by John Harris
‘A mouse couldn’t get through there now, monsieur,’ he beamed. ‘Not even a flea.’
‘And look at the door,’ Reinach said. ‘It fits like a glove and moves like a dream.’
He put his weight behind the heavy woodwork and it swung to with the precision of a railway carriage door.
‘Though I say it myself,’ he crowed, his face wearing an expression of pride, ‘I know my job, and Dréo’s hinges are perfect. It’s twelve centimetres thick and made of oak but, with a little grease supplied by Monsieur Schäffer, it moves without a sound.’
Klemens nodded his approval. ‘What about the paintings?’
‘All done, monsieur.’
The crates stood together at the back of the cellar, all labelled.
‘I had two men here every bit of the time. Herr Oberst,’ Schäffer said. ‘If the crate says “Baron de Frager with horse and groom”, then that’s what’s inside it.’
He handed over the key, and they all stood back while Klemens inserted it. As he turned it in the ancient iron lock, removed from the stables and oiled and refurbished by Sergeant Dréo, there was hardly a click.
Klemens smiled. ‘You’ve done a good job of work,’ he said. ‘It’s more like a prison than a store-room.’
Reinach grinned. ‘Yes, monsieur,’ he agreed. ‘It is, isn’t it?’
4
The Wehrmacht started arriving in the Néry-St Seigneur-Rolandpoint valley the next day.
Mere Ledoux’s youngest son, who entertained ambitions to play football for one of the big French teams after the war, was kicking a ball against the wall of the bar and kept careful count of them as they passed. Everyone knew that the Gestapo was beginning to crack and were collecting civilian clothes - in Dijon there wasn’t a suitcase left in the shops - while the French police were actually beginning to round up the gangs who’d lived off the possessions of the Maquisards hiding in the woods.
Then a German lorry carrying pigs for troop rations was shot up on the Vangouillain-Mary-les-Rivières road near Salutre. In the atmosphere of mounting dread, the German soldiers left their dead behind, climbed into the escorting kübelswagen and bolted. Since the réseau who’d done the job had also had casualties and bolted, the pigs were left unattended until discovered by young Dréo and his friends on their bicycles. By evening they’d all been slaughtered, cut up and hidden by the overjoyed Néry men.
It was as they were turning their backs on the bullet-riddled lorry that they saw the column of Germans pouring up the road from Dijon; a long stream of armoured cars, motor cyclists, staff cars, lorries, even occasional tanks. Lacking any kind of formation, they moved very slowly and there were frequent halts to investigate possible traps - a sure proof that the Maquis were beginning to be feared.
‘I think,’ Reinach observed grimly as they watched from the trees, ‘that our friends are finally heading for le dernier round-up.’
There was already a great deal of hither and thither between Rolandpoint and St Seigneur that seemed to indicate Klemens’ men were preparing to leave. But nothing had yet happened in Néry. To the south, they heard, Villebasse was drowning in Germans who in their rage and fear had set fire to the village and partly destroyed it. Assomes was also sunk deep in the German tide and the young men had tried to avenge the earlier atrocity by sniping at the retreating columns as they passed, while the girls kept watch for the next lot. But, though they were harassed, the Germans were by no means throwing their hands in. While the troops remained in the lorries, tanks were called in and machine guns set up, and the whole column finally went into action with mortars and light artillery plastering the woods behind the running Frenchmen. The village was left devastated, a terrible sight with burning houses, mutilated men, and weeping women and children.
All transport began to disappear - lorries, petrolettes, cars, even bicycles. The Germans had been harried for miles and were willing to shoot to obtain something on wheels.
‘There’s a rumour at the chateau that the Americans are being held up north of Chaumont,’ de Frager announced. The Germans are blowing the bridges across the Marne, and the Maquis are having to fight to hang on to the crossing at Vignogny.’
‘That’s all we need.’ Neville said bitterly. ‘We can’t do a thing if we can’t rely on the Americans coming up on time.’
‘We can do a bloody lot even without the Americans,’ Urquhart growled. ‘What’s the matter, lad, losing your nerve?’
Neville’s head jerked up but for once there was no sign of a smile on Urquhart’s face.
‘You don’t think everything went dead right with Montgomery’s plan at Alamein, do you?’ he said. ‘I bet he bit his nails a bit here and there, in spite of what they say. It’s a good plan you’ve thought up. Boy’s Own Paper couldn’t have done better. And it’ll work. All we have to do is keep an eye on Klemens so that we know the minute the bastards look like leaving.’
The praise surprised Neville because Urquhart had never been one to offer much encouragement, and he began to take heart again.
That afternoon, Reinach found a reason to take his lorry to Haute Falin in the hills. It was noticeable as he left that several mothers with young children were taking the opportunity to visit relations and were packed on boxes in the back. Other women were stuffing perambulators with babies and treasured possessions and setting off in well-spaced groups on foot, ostensibly with the same purpose in view. Half of them carried messages demanding help while their husbands busied themselves digging holes in their gardens, packing valuables into boxes and old suitcases, and burying them under footpaths and dung-heaps and vegetable plots.
After dark the horizon to the south flickered with flashes and they could now hear the sound of gunfire. As they talked, Commandant Verdy de Clary arrived, his cold indifferent eyes hard. ‘I am a French officer,’ he told Reinach. ‘I request the right to join you.’
Reinach glared. ‘You’ve waited long enough,’ he snapped.
Verdy’s eyes flickered. ‘There was no point in aggression when the Germans were powerful,’ he said stiffly.
‘No,’ Reinach snorted. ‘C’est comme au bed des pompiers. Ce sont toujours les mêmes qui dansent. It was always the same people who took the risks. Did you expect them to lay down and let you walk on them? There were some who didn’t. Most of them are dead.’
The old man’s eyes flickered. ‘I’m a French officer,’ he repeated. ‘I demand a command.’
‘I don’t fight under some parvenu who sat back and enjoyed the war,’ de Frager retorted. ‘We don’t want people who’ve rejected us.’
‘I want them,’ Urquhart said quietly. ‘He’s a trained soldier, and I want every man I can get who knows his job.’
‘No one would work with him!’
‘They will if I say so,’ Urquhart snapped. ‘I want someone who’ll do as he’s told, not just some farm-boy who’ll let off his gun when he thinks the time’s right.’
The following morning, Euphrasie, the Baronne’s maid, brought the information that she’d been told to complete the German officers’ laundry before midday.
‘They’re moving!’ Reinach said, and half an hour later Jean-Frédéric Dréo came hurtling into the village on the Spitfire.
Neville and Urquhart had been sitting at the table, Neville frowning at his map, Urquhart sharpening a billhook with a stone as if the normal work of the farm had to go on and there was nothing else in the world to think about.
‘They’re burning papers in St Seigneur and Rolandpoint,’ Dréo panted.
Urquhart looked at Neville, then at Marie-Claude who was helping her mother to dry the breakfast dishes. ‘It’s time we went,’ he said quietly.
He put down the billhook and the stone and rose unhurriedly. As he followed him, Neville’s heart was pounding.
At the door he turned and saw Marie-Claude’s eyes on them, troubled and concerned.
‘Better start things moving, Marie-Claude,’ he said. She nodded silently, drying her hand
s on a towel, her eyes never leaving their faces.
By lunch-time they were on the slopes above the village where a surprising number of men had discovered there was work to do. As the village emptied, several of the older children slipped surreptitiously out of school and set off on their bicycles to play truant. One or two went fishing, passing on their way to the river through the hamlets of Araigny, Tarey and Violet. One boy went to visit his grandmother in Metz-le-Bois, and another cycled through the villages of Cheuny, Amizy and Beauzois before disappearing with his girl friend into the woods at Bois Seul. ‘What you do afterwards is your business,’ his father told him. ‘What you do before belongs to Néry.’
Their arrival halted all activity in the hills. Harvesting stopped. Men and youths disappeared into barns and started digging under dung-heaps and piles of hay, lifting boards or burrowing into the roofs of their cottages, even into the walls at the backs of pigsties. Old rook guns appeared, with twelve-bores and long hunting rifles, even ancient muzzle-loaders that had been in their families for generations and hadn’t seen the light of day for years. The action was largely symbolic because the hill villages had also had parachute drops and there were anti-tank weapons, Stens, Brens, mortars and rifles. Bicycles, petrolettes and horses appeared in the streets and it was surprising how many of their owners found they had business in the direction of Néry. At four in the afternoon, a message reached Reinach from the St Seigneur post office.
Those parcels you asked me about - they’re on their way. They’ve just left. They should arrive tomorrow.’
Reinach dug out the old lorry, tossed his tools into the back for the look of the thing, and set off for the woods. Men were already waiting near the saw-mill with their bicycles and petrolettes, watching a German light plane circling just above.
‘Reconnoitring the route up the valley,’ someone said. ‘They don’t trust anyone these days.’
‘When Major Rieckhoff’s people from St Seigneur reach Rolandpoint tomorrow,’ Colonel Klemens was saying, ‘they’ll pick up Doench’s men and von Hoelcke’s tanks and press on here. When we leave we’ll be in strength.’
‘Route, Herr Oberst?’ Klein-Wuttig asked.
‘Rue des Roches to the Langres road.’ Klemens looked at a sheet of paper in his hand. ‘All food to be removed. All surplus stores to be destroyed. The first vehicles, consisting of two of Captain von Hoelcke’s tanks, will leave here at 10 a.m. the following day. I don’t want to be caught in the Forest of Frênes after dark.’
He paused, glancing again at the paper, aware of Frobinius watching him carefully from near the fire. ‘The second part of the column under Fritzi,’ he went on. ‘will leave as soon as the tanks and the following lorries are clear of the village. All men will carry weapons, ammunition and rations for three days. Lorry-mounted machine-guns will be manned at all times. Look-outs will watch not only the sky but the trees as well. I shall be in the centre of the column with Tarnera. The rear will be made up in the same way as the van, with von Hoelcke’s remaining two tanks coming last. That way, we shall have armour and guns handy at any point. If trouble comes, it’ll come where the read starts to rise to the St Amarin ridge. Questions?’
‘Women?’ Tarnera said. ‘There are still women clerks in St Seigneur.’
‘They leave this afternoon. Their buses go straight through. I don’t want to be hampered with them.’
‘Sniping?’ Klein-Wuttig said. ‘Suppose it starts as we leave the village?’
‘No mercy,’ Frobinius snapped.
‘I want no women and children harmed,’ Klemens said.
Frobinius smiled. ‘We don’t differentiate. We take the whole family.’
‘I would remind you that this is my command.’
‘And I would remind you, Herr Oberst, that since July 20th, on the Führer’s instructions, all commands are subordinate to the SS and the Gestapo. I will handle the security. The first family that’s shot, the first house that’s burned, will serve as a warning for everybody else along the route.’ Frobinius rose. ‘And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have things to attend to.’
As he left the room, arrogant in his shining boots and black uniform, Klemens glared after him.
Klein-Wuttig coughed. ‘One other question, Herr Oberst.’ He’d been worrying for some time over whether he should inform Frobinius about what was hidden in the cellar, In the end he’d decided not to, and now his eyes glanced downwards meaningly.
Klemens’ frown disappeared. ‘The lorry containing the -ah - secret equipment - will be immediately behind my car. Fritzi,’ he said. ‘I’d be obliged if you’d get Transport to provide their best driver. I also want a lorry with a machine-gun in front of my car and another behind the lorry.’ ‘What about loading the lorry, Herr Oberst?’ ‘I shall attend to that myself,’ Klemens said. ‘At the last moment. There’ll be a commanding officers’ conference this evening to finalize details. Let’s make it as late as possible - say nine o’clock - so that there can be no leaks. We don’t want the orderlies guessing what’s happening. We’ll also keep the Baronne and her staff confined to their quarters. I don’t want them to know when we’re leaving.’
‘Ten o’clock tomorrow.’
Euphrasie brought the information the following morning as she arrived at the farm to buy eggs for the Baronne’s midday omelette. ‘Corporal Goehr told me. There’s an officers’ conference tonight and they’re putting a sentry on our corridor so no one sneaks out to listen. Goehr usually comes down with a pot of coffee about then and he had to tell me why he couldn’t tonight. He fancies me.’
Reinach scowled. ‘Very soon,’ he growled, ‘with God’s help, you’ll be able to use those eyes of yours on French boys.’
Euphrasie sniffed. ‘You think I chose to use them on the Germans? That Schäffer tried to put his hand up my skirt.’
As she left, Urquhart rose. ‘I’m off to Rolandpoint to see Brisson.’
‘Tell him to get that radio operator of theirs to contact the Americans,’ Neville said. ‘Tell them they’ve got to hurry. ‘We need them.’
‘Tell Ernestine to get to work on him,’ Marie-Claude advised. ‘You ought to be able to persuade her. Half an hour in bed-’
Neville turned on her. He was tense and nervy and his good humour had gone, but this time he was at one with Urquhart. ‘It doesn’t matter if he goes to bed with the radio operator himself so long as he gets the Americans.’ he snapped.
Marie-Claude looked hurt, and Urquhart winked at her and slapped her behind as he went outside.
From the château that afternoon, they heard the gunfire in the south more plainly.
Worried, Tarnera walked through the village, expecting to see signs of hostility and preparations for their departure. But the place looked normal enough, though somehow to Tarnera things still didn’t feel right. He could see an old man leading a horse into a farmyard. Two or three more, holding billhooks and sickles wrapped in sacking, were standing and talking outside the bar. He noticed they were all smoking, something that was unusual at a time of tobacco shortage and he assumed that some ‘tabac’ owner in Dijon or St Seigneur had been cleared of his stock by the Maquis.
Reinach stopped his lorry alongside him. Lionel Dring was in the cab with him, and several other men and youths with axes and billhooks were in the back.
‘More logs for the colonel,’ Reinach called. He jerked his head to the back of the lorry. They’re all getting in on the act now. The woods are full of wood chips just waiting for the collecting.’
Tarnera offered him a cigarette. ‘What about the dam? Are they still working on that?’
‘Oh, yes, Herr Hauptman. It’s almost dry, but Ernouf’s digging above the Fond St Amarin. He thinks he might be able to get the spring coming down to Néry again by next week.’
By next week, Tarnera thought, they’d all be in Germany with a little luck.
As the lorry drove off, Reinach was grinning.’ “How’s the dam?”‘ he said, mimicking Tarnera. ‘ �
�Nearly dry. Herr Hauptmann.” “And how’s the dip?” “Sopping wet, Herr Hauptmann.”‘
Dring gave a laugh and Reinach’s great empty mouth opened in a guffaw. ‘C’est le sang-froid,’ he said. ‘A cretin’s face and le sang-froid.’
High up the hill, he stopped the lorry and looked back. The smoke from the German fires round the village was lifting slowly to form smudges in the sky. The road in front of him was growing narrower and steeper, cutting into the slope more deeply as it rose to the crest. Over the still air, he could hear the drum of engines and knew they belonged to German vehicles approaching from St Seigneur and Rolandpoint. They were going to swamp Néry when they arrived because only a token number of older men and women now remained in the village, stoking fires with whatever rubbish they could find to make smoke so that empty houses looked occupied, turning radios up so they could be heard outside, and letting themselves be seen a dozen times or more so that there would seem to be more of them than there were. Only a few places like the shops, the bar, the presbytery, the office of the mairie, which would be noticed if they were empty, remained occupied.
Having offered up prayers for the success of what they were going to do, Father Pol dusted the little figurines above the altar in the church, gave a quick flick to the Henri IV window and cleaned the halo of St Peter with brass polish. Putting away his cloths, he genuflected and knelt before the statue of the Madonna. ‘Remember, oh, most gracious Virgin Mary...’ he began.
He had got only as far as’... despise not my petitions .. .’ when Father Xavier from Rolandpoint arrived.
‘Praying for success?’ he asked.
‘Clergymen managed to equate Napoleon’s victories with evangelical counsels,’ Father Pol said stiffly. ‘And no doubt Lutheran pastors manage to do the same with Hitler’s, so there’s no reason why I shouldn’t. Are your people on the way?’
‘At this very moment,’ Father Xavier said. ‘Shall we join them?’