‘I changed it yesterday.’ In fact, it’d been three days.
‘Your mother told me the major’s son’s been killed.’
‘Yes, out in Africa somewhere.’
‘Hmm. I wonder where the major is. Thomas, as your mother calls him.’
‘I don’t know. Did you sleep well then?’
Georges’s shoulders dropped. ‘Did I sleep well? Ah, I slept like a king; it was heaven. A proper bed. Although I still feel tired. And a proper breakfast. I feel human again. The food at Hotel du Gestapo leaves a lot to be desired. I dread to think what Monsieur Michelin would make of it.’ He sniggered to himself as he stepped inside one of the sheds.
Pierre changed the chickens’ water, slightly irked that his father had found him out.
The knock on the front door was alarmingly loud. ‘Blimey, someone’s in a hurry,’ said Georges, popping his head out of the shed.
‘Perhaps it’s the major,’ said Pierre, surprised by how much he hoped it was.
Pierre followed his father back into the house. The living room felt crowded as Georges and Pierre were confronted by three Germans. Their presence seemed to take all the space. Lucienne, wearing her headscarf and outdoor jacket, ready to go out, had already let the visitors in. Pierre recognised the officer, Lieutenant Neumann. Lucienne, fidgeting with her ring, said, ‘These gentleman want a word with you, Pierre.’
‘Where is he then?’ barked the lieutenant. ‘Has he been back?’
Pierre found himself stepping back. ‘Who? The major? No.’
‘Have a look round,’ said the lieutenant to the two privates. While they searched the house, the lieutenant eyed Pierre with narrowing eyes. ‘My French – it’s good now, no?’
‘Very good.’
‘We were expecting the major back last night for dinner,’ said Lucienne. ‘Weren’t we, Georges?’
‘Where is your friend, Foucault?’
‘Kafka?’ said Georges. ‘I haven’t seen him for weeks.’
‘And you?’ he said to Pierre.
‘Nor me, not since the...’
‘Shoot-out?’
‘Yes.’
The two privates returned to the living room, shaking their heads.
‘If you hear anything, you tell us straightaway. You understand, yes?’
‘Yes, of course, Lieutenant,’ said Lucienne. ‘Straightaway.’
The lieutenant nodded and left; the two privates following in his wake.
Pierre and his parents watched them leave, then turned to each other. ‘Oh dear,’ said Lucienne. ‘This sounds serious. Where could they be?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Georges, ‘but something tells me they’re together somewhere.’
‘You mean Kafka has kidnapped Thomas?’
‘Seems mad, I know, but then Kafka is mad. Always has been. You can never know what idiotic scheme he’ll come up with next. Doing nothing has never been his way; he’d rather do anything, however stupid, than do nothing.’
‘I don’t like this one bit,’ said Lucienne. ‘Oh well. I was about to go the bakery and a few other chores. You two need anything? No?’ She kissed both her men. ‘I’ll be back soon.’
*
His father went off to have another bath, ‘purely for the indulgence,’ he’d said. Taking his bicycle, Pierre decided to visit Claire. After all, they were accomplices now. He found her coming out of the chemist. ‘Look,’ she said. ‘Shampoo. Quite a rarity these days. Come, let’s talk.’
They walked towards her home, Pierre pushing his bicycle. ‘So, how are you, Pierre? How did you get on with the Gestapo?’
He shrugged his shoulders. ‘They were fine. Just asked me a few questions.’
‘Me too. We must be the only people in France who have walked straight out of a Gestapo interview intact. They asked me where Kafka’s disappeared to. And your major. They actually believed me when I said I didn’t know.’
‘The same.’
‘Do you think it’s a coincidence – both of them disappearing at the same time?’
‘I don’t know. Probably.’
Madame Clément passed by, her shopping bag full of vegetables. They waved at each other. ‘They knew about the bomb,’ said Claire. ‘Someone told them.’
‘Yes, someone must’ve talked.’
She smiled. ‘Well, it couldn’t have been Bouchette or Dubois, and it certainly wasn’t Kafka, and it wasn’t me. So...,’ she said, drawing out the word. ‘That only leaves you, Pierre.’
‘Does it?’
‘Come on; don’t play games with me.’ She stopped and placed her hand on his sleeve. ‘I approve, you know, you did the right thing.’
He leant his bike beside the wall of a house that backed onto the street. ‘Monsieur Bouchette was killed. I didn’t want that to happen, and now they’re going to execute Dubois.’
‘It was their choice, Pierre. Remember what we said in Bouchette’s kitchen? “Shed your own blood, not the blood of innocents.” Those were Bouchette’s very words. No one but me realises it, but think of the people you saved, the innocents.’
‘Apparently the bomb was small and would have done minimal damage.’
‘Yes, but think of the reprisals.’
‘I suppose.’
‘You suppose nothing. Come here, you... you brave man.’ She pulled him in by the lapels of his jacket and gently, very gently, kissed him on the lips. Pierre felt a warmth cascade through him. His fingertips tingled, his heart burned with a feeling he’d forgotten – the feeling of joy. She wrapped her arms round him. Emboldened, he followed suit. Her kiss became more urgent. This, he realised, was the real thing, the real Claire, so unlike the kiss on the roadside leading into the town. She pulled away and lowered her eyes, momentarily abashed.
He tried to suppress a grin. ‘I thought I was too young for you.’
‘Not any more, you’re not,’ she said quietly, looking up at him through her fringe.
*
Back at home, Pierre found his father sitting in his armchair, deep in thought. ‘Oh, Pierre, I was miles away. You OK? Good. Listen, Pierre... Sit down. I need to tell you something.’ Pierre took a chair opposite him. ‘I never thought I’d tell anyone this tale; I’d promised myself never to mention it, but I think you need to know what sort of man Kafka really is.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘I’ve never told your mother this.’ He paused, his eyes drifting away. ‘It was night time, the first of January 1918. New Year’s Day. Kafka and I had been in a patrol with some boys from our battalion. Kafka’s main job was to be a sniper. I have to give it to him, I’ve never met a man who can fire a rifle as accurately as that man. Something to behold. Well, on the way back from this patrol, we became the subject of a German attack. Shells, machine guns, the lot. We fought back. A few of ours were killed. Kafka saw his mate have his head blown clean off. It upset him terribly; made him determined to fight back in any way he could. His mother had recently died, and he was close to her. So he was already churned up. Then the bombardment stopped as suddenly as it had started. When the smoke cleared, Kafka and I found ourselves alone. The others, if they hadn’t been killed, had gone on without us. We didn’t know where we were. The attack had disorientated us. We didn’t know which way was forward, which way was back. It was pitch black, and bucketing down. We were utterly lost and, I don’t mind admitting it, Pierre, we were scared...’
‘What happened?’
‘We tried to find our way back, naturally. We must’ve gone the wrong direction because we found ourselves in an area that had seen a lot of shelling. German dead lay everywhere and bits of German, an arm here, a leg there. We’d already been fighting for a year or more so we took it in our stride. But when I think about it, as I do everyday, it was enough to turn your stomach. At the time, though, I was just impressed that our artillery had done such an effective job. Kafka and I knew we had to turn tail and make our escape before we were seen. And that’s when we came across him – this German
boy, lying wounded in a ditch. His hand hung off by the tendons; he was barely conscious and had lost a lot of blood. He could have been no more than nineteen, maybe twenty. Not much older then you, Pierre. Fair hair, clean-shaven, bright blue eyes. He had a ring on the hand hanging off. His other hand clutched a crucifix. I read his name on his dog tag – Otto Zeiss, a corporal. He didn’t have long but at the time, I thought we could save him. I wanted us to carry him back to our lines. I thought our medic boys would simply amputate the hand, cart him off as a prisoner and he’d be fine. I was already thinking, you see, of the future. I wanted to be able to live with my conscience after the war, and to be able to say “yes, I saved a man, the enemy; my place in heaven is assured”. Kafka was having none of it. He wanted to kill him off there and then. He could only think of the here and now; angry that his friend had met such a horrible end at the hands of the Hun. We argued; we pushed each other. I said, you cannot kill him in cold blood. He said the man had killed his friend and many others besides; he deserved to die like a dog, without mercy. I knew then that the boy was as good as dead because there was no way I could carry him by myself. So I begged Kafka to make it quick; to allow him, at least, a merciful death. He called me a German-lover, a secret enthusiast of all things German, and said, “He’ll have the death he deserves”. Oh, Pierre, I’ll never forget it. I was powerless to stop him. He stuffed a handkerchief or a rag in the boy’s mouth and then went at him with his bayonet – in the legs, his knees, the testicles. I tried to stop him, to pull him off. The tortures that poor boy endured. Only when he had lost consciousness, did Kafka administer the fatal blow. He pocketed the boy’s ring and that crucifix, and ripped off his dog tag, and threw it into the darkness. It was the final humiliation – his parents would never know; only that he was missing, and would have to endure the agony of waiting and not knowing.’
Georges fell silent, his head in his hands. Fishing a handkerchief from his inside pocket, he blew his nose.
‘The war unhinged Kafka. It was me who gave him that name by the way. He was reading Metamorphosis when I first met him. He must have read it a dozen times during the time I was with him in the trenches. I hadn’t known him beforehand. He lived a few towns away. But getting to know him in the army during the autumn of sixteen, he was your usual happy-go-lucky chap.’
‘I... I don’t understand. Did he want to torture him?’
‘Just killing him wasn’t enough. He’d wanted to hurt this German boy; he wanted to take revenge for all the misfortunes that had fallen on him. I remember, a few months before, we were behind the lines, enjoying a few days off. We were exercising in some woods. Kafka caught a rabbit. Rather than kill it, he stunned the creature and took it back to our lodgings where he put it in a crate or a cage the farmers use for their dogs. Then, he took a serrated knife to it and hacked off one of its feet. The poor thing screeched to heaven come. I remember him saying, “A rabbit’s foot is meant to be lucky, isn’t it?” Then, the next day, he hacked off another foot. By the following day, someone had killed the poor creature out of mercy. Kafka was livid; someone had spoilt his fun.’
‘Do you think he’s kidnapped the major?’
Georges rose to his feet. ‘Either that or perhaps the major’s captured Kafka a long way from home and is on his way back through the woods.’
‘Perhaps one of them is wounded.’
‘I don’t know, but I intend to find out.’
‘What? How?’
‘I know his hideaways. Come help me get some food from the kitchen.’
They’d moved into the kitchen. Pierre watched as his father filled a small haversack with a baguette and a sausage. ‘But why, Papa? Why do you need to get involved?’
Georges stopped. ‘You’re right – I don’t have to. But I need to. I could have saved that German. I could have informed his parents. What I did that night, Pierre, was cowardly and I’ve never been able to forgive myself. Not a day has passed when, at some point, I haven’t thought of Otto Zeiss. Every night now, for twenty-two years, I’ve gone to bed with his face in my mind, the memory of that horrible day. I should’ve saved him from that monster who lives in our midst. I cannot let him do the same to the man who saved my skin from the Gestapo. I know this sounds dramatic, but it’s time to atone for my sins.’
‘It wasn’t...’
‘Yes?’
‘No, nothing.’ It wasn’t just the major who saved you, father; it was me, forced to turn on my countrymen, forced to work for the enemy; it was me who saved you. But he couldn’t say it.
Georges sighed. ‘Your mother, she thinks I’m a godless person. She has no idea. I have great faith; I just never show it. I don’t allow myself. I believe God looks over us, takes note of our actions and our... inactions. It’s just that I am still, even now, too ashamed to step into His house; too ashamed to let Him into my heart. He knows. He knows I could have stopped Kafka from killing that man.’
‘But, Papa, it was war–’
‘Murder is murder, Pierre. The circumstances excuse nothing. Kafka is a murderer and I, by my complicity, am no better.’
‘No, Papa, you can’t say that, you can’t mean that.’ He remembered the expression on Kafka’s face after he’d shot Tintin, a look of diabolical pleasure.
‘Oh but, my son, my dear son, you have suffered too. What sort of father have I been to you? What sort of example have I set you over the years? I’ve ignored you, haven’t I? I’ve been no father to you, just a presence. I didn’t want children; I admit that. I didn’t want to pass on my genes. But of course your mother... She wanted children, lots of children. Of course, we had the two.’ He found a bottle from under the sink and filled it with water. ‘He’ll be waiting for me; I know that. He’ll see it as a game. And if I don’t get there in time, he’ll cut his fingers off one by one.’ He bounced his haversack by its strap. ‘That’s everything, I think.’
‘Can I come with you?’
‘No.’
‘But what if you don’t come back?’
‘Pierre...’ he placed his hand on his son’s shoulder. ‘If I don’t come back it’s because the fates have decreed it. It’ll be my own fault.’
‘What do I tell mama?’
‘Tell her... tell her the truth, that I’ve gone to look for Major Thomas. Tell her I’ve gone to look for Corporal Zeiss.’
With that, he was gone.
*
Pierre spent the next few hours trying to kill time. He was tempted to go see Claire again but, somehow, after their kiss, he feared he wouldn’t know what to say to her any more. Instead, he visited Xavier and together they went for a cycle ride round the outskirts of the town. They lay in a field, leaning against an elm tree and idled away the time. Pierre found he had little in common with his old friend now. ‘I’ll give you a race,’ said Xavier.
‘What?’
‘To that rock over there. And back.’
‘Don’t be so childish.’
He returned home in the late afternoon. His mother had been back and gone out again. A pan of chicken stew simmered on the stove. Taking a wooden spoon, he helped himself to a sip, burning his lips in the process. Rather watery, he thought. He went out into the yard and sat in the rocking chair and considered his sculpture. He wasn’t sure he even liked it any more. Her arms seemed too big, her legs too bulky. It lacked finesse. His amateurism stared back at him. Why did adults, proper adults, always say what they thought he wanted to hear? Why did they always hide behind deceit dressed up as kindness? Who did it benefit? Picking up a stick, he jabbed at the ground. Otto Zeiss. He would probably have been the same age as his father. He would have had a family by now, living a comfortable life somewhere in Germany. Perhaps in Bremen. It had already been several hours since his father left. With each passing hour, his unease intensified. And now, hearing the front open, he would have to tell his mother.
‘Pierre, Pierre,’ she rushed into the yard, untying her headscarf. ‘Where’s your father?’
‘
He... he went out. Earlier.’
‘Where on earth to?’
‘I don’t know.’ He ran his finger along the tip of the stick.
‘Pierre, you do know. I can tell. Where is he?’
‘He’s gone to find the major.’
Her hand went to her mouth. ‘Oh no. No, no, no.’ Rubbing her eyes, she asked. ‘How long will he be?’
‘Well, I wouldn’t know, would I?’
‘Oh dear, oh dear. Why does my heart feel so heavy? If the Germans can’t find him, then what makes your father think he can?’
‘He does know the area better than any German.’
‘Pierre, if that’s meant to reassure me, I’m afraid it doesn’t.’
*
Georges still hadn’t returned by bedtime. Lucienne had been unable to keep still all evening. ‘This is so hard to bear.’ She pulled back the curtain, looking up and down the street. ‘It’s long past curfew. I had my husband back with me for one night and now he’s gone again. It seems so unfair. If anything, this is worse. At least, before, I knew where he was. It’s the not knowing that is so trying.’
‘I know.’
‘Could you not have stopped him?’
‘How? I didn’t know he’d be gone for so long.’
She sat down on the sofa and immediately sprung up again. ‘No, I suppose not. I wished I smoked, or drank. Anything. You go to bed if you want.’
‘What about you?’
‘I’ll wait up a while longer. He must be back soon.’
‘It is strange. First Kafka, then the major and now–’
‘Yes, thank you, Pierre.’ She re-arranged the vase within the living room niche. ‘I don’t care about Kafka; I don’t care so much now about the major. I just want your father home.’
Chapter 20
Pierre ate his boiled egg breakfast in silence. His mother, wearing black again, maintained a silence borne out of worry. She busied herself in the kitchen, continually washing her hands. When, earlier, Pierre had tried to suggest Georges would surely be back today, she snapped back at him. How on earth could he know? Deciding that saying nothing was the best option he concentrated on his egg. Once this war was over, he thought, once everything was back to normal, he would never eat another egg in his lifetime. Nor the cod liver oil.
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