For Freedom: The Story of a French Spy

  I thanked Mary and all the saints above that I didn’t have a message on my person. “No.”

  “We think you are a spy.”

  It wasn’t a question, so I didn’t reply.

  “We are sure you are a spy.”

  It was hot in the room. There was no breeze.

  “Are you a spy?”

  “No.” I wasn’t going to say anything more than the minimum.

  “We are going to kill you, of course,” said the officer. “But maybe not if you give us the answers we need.”

  I thought suddenly of a fable we had learned in school. A fox made a deal with a scorpion to carry the scorpion on its back across a river. Halfway over, the scorpion stung the fox. “Why did you do that?” cried the fox. “Now we will both drown.” The scorpion replied, “It is my nature.”

  It was the Germans’ nature to kill me. Giving them answers would not change a thing.

  “Do you know Dr. Stéphane Leclerc?”

  Oh, please, no, not the doctor.

  “Of course,” I said.

  “Do you know what he does?”

  “Helps deliver babies and cares for the sick.”

  “And what else?”

  “That’s all.”

  “Why do you go to his office so often?”

  I put my hand to my throat. “I strained my voice,” I said. “I’m a singer. He is trying to heal me.”

  “Are you a spy?”

  “I am an opera singer.”

  “We are certain that you are a spy.”

  So the morning went. About lunchtime I was led from the room and taken to another. There two woman soldiers (female German soldiers! I had never seen any in Cherbourg before) removed my clothing and searched me. They ran their hands through my hair. They gave me another dress to wear and carried off everything I had worn. I wondered if they would find the slits in my shoulder pads, the empty hole in the heel of my shoe.

  “May I use the toilet?” I asked the one who seemed to be in charge.

  She glared at me and spoke in rapid German to the other, who asked in French, “What did you say?”

  I repeated the question. “Non!” snapped the second woman without bothering to translate for the first.

  I really needed to use a toilet.

  They took me back to the first room, to the uncomfortable chair. The guards and the officer were all eating lunch. They had a big meal spread across their table. They had roast beef and wine.

  I wasn’t hungry. I couldn’t have swallowed food if they had demanded it of me. I studied the plaster of the wall behind their heads and tried not to think about anything.

  When they were finished and the food was taken away, they resumed their questions.

  “Are you a spy?”

  “No.”

  “Do you carry messages for Dr. Leclerc?”

  “No.”

  “We know that you do. We have the names of everyone. Come, confess. It will be easier for you if you do.”

  Sometimes they tried a different tack. “What’s in the messages you pass? Have you tried to read them?”

  And later still, lies. “De Gaulle is dead, you know. The Allies have suffered heavy losses. France is lost.”

  They never hit me or hurt me. They never screamed or shouted. They never let me get up from the chair again and they never stopped questioning me. I knew that moving water could wear away rock, and now I understood how. But you must be more than a rock, I told myself. You must be something that doesn’t wear away.

  I was. I didn’t cry. I didn’t give in. I made my voice level, soft, so that I would not further harm my vocal cords. In the intervals of silence they granted me, I prayed. Je vous salue, Marie, pleine de grâce, le Seigneur est avec vous. . . . Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. I would have counted a rosary on my fingers, but the silence never lasted that long. I prayed, Make me strong.

  I could tell when night fell because the light coming from the hallway changed. The officer left and another took his place.

  “You’re a silly child to deny the truth,” this one said harshly. “What would your mother say? Your father, your two brothers, Etienne and Pierre? Hmmm? I wonder what they will say tomorrow morning when we knock on their door. Perhaps they are all spies too.”

  If I had broken down, it would have been then, when I thought of Maman being captured by these cretins. “Papa was in the cavalry,” I said. “He served under de Gaulle.” Please heaven, he would understand. He would not remember his daughter as a fool.

  Hold on, I told myself. Hold on as long as you can.

  A guard brought this officer supper, steaming potatoes and a mound of sliced beef. It looked as though it had been cut from the same roast that the other officer had eaten for lunch. It was warm and had gravy poured onto it, and the potatoes were covered with gravy too. By now my stomach was complaining despite my fear. It had been a long time since I had eaten good roast beef, and the gravy smelled so good that I longed for a taste. The officer seemed to sense this. He held up each forkful for me to see, and he smacked his lips and chewed with gusto. He washed it all down with a glass of red wine. Then he sent for a pitcher of water and a fresh glass. He poured a glass of water.

  “Thirsty, Suzanne?” he asked.

  “Yes, please,” I said.

  “Ah, too bad.” He drank the water, then had the glass taken away. “Now. Why don’t you admit that you’re a spy? Then you could get some sleep. I’m sure you’re tired. It’s getting late, you know. Your parents must be worried.”

  In another part of the building a door must have opened. For a moment I could hear a shout, a confused babble of voices, and something in French that sounded like “I won’t go, no! No! You said you would—” Then a door slammed shut, and I couldn’t hear any more.

  The German officer sighed. He crossed his hands on top of the table. “It’s always so much better when people cooperate,” he said. “Tell me how you became a spy.”

  The night passed. The wording of the questions stayed the same, but the tone they were asked in became more insistent, more persuasive. I was too terrified to feel sleepy, but I began to have moments when my brain seemed disconnected from the rest of me. I would see the officer’s lips moving and not understand what he asked. Worse, I would find myself in the middle of a sentence and not know what I had just said. I crossed my arms and pinched the soft flesh below my rib cage, hard, to make myself concentrate. I could not give in. I would not give in.

  Finally the German officer rose from his chair. He nudged one of the guards, who jumped as though he had been asleep. The officer let loose a torrent of German. The guard hung his head. Both left the room, shutting the door behind them. The other two guards, more alert now, watched me carefully.

  The door opened and the first German officer, the one from the morning before, came in. He looked refreshed and clean. He carried a cup of coffee that smelled like heaven. My lips were parched and my dry throat hurt. Of course, I thought, the way I needed to use the toilet, it was lucky they hadn’t given me anything to drink. I smiled to myself over that, just a tiny bit.

  The officer looked at me. His eyebrows shot to his forehead. “So you find us amusing?” He set his cup upon the table. “You’re a tough little girl, I give you that. But you can’t win, mademoiselle. You see, there is only one of you, and there are a great number of us. You may as well give in now. You may as well admit the truth.”

  Hold on, I thought.

  Suddenly, somewhere in the building, many doors slammed at once. Voices shouted in German, lots of voices, loud and harsh, more and more urgently. Feet pounded down the corridor. The guards in my room jumped up. The officer, who was about to take a sip of coffee, went rigid with his arm in midair.

  I sat very still.

  The door to the room flew open. A man I couldn’t see yelled something frantic in German. The officer in the room barked a question. The man answered as he ran down the hall. The officer slammed his coffee cup onto the table an
d ran out, the guards at his heels. Throughout the entire building came a cacophony of pounding feet, shouting voices, slamming doors. Words I couldn’t understand washed over me like an angry sea.

  I didn’t move.

  Perhaps three minutes went by. The noises receded until the building became so quiet it seemed empty. Perhaps it was empty. I stood up, very slowly. I walked to the table and took a sip of the German officer’s coffee. It was warm and very, very good. But then I thought of the officer drinking it, and I set the cup down.

  Still the building was silent. I wondered when the guards would return. I peeked out of the doorway. Down the long hall I could see other doors standing open. I could smell a fresh sea breeze. Where had they gone?

  Don’t be a fool, I told myself. What did it matter where they had gone? They were gone. I squared my shoulders and began to walk down the hall.

  I was almost to the main entrance when a man stepped out of another room. I jumped and screamed.

  He looked dazed. “Are they really gone?” he asked in French.

  I looked at him. He was dressed like a French civilian, not a German soldier. “I think so,” I said. “I don’t know why.”

  The man smiled, but his eyes remained troubled. “Surely you can guess,” he said.

  “I can guess. I just don’t believe it.”

  He nodded. “Well. No use standing here, eh?” We stepped outside. The morning light was blinding. “Who are you?” he asked me. “I should know, shouldn’t I?”

  “What do you mean?”

  He smiled, and suddenly I recognized him. “You,” I said, “you’re Fourteen.”

  He said, “You’re Twenty-two.”

  A group of German soldiers ran around the corner right past us. Fourteen and I flinched. The soldiers jumped into a nearby jeep and roared away without looking at us at all.

  Fourteen smiled again. “It’s over,” he said. “You know that, don’t you?”

  I nodded. “Yes.”

  It was Tuesday, the sixth of June, 1944. The Allies had invaded the beaches of Normandy and saved me.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Fourteen and I continued to walk down the street. No one seemed to notice us. “I think we’re all that’s left,” he said.

  “All that’s left?”

  “They took the rest,” he said. “Last night a busload of prisoners went to Saint-Lô. I could see the bus leave from the room where they were questioning me. They found out all of our names. We were all caught at the end. Didn’t you know?”

  I shook my head.

  “When I think of what they did to the poor doctor—”

  I stopped. “What did they do to the doctor?”

  “My child—”

  “What did they do to the doctor?”

  “They killed him,” Fourteen said. “He and his wife and his children. They killed them all.”

  If I had had anything in my stomach, I would have thrown it up right there. I felt as though a heavy weight had struck me. My breath came in gulps.

  “Don’t you understand?” Fourteen said. “They will kill the ones they took away. They have killed everyone they captured before. All of us but you and me.”

  All of us but you and me. Dr. Leclerc. His little boy. Thirteen, who met me in church. Ten, who seemed so afraid. Seven, the old woman with wispy gray hair. Monsieur Ventreaux, who was number four. Everyone but Fourteen and me.

  Fourteen turned to go to his home, and I walked down my street, dizzy with exhaustion and grief.

  Papa, Maman, Madame Marcelle, Etienne, and Pierre were all clustered in the parlor when I opened the door. Maman and Madame Marcelle were crying, and Papa’s eyes were red.

  I stood in the doorway, swaying. “Suzanne!” Someone grabbed me, pulled me through the doorway. Maman clutched my neck, sobbing. Madame Marcelle clutched my arms, sobbing. The boys shouted, and Papa tried to push us all out of the way so he could shut the door and lock the Germans out.

  Everyone spoke at once. “They came and got you—” “Madame Marcelle told us—” “What did they want with you?” “My little one, are you hurt?”—this last a heartfelt cry from Maman.

  “I’m not hurt. They didn’t touch me,” I said.

  “But why—”

  Etienne gripped my hands. “They came for the doctor.”

  “I know.” I took a deep breath. “I think he might be dead.”

  “Yes,” said Etienne. “They killed him in the street.”

  Maman began to weep again. “You’re all right, you aren’t hurt,” she sobbed.

  “The invasion has started,” said Pierre.

  “I know that too.”

  “How?” shouted Papa. “How did you know these things? What did the Nazis want with my daughter?”

  I sank onto the sofa. “I’m a spy,” I said. “I’m a spy.” All the tears I had held back spilled down my cheeks. I covered my face with my hands. “I’m a spy.”

  “You can’t be a spy!” cried Maman. “Suzanne, no! That’s ridiculous!”

  “You put yourself in danger!” shouted Papa. “My God! My God! What were you thinking?”

  Etienne slid next to me. He took my hands and pulled them away from my face. “My little sister,” he whispered. “A hero of France.”

  Papa stopped pacing. “Well, yes,” he said. “Yes. My God, she is.”

  I tried to answer their questions, but I was so tired and overwrought that Maman soon insisted I be allowed to go to bed. She helped me upstairs. When I went in to use the toilet, she brought me a nightgown and made me remove the dress the Nazis had given me. I don’t know what she did with it; I never saw it again.

  When I woke, it was midafternoon. I lay still for a moment, savoring the heavy relaxed feeling in my arms and legs. I hadn’t slept so well in three years. It was because I was no longer afraid.

  My part was over. The Allies were landing. The war would end.

  I went slowly down the stairs. I could smell the most wonderful smells, roast lamb and garlic and rosemary, and hear the happiest voices, my brothers, my cousins, my aunt. I went into the kitchen. Pierre stood up and began to applaud, and then everyone did—my whole family, Madame Marcelle too. I began to smile.

  “Come,” said Maman. She led me into the dining room. The table had been set with the nicest dishes we still had. In the center was a huge bowl of fresh flowers, and in front of that was a cake with white icing. Cake! I had not tasted cake in years.

  My cousins crowded around the table. “Look, Suzanne!” they cried. “With sugar! It’s sweet!”

  Papa took out a bottle and carefully pulled its cork. Bubbles frothed. Papa laughed. He poured a glass and handed it to me. I took a sip, and everyone cheered. It was my very first taste of champagne.

  We ate the cake first and afterward Maman served roast lamb and the flageolets I loved so well. “Your brothers bought everything,” Maman said. “Lord knows where they found that cake. They have been out most of the day.”

  “The Allies are landing on the beaches twenty kilometers from here,” said Pierre. “All the Germans have rushed there. I didn’t see any in town.”

  I nodded. “They questioned me all night,” I said. “In the morning they started shouting, and they ran out. When I realized they were gone, I left.”

  “What did you tell them?” Papa asked.

  “Nothing,” I said. “Not one word.” I am strong.

  He looked proud. “Well done,” he said. “Who knows, perhaps someday even General de Gaulle will hear what you did.”

  “Papa.” A strange sense of triumph rose in me. “Papa, he already knows.”

  The room went quiet. Papa put down his glass and stared at me. “General de Gaulle knows who I am,” I said. “He has my photograph. He knows all about me.”

  Into the astonished silence I continued, “It was real, Papa. What I did was real. I’ve been a spy for three years. I was a good one. None of you knew. The Germans didn’t know. But General de Gaulle knew, because Dr. Leclerc tol
d him. And the Allies landing here, now—part of that is because of me. Because of the messages I carried. Because of all of us, what we did.”

  Pierre said, “But you just don’t look like a spy.”

  I couldn’t help laughing. “A spy who looks like a spy wouldn’t last long. You should have believed me, Pierre. I’m a better actress than you guessed. I’ve been an artist all along.”

  EPILOGUE

  The messages I carried gave the details of landing places, tides and currents, German forces, bridges, and cities that the Allies needed to know to plan the D-Day invasion. I learned this later, when the war was over.

  On June 22, two weeks after D-Day, the Allies began their attack on Cherbourg. The Germans had fallen back to defend the city; because of its ammunition stores and submarine facilities, Hitler had ordered it held to the last round. Allied air forces dropped a thousand tons of bombs on Cherbourg in the final two hours, most aimed directly at the submarine bunkers. None fell near my home, though you may be sure we huddled downstairs away from the windows that day. I can still hear the noise of those bombs in my head.

  Five days later the Allies liberated Cherbourg. The Germans, what was left of them, were lined up in long rows on the beaches at the harbor, loaded onto prison ships, and carried away.

  In September I received the Croix de Lorraine in Paris from General Charles de Gaulle himself. The Croix was a medal given to those who fought in the Resistance. De Gaulle shook my hand, bowed his head, and said, “Thank you, mademoiselle, for all you have done.” I couldn’t help thinking of the others, the twenty spies in Cherbourg who didn’t live to be so honored.

  We discovered that Dr. Leclerc had had a secret room in his basement, where he kept a radio transmitter that he used to communicate directly with the Allies in England. Radio transmissions were frighteningly easy to intercept; Dr. Leclerc had been very clever to remain undetected for so long.

  Madame Marcelle took a job in Italy after the end of the war. She died a few years later without my having seen her again. As far as I know, Yvette did not recover.

  The hairdresser who had betrayed me stood trial after I left France. Papa wrote that she walked like an old woman, frail and bent, when she took the stand. She was found guilty of consorting with the enemy and sent to prison. But before that she was herded into the street and every hair on her head was shaved off. That was how they treated German sympathizers after the war.