Within a couple of hours of their arrival the system was working and Malloy was hard-pressed in encoding the radio traffic to London. There was more chance of detection-vans operating in Paris and that meant finding alternative sites for Pascal’s radio and after two weeks of intense pressure Pascal found a courier who would take encoded material down to Paul Jarry in Melun for onward transmission.
By the end of March Malloy had asked London to specify areas of priority otherwise they would be overwhelmed and the operation would grind to a standstill and what might be vital information would have to take its turn in the queue with the chance of its value being negated or diluted.
London agreed immediately and the next day a list of a dozen priorities came over. Half of them concerned Wehrmacht troop-movements east to west towards the Channel ports and their hinterland. Even nil reports were to be included. London mentioned that transmissions in daytime hours could be considered as there was so much radio traffic in the Paris area at that time that it could make detection more difficult for the Germans.
The only problems in March were the power-cuts for the civilian population. They came without warning. Only the Jarrys’ radios were operative for several days. And as May came in the pressure from London was increased. The priority classifications were void. London wanted everything, even movements of troops in the south of France.
Malloy barely ventured outside on the streets and Pascal had told him that he wouldn’t be fit to carry on if he didn’t relax and get some fresh air.
They had walked down the next afternoon to the quai. It was the 1st of June 1944. Blue skies and a warm sun sprinkling the Seine with sparkling diamonds as they sat on a bench near to an old man with a fishing rod.
He tensed as he saw a group of German soldiers walking towards them and Pascal said, “Don’t worry. They’re on leave. They put them up in an old warehouse in the rue du Bac. Those guys are just kids from a machine-gun battalion.”
“How do you know that?”
Pascal laughed. “You gave me talks on recognition. That leather pouch on his belt is supposed to hold tools and an anti-aircraft sight for his MG43.”
“And you still remember all that stuff?”
“Yes. Never know when it might come in handy.” He paused. “There’s a lot of messages in the last week on the BBC French Service. Could mean something’s boiling up.”
“How do you get time to listen to the radio?”
“I don’t. People tell me.”
“What else do they tell you?”
“Rommel’s been posted here as commander of the Channel defences.”
“Anything else?”
“Yeah, the Allies took Rome yesterday but the Germans wouldn’t let the newspapers print it today. There’s a lot of changes going on at the Kommandantur. Civilians going back to Germany and soldiers taking over.”
“What kind of people tell you these things? Are they reliable?”
Pascal laughed. “Of course not. Most of them, it’s just gossip but it’s generally right. Especially if they’re Party members. They know how to sort the wheat from the chaff.”
“You still believe in all that?”
“All what?”
“Workers of the world unite, down with capitalism and on with the class war.”
“You think that’s all it is?”
“What is it then?”
“It’s the basis for trying to create a world where everybody gets a fair deal. Where everybody gives what they’ve got. Those with talents give their talents and others give their labour. Where every man has a job by right, and medical care and a roof over his head.”
“And if he doesn’t toe the line he gets sent to Siberia.”
Pascal smiled. “Let’s win the war first, comrade, and then we can argue.”
“If they were all like you, my friend, then I’d join myself.”
Pascal laughed. “Thanks. I’m flattered. We’d better go, we’ve got a heavy schedule tonight. Paul’s coming up himself early evening to take back some of my load.”
On the 4th of June London was asking for even more specific information. They would monitor his frequencies round the clock so that no time was lost. Their requests were about German units moving away from the Channel ports eastwards, and getting this type of information quickly put great pressure on the couriers and telephone contacts. Malloy wondered why London were so interested in troops moving away from the coast, it was usually incoming troops that interested them.
The following day it seemed as if London had gone berserk. They asked for hourly transmissions with no priority restrictions. Anything he got, they wanted it. All their previous rules on radio security seemed to have been abandoned.
The next day, Tuesday the 6th of June he had gone down to the café to cadge a spoonful of sugar for his breakfast coffee and the place was in turmoil. The radio was on full blast, quite openly tuned to the BBC French Service. Eisenhower’s voice announcing that the invasion had started. Then the French translation. It was repeated again and again interspersed from time to time with reports that troops had already landed on French soil.
The several groups of early-morning customers stood listening in silence and there were no signs of excitement. That would come later if the invasion was successful but at that moment they were aware that the landings meant the destruction of villages and towns and the deaths of many French men and women.
It was Pascal who brought home other realities to Malloy when he said, smiling, “I guess at least a hundred thousand people joined the Resistance today.”
When he saw the surprise on Malloy’s face Pascal grinned. “All those bastards who’ve been collaborating with the Germans will be desperate for some
