Andrée's War (15 page)

Relieved, she responded affirmatively and followed him to his horse and cart. She kept a tight grip on her suitcase as she climbed up and settled into the seat at the top of the cart.

The horse jolted before starting its journey through Salies-de-Béarn, which was slowly coming to life after the arrival of the bus from Orthez. They trotted through the narrow streets and over the small bridge, covered in red geraniums; Andrée admired the little houses with their sloping tiled roofs and large windows with closed shutters hiding them from the outside world. This was a Basque town at its prettiest and she looked forward to the journey ahead. They passed an elegant and imposing eighteenth-century house, which Monsieur Flandé told her had been bought by a local family to house Russian refugees after their revolution. As they ambled past the town's school, he told her tales about some of the local families. The sun began to set as they moved out into the open country, but she could see the rolling hills and track which led to Orion. The peacefulness of the countryside left its mark on Andrée, especially given the tense atmosphere she had left behind in Paris, and slowly she began to relax.

It was not long before they were trotting into the tiny deserted Béarnais hamlet. It was almost dark as they went past the cemetery where so many of the villagers were buried, the tiny town hall which doubled up as the local school, and finally the church adjoined to the château. The horse turned through the wrought-iron gates and stopped in front of the château's main entrance.

Monsieur Flandé's wife, the château's housekeeper, ran out to greet the new arrival. A short woman with meticulously tidy hair and a dark Basque complexion, she prided herself on looking after Paul's new friends, conscious that those living in the cities were always hungry.

Madame Flandé apologised that Madame Labbé was not there to greet her guest in person. Her grief, the war and the presence of the Germans in the occupied zone only two kilometres from her home had left its mark on the châtelaine. She was resting in her room and would meet Andrée the following morning.

Madame Flandé showed Andrée to her bedroom, climbing the wide panelled staircase to the first floor. There was little light and Andrée was
barely able to see the steps to her room, but she was happy to have arrived and she knew she was now safe. She had been offered a bowl of soup and some bread, but after such a long journey she just wanted to rest. She lay down on the bed, looked out at the clear night and bright stars through the large windows and promptly fell asleep.

The church bells started ringing at 7.00 a.m. It was time to get up and Andrée was eager to meet Madame Labbé and her daughter, so she dressed quickly and went downstairs to see who was around.

Walking into the kitchen she was greeted by Monsieur Flandé with scrambled egg made with fresh milk from the château's cows and eggs from the yard's hens. She had been expecting this treat, knowing that most farmers and villagers throughout France were still able to feed themselves, despite the Germans pilfering much of it. Madame Flandé was preparing the pastry for a tarte aux pommes as Andrée sat down at the long wooden kitchen table and waited for her mouth-watering breakfast.

As she ate, she marvelled at the view in front of her; the rolling hills were covered by deep-green meadows which spread into the distance. It was a clear morning and she could see the shape of every peak of the imposing stretch of mountains separating France from Spain: occupation versus freedom. Despite the arrival of spring, the top of the peaks of the Pyrenees were still covered in snow and she watched the changing landscape as the sun rose. She could see the fields divided up by the different crops, barley separated from wheat, and she wondered whether the owners of the farm in front of her were ‘friends' of the château.

Breakfast finished, Andrée decided to explore the château and its gardens. She walked out of the kitchen, picked a small bunch of wild flowers in the garden and walked around the house to the front door, where she entered a small rectangular hall with an imposing but beautiful portrait of Madame Labbé in eighteenth-century dress. Opposite hung a portrait of Maréchal Pétain in military uniform. On another wall to the right of the painting of the châtelaine, a huge French nineteenth-century mahogany linen cupboard dominated the hall.

She admired Monsieur Labbé's watercolours hanging in the drawing room alongside several portraits of the Reclus and Labbé ancestors. She then moved into the formal dining room where several large mirrors adorned the panelled walls. Some of the family silver was lying on the table. She thought about the hours that would have been spent sitting around this dining room table, eating, drinking and discussing politics.

As Andrée bent to look at some of the books lying on one of the tables, she heard someone coming into the room; it was Madame Labbé, dressed totally in black. She moved towards Andrée to shake her by the hand and welcomed her warmly. Together they walked out into the garden and despite the cool May air sat down on one of the garden benches to get to know each other. Andrée told Madame Labbé about the documents she had brought down from Paris; her host was pleased that everything had reached Orion safely and assured her that within the next couple of days the information would be taken through to Spain by one of their trusted
passeurs
. Madame Labbé invited Andrée to stay as long as she wished but, unfortunately, she had to return to Paris the next day. Her guest ventured a question: why was there a portrait of Pétain hanging in the hall? Madame Labbé laughed, and explained that by doing so the Germans would think they were collaborators and if there was any trouble the château was less likely to be searched. Life in Orion was difficult, as it was everywhere in rural France during the occupation, but because the château was so remote, there were no Germans on their doorstep. German patrols however regularly visited the hamlet, stealing their food and ensuring their presence was felt.

All too soon it was time to return to Paris. Her mission had been a success, but this was only the beginning. As their intelligence-gathering grew in scope, she would not be able to manage alone; they would need more couriers to help with the workload. But recruiting other couriers was likely to be extremely difficult. The right candidates would need to be discreet but confident, naive in demeanour yet quick-witted, fiercely patriotic but never forthright in expressing their political views. It would be useful to know whether they had families in different parts of France as that would make it easier for them to get
ausweiss
, but at the same time it was always better for everyone involved to know as little as possible about other couriers in
case they were caught. Alain was keen to recruit women because experience suggested that they were less likely to be stopped or searched by the Wehrmacht.

Who could she approach, who could she trust? As the train steamed into Paris, Andrée mentally considered her closest friends and decided she would speak to two people, Marthe Dramez and Margit Ehrart. Marthe, who chain-smoked Gauloises, was small and quiet; she was slightly older than Andrée's other friends, and had proved to be one of the most loyal. Marthe had begun her career as a history teacher in one of the most successful lycées in Paris and she had helped Alain pass his baccalaureate. Later she became headmistress at another leading girls' school, and was awarded the Légion d'honneur in the 1960s in recognition of her work for the Resistance and her contribution to education. Half-Austrian Margit, meanwhile, spoke impeccable German and looked like an Aryan with her blond hair and blue eyes; she would be the perfect candidate to transport any material from Nice. Her grandparents had always lived there, so she had a valid reason to visit and Andrée knew she would enjoy soaking up the warm Mediterranean sun and relaxing in the Free Zone. Margit was always keen to undertake a challenge.

As she arrived back in Paris, Andrée felt very pleased with herself. She had thought of two reliable friends who she was almost certain would help. The intelligence would be divided up and she wouldn't have to risk drawing too much attention to herself at work by travelling too frequently. But at the back of her mind, she knew that the risks were growing; if she was caught, there would be the added risk of betraying the others.

 

*
Indicative of the lifestyle some people in Paris were able to have during the war years, especially the German officers, collaborators and members of intelligence services.

^†
Andrée's host might have been Raoul Maillard. Born in Liège, Belgium, in 1896, he was included in the list of the Orion agents recorded in the archives of the French Ministry of Defence. He came to visit Andrée in London many years later, bringing gifts for her children.

I
n late 1941, finding food was a challenge for most Parisians and as the winter wore on, they began to endure food shortages which were at times so extreme that Andrée described eating several dinners of rat meat and beetroot, a vegetable she refused to touch for the rest of her life. Food rationing had come into force back in May: each person was given an allowance of 350g of meat, 70g of cheese, 100g of fat, 50g of sugar, 250g of pasta and 200g of rice per month. For those living in the countryside, a little more food was often available but the German soldiers were masters of the art of pilfering.

Unsurprisingly, food became one of the most important subjects of conversation for Andrée and her mother for the rest of their lives. During the war years Yvonne managed to buy food on the black market in La Vendée by selling much of her jewellery, several pieces of which had been in her family for many generations. She was also able to bring back food from the country, either from Rochefort-en-Yvelines, where the family owned a small house with a little vegetable garden, or from friends in Normandy who would arrange for parcels to be sent to Paris. Much later Andrée took her own family to visit the Normandy farm that had been the source of much-needed food at a time of deprivation; her four-year-old son refused to drink the fresh milk he was given by the farmer's wife, so different was it from what he was used to in London.

Andrée's diary entries from this period reflect their day-to-day preoccupations – trying to find food, to stay positive, not to dwell in detail on the difficulties of life in an occupied city.

8 December 1941
Life is becoming so unbelievably difficult. There are some fools who have begun to assassinate German soldiers on the streets of Paris. This will not help our cause and because of this curfew has been set at 6.00 p.m. Monsieur Leclercq, the Head of my Department, has said the office will close at 4.00. It is good to be able to leave work early, but not much fun having to be indoors by 6.00.

Around this time, communist activists across France had begun a policy of indiscriminately murdering German soldiers on the streets of the major French cities. The reprisals for these assassinations were horrendous; for every murdered soldier, the Commandant of Paris ordered groups of innocent French civilians to be randomly rounded up from the streets and shot at dawn. Andrée lost one of her closest friends in this way after he decided to risk breaking the 6.00 p.m. curfew following a birthday party. He was arrested on the streets of Paris and taken to a local police station. The following morning, in retaliation for the killing of a Wehrmacht officer or soldier, ten Frenchmen were shot without trial, Andrée's friend among them.

General de Gaulle intervened from London to order that the killing of Wehrmacht soldiers should cease, though perhaps even more effective was the weight of local opinion in areas facing reprisals, where people were angry and scared by the violence on the streets.

On 16 December 1941, Andrée wrote in her journal:

I am organising a New Year's Eve party. There will be twelve of us, although sadly Serge will not be there. Serge has left Paris and has gone into the Free Zone. It was about time he left because there are hundreds of Jews being arrested all over Paris. Monsieur Bigard, Serge's father, has been arrested and Papa is beside himself with anger. Toto Bernstein, a friend of Renée's, has also been arrested.

On Christmas Eve Andrée returned from the family home in Rochefort-en-Yvelines with a three-kilo turkey that she had bought at huge
cost from a local farmer. This Christmas, despite the freezing conditions in their flat because there was no coal, the family ate a meal the likes of which they had not enjoyed together for over a year.

On 31 December, as the new year dawned, she was contemplative, writing:

New Year's Eve 1941. I was thinking through yesterday what we did on New Year's Eve 1940 and the way so much has changed over the year. What will 1942 have in store for us? A big question mark. And the war? What is going to happen to us all?

2 January 1942
We rented a small house in Chaville where we enjoyed a lovely weekend. At midnight on New Year's Eve we all hugged each other and wished each other a happy New Year. We raised our glasses to Serge who had left us three bottles of 1923 Nuits St Georges. We danced the tango. Serge has always been such a special friend and I am going to miss him so much.

On 3 January 1942, she referred to her friend Mado visiting her the night before: ‘She told me in confidence that she also keeps a journal but that she writes nothing important in it.' It was risky to commit anything to paper, of course, Andrée knew from her brother's strict rules, but that did not deter her. As she reflected in her diary: ‘I was a rather shy girl six months ago. How things have changed.'

7 January 1942
I was given a small bottle of perfume today by the Avions Caudron Company to thank me for preparing their passports so quickly. I will have to find someone I can sell it to and make some money. It is so very cold.