Suzanne stood up. ‘I’m just going to check on the capitelles,’ she said. ‘The maquisards are using the larger ones to store weapons. Is there time before supper?’
Marianne nodded.
‘Do you need a hand?’ asked Eloise.
‘Thanks.’
Eloise got up too.
‘We’ll be back in ten minutes,’ Suzanne said.
Marianne went back to stirring the pan. Lucie was tapping the ash from her cigarette into the saucer and throwing increasingly anxious glances in Sandrine’s direction. She was the only one who had noticed how distressed she was when she came back inside. Sandrine avoided her gaze. What Lucie didn’t understand was how relieved she felt that Raoul was gone. Now that the initial sadness was over, it was a comfort not to have to put a brave face on things.
‘All I wanted,’ Lucie said, ‘when I was growing up, I mean, was a husband and a family. Keeping house, seeing the children off to school.’ She pulled a rueful face. ‘Saving the fact that Max isn’t here, you could nevertheless say that, out of all of us, I’ve got closest to fulfilling my ambitions.’ She looked around at her friends. ‘What about the rest of you? What did you want to be?’
Sandrine smiled at her. Over the past three weeks, she had come to admire even more than ever the way Lucie kept her spirits up. The camp at Le Vernet was almost empty. Raoul, Suzanne and Liesl had all tried to find out where Max had been sent or if he was still in the Ariège, but his name didn’t appear to be on any list. In all likelihood, because his arrest in 1942 had been unlawful. Now, of course, such distinctions were forgotten. Did Lucie still honestly believe he would come back? Sandrine didn’t know.
‘Come on,’ Lucie said, trying to get the conversation going. ‘Marianne? What about you, you must have thought about it? Headmistress of the Lycée?’
Marianne turned round and put her hand on her hip. ‘Well, yes. Though I always rather fancied teaching in a university. In Toulouse, perhaps.’
‘What would you teach?’ Sandrine asked. ‘Literature?’
Marianne shook her head. ‘Not now. I’d teach history. The truth of things.’
Sandrine nodded. ‘I think you’ll do it and be quite wonderful.’
‘Good,’ said Lucie, pleased they were joining in. ‘What about you, Liesl? You could be a pin-up, if you were minded to. Or an actress. You’ve got the looks for it.’
Geneviève laughed. The idea of Liesl, the most reserved of them all, posing for a camera in a bathing suit was ridiculous, and was meant to be. ‘No, I’ve got it,’ she said. ‘Liesl will be another Martha Gellhorn. Going all over the world, a war photographer.’
‘My father was a reporter,’ Liesl said. ‘I’d like to follow in his footsteps.’
‘You could start your own magazine,’ Lucie said, warming to her theme. ‘Then when J-J’s old enough, there’ll be a job waiting for him! How’s that for a plan? BLUM ET FILS, I can see it now!’
‘Blum and Son,’ Liesl said. ‘Keep it in the family, why not.’
‘As for you,’ Lucie said, pointing her cigarette at Sandrine, ‘you should be a politician. One of the first women to sit in de Gaulle’s provisional government. What do you say?’
Sandrine shrugged. ‘Maybe.’
‘I’d certainly vote for you, kid. I can tell you that for nothing.’
‘So would I,’ said Marianne.
Lucie nodded. ‘That’s that sorted, then.’ She turned to Geneviève. ‘Your turn. What about you?’
Geneviève pretended to think. ‘Eloise and I could start a chain of shops,’ she said. ‘A general store selling clothes and food, anything anyone wants. SAINT-LOUP AND SISTER, I can picture the sign.’
‘Sisters,’ said Eloise, coming back into the kitchen with Suzanne. ‘We’ve got Coralie and Aurélie to think about too.’
Suzanne washed her hands at the sink, then shook the water off before sitting down.
‘What’s all this?’
‘Lucie’s organising our lives for us,’ Marianne said. ‘What we’re going to do when the war is over.’
‘So we do have rather a problem with you, Suzanne,’ Liesl laughed. ‘Not much call for lady bomb-makers in peacetime.’
‘Even though I am the best,’ Suzanne said, putting on a silly voice. ‘The acknowledged master.’
‘Or should that be “mistress”?’ Geneviève suggested.
Lucie raised her eyebrows. ‘No, that’s altogether something else.’
Everyone burst into gales of laughter, until Marieta banged angrily on the floor from upstairs and they all had to be quiet again for fear of waking Jean-Jacques.
Chapter 137
‘Supper’s nearly ready,’ Marianne said. ‘Do you want me to wait until Marieta comes down or serve up now?’
Sandrine took a deep breath. She had been working out how to say what she needed to say.
‘In fact, while Marieta’s upstairs, I want to talk to everyone.’
Immediately, the atmosphere sharpened. Liesl put the camera down. Marianne took the pan of ratatouille off the stove and covered it with a cloth, then she and Geneviève joined the others at the table. Lucie turned round in her chair and looked enquiringly at Sandrine.
‘We made a mistake in not going through with our attack on Authié in La Cité,’ she said.
Lucie frowned. ‘It wouldn’t have worked, kid. They knew all about it.’
Sandrine carried on. ‘Then Raoul didn’t realise it was him – Authié – in the car. With me. If he had, he would have shot him then. It was another missed opportunity.’
‘His job was to get you away,’ Suzanne said firmly, ‘and he did. Neither of you have anything to reproach yourselves for.’ She shrugged. ‘It’s how it goes.’
‘Other people have borne the burden of our failure,’ Sandrine continued. ‘And now . . .’ She stopped, looked down at the little finger on her left hand, crooked from where Laval had broken it. ‘Authié is looking for Monsieur Baillard and the Codex. We have to try again.’
Liesl frowned. ‘I have a great regard for Monsieur Baillard, but surely we should concentrate our strength on things that matter. That are real. Like trying to find Max.’
‘I agree,’ said Lucie.
‘And you can’t possibly be contemplating going back to Carcassonne,’ Marianne added. ‘You’d never get anywhere near him.’
Sandrine glanced at Eloise and Geneviève and knew they would support her. For all their modern clothes and habits, they were as rooted to the timeless ways of the mountains as Marieta or Monsieur Baillard himself. Myths and realities, they saw no contradiction.
‘Not Carcassonne,’ she said. She hesitated, then continued. ‘I appreciate that this will sound absurd, after all the trouble we’ve taken to stay hidden, but . . .’ she paused again, ‘we need to entice Authié here.’
Marianne, Suzanne and Liesl all immediately started to argue. Sandrine raised her voice.
‘Listen. We have the advantage here. We know the terrain. We can choose the time and place of attack. We will evacuate the village, it will be us against him.’
Marianne was shaking her head. ‘But he could bring hundreds of men with him. It’s absurd. The odds are completely against us.’
Not if Monsieur Baillard is right, Sandrine thought, but she knew better than to say so.
‘What does Raoul think of your idea?’ Lucie asked.
Sandrine hesitated. ‘He doesn’t know about it,’ she admitted. ‘He doesn’t think I should do anything.’
‘And he’s right,’ Marianne said. ‘You’re not strong enough.’
For a moment, no one spoke.
‘You know,’ Suzanne said, ‘it might work. If we make sure we clear everyone out, then lure him here, it might just work. If the rumours are true, if some of the German units are pulling out, then he’s hardly going to be able to muster much support.’
Marianne turned on her. ‘How can you say that? You saw what that monster did to her. When Raoul brought her here I didn’
t think she’d survive. But she’s strong, she refused to give in. We kept her safe.’ She stopped, her voice cracking. ‘For three weeks we’ve hidden her from Authié, from Laval – for two years before that. Everyone says the Allies will come. That the Germans are getting ready to withdraw. We should wait.’
‘It’s because of what he did to her that we have to do this,’ Suzanne said softly. ‘Can’t you see?’
Marianne looked at Sandrine. ‘Is Suzanne right? Is that what this is about? Revenge?’
Sandrine thought for a moment before she spoke. ‘No, it’s about justice,’ she said. ‘It’s about not looking away, about standing up against tyranny. About not spending the rest of our lives in hiding.’ She paused, then added softly. ‘And it’s about making sure that Authié will never again be able to do to someone else what he did to me.’
Marianne stared, now with tears in her eyes, then sat back in her chair. She looked defeated.
Suzanne reached over and covered her hand with her own. ‘Come on,’ she murmured.
Lucie and Liesl exchanged glances. Geneviève and Eloise both looked at Sandrine and waited.
‘What’s your plan?’ Lucie asked.
Sandrine glanced at Marianne, then explained. ‘We attack the electricity substation in Couiza. Tomorrow, or the day after. It’s not guarded and it’s far enough away from both the Maquis camp and any houses not to cause difficulties for anyone else. It’s an ideal target. We deliver a letter to the Milice in Limoux denouncing it as the work of “Citadel” – that should make it certain the news will get back to Carcassonne.’
‘I can take it,’ Eloise said.
‘If you, Geneviève, could spread the same story in Couiza?’
Geneviève nodded. ‘Nothing easier.’
Liesl was still unconvinced. ‘I agree with Marianne. I don’t think we can be sure Authié will come in person, or when. And what if he brings a huge force with him? We’ll be heavily outnumbered.’
Sandrine met her gaze. ‘He thinks I have the Codex,’ she said. ‘He will come.’
For a moment, the word hung in the air like a challenge. Sandrine knew that Marianne, in particular, hated her to talk about the Codex.
‘If we allow a day for the information to get from Limoux to Carcassonne,’ Sandrine said quickly, ‘then for Authié to react, my estimate is the earliest he would get to Coustaussa would be the twentieth of August.’
‘Sounds about right,’ Suzanne said.
‘You’ve no way of knowing for sure,’ Marianne said.
‘No,’ Sandrine conceded. ‘But if Eloise stays in Limoux, unless Authié takes a very indirect route, she’ll hear when they pass through. We’ll have advance warning. That will give us enough time to evacuate Coustaussa and get everyone out of harm’s way.’
‘It will be a ghost village,’ Lucie said. ‘Just them and us.’
Sandrine glanced at her. She couldn’t know, but it was almost as if Lucie guessed what she and Monsieur Baillard were planning. She held Lucie’s gaze for a moment, then looked round the room.
‘So, what do you say?’
One by one, each woman nodded. Only her sister did not answer.
‘Marianne?’
‘There’s so much that could go wrong. You’re gambling on your guesses – about the date, about the numbers Authié brings with him – being accurate. You could be right, you could be utterly wrong, but . . . I understand.’ She stopped again and sighed. ‘So, yes. I don’t like it, but of course I’ll help.’
Sandrine smiled. ‘Thank you,’ she said softly.
Marianne pushed her chair back from the table and walked over to the stove. ‘Now, we should eat. The food will spoil.’
After the tension of the conversation, the atmosphere became light-hearted as they brought everything to the table. Geneviève helped Marianne carry the two large serving dishes – one a casserole, one of ratatouille – and glasses were clattered out of the cupboard. Liesl and Suzanne cleared the papers.
Sandrine had no appetite and she was exhausted. Unobtrusively, she slipped out of the kitchen and on to the terrace. She could still hear the others laughing and joking, but she had no energy left.
‘Ladies, please,’ Geneviève was saying, ‘you shouldn’t mock. My milicien is a good catch, or so my mother’s always telling me. A widower, his own teeth! Most of them, at any rate . . .’
Sandrine let her thoughts drift away. The girls’ voices became fainter until she could no longer make out word from word. She let the scent of the sweet wild lavender and rosemary in the garrigue, the sound of the cicadas and the singing of the birds of the night, nightingales and owls, wash over her.
She thought of her father and was surprised to feel tears pricking her eyes. It had been so long. Since her interrogation, she had not been able to cry. She feared that if she gave way, even for a moment, she would shatter into a thousand pieces and never stop. So she kept her emotions wrapped tightly inside.
‘To “Citadel”,’ said Lucie in the kitchen.
‘To the chef,’ said Suzanne firmly. ‘To Marianne.’
Sandrine heard the clink of glasses and the thump of the pinard on the table, then Liesl’s voice floating out on to the terrace.
‘Where did Sandrine go? Did she turn in already?’
Sandrine closed her eyes and let the darkness hide her.
Chapter 138
ALET-LES-BAINS
‘Is that it?’ Raoul asked.
He had worked all night with the men from the Salvezines Maquis, moving the heavy cylindrical drums containing weapons parts, maps and ammunition, the twelve kilometres from where they’d been dropped in error to the makeshift camp above the Gorges de Cascabel near Alet-les-Bains.
‘That’s the lot, yes.’
Raoul wiped his forehead and neck with his handkerchief, then jumped down from the cart and patted the donkey’s neck. ‘He’s worked as hard as any of us,’ he said. ‘Where did you get him?’
The maquisard shrugged. ‘Who knows?’ he said, then held out his hand. ‘Thanks for your help, comrade.’
Raoul shook the man’s hand. From fragments overheard, he’d worked out that a strike was intended in the next couple of days. He wondered if Sandrine had heard anything about it.
Straight away, Raoul felt the same tightening of the chest he now always had when thinking about Sandrine. If he’d been able, he would have put her on a plane and taken her across the world. To America or England, somewhere away from the war-torn, divided Midi. Then he shook his head. Even if he had all the money in the world, Sandrine wouldn’t leave. She’d never run away. She’d stay and fight to the bitter end. His expression hardened. Whatever else Authié had done, he hadn’t crushed her spirit. She was still as stubborn and determined as ever.
The light was just coming up. Raoul felt an unaccustomed sense of peace as he looked around the glade, recognising some of the men with whom he’d worked. They’d been in pairs, carrying and loading, never all together until now. Most of them looked like he felt. A little dazed from lack of sleep, tired, sharing a bottle of beer or a pouch of tobacco. Relieved that it had all gone off all right. No raid, no shooting, no sirens.
No one dead.
One of the maquisards had set a charcoal fire to burn in the centre of the clearing. Two rabbits were roasting on a spit, breakfast for the men before everyone went their separate ways. On the far side of the fire, Raoul noticed Coralie Saint-Loup’s fiancé sitting on a log rolling a cigarette.
‘Got any going spare?’ Raoul asked, sitting down beside him, struggling to remember what he was called. Some old-fashioned village name.
‘Sure.’ The young man handed over the pouch. ‘Help yourself.’
‘How’s Coralie? I heard you got married.’
‘Expecting our first, he said. ‘I don’t know, it doesn’t seem right, bringing a kid into all this mess, but life goes on, I suppose. It’s what she wanted.’
Raoul nodded.
‘If it’s a boy, we’ll ca
ll him Alphonse.’
Raoul sighed. ‘After you,’ he said, remembering.
‘And my father and his father before him. Family tradition. If it’s a girl, Coralie wants to call her Vivien. After that film actress.’ He shrugged. ‘Can’t say I like it much, funny sort of name. What about you? Still with the same girl?’
‘I am.’
‘Married?’
‘We haven’t got round to it yet,’ he said, ‘but we will. As soon as all this is over.’
‘They say the Germans are pulling out. Do you think it’s true?’
‘I don’t know,’ Raoul said.
For a moment, they sat in silence in the still dawn air, both smoking, passing a tin cup of coarse red mountain wine between them, the smell of the game roasting on the fire curling up into the air.
‘Are you going with the others?’ Alphonse asked, dropping his voice.
‘Going where?’
The boy looked alarmed that he’d spoken out of turn, then decided Raoul could be trusted.
‘There’s a few going to try and catch up with the ghost train,’ he said, lowering his voice even more. ‘See if they can hold it up until the Allies get here.’
Raoul turned to look at him. Like everyone, he had heard rumours about the train fantôme. The last remaining Jewish prisoners in Le Vernet were alleged to have been loaded on to a train bound for Dachau. Lucie’s fiancé should have been one of them, but his name wasn’t on the list. And because Raoul had been caring for Sandrine, he realised he didn’t know if Liesl or Lucie had ever found out where Max actually was. The train had passed through Toulouse on the thirtieth of July, going towards Bordeaux, then north. Thanks to the Allied advance, though, it had been turned back again.
‘Where is it now?’ Raoul asked.
Alphonse shook his head. ‘Heading towards the south-east, so I’ve heard. Provence, maybe. That could be the best chance of getting them free. They say the Allies are going to attack from the Mediterranean.’