1956-04-14 — Page 6

THE CHINA MAIL,” SATURDAY, APRIL 14, 1966.

THE VENGEANCE

THE STORY SO FAR

OF PRIVATE POOLEY-5

adapted from the book by CYRIL JOLLY

ON 27 1940, Royal Norfolk Regiment, were

N May 27, 1940, nearly 100 officers and men of the Pooley felt he had not long to

live.

captured by the Germans at Lo Paradis in France. They were marched into a fiold and shot down by machine-gun fira. Only two men escaped-Private Albert Poolsy, who was badly wounded in the log, and Private William O'Callaghan, Pooley, who vowed to be revenged on the officer responsible for the crime, spont three years in French and German hospitals. He was rapatriated, unfit for further servico, in 1943. O'Callaghan spent the rest of tho war in prison comps, and returned to England in 1945. Ax the only survivors, they did not dare to mention the atrocity in the while they were in Gorman hands, but both men reported

it on their return. No notice was taken of their reports.

A

Time was blunting his

memories. He was now asking

himself: did the massacre

meadow really take

place? By going back to Le

Paradis he could prove that

LBERT POOLEY was discharged from the Army In March 1944, and started work at Hayes Post Once, Middlesex. He had a driving job at first, but one day the door of his van swung on his Injured leg and chipped the damaged bone. Months of it hospital treatment were necessary, He had to be content with a light indoor job.

But if his physical condition was bad, he was in an even worse state mentally. As the months lengthened into years, he felt that the authorities Intended to do nothing about the crime at

Le

Pards.

There

WAIH

nothing so positive as fi conspiracy of silence. The whole thing was simply ig- nored, us if the CO. and Nobby, and some 90 others had not been murdered in cold blood at all.

I

did... and get things

moving before it was too late.

MUST GO BACK

Pooley felt that, with or with- partiedarly good to him when put the operation, he had not he was Hi hospital: Madame long to live. What he was going. Desroelles who kept In to do must bc done quickly. Caminet in the Rue St Pry. Only his wounded Jeg sul Nobby's lighter now seemed not abe Albert Caro, k miner reminded Pooley of the events

working in raw of the coal mines of that far-off day his teg and reproach as a spur to

wind Bethune.

Nobby's lighter, the keepsake he had taken from the pocket of his murdered friend in the pit where they lay. Every time he used the lighter, it peemed to eproach him for not keeping faith with the dead.

Disbelieved

Frui

ሙና s

so evazy,

she

action, to get thing moving vetoes it was too late.

Mrs Ponley tried to him

stop "1 all seemed says, looking back on those nightmare days, "I told him he was a stek man and the proper place

for him was hospital bed, not going to France. he would alt and look ni

that lighter. He took that lighter tu pleves and put it together again. a hundred times. His thoughts were miles away "

Her own

But what could he do? the beginning he had been dis- believed. "A cock-and-bull story" the offer in Bethune hospital hid called it. The security officer at Richmond had diamissed

with contempi. 11 When a neighbour of Pooley, a man he had known for years, one said it was "just propaganda," it seemed the Inst straw.

Day and night, mostly night, when he got to bed, the whole thing went round and round in his mind until he felt ho Win going mad. Perhaps hey WIES wrong, and everyone else was right. Perhaps it hadn't really happened. Perhaps ho really WOB imagining things, had got things twisted.

from

Could he be suffering delusions? His leg was an ever- present source of distress: ho suffered from illness;

need

were

115

Pooley thought if they

alive they would help him get to Le Paradis, which Lady spine five or six inlles out- *kie Bethune He did not know 1810 name of anyone x Le Paradis

She cried

If blained it passport and bought his Uckets.

went,

Ten days before he deane', his second child, was

She was

named after Tepetip Caron, the daughter of Nor could she move him when the miner who had helped him she spoke of her own need with before

and to whom he was little girl to enre for and turning again. Mrs Pooley had Another

drawing only been up: confinement

day or so, and when she saw her husband go she could not keep

back the

I left her like that," Pooley says. That shows the state I cay's bud got luto." His idea was to confirm his story,

then report the whole affair to the regimental authorities, He Norwich to see would go to

He felt that it someone else. he did not go soon and check his story he would never get the

Truth established and his co- rudes avenged. "When I thought of Nobby and the others, mur- deret uke that after ghting there anly, and all these years had and nothing had been

He

were money problems; his little done. I relt mad about it." girl was unwell. Life became almost unbearable.

His doctor sent him to Roes hampton hospital for six weeks" rest," diet and treatment. The rest did him good, but he had not been out long before he was deep in the same slough of doubt and misery.

He tried to do his light job uti the post office but it was hard work

drag even to

himself noul. Only his unusual power of will kept him going. On one ar two occasions he collapsed on reaching his own doorstep.

Mrs Pooley recalls those days and nights with horror.

She dreaded the nights especially,

She did what she could with the medicine and drugs pre-] scribed.

She prepared the diet ordered

by the doctors. But they did ilitle lo

her husband's suffering of body and ngony of mind.

Hideous dreams

With sleep dreams,

hideous сате that racked him and set him screaming and sobbing

So Poulpy set to work. wrote to Belhune, to the address of two fomniites who had been

Sitting in the French trail.

fears.

Pooley Wils overwhelmed by weakness iml loneliness. "I thought "What's the use of it all any way? They're dend nothing I can do will bring them back. Let the whole thing drop. I also thought of how I had left Connie at home and I just felt like turning back there and then. Then it a fag with Nobby's lighter, and I knew was doing the right thing."

It was a very tired man who of the pushed open the door estaminet in Bethune one Sep- tember evening In 1940, and saw the motherly figure of Madame

THE MONK

WORLD

to

murred the enjoyment of the French folk et his rélurn.

Pooley asked how he could gel to Richebourg and Le Part- dia. Richebourg was the home of a French soldier he had nxt

LE PARADIS

while 12 pritoner.

of-war. given Pootoy hir

and

had

the

oddress Englishman know it was tomewhere near La Paradis.

B1: dki rat feli bis friends In Bethune

*

Why wanted to go to Le Paradis as

not word of the shoot- ing had been men - sloned to them and he had yet to prove his story.

Nexi day, his friend pt Riche

bourg borrowed

latil

Throwing up her hands sho promptly fainted.

WHO ARE THE ENEMIES OF

SIR ANTHONY?

Let the Tories unite behind Eden." There ain't gonna be any other Prime Minister for a long time

By RICHARD STRONG

London A year ago, the Tories tool

W

Is that

what tho Tory

mutineers are saying? In which case, I must remind them that during the general electon.

HO are the Tory 5. off the income tax. Now they are talking of putting · It mutineers, the

on again. II It is right to put the MPs whose snip- tax back en 'now, it was wrong Ings and snarlings to take it off then. at Sir Anthony Eden All the papers, and who seek to destroy him? No Prime Minister has ever suffered so cruelly at the hands of his party within so short a period of office. Upon this every commentator agrees.

Yet the names of the dla- sidents are not known in the

their criticisms were inaudible

they were the chief, bene- fetaries of the 6d, off the income

scooped in the The tax pet

vetes. reduction was a fine Incentive in every way. Two million people were freed from income

tax.

Unemployment

dropped to Its lower ever. In

constituencies which sustain them. They operate theagnito. terms of material things, the They plot, but not for a moment British, nation had the best year do the Tory women, devoted to of its life.. their Leader, suspect them the intermy they mit; nor the Never before

As Pooley hobbled round the farmyard he relived some of the great moments of the Norfolk's local Tory Asceintions know of Inst Oght. In a ditch he saw a the misdemeanours of their German And British helmet chosen enes against the Prime lying Alle by side. Many Minister.

trans

reurons' exposure had rusted them, and missing.

were

Outside the love of Commons, all is portrayed as bright and He walked out through the beautiful. Only within is there name doorway that had once led ferment and intrigue. to captivity and

unimaginable One man ... harror.

Nine days

theme Minister are perused in Peru. They are pored over in Pennsylvania. They are scrutin

From tb Durles Form facy walked one hundred and fifty paces along the Rue du Paradis and turned into the by-road Rue de Madagascar-with the car following them. They stood in front of the tarm where they id in Surbiton. were told Madame Duquenne- For Mr Churchil is an out- Creion" Hved. Here, with standing political commentator, World.

Chy, refrigerators, all kinds of luxuries and semi-luxuries avalinched from the factories Into the homes of the people on an unprecedented scale,

Never before had so much wealth been produced frem our industries. And the bcom brought better wages. million

Ten people had increases.

ter mothers, for those

One man alone can be named. There were fat overtime com- One brave spirit who

of strikes The number hos casting. Mr Randolph Churchill. aside the shroud of anonymily. dropped gremation/ly,

And the

were not neglected, Mr Churchill's castaughts on increased allowances for

Plans were laid for the sick, the aged, for the unemploy

t- jured at work. The now beng

are starting to now. Was all this folly? I do not be lieve so. It was peed for the the cure prescribed by Eden's critics. The harsh deflationary policy they favour would put 6 million on the dole and end the bean.

Profits would be slashed. And the Socialists, all their curdling

fulfilled, prophecies

would come to power for 20 years. is true. Churchill (Sir At the same instant Madame Winston) is that rority in British se unsophisticated. Tories caw him. Tho

would happily expression

wreck their party her face changed, not to But who will deny that as

Joy politics, a genius that as that de dood. They should weari but to surprise, and then he is supremely better rule one for backwoodsmen: to

she qualified Throwing

than Mr

Randolph deprive a man of his job dies promptly fainted.

Churchill?

not deprive him of his vote. He is in the House of Com- Where they are stupid, Eden mons. And he is Prime Minister. Is intelligent. The squeeze is Mr Randolph Churchill, I have rigidly controlled. Far better too

be little at first then too much.

en/son, he had spent nine HB Evening Standard column is nation. But (cily indeed

car and driver.

days and nights hiding quoted throughout the They

erulsed in a plgsty, tended by Madame He hes ne immense damage to around for a time Creton.

Sir Anthony Dreng Britola's Ife did not know her Pooley, wh

name, friends and enemies overscos. hed been looking but as he limped into the yard

Why does ho lombast Eden? he saw her. She was much What are his complaints? I defect about on either side,

altered. Years of labour and one above all. That Eden is m struggle had considerably aged Churchill (Sir Winston).

That

Desruciles standing behind her suckienly asked the driver to counter.

Glasses were set up and corka popped. Pooley relaxed. The first stage of his pilgrimage Kind been completed.

10

Pooley had not been at the estaminet long I

before word reached the Caron family, whom he was so much indebted. They were soon round to clasp his hand and embrace him.

The Englishman was lionised, Only his evident Hi-health

OF LACKS

THE

slop. He had seen in the dis- tance the house where his bat- talion had made its last head- quarters and its last stand.

Duries Farm stood alone, large Burd conspicuous above the flat, hedgeless farmlands.

The car drew up at the farm- house and Pooley got out. The house was new extcal for ong end wall. but it had been re- built just like the house he hadi such good cause to remember,

PARIS ONE

her.

up her honds

(COPYRIGHT)

NEXT SATURDAY : Enter Colonel Scotland

FASHION

RIBBON

know you will not wear it as it member of the French Socialist for ever."

is not black."

Paris Newsletter from

A storm

SAM

WHITE

N Paris where famous dress designers are as well known as film stars in Hollywood, 60-year-old Cristobal Balen- cinga would pass almost un- recognised in any gathering. His photograph hus not appeared in a Purls news- paper for 15 years and his collections have recently, at skilled with a needle. his own insistence, gone un- reported.

by her side. At times she would carefully shrouded from the His personal life is even moro try to hold him and soothe him, but the torment of his

mind Public gaze. drove him beyond consolation.

Despite the fact that he nos Night after night he called in been one of the top Paris his sleep to the comrades whom designers since 1937, he remains ho had loft in the pit in the the "unknown" couturier. The

meadow at Le Paradis Monk" green

of the Paris fashion Frightened, sometimes terrified, world. by his

Pooley heard higgles, Mrs

"I'll wipe the alate clean, Nobby." "I'll get the swine, 'Bill." "T

make

him pay for this, if it's the last

ag

I clo,

H

The envy thometimes,

Nevertheless he has succeeded says Mre Poo in acquiring and retaining " The would call their names fastidious clientele which is the ley,

though reading a list and envy

more flamboyant would then fall back exhausted rivals. The Duchess of Windsor

of his with a sob. I knew the name gets her clothes from him, se of many men I had never heard does her him speaks about when awake. Charles Bedaux. So do virtually former friend Mrs He didn't say what he had to wipe out, but I know something all the Rothschilds, and a select of the most Megont terrible had happened out thero number

women on both sides of the in France, I asked him what it

Allantie. was but he wouldn't say.""

Through those pain-drenched days and terrifying nights, one thought took root and grew steadily in Pooley's mind: must go back to Le Paradis. I don't I shall loso my

sanity to reassure himself Ho had Time was blunting the edges of

his memories, By going back to

Ills clothes reflect his personal and professional austerity. Black is his favourite colour, the lines are severely restrained, ha uses the minimum of material, and disdains anything too sexy or too frivolous;

Similarly, his models are uti- the meadow; he could prove like those of other fashion that what he thought had haphouses. pened had happened.

An operation

He is a superb cutter and

One of his famous clients has summer up her impression of his clothea In these words: "The first year may be hesitant in wearing o dress of his. The second year I wear and feel I am in the height of fashion.

"The

TOTHING in France, It seem

Party.

List of guests

EVE

VE of wedding news

Monte Carlo;

from In drawing

no doubt, would like to

по

Prime Minister. But he is not in

is

the House of Commons. He has Trade gap

been having trouble getting

there.

mons performET.

15

A ham actor is not necessarily The aim is to apply the brakes, a bad critic. But, in view of his not commit political suicide.

And fallure as a politician, humility February trade pap

it is

Tha succeeding. should

subdue Churchill's

was the criticisms of Eden

Com- narrowest for nine months.

Where else does Eden show No one has ever heard the wisdom denied to his critica? whole of a

speech by

In his handling of the TUC. He does Anthony. That is perfectly toe giant. Instead, he invites it to vedi to enrage this He drawls. His delivery is poor. He has to be read, and

The cordially

union Eden and the trade cliches

removed, to get the sigul leaders is of great importance conce-if there is any.

Sir

the

not

between

All attemp's Inside the party to revive, discussion on Stalin

are being quite

But Eden will not be judged rnd, comidering the Govern uthlessly suppressed.

by the electors for his wit in the ment's policy over housing and Those who seek to do so are Commons. He will stand or fall subsidies, a spectacular achieve- being threatened with expulsion.on his policies, not on hia meni.

There is no echo in the party epigrams. Press of the ferment created by Morcow's denunciation of Stalin. The plot

Meanwhile

Is for removed from polities, not even the

list of guests for his affairs of the up

A former French stately Parts Орега

flm The wedding to

star Grace

intellectual hina present Socialist-led Govern ending some

Kelly, Prince Rainier is both Communist

what started

he calls "the old feuds

Georgian Society.

y." Its purpose:

ment has brought a storm round

opera's

civil servant Georges Hirsch.

Feud endey.*.

50-year-old Princess Ghislaine, ing from party 1

M. Hirsch, who in this post values in 19aspelled from his

disposes of a budget of over a milion pounds,

Membership will be restri

On two major Issuci, Sir Anthony has reduced Socialist propaganda against the Torles to He has stolen the ricidulous.

The Monopoly Bill, despite

On foreign and colonial ques- two of their pets. tions, as I showed his

has

La far more courageous

Socialist leadership,

And Eden'a

canı has won

Intention to

friends every-

its head by reappointing the petuating others.

"to keep alive the memory of record has been exemplary. As laws, director, 61-year-old that with the former actrees and Comrade Stalin and preserve his a man of peace, be has the trust than anything suggested by the

dowager Princess of Monaco, works which are fast

It tackles of the

people. He has achieved miracles.

an evil against which they whom he

So what outrage has ho com- frothed, but lacked the nerve to lo those who have been formerly mitted at home to justify the ast. has been invited to the expelled from the party on plot to unseat him? It is said: ve-year reign over the stormy wedding, thereby marking the expelled of "Trotskyism," he bungled the hauging question. One charge third year I feel the

before dress has become part of me."

of four years exile from the "Bukharinism," ke resigned only to be

end of

been "Right Wing Certainly that has the

Principality. Says the princess devletionism," and "Left Wing indefensible to blame the Prime abolish conscription as fast as ne reappointed by

flasco. But is Improper and present Government. Here is some of invited to the wedding. I am

"I never doubted i would be deviationism," A rival designer expressed

The founder

of the society Minister; in his Government two where, not least among regular the highlights of these grudging admiration Ins

five these

delighted that a fellow-petress himself was expelled for pone words: "His eye is

Year: always

is destined to succeed me in the

of these things.

His failing ex-Chlef Whips. They are Mr servicemen. directed unerringly towards true

Principality."

James Stuart and Mr Patrick One was; "Bourgols Bohemianism.” A tenor

charge remains. The attempted to o6sas- elegance; It never strays to the

Buchan-Hepburn. It is their job Tories have been dolog badly at sinate him. A fire broke out wholesale Trade or the flekło

to advise Eden on the temper the polls. Liberals are almost nttention of the buyers."

In mysterious circumstances in

and his offices. A famous dancing

of Commons. They To blame

Eden for tils Balenciaga is a Spaniard and star was suspended for In-

have no

no other use except to keep shocking. Though the volués itch and sew, who even as 3 child loved to discipline and a series of legal THE French Communist Parly,

Quote of the week.--Com-the Cabinet straight on the tem- cannot be identified, the whole locks

actions based On a variety of the most Stalinised

in munist Journalist younger than his 60 years.

Andra perature

hey heard country medium height, dark and alim, him.

the uptoar Of allegations was started against Europe, is putting up the fiercest Wurmser, wrlling in the party

mutineers want among the Torles in the House possible his large,

opposition to all organ L'Humanite: "Why other advisers, they should al- of Commons. This is no way to piercing brown eyer

attempts to tumble the Stalin should any non-Russian be more tock this pretty pair-they are a win elections. give him a Valentino - Bike Among many charges made legend.

interested in Soviet criticisms handsome couple and not the Let the Tories unite behind harekomeness.

. against kim is that some of his Brief declaration by France's of Stalin

that

the Russians man who is the victim of their Eden, He is the best Prime most extravagant productions "Little Stalin." Maurice Thorez, would be in a discussion In the miscalculation.

Ministor we are going to have were such follures that they only that though "Comrade Stalin Frencli Socialist Party of the

It is said there is a balance of for

There ain't a long time, played for two or three per- made some mistakes, his con- failings of Premier Mollet."

That we payments crisis.

are gonna be any other. fortnances. M. Hirsch is a "tribution to Socialism will yo

sprading to much. All true.

тист

He lives in the modern six-roomed flat in Paris which he rented when he came hèra ainest penniles from Spain. He has also acquired a country house and a form

near San Sebastian.

Restricted

He is rarely seen at fashion- able parties or first nights and Sit in his perfume- his circle of friends is closely drenched salon and instead of restricted one. He remains com- the wasp-waisted niineing pletely culside the turbulent mannequins of other houses you intrigue, and commercialism of sce rather statuesque women the ftuhlon Industry, whose feet are firmly plented on the ground as they walk.

He was not in a dt slate to

This may explain' a fact which make the journey. Indeed, the

causes him some silght bitter- howpital authorities · now. told Profesionally he Is most ness. It to that unlike other him that, without a very serious admired for his sure taste and, leading dress designers ha hão: operation, he could not hope to remarkable technical skill. He not yet been awarded the ribbon carry on much longer. -The la... not only), a very talented of the Legion of Honour. uloey had at lost. been located designer, but a dressmaker in friend teasing him on this point in the shadow of the spine. ibe strict sense of the word; wuld "recently: "They probably.

Some mistakes

MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN

ALL RIGHT--SO

1 DON'T SEE A

GRASSHOPPER

AS BIG AS

A HORSE.

THAT'S BETTER. YOU NEED A

·REST, MAC.

1-10

YOU'RE GETTING OFF WHY WE'RE NOT NEAR A STATION

WE'RE

STAYING HERE.

Why?

(COPYRIGHT)

I SAID WE'D GET

OFF IF WE SAWA

ANYTHING INTERESTING,

LOTHAR

the sition of members of winning elections.

In

If the trement.

By Lee Falk and Phil Davia.

-ANO THIS IS IT--. GRASSHOPPSAP AS BIG AS A

.ME HOPE

IS ONLY

MAYBE

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TALK

ABOUT

MAGIC!

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