Code Name Verity(84)

When he was nowhere near in earshot any more, Mitraillette burst out in English, ‘My brother is a SHIT.’ Don’t know where she learned that word – not from me! ‘He is a SHIT.’ She said it again and switched to French, which was harder for me to understand, but easier for her to swear in.

Etienne has been assisting at an interrogation. It is beginning to tell on him, and he took it out on Amélie, who had again poked fun at the fading bruise on his forehead. So he told her in hideous detail what would be done to her if she was a prisoner who refused to give answers when the Gestapo questioned her.

Can’t get it out of my head now that it’s in there.

I keep hearing it over and over in dribs and drabs from Amélie herself, who thinks I’m a good listener although I can’t understand half of what she says. She’s partly upset by the Gestapo captain’s involvement, as she puts him on the same shelf in her brain as her priest or the head of her school – someone in authority, a bit distant, mostly kind to her, but above all someone who plays strictly by the rules. Someone who lives by rules.

And forcing pins under a person’s toenails because they won’t talk to you doesn’t count as any rules that anyone has ever heard of.

‘I don’t believe they’d do that to a woman,’ Amélie told her brother as we stood in the road with our bicycles.

‘The pins go in your breasts if you are a woman.’

That was when Amélie gulped and went green, and when Mitraillette got angry.

‘Shut your trap, Etienne, you donkey, you’ll give the kids nightmares! God! Why the hell do you stay there if it’s so horrible? Does it make you excited, watching people stick pins in a woman’s breasts?’

That was when Etienne became cold and formal.

‘I stay because it’s my job. No, it’s not exciting. No woman is attractive when you’re pouring ice water over her head to revive her and she’s managed to be sick in her own hair.’

—

I tell Amélie not to think about it. Then I tell myself not to think about it. Then I tell myself I must think about it. It is REAL. It is happening NOW.

What Jamie said is giving me nightmares. If Julie is not already dead – if she is not already dead she is counting on me. She is calling me, whispering my name to herself in the dark. What can I do – I can scarcely sleep, I just go round in circles all night trying to think what I can do. WHAT can I do?





Have found a super field – rather far from here though – cycling all day with M., Fri. 12 Nov. Incredible how difficult it is to find a decent landing field for the SOE. It’s all so samey, farm after farm, shrines at every crossroad and a community bread oven in every village. The fields are so flat you could land anything anywhere. But there are never any good night-time landmarks or any kind of cover for a reception team. Must be lovely flying in peacetime.





I have been in France five weeks now.

My legs are stronger than they’ve ever been – cycled a good 60 miles twice this week, once to find the field and again two days later to take Paul to see it. He needs to get his w/op to send an RAF plane to take pictures for Moon Squadron approval. In between marathon bicycle rides I spend most of my time taking care of chickens, learning how to wire up small explosive devices and trying hard not to suddenly scream my head off with nerves.

The broadcaster Georgia Penn has had a ‘no’ from the head of the Gestapo in this region – a powerful and terrible man, called Ferber, I think, the Ormaie captain’s boss. Penn has let us know she plans to ignore his refusal and try again by going straight to the captain – she’ll backdate her application, tie them up in their own red tape, right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing. An amazing woman, but totally crackers, if you ask me – hope her own right hand knows what her left hand is doing.

Another Lysander pick-up is planned for tomorrow night, Tues. 16 Nov., at the same pylon-infested field near Tours. Weather unpredictable, but it’s the last chance before we lose the November moon. I may go home with my munitions expertise untested.





No, I am still here. Dratted Rosalie.

Can’t blame the poor car, I suppose, but don’t like to blame the stupid, well-meaning driver.

Oh, I’m tired. Moonrise at 10 p.m. last night so plane not due in till 2 in the morning – Paul came to collect me after curfew and we bicycled to meet the car, him cycling and me riding behind him standing on a bar wedged through the frame. Had to cling to him for dear life for 5 miles, bet he loved that. The car was late meeting us – the driver had to avoid an unexpected patrol – Paul and I stood for half an hour shivering and stamping around in the drainage ditch where we hid the bicycle. Don’t know when my toes have ever been so cold, standing in icy mud, mid-November, in wooden clogs – thought so much of Jamie floating in the North Sea. I was nearly crying by the time the car arrived.