The Light from the Dark Side of the Moon

by Norman G. Gautreau

  “Why too close to Périgueux?” asks Jean-Baptiste.

  Georges shrugs, “Les Boche.”

  “Périgueux is the next closest prefecture,” Marcel explains. “So you think they’re still there?”

  “Mai, oui.” Georges turns to me. “My apologies. I forgot to speak in English.”

  “It’s okay, Georges,” I say. “That much I understood. The Krauts are in Périgueux.”

  “Will you tell us how to get to this cave?” asks Élodie.

  “Mais certainement. I have written it out. We get many requests.” He steps into the adjoining room and returns moments later with a piece of paper. He hands it to Élodie. I look over her shoulder. It reads, in French and German:

  Environ un kilomètre, sud par le sud-est. 162 degrés

  Etwa einen Kilometer südlich von Südosten. 162 Grad32

  “You will see a path,” Georges says, “but, in any case, you may borrow my compass if you don’t have one. The opening is bigger than when the cave was discovered. You won’t miss it. Jacques Marsal, one of the boys who discovered it, pitched a tent so he could guard the opening and charge a fee, but he won’t be there until late in the morning.”

  Élodie looks up at Georges. “Have many Germans visited the cave?”

  “In past times. But not so many these days, and none for a fortnight.” Georges laughs and pours himself another glass of wine. “I think you and the Americans keep them busy, n’est-ce pas?”

  That night, when Élodie and I retire to the barn, Jean-Baptiste follows us. I secretly roll my eyes at Élodie who whispers back, “Don’t let him bother you.”

  I sleep with the other men in the open main part of the barn while Élodie beds down in a stall. The following morning, Élodie and I slip out of the barn to eat some of Isabeau’s homemade baguette and share with our hosts steaming cups of ersatz coffee, made from roasted acorns. With a laugh, Georges points out at the trees. “This war is hard on the squirrels. We pass our shortage of coffee on to them, and now they have no acorns to eat.”

  Élodie stares into her cup for a moment and then glances up at me. “War is hell, as you Americans say in the movies.”

  When we finish our breakfast, Georges goes into the next room and returns with a brass marching compass in a leather pouch and two old, dented, copper lanterns with verdigris patinas. “These will help you find the cave and view the paintings,” he says. “Now I am off to acquire some German dynamite.”

  I loop the compass strap around my neck, and Élodie and I set out for the cave before Jean-Baptiste and the others appear for breakfast. The path Georges mentioned is barely discernible, but the compass guides us past thickets of undergrowth and brambles and through a forest of dense pine, rough-barked chestnuts, and ancient oaks. At last, we find the opening. It is oblong, about six feet high and twelve feet across in the lumpy, irregular shape of a giant potato.

  We turn on our lanterns and peer into the mouth of the cave and see a long, almost-vertical shaft with a wooden ladder propped against it. Élodie slings her Sten gun over her shoulder and begins to climb down into the darkness. I follow quickly and at the bottom, we find ourselves in a huge chamber about sixty feet long and maybe twenty or thirty feet across at its widest.

  “My God!” Élodie cries. The light from her lantern falls on the cave wall and illuminates a horse’s head and neck. It has a woolly mane.

  “Look at this,” I say. My light beam aims at a strange creature which seems to have two long, straight horns protruding from its head. Moving through the large chamber, we see black horses and some animals that look like oversized oxen.

  “I think they are aurochs,” says Élodie. “They are éteint. How does one say? Ah, yes, extinct.”

  As we sweep the walls with our lanterns, a line of aurochs and horses, stags, bulls, and a bear appears out of the darkness, painted onto the stone with such confidence and elegance the animals appear to be alive, moving even. At the end of the large chamber, there are two passageways, one leading left and the other right. We choose the left. It is longer than the first chamber, but much narrower, and we find a dizzying array of figures—a huge black bull, a cow, more horses, more aurochs, more bulls, bison, ibexes, and a magnificent black bull that I estimate is about thirty feet long.

  “I am gobsmacked,” Élodie whispers, her voice full of reverence. “This is the deepest memory of my people, my ancestors. It’s as if we are walking through their brains, or their souls!”33

  Soon, we come to a dead end and we retrace our steps, finally emerging into the first space, from where we enter the passage on the right. This corridor is decorated with hundreds of figures—more aurochs, bison, deer, horses, ibex. At the end of the passage we come to an intersection and we enter the long, wide cavern on the right which has a ceiling that varies in height from a foot or so above my head to three times my height. Here, there are many more paintings, among them a group of seven ibexes, a large, black cow, crossed bison which show skillful perspective, four stags drawn as if swimming in an imaginary stream.

  Élodie lowers herself to the floor and stares, mouth agape, at the procession of animals surrounding us. I sit beside her and put an arm around her shoulders. “I’m stunned,” I say, voice low as if in a church. “What’s that word you used just now?”

  “Gobsmacked?”

  “Yes. I’ve been inside cathedrals that don’t leave me as awestruck.”

  “That’s it, my love. Well said, you! Magnifique! It’s a cathedral of the earth. When I was in England, I saw Stonehenge. Do you know of it?”

  “Yes,” I reply. “I was based at Littlecote House near Hungerford. That’s only about thirty miles away. I saw it several times on weekend passes.”

  “They say it’s a sacred place,” says Élodie. “And I can understand it. That’s how I felt when I was there. Did you feel it?”

  “Very much so.”

  “I think this cave is a sacred place. I feel I am inside the mind of the human race and these paintings are ideas and memories.”

  I lean closer to her, my lips brush her hair. “I’ll bet you’ve never made love inside a cathedral.”

  She turns and looks into my eyes. “Is that a proposal?”

  I lean forward and kiss her. Soon, our clothes are scattered on the stone floor, and our bodies are moving together, the only other sound a trickle of moisture dripping from a crevice in the wall.

  And then we hear it. A creak. Someone coming down the wooden ladder at the entrance. Élodie pushes me away and whispers, “Someone is coming.”

  “Jean-Baptiste?”

  “Probably.”

  I grab the pile of clothes and hand Élodie’s blouse to her. “I would not put it past the idiot.”

  We are rushing to put our clothes back on when we hear a second creak. Then a man’s voice. “Un seul baiser.”

  Élodie whispers to me. “Only one kiss. French with a German accent.”

  “Non!” It’s the frightened voice of a girl.

  “Nein! Ein Kuss. Un baiser!”

  “Non!” The sound of shoes running.

  “Halt!”

  Now come the sounds of a struggle. Scuffling feet. A loud slap of flesh on flesh. A cry of pain. Grunts. The thud of a body slammed to the ground. “Non!” The girl lets out a long scream.

  I whisper to Élodie, “No time to finish dressing. Let’s go.”

  She nods.

  We scramble into the next chamber where we see a man in a Wehrmacht uniform on his knees, straddling and punching a struggling, crying girl. I notice a holster on the man’s right hip. Still barefoot, I approach him quietly from behind and wrap my left arm around his throat, squeezing and pulling back hard. With my other hand, I snap open the holster, pull out his Luger, and force the man to his feet. I press the muzzle of the gun to the back of the man’s head and over my shoulder, I say to Élodie, “Tell him if he resists, he will die.”

  Élodie says, “Wenn Sie sich widersetzen, wird er Sie töten.”

>   “Now tell him to stand against the wall.”

  “Stellen Sie sich gegen die Wand.”

  “I’ll watch him while you see if she’s all right,” I say. I keep the luger trained on the man who, although wearing the markings of a 1st lieutenant or Oberleutnant, has a boyish face and unusually long blond hair.

  Élodie helps the sobbing girl to her feet, and murmurs something reassuring in French, and the girl’s sobs gradually decrease. I catch the word, “Résistance.”

  The German tips his head toward the girl. “Sie ist nur eine Jüdin.”

  Without taking my eyes off him, I ask Élodie to translate.

  “He said, she is only a Jewess.”

  “Do you have your gun trained on him?” I ask.

  “Yes.”

  I spin the man around, pistol whip him across the face, and spit out the only German word I know. “Schwein!”

  The man gives a cry of pain and drops to his knees.

  I risk a glance up at Élodie. “I’ll keep him here while you finish dressing and help the girl out of the cave. Then I’ll send him up as soon as you’re ready to cover him. I’ll put my boots on and follow. Tell him that’s what we are doing. Tell him you will shoot him in the face if he tries anything.”

  Élodie speaks to the man, then urges the girl up the ladder. Moments later, she herself climbs the ladder and calls down. “Ready!”

  I motion with the pistol for the man to start climbing. Peering up the shaft, I see Élodie with her Sten gun trained on the man. When the German reaches the top, she motions him to stand to the side and calls down, “Okay.”

  I slip on and lace my boots as fast as I can, then climb to the surface, ignoring the pain in my wounded thigh. With the Sten gun and the Lugar still trained on him, we march the German ahead of us back to the home of Georges and Isabeau Bosquet.

  When we arrive, Isabeau is at the front door to greet us, and Élodie explains what happened to the girl—whose name, she has learned, is Hannah Katz. Isabeau puts her arm around the girl’s shoulder and ushers her into the house. Over her shoulder, she says, “Hannah lives nearby. I guess the swine wouldn’t report her as long as he got what he wanted. I will see she gets home.”

  I push the German toward the stone barn where Jean-Baptiste, Marcel and Claude now stand at the door of the barn watching. They make way as I shove the German inside so forcefully he stumbles against the rotting hulk of an ancient automobile with flattened tires. He hits the car hard. Dust rises in the air and flakes of red rust fall to the floor.

  Élodie follows us inside.

  Marcel looks the man up and down and then turns to Jean-Baptiste. “What will we do with him?”

  “Execute him.” Jean-Baptiste’s tone is flat, matter-of-fact.

  “No.” Élodie says. “That’s what the Nazis would do. We are not Nazis.”

  Jean-Baptiste looks from Élodie to Claude and Marcel and then steps toward the German. “He should be executed.”

  “No!”

  “Tu es une poule mouillée!”

  Élodie smiles, turns to me. “Jean-Baptiste said I am a wet hen. It’s a French expression which means he thinks I am a wimp or a sissy, as you say in English.” She turns back to Jean-Baptiste. “If you are going to insult me, do it in English so everyone can understand!”

  “To hell with the American! I don’t care if he understands what we say.”

  “You are an idiot!” she practically flings the words into the air.

  “I insist!” Jean-Baptiste growls. “Execute the man!”

  “Your problem is that you are a brute with no imagination,” Élodie says. “He is my prisoner. I will decide.”

  Marcel and Claude, like usual, watch their comrades bait each other without saying a word.

  “If you won’t execute him, what will you do?”

  “Better to punish the real offender: Le zob. His beard-splitter. Please pass me the medical kit.” She turns to me. “I’m referring to his penis, in case you want to know.”

  “I see.” I suppress a shudder. “So, what is your plan?”

  Instead of answering, Élodie gestures toward a wooden bench sitting near the rusting car. “Marcel and Claude, please place him down on that bench.” The two men sweep old auto parts off the bench, which fall to the floor with a clatter. A small cloud of dust rises as they take the German by his arms and legs, drop him on the bench and hold him there.

  “Claude, pass me the forceps and sulfa powder

  Jean-Baptiste snorts. “You object to executing him because it’s what a Nazi would do, yet you would do this to a man? You would castrate him?”

  “No, idiot! Again, that’s something the Nazis would do. But, circumcise a man? I think that is something a Nazi would have little reason to do.” Élodie unbuckles the man’s belt and slides his pants down. The German’s eyes are wide and he tries to squirm free, but it is no use. He is held in place by Marcel and Claude.

  Élodie lifts the scalpel from the medical kit.

  “Wofür ist das? Nein! Nein!”34 the man cries.

  Élodie is about to sprinkle sulfa powder over the man’s penis, when she pauses.

  “Nein! Nein!” the man cries.

  Élodie gazes into the man’s eyes. Finally, she says, “No. I have a better idea. He has long hair. It seems discipline in the Wehrmacht must be slipping of late. We’ll give him a peyot.”

  “What’s a peyot?” Marcel asks.

  I have the same question.

  “It’s the sidelocks an Orthodox Jew wears. I’ve seen it many times. Remember, I used to work with O.S.E.35 We had many older children who were Orthodox Jews pass through our care.”

  Jean-Baptiste gives a sardonic smile and says, “So, you back away from punishing his zob?”

  “I’m a musician, not a butcher. I’ll give him a haircut instead. When he rejoins his friends, he’ll know what it feels like to be a Jew among Germans. Maybe he’ll have more compassion.” She takes a pair of scissors from the medical kit. “Hold him.”

  Marcel and Claude hold the man tightly from both sides. Élodie goes to work on his hair, cutting most of it short, but leaving tufts in front of each ear. She hums as she works, turning his head this way and that. “Your hair isn’t long enough to do a proper job, but your friends will get the idea,” she tells him in German.

  I frown at her.

  Jean-Baptiste draws in a deep breath. “So, you’ve had your fun. Now what do we do with him?”

  “Nothing,” Élodie says as she steps back to appraise her handiwork. Marcel and Claude step back, too, and the man turns on his side and curls into a fetal position.

  “You mean, just let him go?”

  “Why not. He’ll be too embarrassed to tell anybody what happened to him and, I promise you, he won’t be back.”

  “I see,” says Jean-Baptiste. He walks to the bench as if inspecting Élodie’s haircutting skills, then smoothly pulls out his pistol and shoots the man once in the back of the head.

  It happens so quickly, so unexpectedly, I jump.

  The echo of the gun shot reverberates in the barn.

  Élodie turns on him and yells, “Es-tu un idiot? Pourquoi fais-tu ça ?”36

  “Killing those young soldiers after Oradour has made you insane, woman!” Jean-Baptiste yells back at her. “It’s crazy to put an enemy combatant back in the field. How would you feel if he was sent to Normandy and killed some of our people? Also, if that girl is a Jewess, it means she is staying in a safe house. And it means, he knew where to find her. He could expose the whole underground railroad. It would have been stupid to let him go.”

  There is a brief silence, then I say to Élodie, “Jean-Baptiste is right, you know.”

  Jean-Baptiste gives me a slight smile and a reluctant nod of appreciation.

  “I’m going to check on Hannah.” Élodie turns and storms out of the barn.

  I follow her out and as we pass the chicken coop, I put my hand on her arm. “Sorry for siding with Jean-Baptiste like th
at.”

  “I don’t hold it against you.”

  We walk on for several moments. Forcing a smile, I ask, “Beard-splitter? Where did you find a word like that?”

  “You want to ask me that, now?”

  “Yes.”

  Élodie doesn’t answer. Instead she marches on toward the Bosquet farmhouse. Finally, I say, “You should stop thinking about that German. Where did you find a word like beard-splitter?”

  “Why do you want to know?”

  “I just want to know. Where did you find it?”

  Élodie gives an exasperated sigh. “The Autobiography of a Flea, I think.”

  “What’s that? I never heard of it.”

  “It’s a racy Victorian novel. I’ve read lots of them.”

  I shake my head. “You continually amaze me.”

  “What do you find amazing? That I read novels in what is to me a foreign language, or that the novels are naughty?”

  “Both, I suppose.”

  “There’s no mystery. When I was in England, a dozen British women and I had a book club. They wanted to read bawdy Victorian novels. More than half of the women were apart from their husbands for the first time.” She pauses, then narrows her eyes at me. “You are very clever.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “That business about beard-splitter. You wanted to switch my mind from what Jean-Baptiste did.”

  “It’s done. You shouldn’t let it torment you.”

  “Like the boy soldier after Oradour?”

  “You shouldn’t let it torment you.”

  “This man, today, was some mother’s little boy.”

  “He was a rapist.”

  “But, was it really necessary for Jean-Baptiste to do that?”

  I say nothing.

  “I can’t stand him,” she says with a visible shudder. “Before you dropped out of the sky, he was always trying to seduce me. But I would have none of it. I find him repulsive. Then you came along and now he hates both of us. I should have made my revulsion to him unambiguous in the beginning. I wish I would have done. Then we would not be playing these stupid games.”

  Later that morning, after we bury the German behind the barn, Georges returns with two wooden crates stenciled in black with the Nazi eagle and swastika and the words, “Dynamit,” “gefährlicher explosivstoff,” and “gewicht 8.125 Kg.”37