Cold Harbour

by Jack Higgins

  'That's a terrible thing to say.' She turned to face him and he put his hands on her shoulders.

  'Listen to me, Genevieve Trevaunce. War, played the way people like Craig and I play it, is like going to Monaco for a weekend's gambling. What you have to remember is that the odds are always against you. The house wins - you lose.'

  She pulled away. 'I can't accept that.'

  But he ignored her now, looking beyond her, a frown on his face. She turned and saw a man in a lifejacket a few yards away, bouncing around in the surf. Hare ran past her and she followed, pausing at the water's edge as he went in waist deep, secured a grip on the life jacket and returned, towing the body behind him.

  'Is he dead?' she called.

  He nodded. 'Oh yes,' and pulled the corpse up on the beach.

  It was that of a young man in black overalls with the German eagle on his right breast. His feet were bare. He had fair hair and a thin beard and the eyes were closed as if in sleep. He looked remarkably peaceful. Hare searched the body and found a wallet, sodden with water. He took from it an identity card, wet so that it was already falling apart.

  He examined it and stood up. 'German seaman. Off a U-boat. Name of Altrogge. Twenty-three years of age.'

  A seagull swooped overhead, cried harshly and flew out to sea. The surf washed in. Genevieve said, 'Even here, in a place like this, the war touches everything.'

  'The house always wins, remember.' He put an arm around her. 'Come on - we'll go back and I'll arrange for some of my crew to bring him in.'

  ****

  The room Julie Legrande had given her was very pleasant.

  There was a four-poster bed, Chinese carpets on the floor and an excellent view of the garden at the rear of the house from the bow window.

  She stood there now, staring out, and Julie put an arm around her as Hare had done. 'You're sad, cherie?'

  'That boy on the beach. I can't get him out of my mind.' 'I know.' Julie went and turned down the bed. 'It's gone on too long, this war, but we have no choice. To you, he was just a boy, but to people like me…' She shrugged. 'If you could see what the Boche have done to my country. Believe me, the Nazis must be beaten. We have no choice.'

  The door opened and Craig Osbourne came in. 'Ah, there you are.'

  'You didn't bother to knock,' Genevieve said. 'Don't I get any privacy around here?'

  'Not really,' he said calmly. 'In effect we've got two full days so I thought I'd let you know what to expect.' He sat on the window ledge and lit a cigarette. 'Number one, from now on we only speak French. Just to get you back into the habit. That includes me.'

  He seemed different, a hard tough edge to him and she was annoyed. 'Are you sure you're up to it?'

  'Whether I am or not doesn't really matter, but you sure as hell better be,' he told her.

  Julie Legrande put a hand on her right shoulder and squeezed. Genevieve said in French, 'All right. Anything you say. What's next?'

  'As Munro pointed out, we've no intention of trying to make a professional out of you, there isn't time. There are three main tasks and we have two days to cover them. Number one - to familiarise you with the present situation at the Chateau, the staff, both French and German, and so on. This will involve some lengthy sessions with Rene and we've also got a lot of photographic material to show you.'

  'Then?'

  'You'll need to fully understand the purpose of your mission and its background so that you know not only what to look for, but what's relevant and what isn't.'

  'That sounds complicated.'

  'It won't be. I'll take care of it and Munro will help.'

  He started to get up. She said, 'You did say three main tasks, didn't you? You've only mentioned two.'

  'Quite right. The third is of a more practical nature. No need to worry about radio and communication because Rene and his Resistance chums will take care of that, but there are one or two things which could be important from a survival point of view. Can you shoot?' She stared up at him. 'Hand guns,' he said patiently. 'Have you ever fired a pistol?'

  'No.'

  'Don't worry. It's easy when you know how. You just make sure you're standing close enough and pull the trigger, but we'll go into that later.' He glanced at his watch. 'I'd better get moving. We'll start in the library at eight.'

  He went out. Julie made a face. 'It begins, cherie.'

  'So it would appear,' Genevieve said, turned and looked out of the window.

  SEVEN

  MUNRO SAT BY the library fire in a wing-back chair working his way through a sheaf of papers on his knee. The table in the centre was covered with maps, photos and an array of documents. Rene sat on one side smoking one of his small cigars, saying nothing, waiting until he was required. Craig and Genevieve sat together opposite him.

  Craig said, 'The most important thing to remember is that when you drive into that Chateau, you are Anne-Marie Trevaunce. On appearance alone everyone who knows you will accept that without hesitation. So much so that you should be able to get away with minor stupidities.'

  'Well, that's a comfort,' she said. 'I would point out by the way that my German is totally non-existent.'

  'That doesn't matter. All the staff officers speak French to a greater or lesser degree. Now, let's start with a few basic things that Anne-Marie would be familiar with. German uniforms, for instance.' He opened a book. 'The illustrations in here are quite good.'

  She flipped through a few pages. 'Goodness, do I have to learn all these?'

  'Just a few. The Kriegsmarine is simple and you've seen Joe Edge's Luftwaffe uniform which is quite different in style and colour from the Army. Blue-grey and yellow rank patches.'

  She stopped at one page, an illustration of a combat soldier in three-quarter length camouflage smock. 'What's he? Doesn't even look like a German. The helmet's all wrong,'

  'He's a Fallschirmjager- a paratrooper. They wear a special rimless steel helmet, but you don't need to bother about that. Most of the Army uniforms are just as you've seen them in the movies. Here's an important one.'

  He indicated a German soldier with a metal gorget suspended from his neck. 'Feldgendarmene,' she said, reading the caption.

  'Military police. The guy who stops your car on the road or stands guard at the Chateau gates. He might be Army, he could be SS, but that metal plate means police.'

  'And I must always be nice to them?'

  'Well, let's say a hint of stocking getting out of the car wouldn't come amiss.' Craig didn't even smile. 'The only other group of importance to you is the SS because there're plenty of those at the Chateau. Field grey uniforms like the Army and blue-green collars. The rank badges are worn on the collar. Up to Major, you'll notice the SS runes on one side of the collar. After that, it changes, but you needn't worry. Nobody would expect you to know the ranks. You'll always recognise anyone in the SS right up to Himmler himself by the silver skull and crossbones badge in his cap. All right?'

  Genevieve nodded. 'Yes, I think so. The Luftwaffe look like Edge, then come the police with their gorgets, the Army and then the SS with the Death's Head badge.'

  Craig said, 'All right, let's have a look at the Chateau now.'

  They had a large-scale map of the surrounding countryside and then a plan of the house itself, Chateau de Voincourt in finest detail. As Genevieve looked more closely, it all came flooding back. Every stairway and passage, each nook and cranny that she had explored as a child. There was a sudden excitement at the thought of returning. She'd forgotten quite how much she'd loved the place.

  'They have made no structural alterations except for machine-gun posts.' Rene leaned over and indicated the positions with a black drawing pencil. 'The perimeter wall has been wired along its entire length to provide an electric warning system. The gate is guarded at all times and they have installed the usual swing barrier system. For the rest, their security depends upon a system of what they call prowler guards. These are all Waffen-SS and they are good, Mamselle. Make no mistake. They kno
w their job. It is not necessary to like them to admit that.'

  'What he's trying to tell you delicately without offending my finer American feelings is that they are the best soldiers in the world, man-for-man,' Craig Osbourne said. 'He's right. In this case, just to make it harder, most of them are accompanied by Alsatian or Dobermann guard dogs.'

  She said, 'I always did like animals.'

  'Good,' he said. 'Now let's get down to the really important details.' He glanced at his watch. 'We haven't got much time. The hairdresser's due soon.'

  'The hairdresser?'

  'Yes - the way you wear your hair might suit you, but not Anne-Marie. See for yourself. This photo was taken only a month ago.'

  Genevieve wore her hair to her shoulders, Anne-Marie's was much shorter, sliced in a dark fringe very straight across her brow just above the eyes, Genevieve again, but a different Genevieve, with an arrogant smile on her mouth as if telling the whole damned world to go to hell. Unconsciously, Genevieve copied that expression and when she turned to look at Craig, Anne-Marie was smiling out at her from the mirror above the fireplace behind him, just as arrogant, just as hard.

  He didn't like it. For the first time, she felt she had really got through to him in some strange way. There was something in his eyes as if for the moment he was afraid of what he saw. He snatched the photo from her roughly.

  'Let's get on, shall we?' He placed another photo in front of her. 'You know this woman?'

  'Yes, Chantal Chevalier, my aunt's personal maid.'

  Dear Chantal of the rough tongue and the hard hand who had served Hortense through good times and bad for more than thirty years.

  'She won't like me,' Genevieve said. 'Unless she's changed greatly. She never did.'

  Rene nodded. 'It is as it always was. She never cared for Mamselle Anne-Marie. She was never a woman to hide her feelings.' He turned to Genevieve. 'But with you, Mamselle, it was different.'

  But there was no point in going into that - not now. She said, 'Who else?'

  'The chef, Maurice Hugo - you remember him?'

  'Yes.'

  'Everyone else is different, but as they're all servants at the lower end of the scale that a haughty bitch like you wouldn't tend to notice anyway, it doesn't matter. Your maid could be a problem. Here she is.'

  She was small, dark-haired, with a petulant mouth, pretty enough in her own way. 'A putain,' Rene commented crisply. 'Maresa Ducray. She comes from a farm about ten miles away. Pretty clothes, men and money are the three most important things in her life and you can take them in any order. I've written a note on her family background for you.'

  'You can read that later,' Craig said. 'Let's move on. This is the present Commandant at the Chateau, Major General Carl Ziemke.'

  It was a blow-up from what had obviously been a group photo and there was a typed note on the back with his personal details right up to the present moment.

  He was the wrong side of fifty, Army, not SS, silver in the hair and the clipped mustache. The face was a little too fleshy and so was his body. He had nice eyes with laughter lines around them, but no smile on his lips. He looked tired.

  'A good man once,' Craig said, 'but now, they've put him out to grass. He and your aunt are lovers.'

  'I can believe that.' Genevieve handed the photo back to him calmly. 'If you were trying to shock me, you're wasting your time. My aunt always did need to have a man around the house, and Ziemke looks rather nice.'

  'He's a soldier,' Rene said grudgingly. 'I'll say that for him, and so is this bastard.'

  He pushed a photo across to her. She had to lean on the table for a moment, so great was the shock of recognition. She had never seen this man before, and yet it was as if she had known him all her life. He was in uniform similar to Joe Edge's except for the SS collar tabs, an Iron Cross at his neck, black hair cut short, a strong, craggy face, eyes that seemed to look right through her and beyond. Not a handsome face and yet one you would turn to look at again, even in a crowd.

  'Sturmbannfuhrer Max Priem,' Craig Osbourne said. 'That means Major, to you. Knight's Cross holder, a first-rate soldier and a thoroughly dangerous man. He's in charge of security at the Chateau.'

  'Why isn't a man like him at the Front fighting?'

  'He took a bullet in the head in Russia last year serving with an SS parachute battalion. They had to put a silver plate in his skull, so he has to take care.'

  'And how did he get on with Anne-Marie?' Genevieve asked Rene.

  'They fought as equals, Mamselle. He did not approve of her and she did not like him. Her relationship with General Ziemke was excellent. She flirted with him outrageously and he treated her like a favorite niece.'

  'Which all paid off very nicely with passes for those trips to Paris, freedom to come and go,' Craig said. 'But I must stress again how much the Germans value the de Voincourt connection. You and your aunt are collaborators, make no mistake about that. You continue to live in luxury and style while thousands of your countrymen toil in labour camps. And your friends, the French industrialists and their wives, who often help make up the parties at those weekend conferences, are amongst the most hated people in France.'

  'You've made your point.'

  'Only one more individual to be noted with particular care.' The photo wasn't nice. A young SS officer with very fair hair, narrow eyes, a generally vicious look to him that wasn't at all pleasant. 'Captain Hans Reichslinger. He's Priem's assistant.'

  'Nasty,' Genevieve said.

  'An animal.' Rene spat into the fire.

  'Strange,' she said. 'He doesn't look Priem's sort.'

  'And what sort would that be?' Craig demanded.

  Rene said, 'Priem despises him and shows it.'

  Craig picked up a large brown envelope and handed it to her. 'You'll find background information on every individual you're likely to run into in there. Study it as if your life depends on it, because it does.'

  There was a knock at the door and Julie looked in. 'The hairdresser is here.'

  'Good,' Craig said. 'We'll carry on later.' As Genevieve started to move away, he added, 'Before you go - just one more picture. Chief architect of the Atlantic Wall defense system. The man you'll be playing hostess to this weekend at Chateau de Voincourt.'

  He placed, very carefully on the table in front of her, a photo of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. She stood there, staring down at it in astonishment and Munro stood up and crossed to her, his papers in his left hand.

  'So you see, my dear Genevieve, I wasn't exaggerating when I said that what you could accomplish for us this weekend might very well affect the course of the entire war.'

  The hairdresser was a small, rather dapper, middle-aged man with black hair and white sideboards called Michael, and Julie obviously knew him quite well.

  'Oh, yes,' he said. 'Remarkable - really quite remarkable,' when he first saw Genevieve.

  He opened a scuffed brown suitcase that was filled with all sorts of things, make-up mostly, and took out a cardboard folder.

  'I've studied the file, but this is even better than I'd hoped.' He removed his beige cord jacket, took out a comb and a cut-throat razor from the suitcase. 'Let's get started then.'

  'You couldn't be in better hands,' Julie told her as she covered her shoulders with a towel. 'Michael was senior makeup man at Elstree Film Studios for years.'

  'Quite right,' he said, stroking the comb through her hair. 'I was with Sir Alexander Korda and I worked on Mr Charles Laughton when he did Henry the Eighth. Now there was a job, I can tell you. Took hours, every morning. Of course, at my age you have to take life a little easier. I run a theater in Falmouth now. Different show every week. We get plenty of sailors in, being a naval base, which is nice.'

  As she watched in the mirror, she changed into Anne-Marie minute-by-minute. Not just the hair, that was easy, although he knew exactly what he was doing. There was the shade of lipstick, the rouge he carefully put on her cheeks, the mascara on the eyelashes and the perfume, Chanel N
o. 5, one that Genevieve never used herself.

  The complete transformation took him about an hour and a half. When he had finished he nodded, obviously satisfied.

  'Beautiful, though I do say it myself.' He took out a small make-up case in Moroccan leather. 'Everything you need in there, dear. Remember to put plenty on. That'll be your biggest problem. You'll skimp it because you're not the sort who uses much make-up, I can see that.' He snapped the case shut and patted Julie's cheek. 'Must fly. I've got a show tonight.'

  The door closed behind him. Genevieve sat looking at herself. Me and yet not me, she thought.

  Julie offered her a cigarette. 'Have a Gitane.' She began to refuse and Julie said, 'Anne-Marie would. You'll have to get used to the idea.'

  Genevieve took the cigarette and the light which she was offering her and coughed as the smoke caught the back of her throat.

  'Good,' Julie said. 'Now go and show yourself to Craig. He's in the basement, at the shooting range, waiting for you.'

  ****

  The door to the cellar was next to the green baize one that led to the kitchen and when she opened it, she could hear the sound of shooting. The firing range had been made out of two cellars, part of one wall having been removed. The far end was brilliantly lit to reveal a row of cardboard figures resembling German soldiers against sandbags. Craig Osbourne was standing at a table loading a revolver, several other weapons laid out before him. He heard her approach, glanced over his shoulder casually, then froze.

  'Good God!'

  'Which obviously means I'll do.'

  His face was quite pale. 'Yes, I think you could say that. It's quite astonishing. Still.' He snapped the revolver shut. 'You say you've never done any shooting before?'

  'I fired an air rifle once at a funfair.'

  He smiled. 'Nothing like starting from scratch. I'm not going to try and do more than explain the two handguns you're most likely to come across and how you should fire them.'

  'From as close as possible, isn't that what you said?'

  'You think it's easy, like in some cowboy film? Okay, let's see what you can do.' He gave her the revolver. 'Not too far, only fifteen yards. Aim for the middle target. All you do is squeeze the trigger.'