The French Promise (17 page)
Read The French Promise Online
Authors: Fiona McIntosh
‘Your bread, sir,’ another waitress said, placing a basket of crusty slices on the
table, ‘and your beer.’ A tall glass of fizzing pilsner was put down.
Finally he was alone. He knew if he ate first and then opened the letter, waitresses would be buzzing around him again to clear his table and offer dessert or coffee. So with the first mouthful of the hot stew rolling around his mouth and teasing his palate with sweet garlic and traces of juniper and thyme, he broke the seal
on Eichel’s letter.
Max took a slow breath as he unfolded its pages, which crackled pleasingly, attesting to their expense. He took a long draught of his beer as he began to read.
Dear Maximilian,
May I call you that? Please call me Walter if you ever have need to return the correspondence. Let me begin with my sincere condolences for your loss. While I never had the pleasure to meet
your mother, I was certainly acquainted with your father, Colonel Markus Kilian, and I regret to hear that he didn’t know he had a child. I believe the Markus Kilian I knew might have been proud to know of a son growing up in Lausanne.
So now what can I tell you? I understand your desire to know as much as possible but I didn’t know Colonel Kilian on an intimate level. We met at the
opera and a couple of dinners hosted by mutual acquaintances.
Your father was newly posted to Paris and I found in him more than agreeable company and a kindred spirit when it came to the arts and history, the latter of which he had a genuine passion for.
Max looked out of the window absently, his gaze seemingly focused on the cathedral’s great stained-glass window but his thoughts
far away. So his father had loved history too. Anyone looking at him might have seen the corner of his mouth twitch slightly in the semblance of a sad smile. He put the letter down and ate for a few focused minutes, staring only at his food, chewing in thought.
He returned to Walter Eichel’s memories.
I think if we’d known each other longer, Kilian and I would have become good friends – he was
certainly a charming fellow, and excellent company.
I shall recall what I can for you. I’m sure what you want to hear is that Colonel Kilian held little respect for the German government and was openly critical of Hitler.
Max felt a thrill pass through him and he reached for his beer again; swallowed another two mouthfuls.
Perhaps you may already know that he defied
orders he disagreed with and was – in his words – in exile in Paris? I heard that he was the most courageous of soldiers but had no desire to return to the Front and follow what he described rather frankly to me once as the ‘orders of a lunatic’. I might add that Kilian was extremely concerned about the situation in Poland with the prison camps. Like many of us he felt
powerless, although there
were rumours that Kilian was involved – albeit on the fringe – with a conspiracy to bring down the Nazi government in Berlin.
Max gave a small ‘whoop’, then looked around self-consciously to see how many had heard his explosion of glee. He lowered his gaze immediately back to the letter, feeling his pulse accelerating.
I cannot confirm that involvement with a conspiracy against Berlin
of that time to you but perhaps it will ease your mind. I hope so, for your father was a highly respected officer of the Wehrmacht from all that I recall of those days, and from a personal perspective, a man I rather admired.
Beneath the excitement trilling in his mind, Max could feel the dam of pressure bursting its gates as relief powered through him in a flood. His father had
not been a Nazi drone; quite the opposite, it seemed. He greedily read on – his meal, his beer, everyone around him forgotten.
To other matters, I find this awkwardly painful but I know you want the truth and so here it is, as I understood it. Your supposition is right; your father was involved in a relationship with my god-daughter at the time of his death. You tell me that he had no idea of
your existence and that he had no formal attachment to your mother, so I suspect his time spent with Lisette was done so with a clear conscience.
I feel responsible for their meeting but it occurred quite by accident and their attraction was immediate and perhaps inevitable, for your father was an unfairly handsome, altogether charismatic fellow – as I’d heard
another describe him
– and, above all, he was eligible. My goddaughter was undeniably beautiful. Perhaps it would help you to learn a little about her? I hope it won’t be painful for you, as I could read between the lines of your correspondence how much you loved your mother.
As he read about Lisette’s French mother and German father, also called Maximilian, who was from Strasbourg, Max mopped up the
last of the stew and Gabrielle was back in a blink to clear his dishes.
‘Can we tempt you with something sweet? The rhubarb tart is melt-in-your-mouth good and served with
crème Chantilly.’
‘I’m tempted, but coffee will be plenty,’ he said.
She cleared his plates and he returned to his letter and read more about the woman who had stolen his father’s heart, particularly that she’d spent
eight years from her mid-teens in England, which Eichel wrote he’d kept secret due to the paranoia of the time about being noticed for even the smallest reason by the ever-watchful Gestapo. The former banker also admitted that he never risked learning by what means his goddaughter had found her way across the English Channel and entered France in 1943 midst that same paranoia.
Max sat back. What
was Walter Eichel not saying? He was intimating something. She’d come from Britain but had sound French papers. Only one conclusion could be drawn from that. He bit his lip, trying not to second-guess as he read on.
Lisette came to work with me at the bank in Paris. She lived in Montmartre but I never visited
her accommodations. She was a quiet, intelligent beauty – and so she certainly caught
the attention of Colonel Kilian one evening when she ran into us at a café in Saint Germain.
Kilian took to her the moment they met and the feeling, I suspect, was mutual. I know they began seeing each other properly from 8 May 1943 because that was Lisette’s twenty-fifth birthday and your father entertained her for dinner at the Ritz in Paris as a treat; he was the perfect gentleman
in checking with me first.
Beyond that I know little more about their friendship. Your father also asked my permission to requisition her for his office. He was badly in need of a bilingual assistant but I suspect it was also rather convenient.
You mentioned the name von Schleigel and asked whether I’d ever heard his name in context with your father. The answer is yes.
Max blinked and realised a coffee was cooling by his wrist but he’d barely been aware of its arrival. Eichel’s letter was like reading a mystery novel as the jigsaw pieces of a plot began to fit together to form a picture. He stirred a half-spoon of sugar in and sipped, excited that another connection was being made – this time with the man from the Gestapo whom his father had mentioned.
He was a very small cog in a vast machine but I sensed that von Schleigel possessed high ambition. He had arrested a friend of my goddaughter’s – someone called Luc Bonet – whilst she happened to be visiting Provence. I gather it was a misunderstanding, believing
her friend was a Maquisard in the region and high on the list of wanted men. Lisette needed to use my name to extricate both of them
from the Gestapo’s southern headquarters. I think von Schleigel paid me a visit when passing through Paris simply to ensure I wouldn’t sully his name in Berlin. He was on his way to Auschwitz-Birkenau and I couldn’t show him the door fast enough.
That’s all I can tell you, Max. I never heard from von Schleigel again, although I did telephone Colonel Kilian immediately, as von Schleigel
had asked pointed questions about Lisette’s relationships. I felt the colonel should know that this vile fellow was snooping into his life.
All of us – French and German alike – detested Gestapo!
Within weeks of von Schleigel’s visit, Paris was under siege again and life changed dramatically for all of us. I lost track of Lisette and I was deeply sorry to discover the
news of your father’s death on the eve of liberation.
I did hear from my goddaughter in 1946, although I note it had taken many months of forwarding from one address to another to find me here at Regensburg. She gave no detail, simply a note to say she was alive, essentially, and recovering from punishments inflicted for being a Nazi mistress. I noticed the letter was posted from
Inverness in Scotland, so I presume she returned permanently to Britain but I have not heard from her since. If you wish to contact her, I’d suggest you try through her grandparents
in England. I’ll put the address I have for them at the bottom of this letter – they may not be alive, of course, but it’s the only contact I have.
Wishing you all the best in your search for information
and I’m hoping this is a good start. If you do find Lisette, please pass on my love and hopes that she will write to me. I’m eighty-two and time ticks on. Enough said. I was glad to hear from you, Maximilian, and hope that something in these pages will help you.
Sincerely
Walter G Eichel
Max sat back, his half-drunk coffee cold in the cup and his heart pounding.
Inverness! That’s where the letter from Ravensburg was posted. He dug in his backpack and found the letter, which had accompanied his father’s.
It was written in French and was brief, with no salutation:
Mademoiselle Vogel, forgive my delay in sending you this letter. I regret to say that I was the last person to see Colonel Kilian alive but want to assure you that he did not die alone. I stayed
with him to his final breath …
Max knew the letter by heart now. How curious that his father would die in his enemy’s arms. But this was not the man who killed him, so what were they doing together? And coming through the note was a sense of Ravensburg’s respect for his father. But this note to his mother was made all the more intriguing now by Eichel’s reference to Inverness. How
were Ravensburg and his father’s young French lover connected? Why were they both in Scotland – in the same part? He suspected he could guess but he
wanted proof. And if he was right, then potentially he knew something that neither his father nor Eichel knew for sure – although the old man had alluded to it – and would blow the lid on the relationship between Kilian and Lisette.
He had
to know the truth now. And given what he suspected about Lisette, he believed the man from the Gestapo was likely onto something, too – von Schleigel just hadn’t known what. The reference to his father being involved in a conspiracy could be linked as well. So now he needed access to records but the archives were in Germany. Maybe he could –
‘Max! Where have you been?’
He looked up, startled from
his thoughts. It was his closest friend, Nicolas, and he instantly felt guilty.
‘Hi, Nic. Sorry, I’ve been busy.’ He gestured at the seat opposite.
‘I saw you in the window. What, you eat alone these days?’
He grinned, hoping it didn’t look forced. ‘I needed to think some stuff through but my belly was impatient. Want something?’
Nicolas checked his watch. ‘Sure.’ Gabrielle timed her arrival perfectly.
‘Er, coffee please, with milk.’
‘And I’ll have another,’ Max said and before she could ask, he added, ‘I’ll have milk too.’
She smiled at him and left them.
‘She’s doing history,’ Nic said, glancing backwards at her.
Max nodded. ‘So?’
‘She’s keen, always asking about you.’
‘Nic …’
‘I know, I know. Claire. Get over her.’
Max gave him a look of exasperation. ‘Because you’re such an expert with women.’
‘Well, I don’t mooch around in cafes alone, brooding like you do.’
‘I’m not brooding, I’m researching.’
His friend gave him a wry glance as their coffees arrived. ‘Thank you, Gabrielle. How are your studies going?’ Max wished he wouldn’t. ‘Fine. Yours?’
‘Terrible,’ he admitted with a wink.
Nicolas was very good with women, if Max was honest, and he wished he could have even some of his
friend’s easy manner. It seemed he did not take after his father in this regard. They talked over him but he could feel Gabrielle’s gaze wandering to him as he absently sipped at his coffee.
‘See you round,’ he heard Nic say and Max dragged himself back out of his thoughts. ‘I gave you the perfect opening!’ his friend complained.
‘Let it go, Nic.’
Nic sugared his coffee. ‘You know, Max, you chased
off Claire and now you’re living like a monk.’ Max shrugged.
‘She, like everyone else, thought you’d be together for keeps.’
‘It didn’t work,’ Max replied evenly.
‘No … you didn’t let it work. We all have parents, Max. Your mother died.’ Max glared at his closest friend, but Nic was not to be put off. ‘What are you going to do, grieve for the rest of your life?’
‘Grieving is my business but since
you poke your nose in, I’m not grieving, I’m working on a project; I’m just busy, Nic. I’m not crying into my coffee. I’m well aware my mother’s dead and on some level I’m glad of it. Her suffering’s done.’
‘Then what’s eating you?’
Max shook his head.
‘Come on, tell me. No secrets, Max.’
Nic was right. They’d never kept secrets from each other. Given that he’d told his professor, Nic
deserved to know more. He plunged in, explaining about his father.
‘You’re only just telling me this?’
Max shrugged, slightly embarrassed.
‘Hell, Max, you don’t have to keep everything so tightly locked up. So what are you going to do?’
‘I’m going to Germany,’ he replied without thinking, surprised that he sounded so certain, when moments ago he was only just reaching towards it.