Staying Alive Read online

  ‘Not well, as it happens. Only – you know, passing through.’

  Except for a safe-house on the Rue des Trois Moulins that he’d made use of maybe half a dozen times, in the course of his escape-line work. House belonging to an elderly couple who’d risked their lives time and time again to save those of complete strangers. Magnificent – and a constant surprise, how many of that kind there were. Hoeigrand said – blurting it out as if it had been in his mind to say it and he’d only now brought himself to the point of doing so – ‘I suppose you realise why we’ve been called on to follow what’s actually a most unorthodox procedure, bringing you here in your own transport?’

  ‘I haven’t. As it happens.’

  ‘Well. Arrival of the Occupying Power?’

  ‘What’s that to do with it?’

  ‘Everything. Sixes and sevens – transport in particular, they’ve commandeered most of it. And routine procedures countermanded – according to what one’s heard, that is – and officers ordered to attend meetings here, there and everywhere—’

  ‘That the bridge ahead now?’

  ‘Uh? Oh – yes…’

  ‘What I want to know is why I’ve been sent for anyway, let alone how. Orders from some damn Boche, are you telling me?’

  ‘No, I’m not. Simply don’t know. But in your shoes I’d watch the language – uh?’

  Shifting gear. ‘Boches be here to meet us, d’you expect?’

  No immediate reply – beyond a worried glance; but sweat on his snout and forehead, and the beginnings of denial. Embarrassment – the Judas factor, might call it? Marc raised his voice: ‘There will be, huh?’

  ‘I don’t know. Honest to God, I—’

  ‘No.’ Nodding grimly. ‘Dare say you wouldn’t.’

  * * *

  In the front office at the poste he caught the scent of it at once. Confusion, insecurity. No Germans in sight or sound, and no mention of them – confirmation, he thought, of Boche machinations lying at the root of it. And even if there’d never been one in the place you could bet there soon would be. He saw it in the eyes of the brigadier – meaning the sergeant in charge of the poste – and in those of others, including of course Hoeigrand’s. Decent men at heart, probably – at least, some of them would be – Pétainists now because they had to be if they wanted to keep their jobs, but not necessarily with their hearts in it. In fact there were gendarmes who sympathised with the Resistance, and some who actually worked for it. That might be comparatively rare, might not be the case at all with this bunch, but one definitely could sense what in Hoeigrand’s case he’d thought of as the Judas factor.

  Orders from Vichy being one thing, but from the Boche quite another? Especially when seemingly directed against one of their own people?

  He thought cynically then, take ’em a while to get used to it, no doubt.

  The brigadier was telling Hoeigrand, ‘Give your wife a buzz if you want, tell her you’ll be home for your Sunday lunch. One way or another we’ll get you back there.’ He looked at Marc: ‘All I can say is the order came to us from Lyon.’

  ‘Lyon.’ Gesture of incomprehension. ‘But from whom?’

  ‘From the préfecture, monsieur.’

  ‘Telling you to hold me on what charge?’

  ‘No charge. You’re being detained for questioning, that’s all.’ A shrug. ‘Regrettably, there’s only one type of accommodation I can offer you.’

  * * *

  A cell, measuring about four metres by two. At least he had it to himself. Planks with a palliasse on them and a single blanket, supper consisting of rabbit soup and bread. He asked the young gendarme who brought it, ‘Can you tell me who’ll be questioning me, and when?’

  ‘Some Germans who were taking the night train from Marseille, was what I heard.’

  ‘Tonight, then?’

  ‘Uh-huh. Morning, I’m sure.’

  ‘And Germans, plural, but what kind? Gestapo, for instance?’

  ‘That I don’t know. What would they have against you, d’you know that?’

  ‘All I’m thinking is maybe they’ve got the wrong Voreux.’

  ‘Well. Let’s hope so.’

  ‘That or some swine’s got it in for me.’

  ‘Denunciation, you mean.’

  He shrugged. ‘False accusation of some kind. Happens often enough, one’s heard.’

  ‘You haven’t let some girl down recently, I suppose?’

  ‘I never let girls down. Anyway why would it interest the Gestapo?’

  They were more likely to be Abwehr than Gestapo, he thought. At least, if it had anything to do with the escape-line, since it had been Abwehr, Boche military intelligence on the trail of shot-down airmen, who’d discovered and somehow penetrated that. Touch wood, one might be better off with Abwehr than with Gestapo.

  In the short term, anyway. Longer term, one was as likely to finish up in Belsen or Buchenwald either way.

  Right from the start though, he reminded himself, we recognised this sort of outcome as a possibility, knew it was a chance we had to take. Just pray to God they’re on to me alone, not Denise as well.

  Can’t be. Grasping the edge of a plank. As long as she’s kept her head down and her mouth shut – as she will have – won’t be. Please God.

  That same young gendarme came later to collect the tin plate and soup bowl.

  ‘All right, was it?’

  ‘Not bad at all.’

  ‘I’ll say goodnight, then. Good luck tomorrow.’

  ‘Thanks. Tell me something?’

  ‘Uh?’

  ‘I’m not charged with anything, you’re just putting me up for the night, why lock the door?’

  ‘Oh.’ Jiggling the key in his palm. ‘Sorry. Thing is, if you walked out, we’d be answerable.’

  * * *

  Answerable, he thought, to our real gaolers – gaolers, torturers and murderers: in the presence of whom tomorrow I’ll have to pretend innocence, even indicate goodwill.

  If there’s any point in doing so, if they don’t know it all already. All in the past tense, surely, nothing of what I’m doing now – except they’ll want to know what I’m doing now – much more likely it’s a continuance of their investigation of the escape-line, continuance which one might have anticipated, only tried not to think about, the probability that in arresting and interrogating others they would almost certainly have become aware of my existence – though not, please God, identity. Not until now, that is – thanks to the cut-outs we had in place. Had in place then. And what they’ll want to screw out of me…Well, (a) maybe whether any remnants of the line are still operating, (b) other identities – names – in particular of course that of Denise. They’ll know of her existence, just as they’ll have known of mine, but the system of anonymity we built around her – her priority being to shelter the rest of us – was quite elaborate, with provision for her to sever all connections pretty well at the drop of a hat and fall back into a completely law-abiding, pedestrian style of life. So she’s right out of it, and stays there; while the only names I might very reluctantly divulge, either tomorrow or any other time, might be ones they’ll know already, people they’ll have caught.

  And that’ll be that. Except that needing a motive other than family connection, my line will be that I ducked out of that business because it got so that there was nothing in it for me – as well, admittedly, as being extremely wearing on the nerves. Having been in it initially for the money, a fair amount of our traffic in those early stages being the kind that paid. Jews, of course, rich ones – a market to be exploited, in other words. But that – financial reward – went by the board quite early on, the vast majority of colis coming through didn’t pay a sou, hadn’t forked out higher up the line either – and one was running the same risks – or worse ones, things certainly weren’t getting any easier.

  That’s the outline of it, then. Won’t let me off the hook, but at least doesn’t involve anyone else, or admit political motivation. And stage two �
�� what I’m up to on this coast, if they’re interested, as they may be, in which case I’d need to account for how I make my living – well, what Hoeigrand and his colleagues will surely tell them, may have done before I’m interviewed – the fish business, and maybe on the side a little smuggling, to make ends meet until the crabs and lobsters begin to pay their way. If these Boches know anything about me – as they must do – they’ll know I’m by repute a chancer, not invariably on the straight and narrow – like anyone else lacking either connections or qualifications but needing to make a living of some kind, not too choosy about how I do it. Well, look – there are the mountains, Spain’s on the other side of them, there’s merchandise Spaniards will pay for – perfume from Grasse for instance – and other stuff that comes back…

  ‘Tobacco, cigars and cigarettes is what you think of first, but – well, take saccharin, for instance. In case you didn’t know, it’s a sweetening agent, comes in little pills, thousands of ’em in a single pack. Five hundred times the sweetening power of sugar – which you can’t get anyway, not more than a tablespoon a month on the bloody ration – and food factories needing this stuff in quantity and paying through the nose for it – oh, and a medical necessity too, for instance, for diabetics—’

  ‘Hold it there, Voreux.’ Slight smile, shake of the head. ‘We really don’t want to hear about diabetics.’

  Abwehr Leutnant Hohler might by the look and sound of him have been a professor conducting a tutorial. In his late twenties, with thick, reddish-brown hair and blue eyes in a pale, intelligent face, his expression more of concern, even friendly interest, than enmity. He also spoke excellent French with very little German accent. A different creature altogether from the brutish interrogator Marc had visualised in half-waking, restless spasms all through the night – rehearsing, ingratiating himself or trying to, persuading, wheedling – or at appropriate stages, standing on one’s dignity.

  Wished he hadn’t now. Wished he’d slept. He’d be coping better with this if he had.

  Hohler, having checked that flow with a slightly raised hand, was watching him amusedly across the boxwood table. His sergeant – uniformed, name of Bemm or maybe Behm – booted legs apart and back to the grey-painted door, Walther 9-mm holstered on his belt – had actually chuckled. He’d come to the cell with the brigadier who’d been on the desk last evening, and brought Marc along to this interview room, where the brigadier had left them.

  Hohler said, fingering a slim notebook which lay on the table in front of him with a silver propelling pencil beside it – looked like real silver – ‘Forget the diabetics, Voreux. Let’s talk about your sister.’

  He’d started. Actually winced, and the German of course had seen it.

  ‘You do have a sister?’

  He nodded. ‘Yes.’ Even that admission felt like treachery. But since they did know she existed…

  ‘Yes.’ The German had a note of it. ‘Her name is Denise, and you and she are extremely close – am I right?’

  Marc said, ‘Well – brother and sister, you know. Yes, I suppose…’

  ‘Quite unusually close. Didn’t she more or less take your mother’s place – bring you up?’

  ‘Well.’ A gesture. ‘Our mother died giving birth to me, Denise was then nine years old.’

  ‘And your father decamped with a Parisian fille de joie?’

  ‘I barely knew him. He – I mean, I was no more than a toddler when—’

  ‘He left you, and as I said, Denise virtually raised you, did effectively take your mother’s place.’

  ‘Being that much older, she – well, naturally—’

  ‘It’s hardly surprising therefore that the pair of you are extremely close. Far more so than in your average brother and sister relationship.’

  ‘You’re probably right – but since it’s the only family relationship of which I’ve experience—’

  ‘You’d give your life for her, wouldn’t you?’

  Staring at him… Then: ‘I suppose there could be circumstances—’

  ‘You bet there could.’ That smile again – and as backup, the sergeant’s chuckle. ‘I suppose you’re frequently in touch with her?’

  ‘No, as a matter of fact—’

  ‘Why not?’

  Gesture of surrender: hands spread, raised slightly above the table. A sigh, then nodding as if in acquiescence. ‘I think you must know that for a period of – oh, best part of a year, at least — I worked for an escape-line. Getting people out of France. That’s what this is all about, isn’t it?’

  ‘The escape-line which your sister set up and controlled – yes, we know about it, naturally. Also that when the line was penetrated and effectively broken up—’

  ‘You have some reason to think my sister was involved in it?’

  ‘Voreux, we know she set it up and ran it!’

  ‘You’re quite wrong. She never would have done anything of that kind. Whoever laid such information against her was lying. I took part in it, yes, but only – well, in the expectation of making money, especially from rich fugitives – and when I realised that effectively I’d been tricked into it, I backed out. It had nothing to do with my sister, in fact I’d hate her to know I’d been involved in such – such activities… Look – she’s a married woman, also as it happens a qualified accountant, she has more than enough on her plate without – well, I can only assure you, lieutenant—’

  ‘Her husband got away to England in 1940, and subsequently she set up her escape-line which naturally enough you joined. Having the same disposition and political attitudes, and defective eyesight having disbarred you from military service – then this chance of working with her?’

  It seemed they didn’t know he’d started as an agent of BCRA. Probably no way they would. If their informants, whoever they might be, had no knowledge of it – which they might well not have done… Looking up at him again. ‘I can see how you might tie all that together and make entirely spurious sense of it. Simply because she and I are close. Happens not to be true, that’s all, I’d guess at deliberate misinformation. The truth is that I was brought into the escape-line work by a man named Bertillon – Pièrre Bertillon, who’d been with me when I started as a sales representative – in photographic materials, as it happens. Bertillon in fact—’

  ‘– is either in prison or dead. As I’m sure you’d know. Let’s cut the cackle now, Voreux’ – a glance at his watch – ‘since neither I nor the sergeant have all day for this. The fact of the matter is that after my people smashed your sister’s escape-line, you and she would naturally enough go your separate ways, severing all communications.’

  ‘None of this is true. You’ve been misinformed, or—’

  ‘Almost all communications. You’d still be able to contact her in any real emergency – to save her life or your own, for instance. So tell me where she is now? Address, telephone, current employer—’

  ‘She did work for a group of restaurants.’

  ‘Her home address?’

  ‘I can’t remember. I mean, it is some time since—’

  ‘Can’t remember?’

  ‘No – I’m sorry, but—’

  ‘Wouldn’t know where to address a letter – if out of your deep affection for her you thought you could take that much of a risk?’

  He’d swallowed: hesitated for about two seconds. ‘I only—’

  ‘Your determination to maintain the fiction of her innocence is actually quite pointless – more so than you realise. Which I must say makes you rather less intelligent than I’d thought you might be. But leave that, for the moment. We know, as I’ve said, all about the escape-line, her part in it as well as your own – and that your pretence of having been in it only to enrich yourself is nonsense. You joined it because you were joining her. I don’t intend to waste time on any further discussion of this, so please don’t reassert it: we’ll switch to what really interests me and Sergeant Behm here and of course our colleagues elsewhere – the subject of what you�
��re doing now, Voreux.’

  ‘But I was telling you—’

  ‘A load of garbage. Just tell me what all that is a cover for.’

  Blinking at him. Internally, a rising sickness. Which would show as pallor, naturally olive skin fading to ivory. Rehearsals and the sleepless night certainly hadn’t helped.

  ‘Cover…’

  ‘Let’s see if I can jog your memory. Twice in recent times for instance you’ve visited Lyon and made contact with a woman – United States national, correspondent of the New York Times – who since then has taken to her heels. What was the purpose of those visits?’

  ‘I’m trying to raise capital for my fish business. For premises, equipment and transport – which I need in order to get it realistically off the ground. In fact I did mention, earlier—’

  ‘Part of that rubbish. You’re wasting our time, Voreux. You were not visiting that American in order to raise money.’

  Hohler’s tone was less kindly than it had been. Marc blinking, waiting for what might prove to be the coup de grâce. The German flicking over a page of notes.

  ‘Here we are. The code-name “Jake” mean anything to you?’

  ‘Code-name?’

  ‘In radio communications, code-names are used quite frequently. As of course you know. “Jake” is one that’s been picked out of clandestine transmissions from this area, also at the times of your visits to Lyon.’

  ‘I know nothing of any radio.’

  ‘Also a code-word that’s intrigued us. “Hardball”. English, of course – as is the name “Jake”. Proper names, I’m told, are more easily decrypted, at least in certain types of code.’

  ‘None of this means anything to me at all.’

  ‘Are you — or were you – acquainted with an individual by the name of Roger St Droix?’

  ‘Not that I recall.’

  ‘He was the operator of a clandestine radio. What the so-called “Resistance” and in particular the British “Special Operations Executive” call a “pianist”. He was a member of SOE, incidentally.’