The Devils of D-Day Read Free Page A

Falaise at twenty.
     
    Next day, in the high-ceilinged hotel dining room, I ate a solemn
breakfast of croissants and coffee and confitures ,
watching myself in the mottled mirrors and trying to decipher what the hell was
happening in the world today from a copy of Le Figaro on a long stick. Across
the room, a rotund Frenchman with waxed whiskers and a huge white napkin tucked
in his shirt collar was wolfing down breadrolls as
though he was trying to put up the price of shares in the bakery industry. A
waitress in black with a pinched face rapped around the black-and-white tiled
floor in court shoes and made sure you felt you were lonely and unwanted, and
that you only wanted breakfast because you were an unpardonable pest. I thought
of changing hotels, but then I thought of Madeleine, and things didn’t seem too
bad.
    I spent most of the morning on the new curve of road that
comes into Clecy from the south-east. A dry wind had
lifted away most of the snow during the night, but it was still intensely cold,
and the village lay frosted in its valley, with the broad hump of the hills far
behind it, and tiny villagers came and went from its doors, tending their
gardens or their washing, or fetching in logs, and the hours rang from the tall
church spire, and New York seemed a very long way away.
    Maybe my mind was distracted, but I only managed to finish
half the readings that I’d hoped to take, and by eleven o’clock, as the church
tolled its hour, I was wrapped up and ready to drive across to Pont D’Ouilly . I’d taken the trouble to stop at a store in the
village and buy a very reasonable bottle of Bordeaux, just in case Madeleine’s
father needed a little appeasing. I also bought, for Madeleine herself, a box
of crystallised fruit. They’re very big on crystallised fruit in Normandy.
    The rented Citroen coughed and choked, but finally found its
way down the twisting road to the bridge. The countryside didn’t look very much
more hospitable by daylight than it had by night. There was a cold silvery haze
over the fields, and mist was hanging under the elms like soiled net curtains.
The cows were still there, standing patiently in the chill, chewing the colourless grass and breathing out so much steam they
looked like roomfuls of heavy smokers. I drove over the stone bridge, with the Orne gargling beneath me, and then I slowed down so that I
could take a look at the tank.
    There it was – silent and broken – wound in brambles and
leafless creeper. I stopped the car for a moment and slid open my window so
that I could see the corroded wheels, the collapsed tracks, and the small dark
turret with its scaly sides. There was something deeply sinister and sorrowful
about it. It reminded me of the abandoned Mulberry harbour that still lies off the shore of Arromanches , on
Normandy’s channel coast, a grim memorial to June 6, I944, that no stone
monument or statue could ever adequately replace.
    I looked around at the dank hedgerow for a while, and then I
started the car up again and drove along to Madeleine’s farm. I turned into the
gate and splashed across the muddy yard, with chickens flapping and skittering
all around me, and a flock of grubby geese rushing away like athletes on a
cross-country run.
    I stepped out of the car, being careful where I put my feet,
and reached in for my presents. A door opened behind me, and I heard someone
walking my way. A voice said, ‘Bonjour, monsieur. Qu’est-ce que vous voulez ?’
    A short Frenchman in muddy pants, muddy boots and a muddy
brown jacket was standing in the yard with his hands in his pockets. He had a
long Norman face, and he was smoking a Gauloise that
appeared to be permanently stuck to his lip. His beret was pulled well down to
his ears, which made him look pretty rural, but his eyes were bright and he
looked like the kind of farmer who didn’t miss a trick.
    ‘My name’s Dan McCook,’ I told him. ‘Your daughter Madeleine
invited me for lunch. Er … pour