lie of the land.

  The camp was as brightly lit as a beacon, and Farnham remembered Madeleine’s assertion that the Nazis’ most heartfelt desire was to create the future in the image of the past. Looking at the searchlights lazily sweeping from the watch-towers, the dark blocks of buildings in their geometrically shaped enclosure, he had the feeling that time had somehow been kaleidoscoped. If H.G. Wells could have brought the Barbarians forward in his time machine, then this would have been the sort of encampment they would have built.

  ‘This is all right?’ Lucien was asking.

  ‘Perfect,’ Farnham agreed. ‘But we’ll need to dig a scrape, because you can bet your life someone down there will have a pair of binoculars.’

  This was easier said than done, given that their only digging implements were broken branches and their hands, but after an hour or so they had excavated and covered a shallow trench large enough to accommodate them both. And if Lucien was impressed with Farnham’s branch and foliage roof, he found even more to admire in the miniature camera which the Englishman removed from the false compartment in his boot heel. Farnham wished the men in London could have seen the look on the Frenchman’s face – it would have made their war.

  Personally, he had his doubts as to whether it would work, but there would be no harm in trying to take some pictures once the sun came up.

  ‘You should get some sleep now,’ Lucien told him. ‘I can sleep during the day, while you are on watch.’

  This made sense, and Farnham tried to oblige, but it was some time before his body would cooperate. He was just beginning to think it was hopeless when Lucien’s hand on his shoulder woke him up. Through the roof of the scrape a faint grey light was seeping. ‘It will soon be dawn,’ the Frenchman said.

  They divided the bread and cheese that remained into four, and took a share each for breakfast, washing it down with some cold coffee. The sky to the west was still clear, and when the sun alighted on the crest of the hills beyond the Bruche valley it became obvious that another fine day was in prospect. Slowly but surely the shadows were stripped from the land in between, revealing the camp on the ridge and the twisting road which ran down from its gates to the valley on the left. The wire fencing, which was now glistening in the sunlight, enclosed an area about a quarter of a mile square. There were, by Farnham’s count, twenty-two buildings in the camp, and twelve of these, arranged in four rows of three, looked a good bet for the prisoners’ quarters. Another four, set on the other side of an open space, were probably for administration and the guards, which left six unaccounted for. Some were presumably for cooking and washing, others might be set aside for prison work. The one with the tall chimney had to be a boiler house, though Farnham could see no heating pipes running from it.

  He wished he had more to look through than just his naked eyes, but Yves, with good reason, had forbidden him to travel with his binoculars. One routine search and he would have been answering questions at the Gestapo HQ in St Dié.

  He reached for the camera, thinking that the angle of the sun wouldn’t get any better. The men in London could probably interpret a photograph far better than he could the reality.

  ‘That is the crematorium,’ Lucien said quietly at his shoulder. ‘The one with the smoke.’

  ‘The what?’

  ‘Perhaps you call it something else in England. The
place where they burn the bodies.’

  He was not joking. Farnham thought back to the meeting in London, and his conviction that the men from Intelligence had not been telling him all they knew. ‘Which bodies?’ he asked quietly.

  Lucien looked at him in wonderment. ‘The bodies of the people they kill. That building in the far right-hand corner – that is the room where they are gassed. About thirty at a time.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘There are people in the villages who work in the camp, doing the Germans’ laundry, some cooking, other jobs. They see and hear things. And the Germans talk to women, especially when they are drunk.’

  Farnham paused to let it all sink in. ‘And who are they killing?’ he asked eventually.

  ‘Jews mostly, but communists and queers too. I guess they’d kill a queer Jewish communist three times over if they could.’ Lucien still had the look of surprise on his face. ‘I thought this was why you wanted to see…because you knew what was happening here.’

  ‘I didn’t,’ Farnham said wearily. ‘I think someone in London knows, and they sent me to make sure.’

  ‘Ah, I understand now,’ Lucien said. He yawned. ‘Wake me when it gets dark,’ he said, and sank back on to the floor of the scrape.

  Farnham took his pictures, keeping one negative in reserve, just in case something unusual transpired in the course of the day. But nothing did, and he lay there for hours, his eyes mostly transfixed by the smoke which rose from the crematorium. Not that long ago he would have found it hard to believe that down there, in that camp, people were being systematically killed just because of who they were. He had never managed to swallow his father’s theory that the British and Germans offered civilization’s defence against the Latin races to the south and the Slavs to the east, but neither had he ever thought of the Germans as being particularly cruel. Unfeeling perhaps, but not vicious.