The Indigo Rebels: A French Resistance novel Page 5

  “Because you call someone famous when they have achieved something outstanding. And if that someone caught the whiff of easy money, wrote a couple of novels which were ‘in’ at the wave of the new life, and exploits the public just like the politicians and the rest of the ‘selling’ press and editors which she is friends with, that someone surely is infamous, boy,” Philippe finished ruthlessly. “I’m sorry if it sounded rude, but it is what it is.”

  “You don’t know her,” Marcel muttered defensively, sudden heat flushing his face.

  “I know of people like her. I understand that she’s your sister, and you feel compelled to protect her, but answer me this: if she were a good person, a really decent person who you knew would have helped you, wouldn’t you be on your way to Paris a long time ago? I offered to fix your papers if you decided not to stay here with us right away.”

  Marcel followed Philippe in stubborn silence for quite some time, until he sniffled quietly and spoke at last. “She grew up in poverty, Philippe. Kamille – that’s my other sister – and me, not so much. Kamille was too little to remember the war, and I was born after it. But Giselle, she still remembers it all: the hunger, cold, desperation… Just like you do. And you decided to fight for it to never happen again, only you joined the Communist Party, and she decided to follow a capitalist route and become as rich as she possibly could, no matter the price. You’re right, she’s not a good person. She clawed and bit her way into that world, with the same determination with which you’re trying to transform your world. You both have the same goal, not to get caught in the past again, only you both chose entirely different paths to that goal. She’s cynical and practical, she’s your typical profiteer and a capitalist, but she has as much right to be one as you do to be a communist. She wouldn’t like you and your way either if I told her about you. So even if you don’t like her, I ask you to at least respect her, just like she would respect you.”

  Philippe snorted softly in response and caught Marcel midair after the latter lost his footing once again. “And that’s where you’re wrong, boy. Capitalists don’t respect anyone or anything.”

  “Do Communists?” Marcel jerked his shoulder irritably, shaking Philippe’s hand off. “What was with the execution of the Romanovs’ royal family then? And with the destruction of the Winter Palace? And the recent collaboration with the Nazis?”

  The two men faced each other, the top of Marcel’s head barely reaching Philippe’s chin. With eyes glistening in the dark as if asserting each other once again, Philippe with newfound curiosity and Marcel with newfound defiance, they silently stood their ground, each refusing to look away first. Finally, Marcel noticed a shadow of a grin on the communist’s face.

  “You have spunk in you, Marcel. I like it. You’ll make a good fighter.” A slap on the shoulder followed the unexpected compliment, and Marcel blinked a few times, wondering if Philippe had indeed just called him by his name, and not boy as he usually did. “I cannot promise that I’ll respect your sister, but I surely will respect you. Now, hurry; no one needs to see us wandering around the village after the curfew.”

  As they made their way through the forest, Marcel couldn’t understand the reason for a wide grin playing on his face, but some inward satisfaction made him square his shoulders more. Even Philippe didn’t seem to frighten him that much anymore.

  Giselle threw a glare in the direction of her former study once again, for the hundredth time that morning as it seemed. The study was now occupied by Sturmbannführer Wünsche, who turned it into its personal “headquarters” as soon as he finished his inspection of Giselle’s apartment on the first day of his arrival.

  “You don’t use it, do you?” he inquired, turning on his heels towards the mistress of the household, who was standing in the doors with her arms crossed over her chest.

  “You’re observant.”

  “I have to be, Mademoiselle. I work for the Staatspolizei.”

  “I appreciate you warning me in advance. I guess it means that I’ll have to ask the Marxists who I’m currently hiding in one of my closets to look for different living arrangements.”

  The German studied Giselle with his black eyes for quite some time, before finally giving way to a grin.

  “In this case I’ll tell Otto to move all of my documentation here if you’re not using it,” Karl Wünsche finally said, ignoring Giselle’s previous ironic remark. “Also, I’ll have to put a lock on the door to make sure that all the files inside are secure from any intruders while I’m away.”

  “Intruders meaning me?” Giselle arched her brow.

  “Intruders meaning any kind of unauthorized person who might compromise the secrecy of the documentation, entrusted to me by the State,” followed the impassive reply.

  “I see. Well, I’ll free one of the bookcases of all the Communist propaganda that I’ve been collecting for years, so you have some space to put your highly secret documentation there.”

  Sturmbannführer Wünsche snorted softly, exiting the study. “I’ve heard rumors that French women were impossible. They turn out to be true.”

  “You haven’t seen anything yet,” Giselle promised confidently, following him out of the study.

  It turned out that German men were equally impossible, or at least it was impossible to work with one living under the same roof with her. The monotone staccato of Otto’s typing machine following Karl’s dictation in his unemotional, even tone, the metallic clanking of his boots on the hardwood floors – as if he practiced his goose-stepping away from the carpet on purpose! Giselle thought with a huff – and Coco’s constant growling at the men in the other room made it unfeasible for Giselle to concentrate on her writing. Even the tall clock next to the opposite wall seemed to mock her impotence with its emphatic ticking, measuring time that was wasted in vain – in drumming her fingers on the table, swallowing coffee that had long gone cold, in staring at the blank sheet of paper in her typing machine and at the thin stack of papers which consisted of the current chapter; a chapter which was supposed to be at the same level of its neighbors a few days ago. Fifteen minutes later and without a single word written, Giselle, at last, lost her patience and moved her chair angrily, getting up and headed in a resolute step towards the study, in which her new tenant was working with his adjutant. She yanked the door open without even considering knocking first and stood in the doorframe, her demeanor anything but amicable.

  “I can’t work like this!” Giselle shouted, startling the unsuspecting Otto who stopped his typing at once.

  Karl Wünsche turned around and lifted his dark brows, expressing either mild surprise or annoyance at such an insolent intrusion.

  “I can’t work like this,” Giselle repeated with the same firmness in her voice, which echoed from the walls in sudden silence. “When your office, or whoever it was, sent you here, they told me that you’d just be living here. Living, not working. Living as in going to work in the morning, to your own office or wherever it is that you’re supposed to work from and coming back in the evening to sleep. That’s all. End of story. I didn’t agree to house a Gestapo headquarters in my apartment, Mein Herr. I have work to do, and I can’t because you are doing yours. Now, I don’t think it’s quite fair. Do you?”

  Her vexation and deep scowl seem to produce quite a different effect than the one Giselle was aiming at. Instead of offering her his apologies or even trying to argue with her as she had expected, Sturmbannführer Wünsche scrutinized the woman in front of him for a long moment before bursting out into unexpected laughter.

  “You find it amusing?” Giselle snapped, even more insulted.

  “Quite.” The German approached her, took her by the elbow delicately but with a certain firmness, turning her away from the study. “Take your purse and your hat. Let’s go.”

  “Go where?” Giselle asked, with suspicion creasing her brow as she wormed her arm out of his grip. Surprisingly, the Sturmbannführer released her at once.

  “That will be all
for today, Otto,” he informed his adjutant over his shoulder while picking up his uniform cap and gloves from the mail table in the hallway. Seeing that Giselle didn’t move from her spot, he picked up her straw hat and motioned his head towards the exit. “Come, I said.”

  “You didn’t say where.”

  “You told me yourself that you can’t work like this. So, if you can’t work, and most likely you won’t let me work either, we’re going to have some lunch instead.”

  “You’re inviting me to lunch?”

  The skeptical look on Giselle’s face seemed to amuse the German even more.

  “Why? You expected me to take you to the Gestapo headquarters and shoot you there for disrupting my work? Of course not, otherwise you wouldn’t burst into my office like that. Although it baffles me a little, your reaction to my invitation.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t call it an invitation, when someone orders you out in the manner that you just did.” Giselle still had her arms crossed, but her grin was getting wider and wider, mirroring the one on her uniformed tenant’s face.

  He lowered his head, concealing a chortle, straightened up, fixed his jacket and clicked his heels. “I beg you to accept my sincerest apologies for my rudeness. Would you do me the honor of accepting my invitation to lunch, Mademoiselle?"

  Giselle faked hesitance, moving her shoulder as if pondering her reply. “I don’t even know… I’m not dressed to go out.”

  “You can change if you like, but I think you already look absolutely lovely.” His gaze slid over Giselle’s bright blue dress accented with a lace collar and a thin belt made of the same material.

  She knew that she did. For several years now Giselle didn’t have a single item in her closet that she would be ashamed to wear in public or receive guests in. Before Karl’s arrival, she would wear silk slips and matching robes at home but she had to abandon that practice in view of her new lodger’s presence in the apartment. Now she adopted a habit of dressing up and curling her hair every morning before leaving her bedroom.

  “Well, I suppose we can share a meal if you insist.” Giselle finally stopped her fake resisting and took her hat out of the smiling man’s hands, placing it sideways on her platinum locks in a trained gesture, without even glancing in the mirror.

  As they were stepping through the door, which Karl gallantly held for her, Giselle was grateful for the hat shielding the victorious smirk in her green cat-like eyes from the German. He might be the most feared man among his own kind, but she knew all too well that first and foremost he was only a man, and men she knew how to handle, German or not.

  It turned out that Karl was an interesting conversationalist when put in a relaxing atmosphere and offered a bottle of famous French wine, Giselle noticed, while completely ignoring the astounded looks of matrons that passed the open café by; the same matrons with which she used to exchange her rather unconventional views on the French army and the situation in the country in general. Now, shamelessly enjoying lunch with one of the high-ranking uniformed occupants, her chances for redemption as a “good, conscientious citizen” were completely and utterly destroyed. Yet, being the careless creature that she was, Giselle only shrugged off the looks and whispers and turned all of her attention to the representative of the new species that she had never encountered before and who she was so curious about – one of France’s “wurst-loving neighbors.”

  As the day progressed and coffee was finished, Giselle offered her guest a tour around the area, during which he indeed proved his knowledge of French architecture and history, even though he elaborated about them in a completely impassionate tone. Despite this last fact, Giselle was still rather impressed with his, if not passion for French culture (there was obviously no passion judging by his demeanor), but at least his vast academic knowledge. It even made her warm up to the somber-looking man a little, even though “warm up” was not the term that she fancied. Men were simply one of the pleasures of life for her and she used them as such, without any sentimental feelings attached. Accordingly, Giselle kept throwing evaluating looks his way, taking in the impeccable posture, refined speech, enviously handsome smile (on those rare occasions when he allowed it to appear), and calculated all the pros and cons of entering a slightly different sort of a relationship with the German than a hostess and her tenant would ordinarily have.

  “I seem to have lost you with my ramblings about the Louvre, haven’t I?” Karl Wünsche’s voice interrupted her musings.

  “Pardon.” Giselle couldn’t help herself and sniggered. “I was just wondering about something… However, we aren’t so well acquainted that I could ask you such things.”

  “You’ve intrigued me.” He stopped and slightly tilted his perfectly coiffured head to one side. “What sort of things?”

  With an impish gleam dancing in her eyes, Giselle looked up at him, grinning mischievously from under her hat. “Are Germans good lovers?”

  He stared at her for quite some time in stunned silence, frozen under her amused gaze, wondering if he had misunderstood what she had said.

  “I’m writing a book, you see.” Giselle went on to clarify, hardly containing a fit of giggles at his reaction. “And I was wondering if I should write a German character into it, you know, as a lover that my protagonist might have an affair with. But to be sure, I need to know for a fact that it would be a believable move, that she would choose him over her husband, that is. Usually I write from experience but this time I’m afraid I’m completely ignorant and have to rely on independent opinion.”

  Karl regarded her a little longer, while Giselle kept her most impenetrable poker face on. Finally he replied, calmly saying, “No one has complained so far.”

  “Point taken.”

  Well, if she was already going “renegade” on her matronly French neighbors, why not do it to the full extent, Giselle decided, with the usual ease in her mind as she circled her arm through the crook of the German’s elbow. After all, she had long ago abandoned all social conventions and vowed to herself to experience life to the fullest.

  The German didn’t lie, as Giselle found out later that evening when the two came back to her apartment. This time she offered him a “tour” around her bedroom, and she indeed had no complaints whatsoever on his account.

  5

  Kamille moved the lock up and pushed the windows open, allowing the fragrance-filled gust of the wind into the kitchen. She lingered there a little, resting her hands on the windowsill with some potted geraniums on it, while the cool breeze gently caressed her flushed skin. Cooking in such heat was pure madness, and even the light summer dress didn’t lessen her discomfort in the slightest, its thin cotton sticking to her perspiring back. It looked like she’d need another shower before she could set the table, for the thought of her guests smelling anything but the elegant scent of her jasmine soap was only adding to Kamille’s anxiety.

  Why did she even bother, though? Kamille sighed dejectedly and went back to the stove to check on the fish, which she was broiling in mushroom sauce in the hope that maybe that would pique their interest. Hardly. Over two weeks had passed, and neither Hauptmann Hartmann nor his adjutant Horst bothered to appreciate her culinary efforts. No matter how much time Kamille spent in the kitchen doing her utmost to impress the two men, the only response she had gotten so far was a polite smile and reassurance that there was no need to worry about them and that they had plenty of food in the officers’ quarters.

  “But why would you eat army food when I’m more than happy to offer you my dining room?” Kamille argued meekly with a gentle smile. “I cook for myself and Violette anyway; it really is no bother at all to make two more portions…”

  Jochen only pressed her hand in a courteous, but distant manner, and explained that they didn’t want to impose on her more than they did already.

  “After all, the less you see us, the better it is. Don’t you agree?” He finished with yet another polite smile, and left Kamille alone and on the verge of unexpected tear
s, not even suspecting how deeply his words had hurt her.

  “Maybe I do want to see more of you,” she whispered under her breath when the echo of his steps had already been replaced by an indifferent silence.

  The matter was even more complicated by the fact that her new tenant constantly sent her contradictory signs which Kamille never knew how to decipher. He would rush to her aid whenever they happened to return home at the same time and immediately relieve her of the heavy bags she carried; he would help set them on the countertop and even massage her numb hands gently, muttering for the tenth time that she shouldn’t hesitate to ask Horst to take her shopping; and yet, at the same time, as soon as Kamille offered him tea in gratitude for his kindness, he would start shaking his head vehemently and disappear into his room at once, as if terrified of such a prospect.

  Jochen would demonstrate infinite patience when answering Violette’s incessant flood of questions about the army, Germany and anything else that came into her inquisitive mind, yet he seemed embarrassed to exchange even a few words with Kamille, resorting to polite questions about her day at the most.

  And just when Kamille took his detached attitude for coldness, he expressed genuine concern soon after when he found Kamille crying quietly over her favorite tortoiseshell hair clips. After searching for them for a few days she had finally admitted to herself that her mother-in-law must have taken them out of spite, together with her wedding china set and the sheets, just prior to the officers’ arrival. When Kamille gathered up enough courage to call Madame Blanchard, she received a stunningly nonchalant reply: “Yes, of course I took them. Charles gave them to you as a wedding gift; it would hardly be appropriate for you to parade around in them in front of those two Boches who lodge with you now.”

  Jochen tried to comfort her with such sincere gentleness that Kamille allowed a tiny glimmer of hope to ignite inside of her heart. Maybe he did care after all… But then, as soon as her tears dried and a small, hopeful smile replaced them, he once again stepped away and left her to her devices, as if completing his duty and leaving everything at that.