A Hero of France: A Novel

by Alan Furst

  “We’re working hard,” Mathieu said. He rapped his knuckles on the table and added, “Touch wood, all is going well.”

  De Lyon looked at his watch and said, “In a few minutes we’ll go to my office to see an old friend of mine—maybe ‘friend’ is not quite the word—who has asked to meet you. He is called S. Kolb, generally believed to be a spy, thought to work for the British but nobody is really sure. He appears suddenly, here and there in Europe, does whatever he does, then vanishes.”

  “And he is from…?”

  “His nationality? I don’t have any idea—he speaks many languages, none of them as a native. I have heard him described as a citizen of the shadows.”

  Mathieu was amused and said, “A sinister description, I would say.”

  “But maybe, in this case, accurate. You will be doing me a favor, when you talk to him. He has helped me, now and again, in ways no one else could.”

  “Can he be trusted?”

  De Lyon hesitated, then said, “Yes, I believe so.”

  De Lyon had a small, cramped office above the basement nightclub: a typewriter, two telephones, papers everywhere, and a small lamp that left most of the room in darkness. Mathieu could hear the trio, working away down below, and occasional shouts in German followed by raucous laughter.

  Ten minutes later, S. Kolb knocked at the door and entered the office. He was bald, with a fringe of dark hair, wore eyeglasses, and had a sparse mustache—a short, inconsequential man in a tired suit. When de Lyon introduced him to Mathieu, they shook hands briefly and, for just an instant, Kolb looked directly into his face, then lowered his eyes. Mathieu felt something like a chill.

  As Kolb sat down, de Lyon said, “I’ll leave you two to talk,” and left the office.

  “So, here is the brave Mathieu. An honor to meet you, monsieur.”

  “Thank you for the compliment, Monsieur Kolb.”

  “I know some people in London who speak highly of you, you should be proud.”

  “And, if I may ask, which people are these?”

  “People who read the debriefing reports of the airmen your efforts have saved.”

  Mathieu waited.

  “These airmen are urgently needed, as I’m sure you know, if Britain is not to lose this war. The people in London are grateful, and sent me over to France to see if we might be able to help you. Of course I had to find you, but now here we are.” He smiled.

  “Was it difficult…to find me?”

  “A proper question, Mathieu. I can only say that finding people is one of our jobs, we are practiced at it, and it was done in such a way that you were protected. The last thing in the world we would wish is to damage you in some way, we want to help you, Mathieu, if you’ll allow us to do that.”

  “And how would you help me?”

  “To begin with, money. Connections to the civil administration, even to the German Kommandantur. I’m sure you have similar arrangements, but ours are quite dependable and they may reach higher than yours. And then, we would provide a radio, for coded wireless transmission to London, as well as a contact, here in Paris, someone you could seek out if you require assistance. We hope that you never find yourself in difficulties but, in this kind of work…the weather can change quickly, if you know what I mean.”

  “And, in return?”

  “We ask no more than you continue to do your best.”

  “Monsieur Kolb, please understand that I appreciate your offer, but I would like some time to think it over. Is there some way I can reach you?”

  Kolb reached into his pocket and produced a small slip of paper. He handed it to Mathieu and said, “Here is an address in the Occupied Zone, simply telegraph the message on the paper.”

  Mathieu studied the paper, a few words written by a typewriter with a faded ribbon: Agence de Voyage Havas 8 Boulevard Bineau Neuilly-sur-Seine confirm reservation Hôtel Pont Royal signed LeBeau.

  Mathieu said, “I thank you for your offer, Monsieur Kolb.”

  “Please consider it carefully—we hope you will make the right choice.” Kolb stood, and moved toward the door.

  “You are going out during curfew?”

  Kolb looked playfully grim. “Yes, always something, but I will manage. I have a paper I can show if need be—nobody will inconvenience me.”

  And with that he was gone.

  —

  11 April. Under a sky of fleeting cirrus cloud, the courier Daniel rode his bicycle through the streets of Rouen. He was to meet an English RAF officer and escort him back to a safe house in Paris. Rouen was in sorry shape, half of it had burned down during the fighting in 1940, when Wehrmacht units refused to let firefighters extinguish the blaze. For the rest, a classic Norman town—the narrow streets lined with timber-and-plaster buildings—where the English had bought Joan of Arc from a French enemy and burned her at the stake. Worst of all, for Daniel, Rouen was an important port on the upper Seine, part of the German coastal defenses, and there were patrols everywhere—he’d already been stopped by the military police and that had scared him. They had taken a long look at his identity card. And a long look at him.

  Daniel was a Jew. He had, before the war, taught mechanical engineering at a technical school in Montpellier, but that ended. He did not look Jewish, in his twenties he was short, with the sinewy build of a runner in track competitions, dark hair, and five o’clock shadow a few hours after he shaved. He had heard that the Germans were now executing couriers and if they discovered a Jewish courier, they would, he knew, kill him.

  Marshal Pétain and the Vichy administration, eager to please Hitler and crawling with deference, had attacked French Jews soon after the armistice—the Statut des Juifs became law on 3 October, 1940, when Jews were prohibited from public service and the military, and barred from positions that could sway public opinion: journalism, radio, film, theatre, and teaching. So Daniel had returned to his family in Nanterre. Watching his parents struggle, after the Germans had stolen his father’s shoe factory, had only fueled his desire for revenge.

  Daniel had heard about British fugitives on the run and determined to take part in the Resistance, asking this friend and that until he reached someone in Mathieu’s cell. Mathieu had taken his time, making a decision about Daniel. He knew Daniel wanted to kill Germans because they had ruined his life and, he sensed, in time Daniel would do just that. But Mathieu did not have the heart to exclude him—he had already been excluded by the Vichyite fascists, now their French opponents?—and though he accused himself of weakness Mathieu did at last accept the young teacher. He could, he thought, control him; Ghislain hadn’t been so sure.

  The English officer, Daniel had been told, was fifty years old, a technician flying on a photoreconnaissance mission over the German submarine base at Saint-Nazaire. In other times, he would never have been allowed to do such a risky thing—he was a camera technician, in possession of all sorts of secret information—but Britain was so desperate that old and sensible rules were violated every day. When the pilot spotted a group of fighter planes to his west he fled east and, after losing himself in heavy cloud, managed to land in a field, not far from Rouen. The pilot went off in search of a farmhouse but when, after a few hours, he did not return, the technician made his way to a hotel in Rouen. Now it was Daniel’s job to get him out and, eventually, back to England.

  It was dusk when Daniel found the Rue du Grand Pont in the old section of Rouen, near the quay that bordered the river Seine. On a street with burned-out buildings, the Hôtel Rouen still stood, its stucco façade stained black with soot. Daniel shifted his weight on the pedals, about to dismount and walk the bicycle the rest of the way to the hotel. But there were two men walking toward him on the Rue du Grand Pont and one of them noticed him, the one wearing a very expensive double-breasted suit and a grand hat with the front of the brim turned down. Daniel sensed he was an authority of some sort, stayed on his bicycle, and averted his eyes. But too late.

  The man in the suit called out some words Dani
el didn’t quite hear and raised his hand, palm out: halt. Daniel thought about speeding up but he knew that would bring police cars and they would chase him down, so he came to a stop. Now he could see the man’s face: coarse skin, gross features—Daniel had never seen such a smug expression, heightened by a cruel smile. Next to him stood a flabby, pasty-faced young man wearing a pin, a Francisque—the old battle-axe of Gaul and Vichy’s chosen symbol—in his lapel. The man in the suit beckoned Daniel to him and took from his pocket an oval-shaped metal disk showing an eagle atop a swastika—the Gestapo badge. Daniel must have reacted to the badge because the man’s smile broadened, then he said a few words in German and the man by his side, a translator, said, “Show me your papers.”

  Daniel rested his bicycle against a lamppost, then stood before the two men as the Gestapo officer snapped his fingers and held out his hand. Daniel gave him his identity card, the officer studied it, running his finger over the surface, then said, through his interpreter, “You are from near Paris, what are you doing in Rouen?”

  “I have a girlfriend here, I’ve come up to see her.”

  “On a bicycle?”

  “Yes, the weather is good.” As in, Why not?

  “Don’t be insolent, you little prick. Not with me.” Even though he did not speak French, the Gestapo officer could hear a faint note of defiance in Daniel’s speech.

  “I am sorry, sir, I meant no disrespect.” What’s the matter with you? Daniel couldn’t help it, as much as he tried to be diffident there was a certain shading of tone that leaked from his emotions into his words.

  The Gestapo officer glared at him and said, producing a pad and a pencil, “Tell me your girlfriend’s name. And, if you don’t tell the truth, I will know.”

  Daniel told him a name, the officer wrote it down.

  “And she lives where?”

  Daniel gave him an address.

  The officer asked the interpreter a question, then, when it was answered, said, “There is no such street in Rouen.”

  “It’s the only address I have for her.”

  “You French are all the same; lying scum, you lie and lie and lie. Well, let’s go back to my office and have a long talk.” With that, he grabbed a fistful of the back of Daniel’s jacket, turned him around and began walking him down the street. As they walked, the interpreter by the officer’s side, the officer began to whistle a tune, a jolly tune, a march.

  It was the jolly tune that did it. The rage festering inside Daniel now burst free and he spun around and, with the base of his open hand, struck the officer at the midpoint of his nose. Daniel felt it break; the officer’s hat fell off, he took a step backward and yelped with pain as blood coursed down his face. Daniel jumped toward him and punched the officer in the temple—a far more vulnerable spot than the chin or the jaw.

  Stunned, the officer fought for balance, then fell hard on the seat of his pants. From there, he drew an automatic pistol from a shoulder holster, armed it by working the slide, and pointed it at Daniel. Who grabbed the interpreter by the collar and the belt and moved behind his back, using him as a shield. This tactic so frustrated the officer that he fired twice, hitting the interpreter in the heart. The force of the shot threw them both backward, Daniel heard a moan, then felt the man die. Keeping the interpreter in front of him, no less a shield for being dead, Daniel dragged him a few feet toward a building, then let him collapse and ran for the doorway.

  It was a burned-out building with a board nailed across the space where there had been a door, but Daniel used his shoulder to force the board, ran into the building and up a stairway. The interior of the building was in total darkness and the smell was overwhelming: burned plaster, burned electric wiring and its rubber coating, burned paint and furniture stuffing, charred wood rotting after months of rain, and the lingering odor of death. The weakened steps began to flex as Daniel ran upward, then, almost at the next floor, the wood gave way and left Daniel dangling from a step above him. Someone down below fired a shot, close enough, Daniel heard the ripping-silk noise of a passing round.

  Gritting his teeth, Daniel hauled himself to the top of the staircase, then, guided by his hand on a wall, worked his way down a corridor to a place where the second flight should have been. But it was no more. Retracing his steps, his guiding hand found a door hanging on one hinge. Inside, lit by the night sky shining through a window with no glass, the remnants of someone’s life: a blackened sofa, shards of broken crockery underfoot, burst cans of food. He was now on the other side of the building and below him was the cobblestone quay that bordered the river. From the hallway beyond the broken door, flashlight beams began to probe the darkness and Daniel decided to jump the ten feet to the quay, dive into the river and swim for his life. He braced a foot on the window frame and leaped out.

  His ankles gave as he landed, he went down on all fours, then crawled to the edge of the river and rolled into the water—cold as ice, with a strong current flowing north toward the sea. Daniel let it take him, sweeping his hands in small circles, kicking so that his feet did not break the water. Even though his shoes were growing heavy he did not kick them off—he would need them later, if he survived. There was all sorts of debris floating around him—a partly submerged tire, a drowned rat, the end of a wooden packing crate—while patches of oil on the surface shone iridescent in the moonlight.

  When he heard the high-low wail of sirens, from police cars driving slowly along the quay, he let himself sink. Even so, his pursuers had a good idea where he was, swept the river with their searchlights, and began to fire randomly into the water. Some of the bullets ricocheted off the surface and whined away into the darkness, others penetrated the water. Then Daniel felt a band of fire burn across his lower leg. He came up for air, reached down to his leg and found a groove where the bullet had creased his calf. When a beam of light came toward him, he again went under, kicking and paddling as fast as he could. It seemed to take forever—perhaps two minutes—but when he again broke the surface, the quay was behind him.

  He began to tire, his body had done whatever it could, now he needed help or he would drown. Just ahead of him, he could see the end of the packing crate, trailing strands of wire from its edge, and, using whatever strength he had left, he caught up to it, got both hands on the strips of wood reinforcing its frame, and, slowly, the current towed him north. After a time, he had no idea how long, he felt sleep trying to claim him—the temperature of the water was sucking the life from his body. He had to get out, and made for the shore, a strip of gravel at the edge of a wood. He spent a long time on his knees, then understood that the cold air blowing on his wet skin would soon enough do what the water had tried to do. Walk. You must walk, he told himself, and struggled to his feet. The pain returned to his leg, and he limped, but he managed to walk. Occasionally he had to stop and rest but the walking had brought his blood back to life and the breeze had dried his clothes. An hour later, he saw a small fire ahead of him and then the outline of a bridge. By the time he neared the fire he was staggering with fatigue.

  “What brings you out, this time of night?” A rough voice, a low growl. Coming from a wizened little fellow wearing an overcoat held together by a length of rope. A tramp, Daniel realized. A moment later, a few more appeared from, apparently, an encampment under the bridge.

  One of them said, “Go overboard did you, son?” Then, “Fall off your barge?”

  “I’m running away,” Daniel said. “From the police.”

  Somebody laughed and said, “We all know about that. What’d you do?”

  “I’m wanted by the Germans.”

  “Oh? For what?”

  “For fighting against them, I…” He started to wobble but one of the tramps grabbed him before he could fall and said, “We better get him warmed up or he’ll die on us.”

  Holding him upright, the tramp walked him over to the fire and lowered him to the ground, then fed a few dry sticks to the flames. As the warmth flowed over him, Daniel closed his eyes,
fought to stay awake, then lost consciousness.

  Later, when he came to, he was being carried in a blanket along a path through the wood and saw that someone had tied a rag around the wound in his leg. Still dazed, he mumbled, “Where are we going?”

  “Ah, you’re awake…that’s good, son…only a little while now and you’ll be safe…we’re taking you to the convent, up on the next hill.”

  “The convent?”

  “Carmelite sisters, bless them, they help anyone who asks, and they will take good care of you. As for the Boche, well…don’t worry about the Boche…they don’t bother the nuns.”

  “Success in the game is the great incentive to subdue fear. Once you’ve shot down two or three the effect is terrific and you’ll go on till you’re killed. It’s love of the sport rather than sense of duty that makes you go on without minding how much you are shot up.”

  —British fighter pilot, 1940, as quoted by Lord Moran in Anatomy of Courage

  12 April, 1941. On a soft afternoon in the English countryside—the fields newly green, the sky clear but for a few wispy clouds—a dozen young men were passing their time by not doing much of anything; they sprawled on lawn chairs or lay on the grass, smoked cigarettes, made idle conversation, a few slept, others stared up at the sky. They all shared a certain mood, a mix of boredom and tension: boredom because they had spent the last eight months in just this way, tension because any one of them might be dead by nightfall.

  The field where they waited was called Northolt Aerodrome, some fourteen miles from London. The young men were fighter pilots, Polish fighter pilots of the 303 squadron, also known as the Kosciuszko pilots, famous for their courage in combat—which was just this side of crazy, some said—had fought brilliantly in the Battle of Britain and still continued to fight, attacking Luftwaffe formations that bombed targets in the British Isles. Hawker Hurricane aircraft were parked on a macadam runway, while a few feet behind the men, up the slope of a hillside, was a Quonset hut with two desks, a few battered couches, a map that covered one wall, and a telephone.