When Hell Struck Twelve

by James R Benn

  “No, all set,” I said, using my left to set the frequency and grab the handset. I hoped Kaz hadn’t noticed. He seemed lost in thought, rubbing his eyes and leaning forward. Headache, maybe.

  My hand had been steady in Tanville, or at least I hadn’t noticed a tremble. Which was a good thing, since it meant I’d be steady in a fight. Afterwards, well, who knows?

  “King Two, this is White Rook, over.” Big Mike was King Two. We’d gone too far to pick up Harding at Patton’s headquarters, so he’d have to relay the report. It took a couple of tries, but I got Big Mike. I gave him our location, and reported on the engineers we’d stumbled across, their explosives, and the orders Kaz had found.

  “Kaz, Big Mike wants you to go over those Kraut orders,” I said. “Kaz!”

  “What? Sorry, Billy, I think I fell asleep.”

  “You’re one cool customer, Kaz. Here, review the Kraut orders with Big Mike, he wants details.”

  Kaz went through the papers, which instructed the officer in charge of the 318th Engineer Company, sent from Le Mans the day before, to report immediately to General Dietrich von Choltitz, military governor of Greater Paris. Duties unspecified.

  “Those three half-tracks probably comprised a platoon,” I said as Kaz signed off. “A full company means there’s six or more still on their way to Paris.”

  “Big Mike is passing the information on and alerting the MPs at roadblocks. Of course, the rest of them may not be lost and are giving our lines a wide berth.”

  “Let’s hope so,” I said. “You need anything before we move? Some chow?”

  “No, just some aspirin,” Kaz said, tossing back a couple of pills and taking a slug from his canteen. He took a deep breath and exhaled, relaxing back in his seat. “Onward, then. I am looking forward to meeting Lucien Fassier.” “Purely by accident,” I reminded Kaz.

  “Of course. Beaulieu looks to be ten miles due west. We should find the MPs at Les Aspres, a few miles from here,” he said, wiping his brow with his sleeve.

  I drove on, keeping an eye on the horizon for any wandering Fritzes. Kaz seem content to nod off, a pretty hard thing to do in a jeep, even on this halfway-decent country road. It didn’t take long to find Les Aspres, a small village straddling a crossroad, a stream, a few shops and not much else save the monument to the fallen of the previous war. There wasn’t much room left on the granite, and I wondered how they’d handle the deaths and deportations of this latest war.

  The MPs had the crossroads partially blocked by a couple of jeeps. A farmer’s cart, pulled by a wizened horse that had somehow survived German pillaging and hungry winters, rolled through ahead of us.

  “Your vehicle came through here about an hour ago,” the MP sergeant informed us. “We checked his papers real slow like we was ordered to. He was driving a beat-up green sedan with FFI and FTP painted all over it. Pretty sloppy work at that.”

  “Okay, Sarge. You get the word about the Krauts?” I asked.

  “The half-tracks? We did. I sent a jeep out to check the road south of here. They didn’t see anyone. I think the locals are keeping their heads down until they figure out who’s staying and who’s going.”

  “Farmers are sensible people,” Kaz said as we sped off, passing the cart with its small load of sugar beets. “Perhaps after we find Fassier we should emulate them.”

  “Do you have farmer’s daughter’s jokes in Poland?” I asked.

  “Of course. The ancient Romans even had them, in only a slightly different form,” Kaz said. “Have you heard the one about the eggs?”

  I had, but not the exact version Kaz spun for me. He went on about folktales for a while. Apparently, his little catnap had revived him, and he seemed more energetic. If we did end up at a farm with a French maiden close by, I was sure Kaz would be as charming as ever. While he still carried a torch for Daphne, he didn’t let that stop him from enjoying himself. There would never be another Daphne for him, I was sure. But the fact that so many women found him irresistible did occasionally focus his mind elsewhere.

  Me, the only woman I could think about was Diana Seaton. She was Daphne’s sister, and her death had bound the three of us in ways that only grief and revenge can manage. Kaz was protective of Diana, and me as well, for that matter. I felt the same way about her. Given that she was an agent with the Special Operations Executive and currently on assignment somewhere behind enemy lines, there wasn’t much I could do in terms of protection. Diana and I were opposites, at least in the outward things. She was British Protestant upper class, a ride-to-the-foxes sort of English gentry, and I was an Irish Catholic working-class stiff from Southie.

  We would die for each other.

  And nearly had.

  “But the first man disputes this because ‘the man who told me you were dead is much more reliable than you,’” Kaz said, delivering the punchline to a joke I hadn’t paid attention to.

  “Funny,” I said.

  “Yes, fairly amusing for third century Rome, in any case. There, that must be Beaulieu.”

  I took his word for it as we drove down a lane bordered by the dappled trunks of plane trees. Beaulieu was more of a burg than the last two towns. Substantial houses stood back from the road, surrounded by low stone walls and iron fences. Further on, shops and cafés fronted a cobblestone street, the town untouched by bombs or bullets. People strolled on the sidewalks, the afternoon sun sending their shadows after them.

  “Police Municipale,” Kaz said, pointing to a sign above a brick-faced, two-story building with a small garden in front adorned by another monument to war dead. This one had room on both sides, for the Franco-Prussian War and the Great War. I guess they hadn’t planned this far in advance.

  “Café,” I said, pulling in across the street. “I’m hungry, and we might learn more there than from the cops. You can say we’re looking for a friend in the Resistance.”

  “Very well,” Kaz said. “I wonder about the local police here. This is the first large town I’ve seen without FFI markings everywhere.”

  “Yeah,” I said. One lone V for victory had been painted on a wall, but other than that, no crosses of Lorraine or FTP slapped on storefronts or vehicles. It was as if Beaulieu was too tidy to abide such crude expressions.

  We sat outside at the café, where we soon were served a bottle of red wine and a mutton cassoulet. Kaz tasted the wine and complimented the waiter, but I thought I detected a brief wince. He had a delicate palate. I didn’t, took a big gulp, and enjoyed it.

  Kaz then played at suddenly remembering an acquaintance in the Resistance. “Beaulieu, isn’t this where Lucien lives?” he asked me, and then described Lucien Fassier to the waiter, throwing in a whole bunch of French I couldn’t understand. The waiter responded, and I heard him mention Fassier several times. Each pronouncement was accompanied by a sad shake of the head. Once, he gestured across the street, then went inside.

  “Interesting,” Kaz said, tasting the cassoulet. “Much better than the wine, I must say.”

  “What about our long-lost pal Lucien?” I asked, glancing at the door.

  “The Fassier family is well known in Beaulieu. Lucien’s father, Yves, was until very recently the directeur de police municipal.”

  “Lucien’s old man was the chief of police? No wonder his kid turned commie. Where is he now?”

  “Still across the street, but in a jail cell. Our waiter tells me many people in town are still sympathetic to Vichy, and many maintain their admiration for Marshal Pétain. Even so, the elder Fassier was so pro-fascist that the mayor and other luminaries decided he had to be arrested.”

  “To demonstrate their allegiance to the new order,” I said.

  “One could safely draw that conclusion,” Kaz said. “But, it makes it seem unlikely that Lucien would make an appearance. The waiter says he has not seen him for some months.”

  “Which me
ans he did come here before, when his old man was the top cop and probably working with the Germans and the Milice. So, why wouldn’t he come now? Maybe he wants to see his father on the other side of the bars. Maybe he wants to comfort his mother.”

  “Perhaps. Madame Fassier is not well, my new friend informs me. It may be worthwhile to speak to both.”

  “After we eat,” I said, scooping up another spoonful of white beans.

  We decided to see Yves first, since he was right across the street and might be tarred and feathered at any moment. Inside the police station, it was like being in any cop house. A bleak entry room and a bored blue-uniformed officer on duty. Yellowing wanted posters hung off a bulletin board, some of them still bearing the swastika stamp of the occupier. Hey, maybe these guys were realists. The Krauts might be back. So far, Kaz and I seemed to be the sole representatives of the Allies, and no one was tossing any flowers our way.

  Kaz asked to see the prisoner Yves Fassier as I showed my SHAEF identity card, which impressed the gendarme not one damn bit. He spoke into a telephone and cradled it with supreme indifference as we stood by his desk. Another cop called to us from the hallway and we followed him, his polished boots echoing off the tiled floor as he led us to the basement cells.

  “Le prisonnier Fassier,” the cop said, coming to attention and producing the slightest of bows toward the man in the cell. Was he sympathetic to his old boss or was it nothing more than obedience to a habit of years? They were close to the same age, maybe fifty or so, and had probably worked together for decades. Our escort walked away, giving no further clue as to what he thought of his imprisoned former chief. Fassier set aside the Bible he was reading, looking at us with raised eyebrows, as if we’d interrupted his busy schedule.

  “Bonjour, Monsieur Fassier,” Kaz began. He spouted some more French but Fassier stopped him with a wave of the hand.

  “We can speak in English if it is easier for your American friend,” Fassier said, rising from his single chair and facing us through the bars. He was tall, dressed in his blue police trousers and a soiled white shirt. He had graying hair, a few days’ growth of beard, and the posture of a military man, managing to look haughty despite his situation. “I learned to speak it as a child, and I was a liaison officer with the British Army in the old war. That was the last time the Anglais did anything worthwhile for France.”

  “You are entitled to your opinion, sir,” Kaz said, introducing us and telling Fassier we had some questions about his son.

  “What son?”

  “Lucien,” I said.

  “I have no such son. I once had a boy by that name, but he became a godless Bolshevik and betrayed our laws and faith by going off to fight in Spain. On the side of Stalin, can you believe such nonsense? So, I have no son. I have disowned him. If you have anything else to ask, please do so. Otherwise, leave me alone.”

  Fassier folded his arms and gazed at us with contempt. I was no fan of Lucien Fassier, and his old man didn’t do much for me either.

  “You’re not curious as to why two officers have come to ask about him?” I said, avoiding his son’s name, not wanting to set off another round of condemnation.

  “It is of no consequence,” Fassier said.

  “It is understandable that you should have other concerns,” Kaz said, barely disguising his insolence. “Being held prisoner where once you were the chief of police.”

  “I have done my duty, to the nation and to Marshal Pétain,” Fassier said, puffing out his chest and daring us to contradict him. “I have followed the orders of my government, and the only reason I am here is that our coward of a mayor and his people hope to hide their own allegiances by persecuting me. I did what they wanted done, and now I am here, alone.”

  “That is often the way with politicians,” I said. “I was a policeman before the war. I know what you mean. The politicians protect themselves, don’t they?”

  “Indeed they do, young man. I think there will be a very swift judgement against me, and once I am in my grave, no one will be able to speak for me or against them. I am sorry I could be of no help to you today, and I am certain I will be of no help to anyone tomorrow.”

  “Might Lucien speak for you?” Kaz asked softly, bringing us back around to the subject of our visit.

  “You do not understand,” Fassier said, drawing closer to the bars, his mouth twisted in an angry sneer. “In the course of my duties, I hunted Communists along with the other terrorists who threatened our national revolution. I shot them or turned them over to the Germans, glad to rid the sacred soil of France of their presence. I am ashamed to have sired one of them, and I hope another patriot has put an end to his existence. Yes, he once was my son, and for that I can only say I hope the end was quick. As for the two of you, I bid you adieu.”

  There was not much else to say. We went upstairs, and I nodded to Kaz as we approached our escort’s office. The nameplate read Inspecteur P. Ribot. The inspector sat at his desk, reading through a file. Kaz knocked, thanked him for his time, and asked a few questions.

  “I speak a little English. Un peu,” Ribot said. “Let us speak in French, yes?”

  Kaz spoke as Ribot leaned back in his chair, sighed, and then gave his answers. Once we were outside, Kaz explained.

  The Fassier family had lived in Beaulieu for generations and were well-regarded. Young Lucien was an only child, intelligent and loved by both parents. As he grew older, his ideas became radical, and his father put it down to youthful naiveté. Lucien went to university in Paris to study law, and his father, recently appointed the chief of police, hoped the discipline of hard study would mature Lucien’s views and bring him into a career in the justice system. Instead, Lucien volunteered to fight in Spain against the fascists. This was too much for the father who had doted on him and previously defended him against all criticism. The elder Fassier had always been conservative, but his son’s betrayal had deeply offended both his political and religious beliefs, and the elder Fassier became a right-wing extremist. When France surrendered, he blamed the Communists and focused all his rage into stamping them out. Some of the police thought he was hunting for Lucien, perhaps to save him. Others thought he had become unstable. But all agreed he was very good at what he did.

  In answer to the last question, he said he doubted very much that Lucien had ever come home to visit his father. His mother, that was another matter, since she was very ill. Perhaps. Had he seen Lucien recently? No, not for years.

  “Did he give you an address for the mother?” I asked.

  “Yes. It is a short way, we can walk,” Kaz said, heading down the street. “What did you think of Fassier?”

  “I thought the bastard was sincere,” I said. “Did Inspector Ribot give an opinion?”

  “He said Fassier had once been a good man, but his anger and shame led him to do things that were terrible. His thought was that Fassier was indeed searching for his son but was never aware of his own motivation.”

  “Police inspectors can be pretty smart,” I said, as we turned a corner. “I wish I was smart enough to figure out if this was a waste of time.”

  “I can’t see why Lucien would risk seeing his father at any point during the Occupation,” Kaz said. “Even if they were not estranged, he would hate how his father was cooperating with the Germans.”

  “Olga told us Lucien had lost most, if not all, of his early comrades. That could have been due in part to his father, so I agree. But he might risk it to see his mother,” I said, glancing over my shoulder as I caught a glimpse of movement, a shadow melting between two houses.

  “What?” Kaz asked, stopping to look around.

  “Keep walking,” I said. “I don’t know if I imagined it, but I thought I saw someone watching us.”

  “Perhaps Jarnac or Louvet,” Kaz said. “We are not the only ones searching for Fassier.”

  “Yeah, except they do
n’t know they’re not supposed to find him,” I said. I wished I didn’t either.

  “This house,” Kaz said, pointing to a large house faced in granite, with a rose garden choked with weeds. We walked up to the front door, past the untended garden, and knocked. A young woman wearing an apron and a dishtowel over her shoulder answered. Kaz turned on the charm and asked if we could see Madame Fassier. The girl opened the door, saying nothing. She showed us into a parlor and went off without a word.

  The windows were closed, and the room was hot and stuffy. I pushed a curtain aside and watched the street. Had I been seeing things? The white lace curtain quivered in my hand, as if a breeze were blowing. But there wasn’t a breeze in this still room.

  I let go and the fluttering lace quieted.

  “How’s your headache?” I asked Kaz, catching him staring at my right hand as I shoved it into my pocket.

  “Monotonous,” he said, flopping down into a chair. Kaz seldom flopped. He looked ashen and exhausted. But my attention was drawn back to the window as I spotted a guy strolling by, dressed in worn corduroys and a thin jacket with a suspicious bulge in the pocket.

  “Someone definitely has the place staked out,” I said.

  “Jarnac or Louvet?” Kaz asked with a heavy sigh, sounding bored by the whole affair.

  “No way to know,” I said. “The big boys aren’t showing themselves.”

  “Venez avec moi s’il vous plaît,” the girl announced from the doorway. We followed her down a thickly carpeted hall to a sitting room where a low fire burned in the grate, even on this warm day. Seated close to the fire was a thin, gray-haired lady, a shawl around her shoulders.

  Kaz handled the introductions. Unlike her husband, she spoke no English, so I stood back and watched. Also, unlike her husband, her eyes widened at the mention of her son, and her hand went to her mouth in a clear display of concern for him.

  I could make out Kaz telling her he wasn’t the bearer of any bad news, and I saw relief flood her face. A face that was gaunt and pale, with heavy gray bags under the eyes.