She drew herself up. “Ah, justement nothing! You see each month he wrote me faithfully. I’m all he has left. Now for over two months—almost three, Monsieur Varin—nothing. You see he was working in that airplane factory at Altona, near Hamburg, I believe. The British have been bombing it now for several weeks. So I wonder... would it be possible... do you think you could get me news of him?”
The teacher took out a worn black notebook with a small pencil attached. He wrote: “Dupont, Michel. Aged 17.”
“Do you know his number?”
“Six... four... nine... three... one... zero.”
He wrote it down. “Good, count upon me to do whatever is possible. Although I warn you it won’t be easy with these fire-eaters that have come to town, these Silesians. But I’ll talk to the Feldwebel Hans; he’s always helpful. You know his brother is on Goering’s staff. I’ll try; I’ll do my best.”
Her aged, wrinkled face beamed. “Thank you, Monsieur Varin, thank you infinitely. I knew I could count upon your help. Ah, what would Nogent-Plage ever do without you? Au ’voir!” And she weaved off downstreet, ducking and bobbing to everyone she met.
Chapter 6
THE SCHOOLMASTER REPLACED the black notebook in his pocket and resumed his seat at the iron table. Here we are, coming to a crisis in the war, and she wants news of her great grandson, one of God knows how many foreigners forced to work for the Germans. Well, I suppose he is all she has.
At this moment the Feldwebel Hans, clipboard in his hand, strolled up. In warm weather the two often met at noon and the sergeant usually offered the teacher a glass of German beer, which was reserved by the patron of the café for the German soldiers who had to sign for it. The Feldwebel, wiping his face, sat down. The stray dog, still accompanying him, also sat down, panting.
“Hot, very hot,” remarked the German. Then to the proprietor, “Two beers, please.”
Monsieur Lavigne wiped a corner of the table with his dirty white apron.
“Merci,” said the teacher. “Eh bien, what’s new today? Are we ready for the invasion?” At times he enjoyed needling the young German. “Your compatriots act as though they expected it this afternoon at the latest.”
“Ach, these frontline furiosos, they are impossible. Always drilling, shouting at each other, saluting. Frankly, my friend, I am skeptical about your invasion. Perhaps, yes... it is possible. But look at that blockhouse over there. Nothing can wreck it, nothing. You saw it built yourself. There are ten meters of solid concrete over those guns. Tell me, what shells could penetrate such a depth?” He took a large swallow of the beer.
Enjoying his own beer as a guest of the Reichswehr and one not permitted by German army regulations to drink it, Monsieur Varin did not care to contradict his host. But he did not hesitate to voice his doubt.
“Ah, oui, you may be right. But after all, my friend, things haven’t been going too well for you people lately. One has only to look at the maps. They tell the story of what’s happening over there on the Eastern front.”
The Feldwebel did not wish to betray a lack of confidence before a Frenchman, so he said, “Ha-ha, ho-ho, let the English come. We are ready for them.”
The teacher nodded, but he wondered. Daily he read between the lines of the censored Paris press and followed the maps with attention. As he often told the Père Clement when they were alone, those maps indicated plainly the extent of the impending disaster for the Germans.
It’s coming, he told himself. I only want to be here to see it. And surely, he thought, it must come before long or it will be too late. After four years of occupation, of hardships and privation, tempers in the village were rising. That little girl who choked to death last month because no doctor could get through the coastal road. The thin legs of the boys and girls on the street. When you see your children go to bed hungry night after night, well, a man will do anything.
And those strange warships spotted off the coast when the fog lifted suddenly one afternoon. What were they doing? Those massive flights of planes on their daily bombing runs from England. Were they pounding the enemy’s lines of communications in preparation for an imminent invasion? Certainly the Germans were on the alert. Signs of crisis abounded. Nogent-Plage was obviously no longer a kind of convalescent area for battered troops. It had been transformed, by orders from Berlin, of course, into a frontline garrison, a pivotal point of the main coastal defense. That was plain. And the battalion of Silesians was here for one purpose. To repel an invasion on the beaches. Somehow the invasion must succeed. “It must,” said the teacher out loud.
Chapter 7
THE HAUPTMANN SEELER, new commanding officer of the garrison, sat at his desk in the Bloch villa. The windows overlooking the sea were boarded up and his only company was a photograph of Hitler. A thin sheet of paper was before him. It was typewritten, marked at the top: Geheim. Secret. Below was a heading. Oberkommando Des Heeres. From the Army High Command.
This document was about the invasion, which the Abwehr, Intelligence Department of the German General Staff, felt to be imminent. It outlined the steps being taken to repel the assault and detailed the disposition of troops and reserves in the neighborhood of Nogent-Plage. The Hauptmann Seeler was on the telephone. His voice was crisp, soldierly.
“Ja, Major Kessler, ja. Jawohl....”
“In an hour or more, Hauptmann, you will receive Alarmstruppe II. Do you understand?”
“Ja, ja, Major Kessler.” Of course he understood. Alarmstruppe II was the order for the highest state of readiness against an invasion. The Major continued, “We know nothing for certain, Hauptmann, but there is a rumor well substantiated that the invasion fleet is at sea. Perhaps, who knows....”
“I understand, Major.”
“Remember, Nogent-Plage is a pivotal position in the defense of the coast.”
“Jawohl, Herr Major. We are ready; my troops are veterans. We won’t be caught asleep.”
“Good. Heil Hitler!” The Major rang off.
But the Hauptmann was perturbed. He rose and stalked the room. A former Feldwebel, promoted to commissioned rank on the field of battle in North Africa, he was a fussy, myopic little man with thick glasses, a strict disciplinarian who strutted with authority. He was also a brave officer, as the decorations from his campaigns in the desert showed.
The month before he had been sent in with his Silesians to take over and reorganize the defense of Nogent-Plage, but the situation he had found was worse than he had imagined. Until he arrived, nobody seemed alert and discipline was indifferent. Then there was that Feldwebel. The invasion imminent, the Fatherland in the very greatest peril, and what was he doing? Playing football with the boys, greeting civilians in the street. True, the town was quiet for the moment. Yet with all the terrorists about, one could never tell.
The Hauptmann trusted nobody and experience told him this was a wise attitude in war. Although his men all said the Feldwebel was a great football star, this nonsense must end. The captain, whose fattish body and thick glasses betrayed the fact that he could not run across the street or see a football unless it hit him in the face, was determined to maintain the discipline so essential in this moment of crisis.
Furiously he shuffled the papers on his desk. Paperwork was his soul, his goal, his be-all and end-all. As a sergeant he had been celebrated for his impeccable reports, always forwarded through channels, always on time. Large forms, legible, correctly indented, and sent along to a superior were in his belief the mark of a professional officer. Paperwork, he often told his men, was the other, seldom seen side of discipline.
As for that lazy Feldwebel, it made no difference if he was the greatest centre forward Germany ever had. We’re at war. I’m in charge here and the troops and the townspeople had better realize it! The more he reflected about the Feldwebel, the more annoyed he became. That sloppy soldier’s popularity with the troops and, worse still, the townsfolk was a cause of concern for the Hauptmann. Why, he thought, everyone knows that but for hi
s family connections he would have been reduced to the ranks long ago.
In any event, it is my duty as his superior officer to report his inefficiency to the Oberkommando at Caen. Let them do as they wish. And they will have to do something after they hear from me. I shall make a point of telephoning this morning. But first I must have it out with him, Count von und zu Whatshisname. Utter nonsense, that title business. Four years now he has been enjoying himself in the safety of this charming seaside resort while I was up to my neck in sandstorms, fighting with Rommel in North Africa. And promoted from the ranks by the General Bayerlein himself!
He seized the telephone and called the blockhouse beyond the village. “Unteroffizier Kleinschrodt,” he said curtly.
The soldier at the other end of the line feeling tenseness in the voice of his commanding officer, informed him that the Feldwebel had left some minutes ago with the morning report.
“Which should have been on my desk when I came to this office at seven o’clock today,” said the Hauptmann. “Punctuality is the first duty of the soldier.”
Knowing the officer’s passion for paperwork, the soldier at the blockhouse quickly agreed. The Hauptmann slammed down the phone without bothering to reply. He took the papers from his desk, put them into his safe, tried the handle to be sure it was locked, and rose. Straightening his tunic with a sharp tug, adjusting the angle of his cap, locking the door behind him, buttoning the key into the upper pocket of his blouse, he left the office and went out into the street.
The two sentries whirled to attention in unison, presenting arms. The Hauptmann flicked a glove carelessly to the visor of his cap in his best imitation of General Rommel. After the dimly lit office the sunlight from the sea dazzled him a moment. His first sight was the café almost opposite. What he observed enraged him.
There sat the lazy Feldwebel, smugly smoking his pipe and talking to a French civilian. Worse, as the Hauptmann noticed on approaching, the Frenchman was drinking beer against all army regulations. Obviously it was German beer. The Hauptmann also recognized the man, a teacher in town. He had been pointed out as a possible partisan, perhaps even someone who would transmit intelligence to the British.
The Hauptmann stalked across the street, anger flushing his face. The clack-clack of his heels had an ominous sound. Suddenly spotting his commanding officer approaching, the Feldwebel rose hastily, too hastily, stepping back squarely onto the dog’s front paw. The animal yelped twice and skittered away and the Feldwebel lost his balance. He reached out and caught at the table, which overturned, and the two half-empty glasses of beer and the two beer bottles fell to the stone sidewalk. Then, retrieving his balance, he stood stiffly at attention, waiting for the storm to break. It broke with a thunderclap.
“Was haben Sie, Kleinschrodt?” asked the Hauptmann, ice in his voice. The Iron Cross (First Class) and the Knight’s Cross (with a golden oak leaf) trembled on his chest as he spoke. To have to stand here with this lout, he thought. Me, with my decorations and four wound stripes on my sleeve!
But he stood there, saying nothing now, simply looking the Feldwebel up and down. As he did so his eye caught one of the bottles of beer on the ground, label up.
“Reserved for the Wehrmacht,” it said.
The Hauptmann looked the Feldwebel over angrily. An ancient garrison cap with stained visor was on the back of his head, not over his eyes as regulations stipulated. His tunic was dirty. One button was missing. His shoes were unshined, no doubt from that damned football he played with the village boys. As the Hauptmann stood contemplating this sorry figure of a noncommissioned officer in the army of our glorious Fuhrer, he reflected suddenly on those deadly battles in North Africa, where for over two years he had risked his life.
The injustice infuriated the Hauptmann and his dislike of the Feldwebel was so intense that he completely lost control of his temper. For the first time his voice rose.
“What’s the matter with you?” he cried, reaching out and grabbing the Feldwebel’s tunic where the button was missing. He gave it a strong yank and the other three buttons spattered onto the pavement. The tunic fell open and hung grotesquely from the broad shoulders of the younger man.
There he stood, a ridiculous-looking soldier, while the little Hauptmann, baring his teeth, spewed out a torrent of guttural abuse. Like all former noncommissioned officers, the Hauptmann was an expert in flaying the lower ranks. He did not raise his voice again, or shout, but his words were plain.
“You’ll put away childish things, Feldwebel. Kein Fussball. Verstehen Sie?” No football. Understand?
And he had only begun. For a fact, this Feldwebel really did not know what war was, and the Hauptmann took pains to tell him so. Monsieur Varin, who had also risen, wanted intensely to leave, but this meant getting round the overturned table and attracting the attention of the Hauptmann. So he stood there while the abuse continued. Scornfully the little officer pointed down at the bottles, the glasses, and the spilled beer, now a wet spot on the pavement.
Sweat appeared on the Feldwebel’s forehead. A drop rolled off his nose. Still the tirade continued, every syllable distinct. Monsieur Varin had served in two wars under officers of every social class, all grades and temperaments. Never had he listened to such humiliation of a fellow soldier. A nasty piece of work indeed, this Hauptmann, thought Monsieur Varin, listening. It was quite obvious, as the officer pointed to the overturned table, what was being said. Do this again and you will be reduced to the ranks.
“You call yourself a soldier, Kleinschrodt?” said the Hauptmann, utter contempt in his tone. It was a question needing no answer. “Verstehen Sie? Verstehen Sie?”
“Ja, mein Hauptmann, jawohl.”
The abuse went on for several minutes more, and then without warning the officer half turned and held out his hand across the upset table.
“Papieren!”
It was a command. The teacher fumbled in his coat pocket and yanked out the Ausweiss that everyone in the Zone of the Armies was required to carry at all times.
The officer looked at it attentively, then inspected Monsieur Varin up and down. “Schulmeister, nicht?”
The Frenchman nodded. Yes, a schoolmaster. He was tense and frightened, not knowing what was coming, but sure it would be unpleasant. Did it mean he would be arrested?
“Kommunist, nicht wahr? In France all schoolmasters are Communists.”
A sweeping accusation. But in France many teachers were indeed Leftists and quite a few were Communists. Monsieur Varin stood silently before the German officer, so youthful to him yet so old in battle years. For a few seconds the silence persisted. The teacher could have denied the accusation. What real proof was there? No, even though his life depended upon it, he could not forgo his deep beliefs. So he nodded.
“Ja, Herr Hauptmann. I am a Communist.”
There he stood, expecting immediate arrest. Now the sweat appeared on the forehead of the Frenchman. Men had been sent to prison for less. But apparently, with this career soldier who obviously knew France, truth was best. The next question would be harder still, because he could never betray his heritage. The officer would ask him if he was a Jew, and one grandfather on his mother’s side had been Jewish. As long as France was France and a nation, he was a Frenchman, but to the Germans, if they knew of that grandfather, he would be a Jew.
Surely the Feldwebel, with access to the records in the little town hall, knew all about his background, yet had never reported him. Nobody else in Nogent-Plage was aware of his ancestry, for his grandfather had long since died in Lyon.
The teacher stood waiting for the obvious question, but the bespectacled little officer kept silent. He turned, slapped his gloves in a gesture of contempt, and without bothering to return the salute of the Feldwebel, stalked down the street. Activity among the soldiers visibly increased as he passed.
Monsieur Varin discovered his legs were weak. He was trembling. Strange, he thought, feeling his heart bump, how the heat grows at noon on a spring d
ay in Nogent-Plage.
Chapter 8
IT WAS AFTERNOON. The farmer Marquet sat on the plank seat of his old-fashioned cart, with wooden slats sloping outward at the top, filled with thick, oozy seaweed—fertilizer for his land. Years of harsh work had made him seem older than he was. But his horse, although thin like every living thing after four years of occupation, had a cared-for look.
The farmer’s home was an ancient stone house in a hamlet called La Roye, beyond the dunes in back of town. His wife was long since dead, one son had been killed in the campaign of 1940, another, Pierre, was a prisoner of war in Germany. He lived alone and the people of Nogent-Plage considered him slightly mad, because he had a habit of talking to himself. Twice each year he took the long road around the dunes to the coast for fertilizer.
His only companion was his horse whose name was Sebastian. Why Sebastian? Nobody ever found out. But between them was a bond of affection. The animal seemed to understand his lonely master’s needs. And the farmer cared more for the horse, perhaps, than anything save his land, for which he had the fierce possessiveness of the peasant. Between them they would manage to keep the soil nourished and the fields cultivated until the day when his boy would return from Germany.
Slowly the horse pulled the heavy load, up the hill, past the blockhouse, and into the village. Half a dozen young soldiers, stripped to the waist, torsos tanned, towels over their shoulders, picked their way down the cliff to the sea, carefully avoiding the mines and barbed wire. The old man watched with a passionate hatred. How much longer, he wondered, shall we have to look on these well-fed barbarians?
As the cart entered the village, the door of a house at which two sentries were stationed opened and a bespectacled officer stepped out. On his breast was a double row of campaign medals and the Iron Cross. His boots, which reached to his knees, shone in the sun. He walked briskly, shoulders back, every inch of his small frame an officer of the Wehrmacht. From the cart, the old man observed that his gaze went from right to left along the street—he missed nothing. On he moved, the Grande Rue now empty save for a few soldiers at the far end.
His Enemy, His Friend Page 3