The Girl Who Fell From the Sky (31 page)

‘What did you do?’

Yvette brings the coffee over. ‘I laid low. What else could I do?’

‘And no one came for you?’

‘Nobody. They didn’t know this address, see. I’d only just found it. You know, moving around, what you’re meant to do.’

‘So how did London know?’

She shrugs, as though such matters are of no consequence. ‘My final sked, I suppose. I thought they might help me, so I told them about the circuit, and gave this address and then I realised they couldn’t do anything for me at all, that I was on my own, that as far as they were concerned I could go and fuck myself. So I cut the transmission. The city is crawling with detector vans. If you’re on for more than a minute or two they can get a fix on you and then you’re in the shit.’

‘Don’t you have other places to transmit from?’

‘They’ve all been blown, haven’t they? They got Emile, you know that?’

‘
Emile
?’

‘He’d only arrived a week earlier. A Lysander …’

‘But when I last saw him he was waiting for a drop.’

‘He refused to jump. At the last minute, he refused to leave the aircraft—’

‘He
refused
?’

‘They had to take him all the way back, and the next time they had to get him in by Lysander.’

‘He told you this? Surely he wouldn’t have admitted it.’

Again she shrugs, looking suddenly embarrassed. ‘He told me. He’s not like we used to think.’ She sips her coffee, holding the cup in both hands for comfort, looking up at Alice with fear and confusion.

‘We need to get you out of here,’ Alice tells her. ‘We need to get you home, back to safety, back to little Violette.’

It’s the mention of her daughter that does it. For a moment Yvette’s face hesitates, as though it can’t make up its mind what expression to adopt. And then suddenly it breaks up like a paper mask dissolving in the rain, the features crumpling, the whole losing its coherence and becoming something else, a mere assembly of ruined features. She sits with her head bowed, convulsed with sobs and apologising for not being up to it. That’s what she has always done: apologise for her failures. ‘I’m frightened,’ she says through the mess of tears. ‘I never thought I
would be, but I’m frightened. I’m frightened of what they might do to me and frightened of what I might tell them. I’m frightened. And I’m frightened of what might happen to Violette if I don’t survive.’

Alice puts her arm round her shoulders. ‘Violette’s safe, you don’t have to worry about that. And we’ll sort you out. We’ll get a pick-up. How can I get a message to you without coming here?’

‘What’s wrong with here?’

‘You know it’s better to have a cut-out. What about the café across the street? Can I leave a message there?’

‘I suppose so. I go in occasionally. The owner’s a fat guy called Boger. You can leave something with him.’

‘Go in regularly to check. Have you still got your wireless?’

Yvette nods. ‘It’s under my bed. I wanted to get rid of it but I didn’t know how.’ Her eyes widen. ‘You’re not going to use it … for the love of God, I’ve told you, it’s not safe!’

‘I’ll get rid of it for you. I’ll take it.’

‘That’s dangerous, going out on the street with that thing.’

‘It’ll be all right. Everyone in Paris is carrying a suitcase these days.’

Yvette attempts a laugh. ‘They haven’t all got a B2 transceiver in it.’ It isn’t a bad effort, considering the tears. Alice encourages her. ‘You know I brought spare crystals for you? Stuffed up my fanny.’

‘Your fanny?’

The idea seems hilarious. They shriek with laughter, a laughter that borders on hysteria. And then the mood veers dangerously, like a vehicle out of control. ‘And there’s this,’ Yvette says, opening a drawer in the table and taking out a bundle of cloth. It’s like a conjuring trick: one moment a bundle of grimy cloth, the next moment there is a pistol lying in her narrow hand – a Browning nine millimetre semi-automatic.

‘Jesus Christ, Yvette. What are you doing with that?’

‘It’s standard for a pianist. You can’t pretend you’re doing anything innocent, can you? So you may as well be armed.’

Alice takes the weapon from her. She is immediately familiar with it, that is the disturbing thing. All those hours spent at Meoble Lodge on weapons training. The different types. More models than a soldier would see in a lifetime. She points the pistol at the floor, flips out the magazine, works the slide back and forth a few times, pulls the trigger and listens for the empty snap of the firing mechanism. ‘Ammunition?’

Yvette produces a loaded clip and a box with a dozen rounds in it. ‘Take it.’ She pushes everything across the table. ‘Take the shitty thing away.’

Alice crosses the city, humping the suitcase. It’s a battered, leather-bound thing with a few old hotel labels stuck on it and a handle repaired with tightly whipped twine. She hates it for being dull and ugly and as dangerous as a bomb. It sits on the floor of the
métro
car by her feet where any policeman or soldier might ask her to open it, and that would be enough to detonate the thing.

At Réaumur-Sébastopol she has to change trains, lugging the hateful object through the tunnels where her footsteps echo against the tiled walls. There are others going the same way and she tries not to catch their eyes, tries not to be noticed. ‘Let me help you,’ a fellow passenger suggests, drawing alongside her and putting his hand down to take the handle. She pulls the case away from him and attempts not to look. But even out of the corner of her eye she can recognise that grey-green uniform, those black and silver flashes plainly enough. A major in the Wehrmacht. ‘I’m quite all right, thank you.’

‘As you wish.’ His French seems good, his manner quiet and courteous. He follows her to the platform and waits beside her as the train draws in. ‘Are you going to Montparnasse station?’

‘No.’

He glances down. ‘The suitcase has become an emblem of our times, hasn’t it? So many people have their lives in a suitcase. Regrettably.’

She shrugs, ignoring his question and praying for the train to come. When it draws in the officer follows her into the car and finds a seat opposite. He has a faint smile on his lips, as though he knows her secret. ‘Let me guess …’ he says. The train moves away from the platform. Other passengers look away. ‘… You are not going to the railway station, so you are not travelling. So you are visiting. That’s right! You are visiting your aged aunt who lives all by herself in Montparnasse.’

It’s about one minute between stations, on average. She has six stops. Allow time for people to get on and off, what does that make it? She tries to do the mathematics in her head while the smiling officer attempts to guess the reason for her journey.

‘Or perhaps your boyfriend. You are travelling to see your boyfriend who is one of those left bank intellectuals of whom your family disapproves. A poet, maybe. Or a philosopher.’

‘Leave her alone,’ a woman says.

‘I’m sorry, Madame?’

‘I said, leave her alone.’ The speaker is a dowdy, middle-aged woman in grey. Her face is grey, her manner is grey but she is the one who is willing to speak out in defence of a young girl. ‘Politeness is politeness, whatever uniform you are wearing.’

The major seems nonplussed. ‘I’m sorry.’ He inclines his head towards the woman and, across the car, towards Alice. ‘I apologise if I have offended you. I only wanted to make polite conversation.’

‘Politeness is not trying to make conversation with strangers what want to be left alone,’ the woman observes, nodding as though to emphasise her point. Alice smiles thankfully in her direction. Embarrassed, the major looks at other things, the passengers crowding on at the stops, the notices posted above the seats, the blackness beyond the windows.

As the train slows for Saint-Michel, Alice gets up and moves to the door. The major follows, standing mere inches from her, waiting for the car to stop and the doors to open. When she steps down, so does he. She walks on, trying to ignore his presence but there is a crowd building up at the foot of the stairs and the officer catches up with her. They edge forwards. Something is blocking the exit above, slowing the crowd.
Rafle
, someone says. The word goes round.
Rafle
. Round-up. At the top of the stairs there is daylight visible, and she can see uniforms, people pushing and shoving, the general disturbance of men and women looking for their papers, opening their bags. A German voice calls out something in French. People mutter and curse. She grips the suitcase. Perhaps she can dump it. Perhaps she can turn back round and wait for the next train. The crowd presses round her. Panic rises, a tide of sweat and heartbeat, a strange ringing in her ears.

‘Please,’ says the major at her shoulder. ‘We cannot wait for this nonsense. Allow me to help you, Mam’selle.’ His hand is on hers, easing the suitcase from her grasp.

She lets the thing go, surrenders the bomb that could kill her in an instant. Panic tells her to let him go, to turn round and try to escape through the station. She’d be away before he gets to look inside the case. She’d be free and away. But panic is the worst advisor. Panic can kill. She follows him upwards, pushing up the stairs in his wake. Someone in the crowd calls out, ‘Fucking tart.’

She reaches the top. German soldiers and French police are going through papers, going through pockets, going through bags. Maybe they are looking for somebody, or maybe it’s no more than one of those random events, the nagging inconvenience of occupation. The major is talking to one of the soldiers. ‘I can vouch for the
Fraülein
,’ he says. ‘She’s with me.’ The soldier turns and beckons her through. She goes past the
barrage
and onto the sanctuary of the pavement where the fresh air is
cool on her face. Corralled to one side is a group of men and women wearing the yellow star. Beyond, two lorries are parked with people being pushed on board. But no one is interested in her. The panic subsides, leaving a debris of racing pulse and weak knees and sweat.

The major hands her the suitcase. ‘I’m afraid I have an appointment. Otherwise I would accompany you.’

She takes the thing from him. ‘That’s all right. It’s not very heavy.’

‘But you don’t look well. Rather pale.’

‘It was all those people …’

‘Perhaps …’ Perhaps what? He’s a good-looking man, a thoughtful-looking man, a man who would make someone a good lover, a good husband, a good father. ‘Perhaps a coffee? I have a few minutes.’

‘I’m afraid I can’t.’

‘Or maybe we could meet up for a drink later?’

‘I have a boyfriend, you see.’

‘I wasn’t suggesting anything—’

‘People would misunderstand, wouldn’t they?’

He nods, looking crestfallen. ‘I suppose they would.’

She attempts a smile and turns and walks away, past the entrance to the
métro
, past the people trickling through the
barrage
. All the time she knows that his eyes are on her.

The suitcase takes on a personality of its own. It lies there in her room, hidden under the bed, waiting. She knows it is there, Marie knows it is there – impossible to disguise the fact of it as she stood at the door of the apartment waiting to be let in. Clément will have to be told it is there. A suitcase. She doesn’t know exactly what to do with it, or exactly what to do with Clément. She doesn’t know what to do at all. All she knows are the abstract facts – she has to arrange a pick-up; she has to get Yvette back to England; she has to persuade Clément that he should do the same.

‘A Wehrmacht officer tried to chat me up on the
métro
,’ she tells him.

‘I’m not surprised. I’d try and chat you up on the
métro
.’

‘You’re married.’

‘I expect he was.’

She laughs. She doesn’t want to feel at ease like this. She wants to feel anxiety, caution, the wariness that has been drummed into her. But she feels only an absurd and childlike happiness in his presence. And safe – she feels safe. The most dangerous illusion of all.

As promised, he has got tickets for something, a play at the Théâtre de la Cité. It starts early – performances always start early these days, so you can get home before the curfew – and they can easily walk. Does she want to do that?

‘I really want to know if you managed to read the letter.’

He shrugs, as though the matter is of little consequence. ‘Yes, I did. I went to the workshops in the basement of the Collège and borrowed a file. In order to adjust a key that didn’t quite fit, that was my story. The difficulty was persuading the technician that I could manage without his help. And then I had to make up some damn fool excuse to borrow a microscope from the biology lab.’

‘And the letter?’

‘It’s not that easy to keep track of a full stop. I was frightened I’d sneeze or something.’ He’s teasing her. As he always has. Mockery that is like a secret caress, disturbing and thrilling at the same time.

‘But you succeeded?’

‘Yes, I did. Very ingenious. Some kind of photographic reduction process …’

‘Never mind all that. What did it
say
?’

‘It was most flattering. Flattery from Professor Chadwick is
a rare commodity. He was interned in Germany during the last war, did you know that? He knows Germany and German science like the back of his hand. A dangerous enemy. Churchill blusters and calls them the Hun, but Chadwick
knows
them. The question is, do I fall for his flattery?’

‘It’s not flattery, Clément. For God’s sake, they
want
you.’

‘But who is it who wants me, and what for?’ He laughs and glances at his watch. ‘If we don’t get a move on we’ll be late for the theatre.’

They go out, strolling arm in arm and keeping step with each other as though they are practised at walking together. Her initial fears dissolve in the sunlight of the evening. The city has managed to work some magic at last and deliver a fair imitation of its old self, the Paris before the war. The plane trees in the boulevard Saint-Michel are shedding leaves of gold and red as though nothing has happened out of the ordinary and there has been no war, no invasion, no occupation. Near the Lycée Saint-Louis they pass a café where students congregate, young men with long hair, girls with short skirts and brightly coloured stockings. One of the boys calls out, ‘
Bonsoir prof!
’ and gives him a thumbs-up. Another voice exclaims, ‘
Quelle bonne gonzesse
.’ Laughter follows them down the street.