We'll Meet Again (26 page)

The policeman on duty was one she knew, an ordinary gendarme, not a member of the
Brigade Speciale
. His name was Armand and he had a daughter of fourteen. Sometimes they had talked about her and Arlene’s own childhood. Whether he was genuinely interested or whether it was intended to catch her out in a falsehood, she did not know, but she was careful to maintain her cover story and her childish innocence.

‘I can’t, you know I can’t,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow she will be sent to Paris.’

‘Paris, but why?’

‘I don’t know. If I could help you, I would, but it is not up to me.’

Esme began banging on her cell door and shouting in a childish voice,
‘Tante Gabby! Tante Gabby!
Let me out!’

‘Let me go to her. She is frightened.’

‘No. I have my orders. No visitors.’

‘I’ll go home then and wait.’ Madame’s voice was loud, intending to be heard. ‘But if she is not safely at home again by curfew, I shall take the matter further.’ Esme could not hear Armand’s reply, but after that there was silence.

When he came to bring her supper an hour before curfew, he
found her in tears. ‘Don’t cry, Madeleine,’ he said, sitting on the bed beside her. ‘Nothing will happen to you.’

‘I’m frightened. You turned my aunt away. I thought you would let me go, but you didn’t. What have I done wrong? I don’t know what I’ve done. I thought I would be safe with my mother’s cousin. Instead I’ve been locked up. Let me go, please. Please.’

‘I daren’t.’ He picked up her empty bowl and left her.

An hour later, he came back and unlocked the door, then he walked away leaving it wide open. She peeped along the corridor. It was empty. The door to the office was ajar too. She walked forward and gingerly pushed it open. Jean and Paul were standing there waiting for her. They seized her arms and bundled her out of the door. No one spoke.

It was only a few minutes to curfew and there was no one about except a couple of German soldiers walking along the pavement. Jean and Paul pretended to be sharing a joke with her, but all the time guiding her along the street. As soon as they turned the corner, they sped along to the bicycle shop. Pierre’s van was waiting outside. They helped her into the back of it. Paul went back to his shop and Jean climbed in beside Pierre.

‘Sweetheart, are you OK?’ Gilbert’s voice came to her in the darkness and she felt his arms go about her as the van jolted its way over the cobbles.

‘Boris! Oh, thank God.’

‘Amen to that.’ He hugged her to him. ‘You can’t go back to the farm, you know that, don’t you?’

‘No, I suppose I can’t. Where are we going?’

‘Dominic is going to take you down the line. It’s home for you.’

‘But you are coming too?’

‘No, I can’t, there’s too much to do here.’

‘Then I want to stay too.’

‘No way. The Boche won’t rest until they have you. You are a danger to the whole circuit.’

‘Well, thanks very much for that.’

He laughed grimly. ‘You are also a danger to my peace of mind, Esme. I want you safe, safe at home waiting for me to come back. And I will, I promise you. There is nothing in the world I want more than to be with you, because I love you, but not here, not now.’

‘Oh, Gillie.’ She lifted her face to be kissed, then laughed suddenly. ‘You are a disgrace, Monsieur Lebonier, kissing a schoolgirl like that.’

‘Schoolgirl be damned. When we are safe home again, I shall have your whole story out of you, Esmeralda Favelle.’

‘What will happen to Armand?’

‘He is neatly tied up and gagged in the back room of the police station and a nice wad of money has been taken to his wife.’

They drew up at Dominic’s surgery and hurried inside, leaving Jean and Pierre to take the van back to Pierre’s bakery. Dominic was waiting for them, and so were Tim and Pat in their white coats. Gilbert introduced them by their new names. Esme was taken to the bathroom where she washed the prison grime off and combed out her plaits, then put on the nightdress and bed jacket she had been given. By the time she had done that and returned to the men, the ambulance was at the door.

She clung fiercely to Gilbert. ‘If you are in the slightest danger, you must come out,’ she said. ‘Promise me.’

‘I promise. In any case, the war will soon be over. Until then, my sweet, look after yourself and wait for me.’ He kissed her lightly, then helped her onto the stretcher and covered her with a blanket. He smiled. ‘Don’t forget you are supposed to be sick.’

He was reluctant to let go of her hand as Tim and Pat picked up the stretcher and followed Dominic out of the surgery.

‘You’d better be off,’ Dominic told him. ‘Leave ma’amselle to us.’

He released her hand and stood and watched as they placed her in the ambulance, Tim and Pat climbed in and Dominic shut the doors. He rapped on the side and the vehicle drew away.

They were silent for some time. It was not easy to converse; the vehicle was old and very noisy and their driver was in somewhat of a hurry, so they did not even try. They were stopped for their papers when they came to the bridge that had once marked the boundary between the occupied and the free zone. Arlene pulled the blanket up round her face in case the guard was one who might recognise her, but he only gave her a cursory glance before waving them on.

Twice more they were asked for papers but whoever had forged them had done a good job and each time they were let through without trouble. Night turned to day and their driver stopped on a quiet stretch of road to fill the tank with petrol from a can he had brought with him; it was safer than trying to buy it. Here they all got out to stretch their legs and relieve themselves. ‘Where are we?’ Tim asked the driver.

‘No need for you to know,’ he said brusquely.

‘I understand.’

‘Please return to your places. We cannot linger.’

They climbed back into the ambulance. Arlene sat on the stretcher. ‘I think we are about halfway to Lyon,’ she told them.

‘Is that all?’ Pat said. ‘I thought we must be nearly there.’

‘No, we have some way to go yet. Do either of you want to have a sleep? You can take turns to use the stretcher, if you like. Of course, if we are stopped I shall have to be the patient again.’

Pat took advantage of the offer and was soon snoring gently. ‘He’s rather impatient,’ Tim told her.

‘So I gathered. But aren’t you a bit impatient yourself?’

‘Yes, I am. I have a girl waiting for me in England. At least, I hope she is waiting for me.’

‘Boris’s sister?’

‘Yes. How did you know?’

‘He told me.’

‘What else did he tell you?’

‘Not much. In our line of work it is best not to know.’

‘Do you know even know his real name?’

‘I know that is it Gilbert, but please don’t tell me any more, not until we are safe.’

‘Are you … you know what I mean.’

‘Am I in love with a man whose name I do not even know? Is that what you are asking me?’

‘Yes, I suppose so.’

‘If this were peacetime and we were both in England, I should say, yes, I am, but as we are not, such things have to be left unsaid.’

‘He loves you. I saw it in his eyes when he said goodbye to you. Is that the reason he is sending you back with us, so that you are safe?’

‘No, I have become a liability. It is safer for everyone concerned that I should disappear.’

‘How brave you are.’

She smiled deprecatingly. ‘I do my job. I am sorry I have been taken off it, but I have to obey orders. Please don’t ask me any more.’

‘Very well, I won’t.’

‘Tell me about your girl. What’s her name?’

‘Prudence, though everyone calls her Prue.’

‘What does she do?’

‘She says she is a translator but I think there’s more to it than that. She doesn’t talk about it.’

‘We all have to watch our tongues these days. Tell me about her.’

So he did; he told her about his doubts, about their misunderstanding and how he hoped to put it right and that filled in the time until their next stop when they woke Patrick so that she could lie down again. And thus they arrived at a small house on the outskirts of Lyon where Arlene ceased to be a patient and their driver left them.

They were made welcome at the house and given food and beds and the next day were guided to another safe house. They had to wait there another two days until a guide could be found to take them to the border. It had been relatively easy up until then and they were becoming a little too confident, especially as Arlene, whose French was perfect, was always able to come up with a tale that satisfied the curious.

At last a guide was found and they resumed their journey in an old van which took them to a village a few miles short of the Spanish border. Here they were taken in by an elderly lady to wait for a new guide to take them over the mountains. From then on they would have to go on foot.

Madame was very thin and not very tall. She only came up to Tim’s chest. Her husband had been caught and killed by a German border control the year before, while taking escapees over the mountains into Spain, she told them.

‘And yet you still shelter us,’ Tim said.

‘Of course. If I gave up, the enemy would have won and what my husband did would have been in vain.’

‘You are very brave.’

She smiled. ‘You are young and have your whole life before you. It is for the young I do what I do.’

‘Aren’t you afraid?’

‘I would be a fool to say I am not, but it passes. Dying is easy.’

They were sitting round the table in the kitchen, eating a frugal meal as they talked. They felt safe, which was foolish of them because in the middle of the meal when they were laughing at something Pat had said, they heard an imperative knocking at the front door. ‘Quick,’ Madame said. ‘Go out the back way. I will keep them talking.’

‘We can’t leave you,’ Tim said, hesitating.

‘Yes. You can. Go, before they break the door down.’

Pat, who was nearest the back door, ran out, closely followed by Arlene. They were in the backyard before they realised Tim had not followed them. Pat hesitated, ready to go back. And then they heard a shot, followed by another. Arlene pulled on his arm. ‘Come on. There’s no going back.’

Prue obeyed the summons to Mr Welchman’s office, wondering what she had done wrong. It was unlike him to call her away from her work in the middle of a shift. Had she made a terrible blunder translating? Had she inadvertently breeched security?

When she tapped on the door and obeyed the call to enter, she discovered he was not alone. There was an airman and an ATS girl, both in uniform, sitting on chairs on the other side of his desk. The airman scrambled to his feet.

‘Prue,’ Colin Welchman said. ‘This is Flight Lieutenant Duffey. He has something to tell you.’

Prue turned to face the young man. As far as she knew, she had never met him before. He was tall and dark and looking awkward. The girl was looking down at her hands. ‘There is no easy way to tell you this,’ the airman said. ‘But I’m afraid Tim is dead.’

‘Dead?’ She sank onto a third chair, unable to take it in. She was surprised to find that she could speak. ‘When? How?’

‘In France. We were on the run. We almost made it.’

‘Go on.’

He sat down again and leant forward. ‘I was in the POW camp with Tim. He was determined to escape and get home. Unfinished business, he said. We got out together. I’ve been warned not to say anything of how we were helped for fear of reprisals …’

‘I understand.’ The work she did had given her an inkling of the terrible things that were happening in Germany and the occupied countries. It had been her constant fear, and now it had happened, not to Gillie, but to Tim.

‘They were amazingly brave people,’ he said, referring to those who had helped them. ‘We had a bit of a scare when the train we were on was searched by the Gestapo, but our guide got us off in crates and took us on what she called a detour. Then, by an extraordinary coincidence, we met someone Tim knew.’

‘Gillie?’ she murmured.

‘You knew?’

‘I knew he was out there somewhere. How was he? Did he come back with you?’

‘No, he didn’t. I think he should have, but we couldn’t persuade him. His wireless operator had been arrested and he and some others broke her out of jail and he insisted she came with us.’

‘Was her name Esme, by any chance?’

‘We knew her as Arlene.’

She turned towards the girl. ‘You are Esme, aren’t you?’

‘Yes. How did you know?’

‘Gillie told me about you. I am very pleased to meet you.’

‘And I you, but I wish it could have been in happier circumstances.’

‘Tell me what happened.’

It was Pat who answered her. ‘We were dressed as ambulance men and Arlene was our patient. We went all the way to Lyon like that and then spent ages being passed from safe house to safe house
because the French special police were searching for someone. We were having dinner in a kitchen near the Spanish border when Jerry arrived. We all got up to run. I was outside when I realised Tim had not followed but stayed to help our hostess who was an elderly lady. It was just like him to act the knight in shining armour. I hesitated and was going back when we heard a shot and then another. Arlene grabbed me. She said we couldn’t do anything for them, so we ran for our lives across the back garden and over the wall. I felt really bad about leaving him like that. We were good pals, had been through thick and thin together and I couldn’t help him when it came to the crunch.’ His voice cracked and he stopped speaking.

There was silence in the room for some time. ‘You are sure Tim died?’ Prue asked.

‘Yes,’ Esme put in. ‘It was reported in the newspaper the next day. We had to get out fast because the Boche were looking for us. That was in the paper too. I’m sure we’d been betrayed.’

‘I’m glad I had Arlene with me,’ Patrick put in. ‘I’d have been picked up in no time without her. We made our way out of the town and up into the hills, hoping that country people might be more helpful than those in the town. Arlene seemed to know whom to approach and whom to avoid. One man guided us to a safe house and arranged for us to cross the Pyrenees into Spain, but the weather was against us and we were stuck at the foot of the mountains for weeks. Sometimes we would set out, only to be driven back by heavy snow or German patrols or guides not turning up, but we finally made it over the border three weeks ago. The last guide gave us directions to a village and left us there to find our own way.’

‘Just you and Esme?’

‘Yes. We were arrested as soon as we arrived and taken by bus
to the next town and put in prison. We had heard tales of Spanish authorities sending escapees back over the border and we thought we’d had it. We spent a miserable couple of days, trying to think of a way to escape but then we were visited by a Spanish Air Force officer who spoke good English. He took us by car to a hotel. We could have walked out of there, but the Spanish airman assured us steps were in hand to take us to Gibraltar and we were to be patient. Next day we had a visit from an attaché at the British Embassy in Madrid, who grilled us about our escape. He seemed to know all about Arlene, which helped. We had to wait three more days before a car arrived and took us to Gibraltar. We were flown out of there last week. After I had been debriefed, I asked if I could tell you what happened.’

‘What you have been told stays in this room,’ Mr Welchman said.

Prue did not need the reminder. ‘Does Tim’s mother know?’

‘Yes, she was told officially that he had died attempting to escape.’

‘Tim talked about you a lot,’ Patrick told Prue. ‘He couldn’t wait to get back to you. That’s why he was so keen to escape. When we were in hiding, he said if he didn’t make it back to tell you he loved you and was coming home to tell you so and not to take any notice of his silly letter. I am so sorry he couldn’t tell you that himself.’

There was silence again. Tim had not finished with her after all; he regretted that letter. All that nonsense about not caring was nothing but a cover to conceal her hurt. She had almost convinced herself. Did that matter now? He wasn’t coming back. Now it was too late.

She looked bleakly round at the others. They were watching her carefully, waiting for her to react, to say something, to burst
out crying. But she couldn’t, she was too numb to cry. It was as if someone had punched her in the chest and taken all her breath away.

‘Take the rest of the day off,’ Colin Welchman told her.

‘Thank you, but I must get back to work,’ she said. ‘I was in the middle of a tricky message when you sent for me.’ Her voice was a dull monotone; nothing they said had properly registered.

‘Perhaps that would be best,’ he said. ‘We have to brace ourselves and carry on. Can you do that?’

‘I think so.’ She turned to Patrick. ‘Thank you for telling me. It must have been awful for you.’ Then to Esme. ‘Can we talk some time?’

‘Of course, but you know I can’t tell you much?’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘I’ll be here the rest of the day.’ Esme said. ‘I think I’m going to be thoroughly quizzed.’

Prue got up and stumbled from the room and out into the fresh air. Everything looked so normal, the grass, the lake rippling a bit in a strong breeze, the leafless trees and the huts with their smoking chimneys, just as they had been when she had entered the building, but they had the quality of a dream.

‘Hey, Prue, what’s wrong? You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.’

Prue shook herself to find Sheila in front of her with her satchel of post over her shoulder. ‘Tim’s dead,’ she said. ‘Tim’s dead.’

‘Oh, you poor thing.’ Sheila dropped her satchel and put her arms round her. That small gesture of sympathy opened the floodgates and the tears ran down her face. ‘He was shot trying to come back to me,’ she sobbed.

‘Oh.’ Sheila picked up her bag. ‘Come on, let’s go and make ourselves a cup of tea.’

‘I ought to go back to work.’

‘They won’t miss you for a few minutes. You need a cuppa.’ She took Prue’s arm and marched her to the hut where they could make some tea. There was no one there. Silently Sheila sat Prue down and made a pot of tea, poured out two cups and put one in front of her friend, then sat down herself. ‘Now tell me all about it. I’ve signed that damned official secrets thingy, so you needn’t worry I’ll blab.’

Prue gave her a wan smile and took a gulp of tea. ‘He escaped, got clean away, all the way from Germany to France and then he got caught when they were almost safe.’ She scrubbed at her eyes with a handkerchief. ‘The police arrived and he stayed to help an old lady. They were both shot dead.’

‘How do you know all this? No, don’t tell me, you read it in one of those messages you translate.’

‘No, he wasn’t alone. Two others survived and got home. They’ve just been to tell me. His friend said … said he wanted to come home to tell me he loved me …’

‘What did I tell you?’

‘I know, I should have kept in touch with him. It’s too late now and, in the long run, it doesn’t make any difference.’

‘It does to the way you remember him.’

‘Sheila, how did you cope? How did you find the strength?’

‘I don’t know. It comes from somewhere. You have to cope because there is no alternative. It’s this bloody, bloody war.’

Prue had never heard Sheila swear and it made her smile, which was no doubt what her friend had intended. She finished her tea and stood up. ‘The war won’t stop while I weep, so back to work.’

‘Can’t you go home?’

‘Mr Welchman said I could but I didn’t want to. I can’t talk to Mrs Tranter about it and I’d be alone brooding until you came in. I’m better here where there’s plenty to do to keep me busy. I’m
going to meet someone later to learn a bit more. I’ll see you at home later.’ She left Sheila washing up the cups and saucers and went back to work.

How she got through the rest of her shift she could not afterwards say. As soon as she came off duty, she went to look for Esme and found her in the canteen sitting over a cup of Camp coffee, waiting for her. She looked up as Prue brought more coffee and sat down opposite her.

‘How was the grilling?’ Prue asked.

‘OK. I was able to fill in a few details, but it’s astonishing how much they already knew.’ She paused, unwilling to elaborate. ‘Are you all right? I’ve been sitting here thinking how awful it must be for you.’

‘It was a shock I admit, but I’ll survive. We have to, don’t we?’

‘Yes.’ It was said quietly.

Prue had been told all she was going to be told about Tim’s escape and his death, and in time she would come to accept it, but her brother, as far as they knew, was still alive. ‘You must be worried about Gillie. Tell me about him.’

Esme smiled. ‘He’s extraordinary, brave, resourceful, calm. He never flaps. He got me out of that prison just in time. I was going to be sent to Gestapo headquarters in Paris and that would have been the end of me. It wasn’t the first time I’d been in prison and I knew if they connected Arlene to the Esme they had held before I wouldn’t have stood a chance.’

‘You escaped before?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why did you go back?’

‘I was asked if I would.’

‘And that’s all it took, a simple request?’

‘I couldn’t say no, could I?’

‘Have you any family?’

‘I did have once, in France, none in England that I know of. My mother was French, married to an Englishman, but they were both killed early in the war. I had no one to mourn if I disappeared.’

‘But there’s Gillie …’

‘Yes, but I had already volunteered when I met him. We were on the same training course.’

‘He loves you.’

‘I know.’ It was said with a sigh. ‘I love him too.’

‘I know roughly where he is,’ Prue said. ‘Tell me, how is he?’

‘When I last saw him he was well but he’s living on borrowed time. If the Gestapo find out who he really is they will make capital of it and he won’t stand a chance. And I won’t be there to help him.’

‘What could you do if you were?’

Esme grinned. ‘Not a lot. But the separation is unbearable. I’ve asked to be sent back.’

‘Gillie wouldn’t want that.’

‘I know.’ She smiled. ‘I had no idea he was a viscount, not until we were in the plane coming home and Patrick told me. You could have knocked me back with a feather. I pray he comes back safely but the odds are stacked against it.’ She paused. ‘I’m sorry, you’ve had enough sadness for one day. Let’s talk about something more cheerful.’

‘Have you met my parents?’

‘No.’

‘I’ll take you and introduce you. Gillie was a bit evasive when Mama asked him about girlfriends, but I can understand that. It would mean telling her what he was doing and he couldn’t do that.’ She was surprised to find she could still smile. ‘I think Mama has guessed some of it in any case, though she has never said. She
pretends the postcards she gets are coming from Gillie himself.’

‘I wouldn’t be able to tell her any different.’

‘Oh, I know that. You’ll come if I arrange it?’

‘Yes, Gillie told me to get in touch with you when I arrived back. He said you would take me to his mother. That’s why I came with Patrick today, though I would probably have been sent in any case. SOE work closely with the people here.’

‘Where are you going when you leave here?’

‘I can’t tell you.’ Esme chuckled and touched the side of her nose. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll keep in touch.’ She stood up. ‘There’s a car coming for me at five. I’d better go.’

Prue accompanied her to the main gate where a khaki-painted staff car waited for her. Patrick was standing beside it. He came forward as they approached. ‘OK?’ he asked Prue.

‘Yes, thank you.’

‘I’m glad I met you. Tim was right, you are special.’

She felt the tears rising again and blinked them away. ‘So was he. What are you going to do now?’

‘Go on leave and then back to Wyton. They have formed a new unit called Pathfinders since we were taken prisoner and I’m joining that. They go off ahead of the main force to identify the target and light it with flares so that the oncoming bombers can drop their bombs in the right place. We have more navigational aids than we had at the beginning. I’m told they are very effective.’

‘Tim would have been glad to learn that. He hated indiscriminate bombing.’