Read Jackdaws for Free Online Page A

set
the charges," he said defiantly.
    "Name?"
    "Gaston Lefvre."
    "Just remember one thing,
Gaston," Dieter said in a kindly voice. "The pain lasts as long as
you choose. When you decide to end it, it will stop."
    Fear came into the man's eyes as he
contemplated what faced him.
    Dieter nodded, satisfied.
"Carry on."
    A youngster was next, no more than
seventeen, Dieter guessed, a good-looking boy who was absolutely terrified.
"Name?"
    He hesitated, seeming dazed by
shock. After thinking, he said, "Bertrand Bisset."
    "Good evening, Bertrand,"
Dieter said pleasantly. "Welcome to Hell."
    The boy looked as if he had been slapped.
    Dieter pushed him on.
    Willi Weber appeared, with Becker
pacing behind him like a dangerous dog on a chain. "How did you get in
here?" Weber said rudely to Dieter.
    "I walked in," Dieter
said. "Your security stinks."
    "Ridiculous! You've just seen
us beat off a major attack!"
    "By a dozen men and some
girls!"
    "We defeated them, that's all
that counts."
    "Think about it, Willi,"
Dieter said reasonably. "They were able to assemble close by, quite
unnoticed by you, then force their way into the grounds and kill at least six
good German soldiers. I suspect the only reason you defeated them was that they
had underestimated the numbers against them. And I entered this basement
unchallenged because the guard had left his post."
    "He's a brave German, he wanted
to join the fighting."
    "God give me strength,"
Dieter said in despair. "A soldier in battle doesn't leave his post to
join the fighting, he follows orders!"
    "I don't need a lecture from
you on military discipline."
    Dieter gave up, for now. "And I
have no desire to give one."
    "What do you want?"
    "I'm going to interview the
prisoners."
    "That's the Gestapo's
job."
    "Don't be idiotic. Field
Marshal Rommel has asked me, not the Gestapo, to limit the capacity of the
Resistance to damage his communications in the event of an invasion. These
prisoners can give me priceless information. I intend to question them."
    "Not while they're in my
custody," Weber said stubbornly. "I shall interrogate them myself and
send the results to the Field Marshal."
    "The Allies are probably going
to invade this summer—isn't it time to stop fighting turf wars?"
    "It is never time to abandon
efficient organization."
    Dieter could have screamed. In
desperation, he swallowed his pride and tried for a compromise. "Let's
interrogate them together."
    Weber smiled, sensing victory
"Absolutely not."
    "This means I'll have to go
over your head."
    "If you can."
    "Of course I can. All you will
achieve is a delay."
    "So you say."
    "You damned fool," Dieter
said savagely. "God preserve the fatherland from patriots such as
you." He turned on his heel and stalked out.

CHAPTER
    FIVE
     
    GILBERTE AND FLICK left the town of
Sainte-Cécile behind, heading for the city of Reims on a country back road.
Gilberte drove as fast as she could along the narrow lane. Flick's eyes
apprehensively raked the road ahead. It rose and fell over low hills and wound
through vineyards as it made its leisurely way from village to village. Their
progress was slowed by many crossroads, but the number of junctions made it
impossible for the Gestapo to block every route away from Sainte-Cécile. All
the same, Flick gnawed her lip, worrying about the chance of being stopped at
random by a patrol. She could not explain away a man in the backseat bleeding
from a bullet wound.
    Thinking ahead, she realized she
could not take Michel to his home. After France surrendered in 1940, and Michel
was demobilized, he had not returned to his lectureship at the Sorbonne but had
come back to his hometown, to be deputy head of a high school, and—his real
motive—to organize a Resistance circuit. He had moved into the home of his late
parents, a charming town house near the cathedral. But, Flick decided, he could
not go there now. It was known to too many people. Although Resistance members
often did not know one another's