Authors: June Gadsby
Mary smiled up at the handsome, blond-haired lieutenant, who was regarding her curiously.
‘
Bonjour, monsieur
.’ She dipped a tiny curtsy and saw his eyes narrow. ‘I am Marie-Jo Laroque …’ There was the faintest gasp of astonishment from Madame Laroque. ‘… and I have come to visit my grandparents for Christmas.’
‘Indeed?’ He inclined his head and gave the faintest of smiles.
‘I haven’t seen them for so long and … well, it’s Christmas … nearly … and …’ She stopped rattling on and took a deep breath. ‘Oh, are you Oberleutnant Hauptmann? I passed a group of … of military gentlemen just down the road there. Their car has broken down. The one in charge asked me to tell you. I think they have an appointment and are afraid of being late.’
‘Ah! Very well …’ He turned to someone standing in the shadows behind him. ‘Will you excuse me, my dear. I must go and pick them up. Perhaps, Monsieur Laroque, you could send somebody to repair our
visitors
’ car?’
‘Marie-Jo.’ Madame Laroque took Mary by the hand and started
leading
her up the steps towards the big, iron-studded door. ‘I hardly
recognized
you. Come inside, child, before you freeze. Leave your bicycle there. It will be quite safe.’
Mary stepped inside the hall, which looked no different from how it had been all those years ago when she visited as a child, though it seemed smaller and shabbier. Perhaps it had always been that way and she was now seeing the place as an adult, rather than an impressionable teenager with stars in her eyes.
‘So, you have come to spend Christmas with your grandparents?’
The voice that addressed her spoke in German, but this time it belonged to a woman. The wife or companion of the Oberleutnant Hauptmann, no doubt. Mary’s head jerked around so that she could see the woman more clearly as she stepped out into the light shining through the open doorway. She registered the long, platinum-blonde hair, the mascara and the rouge and the blood red lipstick, then her jaw sagged and her heart leapt alarmingly.
‘I’m sorry, but I do not speak German,’ she said, careful not to let the shock of recognition show on her face.
‘Of course, how silly of me,’ Anne Beasley said, switching now to French. ‘How pleasant to have someone of my own age to talk to while the men are at their business.’ She held out a limp hand, which Mary grasped. She felt a warning squeeze. ‘My name is Anna. Anna Kraus. Come, you must tell me all about yourself.’
Five minutes later, Mary found herself sitting beside Anne on a
chaise-longue
in the high-ceilinged
salon
, with its huge oak beams and
chandeliers
and wide, open fireplace. The heat from the burning pine-logs in the grate warmed the place and cast dancing reflections on the faces of the two young women. They were alone, Madame Laroque having excused herself in order to check on refreshments for the new arrivals.
‘For God’s sake, don’t give me away, Mary,’ Anne whispered urgently. ‘The Laroques haven’t recognized me up to now as far as I know. Now, what the hell are you doing here?’
‘Looking for you, basically,’ Mary told her, sticking to French, feeling it was safer than English in the circumstances. ‘Communication has broken down between the French Resistance and England – at least for this part of the world. They seem to think that there’s a spy in the network, passing on information as soon as it’s received. It has to be one of our own people … or someone good enough to pass himself off as one of our own.’
‘We suspected as much. That’s why the safe houses are constantly on the move.’
‘Except the safe house here, apparently.’
Anne blinked at her and Mary felt as though she had betrayed a secret.
‘But, surely, you knew?’
‘No.’ Anne shook her head. ‘I’ve been playing things safe for the last few months, worming my way in on the German side of things. It wasn’t so difficult at first, but now I’m in it’s not as easy as I thought to get
information
. Heinrich is a good man, but he’s also a good German officer. Besides, he doesn’t like talking about war with me.’
Mary felt a surge of heat starting from her neck and rushing to the roots of her hair. She didn’t like what Anne was telling her, but this was neither the time nor the place to criticize her old friend’s morals. Besides, Anne was a British SOE agent and acting under orders.
‘Don’t look at me like that, Mary,’ Anne said, reading her thoughts. ‘We’re all making sacrifices for our country. Some do it with their lives. Besides, nobody’s forcing me and … well, he’s nice. He’s actually
very
nice.’
‘Are you in love with him?’
There was a brief moment when it looked as though Anne was going to say yes, but then she shook her head.
‘Of course not. He’s German.’
Alex was in place at the arranged time. It was the fifth failed rendezvous at which he had waited for
Le Blaireau
to bring him news about the
proposed transfer from the chateau to a point nearer the Pyrenees so they could be on hand for British and Canadian troops escaping into neutral Spain. The old man had told him a week ago that the Germans were wiping out every safe house between Paris and Lourdes. This was to be the last move before Alex could be lifted out and returned to England.
But
Le Blaireau
hadn’t come and now Alex was beginning to worry. With the chateau being full of Germans for the last few days, none of them had been able to come and go as usual. Not even to steal a few necessary gasps of fresh air. The vault was stinking because they couldn’t get rid of the sewage and there had been no fresh food for forty-eight hours. This last party of Germans were intent on having a good time and, consequently, they seemed to be awake and roaming about at every hour of the day and night.
There had been music and dancing. The noise had filtered through to Alex and Private Jenkins. Two Canadians, their wounds all but healed, had jigged around the stone floor while those still recovering sat up in their beds, clapping their hands to the rhythm. Alex felt mean when he ordered them to be silent, but this was not the time to get careless. Not if they wanted to get out of the place alive.
‘
Monsieur
!’ From the darkness, Alex heard Serge’s whisper. He
stiffened
and listened intently to what the gardener had to say, conscious that the old Frenchman was risking his life every time he spoke to him. ‘
Le Blaireau est mort
– dead,
monsieur
.’
Damn! Alex’s blood turned to ice in his veins as he saw all his hopes of escape dashed. Without
Le Blaireau
and the help he had promised, they were all condemned.
‘Thank you, Serge,’ he whispered back, but he knew that the Frenchman had already gone.
A scratching noise from inside the exit of the vault attracted his
attention
. It was followed by a whimpering sound and more scratching. Chiffon! As usual, she was desperate to run free in the open air, but Alex was determined that she would not end up slaughtered like her brothers and sisters. She was a dear little thing and was never far from his side. At night she curled up in the discarded helmet of a dead soldier, but quite often, Alex would wake up and find her snuggled in beside him.
‘Chiffon?’ He tiptoed back into the shed from his hiding place between two huge lime trees. ‘Be quiet!’
He started to lift the trap-door, which had recently been camouflaged in such a way that it was hidden, yet could still be lifted from inside
without
the weight of the vegetables on top. He didn’t see the dog emerge,
but was suddenly aware that she was skittering away over the gravel drive with a joyous yelp. She had not barked since the day she had escaped the German bullets that killed her brothers and sisters, but recently she had been showing a certain amount of agitation.
‘Blast!’ Alex stood up and took a few paces forward. He didn’t dare call out or whistle. Not even Chiffon was worth the lives of the dozen men holed up beneath the chateau waiting to be rescued.
Because everything was so silent in the chateau grounds, the noise being contained inside the building where he could hear yet more music and stamping and clapping of hands, Alex stepped further out than he should have, hoping to attract the dog and bring her back. Too late he heard the crunch of gravel, saw Chiffon hesitate, then turn and rush, not towards him but towards someone standing in the shadow of the terrace wall. Someone who, like him, obviously didn’t want to be discovered.
Mary, tired from dancing with the stomping, heavy-footed Germans in their jackboots, wondered whether they slept with them on and thought that they probably did, and to attention. A very small part of her envied Anne her German lover. They had already retired for the night, to a chorus of bawdy cheers. Heinrich was young and good-looking and, yes, possessed all the necessary charm that the others plainly lacked,
especially
when they were drunk, which was what they were now.
Making her excuses early, Mary pleaded a migraine and told them she was going to bed. They had complained amicably enough, but because they had so much drink in them, it being Christmas Eve, she was at last dismissed with little more than a wave of the commandant’s hand.
On the upstairs landing where her bedroom was, a door creaked open and Anne appeared, barely clad, holding the edges of a flimsy housecoat together. She beckoned to Mary, then tiptoed out to meet her.
‘He won’t sleep for long, so I’ve got to be quick,’ she whispered
frantically
, her eyes darting in every direction as if the woodwork might be growing ears. ‘They know about the safe house beneath the chateau. Heinrich let it slip. They were supposed to move in tonight, but they’re all too drunk, so they’ve postponed it until tomorrow.’
‘It’s Christmas Day tomorrow!’ Mary exclaimed, not believing that any human being could plan such a coup that would almost certainly result in more than one death on Christmas Day.
‘They’re holed up underground, apparently. This chateau was built over a series of caves. Do you know where the entrance is, Mary?’
Mary shook her head. They had never been allowed down in the
cellars as children.
‘No, but I’ve seen the gardener disappear into a shed at the back with bins of food and the odd bottle of wine, but that was only once and could mean nothing at all.’
‘You’ve got to try and warn them, Mary,’ Anne said, her eyes bulging and two angry red blotches appearing on her high cheekbones. ‘I don’t care how you do it, but it’s up to you now. I can’t get away.’
‘But you can’t stay here, Anne,’ Mary whispered frantically. ‘Come with me now.’
Her eyes pleaded, but something told her that Anne was reluctant to leave, even if she could. Mary had seen how her old friend interacted with her German, seen how they looked at one another, how they touched and spoke so fondly together. He was the enemy and Anne was skating on thin ice by going with her heart rather than her head.
For Mary, it had been a nerve-racking few days living with a houseful of Germans. They had been surprisingly polite and far too involved with their own pressing business, not to mention their merrymaking at the expense of the chateau’s good wine cellar, to pay much attention to the owner’s mousy granddaughter. Only once had one of the men made advances that unnerved Mary, but Oberleutnant Hauptmann had put him firmly in his place. Anne’s German, as Mary always thought of Hauptmann, reminded his fellow-countryman that although they were the conquerors, they must at all times conduct themselves with dignity.
‘Leave the girl alone!’ he had bellowed. ‘You should have better things to do, Franz, than be unfaithful to your wife.’
There was the creak of bedsprings and the two women stiffened as a slurred voice called out.
‘Anna? Anna, where are you? Come back to bed. I’m lonely.’
Anne pressed a finger to her lips and ran back into the room. Mary could hear her telling Heinrich that she had just slipped to the bathroom. She wished she had been able to say something to her, other than stare like an imbecile and feel so totally helpless.
Mary went to her room and donned a thick coat and scarf, then slipped down the back stairs and made her way slowly and carefully around the chateau until she was in sight of the old shed. She had been standing there, wondering what to do next, when she heard the dog. Suddenly, she was cornered. The dog rushed at her from one direction, while someone was watching her from the shadows on the other side.
Mary took a step forward and so did her observer. There was only a short gap between them. The dog was dancing excitedly around her,
mewing like a kitten, patting her with soft, gentle paws. Sure that it must be one of the Germans watching her, Mary decided to brazen it out and bent to pick up the tiny creature, which immediately fell silent, nuzzling her neck and licking her face.
‘
Bonsoir
,’ she called out softly, then continued to speak soothingly to the dog in French. There was no reply from the person standing there like a statue, then the place where they were was lit up like a stage as the moon appeared from behind a dark cloud. She gave a strangulated cry. ‘Alex!’
He jumped forward, grabbed hold of her and dragged her back into the pitch-black of the shed. His hand clamped down over her mouth and she felt his fingers, steely hard, digging into her arm.
‘Tell me it’s not a dream,’ he whispered, his mouth close to her ear. ‘Oh, my God, Mary, what are you doing here?’
‘Oh, Alex, is it really you?’ Mary mumbled as her body sagged against him.
A pair of strong arms encircled her as he held her close to his chest, making the little dog between them gasp and wriggle. She felt his mouth press into the top of her head, then he was kissing her on the lips,
tasting
the tears that rolled down her cheeks.
‘This is crazy,’ he said thickly. ‘It can’t be happening.’
‘Alex, you’ve got to get out,’ Mary said, struggling to keep her
composure
. ‘They know about you. You’ve got to get out now.’