Michel Déon - The Foundling's War

A small maid in a lace apron and starched collar, with a sallow serious face, entered, bowed as she murmured, ‘ Com licença ,’ and placed coffee, a jug of milk and toast on the table. She indicated by gestures that a senhor was asking for him downstairs. She meant of course the PIDE official.

‘I hope you slept well. I forgot to tell you my name: Urbano de Mello …’

‘And mine’s Jean Arnaud.’

‘I know. I saw your passport … You might like to know that I’ve had a telephone call from Lisbon. I have to go there this afternoon. I’ll be driving, and if you like I can take you.’

Jean was no longer in any doubt that someone was particularly interested in him. The important thing remained to get to Lisbon. There was no safer way of getting there than with the young policeman.

The Chrysler laboured through the Serra da Estrela. Its valves clattered painfully.

‘Our petrol’s very bad,’ Urbano said.

He drove unhurriedly along narrow roads edged with mimosas and Judas trees in bloom, commenting on the sights.

‘It’s a shame we don’t have more time. There are churches and some beautiful palaces I’d like to show you. Have you heard of Coimbra?’

‘There’s a university there, isn’t there?’

‘Dr Salazar taught political economy there before taking over as head of the government. He’s a quite remarkable man. He has saved the country from ruin and anarchy and this time once again he has kept us out of the conflict. Peace is an incalculable asset.’

Jean did not doubt it. While Spain, even glimpsed from a train window, seemed barely to have recovered from its exhausting civil war, Portugal radiated a prosperity and sense of easy living that the rest of Europe no longer knew and might never know again.

They stopped at a restaurant at Coimbra, near the university. Students in frayed black gowns were talking animatedly, crowded together around several tables. Urbano declared that they served the best salt cod in all of Portugal here. He went on to elaborate a multitude of different gastronomic approaches to cod and ways of serving it. Jean listened to him, amused, wondering how, after playing cat and mouse with him for twenty-four hours, he planned to keep up his surveillance in Lisbon. Whatever happened, there was no doubt that in the capital Jean had been judged sufficiently interesting to assign him a bodyguard who would not let him out of his sight.

‘Seeing these students makes me feel young again,’ Urbano said. ‘I studied law here myself once.’

Jean no longer wondered whether Urbano was more than a simple border official stamping passports. An older student than the others came into the restaurant, slumped at a table and suddenly caught sight of the man from the PIDE.

‘Urbano!’ he called. ‘What the devil are you doing here?’

The two men thumped each other vigorously on the back.

‘I see, João,’ the young policeman said, ‘that you’re still not in any hurry to finish your exams. How much more have you got to do?’

‘Why should I be in a hurry? I like life in Coimbra. If I fail a few more exams I can probably stay here till I’m at least thirty.’

Some students who had finished eating crowded round them. Urbano explained that Jean was a Frenchman passing through. They sat, keenly interested, bombarding him with questions: what was life like in Paris, in the free zone? What did the French want to happen? Had the universities reopened? Jean responded to their thirst for information as best he could.

‘It’s a shame we have so little time,’ Urbano said. ‘We’ll have to come back. Portugal is a friend to France.’

‘France has few friends when she’s on the winning side, but she’s lucky enough to have plenty when she finds herself in the shit.’

João burst out laughing.

‘Shit! Shit! And they taught me at school that French is a refined language, the language of diplomacy! You’re right, but we all cried in 1940 when Marshal Pétain requested an armistice. But he did well. They say here that he’s distracting the Germans while General de Gaulle — his favourite pupil — is preparing, alongside the Free French, to drive them out of the country …’

The other students protested that they did not share his view. Dropping out of French, which they spoke well, they began an excited discussion that would have been interminable if Urbano had not called an end to it.

‘We need to be in Lisbon this afternoon.’

João ordered a bottle of wine that they drank standing, to France’s health.

‘I hope,’ he said, raising his glass for the last time to Urbano, ‘that they were lying to me when they told me you’d joined the PIDE.’

Not missing a beat, the young policeman raised his glass in turn.

‘They were lying to you, João. I’m a civil servant. That’s all.’

‘Then,’ João said, ‘long live the Republic and long live Coimbra!’

For the first time Jean heard France being talked about from outside the country. The perspective was very different from what could be said in Paris. Urbano was especially keen to know what Jean thought of a confused situation, to which optimists attributed a Machiavellian intent (unfortunately non-existent). For his part, Jean was shocked that Urbano had lied about working for the PIDE. As they left Coimbra the policeman sought to justify himself.

‘I didn’t lie, I dissembled,’ he said. ‘As I’m sure you’ll appreciate, no student likes the police, and it’s not my job to shout my credentials from the rooftops. Many ways are open to me to serve my country. I chose this one. It’s not the least interesting by a long way …’

They spoke little for the rest of the journey. On the outskirts of Lisbon Urbano suggested he drive Jean to a small hotel run by a friend of his.

‘Not too expensive and very comfortable. She’ll give you a good room. The hotels are full … there are so many refugees, people waiting for a ship to America.’

Jean assured him that he was not short of money. His ‘uncle’ had given him enough for any eventuality. Anyway he preferred big hotels. You could come and go unobserved. Urbano laughed.

‘You sound as if you think I want to keep an eye on you!’

‘But you do. Admit it!’

‘Not exactly. And Lisbon’s a big city. You can disappear for twenty-four hours without the PIDE catching up with you.’

‘I don’t see why the PIDE should be interested in me.’

Urbano did not look embarrassed.

‘Oh, I won’t deny that you interest us. Foreign powers are exerting pressure on us to keep spies under surveillance.’

‘I’m not a spy.’

‘I’m sure you’re not. Even so, admit it, it’s hardly usual for a man of your age, living in a France occupied by Hitler’s Germany, to get hold of a visa for Portugal on the pretext of paying a banker a visit.’

‘It’s true that it’s not very likely.’

They were coming into Lisbon. It started raining heavily and the old Chrysler had to slow down, its worn tyres skidding on the wet asphalt. Urbano stopped at a large hotel and accompanied Jean to the front desk. Contrary to his prediction, there was a room available. Jean thanked him, convinced that the policeman had taken the opportunity to point him out to the doorman. His movements would be watched. He did not care. In any case they would not be able to stop him being at his meeting with the bank the following day. He was delighted to have been so unmysterious. There was nothing so calculated to disconcert the police or, if not the police, then the foreign service for which Urbano laboured discreetly to augment his modest salary.

The next day Jean kept his appointment with the banker whose name he had been given in Paris. He was introduced to a cold, offhand individual whose expression was hidden behind sunglasses and who spoke to him at first in German.