‘Go on!’
‘She worked for the Germans. She was a double agent, a plant, according to Alain’s doctor. He said she supplied the Germans with information that she got out of Alain about the Resistance movement. He said Alain told this woman when and how he and the other prisoners were going to escape, and she passed the information on to the Germans. It was because of this woman that Alain was shot in the leg,’ Esther hissed.
‘Simone!’
‘Yes!’ Esther said, clearly shocked. ‘How did you know her name was Simone? Did Alain tell you about her?’
‘No. Not directly.’ Claire’s heart began to pound. She swallowed hard and blinked back her tears. ‘It’s Simone who Mitch - Alain - talks about in his sleep.’ The whistle of the kettle made her heart skip a beat. She jumped up as if she was on auto-pilot and made the tea. ‘How do you know all this?’ she asked, handing Esther a cup. ‘Did the commander tell you?’
‘No! All he said was Captain Mitchell is in France and the Canadian and British Military Police want to question him about a German agent named Simone who they believe he consorted with during the war.’
Claire nodded thoughtfully. ‘You said there were two things you needed to tell me?’
‘Two things? Oh, yes! Just a minute, dear.’ Esther took off her coat, unbuttoned her cardigan and blouse and pulled a brown envelope from between her vest and brassiere. ‘This came - from Alain.’ She handed Claire the envelope. ‘I think it’s a copy of what the professor in Canada sent to Commander Landry. The envelope looks like the one I saw on the commander’s desk yesterday.’ Esther forced a smile. ‘I put it here for safe keeping.’ She tapped the small roll of flesh beneath her bosom. ‘Not even a commander in the Royal Canadian Air Force would dare to have a lady of my age strip-searched. Not in peacetime anyway.’
If the situation hadn’t been so serious Claire would have laughed. She took several pages of thin tissue-like white paper from the envelope and, while she drank her tea, read her husband’s medical notes and a letter that Professor Puel had written to his commanding officer. She shook her head. ‘These notes are transcripts of the private sessions between Mitch and Professor Puel. As his doctor, Puel should not have sent them to anyone. It’s a blatant disregard of doctor-patient confidentiality.
‘I read similar transcripts when I was with the SOE in the war. They were mostly interrogations.’ Claire laid the letter that Professor Puel had written next to Mitch’s medical notes, sat forward in her chair and scrutinised both. ‘Did you read these thoroughly, Esther?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Then you know the two accounts are different. Nowhere does Mitch say that Simone is a double agent feeding the Germans information. Puel has assumed that. He must have known of a double agent called Simone, put two and two together, and decided that Simone the German agent and Simone in the Gestapo prison were the same woman.’ Claire looked at the transcript again. ‘There’s nothing in this document that even hints that Mitch is in cahoots with a German agent who was in the French Resistance; not when he was in the Gestapo prison nor at any other time.’
‘Look!’ Esther said, pointing to the second page of the letter, ‘It says here, Captain Alain Mitchell spent an unnecessary amount of time while in the Gestapo prison with a German spy known as Simone who, in my professional opinion, turned him. He doesn’t say he knows Simone turned him, he only says in his opinion she turned him.’
‘That’s right. We already know from the transcript that Mitch was in the prison with a woman named Simone.’ Claire picked up the transcript. ‘If this is an exact record of what Mitch said in the meetings he had with the professor, it’s more likely that he had an affair with Simone.’ Out of the corner of her eye, Claire saw Esther flinch. ‘He talks about her in a very loving and caring way,’ Claire said, almost to herself.
‘This letter is rubbish. There is nothing in the transcript, which was taken down verbatim, about Simone being a German agent. And nowhere is the phrase turned him recorded.’
‘So how can the professor know this Simone turned him?’
‘He can’t know,’ Claire said. A smile crept across her face.
‘What is it?’
‘That’s why Mitch missed the plane home. He went back to the hospital to copy this. He would have known when he read it, as I did, that it was rubbish.’ Claire flicked her hand at the documents in front of her. ‘He would also know the professor would have to send a copy of his findings to Commander Landry, which is why he posted his copy to you.’
‘My grandson, a spy? It’s laughable. This professor chap might be an eminent doctor, but he doesn’t know anything about people.’
‘He doesn’t know Mitch that’s for sure.’ Claire looked through the report again, then shook her head. ‘There’s something here I’m not seeing. Something Mitch remembered perhaps.’ Folding the letter, Claire returned it to its envelope and gave it back to Mitch’s grandmother. ‘Keep it safe, Esther, Mitch will need it when he comes back.’
‘I think you should have a good look around, Claire, make sure there’s nothing missing,’ Esther said, returning the envelope to its place of safety between the layers of her underwear. ‘The commander telephoned me and asked me to go to the base. He sent a car for me, so I didn’t have much choice. When I got there, he and another officer gave me a good grilling. His driver brought me home and within half an hour two military officers arrived. They searched my house. They took all sorts of things
