Anselm looked down at the black sleepers sunk deep into the path, all that remained of the old railway line that had carried the children to Les Moineaux. He said, ‘I assume the whole community knew about The Round Table — is that right?’
‘There was no other way Some of these children didn’t speak French. They were German.’
‘How many people would have known?’ asked Anselm.
‘About sixty. But if you’re thinking one of them betrayed The Round Table, you’re probably wrong. Remember, the Gestapo were ill-informed. If it was someone from here the children would have been found, and the nuns hiding them would have shared in the retribution.’
‘I wasn’t thinking anything of the sort,’ lied Anselm.
‘Well, I do, occasionally So I wouldn’t blame you.
Their conversation turned to lighter things: the ‘Ontological Argument’, the shortage of vocations and the acting ability of Eric Cantona. Suddenly, the Prior changed subject:
‘Father Anselm, you will appreciate the emergence of Schwermann has caused us considerable anxiety. This Priory is revered as a place that served the spirit of resistance. Every time an old man is exposed for crimes against humanity in France I shiver. Is it him? Is he going to point to us? We have no explanation to offer. And now it’s happened. As soon as he opens his mouth the Priory will be drowned. Memories of the Occupation are raw and great stones are still being turned over.’ He paused, suddenly troubled. ‘We’ve already had one visitor.’
‘Who?’ asked Anselm instinctively
‘A survivor, one of the children. He asked me a terrible question.’
‘Yes?’
‘He said, “Could it be that one of Herod’s servants once rested within your walls?” I told him I didn’t understand. Afterwards, I realised I should have said “No”… because my confusion was a sort of admission. He was a most unnerving man.’
Anselm pictured Salomon Lachaise posing a question to a man who could not answer without discovering his own shame. ‘I’ve met him. He came to Larkwood.’
‘Oh Lord… us, and then you… he must know everything.’
‘I don’t think so,’ said Anselm uncertainly ‘He told me he was the son of the Sixth Lamentation.’
‘After the Five of Jeremiah?’
‘Yes… I think he meant the Holocaust.’
They walked in silence until the Prior said, ‘I hope you find Victor Brionne, for the sake of my community and for the sake of Larkwood: He stopped, surveying the treetops with shaded eyes. ‘I think you should talk to Mere Hermance,’ he said. ‘She was here at the time. But be warned. She’ll make you buy a box of biscuits.’
2
Cathy Glenton had persuaded Lucy to have a Turkish bath after a particularly tedious lecture on the demise of the novel.
‘It’s an awful place,’ she said, ‘run by two former wrestlers from Lancashire. A husband and wife team.’
‘What do you do?’ asked Lucy horrified.
‘There are three rooms, each getting hotter than the one before, and when you’ve sweated yourself silly you lie on a table and one of the wrestlers washes you down. Then you dive into a pool of freezing water. ‘‘It sounds like hell.’
‘It is… but then comes paradise. You wrap yourself in a massive warm towel and lie on a couch for as long as you like eating bacon sandwiches and sipping hot, sweet tea. There’s nothing like it this side of the grave.’
They were just about to leave Cathy’s flat when Lucy’s mobile rang. It was Pascal Fougeres.
‘Would you be interested in having a minor role in the preparation of the trial?’
‘Pardon?’ she replied, incredulous.
He went on, ‘It’s not much, believe me. I’m a sort of liaison officer between the lawyers here and those with an interest in the case back in France. It means I have small practical jobs to do for the prosecution. I’m sure you could help… with a stapler, or something. Look,’ he hesitated, ‘are you free now?’
‘Yes,’ said Lucy with muffled joy She lowered the mobile and said, ‘I’m really sorry, Cathy, but I’ll have to cry off.’
Cathy nodded through her disappointment while Lucy sorted out a time and place with Pascal. When she’d finished, Cathy said, ‘I hear the heavy tread of a man.
‘Not quite,’ replied Lucy, acutely self-conscious.
‘Name?’
‘Pascal.’
‘French?’
‘Yes… but it’s not like that.’
‘I know It never is.’
‘Truly’
‘Does he have a spare friend interested in a beautiful mind?’
‘I’ll ask.’
An hour later Lucy met Pascal outside the National Portrait Gallery. Traffic swept behind them in surges, down into Trafalgar Square. Crowds, maddened by maps and itineraries, jostled on the pavement, looking for the next sight. Pascal took Lucy’s hand and they stepped out of the bustle into the mute halls of captured faces. They walked from room to room watched by Audrey Hepburn, Paul McCartney and lots more. Talking in long snatches, they leaned towards each other, looking around.
‘Are you still a journalist?’ asked Lucy
‘Sort of. After I found that memo I gave up my job on Le Monde. They give me lots of freelance work so I survive. And you?’
‘Student… second time round.’
‘Pushy parents first time?’
‘Sort of.’ She thought of Darren, who’d made that specific judgement with hostility, noticing how from Pascal’s mouth the question carried the promise of understanding. Without doubt the time would come when she would explain, but not now She continued, ‘Pascal, I’ve been thinking about our last conversation. I don’t understand why you want Brionne so much for the trial. What about all the other evidence?’
Pascal said, ominously, ‘This trial is going to be about what the victims remember as much as what Schwermann did.’
They left the gallery and joined the crowds walking round to Nelson’s Column. The naval commander towered above them, safe, as they walked through a sea of fat, scratching pigeons.
‘Do you ever wonder how Schwermann and Brionne got out of Paris in the first place?’ asked Lucy
‘Frequently’
‘I mean, where did they go, and who would want to put them on the road with new names?’
‘No one knows. One minute they’re both at Avenue Foch, then four months later they’re in the hands of British Intelligence with new identities and a story that got them into England. Sometimes I think of the Touvier case.
‘What’s that?’
‘Basically he was an old-school Catholic hidden for years after the war by his own kind.’
‘A collaborator?’
‘Yes. He was head of the Milice Intelligence Network for Savoy’
‘Protected by the Church?’
‘It’s more involved than that, but he was hidden in a monastery. So I do wonder in my wilder moments if the Church could have been involved… but it’s so unlikely Hiding a Frenchman, maybe, but an SS officer? That stretches even my imagination.’
He looked down at the demented scavenging of the birds and said, ‘Are you hungry?’
Half and hour later they were eating at a small table in the crypt of St Martin-in-the-Fields.
