The Sisters of St. Croix

by Diney Costeloe

  “And your face. Hold back your hair.”

  Adelaide did as she was told and the old lady washed and anointed the cuts to her face and neck. “You’re lucky, there’s only one bad one here on your chin. It really needs stitching or you’ll have a scar.” She turned to Marcel. “Perhaps when the doctor comes…?”

  “No doctor until we’ve got Adèle away,” Marcel said firmly. “Too risky.”

  “But you…” began Maman.

  “I will wait until Adèle has gone.”

  “Surely you can trust Dr Clabot.”

  “Of course, I still have his car…” he laughed, “well, one just like it. But there are other eyes and ears, and I won’t take any unnecessary risks until Adèle is safely away.” He tried to stand up, but his legs seemed to buckle under him and he sank back onto the chair. “I have to contact the reception group,” he said. “There’s another drop coming in tomorrow night, and we have to be ready. The same plane will take Adèle out. Will you contact Rousseau for me? I need to talk to him.”

  “In the morning,” Maman promised. “What you need now is some hot food and a good sleep… and no argument,” she said fiercely as he began to protest. “Time enough for Rousseau then.”

  Adelaide was given the same bedroom she’d occupied before. As she lay in bed trying to sleep, she considered all that had happened since she was last in that bed ten weeks ago. Ten weeks! Was it really only ten weeks since she had parachuted into France, into the war of occupation? She thought of the people she would be leaving behind, everyday people who were trying to live normal lives; and the others who were living anything but normal lives as they fought against those who had taken over their towns, their homes, and in some cases their families. She thought of Sarah, quietly courageous, and the valiant little Sister Marie-Marc. She thought of Sister St Bruno, hiding a fugitive Jew under her bed; of Father Bernard sheltering those hiding from the Germans, those on the run and in fear of their lives. She thought of the Auclons, the parents prepared to give up their children in an effort to save them; of the twin boys so wary of anyone but each other. Madame Juliette, the Launays and the Charbonniers, simple folk prepared to put their own lives at risk to fight against the evil that had overtaken their country.

  And then she thought of Colonel Hoch, the embodiment of that evil. She had plunged her knife into him without compunction. The memory of Sarah, battered and bruised, and of Sister Marie-Marc, almost unable to stand, flooded through her, and the tears streamed down her cheeks. She had made sure that the monster would never torture and murder again, but for so many that was too late. She had been trained to kill, to be prepared to kill, and she had done so. Fernand, rotting at the bottom of the Launays’ old well, and Hoch, whose eyes gleamed as he inflicted pain; Adelaide felt no more remorse than she would have destroying any other vermin.

  Next day Marcel, though still pale and weak from loss of blood, seemed a little better. Adelaide was sitting with him in the farm kitchen when a young man arrived. He was introduced to Adelaide as Rousseau.

  “We have to be prepared for a landing tonight,” Marcel told him. “Incoming, another wireless operator, outgoing, Antoinette. Can you make the arrangements?”

  Rousseau nodded. “Of course, leave them to me.” He looked gravely across at Marcel. “I must tell you though, Marcel, I am concerned about young Benoit. He’s been acting very strangely these last few days. I think I won’t include him in the reception party. You need to talk to him. To find out what’s wrong.” Rousseau grinned suddenly. “I saw him today. He came into the café and gave me one bit of news to brighten my day.”

  “Oh?” Marcel looked up with interest. “And what was that?”

  “He said two German officers were killed yesterday in a road accident over St Croix way.” He laughed. “Don’t care how they die as long as they do!”

  “How did he hear that?” asked Marcel sharply.

  Rousseau shrugged. “He didn’t say, just said he’d heard it. May not be true of course.”

  “Keep an eye on that young man,” Marcel warned. “He’s too free with his tongue. Does he know about the drop tonight?”

  “I haven’t told him, but it doesn’t mean he doesn’t know. To be honest, Marcel, the whole group chat too much among themselves. You should talk to them all.”

  Marcel nodded. “I’ll have a word,” he said. “I’ll see you later.”

  “Surely you’re not coming tonight!” exclaimed Rousseau. “Not with your arm useless and in a sling. You won’t be any help and it’s an added risk.”

  “I shall be there,” Marcel said in a voice that brooked no argument, and Rousseau shrugged:

  “You’re the boss,” he said and took his leave to go and make the arrangements.

  When he had gone Adelaide asked, “Who is this Benoit? Is he a security risk?”

  Marcel shrugged. “Everyone is a security risk,” he said. “Benoit is probably no worse than anyone else, except that he’s young and can be careless.” Marcel smiled across at her. “Don’t worry, chérie, the risks are there every time, they are no greater tonight than any other.”

  The night was dark with only patchy moonlight between the scudding clouds. Adelaide stood with Marcel in the shelter of a hedgerow at the side of the field that would be the landing strip for the incoming aircraft. His arm was in a sling, but he insisted, as he had to Rousseau earlier, that he was coming with her to see her safely away.

  During the afternoon they had talked, sitting side by side at the big kitchen table, left on their own as Maman had made a discreet withdrawal.

  “When you arrived I wondered why on earth they had sent someone so young and inexperienced,” Marcel admitted. “I reckoned you were a tremendous risk to us all.”

  Adelaide grinned at him. “Yes,” she agreed with a smile. “You made that abundantly clear!”

  He took her hand in his and held it against his cheek. “How wrong I was! You’re the gutsiest girl I’ve ever come across… and the most beautiful.”

  Adelaide felt the colour flood her cheeks and she pulled her hand away. “Come on, Marcel. We both know there’s no future in talk like that.”

  “Isn’t there? This bloody war isn’t going to last forever, and when it’s over I’m going to come over to England and find you.” His eyes were intent upon her face. “I love you, Adèle. Didn’t think it could happen to me… falling in love at my age… far too cynical… but it has. I love you and when we’ve kicked the bloody Boche out of France, I shall come and find you.” He reached out to her with his good arm, pulling her to him. Adelaide allowed herself to rest against his heart, for a precious moment feeling safe within his embrace, and each of them had drawn comfort from the closeness of the other.

  “I mean it,” he said. “When this war is over, I shall come and find you, wherever you are.” He spoke in English, his accent, as he spoke her language rather than his own, imbuing the words with added depth. “Look for me after the war, for if I survive I will come.” He kissed her then, holding her a little awkwardly with one arm, the passion in his kiss reinforcing the passion in his words.

  The sound of the Lysander throbbed in the air and the reception party switched on the bicycle lamps set out to illuminate the makeshift runway.

  The pilot made a single pass overhead, and then the engine note changed as he throttled back and made the approach to land. Marcel pulled Adelaide into his arms one more time and kissed her as if he would never let her go, and she, responding, returned his kiss with equal passion.

  “Remember,” he said fiercely, “and never doubt it, I shall come and find you, chérie.”

  The plane touched down, and almost before it had come to a halt the door was opened and the incoming wireless operator was scrambling down the ladder. Reaching back, he heaved his wireless suitcase from the plane.

  For a moment Marcel stared down at Adelaide’s face as if to imprint it on his memory forever, and then he gave her a little push. She ran across the grass and scrambled u
p the ladder into the plane. The moment the door slammed behind her, as she was scrambling into the observer’s seat, the pilot revved the engine and taxied round to take off again.

  As he did so, there was a rattle of machine-gun fire from somewhere outside.

  “Christ!” bellowed the pilot. “Ambush!”

  One glance sideways through the canopy, and the pilot’s face became a mask of grim determination. The plane was gathering speed and Adelaide was flung against the fuselage as the Lysander lumbered across the field before lifting into the air. The sound of gunfire continued, and as the Lysander banked away, Adelaide looked down to see muzzle flashes from the field below. The moon sailed out from behind the clouds, and in its pitiless light Adelaide saw figures running in all directions, some stumbling and falling, others diving for cover in the surrounding woodland. And then they were gone, as cloud enveloped the plane and she could see nothing.

  “Just got you out in time,” shouted the pilot above the roar of the engine. “Sorry for the poor bastard we just took in! He’s probably bought it!”

  Adelaide huddled against the throbbing fuselage of the plane, the tears flowing, unchecked, down her face. For the first time she allowed herself to acknowledge what Marcel had come to mean to her. Strong and brave, he came to the drop to make sure she got away safely… because he loved her, and she had seen him mown down by machine-gun fire. His words echoed in her ears. “Look for me after the war, chérie, for if I survive I will come.”

  As the Lysander droned its way home across the Channel, Adelaide knew with a despairing, aching heart that Marcel had not survived and that he would not come.

  Epilogue

  Summer 2006

  Adelaide Talbot leaned back against her pillows and sighed. “So there you have it,” she said. “I came back to England and when I’d been debriefed, I was given wireless training and then sent back. Different area of course, where I was completely unknown. Normandy. I worked with the local resistance as a courier and liaison until the Allies landed.”

  She smiled at Rachel Elliott, journalist from the Belcaster Chronicle, who had come to interview her. “I was lucky to survive, hundreds of us didn’t.”

  The old lady fell silent and closed her eyes. Wondering if she had fallen asleep, Rachel glanced across at James Auckland, sitting on the other side of the bed holding his grandmother’s hand.

  “What a sad story,” Rachel murmured. “Sad and brave. I wonder what happened to them all, Sarah, Sister Marie-Marc, Marcel and the children.”

  She was just reaching forward to switch off her tape recorder when Adelaide’s eyes opened again and she said softly, “It was all so long ago, so long ago.”

  “Did you ever find out what happened to Sarah?” Rachel asked gently, sitting back again and letting the tape continue to run.

  “Yes, I did,” replied Adelaide. “It took some time, of course. Everything was in chaos at the end of the war. The Allies discovered places like Bergen-Belsen and Auschwitz. Hundreds of thousands of people had disappeared and those that had survived were refugees; no homes, no families and nowhere to go. We traced Sarah to Ravensbrück, the concentration camp for women. Some of the survivors remembered her, and spoke of how she did all she could to alleviate the suffering of those around her. One woman said that ‘Mother’ was always wherever she was needed, nursing, encouraging, keeping her faith strong to strengthen others. Even most of the German guards treated her with some sort of respect, occasionally giving in to her demands for an extra ration of food to be shared among those too weak to collect their own portion.” Adelaide gave a rueful smile. “She died as she had lived, always caring for those around her, putting their needs first. She finally caught typhus, which in her weakened state carried her off very quickly.”

  “And Sister Marie-Marc? Was she with her?” asked Rachel. She had been completely caught up in Adelaide’s story and felt she had come to know the people who had played their part.

  Adelaide shook her head. “I asked, of course, but no one I met remembered her. I think she probably died en route to the camp. She was in a dreadful state when she was loaded onto that lorry, and it’s unlikely she survived the journey. I imagine they went first to Drancy, the transit camp outside Paris, where the conditions were said to be absolutely appalling.” Adelaide gave a rueful smile. “Dear Sister Marie-Marc, she was so determined to outwit ‘Les sales Boches’ who stole her chickens.”

  Silence settled round them and the old lady again closed her eyes. Rachel didn’t speak; her mind was teeming with everything she’d heard. There was such a story here; far more than she had ever anticipated when, at the suggestion of James Auckland, she’d asked the old lady for an interview. James had sent the book he had written about his grandmother’s exploits in the war to the Chronicle for review, and Drew Scott, the editor, had given it to Rachel to read.

  Rachel had been fascinated and had rung James up to arrange an interview.

  “It’s not me you need to talk to,” he said. “It’s my grandmother. I’ll introduce you if you like.”

  Rachel had accepted the offer with alacrity, and here she was hearing the story, first hand, from the woman whose story it was.

  “You didn’t think of writing the book yourself?” Rachel had asked her.

  With a laugh, the old lady shook her head. “No, I’m far too old. I’ll be ninety in September. No, it was James who suggested it. I didn’t think anyone would be interested, but he said they would, so I left it to him.”

  “And you simply told him what had happened.”

  Adelaide shrugged. “I told him what I knew. I don’t know exactly what did happen when Sarah was arrested and questioned, but,” she added grimly, “having seen her and Sister Marie-Marc and the Auclons when Hoch had finished with them, I could guess.” She sighed and again lapsed into a silence broken only by the summer sound of someone mowing the grass below the window.

  Already Rachel’s journalistic mind was sorting and cataloguing what she had heard, the story she would write already taking shape in her head. The details of the fear and the courage that had emerged as she’d spent the afternoon with Adelaide were safely trapped on tape, ready to be replayed as Rachel worked on her story. No simple book review now; but an in-depth piece of journalism.

  “But of course I did find the twins,” Adelaide said suddenly as if there had been no lapse in the conversation. “Jacques and Julien.”

  “Did you?” Rachel was startled back to the present. “How marvellous! Where were they?”

  “In the convent in Paris. Father Bernard had managed to get them there and Mother Magdalene kept them. She gave them new names and managed to get them new identity papers. When I went back to try and find Sarah, I went to the mother house in Paris in case they had news of her. They hadn’t of course, but Mother Magdalene mentioned that the boys were still there and I asked to see them. They didn’t remember me, but I knew them at once.”

  “And their parents?”

  “Enquiries had been made about them, but nothing was known about either of them. Almost certainly they were sent to one of the extermination camps, but there was no record. They simply disappeared among the thousands of others.”

  “What happened to the twins?” wondered Rachel.

  To her surprise both James and Adelaide laughed. “Well, that I can tell you,” Adelaide said. “I adopted them and brought them home to England. We anglicised their name, Auclon, to Auckland. James is Julien’s son.”

  “What?” Rachel stared at James in disbelief. “You’re joking!”

  “Never more serious,” he grinned. “My dad, Julien Auckland, is a doctor, and my uncle Jacques is a solicitor, or they were before they retired.”

  “And they’re both still alive?”

  “And kicking!” James agreed cheerfully.

  “It really is the most amazing story,” Rachel said. She turned back to Adelaide. “And Marcel? Did you ever discover who Marcel really was? Did you ever find out what happened the nigh
t you made your escape?”

  Adelaide smiled. “Oh yes,” she said. “He told me himself.”

  “But I thought he was…” began Rachel.

  “So did I,” admitted Adelaide, “for the rest of the war. But he wasn’t. Because he wasn’t working with the reception party, he wasn’t out in the field when the Germans opened fire. Only he and Rousseau survived that attack. It turned out that Benoit, the young man they had been discussing, had turned traitor.” Adelaide’s voice hardened. “Like Fernand, Benoit wanted to be on the winning side and had been selling information to the Germans.” A shadow passed across her face as she added, “Needless to say, he did not survive the war. Anyway, Marcel managed to get away, and to gather another group round him. He continued his fight until France was liberated and the war ended. And then he came to find me.” Her face lit up at some private memory. “He was a lawyer. His name was Antoine Talbot, we were married for forty years.”

  The End

  ~

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