The Darkest Hour

by Roberta Kagan

  Catriona turned her smile to the two children. ‘Je m’appelle Catriona et ma Maman est franҫaise. Comment vous appelez-vous?’

  The little girl turned her dark eyes to Catriona’s face and stared intently at her, sizing her up. Her brother alternated his glance between his sister and Catriona, gauging everything. Neither child spoke.

  Catriona fought the urge to go on, and simply waited.

  Eventually the girl spoke. ‘Je m’appelle Valérie et mon frère s’appelle Olivier. J’ai huit ans et il a cinq ans. Savez-vous où sont notre Maman et Papa?’

  Catriona melted to see the bewilderment and loss in the little girl’s eyes. Something in her saw herself reflected there. Olivier moved closer to his sister and she held his hand.

  Honesty was always the best option.

  ‘No,’ she replied in French. ‘It’s nice to meet you Valérie and Olivier. You are being very brave children considering you are only eight and five years old. Now, I don’t know where your parents are, I wish I did, but until we can find them, this nice lady is trying her best to look after you and she’s worried because you won’t eat properly.’

  ‘Nous détestons tout,’ Valérie said with a pout.

  Catriona turned to the anxious woman. ‘They are asking me if I know where their parents are and saying that they don’t like any of the food. I could cook them something French, if you like. I don’t have anything else to do today. Would that help?’

  The woman looked pleasantly surprised at such a suggestion. ‘Would you really? That really is too kind, and in any other circumstances, I would say not to dream of putting yourself out like that, but they barely eat and I’m getting more and more worried about them. They cry at night and I can’t comfort them...’ Her eyes filled with tears. ‘I’ve contacted the authorities several times but they just say if it is at all possible for me to keep them, then I should. Everything seems so chaotic… I’m sorry, I didn’t even introduce myself, my name is Elsa Perkins.’

  Catriona leaned over and shook her hand. ‘Catriona, Catriona McCarthy. Nice to meet you.’

  ‘That’s an Irish accent if I’m not mistaken?’

  ‘Yes, I’m Irish but my mother was French.’

  ‘Well, if you can help me with these two then I will be eternally in your debt. I only live down the street. I don’t know what I have at home that we could make something tasty with, but I suppose we can but try.’

  Olivier allowed Catriona to hold his hand all the way to Elsa’s small, terraced house. Valérie, however, remained aloof and stood watching suspiciously as Elsa searched her cupboards.

  ‘I have some carrots and some potatoes and some ham I was going to make a stew with later? Do you think they would like a stew?’

  Catriona stifled a smile. The British obsession with boiling every shred of flavour out of food appalled her but she was getting used to it. She crouched down to speak to the children. ‘Voulez vous des crudités, des pommes frites et une tranche de jambon blanc?’

  They nodded excitedly. ‘Oui Mademoiselle, s’il vous plait.’ She smiled at their enthusiasm at the suggestion of food they might recognise.

  She explained to Elsa that she was going to parboil the potatoes and then chop them into strips and fry them in a little oil, and then she was going to chop the carrots and serve them raw and accompany the vegetables with a slice of cold ham.

  ‘Would they not rather have it all cooked together?’ Elsa asked, amazed.

  ‘No, definitely not,’ Catriona said firmly. ‘They are more used to it this way.’

  The children soon polished off the simple but much more palatable meal, much to Elsa’s relieved astonishment. They were just dipping cubes of bread in oil and vinegar when there was a knock on the door, which Elsa rushed to open.

  Catriona looked up from clearing the dishes to see a tall grey-haired man enter the small kitchen with her new friend. He had a livid scar running from his temple to inside his shirt collar and walked with a distinct limp – as many of his generation did, due to injuries sustained in the last war.

  ‘Catriona, this is my father-in-law Colonel Justin Perkins. Justin, this is the lifesaver Catriona McCarthy. I met her in a café today and she speaks French so she’s chatting to the children and has made them some food they were actually happy to eat.’

  ‘Hello, Colonel Perkins,’ said Catriona, drying her hands on the tea towel.

  He shook her hand gravely. ‘Justin please, and may I call you Catriona?’

  ‘Of course.’ She was a little taken aback at his informality. He seemed to be very proper in his dress and demeanour but perhaps she had him wrong.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ Elsa offered.

  ‘Yes my dear, that would be lovely,’ he replied, patting Olivier on the head and smiling warmly at Valérie.

  The children seemed to melt a little more now that their rescuer was here. He extracted a small paper bag from his pocket and produced two small lollipops, which made them smile – the first time Catriona had seen either of them smile since she met them. She wondered how he managed to get them; sweets were very hard to come by. They took their treats and left the table to go out into the little garden where there was a football and a very old-looking toy tea set.

  Watching them, the old man said, ‘These pair of imps somehow ended up in my care in the chaos that was the exodus out of Paris. I only have schoolboy French and I had no idea what they were saying to me. I had no real plan to bring them home with me but they seemed to sort of cling to me, goodness knows why, and nobody else was interested in looking after the little mites. When I got to the coast I couldn’t leave them, they’d sort of followed me, so I took them with me. I didn’t think any further than getting them here to be honest. Have you managed to ascertain anything about who they are?’

  Catriona had chatted with them as she prepared dinner, and they’d told her how they had to run out of their home without even bringing the cat. Their father drove for a while but then the roads were full and they had to stop and get out of the car. There was lots of loud bangs, like enormous balloons being popped. Valérie saw her parents fall to the ground and then someone dragged her and Olivier into a big building full of hay and when everything went quiet again they couldn’t find their Maman and Papa. There were so many people lying down on the road and none of them would get up. Other people were rushing around screaming. The children wandered up and down crying for someone to help them but nobody did, until Justin found them.

  ‘Their names are Valérie and Olivier Moreau. Their father works in an office, their parents are called Jean-Luc and Evangeline and they live in the sixth arrondissement.’

  ‘Well, not anymore they don’t,’ he sighed. ‘I suppose their parents were killed.’ He changed the subject. ‘And you speak French because of your mother?’

  ‘And because I was educated in Belgium, the German speaking part.’

  ‘In Belgium. Fascinating. You speak German too, I suppose?’ he asked, stirring his tea.

  ‘Yes,’ she admitted. ‘Though I probably shouldn’t say that out loud these days.’

  ‘And what,’ Justin asked, ‘is a trilingual Irish girl doing wandering around poor battered London, might I ask?’

  Catriona felt a lump in her throat. Apart from Margot, who was now off training for the WAAFs, she had no real friends in London and Elsa and Justin seemed so kind. To her horror, tears began to course hotly down her cheeks. She wiped them in frustration.

  ‘Oh Catriona, what’s wrong?’ asked Elsa, placing her hand on hers.

  The whole story came tumbling out and Elsa comforted her, as Justin watched with cool interest.

  Chapter 5

  March, 1941. London

  Catriona stared at Justin as he stood facing her in her sitting room. He’d called very early, unannounced, as she was getting ready for work at the newspaper. What he was proposing was impossible.

  ‘But I... I don’t understand... I don’t know anything about... anything. I don’t
think I’d be the right person at all.’ She felt her heart pounding in her chest. The clock ticked on the mantelpiece, beside the framed photograph of herself with Kieran.

  Justin nodded. ‘I understand it’s a shock. But the fact that you speak both French and German would be a tremendous advantage. I hate putting you in danger like this, but to be frank, I felt it would be remiss not to inform certain people about your existence. It’s not my section actually, but when I heard your story I spoke to our people in that area…’

  ‘What area?’

  ‘Mm. That area where your French family live. And I’m afraid they agree with me that you are too good an opportunity to pass up.’

  She had met Justin a number of times since December, all at Elsa’s house – including on Christmas Day when he’d turned up with sweets and little wooden toys for the children. He’d always seemed very interested in Catriona’s life, but she’d thought he was just being polite.

  Today was a revelation.

  Justin was not, it seemed, a business man, but someone working for the British government who had found out a lot about her father. He was vague on the details. ‘They believe he was on the brink of something, something really big that could turn things around… Before, that is, he fell off the surface of the earth, so to speak.’

  Catriona stared at him. Slowly the extraordinary reality was sinking in. First Jean-Claude had told her that Kieran was working on behalf of the Resistance, spreading true information about the Nazi occupation. Now Justin was telling her that her father had also been spying on behalf of the British. She said weakly, ‘I had no idea about my father’s life.’

  He patted her arm. ‘I’m sure it was to protect you my dear, not that he didn’t trust you. I have come to know you a little in recent weeks and I find you to be a most trustworthy young woman. A worthy successor to your father.’

  ‘A… what?’

  ‘Indeed. The work he was doing was very important, very important indeed. They need someone to carry it on, and have come to the conclusion that you are the best person for the job. If you agree to do this, Catriona, you must understand, they are not sending you to find Kieran McCarthy, they are sending you to continue his mission. Do you understand? If you find your father alive, that is a bonus for you – but it is not the purpose of your journey.’

  In a state of shock, Catriona heard herself saying, ‘And what would I have to do?’

  Justin opened the brown leather briefcase he carried with him everywhere. He extracted a photograph and handed it to her. ‘That,’ he explained, ‘is Frederik Schroeder. He’s a German officer stationed near Saint-Émilion.’

  She stared at the picture. A pleasant-looking young man with short blonde hair gazed back at her. He was laughing, his eyes crinkled up with merriment. She judged him to be around thirty. She looked up at Justin in puzzlement.

  His kindly gaze held hers. ‘Catriona, what I am about to tell you cannot ever be discussed with anyone else. It is of the utmost importance that this information remains in strictest confidence. Do you understand?’

  Catriona swallowed. ‘Yes.’ Her voice was barely audible.

  ‘Good. Listen carefully. Oberleutnant Schroeder’s mother is French, like yours. His father is German, and served in the last war. Frederik graduated in law at the University of Heidelberg in 1935. He is, according to your father, appalled by the brutal and illegal nature of the occupation. Making the French pay for their own occupation, for example, it is nothing short of organised plunder and is leading to mass malnutrition. Schroeder is particularly horrified by the way local men and women are being shipped off to work in Germany under this so-called Service du Travail Obligatoire.’

  ‘How good of him,’ murmured Catriona.

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘Not all Germans are outright psychopaths, you know.’

  ‘Perhaps not. But this Schroeder is a Nazi officer, isn't he?’

  ‘True. Yet your father felt he could recruit him to our side.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘And now your father is… has disappeared, we need someone else to go to this young man, to earn his trust and finish the job. To recruit someone of his rank to our side – well, it could be very significant.’

  She could hardly believe what she was hearing. ‘You want me to recruit Schroeder? How?’

  The tall grey-haired man paced up and down the narrow room. ‘Get close to him. We feel that the fact that you speak both French and German would allow a level of intimacy that we could not achieve with someone else. Schroeder must be seen to be hard on the locals in order to maintain his trusted position with his superior officers, but a dalliance with a pretty girl is allowed…’

  ‘A dalliance?’ Catriona was genuinely shaken. The British wanted her to form an actual relationship with a Nazi officer?

  Justin either didn't notice, or else ignored, her shocked expression. ‘Your uncle will be useful in arranging an introduction. Schroeder is a regular visitor to your family’s vineyard. He knows nothing of Gaston’s true politics, nor – fortunately for all concerned – of Gaston’s relationship with your father.’ Justin picked up the photo of Catriona and Kieran from the mantelpiece. ‘Even better, you look nothing like your father, so Schroeder will never make the connection. We don't think he had anything to do with your father’s disappearance but…’

  Ice cubes jostled in the pit of her stomach. ‘But you think he might?’

  He set the photo back down. ‘One can never be entirely sure about anything in this war. Nonetheless, we trust your father’s judgement and think Schroeder is worth pursuing.’

  ‘Because he could…?’

  ‘Because, Catriona, as your father understood, Bordeaux is the main centre of Nazi power in that area and it is France’s largest port and therefore of huge significance for both us and the enemy. Who controls it will be vital, and if we had inside knowledge of the Nazi war machine…’ He turned to face her, with a serious gaze. ‘Well then, it would be a huge boost for us. You would be doing this country a great service, and your own as well…’

  ‘Ireland is neutral.’

  ‘Of course. But you're half-French? Still, it must be your choice. And I’m sure I needn’t tell you that the consequences will be dire if you are caught. Torture, deportation, death… The Nazis stop at nothing, not even when it comes to a pretty girl.’

  Catriona sank down slowly onto the sofa, allowing these last words to hang in the air between them.

  What would her father say about all this? Surely he would refuse point blank to consider allowing his daughter to be put in such danger. But her father wasn’t here. And if this Schroeder had been a genuine friend to him, and perhaps knew where he was...

  If you are caught, the consequences will be dire.

  Justin stood with his hands behind his back, peacefully staring into the empty fireplace, leaving her to make her choice.

  Torture, deportation, death… The Nazis stop at nothing, not even when it comes to a pretty girl.

  But then Catriona thought of her mother’s family in Saint-Émilion suffering under Nazi rule. And of the Belgian nuns who’d educated her, and London in flames, and then of Valérie and Olivier, praying every night for ‘Maman et Papa’ to come and find them.

  ‘When would I have to go?’ Her voice sounded stronger than she felt.

  ‘We can get you out on the next full moon. The last one is just gone, so three to four weeks’ time.’ Justin didn’t seem remotely surprised by her answer. ‘You’ll need to be briefed, prepared and your cover story made water tight. The Germans are very sensitive to new people in any area, so we will make sure to give you a good back story. Your accent will be analysed by our people and an appropriate profile invented for you.’

  He took a card out of his pocket and handed it to her. It was an address on Baker Street. ‘Just present yourself at that address tomorrow morning at nine. They’ll be expecting you. Tell nobody what you are doing or where you are going.’

  ‘I would like
to say goodbye to Elsa and the children.’ Since before Christmas, she’d been going there after work every day to help Elsa make French onion soup, potatoes dauphinoise, cheese omelettes, crepes and a few other cheap and simple French dishes. She’d also begun teaching the children to speak and read English, and even did a little arithmetic with them.

  He looked sympathetic. ‘That’s not possible, I’m afraid. Perhaps write them a letter, saying you had to go back to Ireland in a hurry. Family crisis of some sort. Does that sound all right?’

  He offered her his outstretched hand and, speechless, she shook it then held on to it for a moment. She didn’t ever want to let it go. He was the last link to safety, to her normal life.

  ‘I do hope we’ll see each other again, Catriona,’ he said, as he gently withdrew his fingers. ‘The best of luck, my dear.’

  Chapter 6

  May, 1941. Chateau de Clairand, Saint-Émilion, France

  Catriona knew that she looked French in every imaginable way. Every stitch of her clothing was French, and no detail was left to chance. Even the way French women buttoned their blouses was different – but she knew that anyway. Luckily she looked more like her French mother than her Irish father so it was unnecessary to do too much to her appearance. The rationing in London had melted away any slight curves she might have had and she was as thin as all the other women she saw daily.

  For twenty-six days in London, she had stayed at the Baker Street house – never once venturing outside. She was schooled on how French women wore make-up, drilled on what was and wasn’t in the shops so she wouldn’t blow her cover by asking for something that had not been available for months. Every aspect of life under German occupation had been taught to her over and over, day and night, to ensure her safety. The woman who ran the Baker Street house was kind but took no nonsense. She’d explained how most agents had months of training, and how Catriona was in grave danger if she slipped up in any way.