Hunting Ground

by J. Robert Janes

  Georges and Tante Marie kept a dog. It had no name but that. I fed it the cheese I’d brought and some pâté—things I knew it loved.

  The front door was bolted, the back, too. I set the bottles down and tried the windows. There was only one whose catch Georges had forgotten to repair, making me glad I wouldn’t have to find a rock and quietly break in, but could I really do it? Me, the mother of two children?

  Opening it, I climbed in to hear that old clock of theirs. Close and warm, the air was ripe with all such smells. In the kitchen, the fire had been banked, but I knew I couldn’t chance it and told myself I had to start up the stairs. It was the only way.

  There were two little rooms, just enough space on the landing to turn around. The one was for the son they never had; from the other came the sound of disturbed breathing, for Tante Marie had asthma. Mucus gurgles; Georges simply snored, yet I waited. Again, I told myself, I couldn’t do it. I really couldn’t.

  May God forgive me, I had to.

  Those cutters made such a tiny sound, my mind magnified it out of all proportion. The wire was stiffer than I’d have liked, and as I looped it around the doorknob and then one of the railings to tie their bedroom shut, I told myself it must be done.

  The smell of petrol was like no other and, suddenly, it was everywhere downstairs and over the front door, the inside and the out. The dog whined and fussed—it couldn’t understand, or could it? I nudged him away from my hands, hissed at him, ‘Bad dog. Don’t you dare bark at me!’ only to remember that he was always hungry and that he knew I knew this. ‘All right,’ I told him, and he took off like a rocket.

  Then the match was in my fingers, its flame bright and brighter still as a corner of the rag caught fire. Even then, I could turn back, I told myself, but how could I, given what I’d already done?

  I dragged that rag after me. I was moving fast, then to the front door I’d closed and wired, then to the windows and round the house to the back to drop it at last and run into the meadow as the place went up like a tinderbox, and I plugged my ears until the sky was filled with light and the air with their screams.

  ‘Madame, what has happened?’

  It was Rudi, and he’d heard that dog at my kitchen door and come out to find me standing in the road.

  ‘The stove,’ I told him. ‘It must have been that. Georges was always going to clean the pipes but would never take the time.’

  Rudi knew I was not wearing a nightgown. He could see this clearly for the moon had betrayed me. ‘Benzin,’ he said, giving the Deutsch for petrol. ‘I can smell it even from here.’

  The little station at Avon is much the same. I lean the bike against the wall and walk towards the wicket. Few people are about. There are no guards, no swastikas or eagles, no signs in German, and I find this puzzling.

  November’s greying light is impoverished. A flock of pigeons makes a circle, racing high above the empty tracks. Homing pigeons? I wonder. They’re against the law and anyway should all have been eaten by now.

  This, too, I can’t understand.

  ‘A one-way to Saint-Léger, please. I don’t have an Ausweis. At the Felkommandantur in Fontainebleau, they have said …’

  He looks at me and I wonder who he’s going to report it to, but he says, ‘Pardonnez-moi, madame, but there is no longer any need for such things.’ Begrudgingly he takes my money. He’s young and new. Me, I’ve never seen him before.

  ‘I’ve a bicycle,’ I tell him.

  ‘They’ll look after it for you.’

  The return trip must be done by bicycle or else I must stay over. That’s all there is to it. But no one ever gets out at Saint-Léger. Thinking they won’t stop the train just for me, I drag another cigarette from the crumpled packet.

  ‘Madame, allow me, please.’

  It’s the one from the house and I know he must be Gestapo! ‘Merci, monsieur. The train, it’s always late.’

  He smiles that plainclothes smile. Very nice-looking, you’d think. A salesman perhaps. ‘It’s the war,’ he says. ‘It’ll take years to get things going properly again.’

  I turn away, can’t look at him anymore—listen for the sound of the wheels—but he asks, ‘Were you in the camps, madame? Please forgive me, but I’m looking for someone.’

  It’s all lies! I know that his accent is British, but that like others of the Boche, he’ll have learned that English first before the Parisian français. ‘Which camps?’ I hear myself asking, but with hand on the Luger in my pocket. I’ll shoot him if I have to.

  ‘Auschwitz and then Bergen-Belsen.’

  He’s watching me too closely, and I know I’ll have to kill him but say, ‘I couldn’t possibly know anything about those places. I’m simply going to see my sister.’

  He touches the brim of that fedora of his. ‘Sorry. Didn’t mean to intrude.’

  That’s so British, I’m taken aback, but you can never tell with these guys. The lack of guards could mean they’re just waiting to pounce.

  It’s an anxious time, and when the train finally does come in, there’s only an engine and several passenger carriages, and this, too, I simply can’t understand.

  Taking a last drag, I grind the butt out under one of those shoes they’ve given me as my bike is taken by this man who offered me a light and earlier came to the house. He’s sticking close, so okay, he’ll soon know he shouldn’t.

  As I hand my ticket over to be punched, the chef de train, is startled. ‘Saint-Léger?’ he says. ‘Ah, non, madame, a moment, please. I will have to consult with the engineer.’

  It could take ages. ‘Saint-Léger,’ says the one with my bike. ‘Would you happen to know a beekeeper there?’

  ‘Merde, what would I want with beekeepers?’

  The chef de train comes back. I’ve caused a great fuss, but they’ll stop the train only this once. Climbing aboard, it’s like a century ago for me. The coaches are crowded, the uniforms different—American, British, and French, but I see only German ones, hear only their loud laughter and boisterous talk, know only that Gestapo is still watching me and that I’m going to have to kill him and a few of the others.

  There were six coaches ahead and one behind, then the goods trucks, all twenty-two of them, among which would have been placed the Luftwaffe’s antiaircraft gun. With such a heavy load, the engine labours, and I told myself, no wonder there was a fuss about their stopping. I’d such a small part to play in what was to come, but since I had to ride my bike over that way, should I not at least see how it all went? After I got the wax, of course, but maybe Monsieur Raymond wouldn’t be there. Wax was so hard to come by those days—practically impossible.

  Wax and petrol. The Gestapo were investigating the fire. The day before, a team came to take a look at the ashes. Jean-Guy was the one to tell me this, but I already knew of it because they’d come to the door.

  ‘Two old people, madame.’

  ‘Yes, I know. It’s very sad. My children are particularly upset, myself also. The Morissettes had been with my husband’s family for years.’

  The train crossed the ring road that encircled the Fontain-bleau Forest. There were barriers then—new ones with lights. A car was patiently waiting, the beam of its headlamps catching me in the face, causing me to wonder about the blackout and think of Schiller and Dupuis as I heard their shrieks, felt the blows, saw that brimming bathtub and knew they were going to shove me under again!

  Dupuis would come to take a look at the ruins of the farmhouse. He and Schiller wouldn’t let a thing like that lie, not with me around. They’d search for evidence, and I’d be charged with murder, and I wondered if I’d ever see the children again, only to hear the sound of those wheels. We’d gathered momentum. The Wehrmacht’s boys were singing loudly and laughing. Some French girls had joined them. Cigarettes had been offered, and the image of those girls was etched in mind by their wavy, shoulder-length hair, ersatz lipstick, rouge and bright, toothy smiles, their skirt lengths shortened then to all but above the knees.<
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  Saint-Léger … It seemed to take an eternity and then, beyond the windows, everything outside was pitch-dark as the squeal of the brakes finally came and I heard the railway trucks banging their couplings one against another. ‘Saint-Léger, madame.’

  ‘Merci. Ah, mon vélo, s’il vous plaît.’

  He tipped his hat again, that salaud of a Gestapo, and as the chef de train saw that the bike was handed down, I glanced back a last time.

  The train would now be secretly switched on to the other tracks. A coach passed by me, then the first of the railway trucks, and I counted them off, all twenty-two of them, the last trailing away into the darkness.

  The long barrel of the antiaircraft gun was clear enough, an 88 mm and perfect against Spitfires and others, but also an exceptional antitank gun, as was discovered in the desert war.

  ‘Wax? How could I have any? Those salauds take everything.’

  ‘Liar, I know very well you set some aside!’

  ‘You … Why you … Who the hell do you think you are coming here after dark to say a thing like that to me?’

  Sacré nom de nom, he was a son-of-a-bitch himself, that beekeeper! ‘I’m Madame de St-Germain, damn you!’

  ‘That rich bitch, eh?’ He hit his forehead with the heel of his hand, kissed his fingertips, shoved two of them up in front of me, and said, ‘Well, suck on someone else, my fine one. There’ll be no wax for you.’

  ‘But … but I have to do a commission for the Reichsmarschall Göring. I’m a sculptress. They’ll arrest me if it isn’t finished. I have two kids.’

  ‘The de St-Germains, isn’t it? Two kids, eh? Hey, me, Yves Raymond of Saint-Léger, now has you pegged, madame. My father, your father-in-law, and beeswax for his candles!’

  His vulture’s eyes narrowed, the thin lips puckering in anger. He had a goiter, I was certain, and needed a shave.

  ‘Seven thousand francs, madame, plus the interest. You pay me what that family of your husband’s owes mine, and I will gladly sell you the necessary wax.’

  ‘My father-in-law’s been dead for years.’

  ‘But not your husband, madame. If I understand things correctly, he’s in the pay of the Germans.’

  ‘Look, all I want is ten kilos.’

  ‘Ten!’ He was electrified. ‘For that, you’d need to pay me ten thousand francs.’

  ‘And the seven your family’s been owed all these years?’

  ‘Of course. Twenty it is.’

  The French never forget the interest. Me, I was so agitated I wanted to sit down to calm myself, but he said, ‘You’ll have to hurry if you’re to make it home before curfew.’

  It had again been extended to midnight, which would give me a little more than five hours to ride the twenty or so kilometres, if I headed straight for home.

  We went out to the shed where he kept the clarifier, the smoke pots, nets, and other things. He’d been making more hives, and the place smelled of pine sawdust, wax, and honey.

  Patiently, he counted the money twice, to be certain. ‘As it happens, madame, the Boche and the cooperative allow me to sell ten percent, so you’re in luck.’

  The block of wax he set in the carrier basket and said, ‘Happy sculpting or whatever else you do. Hey, wait a minute. De St-Germain … ? Yes, now I remember.’

  ‘More debts? I haven’t a franc left.’

  ‘Wasn’t there a bad fire up your way? Two old people …’

  He knew damned well who they were, but I told him anyway, and that their stovepipes must have needed a good cleaning. ‘I was always telling Georges this, as was my husband.’

  ‘But did you see it happen? The flames?’ he asked. ‘The corpses?’ Like the French everywhere, he really wanted the details.

  I shook my head and heard myself saying, ‘We were asleep, otherwise I wouldn’t be here. My hands and face would have been badly burned trying to rescue them.’

  ‘Peut-être,’ he said, giving me a knowing smile before pinching his windpipe and adding, ‘Some are saying things aren’t right with that fire.’

  Stung by this, I pushed my bike into the darkness, but the lane seemed to take forever and only when I reached the road did I look back to see him still standing in the doorway of his house, ignoring the blackout.

  I was some three kilometres almost due east of the robbery, but long before I got there, I heard the sharp bursts of a Spandau and knew the worst had happened. There was the crump of an explosion, the broken, agitated, and far-too-rapid sounds of inexperienced rifle and pistol fire, but the Spandau stopped, just like that! I hurried, came to a rise, and looked down on a scene of utter chaos. Two of the railway trucks were burning. Men were racing about. The antiaircraft gun was being readied. They were aiming it at our lorries! Clateau was racing for his van. Tommy had leaped up on to the flatbed. A German soldier turned. There was a burst from Tommy’s Schmeisser, and the man fell back to lay half on and half off the flatbed as others swarmed in on the antiaircraft gun, with more bursts of firing and ragged shots all along the train. One of our men fell, and then another, and I called out to Tommy, ‘ON THE ROOF!’ only to realize he’d never hear me.

  Men ducked and ran, yelling, ‘Over there! No, underneath, behind the wheels! In the woods. Stop them!’

  There was more and more firing, the constant racket of it and the crackling of flames, the sight of those burning cattle trucks as a great wall of sound began to rise. It was the terrified screams of those that were being deported and were inside. Fifty, a hundred—two hundred, four hundred? I wanted to scream at Schiller for he’d done it on purpose, but I was unable to run to their assistance.

  Nicki raced through the flames. There was a burst of firing from the gun in his hands. Hot iron was flung away, and people poured from the truck, gasping for air. In ones, twos, and threes they were helped away, but I heard someone urgently shouting, ‘Leave it! There’s no time. We can’t just let the artwork burn!’

  A ladder was brought. It was run through the milling throng by two men and leaned against the side of a truck. Clateau returned to fetch the cutting torch. Matthieu Fayelle was still helping people away from the fire.

  Tommy climbed the ladder. There were flames on either side of him. He pulled a set of goggles down over his eyes and yelled something to Nicki, who stood at the base of the ladder. ‘Tessier … Vite, vite!’

  Dynamite. They were going to have to blow the door. That gueule cassée appeared and went to work right in the heat of the flames. Two sticks, three, four, I don’t know how many, but something was needed to contain the explosion, a sheet of metal—anything so as to direct the force if possible.

  With a bang, the door lifted off, and the men rushed in to fling out the corpses of the four German soldiers who had been sealed inside.

  Not realizing that I would be outlined by the fire, I stupidly waited, though I knew I had to get home and that my job had been done, and when the muzzle of a pistol touched the back of my head, I wanted to cry out in alarm but couldn’t.

  Paintings—large canvases not in crates or anything—were being hustled out of that railway truck and raced towards the waiting lorries and Clateau’s van.

  ‘Let go of the bicycle, Fräulein, and raise your hands.’

  ‘As you wish, but please, you must understand I’ve nothing to do with this.’

  ‘Save it for later. The hands!’

  It was a German officer who had lost his cap and was burned about the face. Sweat clung to the scorched brow. Pain registered in his eyes.

  ‘Yes, I’ve been hit,’ he said in perfect French.

  ‘Where?’ I asked.

  ‘In the guts.’

  ‘Then let me help you. Look, I don’t know who those people are. Honestly, I don’t. I’ve been to buy some beeswax for our church and am on my way home.’

  Not for a moment did that gun of his waver, and I can see him still, even after all that’s happened to me. He wasn’t young or old, was a man with a family perhaps. ‘Have you children of you
r own?’ I asked. ‘I’ve two that are waiting for me.’

  As I tore open his tunic and picked my way through the blood-soaked clothing, he kept that pistol at my head. Part of his intestines was showing in the light from the fire. ‘It’s bad, isn’t it?’ he said.

  How had he managed to get this far? ‘Not too bad. Yes, it’ll be okay, I think. Let me cover the wound with something. I’ve a shawl in my carrier basket.’

  Why should he trust me? he wondered but said, ‘All right,’ and I ran for it, headed straight for the woods and dove into them to roll about and hit my head against a tree!

  Dazed, bleeding—scared, damned scared—I waited for him to end it all, but saw him teetering in the middle of the road with the fire and the confusion behind him. That gun had fallen from his hand. My bike was to one side, the block of wax having tumbled away.

  Slowly, with difficulty, I crept forward and when I was at the edge of the woods, stood up. Our eyes met, and he began to drop for the gun as I raced for it, grabbed it, and pulled the trigger. I can still hear the sound it made and smell the cordite.

  He was lying there, sprawled on his back, his face torn away, and the gun was still in my hand—it would always be there because I couldn’t comprehend what I’d done. In four days, I’d killed three people.

  ‘Maman, will Georges and Tante Marie go to heaven?’

  ‘I don’t know, chérie. Does it matter so much?’

  She nodded, this daughter of mine. Those great big hazel eyes had such sensitivity. Her hair was then a light brownish, that soft shade of amber, and long. She was incredibly beautiful.

  ‘Rudi says it matters. That only if people are good to one another will they enter the kingdom.’

  The kitchen was full of warmth and the aroma of baking bread, for I’d a full house: Schiller and two others, also Neumann and his adjutant, and Rudi, of course. Poor Rudi.

  The Boche were conducting another sweep of the forest and surrounding district. Hostages had been taken. Eleven German soldiers and one captain were killed during the robbery, five of ours, all of whom had far too many relatives.