Fleur De Lies(17)

            “Five people undertook the mission to Pointe du Hoc,” Madeleine continued. “They cut through barbed wire barriers. They booby-trapped potholes. They set off small explosions. At least, that had been their intent. We’ll never know if they enjoyed even a small measure of success because they never returned from their mission.”

            Another silence descended, followed by Cal asking in a flat voice, “Were they captured?”

            Madeleine shook her head. “Many days after the major battle ceased, the remains of my grandmother’s brother and three others were found clustered in one spot on the cliff, as if they had been lined up and executed. One body was never found. We’ve come to believe that this missing person was a Nazi collaborator. A traitor within the Resistance movement. He warned the Germans of the mission and, for his cooperation was allowed to escape, while the others were killed.”

            Uff-da. My perception of World War II had been tempered by distance, time, and reruns of Hogan’s Heroes, but to the local families who had lost loved ones on the front lines, there would never be anything even remotely humorous about it. “Was the family of the man who betrayed the mission ostracized by the people in your town?”

            Madeleine hesitated, bitterness and regret darkening her eyes. “We never learned which person was the traitor.”

            I frowned. “Not even by process of elimination? If you found the remains of four bodies, wouldn’t the traitor be the person whose body you didn’t find?”

            “In normal circumstances, yes. But in this instance, no. My grandmother identified her brother from the fragments of two gold incisors left in his skull. It was the only recognizable part of him. The other three victims were charred beyond recognition from the Allied bombardments on the morning of the invasion. There was nothing left to distinguish one from the other—no clothing, pocket watches, ammunition belts. But we considered it a blessing that their personal effects were incinerated in the bombing rather than end up as trophies of war in the hands of the men who slaughtered them.”

            Osmond looked suddenly distracted, as if he’d just recalled leaving a pot of water boiling on his stove before he left for vacation.

            “What about the artillery guns?” Cal inquired. “Did the Allied bombing runs destroy them?”

            “Pssht. Even I can answer that,” said Bernice in a superior tone. “Didn’t you ever see The Longest Day—that World War II flick starring every leading man in Hollywood? Robert Wagner scales the cliff with Tommy Sands, Paul Anka, and a bunch of unknown stuntmen. They’re a special commando force, and their mission is to destroy the big guns. But after they clean out the Germans, they discover there are no guns. The bunkers are completely empty. I wanna tell you, even Fabian was ticked off to think he’d done all that climbing for nothing.”

            Cal looked perplexed. “So … where were the guns?”

            “The Germans moved ’em to a safer location,” said Osmond. “About half a mile inland. To an apple orchard. For all the good it did them. A couple of army rangers found ’em and placed incendiary grenades in the firing apparatus. When they detonated ’em, all the metal parts got welded together in a big molten clump. Those guns weren’t worth a lick after that. A pea shooter woulda done more damage.”

            I stared at Osmond, thunderstruck at the depth of his knowledge. The guns, the clicker, the tides? How did he know all this stuff ? And then it hit me.

            Even though he claimed not to have cable TV, he could be pulling the wool over everyone’s eyes simply to avoid having to host the gang’s weekly get-togethers to watch reruns of Family Feud on the Game Show Channel. I shot him a suspicious look. He was watching the Military History Channel on the sly. He had to be.

            “Grandmama!” Madeleine propelled herself out of her chair and hurried across the room to assist an elderly woman who appeared in the doorway. She was small-boned, arrow straight, and wore her white hair in a braid that formed a tidy coil around her head. Her cheekbones were high and angular, her complexion remarkably smooth. Her piercing blue eyes snapped with animation and good humor, and when she smiled, I caught a glimpse of the stunning beauty she must have been decades ago.