by Ariel Lawhon
Hubert helps me to my feet, then gives me a look that makes me wish I was still bedridden. “He is…unwelcome.”
“Colonel Pierre Segal,” the man says the moment he’s in front of me. He looks me over and is clearly unimpressed. “And you must be the infamous Madame Andrée.”
“I am.”
“Excellent. I have come to take over this group and run it on correct military terms. Every person in this camp now reports to me.”
I swallow my first response, take one breath through my nose, and ask, “On whose orders?”
“Charles de Gaulle.”
The uniform looks right. Khaki pants and jacket. Knee-high boots. Belt. Narrow cap. He has all the right bars, medals, and insignia. But this story is doubtful. The commander of the French military is in London right now, separated from the front by hundreds of kilometers and a large body of water, and I know for a fact that the SOE does not share details of their covert operations with de Gaulle’s Free French forces. Besides, this man couldn’t have angered me more if he said he was sent to take command directly by Satan himself. I am still furious with de Gaulle’s men for turning me away in London.
“I do not answer to Charles de Gaulle,” I tell him, then turn to Hubert with a question in my eyes.
“He arrived while you were gone,” he says.
“This man has been in our camp for four days and no one thought to tell me?”
“You were in no condition.”
Colonel Segal steps between us and sticks a finger in my face. “I am in charge. You will address all questions to me.”
I am distracted by Hubert, who curses, violently, under his breath, then mutters something about a death wish.
“Get your finger out of my face.”
He doesn’t.
I hear the click of a hammer being drawn back. Just like that Hubert has leveled his service revolver against Segal’s temple. “Madame Andrée gave you an order. And in this camp, her orders are followed without hesitation.”
Slowly, that hand falls away. The expression on his face is one of undiluted rage. Hubert pulls his gun away but does not put it into his holster.
“Now,” I say, palm out. “Let me see your papers.”
Segal hands them to me and I thumb through them, indifferent. “This tells me nothing.”
“It tells you I am a colonel in the French army!”
“Perhaps you are. I neither know nor care. These could be fake.”
“They most certainly are not!”
“Well, mine are.” I point to Hubert. “So are his. And everyone else’s for that matter. There isn’t a soul within one hundred kilometers who has authentic papers. I could shit a pile of papers onto your boot and not a damn one of them would mean anything.”
The man is horrified. “You have no idea—”
“Here is what I know. A blind man could tell that victory is within sight. We have the Germans trapped at Normandy. And now every blowhard in France wants to jump on the bandwagon and play politics. To be the hero. To lead the final charge. I am not impressed by your speech, Colonel. I will not fund you or provide arms to you or anyone in your command. I answer to London only. Not de Gaulle. And certainly not you. Now get out of my camp.”
What Buckmaster cannot understand, from his high command on Baker Street, is that, very quickly, the ground war in France has turned political. The Resistance itself has splintered into factions. Those on the right and those on the left. Devoted Communists. Politicians. Ousted government officials looking to make a comeback. Those disillusioned with Vichy. Those who oppose the Milice. Former army. Current army. The thing is, we will never accomplish what we’ve come here to do if we get drawn into that nonsense. I leave Colonel Segal—if that’s who he really is—slack-jawed beside my tent.
Hubert walks after me as I limp away but doesn’t speak until we are out of earshot. “Gaspard has already sworn him allegiance. Has already fallen in line.”
“Then it will be Gaspard’s responsibility to remove him. Besides, we’ve both seen how easily he can be fooled. A forged message did the trick last time.” Now that my indignation is dying down, my energy is going with it. Hubert has to catch me as I stumble. “Segal’s arrival does give us an opportunity, however.”
“To do what?”
“The very thing you suggested before we left the plateau. To get away from this camp. There’s no telling who will show up next, trying to take credit or order us around. No telling when the Germans will strike again.”
* * *
—
Our exit plan is simple. Hubert and I convene with Denis Rake, Anselm, Jacques, and Fournier to explain that I will code a message for London asking for the massive weapons shipment we were supposed to receive before our retreat from Chaudes-Aigues. Once delivered, Fournier will be responsible for distributing all arms, supplies, and payments. Gaspard and his men are not to receive a single bullet or franc while Colonel Segal remains in camp. Once Segal has been dismissed, and the weapons distributed, the two groups are to separate and spread their men into smaller groups.
“Jacques and Louis will come with us,” I tell him. “Along with the other eighty men we have trained.”
“And where will you go?” Fournier asks. I can tell that he is both proud of this new responsibility and sad to see us leave.
I glance at Hubert and he nods. “North, near Montluçon, to join Tardivat and his men.”
It does not escape my attention that Denis perks up at this bit of information, and I feel a pang of guilt for knowing about Alex but not having told him yet. Now is not the time.
Everything I tell these men is true. But I leave out the fact that I have a secondary motivation in wanting to move north. The Nazi garrison at Montluçon has long gone unchecked. Wolff has unleashed hell around the garrison without consequence. And of all the Resistance groups that I have met, Tardivat’s is the one most eager to go on the offensive. Ever since I cycled through Bourges, a plan has been germinating in my mind. And I will need Tardivat’s help to pull it off.
Anselm clears his throat. “It was hard enough to get you to Châteauroux by bicycle all by yourself. How do you mean to move eighty men north without detection?”
“I never said it would be easy,” I tell him. “And we have one advantage now that we did not have then.”
“Which is?”
“Time.”
Fournier is the first to realize my mind is set. “When will you leave?”
“Once we’ve received your shipment.”
We are discussing the specifics of that shipment—adding only the heavy machinery we were forced to leave behind—when Louis jogs toward us, waving his hands.
He comes to where I am sitting on a log and drops to one knee to give his report. “We have a problem, Madame Andrée.”
Great. “What is it?”
“We have found three women being hidden in one of Gaspard’s groups.” He blushes, and I don’t have to ask what they are being used for.
“That is a problem.”
“No. It’s worse than that, actually. I’ve been told they are all German spies.”
Everyone is looking at me, gauging my response. I was never violent before the war—had never harmed so much as a spider. Something has shifted in me, however. It is deep and primal and fearful. I am no longer afraid to use my own hands to render justice. I am no longer afraid. My capacity for hate has also grown. It is deep and virulent toward the Germans and all who serve them. I am no longer a nice person. But I do not lose sleep over it. So my decision is simple.
“Bring them to me.”
* * *
—
The women are gaunt. Filthy. Bruised. Two of them can’t be older than twenty and they have the haunted look of women who have been broken by sexual violation. I can tell little about the third becaus
e she will not meet my eyes.
“Where did you find them?” I ask Louis.
“With Judex’s group. I went to find Gaspard as you instructed. He wasn’t there so I went to Judex. He was gone as well but that’s when I heard one of the women crying. No one will admit to capturing them.”
“How long have they been in camp?”
“Two days. Maybe three. They won’t say much.”
I look at the poor girls; two are huddling on the ground, crying. They’re cold. Faces buried in their knees. Who can blame them? The third sits apart, head down, perfectly still. She says nothing. Looks at no one.
“I will speak to them privately,” I tell Louis.
The first girl is nineteen. Her name is Cécile and she sits on the floor of my tent, folded in on herself. She was captured in a field near Aurillac. She had gone out to scavenge for strawberries as some of Judex’s men surveilled the area. Her father is dead, her mother ill, and she helps care for her younger brother. She does not know a word of German and cannot find Berlin on a map. Cécile throws herself on my neck, weeping with gratitude when I tell her she can go home.
“If you will wait a moment,” I say, “Louis will take you to your mother.”
The second girl is older than she looks. Her name is Floria and she is twenty-five. They captured her the same day as the first, on the road as she walked home from market. They took what she’d bought—a loaf of bread, four apples, and a dozen eggs—and ate it before they raped her. She speaks calmly, unafraid of me, and my entire body seizes with rage as I hear her story. I am not foolish enough to think that I will be treated any differently if the Germans capture me. Never would I receive the same courtesy that I am offering these women. But I will not condone torture or brutality from anyone who serves under me.
“How many men were involved in this? How many did this to you and the others?”
She lifts one hand and wiggles her fingers. Five.
“Louis!” She jumps when I shout his name.
He sticks his head through the tent flaps a moment later. “Oui, Madame Andrée?”
“Is Hubert still here?”
“Oui.”
“Good. I need him.”
I lead Floria from the tent and return her to Cécile’s side. They huddle together again, shaking, but no longer crying. The third woman has turned her back to my tent. I circle around to study her profile. The set of her jaw. An uncomfortable suspicion begins to bloom in my mind.
“Five men in Judex’s group did this,” I tell Hubert as he approaches my tent. “I need you to take them back to his camp so they can identify their assailants. The girls you will send home with Louis. The men you will bring to me.”
His face is set like stone. “What will you do with them?”
“Have them shot.”
“Good.” He tips his head to the third woman. “And what of that one?”
I look at the back of her head, the chin-length blond hair. Her neck is long and her shoulders thin. My suspicion grows stronger but there is only one way to know for sure.
“Marceline?” I ask.
She turns.
* * *
—
Gaspard and Judex are livid when they reach my tent.
“Where are my men?” Judex demands.
“Hubert is bringing them here.”
“You will release them immediately,” he says.
“No. I will not. Your men have committed war crimes. And they will pay with their lives.”
Gaspard pushes between us and I have to breathe through my mouth so as not to smell the odor drifting from his body. If he’s bathed at any point in the last month, I certainly can’t tell.
“You mean to shoot French patriots in their own camp!”
“I mean to execute men who have kidnapped and raped innocent women in the name of patriotism.”
“The Nazis would do worse to you,” Gaspard spits.
“Yes. They would. And we must not become like the Nazis. A firing squad is far more merciful than getting sodomized with a red-hot poker, don’t you think?”
I do not believe Gaspard or Judex is sorry for what they did to Roger le Neveu, but at least they do not try to defend themselves.
“Judex answers to you,” I tell Gaspard. “And the men who did this answer to him. So Judex will participate in the firing squad or I will no longer arm you or any of the men who report to you. It is as simple as that. I could not stop your barbarism at Mont Mouchet. But I can stop it here. An example must be set.”
* * *
—
“Three of them deserted,” Hubert tells me. “They ran the moment Louis discovered the girls. But the other two were drunk. They’d shared a bottle of brandy…afterward…and fell asleep.”
“Where are they?”
He points to a copse of trees not far away, where two French soldiers sit, bound at the hands and feet. The degree of their trouble has only just now dawned on them and they are sobering quickly. Good. I would like them well and truly terrified before they face justice.
“How do you know they are the ones?” I ask.
“They didn’t deny it. Said the girls were lying German prostitutes and they deserved what they’d gotten.”
“They’d have to believe that to justify what they did. And the girls? Did they accuse anyone else?”
He shakes his head. “I sent them on with Louis. But he asked that you wait until he gets back. He wants to see justice done.”
War is a calamity. It brings sorrow and loss of life. It hardens the human soul. When else does one rejoice in an execution? I am sorry for Louis, that this is who he has become. And I am sorry for myself that I have lived to see such a good young man lose a part of his soul to vengeance.
“We can wait,” I say. “And besides, we’ll need him. If we’re to do this according to the book, we’ll need seven for the firing squad.”
Hubert looks at me and I think that he’s aged a decade in six months. I don’t remember all those lines on his face or the gray at his temples. Is that what I’ll see when I finally see a mirror again? A middle-aged woman who has seen too much? After a moment Hubert’s gaze drifts to Marceline and where she sits outside my tent, hands and feet tied together. She stares at us. Cold and stubborn. Hateful.
“Are you going to tell me how you know that woman?” he asks.
“We were acquainted in Marseille.” Hubert knows little of my personal history, so this is new information to him. “She loved my husband once, I think. If she’s capable of love. But she has always hated me.”
“So that’s why she’s glaring at you. How on earth did she come to be here?”
“I don’t know.”
“You haven’t questioned her yet?”
“I was waiting until you got back.”
“What on earth for?” he asks.
“If my suspicions are correct, I want to have a witness.”
“Why?”
I look at him and I wonder what he sees on my face when I say, “So that I can never be accused of war crimes myself.”
* * *
—
I squat beside Marceline and point at the copse of trees where Judex’s men await execution. “Did either of those men bring you to camp?”
“Non.” There is no less acid in her voice than there was the last time we spoke.
“How did you get here, then?”
“On foot.”
“You can make this difficult if you like. But sooner or later I will find out why you are here.”
She looks up at me. Twists her mouth in a viper’s grin. “I came here to find you.”
“And why would you want to do that?”
There is no joy in her laughter. “Everyone wants to find la Souris Blanche. There is a five-million-franc price on your head
, after all.”
Hubert shifts his weight. Only I know that is a sign of discomfort. All talk of the White Mouse makes him uneasy.
“How did you find me?”
“A group of Maquis led by a woman matching your description retreats from Chaudes-Aigues? Then days later thousands of Maquis begin to mass near Fridefont?” She shakes her head. “You really should be more careful. We have eyes and ears everywhere.”
“You are working with the Germans?” I ask.
“Vichy.” Her spine is straight, and her jaw jutted as she says this. Marceline is proud.
“And Vichy is loyal to Germany.”
She shrugs, indifferent. “They are a means to an end. A way to purge this country of those who don’t belong. If I can help them find the vermin at the top of their most-wanted list, then so be it.”
“Who sent you here?”
“My boss.”
I look at her, so proud and defiant. I am baffled as to why this woman would be in this place. Why an irritant from my past would show up in a Maquis camp hundreds of kilometers from Marseille. I rock back on my heels and study her, trying to remember anything I may have missed from our past interactions. Some clue. A line that would connect these dots.
Marceline is dirty and haggard, wearing a plain dress and loafers with no socks. The top button on her dress is missing and the collar lies askew against her prominent clavicles. The last time I saw her she was wearing a delicate gold necklace with an H pendant, but her throat is bare now. Something in my mind starts to whir, like a gear trying to slide into place. I close my eyes and summon the details of that awful night with Marceline and Henri’s father. She was brazen and arrogant. Intentionally provocative. Possessive of Henri. Friends with his father. A secretary of some sort. A secretary…
The pieces click into place. Marceline told me she worked for a man named Albert Paquet. Then Henri’s father boasted that he was the commissioner of police. And in my fury, I did not give it a second thought. I had other concerns that night, and I have not seen her since. Paquet never once mentioned Marceline in our conversations, so this detail was lost to a dusty pocket of my memory. Until now.