World War II Thriller Collection (93 page)

She drew level with the car. Franck had camouflaged it with vegetation, but when she peeped over the rows of vines she saw moonlight glint off the rear window.

The shoots of the vines were espaliered crosswise, but she was able to crawl beneath the lowest strand. She pushed her head through and looked up and down the next alley. It was clear. She crawled across the open space and repeated the exercise. She grew ultracautious as she approached the car, but she saw no one.

When she was two rows away, she was able to see the wheels of the car and the ground around it. She thought she could make out two motionless bodies in uniform. How many were there in total? It was a long Mercedes limousine and could easily carry six.

She crept closer. Nothing moved. Were they all dead? Or had one or two survived, and concealed themselves nearby, waiting to pounce?

Eventually she crawled right up to the car.

The doors were wide open, and the interior seemed full of bodies. She looked in the front and recognized Michel. She choked back a sob. He was a bad husband, but he had been her choice, and now he was lifeless, with three red-ringed bullet holes in his blue chambray shirt. She guessed he had been the one to sound the horn. If so, he had died saving her life. There was no time to think of such things now: she would ponder them later, if she lived long enough.

Next to Michel lay a man she did not recognize who had been shot in the throat. He wore the uniform of a lieutenant. There were more bodies in the back. She looked through the open rear door. One was that of a woman. She leaned into the car for a better view. She gasped: the woman was Gilberte, and she seemed to be staring at Flick. A ghastly moment later, Flick realized that the eyes saw nothing, and Gilberte was dead, shot in the head.

She leaned over Gilberte to look at the fourth corpse. It rose up from the floor in a swift motion. Before she had time to scream, it grabbed her by the hair and thrust the barrel of a gun into the soft flesh of her throat.

It was Dieter Franck.

“Drop the gun,” he said in French.

She was holding the submachine gun in her right hand, but it was pointing up and, before she could aim it, he would be able to shoot her. She had no choice: she dropped it. The safety catch was disengaged, and she half-hoped the impact of its fall would fire the gun, but it landed harmlessly on the earth.

“Back away.”

As she stepped back, he followed her, getting out of the car, keeping the gun at her throat. He drew himself upright. “You're so small,” he said, looking her up and down. “And you've done so much damage.”

She saw blood on the sleeve of his suit and guessed she had winged him with her Sten gun.

“Not just to me,” he said. “That telephone exchange is every bit as important as you obviously believe.”

She found her voice. “Good.”

“Don't look pleased. Now you're going to damage the Resistance.”

She wished she had not been so fierce in ordering Paul and Ruby to wait in hiding. There was now no chance they would come to her rescue.

Dieter shifted the gun from her throat to her shoulder. “I don't want to kill you, but I'd be happy to give you a crippling wound. I need you able to talk, of course. You're going to give me all the names and addresses in your head.”

She thought of the suicide pill concealed in the hollow cap of her fountain pen. Would she have a chance to take it?

“It's a pity you've destroyed the interrogation facility at Sainte-Cécile,” he went on. “I'll have to drive you to Paris. I've got all the same equipment there.”

She thought with horror of the hospital operating table and the electric shock machine.

“I wonder what will break you?” he said. “Sheer pain breaks everyone eventually, of course, but I feel that you might bear pain for an inconveniently long time.” He raised his left arm. The wound seemed to give him a twinge, and he winced, but he bore it. He touched her face. “The loss of your looks, perhaps. Imagine this pretty face disfigured: the nose broken, the lips slashed, one eye put out, the ears cut off.”

Flick felt sick, but she maintained a stony expression.

“No?” His hand moved down, stroking her neck; then he touched her breast. “Sexual humiliation, then. To be naked in front of many people, fondled by a group of drunk men, forced to perform acts of grossness with animals . . .”

“And which of us would be most humiliated by that?” she said defiantly. “Me, the helpless victim . . . or you, the real perpetrator of obscenity?”

He took his hand away. “Then again, we have tortures which destroy forever a woman's ability to bear children.”

Flick thought of Paul and flinched involuntarily.

“Ah,” he said with satisfaction. “I believe I have found the key to unlock you.”

She realized she had been foolish to speak to him. Now she had given him information which he could use to break her will.

“We'll drive straight to Paris,” he said. “We'll be there by dawn. By midday, you will be begging me to stop the torture and listen to you pour out all the secrets you know. Tomorrow night we will arrest every member of the Resistance in northern France.”

Flick was cold with dread. Franck was not bragging. He could do it.

“I think you can travel in the trunk of the car,” he said. “It's not airtight, you won't suffocate. But I'll put the corpses of your husband and his lover in with you. A few hours bumping around with dead people will put you in the right frame of mind, I think.”

Flick shuddered with loathing. She could not help it.

Keeping the pistol pressed to her shoulder, he reached into his pocket with his other hand. He moved his arm cautiously: the bullet wound hurt but did not incapacitate him. He drew out a pair of handcuffs. “Give me your hands,” he said.

She remained motionless.

“I can either handcuff you, or render your arms useless by shooting you in both shoulders.”

Helpless, she raised her hands.

He closed one cuff over her left wrist. She moved her right toward him. Then she made her last desperate move.

She struck sideways with her handcuffed left hand, knocking his gun away from her shoulder. At the same time she used her right hand to draw the small knife from its hidden sheath behind the lapel of her jacket.

He flinched back, but not fast enough.

She lunged forward and thrust the knife directly into his left eye. He turned his head, but the knife was already in, and Flick moved farther forward, pressing her
body up against his, ramming the knife home. Blood and fluid spurted from the wound. Franck screamed in agony and fired his gun, but the shots went into the air.

He staggered back, but she followed him, still pushing the knife with the heel of her hand. The weapon had no hilt, and she continued to shove until its entire three inches had sunk into his head. He fell backwards and hit the ground.

She fell on him, knees on his chest, and she felt ribs crack. He dropped his gun and clawed at his eye with both hands, trying to get at the knife, but it was sunk too deep. Flick grabbed the gun. It was a Walther P38. She stood upright, held it two-handed, and aimed it at Franck.

Then he fell still.

She heard pounding footsteps. Paul rushed up. “Flick! Are you all right?”

She nodded.

She was still pointing the Walther at Dieter Franck. “I don't think that will be necessary,” Paul said softly. After a moment, he moved her hands, then gently took the gun from her and engaged the safety catch.

Ruby appeared. “Listen!” she cried. “Listen!”

Flick heard the drone of a Hudson.

“Let's get moving,” Paul said.

They ran out into the field to signal the plane that would take them home.

. . . .

THEY CROSSED THE
English Channel in strong winds and intermittent rain. During a quiet spell, the navigator came back into the passenger compartment and said, “You might want to take a look outside.”

Flick, Ruby, and Paul were dozing. The floor was hard, but they were exhausted. Flick was wrapped in Paul's arms, and she did not want to move.

The navigator pressed them. “You'd better be quick, before it clouds over again. You'll never see anything like this again if you live to be a hundred.”

Curiosity overcame Flick's tiredness. She got up and staggered to the small rectangular window. Ruby did the same. Obligingly, the pilot dipped a wing.

The English Channel was choppy, and a stiff wind blew, but the moon was full and she could see clearly. At first she could hardly believe her eyes. Immediately below the plane was a gray-painted warship bristling with guns. Alongside it was a small ocean liner, its paint-work gleaming white in the moonlight. Behind them, a rusty old steamer pitched into the swell. Beyond them and behind were cargo boats, troop transports, battered old tankers, and great shallow-draft landing ships. There were ships as far as Flick could see, hundreds of them.

The pilot dipped the other wing, and she looked out the other side. It was the same.

“Paul, look at this!” she cried.

He came and stood beside her. “Jeepers!” he said. “I've never seen so many ships in all my life!”

“It's the invasion!” she said.

“Take a look out the front,” said the navigator.

Flick went forward and looked over the pilot's shoulder. The ships were spread out over the sea like a carpet, stretching for miles and miles, as far as she could see. She heard Paul's incredulous voice say, “I didn't know there were this many ships in the damn world!”

“How many do you think it is?” Ruby said.

The navigator said, “I heard five thousand.”

“Amazing,” Flick said.

The navigator said, “I'd give a lot to be part of that, wouldn't you?”

Flick looked at Paul and Ruby, and they all smiled. “Oh, we are,” she said. “We're part of it, all right.”

THE LONDON STREET
called Whitehall was lined on both sides with grandiose buildings that embodied the magnificence of the British empire as it had once been, a hundred years earlier. Inside those fine buildings, many of the high rooms with their long windows had been subdivided by cheap partitions to form offices for lesser officials and meeting rooms for unimportant groups. As a subcommittee of a subcommittee, the Medals (Clandestine Actions) Working Party met in a windowless room fifteen feet square with a vast, cold fireplace that occupied half of one wall.

Simon Fortescue from MI6 was in the chair, wearing a striped suit, striped shirt, and striped tie. The Special Operations Executive was represented by John Graves from the Ministry of Economic Warfare, which had theoretically supervised SOE throughout the war. Like the other civil servants on the committee, Graves wore the Whitehall uniform of black jacket and gray striped trousers. The Bishop of Marlborough was there in a purple clerical shirt, no doubt to give the moral dimension to the business of honoring men for killing other men. Colonel Algernon “Nobby” Clarke, an intelligence officer, was the only member of the committee who had seen action in the war.

Tea was served by the committee's secretary, and a plate of biscuits was passed around while the men deliberated.

It was midmorning when they came to the case of the Jackdaws of Reims.

John Graves said, “There were six women on this team, and only two came back. But they destroyed the telephone exchange at Sainte-Cécile, which was also the local Gestapo headquarters.”

“Women?” said the bishop. “Did you say six women?”

“Yes.”

“My goodness me.” His tone was disapproving. “Why women?”

“The telephone exchange was heavily guarded, but they got in by posing as cleaners.”

“I see.”

Nobby Clarke, who had spent most of the morning chain-smoking in silence, now said, “After the liberation of Paris, I interrogated a Major Goedel, who had been aide to Rommel. He told me they had been virtually paralyzed by the breakdown in communications on D day. It was a significant factor in the success of the invasion, he thought. I had no idea a handful of girls were responsible. I should think we're talking about the Military Cross, aren't we?”

“Perhaps,” said Fortescue, and his manner became prissy. “However, there were discipline problems with this group. An official complaint was entered against the leader, Major Clairet, after she insulted a Guards officer.”

“Insulted?” said the bishop. “How?”

“There was a row in a bar, and I'm afraid she told him to fuck off, saving your presence, Bishop.”

“My goodness me. She doesn't sound like the kind of person who should be held up as a hero to the next generation.”

“Exactly. A lesser decoration than the Military Cross, then—the MBE, perhaps.”

Nobby Clarke spoke again. “I disagree,” he said mildly. “After all, if this woman had been a milksop she probably wouldn't have been able to blow up a telephone exchange under the noses of the Gestapo.”

Fortescue was irritated. It was unusual for him to encounter opposition. He hated people who were not
intimidated by him. He looked around the table. “The consensus of the meeting seems to be against you.”

Clarke frowned. “I presume I can put in a minority recommendation,” he said with stubborn patience.

“Indeed,” said Fortescue. “Though I doubt if there's much point.”

Clarke drew on his cigarette thoughtfully. “Why not?”

“The Minister will have some knowledge of one or two of the individuals on our list. In those cases he will follow his own inclinations, regardless of our recommendations. In all other cases he will do as we suggest, having himself no interest. If the committee is not unanimous, he will accept the recommendation of the majority.”

“I see,” said Clarke. “All the same, I should like the record to show that I dissented from the committee and recommended the Military Cross for Major Clairet.”

Fortescue looked at the secretary, the only woman in the room. “Make sure of that, please, Miss Gregory.”

“Very good,” she said quietly.

Clarke stubbed out his cigarette and lit another.

And that was the end of that.

. . . .

FRAU WALTRAUD FRANCK
came home happy. She had managed to buy a neck of mutton. It was the first meat she had seen for a month. She had walked from her suburban home into the bombed city center of Cologne and had stood in line outside the butcher shop all morning. She had also forced herself to smile when the butcher, Herr Beckmann, fondled her behind; for if she had objected, he would have been “sold out” to her ever afterwards. But she could put up with Beckmann's wandering hands. She would get three days of meals out of a neck of mutton.

“I'm back!” she sang out as she entered the house. The children were at school, but Dieter was at home. She put the precious meat in the pantry. She would save
it for tonight, when the children would be here to share it. For lunch, she and Dieter would have cabbage soup and black bread.

She went into the living room. “Hello, darling!” she said brightly.

Her husband sat at the window, motionless. A piratical black patch covered one eye. He had on one of his beautiful old suits, but it hung loosely on his skinny frame, and he wore no tie. She tried to dress him nicely every morning, but she had never mastered the tying of a man's tie. His face wore a vacant expression, and a dribble of saliva hung from his open mouth. He did not reply to her greeting.

She was used to this. “Guess what?” she said. “I got a neck of mutton!”

He stared at her with his good eye. “Who are you?” he said.

She bent and kissed him. “We'll have a meaty stew for supper tonight. Aren't we lucky!”

. . . .

THAT AFTERNOON, FLICK
and Paul got married in a little church in Chelsea.

It was a simple ceremony. The war in Europe was over, and Hitler was dead, but the Japanese were fiercely defending Okinawa, and wartime austerity continued to cramp the style of Londoners. Flick and Paul both wore their uniforms: wedding dress material was very hard to find, and Flick as a widow did not want to wear white.

Percy Thwaite gave Flick away. Ruby was matron of honor. She could not be bridesmaid because she was already married—to Jim, the firearms instructor from the Finishing School, who was sitting in the second row of pews.

Paul's father, General Chancellor, was best man. He was still stationed in London, and Flick had got to know him quite well. He had the reputation of an ogre in the U.S. military, but to Flick he was a sweetheart.

Also in the church was Mademoiselle Jeanne Lemas. She had been taken to Ravensbrueck concentration camp, with young Marie; and Marie had died there, but somehow Jeanne Lemas had survived, and Percy Thwaite had pulled a hundred strings to get her to London for the wedding. She sat in the third row, wearing a cloche hat.

Dr. Claude Bouler had also survived, but Diana and Maude had both died in Ravensbrueck. Before she died, Diana had become a leader in the camp, according to Mademoiselle Lemas. Trading on the German weakness of showing deference to aristocracy, she had fearlessly confronted the camp commandant to complain about conditions and demand better treatment for all. She had not achieved much, but her nerve and optimism had raised the spirits of the starving inmates, and several survivors credited her with giving them the will to live.

The wedding service was short. When it was over, and Flick and Paul were husband and wife, they simply turned around and stood at the front of the church to receive congratulations.

Paul's mother was there, too. Somehow the general had managed to get his wife on a transatlantic flying boat. She had arrived late last night, and now Flick met her for the first time. She looked Flick up and down, obviously wondering whether this girl was good enough to be the wife of her wonderful son. Flick felt mildly put out. But she told herself this was natural in a proud mother and kissed Mrs. Chancellor's cheek with warmth.

They were going to live in Boston. Paul would take up the reins of his educational-records business. Flick planned to finish her doctorate, then teach American youngsters about French culture. The five-day voyage across the Atlantic would be their honeymoon.

Flick's ma was there in a hat she had bought in 1938. She cried, even though it was the second time she had seen her daughter married.

The last person in the small congregation to kiss Flick was her brother, Mark.

There was one more thing Flick needed to make her happiness perfect. With her arm still around Mark, she turned to her mother, who had not spoken to him for five years. “Look, Ma,” she said. “Here's Mark.”

Mark looked terrified.

Ma hesitated for a long moment. Then she opened her arms and said, “Hello, Mark.”

“Oh, Ma,” he said, and he hugged her.

After that, they all walked out into the sunshine.