Dark Summer in Bordeaux (22 page)

‘But surely it is very unlikely that there are other officers open to such corruption?’

‘One trusts not, but it is a risk that cannot be taken. The guilty – these degenerate boys – must be identified and arrested. That is what I require you to do. It is properly, as you will realise, a matter for the French police. If of course, for whatever reason, you fail to do as I ask, then I shall have to employ our own resources. I mean of course the Gestapo. Is that clear? I look forward, superintendent, to your willing collaboration, which will ensure the maintenance of good relations between my department of the Wehrmacht and the French police.’

As a child Lannes had played the game which the French call ‘colin-maillard’ and the English ‘blind man’s buff’. He had always disliked it when assigned the role of the blind man, and felt a fool. Now, not for the first time in his career in the police, he was landed with the part again, unable to see, stumbling round, reaching out to take hold of one of the other players and trying to identify him. Trying and failing. If Schussmann had already been under suspicion, had his visits to the bookshop in the rue des Remparts been noted? But if they had, then surely Léon would already have been identified and doubtless arrested? Or had Schussmann sought to protect him by leaving a suicide note in which he confessed to relations with a number of unnamed boys? That was possible; there had been a decency to him, even a sort of crazy gallantry – his letter to Léon had touched Lannes. But why leave any suicide note, any admission at all? Why not just shoot himself and leave these bastards to guess the reason? That too was possible . . . yet this Kordlinger had spoken with a certainty which suggested that they had indeed been keeping Schussmann under surveillance. And what of the role played by the spook who called himself Félix? Were the Germans on to him? None of it made sense.

And his own position? That wasn’t comfortable either. Kordlinger had spoken politely, giving him to understand that he assumed their interests were the same. But his tone? Was that a bit different? Was there an undercurrent suggesting that Lannes was not entirely to be trusted?

He wasn’t of course.

He looked out on the square. The sky had clouded over and a wind had risen, blowing hard in from the Atlantic. There was a flurry of rain and the passers-by had opened their umbrellas and were walking hurriedly.

One thing was clear. Léon was in danger and needed his protection. His first impulse was to go straight to the bookshop; his second, to do nothing of the kind. They might be watching him too.

There was a knock on the door. The Alsatian came in, smoking one of the Havanas Lannes had procured for him. He sat down without waiting for an invitation.

‘I don’t much like that chap,’ he said. ‘He’s not going to be as easy to deal with as poor Schussmann. Is there anything in his story, do you think?’

‘How should I know? I don’t even know if he told you the same story he told me.’

‘I was surprised when he told me Schussmann was a queer. Did you know that?’

‘Can’t say it had occurred to me either,’ Lannes said. ‘None of our business, was it, anyway?’

‘Seems it is now. Kordlinger came straight from you back to me, insists we must find this boy friend, make an arrest and hand him over to them – an assault on the honour of the German army, or some such nonsense.’

‘Not our business,’ Lannes said again.

‘I wish it wasn’t,’ Schnyder drew on his cigar, ‘but things will be uncomfortable for us – to say the least – if we ignore the request. I say, request, but it’s really an order, and one we can’t ignore. I don’t like it any better than you do, Jean, but we exist on sufferance, we both know that. So you’ll make inquiries, please. Have a word with what’s his name of the Vice Squad. We have to come up with something.’

‘If you say so.’

‘I do. I’m afraid I really do.’

The Alsatian strolled off, saying he had a lunch engagement. With La Jauzion perhaps? Well, he was welcome to her. He wasn’t really concerned. For him Kordlinger’s demand was an inconvenience, no more than that. The idea of handing over a boy of whom he knew nothing to the Gestapo didn’t trouble him. No doubt he would rather it wasn’t necessary – he was a decent enough sort after all – but for him it would be merely another of the pieces of the price exacted by defeat, the Occupation, and the requirement to collaborate. In the name of the Higher Good, individuals were expendable; unfortunate, but there it was. Lannes swore, savagely, as he had scarcely sworn since his days in the trenches a quarter of a century ago. He took his hat and trench-coat and left the office.

He had no destination in mind. It was enough for the moment to walk in the wind and rain which was filling the gutters with yellowish water. He leaned heavily on his blackthorn, his hip painful. They surely hadn’t yet identified Léon, that was one thing.

Or had they and were they putting him to the test himself? Should he speak to Bracal? Could he trust him? And find some way of getting in touch with the spook who called himself Félix? He after all was responsible for Léon’s plight. Bracal might have a means of making this possible – he was a bit of a dark horse.

It was still the lunch hour, but the streets were almost deserted, emptied by this sudden summer squall which was still hurling the rain down. The vile weather was a sort of relief, or at least suited his mood. He didn’t know where he was heading. The city seemed like a maze in which he was trapped in the centre with no idea of how to find his way out.

XXXIII

When the bookshop door opened Léon had a moment of apprehension. But it was an ordinary customer, a middle-aged lady who had been there before and who apologised for her presence because, she said, ‘I’m not really looking for a book today, just taking refuge from the weather.’

‘Yes, it’s dreadful, isn’t it?’ Léon said. ‘Can I give you a cup of coffee perhaps?’

‘That would be very kind.’

While he filled the pot, put it on the stove and waited for the water to boil, she browsed the shelves in the manner of someone who is merely killing time.

‘You’re Léon, aren’t you?’ she said when he passed her a cup.

‘Yes,’ he said.

‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘You don’t need to look anxious. I’m an old friend of Henri.’

‘He’s upstairs. Shall I fetch him, or tell him that you’re here?’

‘No, don’t do that. There’s no need to disturb him.’

‘As you wish.’

She drank her coffee and dabbed her lips with a lace-fringed handkerchief.

‘These are terrible times, aren’t they?’ she said. ‘They say truth is the first casualty of war and the same seems to be true of the Occupation. One finds oneself telling lies, even quite unnecessary ones. For instance, I am not only taking refuge from the weather, as I said, though I suppose that I might have done so in any case. But really I came here to speak to you. Oh dear, that sounds dreadful, as if I was going to tell you off. But it’s not that at all . . . ’

Léon waited. He looked beyond her to the street where the rain was still pelting down.

‘It’s so difficult,’ she said. ‘I’m sure you’re a nice boy.’

Well, there was nothing he could say to that, was there?

She opened her handbag, took out a bunch of papers and laid them on the desk before Léon. They were copies of the Cross of Lorraine which he had duplicated.

‘I found these in Jérôme’s room when I was tidying it,’ she said.

‘Oh, you’re Jérôme’s mother?’

‘Of course. Didn’t I say so? He’s my only child, we’re very close and he has always told me everything . . . ’ ‘I see.’

Everything? He thought – not my story, surely, I couldn’t bear that.

‘Do you? Then you understand why I’ve come here. Jérôme’s not like other boys, I know that. Perhaps it’s my fault. He’s soft, easily influenced, led astray. But what you are doing, the three of you, for I know about Alain Lannes’ involvement too – Jérôme adores him and will do whatever he suggests – what you are doing is dangerous. Perhaps you don’t understand that. But it must stop before you are all in serious trouble. I’ve come to ask you to do this. There’s no point in speaking to Alain, he’s wild and headstrong, but nevertheless, from my point of view, you are still children, all three of you, and perhaps you don’t understand what this can lead to. The Occupation, whatever we think of it, is going to last for years, there’s no doubt of that, to my mind. So I’m urging you, Léon, to give it up, give up what you are doing which may seem like a game to you . . . ’

Léon thought: Félix, Schussmann, the Hotel Artemis.

‘It’s not a game,’ he said. ‘Have some more coffee.’

He lit a cigarette and found that his hand was shaking.

‘You’re wrong to think Jérôme’s soft,’ he said. ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t speak to you like this . . . ’

She dressed him as a girl when he was a little boy and perhaps she would still like to do so.

‘He’s sympathetic,’ he said, ‘but he’s not soft.’

He told her about the incident at the swimming pool.

‘So you see he’s brave.’

‘What does that matter?’ she said. ‘Don’t you understand? If you go on like this, you will get yourselves killed. For nothing. For an idea. Trying to change what you can’t change . . . ’ I’m a Jew, Léon thought, I certainly can’t change that. But he didn’t speak the words that came to mind; it would have been as if he was claiming some special privilege. And in any case she might reply, ‘So you’re a Jew – that’s your problem – it’s got nothing to do with Jérôme.’ She would be right of course, and yet she would also be mistaken. Jérôme had made it his problem too.

Instead he refilled her cup and said, ‘For us the position is intolerable. So what else can we do?’

‘You can do nothing, like the rest of us.’

She began to weep. Léon was sorry for her and embarrassed.

‘We’re careful,’ he said. ‘I promise you.’

‘Careful!’ she said.

Léon thought, my mother would say exactly the same thing if she knew what we were doing. So, I’m sure, would Aunt Miriam. Alain’s mother too, even though I know almost nothing about her. And his father. But this doesn’t mean we’re wrong. It’s a matter of generations perhaps.

He looked up. The rain had stopped as suddenly as the storm had broken, and the sun was shining.

Madame de Balastre dried her tears.

‘I’ve said what I came to say. I can’t prevent you from carrying on with this madness – for that is indeed what it is, Léon, madness – but I beg you not to involve Jérôme in it any further. I’ve implored him to stop, but he speaks of loyalty to you and Alain. There,’ she said, ‘please do as I ask. And destroy these’ – she pointed to the pile of Léon’s drawings of the Cross of Lorraine.

When she left he waited for a few minutes, then fixed the notice, ‘Closed for Lunch’ to the door and stepped into the street, looking first both left and right as had become his habit since the day Félix had been waiting for him there. He started to walk, briskly, with no destination in mind; it was simply that inactivity was intolerable. But then everything except the hours spent with Alain and Jérôme was now intolerable, had been since that evening in the Hotel Artemis, since before then indeed, since that day Félix forced himself on him. And now Jérôme had in a sense betrayed him. To his mother admittedly, only to his mother. He wouldn’t tell Alain – that would be to betray him in turn. People were re-emerging into the sunlight. Waiters at the Café Régent in the Place Gambetta were straightening the chairs which they had tilted up when the rain started. He went into the café and ordered a beer – a demi – and, when he took out his wallet to pay, found that, without thinking, he had folded one of his Cross of Lorraine posters in his pocket. He went through to the toilet and pinned it up where Alain had posted their first manifesto. That was no longer there. Of course it wasn’t. The management had removed it as they would remove his poster as soon as it was noticed. His gesture was an empty one – except that it made him feel better.

Only a little better.

Jérôme’s mother didn’t realise what she had demanded of him. Jérôme could drop out as she urged. Alain too if he chose. Their life would go on as before, and the worst they might feel would be a certain shame. His position was different. He was an outcast, a Jew, and compromised whether he acted or not. If only Schussmann had never found his way to the bookshop. If only Gaston who had loved him and understood him and made him laugh was still alive. If only they could all go back eighteen months and wipe out everything that had happened since. If only he wasn’t so afraid . . .

His steps had taken him into Mériadeck, the Jewish district. A girl, about his age, with a black eye, smiled at him. He shook his head, and she said, ‘Another time, darling.’ He walked on, then stopped and looked back. She was leaning against the wall and the beckoning smile was still fixed on her face. If I was normal, he thought, I would have accepted her invitation. He found himself in front of a tailor’s shop. His great-uncle Léopold, he realised. He turned the door handle and went in.

The old man was sitting cross-legged on the table, sewing. He didn’t recognise Léon. It was at least five or six years, maybe more, since he had been here, and he had been only a child then.