Originally started in 2014 when I was deep in my Lovecraft phase. I feel like my writing style has changed considerably since, yet I look at this now and realise that I somehow also miss this work. Definitely need to brush off the Penguin Classics and revisit all the HPL once winter falls this year.
Part 1
It was the morning after the storm, and life in Navonne was about to return to normal, when the curfew was called. Hobnailed boots tromped down the narrow, cobbled streets, echoing off the grey walls and resounding down the crooked alleys and twisted streets that formed the greater part of Navonne, and the screaming of seagulls was drowned by the roaring of truck engines and the shouting of men in grey uniforms as they went from house to house.
It was to be the start of a very grim affair.
It was the spring of 1944, and the last of the winter storms were sweeping in from the Atlantic to batter away at the coast of France, from the fortified ports in Normandy to the border towns of Spain. Navonne, situated halfway between St Malo and Avranches, crouched on the cliffs next to the mouth of the Couesnon where it flowed into the Atlantic, and was a place where someone with the time and luxury of exploring France was very likely to not visit at all, given the option. Narrow streets snaked and criss-crossed through suburbs dating back to the time of the French Revolution, and the reek of a nearby shellfish factory cast a perpetual odiferous veil over the black roofs and crumbling gables that formed the upper part of the village. The lower parts, where rotting brick and flaking plaster leered past boarded-up windows at patchy cobbled lanes, was a gloomy, vile-smelling maze of uneven alleys and clustered courtyards, where an archaic open-air drain system - also from the French Revolution - hissed with the lapping of tidal waters that coursed darkly through it. It was a place that time, and the world - Humanity - had forgotten, a place where Science and Reason were yet to set foot in this century.
However, to some people - like Oberleutnant Joachim Weismann - it represented a necessary detour, brought on by a medical inconvenience which could no longer be ignored. On convalescence leave from the Ostfront, recovering from a Russian artillery duel which had left him with a broken left arm and a perpetual ringing in his left ear, Weismann had called in a few favours once his hospital bed in Helm was no longer necessary, and soon thereafter found himself in the French countryside. A staff car had not been available, but between his rank and the ever-moving German convoys that crawled through Occupied France, moving from region to region had not been a problem. He had travelled light, with only his personal effects loaded into a marching pack, and had resisted all efforts of the last German garrison commander to issue him with any weapon larger than his own sidearm. Rumours of Maquisard activities in the areas near the coast were rife - yet ultimately unfound, as the presence of so many Atlantic Wall Wehrmacht units acted as a firm deterrent against any ideas of banditry that the French could consider. Also, Weismann had learned everything he needed to know about partisan behaviour on the Ostfront - and the French rabble could not even begin to compare to the savagery of the Russian otriads.
Navonne was to be a distraction from his planned - and on-going - tour of the Atlantic Wall, brought on by an ever-worsening twinge in his left arm, a twinge which had started two days earlier and steadfastly refused to go away despite all efforts at self-medication. Ensconced in the officers' barracks at Avranches, Weismann had enquired as to the presence of an army doctor, and had been referred to the services of one of the doctors attached to the 77th Regiment, encamped at St Malo some twenty-five miles to the west. However, further enquiries with the radiomen of the 77th revealed that the doctor in question, Dr Fleinhem, had been called away to Navonne to treat an outbreak of cholera that had crippled the Wehrmacht company stationed there. Given the option to wait for the doctor to return, or to head to Navonne, Weismann consulted the local maps - which had surprisingly little to say or show about Navonne, despite its strategic position at the mouth of the Couesnon - and made up his mind to travel there in search of treatment. His time in Russia had shown him what could happen to wounds and injuries left untreated, and pragmatism quickly won out over the initial impulse to "tough it out". Also, given the close proximity of the two villages, the trip would surely be of little time and strain to undertake.
So it came to be, early on this chilly spring morning, that Weissman found himself passing through the darkness of the French countryside in the sidecar of one of the dispatch motorcycles attached to the 77th, cool morning air stinging at his ears under his helmet, and the occasional spray of dew falling across them as they twisted and crawled their way through overgrown and tree-shrouded country lanes. At Avranches, the local French villagers were apparently none too happy about the idea of the Germans being stationed at Navonne, and had pleaded with the commander at Avranches - an artillery captain, Hauptmann Geyers - on several occasions to have the Navonnese expelled from their homes. The requests had come in many guises, most of them poorly dressed up as informants claiming to know of Maquisard activity in the village - yet after the first few searches, Geyers had driven them off and threatened to hang the next person to come to him with "Navonne nonsense". All of this, Weismann only found out when he put in a request for a dispatch rider to take him to Navonne before sunrise that morning, and a faint twinge of unease had wormed its way into his mind as he loaded his gear onto the sidecar.
Why would the French be so keen to have the Navonnese investigated, when they refused to cooperate on virtually every other matter the Germans put before them?
What could possibly be driving this seemingly internecine dislike that the Avranchese had for their neighbours?
These matters quickly faded into the back of his mind as the trip progressed - yet flared up again, stronger this time, as they cleared the last of the dense lanes and entered a raised causeway, leading to, in the distance, the dark silhouettes of Navonne itself. To their left, farmed fields stretched away in a quilt-work pattern of blacks and greys to the south and south-east, while the right-hand side of the causeway, where the ocean was to lie in the distance, was lined with a procession of towering trees. Dark branches and black boughs were interspersed every hundred yards or so with a crumbling shed, outbuilding, or the tottering walls of a farmhouse where light glimmered faintly from shuttered windows, and the feeling of age - incredible, oppressive age - was as smothering as driving into a bank of fog.
It was like driving into some creation that had sprung from the pens of the Grimm brothers.
"Almost there, sir," the dispatch rider shouted down at Weismann, and gunned the motorcycle down the straight causeway in a roar of BMW cylinders. The rider was young, a tall boy from the outskirts of Hamburg, and Weismann did not envy him the need to stretch his - the motorcycle's - legs after the twisting confines of the route that had brought them from Avranches.
The causeway flashed by beneath them, a dirt track that seemed in fairly decent condition, and Navonne grew steadily closer. In front of them, half-hidden by the darkness but drawing swiftly closer, an old stone bridge stood at the end of the causeway, arching slightly as it crossed some yet-unseen river, and it was across the front of this bridge that lights now sprung to life, lancing down the causeway on either sides of them. The rider muttered something under his breath, some comment which Weismann failed to catch, and throttled the motorcycle down as they covered the last hundred yards to what now appeared, drawing definition from the shadows as they parted sluggishly around it, to be a roadblock. Grey-uniformed figures manned the wire-and-wood barricades that had been dragged across the road, and Weismannn spotted a sandbag nest, well-adorned with rifle muzzles, under one of the spotlight stands. Whatever the roadblock was expecting, they were taking no risks.
The sergeant that approached them gave a brisk salute when he drew close enough to spot Weismann's rank, and the lieutenant returned it before pulling his travel documents from a tunic pocket.
"Oberleutnant Weismann, on a medical visit to your company doctor. I trust Doctor Fleinhem is in the vicinity?"
"Yes sir, he is working in the medical station at Villeneuve House." The sergeant gave Weismann's documents a quick inspection, then returned them. Weismann could not help but notice the traces of tension that narrowed the man's eyes, nor the hunch of his shoulders - from which hung a loaded machine-pistol - as he turned and waved for the men at the barricades to pull the centre one aside.
When he returned his attention to the motorcycle, Weismann recognized the look.
It was the apprehension that came when one was faced with the unknown - the unknown, and the fear that went with it.
"Private, do you know the way to the house?" The dispatch rider nodded once, and the sergeant gave a brisk nod in return before stepping back to wave them through. "Proceed straight there, and do not stop anywhere along the way. The village has been placed under curfew, and the company is busy rounding up stragglers and ensuring everyone stays indoors. We do not expect resistance, but we cannot take risks either."
"Has there been an incident?" Weismann asked, and received a shake of the head by means of answer. Behind the sergeant, some of the sentries shifted uneasily.
"No sir. Our company commander has ordered a sweep of the beaches below the village, and has imposed a curfew until such time as the sweep is completed."
"I see." Weismann did not, but it was clear that whatever was happening in the village would not be revealed by the tight-lipped sergeant. "Thank you for the warning. Carry on."
The dispatch rider gave the throttle of the BMW a half-turn, and they slowly rolled into Navonne just as the false dawn began to brighten the horizon behind them.
By the time they reached Villeneuve House some fifteen minutes later, darkness still held sway over the streets that opened onto the tiny courtyard that fronted the house, and Weismann's impression of being in one of the Grimm tales had strengthened considerably. The reek of spoiled shellfish was an ammoniac-like haze that was thick enough to taste - and gag on - while the sewer system's canals, which paralleled the roads, gave rise to frequent updrafts of dank, cloying air that wafted up and over them as the motorcycle clattered over the old gratings which covered the canals. No streetlight, or even lamplight from the narrow, shoulder-to-shoulder houses, was to be seen, and the only sign of life was the occasional German patrol they passed - which, in the confines of the streets, necessitated slowing to a crawl in order to make space for both motorcycle and men to pass. Weismann counted three of these patrols in the short distance they covered, and the men seemed edgy and nervous as they marched, weapons at the ready and eyes constantly flickering from doorway to alley to windows as they moved.
Villeneuve House itself was a slightly grander establishment, as high as the apartments around it but considerably wider, and here some light was visible as they pulled up. A lantern hung below a sign which jutted from above the door of the establishment, showing a scalpel crossed over some implement which Weismann did not recognize. The courtyard itself was empty except for a raised pedestal upon which some statue had stood in years past, but which now harboured only seagull droppings and clumps of moss. The rider parked their motorcycle beside this pedestal, then went to the door of the house when Weismann waved him away from the luggage racks where his marching pack was stowed. His arm might be hurt, but he was no invalid.
When he finally had the pack shouldered, the door to Villeneuve was open, and the dispatch rider was conferring with another figure inside. Here, as he approached, the smell of shellfish became infused with another smell, and it was only as he stepped closer and the other man extended his hand in introduction, that he placed the smell.
"Monsieur Francett, mortician."
"Oberleutnant Weismann, Wehrmacht." The mortician had a surprisingly strong grip for someone of his stature - he was a good head shorter than the lanky dispatch rider - and his German, while accented, was extremely well-pronounced. "I presume you are assisting Doctor Fleinhem with his duties here?"
"You are most correct. The good doctor has been based here since the outbreak of... the troubles with the soldiers." Francett gave a small smile, and beckoned Weissman to enter. "The people here do not believe in the scientific methods of our medicine, and my establishment was the only one capable of assisting the doctor in his efforts."
"There is no local doctor here?" Weismann was surprised by the revelation, but not unduly so - the impression that he had been getting from Navonne had him fully expecting to hear of leech theraphy and blood-letting next.
"None, aside from Doctor Fleinhem now. The people here appear to be of a different mindset when it comes to modern things." Francett led the way through a small foyer, past a darkened side room where several oblong caskets were visible in the gloom, and into what appeared to be a medical examination room at the rear of the house. "I was most surprised when I moved here some years ago, and no amount of persuasion from my side has been able to change their minds."
Weismann could only nod in agreement - Navonne did not appear to be at the forefront of anything, apart from decay and the encroachment of time. The dispatch rider, left to linger at the entrance door, he dismissed with a wave and an order to wait at the local dispatch station, where Weismann would come to find him once he had seen Fleinhem.
With the rider taken care of, Weismann returned his attention to the room - and found Francett nowhere in sight. Wooden cabinets, neatly aligned and spotless despite their apparent age, lined the walls of the room, and several anatomical charts were pinned to the walls, showing the human body in various layers of musculature, fat, and other tissues. A curtained doorway on the one side of the room led off deeper into the house, and it was from here that the mortician appeared a moment later, a tray with two cups balanced on one hand.
"Some tea to start the day? I know you must be looking for Doctor Fleinhem," Francett forestalled Weismann's query, "but the doctor has unfortunately been called down to the beach by the commander, and will be back when... well, whenever they have no more need for him."
"Thank you." Weismann accepted a cup, and gave a cautious sip. The aroma of black tea, strong and bitter, cut through his nose and the cloying scent of embalming fluid that had enveloped him from the moment Francett had appeared.
"I was informed of some sort of curfew being in effect - is this a regular occurrence?"
"Hmm. Hard to say, to be honest. I have only recently returned from Paris, and the village has been... different since my return." The mortician gave an apologetic shrug, and pulled two chairs from a corner desk, positioning one for Weismann before lowering himself into the second. "I lost a family member some months ago, and my practice here has been closed for the better part of a year."
Left unsaid was the cause of this family member's death, which - in all likelihood - probably had something to do with the German occupation. The SD, the security and spying wing of the SS, had been particularly hard at work since taking over Paris in 1940. Weismann wanted to feel embarrassed, but realised that he did not care. Pulling the proffered chair closer, he sat down with his back to the nearest cabinet, and an eye on the two doorways that led into the room. He remembered about his helmet and quickly doffed it, sliding the domed shape under his chair.
War is war. It changes men.
"I am sorry to hear that. But I am curious now. Your practice here has been closed for almost a year? Were you not concerned for lost business?"
"Ah. Hah. Yes, well..." The mortician lapsed into one of his pauses, which grew somewhat longer this time before he resumed. The frown that creased his forehead, pushing his spectacles forward, was also new. "The native Navonnese have some unusual customs when it comes to burial practices - and the inhabitants of the surrounding villages refuse to come here either. I would have to be frank and admit that I would not have had more than a handful of clients in that time, had I been open, so the loss was hardly felt."
"Yet you moved here some years ago to set up the practice, correct?" To Weismann, the story sounded somewhat nonsensical - and the tea in his mouth suddenly tasted all the more bitter. There was motive here, surely. "If it was not for business, what then brought you here?"
"Oddly enough, it was for business - but I had been misled about the opportunity for it, I must admit. I had a relative, an uncle, who resided here for some time, and who approached me shortly before his death. This was in 1938, when I was still working in Calais. He sent me a letter, which rambled extensively about some family matters which I had not even been aware of - aunts and uncles and step-families of years past - and then finished with an invitation for me to visit him. I made excuses, initially, but then received notice of his passing, and of an estate which had been left to me." Francett gave a small wave which encompassed the room and its contents. "And here it is. A lovely piece of property, in a quaint seaside town, with great potential for a mortician to set up a practice."
"I detect a measure of irony in that last statement." Weismann lifted the cup to his lips again, but not a single drop passed his lips this time. "Your uncle failed to mention these local traditions, did he not?"
"No. Naive as I was, I leapt at the opportunity - and now I find myself with no way of returning to Calais. Business here has not been as expected, and my finances will only allow so much."
"An interesting predicament." Weismann reconsidered the possibility of poison in his tea, given what he had heard, and decided that only a fool would try to poison a German officer in this manner.
Well - a fool greater than the mortician had evidently turned out to be.
"A predicament, yes, but no longer interesting. I must admit to a certain jading when it comes to the work I have done before. These past years have visited more free time on me than I had possessed before in Calais, and with that time had come the desire to study more. Now, I find myself reading more often than working on the slab - and I fear it has shown in some of my more recent clients."
Weismann was not sure how a practised mortician could actually get his work wrong after so many years, but the conversation was starting to bore him. Setting down his cup, he gave a pointed glance at his wristwatch, and Francett immediately picked up on the cue.
"I'm sorry I cannot help with the doctor's schedule. You are welcome to wait here though? I would offer to show you to the beach, but with the curfew in effect..." Francett spread his hands, and gave a very French shrug. "One does not wish to cause ripples, yes?"
Weismann pondered the matter for a moment, then gave his own shrug.
"How difficult can it be to find the beach in a quaint seaside town?"
There are still several parts of the story left, although the end is - woefully - still unwritten for. Perhaps I will find time to finish it before we run out of parts to share here! Next week Friday should see Part 2 released.