by Nevil Shute
He nodded. “I remember that very well, mademoiselle. M. le Colonel was very interested in my horses for the army, being himself an artillery officer, if I remember right.” He hesitated. “I hope you have good news of M. le Colonel?”
She said, “We have had no news for three months, when he was at Metz.”
“I am desolated, mademoiselle.”
She nodded, having nothing much to say to that. She said, “If my father had been at home he would, no doubt, have come to see you himself. As he is not, I have come instead.”
His brows wrinkled slightly, but he bowed a little. “That is an added pleasure,” he said perfunctorily.
“May we, perhaps, go to your office?”
“But certainly.”
He turned, and led them to the house. There was a littered, dusty office, full of sad-looking account books and files, with bits of broken harness thrown aside in corners. He closed the door behind them, and gave them rickety chairs; there being no other seats he leaned backwards against the edge of the desk.
“First,” said the girl, “I wish to introduce you to Monsieur Howard. He is an Englishman.”
The horsebreeder raised his eyebrows a little, but bowed ceremoniously. “Enchanté,” he said.
Nicole said, “I will come directly to the point, Monsieur Arvers. Monsieur Howard is a very old friend of my family. He is travelling with several children, and he is trying to return to England in spite of the Germans. My mother and I have talked about this, in the absence of my father, and it seemed to us that Jean Henri could help, perhaps, with one of his boats. Or, if that was impossible, Jean Henri might know some friend who would help. There is money enough to pay for any services.”
The man said nothing for a time. At last, “The Germans are not to be trifled with,” he said.
Howard said, “We appreciate that, monsieur. We do not wish that anyone should run into trouble upon our behalf. That is why Mademoiselle has come to talk to you before going to your son-in-law.”
The other turned to him. “You speak French better than most Englishmen.”
“I have had longer than most Englishmen to learn it.”
The Frenchman smiled. “You are very anxious to return to England?”
The old man said, “For myself, not so very anxious. I should be quite happy to live in France for a time. But I have children in my care, you understand, English children that I have promised that I would escort to England.” He hesitated. “And, as a matter of fact, there are three others now.”
“What are these other children? How many of you are there altogether? And where have you come from?”
It took nearly twenty minutes to elucidate the story. At last the Frenchman said, “These other children, the little one called Pierre and the little Dutchman. What is going to become of them when they reach England?”
Howard said, “I have a daughter, married, in America. She is in easy circumstances. She would make a home for those two in her house at Long Island till the war is over and we can trace their relations. They would be very happy there.”
The man stared at him keenly. “In America? That I can well believe. You will send them over the Atlantic to your daughter? Will she be good to them — children that she has never seen? Unknown, foreign children?”
The old man said, “My daughter has one child of her own, and now hopes for another. She is very fond of all children. They will be safe with her.”
Arvers got up suddenly from the desk. “It is impossible,” he said. “If Jean Henri should put his hand to this he would be in great danger. The Germans would shoot him, beyond all doubt. You have no right to suggest such a thing.” He paused, and then he said, “I have my daughter to consider.”
There was a long, slow pause. At last the old man turned to Nicole. “That’s the end of that,” he said. He smiled at Arvers. “I understand perfectly,” he said. “In your place, thinking of my daughter, I should say the same.”
The Frenchman turned to the girl. “I regret very much that I cannot help you in the way you want,” he said.
She shrugged her shoulders. “Tant pis,” she said. “N’y pensez plus.”
He looked uncomfortable. “These children,” he said. “Where are they now?”
They told him that they were waiting in the road, and he walked with them to the gate. It was getting towards evening. The children were playing at the edge of a pond, muddy and rather fractious. There were tear streaks around Sheila’s face.
Arvers said awkwardly, “Would it help you to stay here for the night? I do not think we have beds for so many, but something could perhaps be managed.”
Nicole said warmly, “You are very kind, monsieur.”
They called the children and introduced them one by one to the horse dealer; then they went towards the house. The man called his wife as they approached the door; she came from the kitchen, a stolid peasant woman. He spoke to her, told her that the party were to stay with them for the night, introduced her formally to them. Nicole shepherded the children after her into the kitchen. Arvers turned to Howard.
“You will take a little glass of Pernod, perhaps?” he said.
A little glass of Pernod seemed to the old man to be a very good idea. They went into the salon because the kitchen was full of children. The salon was a stiff and formal room, with gilt-legged furniture upholstered in red plush. On the wall there was a very large oleograph of a white-robed little girl kneeling devoutly in a shaft of light. It was entitled: La Première Communion.
Arvers brought the Pernod, with glasses and water, and the two men settled down together. They talked about horses and about country matters. Arvers had been to England once, to Newmarket as a jockey when he was a very young man. They chatted pleasantly enough for a quarter of an hour.
Suddenly Arvers said, “Your daughter, Monsieur Howard. She will surely find so many foreign children an encumbrance? Are you so certain that they will be welcome in her home?”
The old man said, “They will be welcome, all right.”
“But how can you possibly know that? Your daughter may find it very inconvenient to have them.”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. But if that should be so, then she would make arrangements for them for me. She would engage some kind woman to make a home for them, because that is my wish, that they should have a good home in America — away from all this.” He motioned with his hand. “And there is no difficulty over money, you understand.”
The Frenchman sat silent for a little time, staring into his glass.
“This is a bad time for children, this filthy war,” he said at last. “And now that France is defeated, it is going to be worse. You English now will starve us, as we starved Germany in 1918.”
Howard was silent.
“I shall not blame your country if you do that. But it will be bad for children here.”
“I am afraid it may be,” said the old man. “That is why I want to get these children out of it. One must do what one can.”
Arvers shrugged his shoulders. “There are no children in this house, thank God. Or — only one.” He paused. “That was a hard case, if you like.”
Howard looked at him enquiringly. The Frenchman poured him out another Pernod. “A friend in Paris asked me if I had work for a Pole,” he said. “In December, that was — just at Christmas time. A Polish Jew who knew horses, who had escaped into Rumania and so by sea to Marseilles. Well, you will understand, the mobilization had taken five of my eight men, and it was very difficult.”
Howard nodded. “You took him on?”
“Assuredly. Simon Estreicher was his name, and he arrived one day with his son, a boy of ten. There had been a wife, but I will not distress you with that story. She had not escaped the Boche, you understand.”
The old man nodded.
“Well, this man Estreicher worked here till last week, and he worked well. He was quiet and gave no trouble, and the son worked in the stables too. Then last week the Germans
came here, and took him away.”
“Took him away?”
“Took him away to Germany, to their forced labour. He was a Pole, you see, monsieur, and a Jew as well. One could do nothing for him. Some filthy swine in town had told them about him, because they came straight here and asked for him. They put handcuffs on him, and took him in a camion with several others.”
“Did they take the son as well?”
“They never asked for him, and he was in the paddock at the time, so I said nothing. One does not help the Germans in their work. But it was very hard on that young boy.”
Howard agreed with him. “He is with you still, then?”
“Where else could he go? He is useful in the stables, too. But before long I suppose they will find out about him, and come back for him to take him away also.”
Nicole came to them presently, to call them to the kitchen for supper. She had already given the children a meal, and had put them to sleep on beds improvised upstairs by Madame Arvers. They ate together in the kitchen at a long table, together with two men from the farm and a black-haired, Jewish-looking boy whom Madame called Marjan, and who said little or nothing during the meal.
The meal over, Arvers escorted Nicole and Howard back to the salon; presently he produced a set of dominoes and proposed a game. Howard settled down to it with him. The horse dealer played carelessly, his mind on other things.
Presently he returned to the subject that was on his mind. “Are many children going to America, monsieur? I cannot comprehend how you can be so positive that they will be welcomed. America is very far away. They do not bother about our difficulties here.”
Howard shrugged his shoulders. “They are a generous people. These children will be quite all right if I can get them there, because my daughter will look after them. But even without her, there would be many people in America willing to provide for them. Americans are like that.”
The other stared at him incredulously. “It would cost a great deal of money to provide for a child, perhaps for years. One does not do that lightly, for a foreign child of which one knows nothing.”
“It’s just the sort of thing they do do,” said the old man. “They would pour out their money in a cause like that.”
The horse dealer stared at him keenly and thoughtfully. “Would they provide for Marjan Estreicher?” he enquired at last. “No doubt they would not do that for a Jew.”
“I don’t think it would make the slightest difference, in the case of a child. It certainly would make no difference to my daughter.”
Nicole moved impulsively beside him. “Monsieur . . .” she said, but he stopped her with a gesture. She subsided into silence again, watchful.
Howard said steadily, “I would take him with me, if that is what you want. I would send him to the United States with the other children. But before that, I should want help to get them all away.”
“Jean Henri?”
“Assuredly, monsieur.”
The other got up, displacing the unheeded game of dominoes with his sleeve. He went and fetched the Pernod, the glasses, and the water, and poured out a drink for Howard. He offered one to the girl, but she refused.
“The risk is enormous,” he said stubbornly. “Think what it would mean to my daughter if you should be caught.”
“Think what it would mean to that boy, if he should be caught,” the old man said. “They would take him for a slave, put him in the mines and work him till he died. That’s what the Germans do with Polish children.”
Arvers said, “I know that. That is what troubles me.”
Nicole said suddenly, “Does Marjan want to go? You cannot make him if he does not want to. He is old, that one.”
“He is only ten,” said Arvers.
“Nevertheless,” she said, “he is quite grown up. We cannot take him if he does not want to go.”
Arvers went out of the room; in a few minutes he returned, followed by the boy. He said to him, “This is the matter, Marjan. This Monsieur here is going to England if he can escape the Germans, and from England the children with him are going to America. In America they will be safe. There are no Germans there. Would you like to go with them?”
The boy stood silent. They explained it to him again. At last he said in almost unintelligible French, “In America, what should I work at?”
Howard said, “For a time you would have to go to school, to learn English and the American way of living. At school they would teach you to earn your living in some trade. What do you want to do when you grow up?”
Without any hesitation the boy said, “I want to kill Germans.”
There was a momentary silence. Arvers said, “That is enough about the Germans. Tell Monsieur here what trade you wish to learn in America, if he should be so kind as to take you there.”
There was a silence.
Nicole came forward. “Tell us,” she said gently. “Would you like to grow up with horses? Or would you rather buy things and sell them for a profit?” After all, she thought, it would be difficult for him to go against the characteristics of his race. “Would you rather do that?”
The boy looked up at her. “I want to learn to shoot with a rifle from a very long way away,” he said, “because you can do that from the hills when they are on the road. And I want to learn to throw a knife hard and straight. That is best in the darkness, in the narrow streets, because it does not make a noise.”
Arvers smiled, a little ruefully. “I am sorry, monsieur,” he said. “I am afraid he is not making a very good impression.”
The old man said nothing.
Marjan said, “When do we start?”
Howard hesitated, irresolute. This lad might be a great embarrassment to them; at the best he could only be described as a prickly customer. On the other hand, a deep pity for the child lurked in the background of his mind.
“Do you want to come with us?” he asked.
The boy nodded his black head.
“If you come with us, you will have to forget all this about the Germans,” said the old man. “You will have to go to school and learn your lessons, and play baseball, and go fishing, like other boys.”
The lad said gravely, “I could not kill a German for another two or three years because I am not strong enough. Not unless I could catch one asleep and drive a pitchfork into his belly as he slept, and even then he might reach out before he died and overcome me. But in America I could learn everything, and come back when I am fifteen years old, and big and strong.”
Howard said gently, “There are other things to learn in America besides that.”
The boy said, “I know there is a great deal to learn, monsieur. One thing, you should always go for the young women — not the men. If you get the young women, then they cannot spawn, and before long there will be no more Germans.”
“That is enough,” said Arvers sharply. “Go back to the kitchen and stay there till I call you.”
The boy left the room. The horse dealer turned to Nicole. “I am desolated that he should have said such things,” he said.
The girl said, “He has suffered a great deal. And he is very young.”
Arvers nodded. “I do not know what will become of him,” he said morosely.
Howard sat down in the silence which followed, and took a sip of Pernod. “One of two things will happen to him,” he said. “One is, that the Germans will catch him very soon. He may try to kill one of them, in which case they might shoot him out of hand. They will take him to their mines. He will be rebellious the whole time, and before long he will be beaten to death. That is the one thing.”
The horse dealer dropped into the chair on the opposite side of the table, the bottle of Pernod between them. There was something in the old man’s tone that was very familiar to him. “What is the other thing?” he asked.
“He will escape with us to England,” said Howard. “He will end up in America, kindly treated and well cared for, and in a year or two these horrors will have faded from h
is mind.”
Arvers eyed him keenly. “Which of those is going to happen?”
“That is in your hands, Monsieur. He will never escape the Germans unless you help him.”
There was a long, long silence in the falling dusk.
Arvers said at last, “I will see what I can do. To-morrow I will drive Mademoiselle to Le Conquêt and we will talk it over with Jean Henri. You must stay here, with the children, and keep out of sight.”
9
HOWARD SPENT MOST of the next day sitting in the paddock in the sun, while the children played around him. His growing, stubbly beard distressed him with a sense of personal uncleanliness, but it was policy to let it grow. Apart from that, he was feeling well; the rest was welcome and refreshing.
Madame dragged an old cane reclining chair from a dusty cellar and wiped it over with a cloth for him; he thanked her and installed himself in it. The children had the kitten, Jo-Jo, in the garden and were stuffing it with copious draughts of milk and anything that they could get it to eat. Presently it escaped, and climbed up into the old man’s lap, and went to sleep.
After a while he found himself making whistles on a semi-production basis, while the children stood around and watched.
From time to time the Polish boy, Marjan, appeared by the paddock gate and stood looking at them, curious, inscrutable. Howard spoke to him and asked him to come in and join them, but he muttered something to the effect that he had work to do, and sheered away shyly. Presently he would be back again, watching the children as they played. The old man let him alone, content not to hurry the friendship.
In the middle of the afternoon, suddenly, there was a series of heavy explosions over in the west. These mingled with the sharp crack of gunfire; the children stopped their games and stared in wonder. Then a flight of three single-engined fighter aeroplanes got up like partridges from some field not very far away, and flew over them at about two thousand feet, heading towards the west and climbing at full throttle as they went.