Staying Alive Read online

  ‘I can account for myself, Alain.’

  ‘Not for that radio you’re carrying, you can’t. Besides, supposed not to be seen together more than we bleeding have to – right?’

  It was one of the principles instilled in the course of training. One réseau member gets arrested, others move away fast and lie low, while the one that’s caught is counted on to hold out against interrogation for at least forty-eight hours before leaking anything that might earlier have led them to his or her confrères. Whereas if the Gestapo had prior knowledge of any such associates, chances are the arrests would have been simultaneous.

  Instructors had admitted that not to be seen together was a principle, not a blanket instruction. Very often you had to be together in public places. Just a matter of common sense, she guessed, in practice. She wondered whether Déclan knew she was a greenhorn, still had practically everything to learn. Following him now – along a hedgerow, for the advantage of its shadow, then after casting around a bit he stooped to pick up a bag containing the lamps – bicycle lamps probably – from where he’d left it among what looked like nettles and docks. Telling her as they went on, ‘Proper bastard now. Boches taking over from bloody Vichy. Last couple of days, this is, truck convoys an’ trains full of ’em. Won’t make our lives easier, will it. Like as not you’ll have a few on whatever train we get you on. I got you a ticket, by the way.’

  ‘Well, thanks.’

  ‘Save having to show papers at the guichet. But there’ll be guards, bet your life. Account for yourself, you say – so why’re you in Cahors, for a start?’

  ‘I’m moving house from Paris to Toulouse, I’ve a cousin married to a farmer near La Capelle, took the chance of stopping off with them for a few days.’

  ‘They know about it?’

  ‘No. They exist, but – who’d bother checking?’

  ‘Gestapo would, if they thought they had reason.’

  ‘So I don’t give them reason. I’m coming to Toulouse to find myself a job and because I was sick of Paris. I’m a widow – husband drowned by the bloody British. Needn’t worry, that’s cast-iron. And there’s an aunt of my late husband’s in some village somewhere – whichever way I’m going, I’m hoping to locate her. What’s your story – French wife, you said—’

  ‘Long an’ short of it is I’m a local. Make my living fixing borehole pumps and suchlike. “Agricultural engineer” is what I have on my papers, what my wife calls it is “odd-job man”. But look – stay put a minute, while I do a recce?’

  He left the suitcase and the bag of lamps with her, vanished towards a dark confusion of buildings, ruins of some kind. The moon was obscured by cloud at this moment and it was a jumble, not easy to make out. Ruins of a small farmstead, must have been. No truck visible, anyway not from here. The ground was rutted, though, no doubt by farm traffic. Well – narrow ruts, so carts… Déclan had disappeared. She moved closer to the ruins, dumped the suitcases amongst long grass and rubble, went back for the lamp bag then sat herself down on the larger case. Not all that visible, and she’d be in the shadow of this nearer lot when the cloud shifted. Déclan’s truck presumably somewhere amongst all that, or behind it; he’d be checking that there were no foreign bodies lurking in the immediate surroundings.

  Wise enough, at that – if the truck had been standing there for an hour or two, as it most likely would have been. Déclan was obviously in his element, knew what he was about – and had worked with that other one before, was what he’d call a mate of his. Whereas she’d had her antennae and/or hackles up, to start with, for some reason. Instinct – or just nerves? One of the things you dreaded – well, there’d been cases of agents parachuting into traps, resulting either from bad security, radio interception or plain treachery – informants on the ground here being by no means rare and leading, in cases one had heard of, to reception parties composed of Germans or gendarmes instead of colleagues or résistants, agents like herself landing virtually into their arms then handcuffs, leg-irons, torture-cells and/or firing-squads, and nothing more heard of said agent, nothing known, except – another thing that had been known – messages tapped out on his or her transceiver and individual crystals, such messages having been coded on his or her one-time pad, and at least on one occasion a complete disaster scene developing quite swiftly – other réseaux penetrated and blown, multiple arrests and disappearances as tongues wagged and the ripples spread.

  The nub of it all being that one couldn’t – shouldn’t – ever relax completely or take any set-up, individual or outfit, as sure-fire, safe.

  Although one would, she guessed. Distrust had been strongly recommended as what one might call a proper initial attitude, but for one’s own peace of mind, even sanity—

  ‘Lucy – come on…’

  ‘Alain – my field name’s Suzette. Suzette Treniard.’

  A grunt as he joined her and waited for the case on which she’d been sitting. ‘Suzette. Sure. Just happens I’ve a weakness for “Lucy”.’

  ‘Nice for her, I’m sure. What’s your wife’s name?’

  ‘Oh. Monique.’ Rosie was on her feet; he picked up the suitcase. ‘Watch out for brambles. Tell me – name of the people you’re supposed to’ve been visiting at La Capelle?’

  ‘D’you need to know?’

  ‘If we got stopped on our way into town, need to know where I’d picked you up, wouldn’t I?’

  ‘Suppose you would. Sorry. Their name’s Lafrenière.’

  ‘Don’t know ’em. About Monique though, I better mention she’s not concerned in our business, only in my legit work, the farm stuff. This other I never talk to her about.’

  ‘I’m not likely to meet her, then.’

  ‘If I was with her and we ran into you, I wouldn’t know you. Here’s the old bus, though.’

  A dark-coloured gazogène – charcoal-burning vehicle, the burner and tall funnel behind the cab. It was parked in the angle between what must have been a farm cottage and a roofless barn. Déclan told her, ‘Converted her meself. Sunbeam Talbot she was once.’ He pulled open the passenger door. ‘Hop in, if you like.’

  ‘First gazo I ever saw.’

  ‘Dare say it would be.’

  Gazogènes had come into being through petrol being virtually unobtainable, except by Germans, Vichy officials, or those rich enough to patronise the black market. Who’d more or less have to be collaborators or high-priced Pétainists.

  ‘Did you know this was my first deployment?’

  Asking him this as he climbed in on the driver’s side of the truck. Odour of charcoal, oil, cigarette smoke. He said, ‘Jean did mention it. You’d know who I mean by Jean?’

  ‘Jean Samblat.’

  ‘Yeah. Big white chief. Captain. Whereas yours truly, you may not be surprised to hear, attained the dizzy eminence of sergeant, no less. Still be that, I dare say, if they hadn’t like poached me from my outfit.’

  ‘But to be an agent in the field you have to be commissioned?’

  ‘You do, an’ all – what I’m saying, on paper I’m a Second Loot. And you, now let me guess—’

  ‘Fanny.’ First Aid Nursing Yeomanry. ‘D’you get on with Jean?’

  ‘Poor lookout if I didn’t!’

  ‘And the other courier?’

  ‘Sure. Don’t see a lot of him, mind you.’

  ‘Code-name Raoul.’

  ‘Name on the ground, Marc Voreux. All we’ve wanted for is you, might say. Jean’ll be over the moon, getting you. Good at it, are you?’

  ‘I was a radio operator for a couple of years before they let me into training as an agent. What happened to the pianist I’m replacing?’

  ‘They didn’t brief you on that, eh?’

  ‘Nothing beyond the fact I’m his replacement.’

  ‘That’s about all we know. Bugger should’ve been in a place where I’d pick him up, and wasn’t. So if they got him – caught him on the job’s the likely thing, eh? – least we know is he wasn’t talking.’

 
Rosie thinking, maybe wasn’t. Or was and they’re leaving us in the open where they can keep tabs on us and whatever we may be up to – including what’s done about replacing him. One had heard of that dodge, even if Déclan hadn’t, or preferred not to take it into account.

  One thing they’d know for sure was that he would be replaced. They’d be waiting for you, direction-finders ready to beam in on your first transmission; then no doubt they’d have their ways and means. She broke a silence with ‘What sort of man was he?’

  ‘Nice enough. Quiet, like. Supposed to be writing a book, was his cover. Toulouse and its Environs, he was thinking of calling it. Historian, he was supposed to be.’

  ‘Would you have put him down as capable of holding out against Gestapo-type interrogation?’

  ‘Oh. Oh, well… Tell you the honest truth, Suzette, wouldn’t know who to put down as capable of that.’

  ‘One more question?’

  ‘Uh?’

  ‘Not having a pianist, how did Jean set it up for me to join you here?’

  ‘Ask him that, if I were you.’

  ‘Used some other réseau’s pianist, I suppose.’

  ‘Could’ve.’ A shrug. ‘Well – I mean, how else?’

  ‘So d’you think I’ll be expected to take in work from other réseaux?’

  ‘That I don’t know. Another one for the boss, eh?’

  The principle as taught in training was that réseaux received their orders from Baker Street and reported back to Baker Street, had no contact with each other in the field. On which basis one might hope that no other réseau would even be apprised of one’s existence.

  Déclan stretched and yawned. ‘Don’t have a smoke on you, do you, Suzette?’

  ‘OK to light up, is it?’

  ‘Oh, anyone close enough to spot it’d have us on toast already. And we’ll be here an hour or so yet, by the look of it.’

  The moon was low, behind cloud a lot of the time, and would be down well before dawn arrived from over the distant Alps and the nearer Cevennes. An hour would about do it, she thought – rummaging in her bag for the crumpled pack of Gitanes which Marilyn had produced at Tempsford, when she’d confiscated the Players Rosie had been carrying.

  ‘Gitanes.’

  ‘Bless your heart. Duck down, light two while you’re at it? Got a match?’

  ‘Yep.’ French ones, too. ‘Are fags in short supply?’

  ‘Anything smokeable’s in short supply. And pricey. But I left mine with old Fernand.’

  The farmer, she guessed. She passed Déclan his, then pushed herself back in her seat, head back, inhaling greedily. ‘Boy…’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘When you were a sergeant, were you regular army? No, can’t have been, can you. But—’

  ‘Joined up in ’39. I’d been third engineer in a cross-Channel packet, married Monique in Cherbourg and settled there like. Then when this lot started, thought I’d try the Army – reckoned I’d seen enough salt-water. And – hell, cutting a long yarn short, after Dunkirk, seeing as I was at home in French – and SOE having scouts out like—’

  ‘And Monique?’

  ‘Hung on in Cherbourg a while, then she moved down near Bordeaux where her folk are.’

  ‘And you joined her – after SOE training, I suppose. Was she expecting you?’

  ‘Was by that time, yeah, I’d got word to her. It was in Léguevin I joined her, though. She had a half-sister there – still has – and the pair of us was supposed to’ve come from Bordeaux. Not bad, eh?’

  ‘Just about perfect. But if Léguevin’s west of Toulouse, you’re a long way from home?’

  ‘Often as not I am. Go where the work is, near or far. Big country, eh?’

  * * *

  Tapping this out in note form on my laptop in the Hôtel Mermoz after that first session with old Rosie, I was tired – in fact about ready to drop off. It was gone 1 a.m., now, the hotel and the street outside dead quiet. In any case I could afford to call it a night now, remembering clearly enough her description of arrival in Cahors – enough to work on anyway, converting it into some kind of narrative form as I went along. Déclan for instance piloting his old gazo into the station forecourt, stopping between a farm-cart and a charcoal-powered motor-bus from which country passengers were alighting, and telling her, ‘Get in that crowd, none of ’em’s going to look twice at you.’

  ‘Well, thanks.’

  ‘Oh, don’t get me wrong…’

  At our table in the Colombier a few hours ago she’d put her hand on one of mine and confided, ‘Nice man, was Alain Déclan. A bit rough, in some ways, but absolutely genuine, the real McCoy.’

  ‘Was, you say. Sure it’s was?’

  ‘Oh yes – sadly, quite certain. But for instance, there at Cahors he must have realised how shaky I was, just at that stage, and although he’d been going to drop me there and leave me to get on with it, he changed his mind, saw me right on to the train – didn’t say anything, just came along – through the station building and on to the platform, bringing the larger of my cases. The platform was crowded, not only with new arrivals but with Germans, soldiers who’d come off the train – milling around, goofing at the stacks of freight – farm produce including crates of eggs and – oh, rabbits, chickens, pigeons, cabbages…’

  Then she’d seen the Gestapo, her first ever. First gazo earlier, now first Geheimer Staatspolizei – and exactly as she’d envisaged them, in belted raincoats and soft hats. Cartoon characters, almost, but none the less loathsome for that – not in the least difficult to believe what one had been told, that a lot of them had criminal records. There were uniformed Boches who were not off the train, too, mostly Funkabwehr, security police. She and Déclan had stopped, looking up and down the train to see where there might be room, windows and/or doorways where it might not be absolutely crammed; and in the course of that she’d perhaps unwisely watched one of the uniformed Germans disdainfully handing an elderly woman back her papers. It was his manner that appalled her – as if, if the old girl hadn’t been quick to take them, he’d have dropped them, let her scrabble for them. But glancing away from her as she snatched at them, he’d seen Rosie’s interest in him, was staring at her.

  ‘Alain – aren’t these sweet?’

  ‘Uh?’

  A crate of piglets – pink, squiggly, squealy. She was crouching beside it. ‘Poor little darlings…’ Looking up at Déclan, with the transceiver in its small, heavy case on the stone flags beside her, her left hand resting on it but her attention back on the piglets, Déclan gesturing towards the train – soldiery reboarding, peasants crowding in where they could, Rosie rashly allowing herself to look past him in the direction of that German, who fortunately had lost interest, turned away.

  I had that scene in mind, didn’t need to make a note of it on the laptop. Nor of the train journey itself – Rosie jammed between two large women on the slatted wooden seat, avoiding the smirks of a group of Boche soldier-boys who until they fell asleep persisted in eyeing her, whispering and sniggering amongst themselves. Sixty kilometres to Montauban, another fifty from there to Toulouse.

  3

  I had one breakfast at the Mermoz – why not, I was paying for it anyway – and got to the Brasserie des Aviateurs shortly before ten, prepared for Rosie to buy me coffee and, if she insisted, another croissant. But she wasn’t down yet. The place was quite full, predominantly with senior citizens who for all one knew might be former résistants of one kind or another. I might even have written about some of them. Anyway – conveniently – a group of three vieillards were vacating a side-table from which there’d be a direct view of the blue-glass entrance, and I got to it ahead of a middle-aged man and two girls who might have been his daughters. He looked disappointed at having been beaten to the post, and asked me whether I’d be prepared to share; I told him that regrettably it would not be possible, and as luck would have it, Rosie made her appearance at that moment.

  ‘Am I late, or were you early?’ S
he looked charming, in a pale-green linen suit with that same ruby brooch on it. Victorian, I guessed. And precious to her. Another guess was that it might have been a present from old Ben and she’d never be seen without it. She was saying as I shifted along the banquette seat to make room for her on my left side – the ear that works best – ‘Had to call Paris, and the darn line was busy. Did you get through to your wife?’

  ‘Did indeed. And all’s as well as it could be in the circumstances.’

  A waitress with red hair was clearing away those old men’s litter. Rosie suggested, ‘Coffee and croissants?’

  ‘Well – why not. But one croissant, if that’s obtainable.’

  ‘From which I deduce you’ve already breakfasted.’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘Burn much midnight oil?’

  ‘Got it all noted anyway. It’s left you on the train from Cahors with the young Germans ogling you. You’d have got here – Toulouse – about mid-morning?’

  ‘Yes. Two and a half hours, roughly, with a stop at Montauban.’ She broke off to ask the redhead, who’d returned with her order pad, for croissants with café au lait, and gave her a room number in the hotel. The Ambassade owned this brasserie, apparently. Rosie told me, ‘We’re having an opening session of our conference at eleven. General get-together, introductions, speech of welcome by Monsieur le President, and a meal of wine and cheese served up there in the conference room at twelve-thirty or so.’

  ‘Only wine and cheese?’

  ‘Because our guest of honour can’t get here until tomorrow at the earliest, maybe even Sunday. He’s coming from – oh, from Réunion, and missed some connecting flight, they think.’

  ‘Who is he?’

  ‘First question, though – d’you want to attend this eleven a.m. session?’

  ‘Not unless you think I should.’

  ‘Or the wine and cheese part?’

  ‘Not really. I’d only be in your way. You’ll have to, won’t you?’

  ‘I think so. Yes, I will. So maybe – if we got together early afternoon? Meet here at say two o’clock?’