A Troubled Peace

by L. M. Elliott

  Henry felt his face turn red, then ashen. “I can explain those,” he started.

  “No need.” The fat policeman smirked. “These”—he pointed to the Spam and Camels—“U.S. soldiers steal from their army to sell to our people, exploiting our hunger.” He pushed the ration card with his stick. “As an American, this you could only have if you are in the company of black marketers. You are under arrest, monsieur. Come along.”

  “No, wait, you don’t understand. I’ve got to get to Paris.”

  “Paris? You go to jail, monsieur. Then we will call your army’s military police to send you back to the United States. We do not want your kind in France.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Chink-chink. Chink-chink.

  The jailer rattled a large ring of keys as he passed Henry’s cell. He stopped at the next cell to lecture the “suitcase-bearers” on their crise morale. If it were up to him, he jeered, peasants trying to become princes by selling their wares through the black market would be hanged. One of the women started to cry.

  Chink-chink. Chink-chink. The policeman walked on, pausing at the next cell to ridicule an old man who was serving eight days for picking his neighbor’s carrots because he was hungry, then two teenagers jailed for having a fistfight over a precious box of matches. The prisoners swore at him, then became silent.

  “Jerk,” Henry muttered, “having fun taunting these poor people.”

  The jailer had labeled Henry a “sal Américain.” It’d twisted Henry up inside. How could a Frenchman call him “filthy” with the same tone in which he’d heard the maquis curse the Nazis?

  If the French saw him that way, what would the American police, the MPs, do with him? Henry had seen MPs break up enough fights in the base canteen to know they didn’t stop to ask questions. If they believed that he was a black marketer, the least they would do is send him home, without his finding Pierre, without his getting himself right for Patsy—a complete disaster.

  The Army might even throw in jail time for behavior unbecoming to an officer. Was he still subject to that? Henry concocted a dozen defenses about why he was in France. Somehow he just couldn’t see the MPs buying that he was looking for Pierre. From the sounds of it, too many American soldiers had tried to turn a profit off French misery. His stash of American canned food and cigarettes and the counterfeit bread card certainly suggested Henry was in the game as well.

  Henry rubbed his forehead along the bars of his cell, trying to squash his growing sense of failure and the memory of the last time he’d been in a French prison cell, waiting—when his French guide had turned him over to the Nazis, who in turn hurled him into an unlit, windowless cellar in a prison-chateau. That dark cage had been his introduction to the brutal manipulation of a Gestapo interrogation. The hours in utter darkness were designed to rattle him so he entered questioning already vulnerable with fear born of his own imagining of what was to come. “It’s not the Gestapo, it’s not,” Henry mumbled to himself once again, desperately trying to push back the curtain of memory closing him in, shutting out the light of present day.

  But his mind betrayed him and threw Henry back into pitch-black dark, into the Nazi hole:

  Six feet by five feet. Henry’s fingertips ran along the dank, dirt walls as he counted the room’s perimeter.

  Ten hours. Maybe a day since the Gestapo locked the door. Henry couldn’t keep time straight in complete darkness.

  Pray for me, Ma. God listens to you. Pray that I will be brave. Pray that I won’t tell anything to save my own skin.

  Screams from the next room. Footsteps. A door groaning open. Blinding light.

  “Your turn, American.”

  “Stop it, Forester,” Henry berated himself aloud. “It’s not happening. Feel this.” He wrapped his fingers around the bars of his cell. “Bars, not a dirt wall.” He crammed other voices into his head to replace the Nazis’ to pull himself out of the flashback. Think of what other people have survived and carried with them as they managed to walk, Forester, one foot in front of the other, like the Vercors’s patron, like Madame, like François. “Listen to them,” he ordered himself. “Be worth Madame’s sacrifice. You have work to do.”

  As painful as the thoughts were, Henry made himself hear Captain Dan and the conversation they’d had the morning of their last flight, when Henry had preflight jitters: Don’t get flak-happy on me, Hank. You’re the steadiest copilot I’ve ever seen.

  I’m with you, Captain.

  Dan’s confidence in him had made Henry feel strong, like someone Dan could trust. Henry could be that person again. It would be like flying a raid: Grit your teeth and focus on getting to the target; don’t be distracted by things blowing up all around you.

  Henry steeled himself, as he had countless times before takeoff, his mind free of the cloud cover of its own torment, prepped for flight. Locate Pierre, help him, and get back home—mission accomplished.

  Come back to me, Henry. Patsy’s voice—sweet, beckoning—called to him.

  I’ll find a way, Pats. I will.

  Henry shoved the Gestapo back into the dark and waited for the MPs.

  “This him?”

  Two huge men in khaki, combat boots, and the telltale armbands and white helmets marked MP stood in front of Henry’s cell.

  “Oui, this is the scoundrel.”

  “Let’s go, soldier.”

  “I’m not a soldier anymore,” Henry answered.

  “Yeah, yeah, save it for our CO.” The MP waggled his thumb toward the exit.

  Henry stepped out of the jail cell. “I need my gear.”

  “Right.”

  At the door, the fat French policeman handed Henry’s bag over the counter. As the Frenchman lifted it, his blue coat swung open. Henry spied an unopened pack of Camels in the gendarme’s breast pocket. Hey now! Henry started to open his bag right there, to confirm his suspicions that the guy who arrested him for black-marketing had stolen the very things that had gotten Henry in trouble. But the MPs hustled him along.

  In the jeep, Henry confirmed it—all his Spam, the cigarettes, and the bread card were gone. He was now down to $145 and he had no food backup or bartering items. He scrambled through his things again, looking for Madame’s scarf. He’d be sick if they’d taken that. His fingers grasped silk. He kept digging to find the Camus book. There, too. Thank goodness. Madame’s gifts had become as important to him as that good-luck marble had been on his bombing raids.

  The jeep jolted along Lyon’s cobblestone streets, the MP driving quickly. Sadly, Henry noted the irony that his quest to find and help Pierre, the child warrior of the Resistance, would end in a city that had been a center of maquis uprising and a Gestapo stronghold to squash it. Hold on a minute. If the French had stolen Henry’s things, there was no evidence left to use against him. Henry sat back in his seat, working to contain his excitement, centering himself with the sound of Dan’s voice. Steady. You’re not completely clear of the flak yet, Hank.

  Henry had never mastered a real poker face. The boys on his crew could always call his bluff during cards. Now was the time for Henry to stop being a naïve farmboy, so trusting, so open, so easy to read. He would just have to figure out how to mask his thoughts and play the fact of the missing items at the right moment, in the right way. It was the only trump he had.

  Ready, Hank? Keep sharp for bogeys.

  Ready, sir.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  The military police headquarters was busy—lots of people in and out, soldiers arrested, soldiers released, soldiers just hanging about. The MPs plopped Henry into a row of chairs in the main hallway and went to a desk to check him in. For a moment, Henry considered bolting out the door and into the street, but he knew he’d make it about twenty yards before he was caught. Besides, that would blow his game—his story that they didn’t have anything on him. Henry stretched out his legs and yawned, pretending boredom.

  The hallway was full of American civilians on some sort of official business. Th
ey all seemed to wear the same round glasses, tweed suits with wide lapels, and baggy pants. They stuck their thumbs in the pockets of their waistcoats or smoked pipes—intellectual-looking men who appeared as uncomfortable in their attempts at nonchalance and lounging as Henry felt.

  One among them caught Henry’s notice. He was a tall, broad-shouldered blond, whose golden hair was parted severely and slicked back. About him hung an air of arrogance—something about the way he crossed his arms and surveyed people down his fine, chiseled nose, something about his staccato voice. British maybe, or just oddly harsh the way he pronounced words. Most voices sounded harsh to Henry after growing up around Tidewater drawls, but there was something about this one that disturbed him. Mesmerized, Henry kept watching the man. What was it about the guy that sent Henry into fire drill mode?

  The blond man met Henry’s gaze. Henry gasped a bit at his eyes. They were a deep, bright blue against the man’s pale skin, blue like cornflowers. Henry couldn’t stop staring at them. Where had he seen blue like that before? Blue like the rim of a flame everyone thought was the coolest part of a fire, but in actuality was the hottest, most scorching element—the part that could melt flesh off bone. Those eyes.

  Then the man laughed at something his companion said, a sneering, guttural snort. It was like a firecracker going off by Henry’s ear.

  This time Henry couldn’t stop the memory. He was back in the Gestapo cell, arms tied, soaking wet. He had just been yanked up out of a tub of water and was gagging for breath, for life. Two men held him while the Gestapo torturer in charge spoke: We will give you the count of ten, American. Ten seconds of air. Ten seconds to tell me the name of your Resistance contacts.

  Eins, zwei…

  No? Oh, too bad.

  The men holding him laughed, one in a sneering, guttural snort.

  …8, 9, 10.

  The man on his left arm lowered his face to Henry’s, eye-to-eye. Ready, American? Ready to die for your country of mongrels?

  Eye-to-eye!

  Henry knew exactly where he’d seen that blue before, where he’d heard that snide laughter, that cold voice.

  Hatred threw Henry from the chair onto the blond man, knocking him against the wall and both of them to the floor. “Bastard!” Henry screamed. “You Nazi bastard!”

  He slugged that contemptuous face, pummeled it until the MPs came running and jerked him up and off. But Henry had bloodied him. Bloodied him good. It’d be a long time before those blue eyes could see straight to hurt someone again.

  “Get off me!” Henry kicked and flailed. “He’s a Nazi, part of the Gestapo. He tortured me. Arrest him, not me! What’s the matter with you? Look on his arm for the tattoo they all had. He’s SS!”

  But the MPs dragged Henry down the hall, threw him into a room, and locked him in.

  When the door opened, it wasn’t an MP or Army officer who stepped in. It was a heavyset, round-faced American with thick-rimmed glasses, followed by a guard who stayed against the wall. He waved Henry to a seat and lowered his own bulk into an armchair. He pressed his fingertips together before saying, “Well, son, you’ve gotten yourself into some trouble.”

  Somehow “son” didn’t sound friendly. Henry remained silent.

  “Trafficking in stolen American goods and counterfeit ration cards. Attacking a civilian.”

  “That was no civilian, sir. I know that guy. Boy, do I ever know him. He’s Nazi SS.” For once Henry knew exactly what was real and what wasn’t during one of those nightmare memories. That flashback brought him clarity, not fog; strength, not fear. “I’m telling you, he is a Gestapo torturer. He near drowned me in their bathtub of persuasion. It happened farther down toward the border with Spain. My guide ratted me and a couple other fliers out to the border patrol. And they gave me over to the SS. For two days that SOB helped interrogate me. I’d recognize those eyes and that voice anywhere.”

  The man pursed his lips and thought a moment. Then he snapped his fingers at the guard, who left the room, once again locking the door.

  What kind of weird game is this? Henry forced himself to wait, to hold his thoughts close to his chest.

  “Let’s start over.” The man turned chummy. He offered Henry a cigarette. Henry declined, careful not to add that he didn’t smoke, which would have made his having so many cigarettes even more suspicious. He wondered if that had been the point of the offer—to trip him up.

  “My name is Thurman. Who are you exactly? And what are you doing here?”

  Henry told his name, his rank, his record, how he went home, how he came back across the Atlantic taking care of cows and horses.

  “But what are you doing in France?”

  Henry used serviceman back talk. “Who wants to know?”

  “The United States government, son. Don’t play the stud with me. You’re in enough trouble as it is. I can put you in the brig of a troopship heading back to the States this afternoon on charges that’ll land you in jail for a couple of months. A U.S. Army court-martial just sentenced a GI to life imprisonment for selling twenty gallons of gas on the black market. The Army takes this seriously. Did you come over here thinking you’d make a few bucks?”

  “No, sir.” Lord, a life sentence. But Henry forced calm. “Cool down, papa, don’t you blow your top.” He copped a what’s-the-big-deal attitude and explained about Pierre. That his mother had packed the Spam, that the ship captain had given him the cigarettes. So what?

  “Where’d you get the bread card? The French are pretty hot about our guys messing around in the black market.”

  Here was his moment. Henry took a deep breath. “What ration card, sir? Has anybody shown you this ration card they supposedly took off me?”

  Thurman sat back in his chair and smiled slightly. “Nope. No one seems to have any of the things they said they found on you. No hard evidence.” He paused a moment. “You were with the Resistance?”

  “Yes, sir. They saved my life.”

  “How long?”

  “Couple of months, sir.”

  “Any of them Reds?”

  “Sir?”

  “Communists?”

  Henry knew some of the maquis were communists and socialists, just like le patron was. But Henry didn’t trust this guy at all. For sure, he’d spent the war driving a desk. Henry shrugged. “Not that I remember, sir. What does that matter?”

  “Could matter a lot if Stalin decides he wants to keep on marching right through Berlin into France. Because of the Resistance, the Parti communiste français is well organized and armed. It does not like de Gaulle. The members are very adept at organizing worker strikes that could paralyze the country. We believe it takes orders directly from Stalin and his politburo.”

  “We?”

  Thurman looked Henry over carefully for a long moment. Then he pulled out a business card and handed it to him. It read: Office of Strategic Services. “Know what we are, son?”

  Whatever they were messing around with now, OSS agents had risked torture and death to help the Air Force be clearer on targets. “I know you guys sent agents behind lines, like the British SOE did, to gather strategic info. And that your counterintelligence corps tried to screw up the Germans with false leaks.”

  Thurman smiled, pleased. “You could be a help to us, son, with your knowledge of the French Underground. Give us a call when you get back to the States.” He started to get up.

  “I’m not going back to the States anytime soon, sir.”

  “Ah, yes, you are. I can’t let you off scot-free. I can let the French charges drop because I don’t have the evidence in hand. But we can’t have Americans just strolling around France right now.

  “Unless, of course”—he paused and leaned forward—“you can supply me with information that could help us keep France free of Reds. Some of these communist groups are working hard to build anti-American feeling. A newspaper came out yesterday claiming that when we bombed Hitler’s factories in France we were really just trying to weaken France so th
at we could take over its market with U.S. products after the war—economic imperialism, they called it. That’s a line straight from the Soviet Union propaganda machine. I bet you could give us a list of some Resistance people we should keep an eye on until we know they really are with us. A little friendly surveillance, that’s all. If you could do that, I could look the other way about your being here.”

  Thurman let that sink in for a few seconds before adding, “We’re just trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together again in France, son. We want to make sure he looks more like Uncle Sam than the Russian Bear when we finish.”

  Henry frowned. Snitch on the political leanings of people who’d risked their lives to save him? He remembered what the Vercors doctor had said about de Gaulle’s dislike of socialists and communists. The whole thing stank.

  Well, Henry was learning fast. Two could play at this not-so-subtle game of blackmail and bribe. He hardened his voice. “What are you doing with that Nazi?”

  “What Nazi?”

  “Look, Mr. Thurman. I don’t know what you’re doing here. But I can tell you that guy I hit in the hallway is Gestapo. Maybe you think he can help you track communists, because the Gestapo was so ruthless hunting down the maquis. Or maybe you think you can use him to rat out other, higher-ranking Nazi SS hiding in France or on the run back to Germany. But that guy tortured Americans like me. He should answer for it. And God knows how many French he killed.”

  Henry leaned forward himself, so close to Thurman that he could catch the whiff of real coffee on his breath. “Bet my friends the French policemen would be interested to know that Nazi is walking around ‘scot-free,’ as you put it. I don’t think they’d cotton to the idea of his hanging around with you when you obviously know exactly what he is—an SS torturer.”

  Thurman glared at Henry.

  Henry glared back, refusing to blink.

  Suddenly Thurman burst out laughing. “Be sure to call that office when you do go home, Forester. I like you. I could use a guy like you.” He stood up and extended his hand. Slowly Henry rose and took it. Thurman’s hand was clammy. “Where in France did you say you were heading next?”