Chapter 3

Tulle, 9th June 1944

Banging and loud shouts of raucous German roused Elise. Listening, she realised the SS were conducting house to house searches. Standing to one side of the window, she saw men being herded up the street under guard. Elise threw on her clothes. A crash on the Pharmacie door shook the house, followed by the thud of heavy boots on the stairs.

She stood in the open doorway of her room as an SS trooper appeared at the top of the stairs. He ignored Elise, roughly pushing her aside as he barged into the room, banging open the cupboard and searching under the bed. Satisfied, he searched the other two rooms, finding nothing of interest. On the landing he gave Elise a sharp look and then clattered downstairs to join a comrade who had been searching the ground floor. Not finding whatever they sought, they pushed past a stunned Geneviève and out into the street.

Genevieve stood motionless in the shop, pill bottles and boxes littered the floor where they had fallen during the search of cabinets and cupboards.

“What’s going on, Genevieve?”

Genevieve did not move.

“Genevieve?”

She turned a shocked and pallid face towards Genevieve. “They are rounding up all the men and boys over sixteen...”

Elise felt her stomach lurch. There had been reprisals against civilians. But all the adult males in a town the size of Tulle?

Not even the SS would go that far – would they?

To distract herself, she started cleaning up the mess on the floor. After a minute, Genevieve joined her, her shaking hands putting things in their place on the shelves and in the cabinets.

Groups of men were hurried past by their SS guards and then their part of the town fell silent. They made coffee – really roasted and ground acorns – and stood in the shop, unsure what to do. A woman scurried past, glancing furtively at closed doorways and locked windows, but did not stop. They had no idea what the Germans planned – but a growing miasma of unease settled over them.

Genevieve tried the phone – it was dead.

At ten o’clock, they heard the sound of an announcement over the loudspeakers in the town centre but could not make it out. The two women shared an uncertain look, questions hanging between them.

What was happening in the town?

A squad of SS ran up the street and two peeled off. They barged into the Pharmacie and out into the yard, returning shortly with the ladder they had found there. Out in the street, an SS squad went by, also carrying ladders.

Why do they need ladders?

Elise’s unease grew.

Genevieve grasped her shoulder. “Come. We are going to a friend’s house down in the Rue de la Gare.”

Elise could see the fear swirling in Genevieve’s eyes as they darted about, seeking security, sanity. Together, they walked towards the town centre, but were stopped by a group of SS troopers carrying ladders and ropes.

“Get to your houses.” One of them shouted in German, waving his arms. “To house, to house,” he added in broken French.

The two women stopped. They didn’t move fast enough for the SS trooper. He grabbed them by the arm and dragged them to the nearest front door. It crashed open after a couple of heavy-booted kicks and he threw them inside. The two women sprawled on the floor, the black uniformed trooper towering over them.

“Stay here.” He slammed the door closed.

Elise clambered to her feet and helped Genevieve to hers. They were in a dim corridor. A slight sound caused Elise to turn: a pale, tear-stained face peered round the corner of a doorway.

Elise walked down the corridor. “Madame, we apologise for this intrusion. We were trying to reach a friend’s house but...” Elise voice faded when she registered the woman’s face: red eyes, wet cheeks beneath dishevelled grey hair; the hands twisting a handkerchief through her fingers.

“Madame, they have gone. You are safe.” Elise thought the old woman was terrified the SS would return.

The grey hair waved as the woman shook her head. “They took my husband and son. They burst in and ... took them away.”

Genevieve pushed forward. “Do you know what’s happening?”

The woman stared at them, tears dribbling down her face. “They took my Claude and Frederique.” She sobbed and slid down the door frame, collapsing to the floor.

Elise and Genevieve half-carried her to a couch, where she lay, weeping continuously. Elise went exploring and found the kitchen, returning with a glass of water, but the woman turned her head away. Elise placed it on a table beside the woman.

Genevieve sat on her haunches. “We cannot go out again with the SS out there.” She went to the curtained front window, glancing down the street. “If we went upstairs, we might be able to see something.”

They explored upstairs, but they couldn’t see anything from the windows there. Then Genevieve found the attic stairs, disguised behind a cupboard door. An attic window looked over the house next door and down Rue de la Gare. Genevieve spat on the dirty glass and used a fold of her skirt to polish it. With a gasp, she recoiled.

Elise leaned forward. In the section of the street they could see, SS troopers were up ladders, securing nooses to lampposts, balconies – anything that would serve as a strong enough suspension point. They were laughing and joking as they went about their work. She collapsed on her haunches, aghast at what the scene presaged. A group of ten Frenchmen of various ages were marched into the street.

Elise made herself watch; there had to be witnesses. One by one the men, hands tied behind them, were pushed and shoved up a ladder. A noose strung round their neck, the soldiers pulled the ladder away and the men strangled, feet kicking as the troopers stood, watching. One SS trooper mimicked the expiring jerks of one of the men, drawing laughter from his companions. The bodies ceased moving and the SS troopers moved on further up the street out of view to continue their appalling work. The corpses hung there, dead-weights shifting in the chancy breeze.

Genevieve had collapsed on the floor, unable to watch the brutality playing out before them. Elise’s stomach roiled, bitter bile in her throat, and tears streamed down her face as emotions stormed through her.

How could human treat people with such brutality – and be happy in their work?

Elise felt something harden inside her and the tears stopped. She found a place of emptiness, of calm in the eye of the emotional hurricane. As if watching herself, she sat enthralled by this place of safety as raw hatred, anger, fear and pity raged in a dark rainbow around her. From this sanctuary, she banished all emotions. Pity, compassion, empathy and sympathy were dangerous weaknesses: expelled. Anger, hatred, fear and even love: gone. She eliminated them from her world: unnecessary and dangerous baggage. She needed only this emotionless centre. She would use this place of calm to deal out vengeance to those responsible for what she had seen.

And all Germans were responsible for loosing this black horror into the world.