A Good Death Read online

‘Three weeks ago,’ he repeated slowly. ‘Only three weeks ago.’

  ‘They were still here three weeks ago, the Germans. The SS were billeted here for weeks, since the beginning of June. There was an ambush and Henri was caught with Pierre Rouget, you know, the son of the Rougets at Cavialle, the younger one, and Philippe Boysse was shot too, and …’

  ‘Begin at the beginning. Tell me exactly.’

  She pulled out a chair. Her speech fumbled for a moment; she could not really tell him. With four years to account for, she did not know what was significant any more. Clinging to exactitude, she said, ‘It was Wednesday afternoon. They were coming back, the Germans, back to Bonnemort and they were attacked on the track just the other side of the hill. Several Germans were killed. And then they escaped, our people, I mean. But Henri was wounded, so they got him and Pierre Rouget too and some others, and they took them down to the village.’ Her voice was emotionless. ‘They banged on the doors and forced everyone out of their houses. The German officer was mad with rage, they say. They tied Henri up and shot him in front of everyone. Then they strung up the rest of them from the tree. There were seven executed altogether that day. The mayor agreed that they would bury the dead German soldiers in the cemetery. And they all went there and had to dig, everyone, even the baker’s father, eighty-five years old. Then they were allowed to go back to their houses. And the next day they were gone, Germans, Milice, everyone.’

  Dorchin could wait no longer. He dipped his spoon once again into the thick mess in his bowl. Theo did not move. The spareness of the story increased its horror. Only three weeks ago.

  He thought of his meeting with the partisans, only an hour or so ago. There’s a lot been going on at Lepech …

  Florence said, ‘Someone got the German officer.’

  Micheline carried on, with no sign of vengeful pleasure, her reply as flat as the rest of her account, ‘They cut his throat and left him here.’

  ‘Here?’

  ‘Yes. Naked as a pig in front of the house. We got up in the morning and there he was. But we didn’t know what had happened to Henri then, until Petignat came up from the Gendarmerie to tell us, so we didn’t understand why they killed him.’

  ‘Micheline,’ he began. He should have been here three weeks ago. He should never have left. ‘And the rest of the family?’ He remained standing, prepared for the worst. Micheline pushed aside those troubles as old ones, reduced to nothing by her present grief.

  ‘Georges was deported to Germany. We haven’t had any news from him. Roger and Claude are in the Maquis. Claude is Florence’s intended. They were to be married last year, but…’ She couldn’t be bothered to explain the events that had produced this minor family tragedy.

  Florence was holding the door open. ‘Madame is in her sitting room. I went to tell her.’

  ‘She’s here? I thought she must have left.’

  ‘No, she’s here. The children are asleep, of course. I didn’t wake them. The ladies are always up at this hour, but I haven’t told them yet. I thought you’d want to see Madame first.’

  She walked with him across the courtyard, solicitously shining her torch for his footsteps, as if he did not know the way.

  ‘We haven’t used the house since the Germans came.’ She was gabbling now, as if the words flowed while her mind was absorbed elsewhere. ‘The family all moved into the tower and spent their days in Madame’s sitting room.’

  She was opening the tower door and leading him up the stone steps. He had a strong feeling of unease. Why had Ariane not come down to meet him as soon as she heard he had arrived? He had the sense he was being ushered in to visit a prisoner.

  Answering his unspoken thought, Florence said, ‘Madame was already in bed. She wanted to prepare herself.’

  A glow in the fireplace, where someone had thrust some wood into the embers and the flames were reviving. No other light. His wife standing by the chimneypiece, posed to meet him. He could see her tension in the firelight that framed her silhouette. She was a tall woman, athletically built with strong shoulders, large hands and feet. She had never been beautiful, still less pretty, although she had always had the money to achieve elegance and the status of jolie laide. He saw, and his heart was touched, that she must have been hastily dressing up for him. She was wearing a peacock-blue dress, tightly belted at the waist, one he had always liked. Round her head she had wrapped a silk scarf, blue, yellow and red.

  ‘Ariane,’ he said and moved quickly forward. ‘Ariane.’

  He smelled her scent, the same as before. He could never remember what it was called when he went to buy it. He embraced her and felt her thin torso, less substantial than four years ago. He put his hand to her neck and felt a faint clinging of perspiration beneath his fingertips.

  Her arms hung at her sides and her face was pressed against his neck. He leaned back to look at her, putting his hand to her head. Hers followed, but it was too late; the silk scarf slid to the floor. A metamorphosis was taking place in front of his eyes and he was holding a stranger in his arms. Her familiar face became unrecognisable, a mask fixed to a skull that was covered with black stubble, white skin flecked with black like a plucked fowl’s, repellent to the touch.

  Part Two

  Paris and Bonnemort

  10 September 1944 – 28 January 1945

  Chapter Two

  Swords and shields, flags like silk scarves, blue, yellow, and red, hung on the walls of the dining room of the Hotel de Brionne. This was the Ministry of War where the general had taken up his function as a minister on 7 June 1940, just ten days before leaving for London and exile. Now he was back, sitting down to lunch as if there had been no interruption. The smell of the meal rose agreeably to the nostrils of the four men as they took their places. Even with the current difficulties of procurement, the Ministry’s food was good, which was nice for the guests. Nothing else about the meal would be designed for their enjoyment. In the last four years Theo de Cazalle had eaten many meals with the general, so he knew what to expect. His fellow guests, two eminent members of the Resistance from the National Committee of Liberation and the National Front, were not accustomed to the tension, so bad for the digestion, that was often a feature of dining with the general, at least when he had lessons to impart, as he had today.

  They drank their soup in a silence that exaggerated the sounds of swallowed liquid. Theo watched the great jaws masticating bread and waited for the metaphorical chewing up that was to come. He avoided the eye of Palewski, opposite him, who was looking preternaturally grave, and concentrated instead on the armour-covered walls. Four years of close association with the Big Man had produced familiarity, but not intimacy. He was always courteous to his staff, but difficult to handle on any subject where the facts did not fit his wishes. The general recognised Theo’s skill at mediating between him and the Resistance, who had rarely fallen in with his line, but he did not admire him for it.

  * * *

  Theo, like his leader, was a career army officer, the son of an officer. His family came originally from the Touraine, but during the course of the nineteenth century a combination of obstinate monarchism and financial incompetence had left them with just one decaying chateau on the banks of the Loire. Theo’s father had been forced to sell even this remnant and the only property that remained was the farm of Bonnemort. It had been kept because it was the home of the aunts, his grandfather’s sister and sister-in-law, who had both been widowed young and pensioned off in this obscure house.

  Here his mother had fled from the heat of Algerian summers and the deadening routine of the cantonment. Here Theo had come every holiday of his childhood in the golden age before the Great War. His father was killed at Ypres before Christmas 1914; the aunts had lost their five sons by 1918 when Theo himself entered cadet school, aged just eighteen. The women’s fervent prayers on his behalf caused the war to end just in time to ensure his survival. The luck that had saved him from the carnage of the western front continued to shine on hi
m in peace. He enjoyed his profession and was proud to be an officer in the best army in the world. He managed his career with some success so that he did not have to spend years in a barrack yard in the desert. After a suitable time, when he was promoted to captain, he married, Louise, a distant cousin; a daughter, Sabine, was born; his wife died.

  * * *

  The general was speaking now. Wiping his lips firmly with his napkin, he began the urgent subject of the moment, the cleansing of France. The question of what was to be done with the supporters of the previous regime was not new, but it had become urgent. The courts martial that had been planned must be set up, region by region, to deal with the crimes of Vichy. It had to be done as rapidly as possible in order to contain the popular fury which, since the landings in Normandy, had erupted in summary justice all over France. For the men of London, and above all for the general, it was necessary to seize control and to reforge national unity. For the Resistance leaders in France it was another matter. They wanted revenge for the deaths of their comrades, for the tortures, deportations, requisitions they had undergone.

  ‘France requires us to forget, to concentrate on the reestablishment of the authority of the Republic,’ the general was saying now.

  ‘But some examples must be made …’

  ‘Of course, the guilty must be punished, the leaders, but it would be a disaster to rummage through the injustices of four years to try to right every wrong. France must be strong and united to take her rightful place among the Allies at the peace conference. We must put the past behind us.’

  The two guests glanced at one another. They had stayed and suffered and now the exiles came back to tell them to forgive their enemies. They did not want to give up one of the sweetest fruits of victory.

  ‘We must examine what went on in the local administration,’ said one of them. ‘And in the police, the town halls … It was there that Vichy weighed on the people.’

  ‘It is these areas, in particular, that have to be controlled,’ the general contradicted him. ‘They are precisely where individual resentments and personal enmities are exercised. We want no revolutionary justice. The state must take over as soon as possible. Some terrible scenes have been enacted, shaving of women’s heads, beating of men, even here in Paris.’

  * * *

  Theo shuddered as an image of Ariane’s skull, darkly shadowed, the black quills just growing through the skin, superimposed itself on his memory. What had she done to deserve such treatment? What can lead a woman to betray husband, country, herself? Fear? Pain? Greed? Love?

  * * *

  He forced himself to concentrate on what the general was saying.

  ‘Justice, true justice is an element of sovereignty. It is impersonal, detached. The Republic, with calm and authority, must take it over from the people. No justice is done in passion.’ Even in private the Big Man’s sonorous tones sounded with a portentousness equal to a national broadcast.

  * * *

  Had there been a mock trial of Ariane with testimony of her guilt. Or a spontaneous outbreak of rage in the local community at the sight of a woman, his wife, who had … done what?

  The murdered German officer had been her lover. His mind had made that leap at once, while he was driving through the night away from Bonnemort back to Paris. That was why his killers had left his body in front of her house. It was obvious. Micheline had implied that the murder had something to do with Henri’s death, but he dismissed this connexion. The outline was clear to him, but, like Micheline, he groped for detail to anchor himself.

  * * *

  ‘Swift and limited.’ De Gaulle had eaten enough. He was crumpling his napkin with finality. ‘No, no.’ He waved away the unspoken protests of his guests. ‘Some people will get away with their ill deeds, but we need them. And loyalty is due to France herself, not to the inadequate individuals who represent her from time to time.’

  * * *

  That night Theo had not acted with the philosophic generosity that his leader advocated; he had turned on his heel immediately and left. Such was his rage at the time that he did not even speak to Micheline or Florence to say goodbye. Seating himself at the wheel, he had shouted to Dorchin from the yard.

  The previous time he had left home, in the midst of disarray and defeat, he had been a happier man. The Germans had crossed the frontier on 10 May in 1940 and six weeks later France had collapsed. Theo had been wounded in the neck and taken to a field hospital from which the doctors had already fled. The wounded were evacuated to Bordeaux where, feverish and hallucinating, amid scenes of desperate overcrowding, he was unaware of the nightmarish reality taking place beyond his sickness. When, after three weeks, it was all over and he had more or less cured himself, he found that it was, indeed, all over.

  He had always been a man with friends and even in the hospital a friend discovered him. Dr Maniotte, a pulmonary specialist who had a country home at Lepech Perdrissou, was still at work as a doctor of all trades, sewing up wounds, delivering babies, setting broken limbs. Somehow, he recognised his former tennis partner in the unshaven face and bandaged torso lying unconscious in a corridor. From him, Theo heard the news of the Armistice, the castration of the army, the occupation of the north. The country was now divided into two zones and there was no communication between them. Lying in fever, he had not heard de Gaulle’s appeal from London, broadcast by the BBC on 19 and 20 June. Later, as he lay semi-conscious, he heard diatribes against the Anglo-Saxons and the traitors who had joined them, and he understood that the British hadn’t yet been defeated. He decided at once to join the fight wherever it was, even if it had to be in the gloomy greyness of London.

  He had been under no illusions about his legal position. He was about to become a deserter from the army, which had been ordered to lay down its weapons. As de Gaulle had already been sentenced to death in absentia by a military court, Theo could not expect more lenient treatment. He decided to save his family from the confiscation of his property by disappearing from the records in the neatest possible way: he would fake his own death. Maniotte, who obtained the appropriate papers and saw to their countersigning, said to him, ‘This is the first time in my medical career I have ever committed a fraud. I’m now a criminal.’

  ‘You’ll do it many more times before we’re through,’ was Theo’s robust reply.

  Before the Armistice in June 1940, Maniotte had sent his family to his house in the free zone, very close to Bonnemort. Theo persuaded him to join him in crossing the Line of Demarcation, still officially closed. Only Ariane had seen him on that brief visit to his home. He had told her of what he intended with a clarity which showed that no other plan was possible. He warned her to expect notification of his death, a fiction she should maintain with all the other members of the family. He promised to send messages when he could, but she would have to accept that there would be no way of knowing if the pretence had become reality until the war was over. She had not argued with him. He was not sure now whether she had approved of his actions, or was simply too shocked to attempt to dissuade him. He had left early the next day, shedding his name, his country and his past.

  If some abstract idea of nation and people had determined him to resist when defeat came, the more personal vision of his home and his wife had made him endure the years of exile. Now, with that ideal shattered, he was overtaken by a profound sense of pointlessness. Corruption was everywhere; nowhere was safe if it had penetrated to the remoteness of Bonnemort.

  His encounter with his wife, about which he had told no one, pressed on his vision and he began to realise that it entailed larger consequences than personal grief. Having a ‘collabo’ as a wife was not just emotionally painful, it did not look good. The communists, who declared themselves the party of the martyrs of the Resistance, would certainly make use of it, not just against him, but against the Big Man, too. Even within his own camp, there were those who would like such information for the damage it could do him. So one course of action open to him was
to embrace the general’s policy of not enquiring too deeply. He had suppressed a smile during that lofty discourse. The general himself was slow to forget a wrong. In Theo’s experience, his long-burning resentment never faltered.

  Theo felt, like Othello, that he would have found life sweet if he had not known. But he did know, and, he wanted to know more. He wanted every detail. Who had shaved her head, who had watched, with eyes full of guilty pleasure? He was astonished at the power of his imagination. Sitting at his desk in the Ministry of War, he would be roused by the sound of the telephone, or the entrance of an assistant, and realise he had been thinking of his wife for the last fifteen minutes. If only he could discover what had really happened, perhaps he could rid himself of his most persistent and disgusting obsession: picturing Ariane with the unknown officer, his enemy, the occupying German, dining with him, drinking with him, fucking him. He had become a perverse voyeur, creating images he did not want to see and shuffling through them, like a vendor of pornographic postcards. No forgetting would be possible before he knew what he had to forget. Fantasy was unforgettable; it recurred, with embellishments. Only the truth could be forgotten.

  Chapter Three

  Theo was walking across the Concorde Bridge late at night, his head sunk forward between his shoulders, his eyes on the rhythmical reappearance of his toecaps. He stopped in mid-crossing to look upriver. The surface of the water, puckered by the light rain, was just visible, a greyer, liquid variant of the ambient darkness. He had made no progress in the two months since his visit to Bonnemort. The obvious course was to confront Ariane. Time and again he unscrewed his pen to begin a letter to her and found that no words would flow with the ink. Rage, disgust, indignation, injury still dominated his thoughts. They would have to meet; at the very least, justice demanded that Ariane be allowed a hearing. But not yet, not yet.