The Devils of D-Day Read Free Page B

dejeuner ? ‘
    The farmer nodded. ‘Yes, monsieur . She tells me this. I am
Jacques Passerelle .’
    We shook hands. I offered him the bottle of wine, and said,
‘I brought you this. I hope you like it. It’s a bordeaux .’
    Jacques Passerelle paused for a
moment, and reached in his breast pocket for a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles.
He hooked them around his ears, and scrutinised the
bottle closely. I felt as if I’d had the down-right effrontery to give a vacuum
pack of A&P bacon to a Kentucky hog farmer. But the Frenchman nodded again,
put away his spectacles, and said, ‘ Merci bien , monsieur . I save this for Dimanche .’
    He ushered me through the stable door into the kitchen. The
old woman Eloise was there, in her dark grey dress and her white lace cap,
boiling a huge copper pan full of apples. Jacques introduced me, and we shook
hands. Her fingers were soft and dry, and she was wearing a silver ring with a
miniature Bible on it. She had one of those flat, pale, wrinkled faces that you
sometimes see staring out of the windows of old people’s homes, or from the
windows of buses on old people’s outings. But she seemed to be independent and
strong around the Passerelle home, and she walked
with a straight back.
    She said, ‘Madeleine told me you were interested in the
tank.’
    I glanced at Jacques, but he didn’t seem to be listening. I
coughed, and said, ‘Sure. I’m making a map of these parts for a book about
D-Day.’
    ‘The tank has been here since July, I944. Mid-July. It died on a very hot day.’
    I looked at her. Her eyes were washed-out blue, like the sky
after a spring shower, and you didn’t quite know whether she was looking
inwards or outwards. I said, ‘Maybe we can talk after lunch.’
    Out of the steamy, apple-aromatic kitchen, we walked along a
narrow dark hallway with a bare boarded floor. Jacques opened a door in the
side of the hall, and said , ‘You
would care for an aperitif?’
    This was obviously his front parlour ,
the room he kept only for visitors. It was gloomy, heavily-curtained, and it
smelled of dust and stale air and furniture polish. There were three chintz
armchairs in the style you can see in any large French meubles store, a copper warming-pan hanging on the wall, a plastic madonna with a small container of holy water, and a
dark-varnished sideboard with photographs of weddings and grandchildren, each
on its own lace doily. A tall clock ticked away the winter morning, weary and
slow.
    ‘I’d like a calvados, please,’ I told Jacques. ‘I don’t know
anything better for warming yourself up on a cold day. Not even Jack Daniels.’
    Jacques took two small glasses from the sideboard, uncorked
the calvados, and poured it out. He handed one over, and lifted his own glass
solemnly.
    ‘ Sante ,’ he said quietly, and
downed his drink in one gulp.
    I sipped mine more circumspectly. Calvados, the apple-brandy
of Normany , is potent stuff, and I did want to do
some sensible work this afternoon. ‘You have been here in summer?’ asked
Jacques. ‘No, never. This is only my third trip to
Europe.’ ‘It’s not so pleasant in winter. The mud, and
the frost. But in summer, this is very beautiful. We have visitors from all
over France, and Europe. You can hire boats and row along the river.’
    ‘It sounds terrific. Do you have many Americans?’ Jacques
shrugged. ‘One or two.
    Some Germans sometimes, too. But
not many come here. Pont D’Ouilly is still a painful
memory. The Germans ran away from here as if the devil himself were after
them.’
    I swallowed some more calvados, and it glowed down my throat
like a shovelful of hot coke. ‘You’re the second person who’s said that,’ I
told him. ‘Der Teufel .’
    Jacques gave a small smile, which reminded me of the wav
that Madeleine smiled.
    ‘I must change my clothes,’ he said. ‘I don’t like to sit
down for lunch looking like a mud man.’
    ‘Go ahead,’ I told him. ‘Will Madeleine be down.