As the day wore on, this was an impression that did not alter. Indeed, there was even greater madness to come.

20

FRANCE, 1940

It was late afternoon when our convoy took to the road again. We were headed to Toulouse, about one hundred fifty kilometers to the northeast, and thought that we could probably make it before dark. We took Eva Kemmerich with us so that she might look for her husband when we visited the camp at Le Vernet the following day. And, of course, our eight prisoners. I hadn’t really looked at them. They were a miserable, malnourished, smelly lot and little or no threat to anyone, let alone the Third Reich. According to Karl Bömelburg, one of them was a German writer and another was a well-known newspaperman, only I hadn’t heard of either of them.

Outside Lourdes, in sight of the River Gave de Pau, we stopped in a forest clearing to stretch our legs. I was pleased to see Bömelburg extend the same facility to our prisoners. He even handed out some cigarettes. I was feeling tired but better. At least my chest was no longer hurting. But I still wasn’t smoking. I had another bite off Bömelburg’s flask and decided that maybe he wasn’t such a bad fellow after all.

“This whole area is full of caves and grottoes,” he said, and pointed at an outcrop of rock that hung above our heads like a thick gray cloud.

We caught a glimpse of Frau Kemmerich disappearing into the rock. After a minute or two Bömelburg said, “Perhaps you would be good enough to go and inform Frau Bernadette that we shall be leaving in five minutes.”

Instinctively, I glanced at my watch. “Yes, Herr Major.”

I walked up the slope to fetch her, calling her name out loud in case she was answering a call of nature.

“Yes?”

I found her sitting on a rock in a leaf-lined grotto, smoking a cigarette.

“Isn’t it lovely here?” she said, pointing over my head.

I turned to admire the view of the Pyrenees that she was enjoying.

“Yes, it is.”

“Sorry if I was a bitch back there,” she said. “You’ve no idea how bad the last nine months have been. My husband and I were in Dijon when war was declared. He’s a wine merchant. They arrested us almost immediately.”

“Forget it,” I said. “What happened back there…You were justifiably upset. And the camp did look bloody awful.” I nodded down the slope. “Come on. We’d better go back. There’s still a long way to go before we get to Toulouse.”

She stood up. “How long will it take to get there?”