33.
JOHANNA HAD TOSSED AND turned in bed, listening to the battle raging for hours.
The gunshots were closer, the explosions louder. It was all more concentrated than previously. Judging by how long it had gone on, no matter who had won, there couldn’t have been that much firepower without a lot of casualties. The only reason she’d been able to sleep at all was because Fabienne was safely in her own bed in the cottage, and the memory of their lovemaking had helped her to relax for the first time in a long time.
There was a constant rumble of armoured vehicles coming from the main road, and now troops marched in formation behind them. The horrors of the previous evening had created an apocalyptic effect on the morning, as if every soldier had abandoned his post and was heading to the northern front. She’d expected calm after the battle, but what she saw and what she felt as the house trembled under the heavy vibration from the tanks and trucks was a catastrophe in the making. Was it the continuation of the grand offensive her husband had mentioned? Had Germany succeeded in Operation Dijon?
She went downstairs and made coffee. Her stomach tightened as she considered how many Resistance fighters might have died trying to save their countrymen. Her heart skipped a beat when Fabienne entered the kitchen and smiled at her as if the war had ended. God, how she loved her.
“It’s busy out there,” Fabienne said. She drew down on the cigarette she was smoking. “I spoke to Father Paul this morning.”
Johanna wanted to hit her for being so flippant, for risking her life after all that they had been through in the last few days, and after Johanna had promised not to leave her. She couldn’t bear to think of losing Fabienne. “Are you insane, going out there now?”
“I had the milk run to do.” She grinned. “Don’t you want to know the news?”
“I can see it from my window. It’s a massive offensive, by the look of it.” She poured two cups of coffee and handed one to Fabienne who took the drink and put it back on the side.
Fabienne took the cup from Johanna and set that down too, then held Johanna’s hands. She was smiling with her eyes and looked much younger.
“The resistance commandeered the trucks that were carrying weapons last night. Six of them, Johanna. Chemical weapons were seized. They took them to the quarry and blew them sky high.” She tugged Johanna into her arms and swept her around in a circle.
“But what about all the tanks and soldiers?”
Fabienne released her and shrugged. “Like last week and the week before. They are going to fight at the front. Father Paul said we stopped a major offensive that probably would have won Germany the war. They were going to use the chemical weapons against the allies. This is a huge blow for them and a massive bonus for us.”
“Oh my God.” Johanna’s hands trembled as she brought them to cover her mouth. “Oh my God, they did it.” She had no idea what would happen now, but every small win for the French was an even bigger victory for freedom. Johanna wanted to dance, but the war wasn’t over yet, and Nanny might come down at any moment. “What do we do next?”
Fabienne sipped her coffee. “We wait for new orders. I don’t know when they will come.” She picked up the wood basket. “Until then, we carry on as usual and hope that things will calm down again.” She went outside.
Johanna walked into the living room, lifted the lid of the piano and started playing “Rondo Alla Turca”.
“That’s one of my favourite pieces,” Fabienne said as she passed through the room with cleaning cloths in her hand.
Johanna didn’t want her cleaning and cooking for them anymore. It felt wrong, inequitable, though she enjoyed having her around the house.
***
Gerhard burst through the front door at half-past three like a raging bull, causing the windows to rattle as he slammed the door behind him.
Johanna came from the kitchen where she’d been helping with the dinner preparations, wiping her hands on a towel. She hadn’t thought twice about the impact of the Resistance’s success on him, but it was evident now.
He threw his hat on the sideboard, his face contorted with rage. He paced the room. “I need a drink.”
She went into the kitchen and instructed Fabienne and Mamie to go home, and grabbed a bottle of wine from the fridge and a glass. She poured for him, and he drank in one long slug. She filled his glass again, and he drank as if he was parched. “What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong?” He motioned to throw the glass but kept it in his hand, landing it heavily on the table as he slumped into his seat. He held his head in his hands, his elbows resting on the table, and rubbed his face.
Johanna went to the kitchen and got another glass, poured herself a wine, and waited for him to speak.
“We lost a convoy of important weapons last night.”
She sat down, crossed her legs and sipped her drink. She didn’t dare say too much in case she incriminated herself. “And they are blaming you again?”
He poured himself another wine, slugged it back in one go, and slammed his clenched fist down on the table. “It’s my fault. My responsibility.”
“Surely, you can’t be the only—”
“You don’t understand, Johanna.” He stood swiftly, turning the chair over.
She tensed and pulled back, an automatic reaction to the expectation of him lashing out at her. When he didn’t, she exhaled and rested her hand on the table.
“I’ve been reassigned.”
“What do you mean, reassigned?”
He laughed: a strangled noise that curdled her stomach.
“I am lucky, you see.”
Johanna was confused, and he sounded deranged. “What do you mean?”
He stared at her, and it was as though the ghost of him walked through her. A tingling chill slid down her spine.
“They could have executed me. Instead, I have a new post. Demotion is better than death, I suppose. I will learn to live with the humiliation.”
Johanna’s heart dropped into her stomach as the realisation of the consequences for her and Astrid hit her. If he was moving, so were they. “Where are we going?”
“Belsen. I am being reassigned to help at the concentration camp there. You are being sent back to Berlin.”
The voice in her head screamed “no” repeatedly and the room started to spin. She felt as though she was rising out of her body, staring down at this incomprehensible scene. It was a joke. No, it was a nightmare, and she was going to wake up any second. She pinched her arm and watched the red mark appear. There was a deep burning ache in her chest, and, thinking about Fabienne, it turned sharp and pierced her heart with such a force she thought she was going to die.
“When do we leave?” she asked, the words coming automatically. She could hardly hear herself speak.
“I leave tomorrow. You will leave on Friday. Schmidt will go with you, Nanny and Astrid. There will be two other guards assigned to your detail, though I don’t know who they are yet.”
His words had become garbled after he’d said Friday. She shook her head, her mind trying to trick her that this wasn’t happening. But it was very real. She couldn’t move from the chair, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t look at him.
He turned from her. “I’m going to my room until dinner.”
She sat at the table for some time, trying to settle the emotional turmoil that churned inside her and think clearly. She didn’t know how she was going to do it, but neither she nor her daughter were going back to Berlin. She had to talk to Fabienne.
***
Fabienne had just started up the stairs when the knock on the back door came.
Johanna was ghostly white. The excitement of earlier had been drained from her by something horrific. Fabienne was sure this was to do with Gerhard returning home in a foul mood. Her stomach lurched.
As Johanna stepped into the house, Fabienne checked her over. There was no obvious evidence that she’d been hit or hurt physically, though she moved slowly, deliberately.
Fabienne coaxed her to the table and helped her to sit, crouched down to her and caressed her cheek. “What happened?”
Johanna stared up at her. “We’re leaving.”
Fabienne lowered her hand. A lead weight plummeted in her stomach. Her worst fears had raised their serpent heads and were ready to strike the final, devastating blow. She pressed the heel of her hands to her eyes to block out the scene that kept playing through her mind. “Why? When?”
“Gerhard is leaving tomorrow, and we are going back to Berlin on Friday.” Johanna shook her head. “He’s been reassigned because the mission failed yesterday. I don’t know what to do.”
“Putain, putain, putain!” Fabienne got to her feet and drove her fingers through her hair as she paced the kitchen. She couldn’t lose Johanna, not now, not after everything they’d been through. Not after making love as they had done yesterday. She stopped pacing and turned to Johanna. “You can’t go.”
Johanna shook her head. “I don’t want to go. Earlier, I was adamant we wouldn’t, but after having had hours to think about it, I can’t see a way of avoiding it.”
Fabienne retrieved the bottle of brandy from the cupboard, and two glasses. Mamie came into the kitchen. She took out a third glass and poured their drinks.
“Did I hear correctly?” Mamie said.
Johanna nodded. “My husband has been reassigned because he failed in his duties, which means Astrid and I are being sent back to Berlin.”
Fabienne looked to Mamie. Johanna leaving was only one part of the problem. “You know what else this means?”
Mamie took a sip from her glass. “There will be a new kommandant.”
Fabienne inhaled deeply. She wouldn’t work for a third. “Yes.”
Johanna was still shaking her head. “I hadn’t thought about that. Oh my God!”
“I don’t think I can cope with a third one,” Mamie said. “With the way things are going, I wouldn’t expect the next kommandant to show any kindness. This is not good news.”
“We won’t have to,” Fabienne said. She drank the brandy. Solving Johanna’s problem was easy to do in principle; avoiding a third kommandant was a different matter altogether.
Johanna hugged herself, rocking in the chair. “I can’t leave. I don’t want to go back to Berlin. God, I don’t even think I want to be German anymore. Please, Fabienne, help us.”
No matter which way Fabienne thought about it, she kept coming back to the same solution. “There’s only one way you can stay.”
Johanna grabbed her arm. “What is it? I’ll do it. Anything.”
Johanna’s desperation mirrored her own and Mamie’s. “They have to think you and Astrid are dead.”
Johanna released her with a look of disappointment, shaking her head. She flung her arms in the air. “How are we supposed to do that with Nanny and Schmidt watching us?”
“It doesn’t solve the problem of a third kommandant either,” Mamie said.
Fabienne looked to Mamie. “We have to burn down the house, and they have to think Johanna and Astrid are in it,” she said. She’d sounded more casual than she felt. The house had been in their family for generations, and technically it was Mamie’s decision.
“No. You can’t do that. It’s your home.”
Johanna’s objection fell on deaf ears as Fabienne waited on Mamie’s response.
Mamie smiled at her, raised her glass in a toast, and drank. “We will burn the house down and everything in it, then no one can move in.”
Relief flooded Fabienne. She nodded to Mamie and sipped her drink.
“But you will have nothing.” Johanna was looking from one Brun to another, wide eyed.
Fabienne knelt in front of her and held her hands. “We will have each other, and that is the most important thing. Now we need to come up with a plan.”