Night Sky (29 page)

Laperrine smiled. ‘Well, the top speed of this thing is six knots. Not exactly fast and exciting.’

Ashley leant forward. ‘But there are compensations?’

The Canadian smiled. ‘I think so.’

An infinitesimal shudder of excitement went down Ashley’s spine and the effects of the drink cleared from his brain. ‘May I ask a leading question? Why don’t you have any guns?’

‘Ah … Well, we do.’

‘But nothing mounted on deck.’

‘No. We keep our weapons out of sight.’

The man was going to tell him more, Ashley was certain of it. Smiling, he pressed, ‘Because—?’

Laperrine paused, as if weighing him up. ‘You must say nothing – And I only tell you because – well, I think you might be interested.’ He took a breath. ‘We’re going to the other side, to mingle with the fishing fleets off the west coast, to … exchange things.’

Ashley had guessed it would be something like that. He suppressed a smile of exhilaration. Then he remembered the grey paint. ‘But – you can’t go like this, surely.’

‘Oh no. She’ll look just like any other Concarneau trawler by the time we’ve finished with her.’

Ashley said quickly, ‘Go on.’

‘There’s not much more to it really. We’re only just setting up the operation. But we do need more people. To be exact, someone who would command another boat. You would be … ideal. You know the coast, you know the people and you speak French—’

‘Not very well!’

‘But you understand it?’

Ashley nodded confidently, as if it were entirely true, which it wasn’t. His French was really quite poor. He asked, ‘But what about the fishing fleets – surely they’re kept under guard?’

‘Yes, guard boats go out with the fleets, but the Concarneau trawlers are allowed out for as much as two to three days at a time. It should be easy to slip in amongst them at night.’

Yes, of course it would. Ashley could imagine it. Pretending to fish, closing with the other trawlers, passing arms, receiving information. He could see it all and the idea thrilled him.

He looked up at the Canadian. ‘I wouldn’t mind knowing more.’

Laperrine smiled because he had been right about Ashley, and because he could see the glint of excitement in the other man’s eyes. ‘Good. I’ll tell the Department.’

They had another drink then Ashley got up to leave. ‘By the way, where on earth are you going to take her, to get her repainted?

‘Somewhere quiet, away from curious eyes. Our base is to be at Helford. We’ll probably do it there.’

The Helford River was just south of Falmouth, a quiet, beautiful place, but overlooked by a couple of small villages and a number of large houses. Ashley thought: It won’t be any good.

He shook his head. ‘You should go somewhere more isolated. What about the Scillies? Somewhere like New Grimsby. No-one would ever see you there.’

Laperrine smiled and shook Ashley’s hand. ‘It sounds a good idea.’

It was late. Ashley had to hurry to catch the last boat back to the ship. As he walked briskly along the dark deserted streets he felt euphoric.

The whole thing was mad. Going over to the other side, masquerading as a working boat, mingling with the fleet under the noses of the Germans. It was the stuff that boys’ adventure books were made of, the sort of thing he had loved to read about as a child.

That, he realised, must be why the idea appealed to him so much. He had always suspected that, in some ways, he had never grown up.

He laughed out loud. What the hell did it matter?

He adored the idea, he couldn’t resist it. He couldn’t wait to be frightened out of his wits and exhilarated at the same time. It was what he’d been waiting for all his life.

D
AVID CURLED HIS
body up into the foetal position and thought about a field full of flowers. Flowers got him off to sleep faster than anything else. Some days he didn’t need to think of anything, he just fell asleep the moment he lay down on the wooden boards. But when he was in pain it was different. It was usually his stomach which gave him trouble; sometimes the pain was awful. But today it was his knee; heavy rain had made the quarry treacherous and he had fallen heavily, twisting his knee and splitting open the skin. So today he needed to think of something, and it was best to think of flowers.

The sounds of the hut did not bother him. The continuous moaning and sighing, the sounds of suffering, the coughing and rasping of breath did not touch him at all. His ears heard the sounds but his mind cut them out, because his mind did not want to hear them.

He lay still, concentrating on the flowers, ignoring the pain, waiting for the escape into unconsciousness. Sleep was the one thing he looked forward to: it was God-given, miraculous, a gift from heaven. He waited for a long time, and then the sleep came at last, drifting in like fog out of a valley.

His mind was closed to sounds – yet he heard. He heard the sudden clatter of a stick being run along the side of the hut. Everyone heard it. Even before the door of the hut was opened men were getting off the wooden bunks and standing up, their faces impassive, their eyes staring disinterestedly at a point on the opposite wall.

Automatically David climbed down from the flat wooden shelf that was called a bunk – it was the top tier of three – and stood in the passage that ran the length of the hut. He felt nothing, showed nothing. He concentrated on standing upright despite the pain in his knee.

Two of the
Prominente
marched in, beating their sticks loudly against the door until all three hundred men were standing silently. There was no moaning or sighing now; the
Prominente
beat you if you made too much noise.

‘You will wait!’

So they waited. David stared at the wall opposite and thought of the flowers again. The field was very large and quite overgrown with tall grass. But rising from the grass were tall poppies, brilliant red and moving gently in the breeze. A stronger wind came rippling across the grass, turning the colour of the grass from green to yellow, and bowing the poppies’ heads over, as if in shame …

David liked to concentrate on a different picture each day. From the moment he reached the quarry in the morning until he lay down to sleep at night, his body crying for rest, he liked to develop a picture, to find each small detail and fit it in place, until the composition was complete.

Otherwise he did not bother to think at all. Thinking was a great mistake. Those who thought of their past, of things they had lost, of families they were unlikely to see again: those were the ones who suffered.

David had been in Dachau almost a year. Soon after his arrival he learnt that you survived only by living each moment as it came, second by second. It was important to question nothing, challenge nothing, desire nothing. If you desired such things as freedom, food, clean water, you simply went mad.

He also learnt not to get angry. He wasn’t angry now at being disturbed from his sleep. Anger was pointless. You just lived each second, each minute as it came …

They had taken him first to Sachsenhausen. After two days they put him on a train and transferred him here, to Dachau. They had been the worst, those first few days; afterwards everything had seemed almost bearable. On the train each truck was crammed tightly with people. There was no food or water. When finally the door of the truck was opened and David, blinking in the strong light, saw that some had died and were being piled at the side of the track, he began to realise that you must live each minute, second by second, without thought, without question.

The most difficult thing was understanding the system and the rules – understanding how to survive. Oddly, the SS were the easiest to deal with. They liked order, numbers that tallied and obedience. One could cope with that. On arrival there had been prisoner registration. They had waited, the two thousand Jews off the train, in a long line. They had been allowed to sit until it was their turn to stand and advance to the desk of one of the four clerks sitting in the middle of the central compound. Their names, professions, and the details of their parentage were all carefully typed on forms; they were issued with a number; then they passed on to delousing and uniform issue.

Order and numbers: one could cope with that.

It was the
Prominente
’s rules that were impossible because they had none. They had been hand-picked by Himmler, these
Prominente
, from jails across Germany. They were all serving long sentences, for violent crimes mostly. It was said that the majority had been here since 1933 when Himmler personally created this, his showpiece, his first concentration camp.

The
Prominente
had no rules. They kicked, beat, hacked … sometimes they pushed men off the highest point of the quarry and watched them fall to their deaths. If you worked too slowly they might shoot you – or they might drop a heavy stone on your foot, or club you, or beat you round the head. They loved their work, these men. They picked people at random. You never knew who would be next.
That
was their secret: there was no order, no pattern, just uncertainty and fear. You never knew what might happen. But if you were clever you learnt not to care. It might be you, it might be your neighbour. Some weeks before, two men – David had not known them – had stood together at the top of the quarry, embraced briefly, and jumped to their deaths. It had been their own choice. It seemed to David that the gesture was noble, something fine and clean in the stinking cesspit of the camp. Those men, by choosing to die, had placed themselves high, high above the contemptible creatures who ran the camp and dared to call themselves human beings.

David envied the two men their courage. It was a courage he lacked. But then he’d probably die soon anyway. If you didn’t die at the quarry, dysentery or disease got you. David’s bunk-mate had died of typhoid the day before; that’s why there’d been room on the bunk for David to curl up.

David had probably caught the disease already. The thought didn’t bother him too much. When it came to living or dying, he didn’t care much either way.

The
Prominente
shouted, ‘Attention!’

David made the effort to bring his heels together and stand straight. He reckoned he could stand another five minutes at the most. That should be enough.

Two SS officers came in. They wore the insignia of the Death Head battalion. One referred to a list clipped on to a board and said, ‘Stand forward the following: Abraham, Freymann …’

David stepped forward. His heart was hammering hard against his ribs. Perhaps …?

Perhaps, dear God, this is the end
.

An overwhelming regret came over him: a regret for everything that had been taken away from him – his beloved little rabbit, his home, his work. Everything he had ever cared about.
I loved it all so much
.

The other names had been read out – there were only five of them – and now the prisoners fell into line and followed the SS men out of the hut. The procession made its way quickly across the compound.

David tried to keep up, but the knee slowed him down. He began to lag behind. He suddenly thought: So what? If he was to die anyway, what difference did it make if it was now or five minutes later against a wall outside the compound?

The thought calmed him and he stopped trying to keep up.

He was getting used to the idea of dying. His first response had been emotional, the response of a man who had something to live for. But now, as he limped painfully along, he could see the rational side of it. There was nothing to live for. Death would, after all, be a merciful release – his stomach trouble was getting worse and sometimes he sicked up blood. A bleeding ulcer probably. The work at the quarry had been getting more difficult for him: he was breathless, weak and more prone to fall. Each day the effort of working, of pushing his body to do things it was no longer capable of doing, was more agonising.

One of the SS men had turned and was looking down the short line of walking men. He saw David, now ten yards behind. David thought: He’ll probably club me.

But the SS man did not stride angrily towards him. Instead he waited.

David struggled on. When he came level with the soldier he braced his body for a blow. Three more steps and he was past. There was no blow. Through the corner of his eye David saw that the SS man was behind him, following slowly. He seemed quite happy. Good Lord, David thought, whatever next?

They passed through the main gates and approached a side compound surrounded by a single wire fence. There were three huts inside, all of them quite new and in good condition – raised off the ground and fitted with windows. They were like barracks, David realised. Why had they been brought here? For interrogation? Surely not after all this time. Perhaps for notification of a transfer. But one was never
told
of such things …

David thought: Whatever it is, they won’t kill us here.

They waited outside one of the huts. David counted the prisoners in the group. Yes, seven in all. He recognised one: Meyer. Meyer had also been a scientist, a very important one and director of a large laboratory. Meyer looked terrible. The skin of his face and chin hung in folds, and he had the stoop of an old man. The striped uniform bagged out from his emaciated body. He was no more than fifty-five; he looked seventy.