Mr Bartlett constructed Brionne’s Evidence-in-Chief like a master stonemason. Both hands held each question and every expected answer was pressed slowly into position. He halted work frequently, allowing facts to settle.
‘Mr Brionne, you worked with Eduard Schwermann between 1941 and 1944?’
‘Yes.’
‘You are French by birth?’
‘Yes.’
‘You joined the Paris Prefecture of Police in June 1941, at the age of twenty-three?’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘You were, however, not an ordinary policeman, in the sense that you were based at the offices of the Gestapo.’
‘That’s right.’
‘I shall spare the jury an argument as to your status. Your place of work made you a collaborator?’
There was no reply Brionne’s lower jaw was gently shaking.
‘I asked if you were a collaborator. Please answer.
Very quietly, Brionne replied, ‘Yes.’
‘Louder, please.’
‘Yes. I was a collaborator.’ The words seemed to burn his mouth.
‘Please tell the ladies and gentlemen of the jury how you came to work with Mr Schwermann. ‘
‘I spoke good German. I was transferred to an SS department within weeks because they required a translator.’
‘And was that the extent of your “collaboration”?’ queried Mr Bartlett, slightly stressing the last word.
‘It was enough.’
‘Mr Brionne, I am now going to ask you some questions about an organisation known as The Round Table. We understand Mr Schwermann was credited with uncovering the smuggling operation. Did he ever tell you how he did it?’
‘Not exactly, no,’ Brionne wavered. ‘All he said was that a member of the group had told him everything.’
‘Did he say who this person was?’
‘No.’
‘Did you enquire?’
‘I didn’t, no.
Mr Bartlett’s voice was growing imperceptibly louder, imposing a sort of moral force on to his questions. ‘Having discovered, or perhaps I should say, having been presented with this information, what did Mr Schwermann do?’
‘He made a report to his superior officer.’
‘And the inevitable arrests followed?’
‘Yes, they did.’
‘Do you recollect the morning of the day the arrests took place?’
‘I do.’
‘Were you alone?’
‘No. I was with Mr Schwermann.’ ‘Please describe his demeanour.’
‘He was anxious, smoking cigarette after cigarette. ‘
Mr Bartlett contrived mild surprise. ‘Let us be absolutely clear. Is this the day The Round Table was shattered?’
‘It was.’
‘A day for which he would later receive the praise of Eichmann?’
‘Yes, that’s right.’
‘It should have been a time of excited apprehension for him, should it not?’
‘Yes, I suppose so.
‘Have you any idea, then, as to why he was so anxious?’
‘No.’
‘Let’s see if we can find an answer. You knew Jacques Fougères?’ The barrister was speaking quietly now.
‘We were the best of friends. The best …’ He’d become a mourner in a dream.
‘Mr Brionne, did Jacques Fougères have a child?’ Lucy sat forward.
‘Yes.’
‘A boy or a girl?’ ‘A little boy.’
‘Did you know the mother?’
‘Yes. Agues Aubret.’
‘By reference to the racial regulations implemented by the Nazis, to which ethnic group did she belong?’
‘She was Jewish.’
‘And the boy?’
‘The same. He was Jewish.’
‘Even though the father was a French Catholic?’
‘Yes.’
‘As far as Mr Schwermann’s superior officers were concerned, the boy, if found, would unquestionably have been deported?’
‘Yes, unless she had forged papers to conceal her Jewishness.’ ‘Where is Agnes Aubret now?’ asked Mr Bartlett quietly ‘She perished. Auschwitz.’
Brionne was unable to continue. His face shuddered repeatedly with such violence that the judge suggested he might like to sit down, but Mr Bartlett pressed on urgently:
‘And the boy, the boy; what happened to the boy?’
‘He was saved,’ mumbled Brionne, turning quickly to the dock. ‘Mr Schwermann took the child, before the arrests were carried out, and hid him with a good family.’
Mr Bartlett followed through quickly and quietly, prompting fluid, hushed replies.
‘How do you know this?’
‘I saw it with my own eyes.
‘How often did the opportunity to act in this way arise?’
‘Just this once.
‘He seized it?’
‘He did.’
Lucy could not bear it any more. She sidled hurriedly out of her row towards the court doors as Mr Bartlett sat down and picked up his highlighter.
2
The folder was sealed as if it were meant to survive the rough handling of a prying child. Max stared at the unmarked surface, the bands of brown masking tape crossing each other like planks in a garden fence. His fingers held the corners lightly, reluctantly, as if the whole might dirty him.
Anselm had brought Max to the table beneath the wellingtonia tree after he’d arrived at Larkwood unannounced. A thick stubble dirtied his neck and cheeks. He said: ‘The day my grandfather came here, he gave me this.’ Max placed it on the table and drew his hands away. ‘He told me “You’re the only person I can trust, you always have been, but now it matters more than ever before. Keep this safe. Show it to no one. If Victor Brionne is found then bring it to me immediately If not, and I’m convicted, then I want you to burn it. But promise me this; do not open it.”‘
Anselm’s mind tracked back to Genesis and the instruction of the Creator: not to eat the fruit of the tree that gave knowledge of good and evil. Schwermann had played God with the same rash confidence that obedience would be rendered. Max continued: ‘Yesterday, the Prosecution asked for an adjournment. In my guts I knew it was because Brionne had turned up. I’ve just heard a news bulletin. I was right. The Prosecution have closed their case. As we sit here, Brionne is giving evidence on my grandfather’s behalf. I’m meant to have brought this to court’ — he pointed at the folder — ‘but I can’t, not without knowing what’s inside.’ He pushed it towards Anselm. ‘I can’t open it. I’ve brought the one part of him he did not bring to Larkwood.’
Somewhere out of sight, one of the brothers was at work making one of the songs of spring: the unhurried scrape of sandpaper on outdoor timber, a preparation before the laying of paint. Anselm took the folder and carefully pulled it apart. He withdrew three documents held neatly together by a paper-clip. Laid on the table, their corners lifted lightly in the breeze.
The dull blue ink had the slight blurring characteristic of print from an old typewriter. Anselm signalled to Max to come closer, to see for himself.
The first was headed ‘Drancy—Auschwitz’. It carried a list of numbered names and was evidently a deportation register. Before Anselm could scan the entire page his eyes alighted upon a single entry:
4. AUBRET, Agnes 23.3.1919 Française
The lower right-hand corner had been signed by Victor Brionne — representing, presumably, either the compilation of the list or confirmation of its execution. Anselm turned it over and saw the faded smudge of ink around the indentations of lettering: the list had been typed upon a carbon sheet. This was the original. Somewhere there was a duplicate. It was an irrelevant detail that nonetheless attached itself to Anselm’s concentration.
Anselm turned to the second document. It was another Drancy-Auschwitz convoy list, a block of names. The dates of birth caught his eye. He stared at distant trees, carrying out a spontaneous horrified calculation. They were all children. Each was marked off as though safely accounted for on a last school trip. And there, near the top of the page, Anselm saw what he half expected to see: a boy called Aubret, aged fifteen months, French, and in the margin a broad, unwavering tick. Again, the paper was signed by Victor Brionne. Instinctively he glanced at its back. Curiously, the page was clean, without the marks of carbon.