The Little Parachute

by J. Robert Janes

  She would offer only so much, felt Angélique, and this one would only demand more, but all he said, and it was a surprise, was, ‘Which of these do you love the most?’

  He wouldn’t break any of them, and she knew this, for Herr Dirksen wasn’t like the Sturmbannführer Kraus. ‘I love all of them, Colonel, each for itself and equally.’

  He even smiled as he said, ‘A good answer, spoken truly. I’d have said the same.’

  ‘But I’m the one who’s under arrest.’

  Holding up a cautionary finger, he said, ‘Not under arrest. Under a request for assistance, that’s all and a great difference. You convinced the boy’s father to leave?’

  She tried to look away and finally succeeded. ‘The Messerschmitts had come over the route nationale south from Paris twice by then. The car had been all shot up, our suitcases, everything. But on the third pass, Martin became separated from us. Anthony started back towards the road but those ME-109s were like angry wasps, dark when looked at into the sun. I …’

  ‘Please continue,’ said Dirksen gently. ‘I know how difficult it must be, but it’s necessary.’

  How could anyone else really know what those few moments had been like, the anger that had erupted so swiftly between two who had loved each other so thoroughly, the harsh and unkind words? ‘I … I told him he had to leave and head back to the coast and that yacht of his as fast as possible, but Anthony was terrified he’d lose Martin, that the boy would be killed. He blamed himself, you see? Me, I slapped him hard, trying to put reason into him. Once, twice, three times. We were both terrified but those ME-109s weren’t going to leave that road alone and when they started firing at us again, he realized that it was no use his trying to get Martin and me out of France, that alone, he might have a chance. You see, he knew too much they would want from him in Berlin. Hesitating still, he searched the road desperately for a glimpse of Martin. He even cried out that name several times and me, I can still hear the despair that was in him, but … Ah, he knew that what I had just said was only too true and that he really had no choice but to leave us.’

  ‘Did he curse you?’

  ‘Is that so bad? He said it was all my fault too, but he didn’t mean it. How could he have? In the chaos of those few moments, neither of us were ourselves. Even I had peed myself.’

  He’d give her a moment, felt Dirksen. The flacons were beautiful and they did seem to have a calming effect on her. ‘You were out in a farmer’s field, I gather, but could he have returned to that road?’

  ‘Did he change his mind, is this what you’re asking?’

  ‘You know it is.’

  ‘Then I must tell you, Colonel, that he didn’t, that for the past three years I have believed absolutely that he had made it and was safe in England. Oh for sure, he’d have taken some with him on that yacht of his, but they’d have got away, since the Messerschmitts, the Stukas and such were busy elsewhere tormenting the defenceless like myself and Martin, but I didn’t find him until their fifth pass. By then Martin had run far along the road in terror, poor thing, and was lying face down beneath the man who had tried to shield him and had taken the cannon shells instead.’

  ‘His father … Was it his father?’

  ‘His what? But why do you ask such a thing? It was just some man whose heart instinctively included a small boy in tears who cried out for his father. In all that distance, I saw no sign of Anthony. None, I tell you. I looked. Believe me, I did, while searching for Martin and cursing myself for what I had done. “Killed” my lover’s son.’

  ‘But at La Vagengende last night you said his father might have died?’

  ‘That was a mistake. I … I didn’t mean to say that. Oh for sure I did think at first that Anthony might have gone back to that road—there, will that help you? But I didn’t find him, did I? Martin’s just being impossible. He misses his father terribly, and yes, he can’t ever bring himself to believe Anthony would have left him, but …’ She shrugged. ‘It’s true. He did.’

  ‘Then the boy believed last night that his father had been living in that flat for the past three years, and that is why he went there?’

  ‘It was logical, wasn’t it? Martin hadn’t been long in Paris. When he ran from us where else was he to have gone if not to that house?’

  ‘The streets were in total darkness.’

  ‘He must have remembered the way. Anthony and he … they went for a walk that first day and … and must have passed that restaurant.’

  And the boy had remembered after a good three years. ‘Martin fell and hurt himself last night. A sergeant tried to assist, and the boy lost that pencil again, but fortunately a report was made and we were alerted to the direction he had taken. I’ve the pencil, too.’

  The woman couldn’t stop herself from looking at it with loathing. No doubt she was cursing the mayor of Abbeville, the doctor and all the others. Thiessen, too? he wondered, but with that one there was a problem, for in her description of their last moments together on that road, she had indicated a weakness in the boy’s father, whereas Thiessen, if he was what they now thought he could well be, had given the impression of nothing but the reverse.

  Carefully Dirksen folded the chemise and set it aside with a finality she couldn’t help but notice. ‘You know what this means, don’t you? he asked.

  Tears came, her lips parting, she to pause while she thought nothing but the worst, only to blurt, ‘Please don’t separate us, Colonel. He’s only a little boy.’

  ‘But he’s British.’

  ‘And you’re going to lock him up in an internment camp? Not the one at Saint-Denis. That’s for adult British men who had been living in France when … when it was taken.’

  ‘Poland, I’m afraid. That is what my superiors in Berlin have ordered.’

  ‘One of those camps, those terrible places you people have for Jews, Communists, gypsies and résistants?’

  Far too many had now heard at least rumours of those, which wasn’t good, of course, but … ‘He knows too much. Look, I’m sorry, Mademoiselle Bellecour, but Berlin are insisting he be taken from you.’

  ‘But … but he can’t speak. He still has terrible nightmares and even wets the bed at times. Me, I’m all he has, Colonel. Without me …’

  In despair, she wrung her hands, was sickened by the thought, and said at last, ‘Send me with him, then. At least do that. Have a bit of conscience.’

  ‘That’s just not possible,’ he said, handing the chemise to her so that she could dry her eyes and blow her nose. ‘It’s the Sturmbannführer Kraus and the avenue Foch for you and a full interrogation. Berlin won’t have less. I’d lose my job if I interfered.’

  Kraus, ah no.

  But was she ready now to cooperate? wondered Dirksen. Things like this were often so delicate. ‘It’s time, isn’t it?’

  Apprehensively Angélique waited for him to ask what he now wanted of her.

  ‘What was your lover’s name?’

  ‘Anthony James Thomas.’ It seemed so strange to be saying it aloud and to the enemy. Quickly he wrote it down in his little black notebook, she staring at the thing he was using to write with. That thing …

  Dirksen took apart the mayor’s pencil, and to show her how simple it had been, tightly rolled up a cigarette paper and slid it into the barrel. ‘We know you and the boy were unaware of this, but you did carry a message for the terrorists. It’s my considered understanding that early this evening Dr. Vergès made contact with someone who passed it on to someone else, each of whom will have been followed, and each of whom will be arrested just as soon as their usefulness ends.’

  Everyone at the meeting Isabelle Moncontre was arranging for tonight would have to be warned, thought Angélique. She couldn’t fail to do so, it was that urgent, but she’d have to bargain with him also, had no other choice. ‘What is it you wish of me in exchange for Martin’s life an
d our freedom?’

  Had she finally realized he was her only hope? ‘Good. That’s settled, and I appreciate your frankness. The boy will return the pencil. There’ll be no mention of anything here. One week from now you will return to Paris with another message from them.’

  There’d be no arrests until then—was this what he was saying? ‘And if monsieur le maire should ask us to do a little more?’

  ‘You’ll convey this to me, not to the Sturmbannführer Kraus.’

  Then the two of them didn’t trust each other—was this, too, what he was saying? ‘That man who died while we were at the avenue Foch must have been betrayed by someone in Abbeville, Colonel. If I should need to get a message to you in a hurry, would this same one be not only useful but most necessary?’

  ‘That’s not possible, but I’ll make sure our contact is aware of your new status. At the first sign of trouble, we’ll be alerted. If the terrorists move in on you, rest assured someone will come to the rescue.’

  How comforting. He’d seen right through her, but was this betrayer in Abbeville’s hôtel de ville and Kommandantur? How else could Herr Dirksen get such news so quickly?

  Ready to leave, she stood up to extend the hand of agreement, Dirksen noting the squared, proud shoulders, fiercely jutting, deeply clefted chin and those limpid grey eyes that had driven Anthony James Thomas to such a foolishness he would cross the English Channel in the hope of rescuing her. ‘Sit down. We’re not finished. I asked you to tell me about your former lover. Did he speak or write Deutsch?’

  So it was to begin again, was it? ‘Fluently? Well enough to pass as one of yourselves—is this what you’re asking?’

  ‘You know it is.’

  ‘Then yes. Better than his French, which was very good. Before the war his business interests took him to the Reich many times. He wasn’t a spy, so please don’t get the wrong idea. He designed yachts for prominent Nazis and his only worry was that they would neglect to pay him. Ah!’ She shrugged. ‘In that I guess he was absolutely correct.’

  ‘That sort of talk will only cause you harm. Was Cologne ever on his itinerary?’

  ‘Cologne … ? But why that city, please? Ah, you won’t tell me. Berlin have forbidden it. Kiel, then, and Lübeck and Hamburg and Bremerhaven—he had an interest in submarines, yes, of course, but was like a small boy with them. It was nothing. His one passion, apart from myself and Martin, was in designing yachts. Never have I known a man so possessed.’

  But he had known far too much, thought Dirksen, and she had admitted that she had tried to warn him to leave the country before it was too late. Smiling inwardly at her mistake, he knew she was full of surprises, and when he was finished with her, genuinely hoped there would be no more of them.

  Pulling out the photograph of Thiessen’s family, he set it before her. ‘Please take your time. Would Martin’s father have known this woman and her children?’

  Since he had travelled in the Reich so many times. Did this one forget anything she had said to him?

  ‘Well?’ he asked.

  And don’t keep me waiting, oh for sure, but she really was genuinely puzzled and would have to shrug. ‘It’s possible. Look, I really wouldn’t know. How could I? He met a lot of people I never knew. He did tell me about some of the parties, the weekends of sailing, but it was business, wasn’t it? And I knew his heart belonged to me and to Martin. What’s her name?’

  Had jealousy crept in even after three years of separation? ‘This we don’t yet know but a photo of this snapshot is on its way to the police in Marienburg, a suburb of Cologne. We’ll learn soon enough.’

  A suburb, but are she and the children dead from the firestorm, Colonel? Isn’t this what you’re wondering? Dead and how convenient, the real Theissen dead as well, Anthony having killed him and taken his identity?

  Secretly Martin watched the two women who guarded him. The youngest was filing her nails and blowing on them. Her legs were crossed. A lighted cigarette was nearby.

  The older one was straightening her stockings. Thinking that he had dozed off, she had hiked her grey skirt to fix a garter.

  He had to do it. Somehow he had to warn the Mademoiselle Isabelle that they had been arrested and that she mustn’t try to come here or send them a message.

  Bolting off the bed, Martin shot out the door. The Blitzmädchen shrieked and stumbled into each other. They were up and after him as he raced past the lift and headed for the main staircase and plummeted down it. Got to get away, he cried out silently. Can’t let them arrest her too. Can’t …

  Hitting the second-floor landing, he ducked under an arm, raced past a general and his lady friend, frantically punched the lift button and saw the arrow coming down. …

  The Blitzes were blocking the corridor. There was no time to wait for the lift. Tossing a glance behind, he tried to decide what to do as they ran at him. He raced away. The corridor soon ended. Ended!

  Throwing himself at them, Martin fought and bit and managed to get free. The lift had stopped. Its door was closing. …

  A hand reached out and yanked him in. Kneeling on the floor, the Mademoiselle Isabelle laughed until the tears ran as she kissed and hugged him. ‘Ah, mon Dieu, mon ami, that was close, eh? Merde, I thought you were never going to get away. I’ve been watching that room of yours for ages.’

  Fondly she passed a hand over his head and gave a little shudder of relief. ‘Here,’ she said, tucking a note into his pocket. ‘Make sure you and your mother memorize the address and the time, then burn it.’

  Again she embraced him. He touched her hair, her tears and then … then, yes, her lips.

  She kissed his cheeks, laughed and said, ‘I had to pay the lift operator a hundred francs to lose himself.’

  And when they reached the ground floor, Martin was dutifully waiting for his guards who slapped him hard and took him by the ear, she laughing at them and asking, as they crowded into the lift, ‘Was he being bad?,’ then slipping past them and out. But when they didn’t answer and only glared at her, she shrugged and remained watching the gate as it closed and the lift began to rise.

  ‘Bonne chance, mes souris grises,’ she sang out. ‘That one wants to fly, but with hens like you to guard him, I would as well!’

  The car was waiting for her in the pitch-darkness of the boulevard Saint-Michel near the hotel, and when Marie-Hélène got into it, she wanted Hans to hold her but he wouldn’t.

  Still thinking of Martin and what she had just done, she said bitterly, ‘I was followed this evening when I went to the Bois.’

  ‘Are you certain?’

  ‘I felt it, and for me that’s enough.’

  ‘Then you’d better tell me everything,’ he said with a sigh.

  Stung by his impatience, she turned from him to stare out into the darkness. ‘I think it was the one who got away from us in Lyon. I think he followed me all afternoon and I didn’t even notice.’

  ‘That’s impossible. Châlus was badly hit. There was a lot of blood in that traboule and on the staircase.’

  Those were the narrow, filthy, dark passageways that had led from house to house and street to street and she had hated them. ‘But he did escape, Hans, and none of the others would tell us where he was holed up.’

  There had been tears then and now as well, and he had to wonder if she really had been duped into thinking everything had been all right for her this afternoon. Her fists were clenched. She stamped a foot.

  ‘It was Châlus, Hans, the leader of the réseau Parrache! That bastard had reddish-brown hair and fair, sunburnt skin. He had a narrow chin and big ears that stuck out just like Martin’s do. His son! And now he’s using this whole Bois Carré business to put an end to me.’

  What the hell had upset her so much?

  ‘Raymond Châlus,’ she went on, and he could hear the anguish in her voice. ‘Age forty-two. Tall and lo
ose-limbed exactly like Martin Bellecour will be some day if we don’t stop these people. He even has that boy’s smile, but he’s a coldhearted killer, Hans, and he knows absolutely who was to blame for the loss of all his comrades.’

  Lyon, and the capture of sixty-two of that circuit, but that had been eight months ago and Châlus could just as easily have died from his wounds. ‘You’re worrying too much. Relax. It’s the strain. We’ll soon have all of them and then we can take a little holiday, you to travel through Switzerland to Berlin, myself direct.’

  The RAF were now bombing Berlin during the day as well as at night, and the USAAF, while already hitting lots of other targets, would soon concentrate on it too,* but she’d still have to ask, ‘And afterwards?’

  For now, he’d have to give her what she wanted. ‘We’ll plan your retirement.’

  And what of Kraus? she wanted so much to ask but couldn’t bring herself to. Not yet. ‘Everything has been put in place for tonight but me, I just hope it comes off okay, Hans, because if it doesn’t, there’ll have been trouble.’

  ‘Has Kraus been after you again?’

  ‘No. No, it’s nothing like that. Oh for sure, he desperately wants to be the one in charge of looking after the security of those sites, whatever they are, and yes, he believes he’s going to get that opportunity, especially if things don’t go according to plan tonight.’

  Kraus had definitely been after her again. ‘He feeds the Reichsführer Himmler telex after telex demanding arrests and will never learn the value of patience. Always the full orchestra has to be in place before the symphony begins.’

  And was she to be the contralto?

  When she felt his hand slide beneath her hair to cup the back of her neck, his weakness towards the threat of Kraus made her say, ‘Please don’t touch me. For now I’m alone and must remain so. Besides, if you want the truth, I think my heart has been taken by another.’

  A ten-year-old boy who couldn’t speak and would sign his name by adding a little parachute. Had the mothering instinct got to her?