Night of Flames: A Novel of World War II

by Douglas W. Jacobson

  Marchal waved at her then glanced toward the cleared area where Andrew and Justyn were still at work. He motioned her over to the wagon. “Van Acker needs to see you today. There’s been a development.”

  “What’s going on? What development?” Anna asked.

  “He didn’t say. He just asked me to drive out here and tell you he needed to see you.”

  Anna let herself in the back door of van Acker’s butcher shop. His assistant was not there, but she could hear van Acker’s gravelly voice in the front of the shop. She slipped into his small, cluttered office and waited. A few minutes later the bell jingled on the front door of the shop as the customer left, and van Acker lumbered into the office, sliding his large frame around her and sitting down at the desk.

  “We have a problem,” the big man said, wiping perspiration from his forehead with a questionable-looking rag. “Andree de Jongh and her father have been arrested by the Gestapo.”

  Anna stared at him in disbelief. “Mon dieu! What happened?”

  “Apparently an informer turned them in. They were both in Brussels and were picked up the night before last. But that’s not the worst of it.”

  Anna was silent.

  Van Acker wiped his brow again and continued. “Two other Comet Line operatives were also arrested. One of them was the escort designated to take the American aviators to Paris.”

  Anna felt queasy. “What are we going to do? They can’t stay, can they?”

  “Non, they can’t stay,” van Acker said. “And we’re running out of time. A couple of Gestapo goons were in here this morning.”

  “In here? This morning? What did they want?”

  “They said they knew someone in the area was harboring enemy fugitives. They wanted me to know how serious it would be for whomever it was. I’m not sure what they really know, but we can’t risk it any longer. They have to go now.”

  “But how? Who’s going to escort them?”

  Van Acker looked at her.

  “Me? Jules, you can’t be serious? Non, I can’t do it!”

  “Anna, I wouldn’t ask you if the situation weren’t so serious. I can’t do it; the Gestapo’s watching me now. Marchal and Delacroix have to stay here because there’s a drop scheduled for next week. The second American is staying with some people in Warempage, but they’re elderly, and only barely speak English or Flemish. They would have no idea what to do.”

  “Jules…it’s…it’s out of the question. What about Justyn?”

  “Couldn’t he stay with the Marchals?”

  “Well…I suppose he could but…Non! C’est impossible…it’s too…I can’t leave Justyn. There must be another way.”

  Van Acker was silent. He stared at the desk, the veins in his nose more pronounced than ever.

  Anna’s heart pounded. She knew there was no alternative. They could certainly provide the Americans with train tickets and false passports—but to send them off on their own would be a death sentence. They didn’t speak the language. They couldn’t read signs or menus. They’d never get past the border guards or railway conductors. And she knew van Acker would never take the risk of their capture and interrogation by the Gestapo. She knew what he would have to do to them. A knot in her stomach tightened. Andrew had become like a brother. “When would we have to leave?” she said softly.

  Van Acker looked up at her. His eyes were moist.

  “I have all of their documents right here,” he said. His voice cracked. “I know your English is decent. How is your Flemish?”

  Anna felt like she was being sucked into a whirlpool. “My Flemish? It’s been a couple of years, Jules. Not since Antwerp, and then only passable. Most everyone in the Leffards’ circle spoke French. How good will it have to be?”

  Van Acker shrugged. “I’m sure you’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it. Marchal has a couple of suitcases with appropriate clothing for them. Word will be sent to the contact in Paris to expect you. You should leave tonight. Marchal will use my car and drive the three of you to the station in Bastogne. If everything goes according to plan you should be back home in four or five days.”

  The second American was a twenty-year-old Californian from San Diego named Brian Chesterman. He had thick blond hair and a muscular frame and looked to Anna like someone who had spent a lot of time doing push-ups on a beach.

  Both of the aviators had false passports and identification papers that identified them as residing in Merksem, a working-class suburb of Antwerp. They were to appear as Flemish-speaking Belgians who understood neither French nor German. Over the past few weeks they had been taught to speak some superficial phrases in Flemish, which would hopefully be convincing enough in the event of a brief encounter.

  Anna knew the concept had been used successfully by the Comet Line in the past since it was uncommon for either French or German soldiers to understand Flemish. Anna also had a set of false documents with an address in Antwerp. She wondered when van Acker had obtained them.

  The train stopped in Lille, just across the French border, and a French conductor entered their car, accompanied by a German Feldgendarme. They began checking documents. Anna tried to remain calm as the two officials proceeded down the aisle, resisting the temptation to look at either Andrew or Brian. The conductor stopped at their seat and took the ticket and passport that Andrew handed to him. He checked them over carefully then addressed Andrew. “Bonjour, monsieur. What is the reason for your trip to Paris?”

  Anna’s heart skipped a beat. She was about to intercede and explain that Andrew didn’t understand French when the aviator responded in Flemish. “Ik begrijp het niet. I don’t understand.”

  The conductor glanced over his shoulder at the Feldgendarme who just shook his head. He turned back to Andrew but Anna tapped him on the arm. “Excusez-moi, monsieur, they’re both traveling with me,” she said. “I’m afraid neither one of them speak French or German. Perhaps I can help.” She held out her ticket and passport.

  The conductor glared at her for a second then snatched her papers. “Very well, madame,” he said. His tone was official, condescending. “What is the reason the three of you are traveling to Paris?”

  Anna stole a quick glance across the aisle at Andrew and Brian. Andrew appeared surprisingly relaxed, but Brian fidgeted and looked at the ground, beads of perspiration on his forehead. Anna smiled at the conductor and touched his arm again, lightly. She spoke quickly to keep his attention. “I’m sorry to cause this confusion for you, monsieur, but our company has contracted for some welding equipment with a small firm in Paris. These men are being sent there to inspect the equipment before it is shipped. I am their interpreter.”

  The conductor held Anna’s eyes for a moment then returned her documents. Abruptly, he turned and barked at Brian for his papers.

  Brian frowned and shook his head.

  Anna held up her ticket and passport. “Kaartje en paspoort, show him your ticket and passport,” she said in Flemish.

  Brian nodded and produced the documents.

  Anna tried to keep her breathing under control while the conductor examined Brian’s papers. No need to worry, she told herself. Everything should be in order. The clothing that had been provided for the two aviators had been well selected and their hair had grown out to the point where their outward appearance seemed fairly typical of young Belgian men.

  Suddenly the conductor spoke to Brian in English. “So, you are an engineer?” he asked.

  Anna stiffened.

  Brian looked up. He stared at the conductor and stammered, “Pardon? Ik begrijp het niet.”

  The conductor glared at him, then tossed back the ticket and passport, grunted something unintelligible and moved on to the next row.

  It was a little after seven o’clock in the evening when they disembarked at Paris’s Gare du Nord. Anna led the way through the busy station. As they had worked out in advance, Andrew and Brian went into the toilet while Anna walked over to the newsstand and purchased a Parisian magazine. She sat d
own on one of the nearby benches and pretended to leaf through the magazine while glancing about the cavernous station at the hundreds of people moving about in all directions. She felt foolish and frightened, not knowing exactly what she was supposed to be looking for.

  In the car earlier, on the way to Bastogne, Marchal had told her to appear as nonchalant as possible but to watch the crowd; if she spotted the same person more that once, it might indicate that she was being followed. It sounded pretty vague and haphazard to her, but Marchal had said that it was the best they could do in the way of training on short notice.

  As Anna watched the ebb and flow of people moving about she noticed something. Standing out from the throng of Parisians in their worn, drab clothing were groups of well-dressed Germans, chatting and laughing, clutching bags from some of Paris’s finest shops. Most likely they were officers and their wives on a shopping holiday in the jewel city of their conquered lands, she thought.

  Anna watched the Germans parade through the station, haughty and arrogant, her contempt building. Her fear began to dissipate and a myriad of suppressed emotions flooded back. She thought about her father…about Jan…and about Irene, lying on the floor of the toilet in Prague.

  Her resolve stiffened. She knew exactly what she had to do. Get these young aviators on their way back to England and back into the war, and send these despicable creatures back where they came from.

  She blinked, looked across the station and spotted Andrew and Brian emerge from the toilet. Andrew lit up a cigarette, as he had been instructed to do, and the two of them looked over in her direction. As a signal that she believed they were not being followed, Anna stood up, placed the magazine into her bag and walked toward the exit. Andrew and Brian followed a minute later. It was dark outside and the night air was cool. The pedestrian traffic on the sidewalks was heavy with people commuting home from work. The three of them had all studied maps of this section of Paris, and they split up, each heading in a different direction.

  Twenty minutes later they reunited at the intersection of rue La Fayette and rue de Chateaudin, and set out on foot for the address Anna had memorized. It took over a half hour to reach the neighborhood on the Left Bank of the Seine, but Marchal had warned Anna to avoid the subways and the police checkpoints that were randomly set up at the stations.

  The building on rue Lobineau was a nondescript three-story structure with a black tile roof, not unlike thousands of others in Paris. They stepped inside the small entryway and located the doorbell labeled Martel. The buzzer sounded and they passed through the second door and climbed the stairs.

  Monsieur Martel was a pale, boney man with a neatly clipped goatee and gray hair. He wore rimless glasses and looked to Anna like an accountant or banker. In fact, she learned that M. Martel was both. He was an accountant for one of Paris’s larger banks and had his office in a building just a few streets away.

  Over a glass of wine and some brie spread on thin slices of bread, Martel informed them that he had assisted more than thirty British and American aviators and a handful of French Jews during the last two years. Most of them had spent the night in his apartment.

  “I am devastated when learned of Andree de Jongh’s arrest,” he said. His English was broken but understandable. “She recruited me personally, such sincere, dedicated person.” He glanced at the cracked ceiling and sighed. “I was frightened. Had decided to quit. Then got word of two Americans being escorted by attractive redheaded woman.” He glanced at Anna with a smile and shrugged. “What can I say? Was intrigued.” He raised his glass. “À la vôtre! The report correct.”

  Anna smiled back. “What is the next step, M. Martel?”

  Martel set his glass on the small coffee table and glanced at the three of them. “You all spend night here. Anna, you leave after breakfast, return to Belgium. Andrew and Brian will be picked up here later in day and taken out of city. God willing, back in London in few weeks.”

  A look of disappointment came over the faces of the two young aviators at the words “a few weeks.”

  Martel leaned forward, tapping Andrew’s knee. “Trust me,” he said, “we get you back to England, back in airplane so you can bomb hell out of maniac Huns.”

  The next morning was cold, the sky slate gray. Anna turned up the collar of her thin, woolen coat as she left the apartment building. She felt empty. Saying good-bye to Andrew had been harder than she imagined. In just a few short months she had become very attached to him. And now he was gone. Like so many others in her life. She had forced herself not to cry when he embraced her and said that he would never forget her. But she cried now, crossing a bridge over the gray, swirling waters of the Seine. She knew that the image of the two American boys standing in the doorway, looking lost and alone, would stay with her for a long time.

  Chapter 33

  JAN SNAPPED AWAKE as the plane hit a pocket of turbulence above the Baltic Sea. He glanced at his watch but couldn’t see it in the dark interior of the Halifax. Up front, in the green glow of the instruments, he could make out the silhouettes of the pilot and copilot, their heads slowly turning as they scanned the dark skies.

  The other two crew members with him in the back were sound asleep, oblivious to the droning oscillations of the four-engine bomber. Jan stretched his legs and readjusted the duffel bags he was leaning against to provide some protection from the cold, metal skin of the fuselage. He realized he should try to get back to sleep, but his mind was once again alive in anticipation of what lay ahead.

  It was November and almost four weeks had passed since his meeting with Colonel Whitehall in London. Between the crash courses in radio operation and ciphers, basic rocket design, parachute jumping and meetings with a seemingly endless stream of intelligence analysts, he’d had very little time to himself. In retrospect, that was probably a good thing, he thought.

  During the past year, Jan realized his mental attitude was darkening with the growing number of stories he’d heard about atrocities being committed by the Nazis in Poland. In his sessions with MI-6 he’d pressed for information but hadn’t gotten much. Either they didn’t know or they weren’t talking. He knew it was probably naive to think that just because he was being sent to Poland he’d be able to find out something about Anna, but it was better than sitting on his ass in Scotland. Maybe when he got there he could—

  Jan felt a hand on his shoulder. It was the copilot. “We’ve reached the coast, Major. We’re about twenty minutes from the drop site. You’d better get your gear on.”

  Jan nodded at the British officer and got to his feet. His left leg ached from the cramped position he’d been in, and he rubbed it vigorously to stimulate the circulation. Once again he felt a surge of gratitude for the skill of the British doctor on board the hospital ship.

  The pitch of the propellers changed as the big plane banked to the left and began descending to parachute altitude. Pushed to the maximum extent of its range, the stripped-down Halifax would be dropping Jan just a hundred kilometers beyond the Baltic coast in a remote area of northern Poland. It was a long way from Blizna, but Whitehall had assured him that everything had been arranged and he would be met at the drop zone by agents of the AK. He wondered briefly how Whitehall would feel about such “assurances” if he were the one jumping alone into an occupied country, but he put it out of his mind. He just wanted to get it over with without breaking his leg again.

  The copilot shouted something unintelligible. Apparently the other crew members understood, however, because they both gave him a “thumbs-up.” One of them pulled the door open, and the noise level jumped several orders of magnitude. An icy rush of air blasted Jan, and his mind went blank as he watched the two airmen slide heavy wooden crates across the floor and shove them out into the black abyss.

  Jan snapped onto the static line. He felt a pat on his back, closed his eyes and stepped into the void. In an instant, the noise vanished and the parachute exploded above his head, jerking him upward.

  When he looked
down, Jan spotted a flickering light off to his right. With surprising speed, the ground rose up to meet him and he thumped down hard, tumbling over on his left side.

  It was over.

  He lay there for a second, flexing both legs, then jumped up and began hauling in the parachute.

  He pulled in the last of the billowing white cloth and stuffed it into the pack just as several shadowy figures emerged from the trees. He dropped to his knees and pulled out his pistol, glancing over his shoulder, to the left and right. He couldn’t see anyone else, so he trained the gun on the three advancing figures and waited.

  The figures stopped twenty meters away, their rifles now visible. One yelled out in Polish, “Have you seen the night hawk?”

  Jan felt a surge of relief at the expected phrase and started to reply when his voice caught. He cleared his throat and yelled back, “Yes, it’s flown off to the north!”

  The three figures exchanged glances. They lowered their rifles and ran to him. The one who had yelled out, looked beyond Jan to the tree line on the other side of the field. He pulled out a small flashlight and switched it on and off three times. Without a word he touched Jan’s shoulder and motioned for him to follow as the three men turned and trotted back the way they had come.

  Just before they reached the trees, Jan looked back over his shoulder and saw another group of men run into the field from the opposite tree line. They headed toward the crates.

  Jan turned back and followed the three men into the woods and along a narrow path to a small creek. Still without saying a word, they sloshed through the shallow water and up a small rise to a clearing where they finally stopped. The one who had spoken earlier wiped his hand on his rough, woolen trousers and extended it to Jan. In a coarse voice he asked, “You are Albin?”

  “Yes,” Jan replied with considerable relief. The forged papers in his jacket pocket identified him as Albin Tominski, a Polish citizen from a town near Poznan in western Poland. He gripped the short, stout man’s hand and repeated, “Albin Tominski.”