by Kit Sergeant
He shrugged. “I’m not sure. I was told that I will be your main contact from now on.” His frown deepened. “I doubt you will ever buy fruit from Canteen Ma again.” He gave her one last nod before walking away.
Marthe hefted the box of liquor, her heart weighing on her as much as the bottles of schnapps. She supposed that Canteen Ma’s luck had run out, a fate that they all faced every day. Perhaps she had already gone before a firing squad, leaving nothing in her wake but a creaky cart, no one to recognize or honor all of the work she did for the Cause.
At any rate, Marthe would miss seeing the eccentric old lady.
A few weeks later, Alphonse approached Marthe in the courtyard and informed her in a low voice that the Germans were accumulating large amounts of rifle ammunition and using the grounds of a house near the Grand Place as their dumping ground.
“Should we let the Allies know this would make a good bombing target?” Marthe replied, her voice barely above a whisper.
Alphonse pulled at his lip. “No. They’ve also been constructing anti-aircraft guns, and I doubt the Seven Sisters could get close enough without suffering a great deal of damage of their own.”
“We can’t just let them stockpile all of this stuff to use against the Allies.” Marthe thought for a second. What would Max have done if he was in the same situation? “Alphonse, I’ve got it.” She gestured for him to follow her into a corner, away from any prying ears. “I’ve got sticks of dynamite. If we light them and toss them into the ammunition stores, that should be enough to turn it all into one big inferno.”
“No. Marthe, that’s madness. There’s a ring of soldiers constantly patrolling the outside walls. We could never get the dynamite past them.”
“We’ve got to do something. Even if it’s just informing the Allies so they can come up with a plan.”
Alphonse nodded. “You let your contacts know, and I’ll try to think of an idea in the meantime.”
A few days later, Alphonse pulled Marthe aside as she was leaving the hospital. “Have you ever heard anyone mention a secret passage underneath the hospital grounds?”
“No.” She sat down on a bench underneath a yew tree. “Is there such a thing?”
Alphonse nodded, clearly too excited to sit. “In 1914, Roulers was bombed by shells. I had just finished an ambulance shift and joined a couple of orderlies who were investigating the craters left by them. One of them revealed a big black hole surrounded by stonework. We went down with torches—it seemed to lead for miles under the town, but we didn’t have the leisure time, nor the strength, to follow it to its conclusion so we covered it over with some dirt and forgot about it.”
“Do you think that the others have forgotten about it was well?”
“I believe so.” Alphonse finally took a seat next to her. “Most of the men who went down with me have long been transferred, and the wooden staff hut was erected right over the crater. But look at this,” he held up a history book. “Roulers, like many medieval towns, once had an open sewer running through the middle of the main street. Don’t you see, Marthe?” He dropped the book. “This sewer leads right past where the ammunition store is located.”
She began to see Alphonse’s point. “If we could get into the sewer, we could work our way through until we were underneath the dump, set off the dynamite, and vanish, leaving the stores to incinerate.”
“Exactly!”
“But,” Marthe pulled at her bottom lip. “What if we misjudge the distance we’ve gone and stick our heads out of the ground in the middle of the Grand Place after curfew, or, worse yet, at the feet of one of the sentries?”
Alphonse pulled a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it. “Yes. It will be risky—we could even come right through the floor of the Town-Kommandant’s office.”
She slumped, crossing her arms across her chest.
He blew out a ring of smoke. “But if we are careful and use common sense, I don’t think we will. It’s possible to use careful calculations, at least up to a point.”
At this, Marthe sat up again.
Alphonse picked up the book and flipped through it. “The sewer runs mostly straight—it had to. Look,” he displayed a page. “We can use this old map to estimate how far it is to the center of the dump.”
“Surely it’s not that easy to know how far you’ve traveled underground.”
He flicked his finished cigarette. “I’ve thought about that—we’ll make a length of string 100 meters long. If the dump is 3 kilometers away, that’s thirty times the length of my string. But I would need a partner to help me measure and hold the string taut. What do you say, Marthe?” He put a hand on her arm. “Are you willing to take on such a risk?”
The warmth of his touch seemed to seep inside her, filling her blood with an unexpected fire. Alphonse must have seen something peculiar in her face because he removed his hand to dig in his pocket for another cigarette.
“Of course,” she replied once her insides had returned to a normal temperature. “Especially if the reward is seeing all those potential weapons being blown to bits. When do we start?”
“Tomorrow night seems as good a time as any, provided they don’t send me to the front with the ambulance. Find a reason to work late at the hospital, and meet me at nine in front of the staff hut.” He glanced over at her. “But be sure to get some rest tonight, Marthe. We are going to have quite a series of hard evenings ahead of us.”
As soon as the town clock struck the nine o’clock hour, Marthe set out for the staff hut. Most of the other employees had long gone home, and only the orderlies on duty were in the wards. A lone figure, shadowy in the closing dark of the evening, stood outside the long wooden hut.
“Hello?” Marthe spoke with a disguised tone in case the person was not who she thought it was.
To her relief, a familiar voice answered, “Hello, Marthe, you are right on time. Sit down for a moment.”
She sat as the dim figure of Alphonse paced in front of her. “I’ve done some more reconnoitering, and I think our plan is sound. This hut,” he reached out and set his palm on a wooden slat, “is slightly raised to keep out the dampness of the ground… and the rats. It leaves us enough room to crawl beneath and slip right into the hole, without having to raise up floor-boards, only to replace them again when we leave.”
The ever-practical Alphonse had worked out even more logistics than she’d anticipated. “What’s in the sack?” she asked, nodding at it.
“Cement, a hammer, a saw, a strong chisel, and, of course, plenty of nails.” Even in the extensive darkness, she could see his white teeth flash as he grinned. “I’ll not be able to visit the canteen for at least a month, now that my pay is pledged for all of this gear.”
He beckoned Marthe to follow him inside the little hut. “The first thing we need to do is,” he gently placed his sack full of supplies on the floor of the cabin, “hide our light.” He grabbed a bunch of newspapers, and the two of them covered the windows. Alphonse then lit a lantern and gestured to several loose wooden planks in the corner of the cabin. “These were left by lazy workmen. They’ll form the floor of the sewer beneath us.”
“How deep is it?” she asked as she helped him move one of the planks toward the gap.
“It’s about a 2.5-meter drop.” He paused to gaze at her. “This is going to be a messy job, Marthe. I hope that cloak of yours is an old one.”
Once again, she felt her face heat up, but ignored the feelings that her proximity to Alphonse ignited. “How will we get out again once we are down there?”
“That’s where these will prove incredibly useful.” He dropped a plank and then the sack into the black hole they’d uncovered. He then gave her a mock salute before sliding into the darkness.
It seemed like an eternity before Marthe heard a faint thump. She peered into the dark hole, only just able to discern the gleam of a torch.
“Well, Marthe, I’m safe in the sewer.” Alphonse’s voice was garbled and she heard him spit. “
Just remember to keep your mouth shut tight.”
She drew her cloak around her and then scooted to the edge of the hole, feet first, the way Alphonse had done. She dropped down, and he caught her waist.
“Thanks,” Marthe murmured as she stood unsteadily on the loose rubble of the sewer. He moved away and raised his torch. She could see they were standing in a passageway, the walls and ceiling paved with flat stones, surrounded by a cold, damp stillness.
“We should get moving.” He rummaged around in the sack and produced a length of cord. On either end were wooden pegs. He handed one end to her and took the other, setting off down the passageway.
Marthe stood still, watching the light from his torch growing fainter as the cord tightened. She reached up to rub at her eyes and brushed a mesh of cobwebs. The dust it uncovered caused her to sneeze as she felt the peg in her hand jerk. As she started forward, she heard rustling in the opening above. She froze, certain that they’d been caught even before they’d made headway into the sewer. She raised her torch to reveal two beady black eyes. She maneuvered through the sewer as quickly as possible.
“What’s gotten into you?” Alphonse asked when she reached him.
“I saw a rat,” she breathed.
“Yes,” she could hear the laughter in his voice. “You’ll run into quite a few of them.”
They spent an hour in the subterranean sewer, taking turns walking with the string until it pulled taut, signifying another 100 meters. The only sound besides their own footfalls was the ever-present scurrying of the rats who managed to stay just beyond the reach of their torchlight.
At last they’d made 30 passes. Marthe joined Alphonse underneath where he suspected the store lay. He scraped up a little mound of dirt with his hands and drew a cross with white chalk to mark the spot.
She lifted her lantern to contemplate the seemingly impenetrable stone above their heads. “The roof above might collapse if we try to pull away that rock,” she stated.
“My father was a miner,” Alphonse replied. “Do you know what a miner would do if he had to remove rock but wanted to preserve his head?”
She shook her head.
“He’d put props against the roof before he picked at the mortar.”
“The loose planks?”
“Exactly.” He held out his hands, measuring distances. “We’re going to need a ladder to help us get to the ammunition dump, and at the other end.” He pulled out a pocket-watch and held the torch near it. “I’ve got to be in my barracks by midnight, or else I might have to answer some awkward questions.”
Marthe moved closer to him. “Do you really think this will work?”
He lit a cigarette, the match casting light on a horde of rats scurrying away. “What do we have to lose if it doesn’t?”
She pictured the piles of ammunition that, hopefully, lay just above their heads. The actual act of blowing up the dump loomed much more dangerous than walking through a sewer, but Alphonse’s presence alleviated some of her nervousness. “Tomorrow night, then? Same time?”
“Same time.”
They began their journey back to the hut. Now that the work was finished for the night, Marthe could hear her heart hammering, keeping pace with the rats’ scampering. “I don’t know that much about you, Alphonse. Who were you before the war?”
He lit another cigarette. “Who was anyone before the war? Does it matter at this point?”
She thought for a moment, picturing herself, little Marthe Cnockaert as a nursing student at University, ready to do anything she could to please her family. And now here she was, planning to blow up a German ammunition store. “Did you always know you wanted to be a priest?”
“No.” His tone grew softer. “I wasn’t sure I was ready to give up a family for God.”
“But you changed your mind.”
“Yes. There are some things worth sacrificing for, no matter what the cost.”
She agreed with him on the statement in principal, but not necessarily with forfeiting the chance at love.
“What about you, Marthe? What will become of you once the war is over?”
“I suppose I’ll stay a nurse. At least until I get married and have babies. That’s what women do, isn’t it?”
“Is it?” Even though he was right next to her, Alphonse’s voice sounded far away. “Somehow I can’t picture you in that role.”
“I want a family,” she stated, her voice firm. “I know that more than ever… now that Max is gone.”
“I didn’t know that you knew for sure about Max. Did you get word from the front?”
Glad for the change of subject, Marthe spent the rest of their journey back filling him in on what happened to her brother. “That’s where I got the dynamite sticks,” she told him as they reached the hole below the staff cabin.
“I wondered.” They paused and looked up, feeling the air of the cabin on their faces. “I’m going to lift you up as high as I can, and you will have to pull yourself out.”
Marthe nodded, feeling an unexpected ache when Alphonse put his hands around her waist. As he hoisted her up, she realized she wasn’t as sure about her future as she’d sounded before in the pit. She didn’t know if she wanted that family after all if it couldn’t be with Alphonse.
Chapter 45
M’greet
June 1916
M’greet wanted nothing more than to be with Vadim in Vittel. She had not heard a word from him since he left for the front, despite asking anxiously at the Grand Hotel’s front desk every day. Following Hallaure’s instructions, she managed to convince her doctor, another former lover, that a mysterious illness had come over her and required her to go to the spa at Vittel as soon as possible.
When she obtained the doctor’s consent, she set about trying to get a pass. The official at the Military Bureau for Foreigners appeared somewhat friendly and told her she wanted the Deuxiéme Bureau next door. 282 boulevard, Saint-Germain was an expensive-looking apartment building with tiled floors and high ceilings. She adjusted her straw hat with its fashionable gray plume before she went up to the front desk.
An officer greeted her and asked for her papers. He gave them a cursory glance before nodding at her. “Come with me.”
He led her to an office where a large man with greasy hair and a too-small mustache that did nothing to hide his pock-marked face sat behind a desk. “Ah, Miss Mata Hari, come in, come in.”
M’greet was only a bit startled that he used her stage name—her papers only gave her real name—but figured that her dancing fame had once again proceeded her.
He nodded at her but didn’t rise. “I am Georges Ladoux.”
Taking the papers from the officer, Ladoux flipped through them with his fat hands. “Ah. I see you wish to go to Vittel. Are you not aware that it is in a military zone?”
“I am well aware.” Although he was slow to invite her to sit down, M’greet arranged herself in a hard-backed chair anyway. “But it is also a resort that I have gone to before. You will see there is a note in there from my doctor so that I may be permitted to take the waters.” She coughed delicately.
“It is difficult for foreigners to get a permit to go there. You are Dutch, are you not?”
M’greet searched her mind for one of her usual answers, but Ladoux’s beady eyes made her think twice. “That is correct.”
He picked up a paper from the pile and used the edge of the desk to straighten it. “It seems you have come under the suspicion of England.”
She opened her eyes wide. “I’m not quite sure how. Was it that business in Folkestone so long ago?”
He put the paper down. “Folkestone. Yes. And this man, this Hoedemaker, he seemed to believe you were not being completely honest.”
“Nor was he. He implied to the entire ship that he was in my room after hours.”
Ladoux sat back and crossed his arms, focusing his gaze on her face. “The British are convinced you are a German spy. I, however, am not so sure.”
&n
bsp; She leaned forward. “You have to believe me when I say that I am pro-Allies. Completely.”
“Your friend Jean Hallaure informed me that you would request to go near the war zone.” He opened a desk drawer and pulled out a cigarette. “But, if you love France so much, you could render us a great service. Have you ever thought of that?”
Great service. She sighed to herself—here was yet another man asking her to spy. “I do love France, but this is not the sort of thing for which one offers themself.”
Ladoux lit his cigarette in lieu of replying.
“Besides,” M’greet added as a thought occurred to her. “My services would be very expensive.”
Ladoux blew out the match. “What would they be worth to you?”
“I suppose, if I could deliver what you are expecting, a great deal. Although, if I were to fail, it would cost you nothing.”
He exhaled a circle of smoke. “If I give you a pass, you must promise me you will not seduce any French officers at the airfields near Vittel. As far as aviators go, you never know what could fall upon you from the sky.”
She folded her hands in her lap. “I wouldn’t dream of it. There is a Russian officer I wish to see, and with whom I am very much in love.”
“Ah.” Ladoux flicked ash into a tray. “I have seen you having lunch with him.”
She narrowed her eyes. This fat little man was the one having her followed all over Paris. “You have seen me, or your lackeys that tail me everywhere have reported such?”
Ladoux coughed and then waved smoke out of his face. “Their reports are mostly regarding you visiting the finest Parisian perfumeries and shops, but nothing else.”
“Then this stupid game needs to stop.” M’greet tapped a gloved hand on the desk. “Either I am dangerous, and you will expel me, or I am nothing but a pretty little woman who danced all winter and now that summer has come, wants nothing more than to be left in peace.”
He stabbed his cigarette out. “I will grant you this pass with the understanding that you will meet with me again on your return from Vittel.”
