Death Has Deep Roots (11 page)

“But they did not do so.”

“Fortunately – fortunately for him, I mean – Major Thoseby was at that time in Switzerland. By the time he got back the Germans had tired of waiting and had raided the farm.”

“When was that?”

“On September twenty-sixth, 1943.”

“Were you in Langeais at the time?”

“No. When the raid took place I was at Amboise, that is the other side of Tours. I came quickly to Langeais to see if I could be of assistance. After such a raid there was always a lot of clearing up to do – of countermeasures to be taken.”

“I quite understand. Was it your impression that Lieutenant Wells had been taken by the Gestapo, or that he had been killed in the raid?”

“It would have been very unlike the Gestapo to have killed him at once. They would require him for questioning.”

“Was there any first – hand evidence that Lieutenant Wells was taken?”

“None. Such raids were almost always carried out at dusk or just before dawn. They were very quickly and efficiently conducted. Any prisoners were taken away separately, in closed cars. It was part of the German policy that no one should know who had been taken.”

“It was known, though, that the prisoner, Miss Lamartine, was taken on this occasion?”

“Yes. The Germans had left a guard hidden in and around the farm. The people who were sent to warn Mademoiselle Lamartine – she was away on an errand – missed her and she walked into the trap. Our people, however, actually saw her taken, though they were just too late to stop her.”

“How soon did Major Thoseby learn of this?”

“Two days afterward. In fact, I spoke to him of it myself.”

“What were his reactions?”

For the first time in his evidence Commissaire Lode paused before answering. “Major Thoseby was not a man who showed his emotions easily. Indeed, from a man in his position you would not expect it.”

“You did not notice any reaction?”

“I did not say that. I said that he did not show his feelings easily. I, who knew him well, realised that he was shaken.”

“Thank you,” said Mr. Summers. “May we turn now to the time following the Liberation and the expulsion of the Germans from France. Did you see the prisoner again?”

“Not at once. The Germans, when they left, had taken a number of their special prisoners with them. I believe that the prisoner was taken.”

“Yes. Well, no doubt she will tell us about that herself. I am afraid you must confine yourself to your own observation. When did you see the prisoner again?”

“In November or December of that year. I remembered her, of course. I was, I think, a little surprised to see her alive. I did what I could to help her, but I had at that time no official position. It was a very hard winter.”

“Had she her child with her at this time?”

“Yes.”

“You saw him?”

“I did. A tiny, thin child, of about six months. Very serious – but complaining little. I should say a child of natural fortitude.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Monsieur, if you had been in France that winter you would not ask. The Germans did more damage in their departure than they had done in four years of occupation. There was no electricity for lighting or heating, little fuel, a great scarcity of food.”

“I understand. Can you describe the child?”

“Most children of six months look alike, I think. He had what we call ‘
tête d’anglais.
’”

“You mean he had an English look.”

“Anglo-Saxon, yes. Light hair and very light blue eyes. At that age most French children would have dark eyes and dark hair.”

“I see. You mentioned just now that you did what you could to help the prisoner. What particular help did she ask for?”

“She wanted somewhere to live, some money. We were able to supply her with the necessities of life. All knew what she had suffered, and many were generous.”

“Did she ask you for anything else?”

“Yes. She asked me to see if I could put her in touch with Major Thoseby.”

“Were you surprised at this request?”

“No, I don’t think I was.”

“Why did you imagine she had made it?”

“I imagined, at that time, that she had thought that he would be in a position to help her.”

Monsieur Lode gave this answer clearly and quietly and for a moment everyone in the court considered it, turning the words over to see what they could make of them. Macrea had his head cocked like a man who has sipped a fine brandy and is about to pronounce judgment on it. The prisoner was leaning forward with strained attention for counsel’s next question.

“Thank you,” said Mr. Summers, “that is all.”

“Monsieur Lode,” said Macrea, “I want to ask you a question which I put as one of my first questions to another witness. You knew Major Thoseby well. In your opinion was he the type of man to indulge in an illicit union with a young unmarried woman?”

“I do not think I can answer that question.”

“Why not?”

“I do not think that any man could answer that question about another man.”

“The last witness agreed that it was a matter about which one’s friends could form an opinion.”

“In England, perhaps so. In France I can assure you a man would never discuss such things with another man. With his mother, perhaps. Not with anyone else.”

“With his mother?”

“Certainly. A Frenchman conceals nothing from his mother.”

“I will put the question in another way. Was there anything in Major Thoseby’s conduct to suggest to you that he was a man who would act in such a way?”

“That I can answer. No.”

“Or that he, in fact, acted in such a way toward the prisoner?”

“No.”

“Did he see the prisoner much?”

“Yes, from time to time – in the course of his duty.”

“Would his duty ever be likely to lead him to spend the night with her?”

“On one occasion, at least. Yes.”

“I see.” Macrea had for the moment the look of a pedestrian who steps into a deep and unsuspected hole. “When was this?”

“It would have been in May of 1943. It was when the Gestapo were very active in the Langeais area and almost everyone concerned with Resistance work had to take to the woods. Major Thoseby was on his Way through and had to spend the night in a barn—it was on the outskirts of the Forêt de Rochecotte. The prisoner also was sleeping in the barn.”

“And was anyone else present?”

“Oh, yes – about fifteen other persons were sleeping in the barn as well.”

“Yes – I see – not what one might call an intimate occasion.”

“No.”

“Monsieur Lode, after the war, in 1946, did you work for a time at Arolsen in North Hesse?”

“Yes.”

“You were one of the French team on the UNRRA Tracing Staff.”

“That is correct.”

“You dealt, I believe, particularly with lists of persons who had been in concentration camps and in Gestapo prisons?”

“Among other matters, yes.”

“Do you remember personally dealing with an inquiry for a Lieutenant Julian Wells?”

“Yes. I do. I recollected him, of course, since I had been so nearly connected with his original capture by the Germans.”

“Would it surprise you to know that this inquiry was put on foot by the prisoner herself?”

“Yes, I certainly did not know that.”

“Does it surprise you?”

“Yes. I think it does.”

“Why?”

“I have explained why, in my opinion, Mademoiselle Lamartine tried to get in touch with Major Thoseby. He had been the senior British officer in the district and it was natural she should turn to him for help. The same reasons hardly applied in the case of Lieutenant Wells.”

“I am obliged,” said Macrea. “You would agree then that if the prisoner afterward sought news of Lieutenant Wells her reasons were probably personal ones?”

“My lord—” began Mr. Summers.

“I will put it to you in another way. It is within your knowledge that Lieutenant Wells spent three weeks at the Père Chaise farmhouse?”

“Yes.”

“He was hidden there from the time of his arrival until the Gestapo raid. He would probably not have been able to go outside the farm?”

“That is so.”

“And the prisoner was living at the farm all that time?”

“Yes.”

“In fact, they were living together for three weeks?”

“I must protest—” said Mr. Summers.

“I anticipate my learned friend’s protest,” said Macrea smoothly, “by hastening to add that I was using the words in their primary sense only.”

As Nap stepped off the boat, under the single unshaded electric light, on to the battered quay at Dieppe one thought was uppermost in his mind. That whatever steps he might have to take would be better taken out of the company of Josephine Delboise. Nor did he come to this conclusion from any motives of distaste for Madame Delboise as a person. Nevertheless, he felt it would be in all things safer, better and wiser did they part company.

Being a direct young man he therefore sought her out in the Customs shed, took possession of her two cases, led the way out on to the platform and found two seats in a first – class carriage in the Paris train which was waiting alongside the quay.

He placed his hat on the seat opposite, asked Madame Delboise to preserve the seat for him should any rival claimant appear – an unnecessary precaution really since the train was three – quarters empty – and went back to the Customs shed. A few minutes later he reappeared with a large and expensive – looking suitcase, which he placed on the rack. It was labeled for Paris and he imagined that the real owner would be able to identify it without difficulty at the other end. He then announced that there was just time to buy some newspapers before the train started, and went forth once more into the corridor. Madame Delboise appeared to be dozing, but gave him a sleepy smile of approval as he went.

Two minutes later Nap was stepping quietly off the darkened side of the train. He retrieved his own humble grip from behind a pile of lobster baskets and set out at a round pace along the quay.

There appeared to be no barrier to mark the end of the Gare Maritime and in a few minutes he was rounding the landward end of the jetty. The railway sheds were deserted and the arched colonnade where by day the fish sellers and the greengrocers hold their market was black and silent.

As his footsteps rang out on the cobbles the stone arches threw back the echo. It was almost as if someone was walking behind him, in the shadows. He stopped abruptly. The echo stopped also. But did it stop quite quickly enough?

Imagination, thought Nap. Anyway, there was no time to lose for his train for Rouen left the Gare de Ville, at the other side of the town, in less than ten minutes.

He hurried on.

Dawn was coming up cold and grey as Nap’s train crossed the watershed of the Alpes Normandes and plodded down toward the valley of the Seine. It was not a fast train.

By the time it got to Rouen it was past six. Nap stood in the
place
outside the station and looked round him with unashamed nostalgia.

Despite the early hour most of the cafés were open and an old white – coated waiter was moving round outside one of them uptilting chairs and polishing the glass table-tops. A many-caped gendarme paced by on the sidewalk, lost in official thought. There were bicycles everywhere. Men bicycling to work; housewives bicycling to be early at market; women bicycling in from the country; elderly people bicycling with serious attention; children bicycling for fun.

Nap felt furiously hungry. He also felt grubby. The solution seemed to be a quiet hotel where he could wash and have breakfast, and possibly make up on some of the sleep he had lost the night before.

He looked round for a guide. The only stationary figure in the whole
place
was a young man who had dismounted from his bicycle and was now standing in the roadway looking up through steel-rimmed glasses at the train indicator board. He was wearing khaki slacks and sandals and his torso appeared to be covered by a curious tight-fitting brown garment. As Nap came nearer he saw his mistake. It was not a garment at all. He was naked to the waist.

“Hardy type,” thought Nap. He was about to phrase his request when the young man rose suddenly on to his toes, placed his hands on his hips and started to rotate his body rapidly and flexibly, finishing with a backward bend which brought the top of his close-shaven head almost on to the pavement behind him. Then he rose slowly into an upright position, at the same time drawing in his breath until his stomach was perfectly concave. Finally he let his breath out with a rush and smiled. His eyes glinted behind his glasses.

“I was wondering,” said Nap, “if you could possibly—”

“On the contrary,” said the young man, “you were wondering what I was doing.”

“I cannot deny it,” said Nap.

“It is the new
gymnastique médicale,”
said the young man. “It combats anemia and obesity. It is composed of two elements, the
gymnastique respiratoire,
which combats asthma and assists natural breathing and the
gymnastique orthopédique
which combats bad attitudes. In addition I practice a private system of deviations of the vertebral column, from which I have great hopes. How can I assist you?”

“I was wondering,” said Nap, “if you knew of a quiet hotel which would be likely to have a room vacant.”

“Certainly,” said the young man. “Follow me.”

Wheeling his bicycle with one hand he led the way at a pace which had Nap gasping. They forked left at the main crossroads, turned left again, and crossed the old market square whose ugly stone tower commemorates one of the ugliest deeds in Anglo – French history.

When the young man stopped Nap waited for the inevitable lecture on Joan of Arc, but it appeared that the young man’s mind was on more recent history.

“Gestapo headquarters,” he said briefly.

Nap could see nothing in the direction in which the young man was pointing except three large holes in the ground. Looking closer he saw, from the remnants of brickwork, that he was looking down into what had once been the basement of a fair-sized house.