Night Sky (87 page)

It was only five. Julie went to a brasserie and ordered a meal. It was difficult to make rabbit stew last four hours, but she managed it by ordering coffee afterwards, then water and then coffee again. The bread coupon she’d proffered entitled her to a full three-course meal, but she wanted to economise. She had money all right – she’d taken Michel’s from the hiding place in the oven and there had been quite a bit – but she didn’t want to squander it, not only because it might have to last a long time, but because it was Michel’s.

To pass the time Julie watched the people in the street. The Parisian women looked incredibly well dressed, though how they managed it when materials were so short amazed her. They made Julie feel inadequate and inelegant; her frumpy, second-hand suit must look dowdy by comparison. She tried hard not to mind but failed.

At last it was almost nine and Julie headed back towards the bar. The streets were busy. Everyone seemed to be out for a stroll, talking in groups or wandering in and out of cafés.

When she reached Chez Alphonse it was crowded and noisy, and the atmosphere thick with smoke. The barman was busy serving and it was some minutes before she managed to catch his eye. He nodded and turned to speak to a man at the far end of the bar. The man stood up and came over to Julie.

He smiled and said, ‘I’m Pierre.’ He was about forty, fair and boyish and jolly-looking: not at all how Julie had imagined a hardcore communist to look. He took her elbow and said above the noise, ‘Come. We can’t talk here. Let’s go for a stroll.’

He led the way out of the bar and waited for her to join him on the pavement. They began to walk slowly up the street. Pierre said, ‘So! They’re still trying to hang everything on Michel, are they?’

‘I’m afraid so.’

‘Ha! He always made enemies, Michel. Always attracted trouble, even in the old days.’

‘The old days?’

‘At university. I was his tutor.’

Julie looked sideways at him. She asked, ‘Have you found out anything? That might help Michel?’

He shook his head. ‘Not directly. I’ve asked around – my friends in the police and so on. Nothing. No rumours, nothing. Mind you, they have a basinful at the moment, sorting out the black marketeers from the collaborators, and the collaborators from the informers.’ He snorted. ‘Most of the real villains will get clean away, of course!’

He made it sound hopeless. ‘But why?’ she asked.

‘Oh, they’ll have covered themselves well and in a little while they’ll pop up as magistrates and bankers and swear they were never fascists …’

They came into a wide boulevard full of light and activity and crowded cafés.

Julie said, ‘The traitor, the man I’m looking for, he came from Paris. At least I’m fairly sure he did.
Someone
must have known him … or seen him. His name was Fougères.’

‘The name means nothing. He probably used a hundred different names. Do you have a photograph?’

Julie shook her head. She wished she had. But when she had prepared the identity cards she was always careful not to keep any spare photographs. It was maddening when she thought about it now.

‘Never mind. Let’s go and see what we can find.’ He indicated with his head and quickened his pace.

‘Find—? Where are we going?’

‘I’m not promising
anything
, but there’s someone you should see. Someone who might know something.’ He emphasised, ‘But I’m not promising a thing.’

Julie ran a little to keep up. ‘Who? Who is this person?’

Suddenly Pierre gave a short laugh. ‘Ah … Well, you see, we like to help the police out. In our own small way.’

She looked at him questioningly.

‘We’ve caught ourselves someone. Someone who might otherwise have avoided the full force of justice.’

Julie tensed. ‘Who—?’

‘An informer.’

‘And he might have known—’

Pierre said firmly, ‘Not necessarily. But he knew the Gestapo well enough. He worked for them for at least two years. He might have heard something about your man, you never know. Anyway, let’s go and see.’

Julie followed, trying to absorb the full meaning of what Pierre had said. This informer – would he have known about other informers? Would they have met? It seemed very unlikely. And would they have had the same contacts? Again, it seemed unlikely. She decided not to raise her hopes too high.

She found the idea of the captured informer rather disturbing; she couldn’t help wondering what they would do with him afterwards. She thought of asking more, but in the glow of the occasional light Pierre’s face looked stern and unboyish and she decided against it.

They walked in silence for ten minutes, into a darker quieter area with few cafés or restaurants. Julie had no idea where they were. Eventually they came to a tall, redbrick apartment building.

Pierre guided her into a narrow alleyway at the side and then to some steps which led down to a cellar. The alley was dark, filthy and oppressive. Julie hung back.

Pierre turned. ‘It’s all right. Just follow me.’

He led the way down the steps and knocked softly on a door at the bottom. There was a long pause. Finally the door opened slightly. Pierre put his head to the crack, murmured a few words, and the door swung open.

Pierre stepped forward. Julie followed, half-impatient, half-frightened of what she might see.

It was a bare cellar, cold and damp, its floor scattered with rubbish. There was a blinding electric light hanging on a wire from the ceiling. It cast a pool of white over the centre of the room, leaving the walls in deep shadow.

Immediately under the light was a chair. A man was sitting on it. He was bound to the chair by rope which had been passed several times round his chest, pinning his arms to his sides. The front of his shirt was covered with blood which seemed to have come from his face, though it was impossible to be sure because his head was lying forward on his chest. He seemed to be asleep.

Pierre strode across and, grasping the man’s hair, raised his head. Julie gasped. The face was a mess, the nose bloody and the eyes blackened.

She stared hard for several moments.

Then she exhaled.

She had never seen the man before in her life.

She kept looking, just to be sure. But there was no doubt.

‘You don’t recognise him?’ Pierre asked.

‘No.’

Pierre nodded. ‘No reason why you should.’ He let the head fall again.

There were two other men in the room, the one who had opened the door and another who came up to Pierre and said under his breath, ‘I think we’ve got the lot. Shall we—?’

Then they were whispering and Julie didn’t hear any more. Eventually the conversation finished and Pierre came back to her.

Julie began, ‘What exactly—?’

Suddenly, the man in the chair jerked up his head and moaned. Julie held her breath. Then he slumped forward again.

She asked again, ‘What exactly did he do?’

‘Oh, he was a little sneak, a tell-tale … He shopped people to the Gestapo. For money. Not much money, either! That’s because he enjoyed doing it, you see.’ He shouted, ‘Didn’t you, you
con
? Eh!’

The figure in the chair whimpered and began rocking his head from side to side.

‘But he doesn’t enjoy it so much now,’ Pierre snorted contemptuously. ‘His national socialist principles didn’t last very long. In fact, he’s prepared to swear to anything just at the moment.’

Suddenly the figure began to wail, a continuous whine that rose and fell like a dog howling in the night.

Pierre regarded the sight with distaste. ‘Four of my comrades died because of him.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘It’s always the spineless little shits who do the damage. Look at him! He’s frightened, the yellow-belly! Terrified of what we might do to him! Spineless little shits!’

She shook her head. ‘Our traitor wasn’t like that. He was clever … hard … and cunning. Not like that.’

‘Ah. Well, let’s find out what this creature knows.’

Pierre went up to the chair and pulled up the man’s head again. There was a shriek and the man started sobbing and whimpering. ‘No, no … please … please …’

‘Your masters sent someone to Brittany. Do you know who?
Do you know who?
’

The man shook his head from side to side, his eyes wide and staring. ‘No … No … Brittany … no!’

Julie stared, repulsed by the bloody face.

Pierre was getting impatient. He waved to one of the other men. ‘Encourage him, Charles, will you?’

‘No, please!’ Julie exclaimed.

Pierre paused in surprise.

Finally he shrugged. ‘All right. If you wish.’ He said to the figure in the chair, ‘The lady is kind. She doesn’t want you to suffer. Tell her what she needs to know, eh? Otherwise we’ll go back to the other way. Tell her! Who else did your masters use? Who was sent to Brittany?
Eh?
’

The wild eyes swivelled round and fastened on Julie’s face. The mouth opened and closed, like a fish. Eventually the man whined to Julie, ‘They’re – going – to – kill me!’ And started to cry. ‘Please – stop them.
Please!
’

Julie looked to Pierre for help. He said roughly, ‘
Tell the lady what she wants to know
.’

The man’s eyes were fastened on Julie. ‘I know n-nothing!
Nothing!
I was innocent! The Gestapo blackmailed me. They forced me into it. Save me!
Please! Please!
’

She said quietly, ‘If you could tell me what you know … I’d be grateful.’

The man gulped. ‘… I heard very little. They were
very
careful. They forced me to tell them things, then they made me go away.
Really
.’ He was sobbing gently.

The sight was pathetic, cruel. Julie made herself remember that this man was a murderer, just like Fougères. She pressed, ‘But gossip … rumours … there must have been
something
.’

He shook his head. ‘I can’t think … I can’t think!’

Pierre said roughly, ‘Who was in charge of informers?’

‘Kloffer.’

Pierre said quickly, ‘And did Kloffer ever talk about his – agents?’

‘No! Kloffer was too grand for me. I never talked to Kloffer! Never! I wasn’t important enough! I wasn’t one of their informers. I only dealt with stockings, perfume – I was never an informer. Never!’

Pierre said to Julie, ‘He’s lying,’ and made a sudden movement towards the chair. The man threw back his head in terror.

‘Who
did
you deal with then?’ Pierre demanded.

‘There was a sergeant – and a junior officer.
Not
important people. They never told me
anything
!’

Pierre was getting impatient. ‘
Try harder
!’

The wretched man rocked his head slowly from side to side. ‘Please … I was never told anything …’

‘
Try harder
.’

‘Oh please, oh
please
!’ He was whining again. Suddenly he stopped. There was a long pause. He frowned with mental effort. Finally he gulped and said, ‘The sergeant … he was in charge of false papers. I never had any, of course! I was only a black marketeer. I wasn’t important enough. But … I know others did.’

Pierre urged, ‘Others?’

‘No names were ever mentioned. Never. But—’ His bloodshot eyes fastened on Julie again and he spoke quickly through swollen lips. ‘Once or twice I heard things. F-from the sergeant mainly. He’d talk about successes. Things they’d found out, groups they’d smashed, th-that sort of thing. There was one man I heard about, a t-top man, someone who w-worked for them all the time …’

Julie held her breath. ‘
Yes?
’

‘… the tip of one of his fingers was m-missing! So the sergeant said …’

The man desperately searched Julie’s face for a sign that he had said the right thing. She looked at Pierre and shook her head.

Pierre said coldly, ‘No good,
con
.’ He began to move away. ‘That’s it then.’

‘
No-o-o!
’ It was a great wail. ‘Please, I
beg you
.’ Then he was looking from her to Pierre and talking so fast that she missed the first few words. ‘… and there was another. Someone they gave false papers to all the time. He was important, I knew. He’d started as a dealer, like me. Usual things – petrol, stockings, perfume. Then he became an informer. The sergeant talked about him a couple of times. I never heard a name, never a
name.
But they called him the Marseillais. Or the Man from Marseilles. Something like that.’ He looked desperately up into their faces. ‘He was important, I know that – but nothing else. They never told me anything else!
Believe me.’

A Marseillais. Julie tried to recall Fougères’s voice. It had been an educated voice without, as far as she could tell, any regional accent. Not very likely, then.

She asked, nevertheless, ‘Did this sergeant ever say what this Marseillais had done exactly? What sort of jobs?’

The prisoner’s head fell to one side and she thought he was going to faint. But he mumbled, ‘Infiltration. His s-speciality. Very s-successful…’ The puffed eyes reopened.
‘Réseaux
… he got inside an escape line … for airmen …’

Julie stiffened and put her face up to the prisoner’s. ‘Yes—?’

‘That’s all I know. He was very important!’ The man grimaced as if in pain.

‘But which line?’ Julie took him by the shoulder and shook him slightly. ‘Which line?’

‘I don’t know … I don’t know!’

‘Was it Meteor? Was it? Or ours in Brittany?

The man threw his head from side to side and started to sob again. ‘I don’t know …’

Julie stood for a while, watching him. Pierre took her aside. ‘It’s not much.’

‘No.’ It was almost nothing. She asked, ‘What about this Kloffer? Was he captured?’

Pierre shook his head. ‘No! The Gestapo were the first people to disappear. He’ll be holed up in Germany by now, planning his excuses.’

A cry came from the figure in the chair.
‘Please, lady …
Please have mercy … Please don’t let them kill me. Please!’ He was wailing again.

Julie looked back. ‘What about him?’

Pierre murmured, ‘We’ll decide.’

‘Are you sure he did it?’

‘We’re sure.’ He went to the door. ‘Here, I’ll see you back.’ As she stepped out into the cool night air a howl came floating through the door. Julie clenched her fists and walked quickly up the steps towards the street.