by Allan Massie
I said, ‘Collaboration is not a faith, it’s an exercise, in which we shouldn’t put our trust. Let’s not think of Europe, which is a myth and delusion. Remember we are French. The interests of France, the interests of the historic sovereign State which is France, and the interests of Frenchmen, are all that need concern us. We have to play a waiting game, to tolerate’ – did I lower my voice, to a whisper, as I spoke of the interests of France in the heart of the French capital? I, as a Minister of the French State? – ‘to tolerate the Germans as our conquerors. But we need do no more. Friendship is unnecessary. It’s a mistake, my dear, to bind yourself to the occupying power. Perhaps I see that more clearly, being based in Vichy. But that’s the Marshal’s opinion also. We must consult only the interests of France.’
‘Oh yes,’ he said, ‘but when you play roulette, zero belongs to the bank. We have no choice but to put our stake on the red or the black, odds or evens. That’s the nature of the game, and therefore of our choice, and you can’t shift your stake while the wheel spins. Besides, I’m afraid that the Marshal inhabits a world remote from reality. It’s the privilege of the old, denied to you and me. So I think we should have some more brandy. Cognac can do more than commonsense to reconcile us to destiny.’
He talked of killing himself, of the temptation of the gun, razor and medicine bottle, but my memory of the evening is of his laugh ringing out, mocking and free. Was it however the notion of freedom that he really mocked?
I was so busy, this time in Paris. I had no time to reflect. My time was taken up by a stream of visitors, too many of whom seemed to be seeking some form of reassurance from me. I strove to supply what I could not feel myself. Or perhaps feed to myself.
When back here in Vichy I thought of my talk with Drieu, of that confession of faith which I had made, it seemed to me that, without realising it, it was also a confession of infidelity. After all, for years, thanks to my long and enduring conversation with Rupert – and of course thanks to my reading – I have believed in Europe. What did I used to call it: the European Idea? And I have been driven to abandon that hope. Christendom is dead. The black uniforms of the SS are a vile parody of the Teutonic Knights of whom I dreamed. We are inhabitants of a besieged city, driven back into the citadel. No one in a citadel ever believes in the Future. L’Echo de l’Avenir is drowned by the clash of the present.
Perhaps it is only a personal disillusion? Among those I met in Paris was Anne’s young brother Hervé. I felt a tremor of excitement at the thought of meeting him; the idea of the brothers and sisters of someone one loves is always entrancing, though the reality so often disappoints.
He is very thin. I found him biting his nails. But his quick smile was Alain’s, and that touched my heart. And pained me also. I passed on Anne’s message of love, asked how his mother was, and said that I so much hoped eventually to meet her.
‘I hope,’ I said, ‘that she is not distressed by my relationship with Anne. Anne of course assures me she isn’t, but I fear she must be. Believe me, I regret its irregularity myself.’
‘It’s a time when we can’t avoid irregularity,’ he said.
Certainly Hervé is irregular enough himself. Like many young men his passion outstrips his judgement. He spoke rashly to me. His passion, as both Alain and Anne had warned me, is for Brittany.
‘I have no feeling for France,’ he said. ‘You must realise that for me France is the historic enemy.’
His smile was so charming that I forgave the absurdity. Politics is still a sort of game for him, even though he recognises that, like a bullfight, it may result in death.
‘At first I believed the Germans,’ he said. ‘They promised us self-government, you know. But it is all a sham. Like your government in Vichy. So, I have altered my views. Isn’t it time you altered yours? Don’t you see that we have been deceived?’
No one, since May 1940, has spoken to me so frankly, and I risk my life, and his, in writing it down.
Yet the compulsion to write these things is irresistible. It is like a drug. And, in my heart, I believe I am safe. I even wonder whether that sentence about the risk isn’t an example of contemptible rhetoric.
Young Hervé is evidence of our failure. What have we offered to ardent youth? Youth such as is ready to speak without calculation. When I told Anne how he had spoken, she said:
‘He is so brave and foolish. He talks like that to you, and he will talk in the same way to everyone. At a time like this.’
Marcel came to see me, and dissolved in tears as soon as we were alone. His lover David had left him, accusing him of being, in his heart, a collaborator.
‘I denied it furiously. I told him he was only deserting me because I could no longer get him a part. As if it is my fault he has a Jewish mother. But he has fled. Of course, his American passport helped him.’
Marcel snivelled.
‘But that’s not the worst of it. The worst of it is that he is quite right. I am a collaborator, not because I believe in collaboration, but simply because I am afraid. And worse still, as a symbol of my collaboration, as you might say, I have fallen in love with a German boy who is an officer in the Gestapo. What should I do, Lucien?’
They come to me asking such questions. Marcel deluged me with descriptions such as he would in the past have been ashamed to proffer. I can’t repeat them. They render him abject and disgusting. He is a sort of slave to images of cruelty which excite him unbearably. I suppose the easy thing to say is that he is mad, that he is not the Marcel who has been my friend for a quarter of a century. But this is not true. He is the same man. We are all, always, the same man. What he reveals now is only the longing he has hitherto concealed.
And when I look at him, and when I see that kind, intelligent monkey-face rivered with tears, and yet somehow gloating over his shame, what do I see but a mirror, in which I am reflected, and behind me, the shade of France? Isn’t our acceptance of the Occupation an acceptance of rape? Isn’t the humiliation and pain what we – I – have for so long and so intensely desired?
I left Marcel, and walked out on the boulevards, and along the Seine. Everything was grey as morality. There were no colours and no black and whites. I went into a bar, the sort of place to which working-men resort on their way home, and ordered a glass of rum. As I drank it a Negro boy approached me and began to talk. His conversation was rambling and incoherent. I don’t remember what he said. But I was glad to have him burble beside me, offering at least the imitation of human society. There was nothing personal in his conversation, and nothing political. He wore a thin shabby suit and complained of the cold. I bought him a glass of rum and another for myself. I think that was all he wanted, just to be bought a drink. I don’t think he would have taken it further. I don’t think he intended to make any proposition. Anyhow, it didn’t matter, for a group of other young men, evidently friends, entered the bar, and he joined them. I was left with my stubby glass held in both hands, which were clutching it hard, as if it represented something of great value.
I walked out of the café into the dusk. There were only a few people in the street, all moving with their heads lowered as if wishing to suggest that they recognised they had no right to be there. There was no live smell in the air, only a damp muddy odour rising from the river, and the silence was oppressive. Then I came on a little group of half a dozen who were gazing at a notice fixed to a fence. One of them was directing a torch at it, and I was able to read what was written.
Jean Lafond, house-painter, of Paris, having been condemned to death by a German Military Tribunal for an act of violence against the German Armed Forces, was executed this morning.
Later, someone told me that such notices, which are printed in red ink, have been more common recently. Nobody in the little group said anything. They stood with their heads bowed – but that was necessary to read the words – and then turned away. But they had remained there longer than was necessary to read the words as if by doing so they were paying some kind of tri
bute. As for me, I stood still for a long time after the man with the torch had moved on.
Of course, it can’t be denied that such deaths are unavoidable. Our peace is a sort of civil war. An act of violence? What does that mean in a world in which every gesture signifies violence, in which every decision condemns someone to death?
I was on my way to a reception at the German Embassy. For a moment I thought of abandoning my intention. Nausea disturbed me. A policeman came and stood beside me, shining his torch on the notice so that I found myself reading the words again – as if it was necessary to do so. I felt the policeman’s gaze shift to my face. He was summing me up, or rather trying to assess my feelings. It would have been important to give nothing away, if I had had anything to give. But it occurred to me that I was as ignorant of his reaction to the notice as he of mine, and that policemen are after all citizens with their own sentiments and opinions. I should have asked him what he thought of such things, but I didn’t. Instead, with premeditation, I enquired if he knew how I could best find my way to the German Embassy. Was I near a Metro station? He said, abruptly, that he had no idea, and I guessed that the notice offended him. Then, as if remembering that he was a functionary subject to discipline, and suspecting that I might be someone of some influence – or else why would I wish to go to the Embassy? – he pulled a map from his pocket, made great play of consulting it, and then gave me the directions which, I was certain, he could perfectly well have provided without this comedy. But I understood why he played it out, and liked him for doing so.
Chandeliers, lobsters and champagne, and a covey of hack writers, little functionaries and black market businessmen seeking legitimate contracts, all sweating in the brilliant light. Drieu was there, and Robert Brasillach, which pleased me. I congratulated Robert, at a moment when Drieu had gone to the sideboard to replenish his glass, on the last number of his magazine.
He said, ‘It grows more difficult and more necessary to maintain the faith.’
We were joined by Gerhard Heller, who works in the German Propaganda Department. He is a Rhinelander and a Protestant. Drieu introduced him to Scotch whisky, of which he contrives to retain a small supply, and assures me that Heller is devoted to the interests of France.
‘He’s a civilised man,’ he said to me the other night.
We talked for some time about common ground between our responsibilities. He told me that he strove to avoid censorship.
‘I always tell French publishers that that’s their business, not mine. As long as they are careful what they publish, and refrain from putting anything out which is overtly anti-German, they can keep and exercise a surprising degree of freedom. After all,’ he stretched out a hand, seized a glass from a tray being carried by a passing manservant, downed it, and replaced it on the tray, ‘after all, very few of my colleagues can really read French, and even fewer have any interest in literature.’
What surprised me was that he spoke as if we were allies. Robert, who had been distracted by someone who wished to speak to him, turned round.
‘Nevertheless,’ he said, ‘it can’t be denied that nine tenths of what people would write – if they weren’t afraid – requires to be censored. Furthermore, there’s a certain magazine, Confluences, published in Lyon, Lucien, and therefore under control of your own Ministry, which should be shut down. It reeks of the Third Republic, and half its writers are Jews or pederasts. I’m told they are even planning to publish the ravings of the American Jewess Gertrude Stein, to say nothing of a scurrilous review of my own poetry. I don’t give a fig for that, but the former is serious. Have a word with whoever is responsible, won’t you. There’s a good fellow. Ah, here’s Otto. You know the Ambassador, of course, don’t you, Lucien? If only people realised what a good friend you are to France, Otto, we could sign a treaty of perpetual friendship tomorrow.’
‘Why wait till tomorrow, Robert?’ the ambassador smiled. ‘Why wait?’
There was an ease and intimacy to the conversation which were delightful; or should have been. There is absolutely no reason to doubt the benevolence of men like Abetz and Heller. They are true friends of France, and both recognise our cultural primacy. Indeed, their appreciation of French culture is so extreme as to be almost shameful. That is why they are so anxious to please. They are in awe of our cultural heritage, and, being in awe, they are even ready to underrate what Germany itself has contributed.
‘You are the Greeks in the new Roman Empire,’ Heller said. He spoke without irony.
‘No,’ Abetz said, ‘that is not accurate. It is true that culturally France stands to Germany as Greece did to Rome, but in the New Order of Europe that will develop from this war, we must be equal partners.’
For a moment, as he spoke, in that drawing room, under the shimmering chandeliers, I could believe him. His sincerity was apparent, and the social ease, with the suggestion that differences were valuable, even fruitful, gave a hint of how things might be in a Europe where war has become an impossible thought, in which a recognition of common heritage and common interests could create a real sense of community. This was, I told myself, the civilisation which we were struggling to create; this was the promise of which even Monsieur Laval had had an incongruous glimpse. The doubts I had expressed to Drieu appeared defeatist. I could imagine a Europe in which Hervé’s Brittany had its own proud distinct identity, in which France and Germany, and of course Italy and other countries, retained their own historical validity, but in which also a true spirit of community and cooperation prevailed. Rupert and I used to talk of Charlemagne as the inspiration of that Europe, the reviver of Empire in a Christian form; we thought of ourselves as the new Carolingians … it was possible.
Jean Lafond, house-painter, of Paris, having been condemned to death by a German Military Tribunal for an act of violence against the German Armed Forces, was executed this morning.
I looked past the Ambassador’s shoulder at the framed photograph of the Führer which brooded over us, and I remembered what they had cried at Mauriac in the café.
Drieu caught my eye. He raised his glass of champagne.
‘L’Echo de l’Avenir,’ he said.
‘A remarkable magazine,’ Heller said. ‘I could almost wish, Monsieur de Balafré, that you would lose your Ministerial post, if it would enable you to resume publication.’
‘With that title?’ I said. ‘It seems unlikely. Isn’t it perhaps a little sombre?’
I spoke of course without premeditation, as I might have spoken before the war persuaded us to think first, then bite back intended words. A few minutes ago I gave Anne an account of the reception. When I had finished, she kissed me. Was I wrong to read pity in that kiss? Certainly, she had nothing to say. We both know we have not reached the worst. I am going to be compelled to do things, support actions, which disgust me because they are unworthy. There is talk for instance that French labour will be conscripted to work in Germany. It will be dressed up in some way: a returned prisoner of war for each conscripted labourer, perhaps. It will be impossible to prevent this, even to ameliorate it. We took the first step in that direction a long time ago.
Are there sadder words than these: ‘There is no turning back’? Yes, there are others: ‘There is no alternative to our present policy.’
There is a café on the pavement below our terrace. My attention was caught by a peal of laughter. It came from a girl in a yellow dress. She was leaning back in her chair, her black hair loose and gleaming in the snowy sunshine. The movement of laughter had pulled her skirt up to reveal a long shapely thigh. Her boyfriend leaned towards her and tugged the skirt down. When he had done so he did not remove his hand, but let it rest there pressing gently on her leg. She swung forward, bringing her elbows down on the café table and dropping her chin into the cup formed by her hands. They gazed into each other’s eyes. She moved her legs together to hold his hand where it was. Then she touched his lower lip with her forefinger. He wore the blue uniform of the Service d’Ordre Légionnair
e. He was telling her how he and his colleagues had ransacked the apartment of a Jewish woman. ‘You should have heard how she caterwauled,’ he said. There was a frost this morning and his happy voice cut the air. The girl pressed her legs together, holding his hand fast. At that moment Anne came back into the room with our little cat in her arms.
‘You don’t think Hervé is going to do anything silly, do you?’ she said.
‘I’m not sure I know what is silly any longer.’
‘I mean,’ she said, putting the cat down on the table and stroking the length of her back, ‘join the Resistance.’
It is the first time we have given disaffection that name by which it chooses to be known.
Then she said: ‘Are we going to lose the war?’
‘Do you mean lose it again?’
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
IT IS A romantic fallacy to suppose that anyone’s story is an individual thing. We share with our contemporaries emotions as well as ideas, hopes and fears as well as political convictions. In trying to decipher Lucien and tell his story, I find the picture blurred. He becomes one of the crowd of History’s victims. To call him that will seem to some special pleading, as if I am saying that he was not responsible for his actions. Of course he was – and wasn’t.
We are all placed in History, landed there, involuntarily and unconsulted. Some generations have the apparent good fortune to be able to feel free of History. No great questions disturb the tenor of their life. Yet even such people are formed by their historical experience. The questions posed may seem trivial to another more strenuous age. They are still not of their own making. Every new age asks new questions of candidates who have had no opportunity to prepare for the examination.
No one in France was prepared for the examination of 1940. How could they have been? How could Jean Lafond, house-painter, of Paris, have imagined that a day would arrive when he would be given the opportunity of performing ‘an act of violence against the German Armed Forces’? And could he have guessed before he committed that act that he would take the chance?
