time in this story, I lacked imagination. The trouble was, wherever I looked I saw them German swines. They were always in the office and the office was next to our house. La Duchesse said we had nothing to hide.
‘I take people as I find them,’ she’d say. ‘If this is what my life has come to then I’ll make do. And at least those Germans show me more courtesy than other persons about.’
It was a dig at me, her errant son, but what could I reply? This was Hell’s own nightmare. I felt sure I’d be caught out and I remember the day I found La Duchesse at our front door, waiting for me.
‘Where have you been?’
I told her nowhere but I felt so guilty. I would’ve made a rotten spy.
She looked me up and down. ‘I have things to do. Your brother is next door with Blanche. Will you fetch him in an hour?’
I nodded silently and galloped up the stairs, feeling her eyes burn into my back. When the front door slammed I turned around. Was silence better than lies? Je ne sais pas.
The pressure was too much for me to take alone. Without even thinking I was tapping lightly at the door of the spare room, hoping Pop would answer.
‘Pop,’ I whispered. ‘Are you there?’
I imagined him slowly opening the door, seeing the worry on my face, and I saw myself walking in, ready to tell him everything. But back on the landing I tapped again and waited and heard nothing. After another minute I pushed the door open. The room smelt stale and the curtains were half-drawn, but what I saw on the wall in front of me made my hairs stand on end. It was a crumpled map of Europe pinned up high, with small flags dotted over it, marking what I realised were the Allied positions. Eh me, it was a sight I hadn’t expected. I walked over to the dresser to get a better look and there was one of the old leaflets from before the Germans came. The words ‘Why Go Mad? There’s No Place Like Home’ stared back at me.
It was like Pop was talking to me, trying to tell me something, and I sat on the bed with my tired eyes watering. I stared at the map and wondered where Pop had got his information from. I wanted to ask him, and I waited and I waited. I didn’t know where he’d gone. Still don’t, in fact. I sat there with my old school satchel resting on my lap. I toyed with the dust that danced in the air in front of me, I flicked through the pages of his prayer book. On the back page Pop had written some numbers and I wondered if it was verses of the Bible. Then the door slammed and La Duchesse was calling for me. Over an hour had passed, I had let her down again.
That is when I did it, Emile. I was in a hurry and I had to hide my scrapbook. I quietly pulled the dresser away from the wall and lifted the floorboard. I remember thinking someone had pulled the nails up once already. I slid my scrapbook underneath Hubert’s strongbox, and off I went to fetch you.
Malin haen? Oui, J’étais si malin, mais saber-dé-bouais j’sis gnolle auch’t’haeure? Is it any wonder nobody wants to hear my side of this story? They cannot imagine I could do something so stupid. They’d prefer I just went away. Well, I’d have liked to get away and that was always the plan. We were meant to be off on 12th December, a Thursday. It was going to be me and Ray and J-P to Southampton for Christmas. Au yous, my goose was cooked all right. We reckoned on departing before eleven o’clock at night, and after that we had plenty of hours of darkness to get some distance from the German Water Police.
I’d tried to convince Ray to wait because I was scared about the weather, but I was also worried what would happen if I was gone. I knew there’d be a payback and my family’d be for it.
‘I’ll go without you, then,’ Ray offered. ‘Maybe it is different for me. My sisters are safe in England and my mother’s as tough as a boot. Just get me the intelligence and I’ll take it without you.’
I wasn’t sure if he was joking. Should I let him go without me and