Corporal Jacques Maillot sat in a small bunker overlooking a distant crossroads beneath the hill. The outpost was part of a long chain of fortifications behind the Maginot Line, built to provide defence in depth should the Germans break through.
He had no stomach for a fight. A 45 year-old veteran of Verdun, he’d had enough of the mud and the slaughter. He survived that horror with no more than a few light shrapnel wounds; but so many fine comrades of his perished in the mud. And for what, he asked. Patrie? Gloire? Honneur? He'd often ask himself what it had all been for. He knew his history; in 1812, in 1870, the Prussians had come; they'd stayed a while, they exacted their spoils of victory; then they went home and everything went back to normal. But in 1914, France and its ally England had tried to stop the Germans and for four bloody years both sides battered each other to a pulp.
And what had come of it all? Nothing. Twenty years of nightmares; nights stained with the vision of mud churned with shattered human bone and entrails, reddened with blood, picked out with scraps of uniform and broken equipment. And over those 20 years, the foe had grown bolder and uglier; now three weeks earlier the Germans had simply gone round France's impregnable Maginot Line. The Germans had cut off the British at Dunkirk and were now swinging round and heading his way, heading for Paris and the interior of France.
The Blitzkrieg caught the French commanders unprepared. Men like Jacques, second-line men, rapidly mobilised once it was clear that Germany would attack, had no interest in this business. He and two privates – also middle-aged veterans of the Great War – had been assigned to man this hillside observation post. Equipped with a light machine gun and field telephone, their job was to hold up any German troops advancing along the two parallel chemins vicinaux that bifurcated southward from the crossroads, passing on either side of their hill. Supporting them to their right was another bunker, housing an antiquated howitzer also trained on the crossroads.
But today, Jacques sat there alone. His two comrades had both left the other day; one had simply gone home to his family in Picardie, the other had a girlfriend in the nearby village; he’d gone with her to see a film on Friday night in Vitry and never returned. He stared at the calendar on the wall; an attractive girl advertising cognac, and thought of home in the Dordogne valley; his wife and his daughter. Jacques poured himself a glass of red table wine, cut himself a few slices of saucisson sec, placed them into a baguette and sat down to have an early lunch. The Germans would be coming soon.
He'd been expecting an attack to be preceded by the thunder of approaching artillery and columns of black smoke rising up from the landscape. He remembered impending German advances from the Great War. But other than a few aircraft of unknown provenance circling high above between the wispy clouds, he had no inkling that the enemy was near. But he thought that he could make just out the faint roar of engines in the distance. He toyed with the idea of picking up the telephone and calling battalion HQ, and loading the machine gun, but decided against it. He looked across at the artillery post 50 metres away across the hillside; there was no sign of life there. He strolled over – no one there. The whole gun crew had just gone; probably that night. So he walked back, chewing a stalk of grass.
The sound of engines grew more distinct, he could now make out a cloud of dust behind the treeline on the horizon. He picked up his binoculars and focused on the crossroads. At last he could see them; headed by motorcycle combinations, followed by light armoured cars and trucks full of infantry, the cavalcade reached the crossroads. There, the German column split in two, tearing along unimpeded at full speed down both roads on either side of the hill.
Had Jacques and his comrades put down some fire on the crossroads, they could have halted the German advance for a hour or so; the enemy would have had to stop, take up defensive positions and return fire. And he could have picked up the telephone, then battalion HQ might have mobilised some defences between here and Vitry – but what was the point? None. To the devil with it all.
Well, thought Jacques, there was nothing more to do here. He stepped out of the bunker, walked to the top of the hill and looked at the horizon to the south. No columns of black smoke rising up. No dive bombers. The Germans must have gone straight through. He pulled a bicycle from out of the storeroom at the back of the bunker. It was grey and heavy, with white balloon tyres, full mudguards, an enclosed chain; he had quite a struggle to pull it free from all the junk, clanking through coils of barbed wire, boxes of ammunition, ladders and entrenching tools. Finally, he'd got it out into the open. Filling his knapsack with all the provisions left in the bunker, tins of paté, biscuits, apples, he took his bedroll and personal effects and pushed the bicycle over the bumpy track down towards the road. He was going home.
Part II tomorrow.
This time last year:
Waiting for the meltdown
This time two years ago:
On the (bad) road to Toruń
This time three years ago:
Flat tyre
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