The Book of Lies (16 page)

Dad said the Occupation brought out the worst in everyone. One young soldier was shot because he didn't want to be a Nazi and tried to run away, and another was killed for milking a cow. Of course, that was in
1944
when everyone was starving or eating their domestic pets, and although his death was tragic, it wasn't his cow to milk. There's also the story of the soldiers who were drowned because they refused to leave the rock they were standing on, even though it was slowly being covered by the tide. No one came to relieve them of their guard duty and they refused to be helped by a local fisherman.

FYI: There were four or five suicides a week among the troops in occupied territories in
1943
. This is widely attributed to low morale, local alcohol and only pets to eat. Certainly by
1944
the German soldiers left on Guernsey were in a terrible state. They even tried to eat seagulls they were so hungry.

They never ate each other but I told Vicky they did. Unfortunately she believed me and dreamt there were flesh-eating Nazi Zombies lurking on the cliffs. For three weeks solid she woke up screaming and couldn't be left alone. Dr Senner was understandably upset and came round to talk to Dad about it. He (wrongly) blamed Dad for putting ‘Sensational' ideas into my head. At first I thought this was a compliment, but he then told Dad to ‘Face-Facts' and ‘Get-a-Grip'. It was very excruciating for Mum, who was left to apologise after Dad turned pink and then purple and stormed off to the Yacht Club. She whispered something to Dr S., who mentioned seeing Dad at the surgery. I wanted to ask why, but I wasn't supposed to hear.

It was much later when Dad came back and loaded the TV into the boot of his car. He was staggering slightly from the effort and his eyes were red with fury. I tried to go and hug him but he pushed me away and ordered me to my room. He said I'd let him down terribly, and he promised me that he'd never tell me anything about his work ever-ever-ever again.

He kept to his word, as a matter of fact. He stopped taking me out in the boat, and when he was home he locked himself in his study until late. I'm sad to say we hardly ever spoke properly again, and it was only after he'd died that I went into his study and took copies of all his books and went through his files. That's also when I started learning them off by heart and inside out. I wanted to make sure that I never got my facts wrong again, and I wanted to make Dad proud of me. In case he ever came back.

Mr McCracken would've found Dad's files so interesting, and if he'd ever bothered to look at them, they might've taken his mind off his messy divorce. Divorces can be time-consuming and traumatic, and I'm sure the Deadly Poison Pen Letters only made the trauma worse. They kept appearing on his windscreen after school, and sometimes they were tucked between textbooks on his desk. I can't be sure when they started, and they were often only a word (although COCK-SUCKER might actually be two).

Dad said you should always get your facts straight before you jump to hasty conclusions. He said everyone had the wrong idea about the Roziers, because they believed what they'd been told and never bothered to ask more questions. There was a lot of finger-pointing during the Occupation, as I've already said, and it didn't even stop when the Germans left. People were driven by money, malice, or just plain envious jealousy, and those who were wrongly accused had to move to Torteval.
⁴³

Par le chemin,
the only reason I know about Mr Mac's nasty letters was because I was with him when he found one. It was a few days after Michael's accident and I was trying to take my mind off things by helping him tidy the History library. I'd also got my first B– and needed to discuss this Greek tragedy.

‘It's not the end of the world,' is what Mr Mac said, ‘but you have been a bit distracted. This is an important year, and I don't want to hear any more tales about you and Michael Priaulx doing whatever it was you were doing.'

‘Nothing was going on with me and Michael,' I promised, ‘but I do feel bad that's he's ended up half-dead.'

Mr Mac carried on stacking
The Tudors
onto a shelf.

‘If Michael had been drinking and you saw him before the fall, you
should
tell the police.'

Mr Mac was frowning at me now, and I hated the feeling that I'd let him down again. It made me quite emotional. I'm not usually one to start crying in public, but that ‘B–' had really cut me up. I stood there, clutching G.R. Elton, and before I knew it tears were streaming down my cheeks. It was like I'd sprung a leak: my shoulders shook and my lungs heaved. How embarrassing. I didn't see Mr McCracken's face because I was looking at my feet, but he gently rested his hand on my shoulder. I thought that was very big of him. I must've turned. He was close enough so that I could've pressed my head into his chest. I bet it would have felt like the most natural thing in the world (or Guernsey). I could smell his spicy cologne and I wondered if he had stubble. Sometimes when I saw Dad asleep on the sofa I didn't just want to prod him awake – I wanted to run my finger along his chin and feel his stubble. One time I did and he didn't even notice. I remember its smell quite distinctly.

Mr McCracken was a lot taller than me so our faces didn't get close.

‘There, there,' he said.

After a few minutes I pulled myself together and tidied up my book pile and thanked him.

‘Come on.' He picked up his briefcase. ‘I'll give you a lift home, you're in no fit state to cycle.'

So we walked to the staff car park, and that's when I saw the note on his windscreen. I could tell by his face it wasn't the first. Poor Mr McCracken. Our melt-in-the-mouth moment was ruined. I tried to take his mind off it as we drove through the water lanes. We talked a bit more about Michael and his injuries.

‘That boy had a death wish,' sighed Mr Mac.

I told him he was wrong.

I then explained the massive difference between death and dying (and this bit is very deep). Most people are afraid of death but are actually quite curious about dying. Dying is about experiencing something terrifying but also thrilling, where your heart either goes very fast or stalls. Dying is about seeing your life flash around you in Brilliant Technicolor. It's about taking a big risk: like driving at maximum speeds or stealing something precious or jumping off something high. It's about pushing your luck and getting away with it and deciding life isn't so bad. Death, on the other hand, is a big, blank space. You feel and see nothing. It's not even a colour. When you're dead people forget who you are and what you looked like. They carry on without you. I can't believe Michael wanted that to happen.

‘You've thought about it an awful lot, haven't you?' muttered Mr Mac.

I nodded back. ‘I used to hate thinking about it. I even developed this excellent theory that nobody ever died, they just went somewhere far away, like Australia.'

He smiled. ‘Why Australia?'

‘I don't know, although, coincidentally, Michael has an uncle who moved there after the War. He told me he wanted to visit him.'

The McGears crunched and we shuddered into the Village.

‘Well,' sighed Mr Mac, ‘the weather's nice but it's a funny sort of a place, no
history
, everything's so
new
.'

I couldn't really imagine it.

We pulled up outside the house and I don't know why, but I imagined that Dad was waiting for me. I pictured him coming to the door to welcome me back from school. Maybe I'd been thinking about Dad as much as I'd been thinking about Michael. Of course, it would've been very unlike Dad to come to the front door to greet me. No, he'd be sitting in his study, completely ignoring/avoiding me. So I imagined him in his study. I wondered if he'd secretly be pleased to hear that I'd kept all his papers.

The car had stuttered to a halt and McCracky was staring at me.

‘What?'

I tried to look calm. I hadn't realised I was speaking out loud.

‘What did you just say?'

I shrugged. ‘Nothing.'

‘
I
see,' he laughed. ‘You were talking to yourself. I know someone else who does that, apparently you get a better class of conversation that way. I don't suppose it says much about the quality of my company.'

I opened the car door. ‘I don't talk to myself.'

‘Oh?' he frowned. ‘Who do you talk to then?'

I stared up at our house and of course I knew the answer. It was properly Ironic. I couldn't talk to Dad the whole time he was alive, but the minute he was dead I knew he'd have to listen.

18
th December
1965

Tape:
3
(A side) ‘The testimony of C.A. Rozier'
[Transcribed by E.P. Rozier]

The dead can't talk and it's a shame, since there's one dead man I'd really like some answers off and that's Jean-Pierre Duquemin. J-P was a chap Ray knew, a mechanic at Falla's Garage, but he was also a
crapaud
, which should've been an omen. I don't like Jerseymen any more than the English, although to give J-P his due he worked hard and only ever said ‘mais wai' to everything he was asked. P'têt he agreed too much with what Ray said, and if that's so he paid a heavy price for his goodwill. I cannot think of a worse way to die
.

He's buried next to Pop at Fort St George, and I like to keep their graves tidy in case we ever get visitors. Not that Ray Le Poidevoin would be welcome. He can stay on the other side of the world and that is still too close for comfort.

Three isn't ever a good number, is it? I knew it from the offing. But we needed J-P, since it was him who got us the Seagull outboard motor and it was him who found us some good black paint.

‘Have you got a death wish?' laughed Ray when he clapped eyes on
Sarnia Chérie
. ‘Escaping on a bright-red boat? We'd have been sitting ducks.'

I hunched my shoulders and blushed from shame.

‘I was going to paint her, of course I was.'

‘Well,' Ray nudged Jean-Pierre, ‘now we all can.'

I knew I was out of my depth, but once old Ray got going he was like a dog with a bone. He told me to get to work on mapping a route to Southampton, meanwhile J-P caulked the boat and he found us a half-decent trailer. Planning an escape, I soon realised, was a serious business. I had to find an embarkation point, get to know the shipping routes, work out the timings of night patrols.

In case you're curious, Emile, I'd done a good job of hiding
Sarnia Chérie
for two long years. Old Mess. Chardine
⁴⁴
had a boatshed not used for nearly a decade, over at Hommet Bonnet. It was so overgrown you couldn't see it till you were in it and nobody imagined it was ever worth bothering with. To tell the truth, the Krauts acted like they knew every inch of this island but they didn't know their Jaonniere from their Jerbourg, and they'd never get their nice boots dirty! So J-P was working there at night, under cover, and I started scouting further up the coast. It was a good few weeks before I settled on a slipway, just north of Bordeaux Harbour.
⁴⁵
There were mines in the fields all around but the track was safe, since fishing boats still used it. From there I reckoned we'd have a safe run out to sea.

But I was in over my head all right, sweating over my Channel Islands Pilot and pretending I knew the ropes. Ray called me ‘the brains of the operation'. Si l'bouan Dju I'l pllais! I feared in my heart
Sarnia Chérie
wouldn't get us halfway across the Channel and that was the God-honest truth. Some folk later said I was lucky the Nazis stopped me. Bran-d'iaeux! What do they know but the lies Ray peddled for his five minutes of glory. They call me bitter, but there's good reason I'm bitter, eh? Think of all the tripe that's been written.
⁴⁶

It was a foul winter but Ray was hell-bent on leaving once the boat was ready, giving no heed to the weather. We argued about it plenty, and he always used the same cheap tactic. He'd say I was too chicken, just like my old man. I never knew how to answer him. In truth I found it harder and harder to defend old Hubert. He barely spoke or looked at me, and he moved about the house like it wasn't his no more. I knew he was sick, but he'd always been sick. He'd lost weight, but so had we all. The skin was hanging off La Duchesse and I'd catch her sometimes, standing in front of the mirror and pinching at her cheeks so as to give them a bit more colour. She was run ragged, and she'd even started taking in soldiers' uniforms to wash – not' mémaon
–
enne lavresse,
pensaï donc! Of course, I saw plenty of local women lower themselves in all kinds of ways. Not that I'm suggesting anything about La Duchesse. She was always the hero, holding things together. No doubt about it.

But Ray was all about a different kind of hero. He had decided that if we were going to England then we couldn't go empty-handed.

‘We take intelligence with us,' he said. ‘We should map out the island, the new fortifications, estimate the number of men and weapons at each base. It will help the Allies win the islands back!'

He expected a lot of me and I did my best, in truth I did. I started work on my own version of Festung Guernsey. With scraps of paper taken from the office I drew maps, dividing up the island into sections, and I started noting down all the strongpoints and billets in St Peter Port and St Martin. I wandered all around the east coast, scribbling as I went, and as my scrapbook grew, so did my anxieties. I couldn't think where to hide it. I stashed it under my mattress, then I hid it in a drawer, then I kept it in my satchel. Hé bian, it's nearly funny since, for the first time in this story, I lacked imagination. The trouble was, wherever I looked I saw them German swines. They were always in the office and the office was next to our house. La Duchesse said we had nothing to hide.