by Rachel Hore
She laughed at that. ‘How could I be more frightened than I am? Rafe, I know exactly what could happen to me. There’s no point trying to protect me from it. We’re in this together all the way.’
‘I want to protect you,’ he said.
They lay together, not feeling the need for any more talking. The creatures in the roof settled into silence, perhaps aware of the coming storm. Outside, the little rolls of thunder were grumbling louder and closer, and though the moon no longer shone, the room was periodically lit by lightning. Then came the first urgent taps of rain.
Rafe drew the sheet up over her shoulders and together they lay listening to the storm as it passed overhead. The air became cooler, less heavy, and eventually she slept.
After that night he often came to her. Her room had the advantage of being further away from the Girands’, but his had a double bed. Once they were embarrassed to meet Mme Girand in the corridor, but she merely murmured, ‘Bonne nuit,’ and retreated to her own bedroom.
They went downstairs the next morning feeling very nervous about what might be said, but the woman was exactly the same with them as she always was and the matter was not mentioned, so after a while Rafe’s room was where they spent the night. It was, Beatrice thought, like being in a sort of haven together where they could, for a short time, be blissfully happy.
At first they didn’t talk much; it was as though they lived entirely in the present – alive to a creak of the stairs, or the distant sound of a vehicle or the warning bark of a dog a mile away. Here, at least, the weight of the past had fallen from their minds. There was only the work they had to do, and the delight of exploring each other.
‘Do you think of home?’ she asked him once, but he shook his head.
Once she woke in the small hours to find he was awake, too, lying quietly, just watching her in the half-darkness.
‘What is it?’ she whispered.
‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘I like to see you sleeping. You look so peaceful.’
Rafe, on the other hand, was a restless sleeper. There was another time she awoke in pitch darkness to find him gone. She panicked, got up, found the door was open and slipped down the stairs. It was such a relief to glimpse him outside at the edge of the cornfield, pacing up and down, the tip of his cigarette glowing fiercely. Not wanting to disturb him, she padded upstairs again to bed.
Once, after they’d made love, he clung to her so tightly it hurt. ‘I love you,’ he mumbled. ‘I still can’t believe you’re here.’
‘Oh, Rafe, I love you, too. But I worry . . . will it be different when we’re back in England?’ If they ever got back, said a little voice in her mind.
‘All I know now is that I want to be with you always,’ he said, and she was almost but not quite comforted.
July 1943 moved slowly by and something in the air was changing; Brigitte and Gaston sensed it, the old men in the café felt it. German patrols passed through more frequently; there was a house-to-house search one market-day, ending in a whole family being taken away, their crime being to hide a Jew. Then Stefan brought word that the man he’d had followed, André, had vanished, and enquiries at the hotel led nowhere. He’d simply paid up and left.
‘The tide is turning out there. They’re getting frightened.’ Gaston’s solemn pronouncement followed the news filtering in of the Allied invasion of Sicily.
‘They’ll tighten the screws here, then,’ Rafe replied, and indeed the hope in people’s eyes was tempered by fear. The Resistance might be growing bolder, but everyone was afraid of reprisals. And so the tension grew.
Chapter 31
‘Bea, get up!’ Rafe was shaking her awake. There was the sound of banging, shouting all around, coming from downstairs. A woman’s voice – Brigitte’s – could be heard, high-pitched, screaming. Beatrice knew what she had to do. Her hand closed on her pistol under the bed, her ammunition belt. Then her jacket – she pulled it on – and shoes. Rafe, already dressed, wrenched open the shutters. He said, ‘You first – hurry.’
It was all familiar from the training. Step on the chair, swing over the windowsill, hang down, jump, knees together, into the darkness. And she was rolling amongst the weeds, getting to her feet, then stumbling over a low wall and away, running through the cornfield. She could hear Rafe behind her, then his jacket brushed against her arm. ‘Over there,’ he gasped. She swerved towards the hedgerow and a copse of trees, blacker shapes in the blackness.
Bright beams of light, the crack of gunfire. Now they were out of the cornfield and treading on loam. When they reached the copse she looked back. Half a dozen torchbeams were searching the field; the man with the gun was out in front.
Beyond the copse lay another field, then, she knew, dense woodland and, some distance off, the river. ‘This way!’ she cried. Into the field she ran, Rafe just behind her. A bullet sent earth flying up into her face. She cried out, brushed it away, still running. Her breath came in heavy gasps now. The ground changed again under their feet and they were dodging past trees, their clothes catching on undergrowth. She mustn’t look behind or the torchlight would blind her.
She was beginning to see quite clearly in the darkness. They found a path and ran along it, all the time alert to the sounds of pursuit. They came to a lane, crossed it, and cut along the side of another field under a line of poplar trees.
To the right, the land began to slope downwards. Rafe overtook her and veered out into the open and down the hill. The response behind was more cracks of gunfire before the dip took them out of sight of their pursuers. There was a brighter sound, the rush of running water. The river! Her heart leapt with hope. On they ran.
They crossed another lane by an old farmhouse, setting dogs barking, then climbed a wooden fence and struck out once more into scrubby woodland. The rush of the river was all the time growing louder. There must be a weir. Now she saw Rafe’s purpose. She remembered from her briefing that the river was quite wide at this point, and shallow, with lots of forested islands; surely there would be plenty of opportunity to hide. And now they were nearly at the water. She could hear it, frothing and churning. She was right, there must be a weir, though it was too dark to see it through the trees.
Pain ripped through her ankle and the ground slammed into her chest. ‘Bea, no, get up!’ Rafe cried, and she felt his arms around her, hauling her to her feet.
When she put her leg down the pain in her ankle was excruciating. ‘I can’t,’ she sobbed. ‘You must go on.’
‘Don’t be stupid.’ He tried to drag her, but she resisted.
‘Leave me, Rafe. It’s your only chance.’
‘No.’
‘Rafe, this is not about us,’ she said, struggling. ‘I’ll be all right; I can talk myself out of it. Go, for God’s sake, or they’ll get us both.’ And the whole thing would be doomed.
‘I won’t leave you.’
Torchlight strafed the trees above and shots exploded all around. Rafe bucked and cried out, and it was with a sense of desolation that she saw the darkness claim him. She prayed he’d not been badly hit. She rolled over behind a tree, stood up on her good foot and fumbled for her gun.
When the first white-faced figure came at her, she took steady aim and pulled the trigger.
It was his expression in the torchlight before she fired that fixed forever in her mind. He was a young man, as young as Rafe, with Rafe’s gold hair, and his face showed utter terror. Then it flowered with blood and he fell.
She was aware of someone behind her, felt a great crack to her head and for a time knew no more.
She came to on her back in an open truck. Her head ached, her ankle burned with pain, her wrists were bound tightly behind her. Something heavy pinned her legs to the floor. When she moved her head to see, she realized with horror that it was the body of the poor boy she’d shot.
‘Get down!’ came the order in German and a vicious jab in the chest cut off her breath. She lay still, aware of her tormentor’s rifle still hovering above, waiting
for an excuse to hit her again. The vehicle changed gear and roared on, bumping over the country roads. Soon the vibrations changed and she saw the passing silhouettes of buildings. Eventually the truck rumbled to a halt. Another soldier came to help remove the body, then they seized Beatrice and tried to make her stand, but her ankle crumpled, making her scream with pain. They half-carried her through a small door in a huge, dark building. For the first time she felt real fear.
They dragged her down a dimly lit corridor past a row of cells, all of them closed, until they reached an open door at the end where they took her in and laid her on the concrete floor. There they untied her and retreated. She sat up as a wardress appeared, a muscular German woman, who stripped her of her jacket, trouser belt and shoes, and searched her with rough hands. Then she, too, left, locking the door behind her.
Alone for the first time since her capture, Beatrice inspected her ankle gingerly, wondering if it was broken. It was certainly swollen and, when she tried to stand, it wouldn’t take her weight. Her head still ached from the blow.
She took the measure of her surroundings. The cell was about three yards square. The only window was too high to see out of, though it threw stripes of pale dawn light across the floor. No chance of escape there.
A thin straw mattress lay against one side wall, a metal bucket at the other. She crawled over to the mattress and curled up to gather her strength and to think. Rafe. She prayed that he was still alive; that he had got away. But what had happened to Charles, and to the Girands? Desolation crept over her. She didn’t know where she’d find the strength for what would happen next. Whatever that was. It struck her that the suicide pill had gone with her jacket. That decision had been made for her, then.
She must have slept for some hours, despite the pain, for suddenly the light from the window was brighter and sound from the street came to her ears.
A few minutes later, the cell was unlocked and two policemen were admitted.
‘Get up,’ one said in English.
‘Excusez-moi?’ she responded, slipping into her part.
‘I said get up.’ He hauled her to her feet. She cried out, but found she could just about stand if he held her.
‘J’ai mal à ma cheville,’ she cried. ‘J’ai besoin de voir un medicin.’
‘Later,’ he said. ‘I think it’s not broken.’
Each taking an arm, they conveyed her out of the prison, across the square and into a grim three-storeyed house that was guarded by more Gestapo.
She was taken to a room where a senior officer with a broad fleshy face sat behind a large desk, and was helped into the chair opposite. The man pulled a notepad towards him and took up an expensive-looking fountain pen.
‘Good,’ he said in English, surveying her calmly. ‘Now, we talk. Tell me your name.’
‘Je ne parle pas l’anglais,’ she replied, looking him in the eye. His eyes were very pale blue; the whites reddish from tiredness. Now he grew irritable.
‘It is useless to pretend. We know you are English.’
‘Je ne comprends pas. Parlez en Français,’ she persisted.
He sighed. ‘So we play it your way. Bien. Parlons français.’ His next question threw her. ‘You know André Mansart.’ He spoke in French now.
André. The man in the café. He could only mean him.
She pretended to consider. Every nerve in her body was alert. What was the best answer? ‘No,’ she replied.
‘I think you do.’
‘I don’t.’
‘What is your name?’
‘Paulette,’ she told him.
‘Paulette,’ he repeated, shaking his head. But he removed the top from his pen and made a note on his pad. ‘Paulette who? And where do you live?’
She remained silent, deciding that she must still pretend to be Mme Girand’s cousin, but that she shouldn’t let out information too eagerly.
‘Mademoiselle, I should tell you that we already know more about you than you think we do. If you give me correct answers, you will find that everything will be simple and straightforward and you may go home very soon.’
Bea thought this very unlikely, but perhaps it was worth pretending to go along with this line for a while and see what happened.
‘My name is Paulette Legrand,’ she said hesitantly. ‘I live in Nexon with my family.’
‘Then what are you doing living with er . . .’ he consulted an earlier page of his notepad ‘. . . the Girands in Saint Pardoux? It is no use denying, since that is where they said you were last night.’
‘I am staying with her for a while to work in the café. Her husband is unwell and can no longer do much. She needs help, and my mother sent me.’
‘And your mother’s name is . . .?’
‘Félice.’
‘And her address in Nexon?’
‘Nineteen rue Saint Juste.’
He put down his pen and said, still in French, ‘I think we will find that there is no road with that name. Now why don’t you drop this pretence. We know you are English.’
Her head began to pound harder, but she forced herself to keep looking at the German.
‘No. You are wrong. I’m Paulette.’
‘And what was Paulette doing, running away with a British spy? And why did she have a firearm, hmm? Where did she learn to use it?’
‘I’m not saying any more,’ she replied. ‘You talk in riddles and won’t believe me when I tell the truth.’
‘What is the truth?’
‘That I’m French. That my name is Paulette.’
‘Yes, yes, and Paulette has killed a hero of the German nation. You are not the innocent young girl you try to make out.’
‘If you won’t believe me, then I will say nothing more. Except that I need to see a doctor. My ankle really is very swollen.’
‘Yes, yes. So, you will not be unduly alarmed then, when I tell you that the body of the man you were with was pulled out of the river last night.’
Beatrice froze, a voice screaming in her head. He is dead. Rafe is dead. No, it was a trick, it had to be. She forced a shrug and heard herself say, ‘I don’t know who it is you mean.’
At this the man appeared to give up. He screwed the top back on his pen, stood up and went to the door. He opened it and spoke to someone waiting outside. In the brief moment that his eyes were off her she struggled to master herself. Rafe was not dead. She refused to believe it. It was the only way she could go on.
They returned her to her cell and dumped her on the mattress, but it seemed they were determined not to let her be. Every few minutes someone came to disturb her. First the woman who’d searched her the previous night. She brought water, bread and a bowl of fatty soup that Beatrice could not eat. Then a guard, who walked in and stared round the cell, as though checking that she couldn’t escape. Then, at last, the doctor arrived. He was an old Frenchman with thinning silvery hair. He was fearful of the guards and wouldn’t look her in the eye. First he examined her head, where she’d been hit, then tutted at the state of her ankle, manipulating it and getting her to stand. Finally he said he didn’t think it was broken and ordered a cold poultice to reduce the swelling. The wardress tried to stop him giving her a bandage. ‘I’m not going to hang myself with it,’ Beatrice said, angry and eventually the woman gave in. ‘Take these aspirin for the pain,’ the doctor murmured, before packing up his bag. ‘I will ask to see you tomorrow.’
Tomorrow. She was losing all sense of time. She lay down to get what sleep she could. What seemed only a short time later, but was probably late afternoon, the Gestapo officer summoned her for interview again. She held stubbornly to her story.
This time, when she returned to her cell she was pleased to hear the soldier who escorted her say the word ‘Resistance’ to the wardress. If she’d instilled a doubt that she was English then she’d done well. Her life might still be on a thread, but she hadn’t betrayed the others and the Germans might just deal more leniently with her if they thought she was a rebel
lious French girl than if she was a British spy.
Her feelings of relief were quickly stifled. The next morning when she awoke she was taken from her cell to a waiting car.
They told her she was being transferred to Paris.
And so the nightmare deepened.
A gruelling 200-mile drive across France, then the car turned down a long avenue of trees ending at the heavy gates of a monstrous prison building. Once inside she gave her name as Paulette Legrand. They wrote it in their book. A dumpy woman in grey SS uniform marched Beatrice down an underground passage, then up a long metal staircase off which ran floor after floor of corridors caged with iron bars. They went down one of these to a wretched little cell. There the woman stripped her naked and searched her, then gave her different clothes of a coarse material, ordering her to put them on. When she asked to keep her underclothes, the woman answered her with a slap across the face. The door clanged shut and she was alone.
This cell was worse than the last, draughty, for the tiny window was broken. Plaster peeled from damp walls. There was an iron bed with a lumpy mattress, a broken chair and a dirty bucket. That was all. Beatrice lay down on the bed and wept.
The next day, the process was reversed. Along the corridor, down the staircase, through the underground passage and out into the fresh air, where a long black car awaited. And so, once more, Beatrice entered Paris. There were the lovely gardens, the long boulevards, the elegant shops, but none of these for her now. Yet the building in the grand street running off the Arc de Triomphe where the car drew to a halt was not as she expected. This was no dark prison or functional police headquarters, this looked like a grand palace. How appearances can deceive.
They took her up a wide staircase to the fourth floor, and into a splendid, high-ceilinged office. The man behind the desk, who stood at her entrance, did not have the appearance of the monster she expected, instead being young, good-looking and dressed in a tailored suit rather than uniform.
‘Come and sit down,’ he murmured in English, and dismissed the men who brought her. She sat on an upholstered chair and looked about, her fear temporarily allayed. It really was a beautiful room, with silk curtains at the windows and old paintings on the wall. All this spoke of civilization, of graciousness.