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 principle, but not necessarily with forfeiting the chanc
e 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 preceded 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.”
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.”
She rose to leave.
“And, madame, in case you are looking, you will find your friend Masloff in a hospital at the front.”
She refrained from gasping aloud. Ladoux was clearly trying to get a rise out of her, but she refused to give in. “G’day, Captain.”
“Good-day, Madame Zelle-MacLeod.”
The following afternoon, M’greet went to the Quai d’Orsay to visit Harry de Marguérie. She was so used to looking upon Vadim’s young face that Harry looked like an old man.
She told him everything. To his credit, he did not seem to be jealous about Vadim. After she’d finished her story, he ran a hand through his thinning hair. “Did it ever occur to you that little Normie, had he lived, would be the same age as Vadim?”
She opened her mouth, but couldn’t think of anything to say. “It’s not like that,” she managed to croak out after a beat. “We’re in love. I just want to be near him. And now this Ladoux man wants me to become a spy.”
He laughed. “Another disguise, Marguérite?”
“This time it would be in the service of France, not to better my own life.”
He shook his head. “You know, some people view the work of espionage as opportunistic and mercenary.”
“Some would say the same thing about myself.”
That old grin again. “True.” His face grew serious as he asked, “How old would you say Ladoux is?”
“I don’t know. Forty-something, though the fat might have hidden some of his wrinkles.”
“Did you ever ask yourself why this, as you say, forty-something man is still a captain?”
“Does it matter?”
He put his steepled hands under his chin. “French men at the front have a survival chance of less than half.”
M’greet frowned as she recalled what Ladoux said about Vadim.
Harry didn’t seem to notice her reaction. “Officer promotions are handed out swiftly in orde
r to fill these dead men’s posts, so you’d think by now Ladoux would have a higher rank.”
She supposed the points Harry brought up should have bothered her, but at that moment, she could think of nothing else but Vadim. “Maybe that’s the highest rank he can achieve in his line of work.”
Harry tucked his hand underneath his face and thought for a minute. “This line of work is, indeed, extremely dangerous, but if anyone can serve my country with such work, it is you, Marguérite. Ladoux probably knows that too.”
She gestured toward the window. “If that’s so, why do you suppose he is still having me followed?”
“Is he?” He went over to the blinds and peered out. “Two youngish-looking men, one in a brown suit, one in a green?”
“That’s them. They’ve been tailing me for months.”
“I wonder why Ladoux would offer you a position in the French Intelligence Service if he suspects you enough to have you tailed.” Harry picked up his suitcoat from the chair. “C’mon.”
“Where are we going?”
“We’re going to have some fun. Watch what happens when Ladoux’s flunkeys try to follow the Secretary of Foreign Affairs as he takes Mata Hari out to dinner.”
The next day M’greet returned to Ladoux’s office. She stalked in this time, displaying a confidence she did not quite feel. “Captain, in principle, I submit.”
Ladoux’s stern expression showed no surprise. “Does that mean you agree to work for me?”
“Yes, provided you will still allow me to go to Vittel.”
He scribbled something on a piece of paper before sighing, “So be it. You will report back here when you return for further instructions.”
His tone indicated that he had finished with the conversation, but M’greet was not satisfied. Yesterday he had seemed so interested in her affairs and now it was as though he couldn’t care less. “Captain, is it possible for me to send a telegram to Vadim Masloff from this office? I have not heard from him since he left.”
The Women Spies Series 1-3 Page 90