Downfall

by Sally Spedding

  “God damn him!” Irène Rougier cried out as Valon threw his Lieutenant a look of disapproval. “Why wasn’t I told?”

  “He has to know too,” said Delphine. “As soon as possible.”

  “Does he indeed?” Whereupon her mother pulled away and almost ran up the ancient, wooden stairs before slamming the bedroom door shut.

  The woodburner crackled eerily in the silence. Delphine then looked Lise Confrère in the eye. Her own welling up. “Thank you for all you’ve done. You and Captain Valon, and I’ve not even offered you a drink.”

  “We’re fine,” said the blonde, tugging her black waterproof cape over her shoulders, while Valon opened the front door, his two-way radio at the ready. “However, there is one thing you could do. But go together.”

  “Roza?”

  A nod. A smile.

  “She’s met you already and seems to trust you more than us. She might prove very useful indeed. Oh, and by the way, not a word to the media. They could destroy you. As if you’ve not been destroyed enough already.”

  What an odd thing to say…

  “You’re implying I’ve made contact?”

  Pause. A glance at Valon already outside.

  “Well, I’d hardly call Jérôme Meyer a liar.”

  28.

  Thursday 4th December. 07.30 hrs.

  Neither Delphine nor her mother had slept properly, sharing a lumpy double bed for the first time since she was a baby, dwelling upon Lise Confrère’s final little offering, wondering why that helpful archivist had been in touch with her. Or maybe he hadn’t. Then remembered the tracker which could have been in place at the time of her visit to Le Maine Express, but dismissed its implication by turning over so violently, she almost fell out.

  The knife once used for carving the summer’s hog roasts which had lain next to her thigh, clattered on to the floor’s bare boards, and just then, its harsh din represented the end of her co-operation with the Lieutenant. The tough cop who’d not hesitated to contact her father’s clinic over a private matter. Who’d also seemed less than sympathetic to the previous evening’s alarming incident.

  As for her mother, with her Luger under her pillow, she’d repeatedly called out her own mother’s name, while clasping Delphine’s arm. At 02.00 hours, Delphine had woken to find those same fingers clamped around hers, almost cutting off her blood supply.

  In a semi-conscious state, the sixty-year-old had also muttered random words – half-French, half-German, becoming ever more agitated. ‘Betrayer! Whore!’ then ‘Devil!’ Before rearing up as if she herself was immured inside that burning church on a bright June day not long enough ago. Close to dawn, when the starlings and crows began pecking at the farmhouse’s mossy roof and its sagging guttering, she’d also muttered thoughts about her husband. “I used to wonder if he might be attractive to men, being so handsome and fit. So perfect…”

  “Go on,” Delphine had urged her sleepily, not wanting to break the strange spell.

  “I’d see them eye him up and down in a certain way. Women too, mind.”

  “Are you saying he could be guilty all along?”

  “Who knows the secrets of people’s hearts? He certainly doesn’t know mine.”

  *

  That last phrase stayed with Delphine for the rest of the wet, seemingly endless night, and as soon as a lighter sky permeated the bedroom’s unlined curtains, she sneaked downstairs to leave a muted message on Jérôme Meyer’s voicemail. It promised he’d call back as soon as he was available.

  She then switched on the TV, just in time for the 8 a.m. news, and after reports of more violence in southern Sudan, and of Entente Cordiale celebrations planned for next April, came an item which made her start. Roland Seligman, the Les Palmier’s Group CEO had been rushed unconscious to an undisclosed hospital. No more details given. The photograph accompanying that news, showed a younger, happier man out on a golf course somewhere. She switched it off, wondering what could have happened to him, convinced more than ever that someone had wanted that particular hotel to fail. But why? The one unanswerable question. Normally, she’d have phoned Lieutenant Confrère, but not now. There was another, much older woman lying above her, needing her attention.

  *

  Only by bringing Irène Rougier a cup of coffee and a warmed-up brioche, was Delphine able to persuade her to replace her moth-eaten nightdress with yesterday’s clothes. Once they were both ready to leave, she noticed several scratches on the top of her mother’s hands. How her leather gloves were torn.

  “You’ve been in the wars,” she observed once she’d double-locked the front door.

  “Nothing new in that.”

  “So?”

  Irène Rougier sighed as if knowing Delphine wouldn’t give up.

  “Once you’d gone to sleep, I went to check the barn again. Tidy up a bit. There’s so much junk in there. Dangerous junk. That’s what happened.”

  “I’ll mend the gloves for you when we get back, or they’ll get worse.”

  “No. They’ll remind me to sort it all out.”

  *

  Once Delphine had checked around her car as Captain Valon had advised, she and her mother got in to avoid a sudden, violent squall of rain.

  “I hope you’ve forgotten what I told you last night,” her passenger mumbled, fastening her seat belt with shaking fingers. “If not, I may live to regret it.”

  “I have,” lied Delphine. “But if you’ve any clues as to where Papa might really have gone, then that’s something I do have to know. He could be in the gravest danger.”

  “He always liked a fight. Almost cost us that café several times. But could he leave it? No. Never.”

  Not what you said yesterday in Labradelle…

  “But do you trust him? I mean, after all this time?” Delphine asked, starting the engine, aching for a crumb of normality. Something solid to cling to. Her mother’s answer came as a surprise.

  “Yes,” as she stared out at the gloomy trees lining the lane opposite. “If I’d not met him, I’d have probably swallowed enough pills to guarantee oblivion. And,” she turned to poke Delphine’s right arm. “You’d have just stayed an angel waiting to be born.”

  An angel…

  Delphine turned off the ignition and pulled up the handbrake. For several moments, they clung together. Mother and daughter with tears in their eyes. Two very different people but neither to blame for having been separate too long.

  “What were you saying in half-French, half-German last night?” Delphine then ventured, sensing the time was right for a little less mystery and rather more truth. “You sounded really upset.”

  Her mother lowered her head, not only to study her bag, but hide her tears. “I was. And have been since the day I learnt who might have caused the decimation of Oradour-sur-Glane.”

  Delphine shut her eyes.

  “Who?”

  “Someone close to me. Too damned close…”

  Delphine’s heartbeat reached overdrive as her mother’s trembling voice continued. “But how could I tell anyone the truth? The Rosheims, my maternal great-grandparents, had gone to early graves spared this darkest of all secrets. My grandmother too, but not grandfather Charles. Only he knew that their one child, their daughter had… had…” Here, she was unable to continue until Delphine stroked her hand, saying that as she’d soon be twenty-one, she was adult enough to deal with most things.

  “On the fourth morning after the D Day landings in Normandy, my young mother, Emilie Rosheim confided in him how she’d become attracted to a young Private in the Waffen-SS Der Führer Regiment whom she’d met while visiting a friend near Guéret. And what better way to impress him than to claim that Oradour harboured an FTP Resistance ‘Gang’ with a huge supply of weapons?”

  “I expect there was a lot of gossip flying about,” said Delphine, trying, despite a creeping sense of dread, to keep her own mother talking. “People taking sides.”

  “There was. It was Vichy territory then, with p
lenty of collaborators willing to betray their countrymen. Enough Boche too, wanting more revenge, especially after Tulle. They’d lost a vital railway line and two senior officers.” She paused. “But it wasn’t gossip.”

  “Oh my God.”

  “Please, Delphine. Let’s go.”

  Not yet.

  “Did Charles tell you this?”

  A nod. “He had to. Because when the Das Reich Division arrived at Oradour that very afternoon, Emilie may have hung around to see if René, her ‘beau,’ was there. They’d planned to marry after she’d finally told him he was my father, but it didn’t happen. We’ll never know why, but the worst, most terrible thing is…” Her mother paused, gripping her bag tight.

  “Go on,” Delphine gently encouraged.

  “She ended up with all the village’s women and children, burnt alive in the church, while he was shot like a dog in the Laudy barn. My Papa. Your…”

  *

  Delphine re-started the engine and crashed the gears, so busy was she thinking of the dreadful past. Of her handsome, unofficial grandfather and her traitorous grandmother who might have tried to save her own skin, but failed, for fear of a lynching by the village mob. Who could know? There were still so many conflicting stories. Memories warped by time.

  She also thought of great-grandmother Irène who’d then fled with Charles and baby Irène to the Pays de la Loire region and bought the Café de Lilas. How his new life must have been tainted by fear and guilt until his death when his daughter was eighteen.

  “And this Private’s name?”

  “Don’t you think I’ve been trying to find out? But whoever he was, he’d have been keen to pass Emilie’s information on to either Diekmann, his Kommandant or General Lammerding, who, according to Oradour’s Centre of Memory, gave the order to destroy the village. And if he had then deserted like many others, might not be mentioned in any record books or trial papers. Even grave receipts.”

  “And could still be alive.”

  Her mother’s hand flew to cover her mouth. “Oh, good Lord.”

  The whole picture was changing, like those colourful, shifting shapes in kaleidoscopes, except this was no attractive toy.

  “So, you survived all that?” Delphine couldn’t think of anything else to say.

  “I said, just go.”

  “One more question. Is this one of your secrets Papa doesn’t know about?”

  “The only one. And do you think he’d have gone anywhere near me if he did? And all the while, Emilie Rosheim’s surname had been passed down to me like a curse.”

  *

  Delphine handed her trembling mother a damp paper tissue and left Bellevue’s crowded yard. In doing so, she automatically glanced in her rear-view mirror. Something about their front hedge wasn’t quite right. She looked again, properly this time, then, despite the driving rain, got out.

  Non…

  “That shrine. Look!” She called out. “It’s gone!”

  Her mother joined her outside, holding her crinkled umbrella over both their heads. They stood speechless by the upturned tub and its scattered, artificial plants. The shaft of the iron cross snapped in two, shoved into the hedge.

  “Your father erected this, thinking that teenager had died,” Irène Rougier said eventually. “Now that same person has destroyed it.”

  “I’m not so sure.”

  Her mother faced her, red-eyed. Her umbrella angled towards Delphine, leaving herself soaked. “I have to tell you now that whatever happens, I’ll be staying put here. I want to see those cold, grey eyes again. That skin smooth as cream. Those fingers like white maggots that tapped on our front window…”

  “You mean, you’ve seen him?”

  “Who else could it have been?”

  “When?”

  “Here. A year ago, on November 30th. You were at work and your father had gone to Ballon. I was doing the ironing, and when I glanced up, there he was, just staring into our front window…”

  Like he did at the Auberge de l’Aube yesterday…

  “Any car?”

  “I couldn’t see. I’d slid out of sight.”

  *

  The smell of wet coats accompanied them south on the Rue du Mans, and on the way, having stopped for petrol, Delphine couldn’t help wondering what exactly the late Basma Arouar might have dug up about her family, particularly the Rosheims, émigrés, like Ursula Villedin, from Lorraine who’d been known as ‘Ya Ya’s’ because of their inability or unwillingness to say ‘oui.’ Or, Adriana Fachietti, whose father had business interests in Palermo, and might even be part of the Mafia there. And what if Michel Salerne’s criminal brother was somehow involved? After all, the notorious Fresnes prison wasn’t so far away.

  Merde…

  Perhaps Labradelle ought to know. But not yet…

  *

  Despite the car’s heater on maximum and the closeness of her own flesh and blood, Delphine felt unusually cold. Too much was still unresolved, and her feeling surplus to requirements as far as Labradelle was concerned, had been the icing on the mouldy cake. Yes, Captain Valon and Lieutenant Confrère’s attentions last night had been professional enough, but nothing more. No warm farewell, or any suggestion she might still be of use. Let it go, she told herself, but there was one question for her mother to answer.

  “Why did you allow Papa to hit me like that?” she asked, not to be perverse, or literally to open old wounds, but to discover how close her parents really were. She could grasp how one might fly to the defence of the other in a dangerous situation such as at the Auberge de l’Aube, but not what had happened on Tuesday night.

  “I’ve said sorry.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “You’re so like him.”

  “Not my fault.” And then, while turning into the crowded hospital car park, her phone’s inappropriate ring tone filled the little car.

  Martin?

  It was.

  Be careful…

  “Delphine?”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s me,” he began. “I’m in trouble. Big, fucking trouble.”

  He certainly sounded rough. Frightened a better word.

  “Thanks for putting a tracker on my car. Not.”

  Another burst of rain hit the 2 CV’s soft top.

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “You bloody do.”

  Her mother was watching her.

  “Look, I’ve nothing to say. Whatever you’re involved with, or…”

  “I’m at somewhere called ‘Les Cigales,’ in the Causses de Quercy. For God’s sake, help me…”

  What?

  “Not Paris? With Jean-Marie?”

  “Fuck no.”

  “You didn’t intervene when young Roza needed help.”

  “I couldn’t. You must understand that. I’m sorry…”

  End.

  *

  “I’d have listened a bit more.” Irène Rougier rubbed salt into the wound while counting out small change for the car park. Hesitating over some thin, old francs. “At least asked how he’d got there.”

  “Thanks.” But all the while Delphine was thinking how the inhospitable Causses was another country. A long way away. How he really had sounded sorry.

  Her phone again. This time, a puzzled Jérôme Meyer returning her call. No, he’d not contacted Lieutenant Confrère, and wondered why she’d said that.

  How odd.

  Delphine apologised, still puzzled.

  “It was very interesting to meet you,” he said finally. “So do keep in touch and please be on your guard.”

  “I will. Thank you.” But her words were just empty sounds. And meanwhile, her incorrigible mother had got out of the car and was already forcing her illegal tender into a nearby parking meter.

  29.

  14.20 hrs.

  “The Causses?” exclaimed Lieutenant Lise Confrère, who, instead of the hoped-for Captain Valon, had picked up the phone at Labradelle. Delphine, although
tempted to end the call, let guilt about her response to Martin allow the gendarme to continue. “It’s vast and wild, except for…”

  “What?”

  “Never mind.”

  “He sounded genuinely scared.”

  “I’m sure he did. Do you have another phone number for him? The one you gave us is useless.”

  “No.”

  “Shame. I’m thinking logistics. ‘Les Cigales’ may be little more than a hovel up an unnamed track. A needle in a haystack. But it’ll be up to Cahors to sort that out. By the way, where are you?”

  Delphine stalled. The gendarme had either lied about Meyer calling her, or her memory might be affected by stress. “St. Xavier’s Hospital car park,” she said. “And when we’ve seen Roza, I might do some searching myself.”

  That made her feel better, but not for long.

  “Non.” Came her mother’s sudden response as she steered Delphine towards the Reception area where phones had to be switched off. “That’s just reckless.”

  Confrère was speaking again. “Look, when you’ve seen her, call me back. After midday, we’re up to our eyeballs, and there’s something else.”

  “What?”

  “Your mother’s right. Please don’t be a dead Delphine.”

  “She won’t,” snapped Irène Rougier. “Not if I’ve anything to do with it.”

  *

  Having registered their arrival at the hospital, with their IDs checked and passed, Delphine left her mother in its café area, telling her to be vigilant. She didn’t know the Roma camp was on the Gauffroi’s land and didn’t need to. At least earlier, she’d seemed sympathetic to the young girl; a small step in the right direction from someone who herself had suffered enough under fascism. It would have been useful to have learnt more of the late farmer’s relationship with the Rougiers all those years ago, but just then, for Delphine, the injured youngster took priority.

  *

  Roza Adamski seemed diminished in every way. Her ordeal had left her with not only a serious neck wound concealed by bandaging, but also two broken ribs sustained while fighting off her attacker. The ward sister informed Delphine that her mother had just left and would return later that afternoon. How? Delphine wondered, as there’d been no sign of a car near their caravan. Perhaps Patrick Gauffroi would be the taxi, and if so, she’d miss seeing him