The Winter Agent

by Gareth Rubin

  ‘Shit,’ Reece spat. He broke off and walked away. ‘Is there any way at all you can get to him?’

  ‘How?’ Alain was becoming irate too now. ‘I work in the office, not on the wings. If I look slightly out of place, they’ll do to me what they do to your people. I’m not doing it for any money.’

  Reece paced up and down. ‘Give me a bloody cigarette,’ he muttered.

  Alain offered him one and a match. Reece lit it and threw the match to the side still alight.

  ‘Maxime,’ Sebastien said. He pointed to the ground. ‘Oil patches, you know. We don’t want the whole place to go up.’

  Reece ignored him and drew in a lungful of tarry smoke. He had failed to rescue Luc from the prison transport and then, through his ignorance of her – of her game – he had let Charlotte escape with all she knew. He had failed twice. He wasn’t going to let it happen a third time. Often it was hatred of the Nazis that motivated him, seeing their brutal arrogance infect the streets of his youth; sometimes it was a desire, like Hélène, to see the world made better; but now, here and now, he felt a simple sense of duty: he would get to Luc to save him and gain the vital knowledge that he held because it had to be done and he was the one standing square in front of the task. ‘I’ll go in,’ he said.

  ‘How?’ Sebastien sounded amazed at the idea.

  Reece blew the smoke out of his nose. It burned on the way out. ‘We create a diversion – a night attack while most of them are asleep. Grenades on the front gate. There’ll just be a few guarding the exterior, won’t there?’

  ‘Maybe seven, eight,’ Alain replied uncertainly.

  ‘So we let them spot us outside. Some run out after the rest of you. Once they’re out of sight of the guard post, I impersonate one of them, wearing their uniform, and slip back in behind them. In the confusion, they won’t be looking for one man trying to get in. I speak good German.’

  ‘There will still be guards everywhere,’ Sebastien objected. ‘As soon as the siren goes they’ll all jump up, ready to shoot.’

  Reece turned his head away, ignoring the objection. ‘What’s it like inside our friend’s wing?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s a corporal in charge at night,’ said Alain. ‘Skinny little runt. Looks like he still sucks his mother’s tit.’

  ‘We don’t have another option. This op has to happen,’ Reece told Sebastien. He turned to Alain. ‘Can you get me a uniform? Steal one. An NCO would be best.’

  ‘The laundry room isn’t exactly high security,’ Alain replied. ‘I can get in there.’

  ‘No doubt you will name a price now.’

  ‘Oh, I am not a greedy man. Another five hundred francs will be enough.’

  ‘Agreed,’ Reece told him, caring little about the price. ‘I would guess the boots would be harder to come by?’

  ‘Yes, they don’t send them to the laundry to be cleaned.’

  ‘No matter. With the raid on, no one will be looking at my feet.’

  ‘It’s suicide. Too risky,’ Sebastien blurted out.

  ‘We have no choice. I’m telling you, we have to make contact with Luc. If you’ve got another idea, let me know right now.’

  Sebastien took a cigarette and thought it over. ‘No, as it is, it’s too risky – too many variables – what if they don’t come out of the gates when we attack but shoot at us from the walls? But listen. I’ve got a way to increase our chances. We put it to London months ago, when we wanted to free a group of resistants, but they refused. This might twist their arms.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Operation Jericho.’

  CHAPTER 17

  14 February 1944

  SOE’s London offices were in a nondescript block in Baker Street, lending the service the nickname the Baker Street Irregulars, after the benign street gang that occasionally aided Sherlock Holmes. At 7.30 a.m. Major Delaney arrived to find a deciphered message on his desk from Fisherman. He read it, lifting a cup of tea to his lips.

  Message from Maxime Beggar circuit. Item secured in Op Beggar 4 lost. Only chance to secure information is urgent approval of Op Jericho. I will infiltrate. How soon can op be executed?

  The cup slipped from his fingers and tea spilled on the desk. His assistant stopped typing a letter and looked over. ‘Something I can do?’ she asked.

  He stared at her. ‘Bring me the Jericho file.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Then …’ He broke off. She looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to continue. He wanted to tell her that the fate of the second front, still months away, could be decided that day. That the invasion was on a knife-edge and the German counter-plans could destroy it in the blink of an eye. He couldn’t. Like Churchill and so many others, he had to pretend that the chances of success were far higher than they really were, that the men in the gliders and landing craft were far less vulnerable than he knew them to be.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Then call the War Rooms. Tell them I need to see the Prime Minister immediately.’

  At the same time, on the outskirts of the city of Amiens, Alain tramped through a muddy lane to his job at the prison. He stopped to pick up a cigarette butt. There were still a few puffs left on it and his freezing fingers shook as they struck a match. The tiny glow of heat brought his veins to life and he realized that up until then his hands had been entirely numb.

  It was hard lighting the fag – it was damp and smouldered rather than burned. Eventually, he managed to draw a little smoke from it, soothing his lungs and mind as he gazed up at the seven-metre walls surrounding the jail.

  For a moment he seemed to wake from a dream – was he really doing this? He normally left the heroics to others. If the Germans got even a sniff of what he was up to, they would … well, they would do to him what they did to the poor bastards inside.

  He could hear the rattling of keys on the other side of the steel door. What should he do? Turn around and run? Feign illness and go to ground?

  One thousand francs. And all he had to do was steal a uniform. It was good money. Very good. But who needs good money when you’re in the grave? The key was shoved into the lock. A hidden man’s boots stamped on the ground in an attempt to keep warm.

  Should he go through with it or find an excuse and back out? After all, the Germans weren’t even that cruel – he had known harsh times all his life and this wasn’t as bad as some he had been through; the politicians in Paris didn’t care any more for working men like him than the Nazis did.

  Perhaps if he told the Germans what he had been paid to do, they would pay him for the tip-off. Twice the cash and no risk at all. It made sense. Yes, that made sense.

  The key turned slowly, thudding away the tumblers. The door opened and he stepped through it.

  He was going to back out.

  Reece and Sebastien watched Alain disappear into the prison. They turned back to their path, sauntering along the road, gazing at the fields around them, chewing some black bread they had bought on the way. ‘We’re about two kilometres due east of the city right now,’ Sebastien said.

  ‘Right.’

  ‘You see how the prison’s shaped like a cross? Those are the soldiers’ barracks.’ Sebastien pointed to opposing ends of the horizontal beam of the building. ‘There should be about seven hundred inmates; a hundred or so are women. It goes up and down depending on how many have come in overnight and …’

  ‘And what?’

  ‘How many have been executed.’

  They stopped walking and Reece glanced up at the high walls, seeing friends, comrades, falling before the machine guns. There was a stench in the air that wouldn’t leave the prison, the smell of what the Germans used it for. After a while, he spoke. ‘How many of them are resistants?’

  ‘About a third. The rest are mostly in for petty stuff – theft, that sort of thing. You really think you can just walk in there?’

  ‘If there’s enough going on to distract the Germans, yes.’

  ‘For a suicidal plan, i
t’s probably the best method of suicide,’ Sebastien muttered.

  ‘All right. Where do we head after the op?’

  ‘That way leads to a little town named Albert,’ Sebastien said, pointing. ‘No garrison there, so it’s quiet.’

  ‘Fine.’ Reece gazed around, away from the prison. Despite the pain from his tired body, the sight that met him seemed to chime with something in a part of his memory that had rarely seen the light of day recently. In front of him, sharply contrasting with the wet and dirt and corruption now in every brick of Paris, were fields and rising hills, small birds flitting between finger-like branches, a white sun in the pale sky and no sound but their own breath. He took another moment to breathe and allow himself to remember what France had been.

  Alain glanced at them through a barred window, watching as they walked away. His cigarette was definitely out now, damp and lifeless, but it still clung to his lower lip. He tramped through clunking gates and doors until he reached the administration wing, where he spent his time arranging staff rotas and detailing what the prisoners had brought with them and what they were to be given back when – if – they left. The two columns rarely tallied. Anyone foolish enough to declare a valuable item to the receiving officer would never see it again.

  He felt relief now that he had decided to back out of the plan and satisfaction that he had thought of a way to get paid nevertheless. The stairs were wet with mud brought in on leather boots. As he stepped up to the next stair, he slipped and fell to his knees, to the amusement of a pair of Germans passing him on their way down. He smiled, in on the joke, allowing them to enjoy it. One said something to the other in German and the second one laughed. Alain smiled again and resumed his journey.

  ‘He says the floor is as wet as your mother was for him last night.’

  Alain turned and forced a smile. ‘He is very droll.’ He turned back and went on climbing.

  ‘He says ten francs was too much, though.’

  ‘Does he?’ The humiliation began to light in his cheeks.

  ‘Hey, why don’t you do for me what she did last night?’

  Alain gritted his teeth and continued climbing up to the next floor. Then he felt a hand jerk his collar backwards, pulling him off balance. He grabbed the bannister and waited for the two men to leave him alone.

  And as they descended the stairs, something fell into place. He would wipe the smiles from their faces.

  He spent the morning performing his normal routine. At lunchtime he ate his black bread spread thinly with margarine, a poor substitute for the sweet butter he used to eat, then at 1.30 p.m. he paid a visit to the staff toilet on the ground floor, taking a large bag with him. It was a stinking place, always awash with a centimetre of stale water on the floor. No one ever bothered to clean it. Even the inmates’ stalls were cleaned regularly, if perfunctorily. But the staff toilet also happened to be next to the laundry room. He came away with a sergeant’s trousers and jacket.

  That evening Alain delivered the bag to Sebastien’s safe house. Reece handed him an envelope with one thousand francs and Alain counted the cash.

  ‘Your friend is in the east wing. I couldn’t tell which cell, but there aren’t many there.’ That would make it harder, Reece thought, but there was no helping the situation, and no reason for thinking Alain was lying about not knowing Luc’s exact location. ‘Count your friend lucky they haven’t sent him to one of the camps yet.’

  ‘Number of guards?’

  ‘Normal rota for tomorrow. Fifty-two French working in eight-hour shifts. I don’t know about the Germans, but about thirty normally.’

  ‘All regular men?’ Reece asked, checking the uniform. It should fit him, more or less.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And everything else is as you told us? Mealtimes, that sort of thing?’

  ‘Everything’s normal, as far as I know.’

  ‘Good. All right. Is there anything else you can tell us that could help? Think. Anything at all: a broken pipe, a fight between inmates. Anything.’

  Alain pondered for a second. ‘It’s freezing inside, though I doubt that makes a difference,’ he said.

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘Then I wish you luck. That’s all I can think of.’

  Reece nodded his thanks. For a moment he wondered if he should be suspicious about Alain’s sudden enthusiasm for the plan, but he decided that he was just being overcautious.

  They waited for five minutes without saying a word, in case anyone had seen Alain enter, and then he left and Reece returned to the parlour, where Sebastien sat shuffling a pack of cards in the dark. Across the room from him, Thomas and Hélène were eating omelettes made with powdered eggs and carrots. Reece gazed at them in the gloom. He still couldn’t discount the possibility that Parade had an informant within Beggar, but he had little choice about having his fellow agents there for the op. He needed all the hands he could muster; even with Sebastien’s circuit joining them later, they would be short on bodies.

  In order to maintain security he had had one of Sebastien’s men bring Thomas and Hélène to Amiens without telling them where they were going or what the operation was to be and since then he had watched them at all times.

  Thomas finished his food and ambled over to the table, where Sebastien dealt a hand of whist. Reece took the opportunity to hand over his cards and join Hélène. ‘How are you feeling?’ she asked.

  ‘We’ll get the job done.’ He couldn’t help being cagey. ‘How are you bearing up? It’s a long time since you saw your family.’

  ‘God, it feels so long. London’s promised me a week’s leave next month. They’re trying to co-ordinate with the Canadian army so my husband can get leave too and we can spend it together.’

  ‘I’m sure he would appreciate that as much as you.’

  ‘I haven’t seen him for nearly two years. It’s tough. Really tough. Do you have someone back home?’

  He thought of someone holding a lighter as they stood waist-deep in water. Then the flame flicking off and nothing but the tunnel. ‘No. No one.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, in her strange Québécois accent. ‘You need to find someone, someone who actually likes you, not just some young girl impressed by all your war stories. Don’t sit around in some country house chasing girls from the village, or whatever it is you do.’

  ‘I’ll do my best.’

  ‘We need more coal for the fire,’ Sebastien said, throwing down his hand. ‘You’re clearly dealing from the bottom of the deck anyway.’

  ‘Bloody right I am,’ Thomas replied.

  Sebastien went out through the French windows at the rear of the room that gave access to the garden. Reece heard him knock into something outside.

  Then the French windows opened again. ‘Did you forget something?’ Reece asked. Receiving no reply, he looked around. Sebastien stood in the doorway, but his figure wasn’t the only one framed by the night sky. Behind him were two leather-coated Gestapo men with guns pointing into the room.

  Reece threw himself to the side, desperately searching for some sort of weapon. One of the Germans knocked Sebastien out of the way and shouted at Reece to stop. Behind them, a powerful electric torch shone into Reece’s face, blinding him.

  At the same moment, the front door seemed to break in two. A shot was fired, but he couldn’t tell from where and all there was was confusion. The last thing he remembered was the butt of a pistol thudding into the base of his skull.

  CHAPTER 18

  During interrogation

  i) Speak slowly, clearly and firmly. Do not answer simple questions immediately, and hesitate with the more difficult ones. Similarly, keep an even level of preciseness, i.e. do not overdo the detail in replies to easy questions and then ‘forget’ everything with difficult ones.

  ii) Remember that shouting, bullying, coaxing, joking, sentimentality, etc., is all an act to make you afraid, angry, hilarious or sentimental and thereby lessen your vigilance.

  iii) Avoid re
plies that lead to further questions. All your answers should end in a cul-de-sac. Do not help the interrogators by adding unsolicited information …

  iv) Do not express personal affection or interest in anybody.

  15 February 1944

  He was drowning. His mind and flesh told him so. He was in a ship leaving Dunkirk and it was going down. A thousand bodies around him were falling to the bottom of the Channel. He saw them all, soldiers with empty faces, grasping hands, brine flooding their mouths.

  But then it was no longer heading for England, it was heading for a cold French beach, and the ship, packed with eager young men, was powering towards the harbour even though it had been torpedoed from below, tearing its metal body apart and letting the sea rise over them all.

  When he opened his mouth to yell out, to make it stop, freezing water poured in and he choked. The water streamed down his throat, wracking his body with sharp pain.

  ‘Stop it now.’

  He barely remembered himself. His name was out of reach, like the coast. But something, somewhere, was telling him he had to forget. He had to keep something locked away.

  He should have died, it said, he should have crushed the L-pill between his teeth rather than be taken.

  And as he came to himself so did that memory. His recce mission. If they found out where he had been, they would understand the significance and those blank faces would be filled. Ten thousand boys would fall through the sea because of him. He had to keep it locked away from them.

  ‘Pull him up.’

  It was a man’s voice. A moment’s pause, then Reece’s head was wrenched back by his hair and a rag torn away from his face. He spewed cold water over himself. He tried to open his eyes, but the moment he did so a glare of intense light burned his irises and he shut them tightly again. He felt himself thrown into a chair and straps wrapping around his wrists and ankles.

  He shook his head, willing his eyes to open. Splinter by splinter, his eyelids lifted. The light was ferocious, but after a few seconds his vision adjusted and he could make out two arc bulbs shining straight into him. Silhouetted against them were dark faces. Then the silhouettes pulled away and all that was left was the white glare. He tried to put his hand up to block it out, but it wouldn’t move.