Code Name Hélène

by Ariel Lawhon

  At some point, late in the evening, after nursing a glass of single-malt scotch, Garrow lays his head against the window and drifts off to sleep. He looks like himself again. He’s gained weight and the whites of his eyes are no longer yellow. His ribs aren’t showing. The bruises are gone. But something is different. It can’t be seen or even named, but no one can endure what he did and not come out changed on the other side. Will this happen to me as well? I wonder. I am trying to identify what this thing is so I will know it when I see it in the mirror, when John Farmer speaks.

  “You were the one who got him out of Mauzac, weren’t you?”

  He has been watching and listening this entire time, putting two and two together.

  “How did you hear about that?” I ask.

  “Everyone has heard about the woman who broke Garrow out of a concentration camp. You’re a legend.”

  “No. I’m not.”

  Farmer’s words make me uncomfortable. I didn’t do any of it alone. Henri gave me the money. O’Leary and Françoise did their part. The operation cost each of us dearly. The idea that it’s now some story told around campfires during SOE training rankles me. I turn away from him and close my eyes. Count my losses. Try to ignore every savage emotion that presses in on me.

  * * *

  —

  The estate where we conduct the next phase of our training looks like something out of a painting. It sits right at the edge of Loch Nevis on Inverie Bay. Above it are hills covered in gray heather and, beyond them, snowcapped mountains. The house is built of startling white stone and has ten chimneys that rise above the roofline, smoke curling from the tips. All the lights are on and it glows with a deep, golden warmth. It looks like the very place one would want to spend Christmas. We tromp up the front steps after midnight and are shuffled off to sleep, each in our own bedroom.

  * * *

  Henri

  FORT SAINT-NICOLAS, MARSEILLE

  October 16, 1943

  Henri has lost all track of time. It was easy, at first, to keep the days straight. But when they began regularly interrogating him, the pain took over and his mind…shifted. It’s a protective measure, he thinks. A way to survive. Seconds. Minutes. Hours. Days. Weeks. Months. They’re one and the same to a mind that is trying not to break. He has not seen the sun since the day he was taken to the bank. Great lengths of time go by before he sees Marceline or Paquet. His cuts and bruises heal. His hair and beard grow longer. But other times they are in and out of his cell on a near-constant basis. Asking questions. Demanding information. Knocking him around. He says as little as he can. He breathes through the punches. Counts backward silently as the kicks land. Paquet used his baton during one of these interrogations, but Marceline stopped him after the first excruciating blow to his head.

  “We still need him,” she said.

  Henri lay there, afterward, blood trickling from the cut in his temple, and prayed for an infection. He knows it’s possible under these conditions. The filth. The hunger. Pain and fever and unconsciousness. But he isn’t so lucky. The wound oozed, then scabbed, and now there is a puckered, pink scar near his left eyebrow.

  So, yes, he’s been here for months. How many? That is a question he cannot answer. Unlike the others, which he chooses not to answer.

  “Where is your wife?”

  “Who are her accomplices?”

  “What cities did she travel to?”

  “Who funded her operation?”

  “Who supplied her with travel documents?”

  “When did she begin her treasonous activity?”

  “What is the extent of your involvement?”

  On and on and on they go. Sometimes Paquet brings a chair into his cell and sits while Marceline barks out questions. But usually it is her sitting there, smoking a cigarette, looking at him as though she cannot understand his choice. Nancy over her. It always comes back to this. That single question burns in her eyes continually. How could he choose a foreigner? An Australienne?

  Henri thinks that the season has changed again. The stone walls have grown colder recently. By a few degrees only, but it is enough to make him shiver as he sleeps. It is enough to heighten his sense of misery. He is awake when he hears footsteps approaching his cell again.

  Low voices.

  A key turning in the lock.

  The groan of rusted hinges as the door swings outward.

  He stares at his bare feet. Marvels at how long his toenails have grown. How dirty they are. He decides this will be what he focuses on through whatever comes next.

  A gasp. “Henri.”

  He is expecting her voice. Or maybe Paquet’s. But not his father’s.

  His head snaps up.

  “Papa?”

  Henri tries to get to his feet, but he is weak. He is hungry. One arm is still chained to the wall. And his legs give out. He slides back down the rough stone and lands on the floor with a thump.

  Ranier Fiocca has never been a tender man. Proud. Exacting. Arrogant. Stubborn. Impatient. Determined. So many things that make an excellent businessman and so few that make a good family man. And yet, they have always had each other. They are family—even if an odd one.

  His father turns on Marceline. “What have you done to my son?” he demands.

  “He has done this to himself.”

  “Chained himself to a wall? Stripped himself? Beaten himself?”

  No, not a tender man at all, Henri thinks. But he can stoke a rage like few people he has ever known. It is a pity his father and his wife never got along. Had they ever found themselves on the same side of a cause, they would have made a terrifying partnership.

  “Your son didn’t just conspire with a known traitor”—she looks at him as though to suggest he could have prevented this—“he married her. He funded her operations. And now he is hiding her.”

  Henri has never seen his father cry. Never seen his face twist with anguish or his fists pound his thighs in fury.

  “I knew it!” he hisses. “I knew that woman would ruin you. Look what she has done.”

  “Noncee did not do this to me, Papa.” He lifts his free hand and points at Marceline. “She did.”

  “Non! That woman trapped you. Seduced you. Addled your mind. Spent your fortune to support her treachery. And now she has abandoned you!”

  Henri watches as Marceline stands beside his father and sets a comforting hand on his shoulder. Watches those wicked, snakelike fingers spread across his shirt.

  “All we need is her whereabouts,” she says. “And then we can release Henri. It isn’t hard. But he refuses.”

  Her voice is dripping with deceit, but his father hears only what he wants. He cannot see through the fake mask of concern.

  “Henri, please.” Ranier Fiocca moves forward and drops to his knees before his son. Grabs Henri’s good hand and pulls it to his face. Kisses the knuckles. “I had to beg and bribe my way in here. I had to plead with them so I could see you. Please. Please. It isn’t too late. That woman does not deserve you. Tell them where she has gone and they will release you.”

  Henri doesn’t want to spend another moment in this cell. He doesn’t want to shield himself from one more punch or kick or whip. He wants a warm bed and a hot meal and the comfort of his wife’s body. He wants to taste her kiss and hear her laughter and be free of this place forever. Henri Fiocca has no idea if those things are possible. He has no idea how this war will end. But he is absolutely certain of three things: his wife is the bravest person he has ever known, his father is a fool, and Marceline is a liar.

  Henri pulls his hand away. “Non.”

  “Son! Don’t do this! Don’t throw your life away for that woman.”

  “She has a name, Papa. Noncee. She is my wife and I love her. Go now. Leave me alone.”

 
It pains him to wound his father in this way. So he does not watch Marceline lead him from the cell. He spares himself the knowledge of whatever expression is etched on his father’s face. The door bangs shut. The key turns. The footsteps retreat.

  Then Henri Edmond Fiocca begins to weep.

  * * *

  *

  When the door is opened again Henri startles awake from the first deep sleep he has had in weeks. The grief of seeing his father, of sending him away, pulled him deep beneath that fold and he is grateful for the rest.

  Marceline and Paquet enter his cell. Paquet kicks the sole of Henri’s bare foot with his boot. The pain evaporates all tendrils of drowsiness that were swirling around in his mind.

  Henri gasps and pulls his feet under him.

  “That was a very stupid decision,” Paquet says. “But I will give you one more chance. Where is la Souris Blanche? Where is your wife?”

  When Henri speaks a moment later, it is the absolute truth. “I do not know.”

  Marceline looks at Paquet.

  He nods.

  She crosses the small cell and squats beside Henri. She rocks back on her heels and once again looks at him with disappointment. She pushes a lock of hair away from his eyes. “It is clear we will get nothing from you. You have made up your mind. And we have made up ours.”

  “What are you going do?”

  “The job that I have been given.”

  “You are going to kill me?”

  “That is only a task,” she says. “A thing that must be done before I can go to bed. But my job—my real job—is to find your wife and kill her. Be assured that I will not fail.”

  Henri is startled by the growl that rises in his throat.

  Marceline sets one finger against his lips. “She isn’t worth it, you know. Any of this. Not your loyalty. Your fortune. Your love. Her cause will be destroyed. Her name will be forgotten.”

  “Not by me.”

  “Alas, you are not enough to keep her memory alive.”

  Marceline reaches her hand into her pocket and pulls out the key to his manacle. Two swift turns and she has released him. She grabs him beneath one arm and Paquet takes the other. They drag him from the cell and dump him in the hallway.

  Henri does his best to push himself onto his hands and knees, but one arm is numb and the other hand healed badly from the break, so he collapses, twice, before pushing up onto his knees and then to his feet. He wobbles, but he remains standing.

  “Kneel,” Marceline says.

  “Non.”

  Paquet punches Henri in the small of his back and he collapses, knees hitting the hard, stone floor, pain exploding through his field of vision in the form of a thousand little white lights. He groans. Bites his tongue. Tastes blood.

  Henri looks up at Marceline. She holds out her hand, palm up. Paquet pulls a pistol from the holster at his waist. He hands it to her dispassionately and she takes it without comment. But Henri sees her swallow. He sees her hesitate, before wrapping her fingers around the handle. This is harder for her than she wants it to be.

  Henri closes his eyes. He thinks of Nancy’s face. He summons the memory of her laughter. The curve of her lips. That one perfect dimple. He thinks of how she plays with his earlobe when they kiss. The taste of her tongue. Henri summons courage from her memory. He cannot stand, but he straightens his back. He clenches his jaw. And he drowns out the sound of the hammer being drawn back on Paquet’s pistol with a single word.

  “Noncee,” he says.

  * * *

  INVERIE BAY

  October 16, 1943

  I wake with a scream lodged so deep in my throat that I begin to gag. I am thrashing in the dark. Kicking at my blankets. Clawing the air in front of my face. Something has gone terribly wrong. It’s as though an elephant is sitting on my chest. As though there are snakes beneath my skin. As though my soul is being ripped in half.

  A nightmare.

  A nightmare.

  It’s only a nightmare.

  It’s slipping away from me and I remember nothing but shadows and warnings. Something malevolent. I gasp for air. My satin nightgown is glued to my breasts, belly, and thighs with a thin film of sweat. I sit up. Leave my room. Walk trembling, down the hall, to the bathroom and peel off my nightgown. Toss it on the floor and step into the shower. I stand beneath the lukewarm spray, my senses slowly returning to me. I am in Scotland. I am alive. Nothing is wrong.

  Over and over I repeat this to myself. I repeat it until I believe it. Until I am no longer shaking from that strange, foreboding dream. I repeat it until the water runs cold and I am shivering. I turn off the tap and stand in the shower, dripping. I steady my breath. I watch the water trickle down my skin and run into the drain. I let the sound of a leaky faucet erase the sound of my racing heart.

  I pull a towel from the hook on the bathroom door, wrap it around my damp skin, and go back to bed. I lie there in the dark, eyelids growing heavier, and I mutter the incantation that always brings me peace.

  “Henri. Edmond. Fiocca.”

  A long, calming breath through my nose.

  “Henri. Edmond. Fi…”

  Breathing. Fading. Darkness.

  “Henri. Edmmmffff…Henr…Hen….”

  And the great mercy of an unknowing sleep falls heavy on me once more.

  Madame Andrée

  MARSEILLE, FRANCE

  September 1, 1944

  I weep into Antoine’s chest, gasping for air, trying to push away even as his arms are locked around me in a rib-crushing vise.

  “I am so sorry, I am so sorry,” he whispers, over and over again. “I could not help him. I tried everything. Begging. Bribes. Not even Françoise could get me into that prison. Paquet gave his orders and no one dared to cross him.”

  “Paquet?”

  I feel Antoine’s head nod beside mine.

  “I was chasing devils everywhere else. How could I have missed the one living right beside me?”

  “It’s not your fault,” he says. “Don’t you dare blame yourself.”

  After a while my tears slow and my breath comes in hitches. “Where is he now?”

  “Somewhere in Marseille. I do not know. Many of the Vichy officers have gone into hiding since the Germans retreated. They fear reciprocation for what they did to French citizens.”

  We stand in the far corner of the bar, in the very place where Henri and I sat one afternoon, listening to France and England declare war. My friends form a loose circle around us, daring anyone to intrude.

  Now that I am no longer thrashing against him, Antoine’s arms loosen, and I step away. “Would you do me a favor?” I ask.

  “Anything.”

  “See that my friends get a room and a change of clothes.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Home.” I shrug, then begin to cry once more. “But I will be back tomorrow.”

  I take a step toward the door, but Denis steps in front of me. “Wait,” he says.

  “What?” I gasp, voice raw, eyes overflowing.

  “I am so sorry, Duckie.” He pulls me into his arms and lets me soak his shirt with my tears.

  * * *

  —

  My friends do not know how to let me go. But I need to do this alone. So I return to the flat that I shared with Henri. The keys he sent in my trunk still work, but our home has been ransacked. Every valuable item stolen. My stockpiles of food, cigarettes, and liquor confiscated. The furniture broken. Dust and cobwebs everywhere. There is no sign of Picon. I know Henri is not here, has not been here for a very long time, but I search for him anyway. Opening cupboards and doors. Looking in closets. Smelling his clothes, desperately searching for the faintest trace of his scent. But I find nothing.

  I walk into our o
ld bedroom, crawl into the bed that I once shared with my husband, and scream into the pillow for so long that my throat becomes raw and I can taste blood in my mouth. I pound my fists against the mattress. I weep and curse, allowing myself to break, finally and completely, into a thousand jagged pieces. Then I cry harder, grinding those pieces into dust.

  * * *

  —

  I’m not sure if it is sleep that finds me. Or some other all-consuming thing. But I wake, late the next morning, my emotions no longer reckless and violent. My mind feels very still. And though I dread it, I know what to do.

  There are still a few items of clothing in the closet and thrown about on the floor. They are dusty and wrinkled but in far better condition than what I’m wearing. I turn on the shower and wait until the water is no longer rusty. It never gets warm but I’ve long since given up being picky about things like that. I scrub my body in a way that I have not been able to do since the public baths in Chaudes-Aigues. I get dressed in a black pencil skirt and the green cashmere sweater that Henri loved so much. They are at least two sizes too big now, and I have to dig through the remnants of our closet for a belt.

  I look in the mirror. My hair has grown past my shoulders. There are fine lines and circles around my eyes. I am the same but different, and I greet this new reflection with a nod of acceptance. There is metal in my spine and there are fractures in my soul. I resemble Garrow now. I have been changed by war.

  I comb my hair and dig through the medicine cabinet until I find a tube of mascara that hasn’t gone completely dry. A bit of blush. Powder. And then I pick through my purse and pull out the tube of red lipstick. With a shaking, unsteady hand I apply my armor.