The Devils of D-Day Read Online Free PDF Page B

Saint Therese.
    Then again, monsters and agents of hell have been seen,
seeking out the cowardly and the vicious. It was said that Heinrich Reutemann , the SS commandant, kept at Dachau a dog that was
possessed by the devil.’
    ‘And this tank?’
    The pale withered hands formed their reverent steeple. ‘Who knows, monsieur ?
It is beyond my comprehension.’
    I thanked him, and got up to leave. His room was like a dark
musty cave. I said, ‘Do you think it’s dangerous?’
    He didn’t turn his head. ‘The
manifestations of evil are always dangerous, my friend.
    But the greatest protection from evil is a steadfast belief
in Our Lord.’
    I stood by the door for a moment, straining my eyes to see
him through the gloom.
    ‘Yes,’ I said and then went down the cold and silent marble
staircases to the front door, and out into the wintry street.
     
    I didn’t drive straight there, partly because I was waiting
for the late afternoon to grow darker, and partly because the whole thing made
me unusually nervous. By seven o’clock, though, after a roundabout tour through
the muddy shuttered villages of the Route Scenique of
the Orne Valley; past farmyards and peeling houses
and roadside shrines where pale effigies of Christ crucified leaned mournfully
into the evening frost; past inkblot trees and cold whispering fields; I
arrived at the Passerelle’s farm, and drove into the
yard.
    The evening was bitter and still when I climbed out of the
Citroen and walked across to the farmhouse door. A dog was yapping at some
other farm, way across the valley; but here everything was quiet. I knocked on
the door and waited.
    Madeleine came to the door. She was wearing a blue check
cowboy shirt and jeans, and she looked as if she’d just finished changing a
wheel on a tractor.
    ‘Dan,’ she said, but she didn’t sound surprised. ‘You left
something here?’
    ‘No, no. I came back for you.’
    ‘For me? Je ne comprends pas. ‘
    I said, ‘Can I come in? It’s like the North Pole out here. I
only wanted to ask you something.’
    ‘Of course,’ she told me, and opened the door wider.
    The kitchen was warm and empty. I sat down at the broad pine
table, scarred from a hundred years of knives and hot saucepans, and she went
across to the corner cupboard and poured me a small glass of brandy. Then she
sat down opposite, and said, ‘Are you still thinking about the tank?’
    I went to see Father Anton.’
    She smiled faintly. ‘I thought you would.’
    ‘Am I that easy to read’’
    ‘I don’t think so,’ she smiled ‘ But you seem like the kind of man who doesn’t like to leave puzzles unsolved. You
make maps, so your whole life is spent unravelling mysteries. And this one, of course, is a very special enigma indeed.’
    I sipped my brandy. ‘Father Anton says he’s heard the voices
himself.’
    She stared down at the table. Her finger traced the pattern
of a flower that had been scorched into the wood by a hot fish-kettle. She
commented, ‘Father Anton is very old.’
    ‘You mean he’s senile?’
    ‘I don’t know. But his sermons ramble these days. Perhaps he
could have imagined these things.’
    ‘Maybe he could. But I’d still like to find out for myself.’
    She glanced up. ‘You want to hear them for yourself?’
    ‘Certainly. I’d like to make a
tape-recording, too. Has anyone ever thought of doing that?’
    ‘Dan – not many people have ever gone to listen to the
voices on purpose.’
    ‘No, I know that. But that’s what I want to do tonight. And
I was hoping you’d come along with me.’
    She didn’t answer straight away, but stared across the
kitchen as if she was thinking of something quite different. Her hair was tied
back in a knot, which didn’t suit her too much, but then I guess a girl doesn’t
worry too much about the charisma of her coiffure when she’s mucking out cows.
Almost unconsciously, she crossed herself, and then she looked back at me. ‘You
really want to go?’
    ‘Well,