A Gathering Storm

by Rachel Hore

  ‘I expect you know why I’ve asked you here.’

  ‘S’il vous plait, parlez français.’

  ‘I think you must give up this pretence. I can assure you that we know all about you.’ There was something about this voice, suave, assured and dangerous, that inspired fear. He laid his fingers on the edge of the desk, very lightly, like a pianist poised to play. It was a gesture of total control.

  ‘Miss Marlow. It is Miss, isn’t it? I believe you are not married.’

  She couldn’t stop herself staring at him in horror. ‘Comment? Qu’est-ce qui se passe?’ she managed to whisper. She waited for him to mention her son, but thank God he didn’t.

  ‘You see? We know everything about you already. We know about your operator, Rafe Ashton, we know the man you call Charles. We know a very great deal, Miss Marlow. Your mission is, how do you say, full of leaks. Your leadership too trusting.’

  She pressed her lips together and said nothing, but knew her dismay must show.

  He pulled a folder towards him and, opening it, took out a small rectangle of card. This he passed to her. ‘You know who this is.’

  She found herself staring at a picture of her mother. Her mother at twenty, riding a hay-wagon, laughing. ‘Pretty, no?’ The officer’s eyes sparkled.

  ‘What does this prove?’ she said in French, but a sense of dread stole over her.

  He sat back in his chair as though to enjoy the full effect of his words. ‘We paid her family a visit,’ he said, and she almost gasped. ‘Your grandmother and your Cousin Thérèse are, shall we say, enjoying a little holiday with us.’ His thin pale lips curved in a smile and she stiffened and stared down at the photograph, trying to control herself, aware that he was watching her like a leopard with its prey.

  Finally she said, in English, ‘My family are nothing to do with this affair. It is me you must deal with, only me.’

  ‘Then in your hands lies their fate,’ he said briskly. ‘But, please, things are not so bad. If you help us then you, too, may return home. Since we know so much already, there is no point in withholding anything else from us. We will find out somehow.’

  ‘I won’t tell you anything,’ she said.

  ‘I think you will. It is obvious that your masters care nothing for you, since they have been so lax about security. There are these, for instance . . .’ From the folder he withdrew two sheets of paper and gave them to her. ‘We have copies of all the radio messages.’

  She read them quickly in growing alarm. How did they get hold of these? Did this mean they’d captured Charles? One was a transcription in which Charles had asked London what to do about André. The reply seemed to her now horribly glib: We know nothing of Andre, stop. See what you can find out about him, stop. He may be useful. Useful, yes. But to whom? Had he been acting by himself or was he working for the Nazis?

  The police officer chuckled, as though enjoying her discomfort. She pushed the papers back on the desk.

  ‘What we want from you,’ the man told her, ‘is names. Names and the details of plans. Where the stocks of weapons are kept, which targets are involved. By telling us these things, you will save lives. These rebels are but a fly on our operations, but they are a nuisance and we are determined to stamp out this kind of trouble. In the long run you will see it is for the best.’

  ‘I don’t know anything about plans and targets,’ she told him. ‘And I wouldn’t tell you even if I did.’ She looked down again at the photograph of her mother, still cradled in her hands. ‘So you see there’s no use trying to get at me through my family.’

  He put out his hand for the photograph.

  ‘No, I’m keeping this,’ she told him, with a lift of her chin. She would rather tear up the photo in front of him than return it into his keeping.

  ‘Have it,’ he said. ‘Maybe focusing upon it will make you see reason.’

  ‘I am already clear in my mind,’ she said. ‘Did you not hear me? I know little and will tell you nothing.’

  The man’s smiling expression did not change. He rose and shook a little bell and two soldiers came in. For a moment she wondered what was happening but he merely put out his hand and said, ‘Thank you for coming to see me, Miss Marlow. I’m sure we shall meet again very soon.’

  She ignored the outstretched hand and turned to go. Then remembered something. ‘One thing,’ she said, turning back. ‘The wardress in the prison. Last night she struck me in the face. It was cruel and quite unnecessary. I would ask that someone speak to her about it.’

  ‘I am sorry to hear this. Leave the matter with me,’ the officer said, unblinking.

  Beatrice wondered if anything would be done, but she felt better having said it.

  As the door of her cell clanged shut, Beatrice sank down on her bed and for a moment gave in to an attack of wild despair. What was she to do? She had no idea whether Rafe was alive or dead, no idea whether she should concentrate on helping her family. She was quite sure the officer was telling the truth, that her cousin and grandmother were in custody. She imagined this prison contained others like them, hostages. She tried to think calmly. Where should her loyalties lie?

  If the enemy knew as much as they seemed to about the activities of her operation, would she really be betraying her country to fill in a few details and save her family? Her whole operation was blown, and surely safe houses would have been closed down by the remaining members, and people sent into hiding – if they hadn’t already been arrested. And yet . . . she thought of Stefan and the doctor and the pirate-man. They all had families, too, and yet they’d struggled against the occupying force in such a brave, almost reckless fashion. If she said anything that put even one of them into danger, it would be the same as saying that their sacrifices were worthless. In what book was her family worth more than theirs? At least her child was safe in England.

  Her thoughts were broken by a heavy trundling noise, then came a bang on the door. The peephole opened and a bowl of something steaming was pushed through onto a little ledge, followed by a lump of greyish bread. She went to fetch it, not realizing until now that she was ravenous. She forced herself to eat the horrible stew slowly, moistening the bread with it, silent tears pouring down her face all the while.

  Afterwards, still hungry but too exhausted to care, she lay down and slept, a fitful sleep full of terrible dreams. Once she woke and it was pitch black and her ankle was throbbing. She needed to turn over but she couldn’t move. It was as though the darkness were pressing down on her, stopping her from breathing, stifling all hope.

  She must have slept again, because she was woken next by a man’s shout beyond the tiny square of window, where pale daylight now gleamed. Another shout came, then a shock of gunshot and a thin, animal cry that tore at her soul. She staggered over onto the chair and tried to see out of the window, but the only view was of the brick building next door. Marching footsteps and men’s guttural voices echoed upwards from the yard. Then came other cries. For a moment she couldn’t make them out. In her inward eye she saw the soldiers untie the bodies and take them away. She slumped on the chair and raked her hand through her hair, again gripped by a terrible despair. The cries came from all around now, from other cells, she realized. ‘Vive la France!’ they were crying and her heart leapt.

  On the wall by the chair someone had written something in tiny faded handwriting. She had to twist her head to see, and after several attempts managed to make out the words.

  Quand j’etais jeune, je gardais les vaches.

  Maintenant les vaches me gardent.

  When I was young, I watched over the cows.

  Now the cows watch over me.

  It was the last time she was to laugh for quite some time.

  Later that morning – she was already losing a sense of time – the wardress came to fetch her. There was something in her eyes that made Beatrice wonder whether she hadn’t indeed been spoken to, but there was no repetition of the rough treatment. Beatrice was taken to the same office in the G
estapo Headquarters in Avenue Foch, to meet the same man, but this time the atmosphere was different. Although the man spoke as quietly and politely as he had the day before, there was an underlying tension.

  Again, he asked her to give him names and the details of Resistance operations in Southern France. Again, she said no.

  ‘I’d like to show you something,’ he said, going to open the door. ‘Come.’ He waited courteously for her to go through first, then led her up a flight of stairs to another part of the building. Here he opened some double doors with a flourish, and she was shown into a beautiful chamber that was clearly used as a conference room.

  Her eyes were immediately drawn to a great map of France on one of the walls, and it was this that the officer had brought her here to see. As she got close enough to read, her resolve almost left her. At the top of the map was Major Buckmaster’s name, and spreading out beneath it, like a great spider web, was a chain of command that named all his circuits in France, their organizers and wireless operators. So it was true. They knew everything. But no, they didn’t. Again, the thought of Stefan and his comrades-in-arms kept her strong.

  And you will recognize this, perhaps,’ the man said, going to a sort of sideboard, opening it and bringing out a heavy object the size of a shoebox. Of course, to an untutored eye one wireless set might look very much like another, but Beatrice knew where she’d seen this one before: in Charles’s room over Café le Coq.

  ‘I know what you’re telling me,’ she said in a colourless voice. ‘Is he still alive?’

  ‘I’m afraid it is I who asks the questions. Now, are you ready to talk to me?’

  She looked up again at the chart, at Charles’s name under Rafe’s, and decided.

  ‘No,’ she said.

  Although he said nothing, merely turned on his heel and told her to follow him, she could tell he was furious. Back in his office, he picked up the telephone and rapped out something in German. Soon, two guards arrived and again she was led away.

  ‘This is not the way to the prison,’ she said in French to the man sitting next to her in the car. ‘Where are we going?’

  He ignored her as the driver took a route through a mass of side-streets, finally stopping outside a grim-looking concrete building in a narrow, shadowed road.

  ‘What is this place?’ she asked in increasing alarm, but again she was ignored. She was hustled out of the car and inside the building. There, two guards escorted her up several flights of stairs, along more corridors, until they stopped outside a door and without further ceremony, pushed her inside. She stumbled, but when she turned to ask where she was, it was already too late. The door slammed shut and she was alone.

  Alone – and yet, in this shadowy room she sensed the presence of others, those who had been here before her and whose pain and sorrow had been absorbed into the atmosphere. And as she glanced about, the voices of the ghosts began to speak through writing on the walls. Above the bed someone had pencilled in English Never confess and I am so afraid. By the door: Catherine, je t’aime. Adieu, mon amour. Almost worst was a simple calendar labelled July 1943, marking off the days in crossed-through blocks, each completed block meaning five. Four vertical lines: on 29 July it had ended. She tried to calculate the date and thought it must now be . . . no, 30 July! She stared at it in horror, wondering what had happened to the unknown person who had been here until yesterday, then searched around for something that would make a mark. Finally, she found a bit of soft grey grit that enabled her to complete the block, gaining a tiny satisfaction from the task.

  She’d just laid the grit down on the floor where she could find it again, when there came the urgent sound of footsteps outside, then of a bunch of keys and the lock turning. The man the guard brought in was her interrogator from the Avenue Foch.

  ‘Ah, Miss Marlow. I hope you are comfortable in your new premises?’ His manner was the same as ever: polite, suave – even warm, as though he really did care whether she was comfortable.

  ‘What do you want?’ she asked.

  ‘You will come this way, please.’ She stood and made to follow him, but suddenly her limbs felt terribly weak. She concentrated on the hot throb in her ankle, finding it gave her courage.

  The guard opened a door to a large square room with windows all around. A tall figure of a man was silhouetted against the light. And at the sight of him, Beatrice felt a terrible animal fear. She could not, would not enter, but stood obstinately, her hands on the doorframe, until the soldier pushed her over the threshold. She fell against a table. On it was laid a collection of cruel-looking metal tools. And the wall above it was splashed with red-brown stains.

  Firm hands pulled her up and sat her in a chair. The guard tied her wrists to the armrests and her legs together above the ankle. The face of her interrogator filled her line of vision. She stared into those calm blue eyes, knowing he could save her. He said, ‘Miss Marlow, Beatrice, all you need to do is tell us the things we wish to know. The names, please, you know the ones I mean. And details of the plans. It’s very simple.’ His voice was low, reassuring.

  Her lips quivered. Part of her wanted to tell him. She couldn’t see the man standing behind her, but every bit of her body sensed that he was there. Finally she gained enough control of herself to say, ‘No. I’ll tell you nothing. NOTHING.’

  His face suffused with anger. ‘Miss Marlow, by whatever means, we will get this information from you.’

  Her response was to spit in his face. He recoiled, wiped his face with a handkerchief, then gestured to the man behind her, who moved over to the table by the door so she saw him clearly for the first time. Under his white doctor’s jacket he wore a suit. The trousers had sharp creases and his black shoes shone. When he came towards her he carried a pair of cruel-looking pincers.

  The guard stooped and pulled off her shoes. She struggled but they held her down; she went rigid with terror, and swallowed her breath.

  The pain, as they ripped out her toenails, was worse than anything she’d experienced. She tried to scream, but the guard clapped a hand over her mouth. She bit the hand as hard as she could. A man’s high cry of outrage and the hand smacked her.

  ‘Give me the names of the people who helped you,’ the interrogator said very gently. ‘One name and we will stop. Come, Miss Marlow. Bitte.’

  She shook her head frantically and closed her eyes, rocking herself against the waves of agony. Someone seized her other foot and again came the torture. This time she heard the ripping of her flesh.

  But still she would say nothing.

  She made no mark on her cell calendar for the next few days, for light and darkness merged and faded as she lay in agony on her bed. She was aware once of a man with careful hands anointing her feet and dressing them with bandages, but mostly they left her. The food came and was taken away uneaten. She could not sleep, though she’d doze, and when she did, the lost voices in the cell spoke to her, soothed her, bade her be strong.

  And then the Gestapo officer came again. Two soldiers seized her and back they took her to the torture room. This time the man in the suit took an electric branding iron. He lifted the shirt from her back and pressed the iron to her flesh, and she shrieked at the most exquisite pain. After that she sank into kind oblivion. When she swam back to consciousness, it was only to pass out again with shock, the smell of burning meat filling her nostrils.

  And still she would not tell them what she knew.

  They took her back to her cell. Now she could only lie on her front and sob as the doctor treated her wounds with something that stung. He murmured soft phrases in German as though she were a child, and she sensed that he was doing his best in the midst of the horror. The whole world was pain and confusion and she did not know who she was any more. She’d wake from visions that she was looking down on herself from above: a slug-like creature on the bed, black and naked. She had no identity, only a single will – that she would not speak.

  Twice more they took her to that room, but the
second time was different from all the others. The white-coated man held a syringe and thrust its needle into her thigh. She must have passed out, because the next thing she knew she was again in her bed, the blanket flung across her. After this, they did not come for her any more and she supposed they’d given up. So she came to wonder what the injection had been, and what she might have told them under its influence.

  Chapter 32

  Once the worst of the pain receded, dread poured into its place. It took many days for Beatrice to train herself not to tense at every footstep in the corridor, and as daylight drained from the cell each evening, she threw up a prayer of acknowledgement that she’d survived.

  But darkness brought different terrors. Tomorrow, it might be her turn to be seized from her sleep and marched down to the yard below at dawn, tied to a post, blindfolded and shot.

  She tried to calm herself by imagining that she was somewhere else; riding Cloud over the cliffs by Carlyon in the wind and the rain, kneeling amongst the rockpools looking for mermaids’ palaces. Tasting salt upon her lips, stroking Jinx’s oily hair and feeling the wet roughness of his tongue. How happy she’d been there, she knew that now. Her spirit roamed every part of St Florian; her feet walked the cobblestones by the quay, her fingers twisted the wiry sea grass. She remembered the chalk and leather smell of Carlyon’s schoolroom, the view of the croquet lawn, Angelina’s bewitching laugh.

  She tried to think of them all now, of her son running around, but he would look different, she couldn’t imagine how, and this upset her.

  They’d be worried about her. Miss Atkins might have written to her parents. She tried to project her thoughts to let them know she was still alive. This made her feel a little better.

  She had no idea if Rafe was alive or dead, in prison or free. She’d done all she could for him, to the utmost of her being, but she dreaded the worst. Since they had Charles’s radio and if, under the influence of some chemical, she’d given out names, then . . . she didn’t dare to think.