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A rmand Abadie sat in his office, taking meetings with informants.

Wednesday was his favourite morning of the week, listening to the secrets confided in him by loyal citizens.

He commended himself on his clever idea to establish a weekly clinic for concerned Toulousians to meet with him personally.

The idea had come to him during one of his people watching lunches and had led to countless successful raids on Jews and other undesirables .

Armand had taken to using the expression after watching a newsreel featuring Hitler at the cinema.

It was the perfect catch-all term for the scum that had washed into his city in ever-increasing waves since Marshal Pétain signed the armistice, and Jews, communists, blacks, homosexuals, gypsies, and all the other ugly misfits who in his opinion, like Hitler’s, had no place in society.

He checked his pocket watch he still used since the Great War.

The beauty of the watch face and the intricate craftsmanship of the gold casing still moved him when he looked at it.

He kept it on him at all times during the day and lay it on his bedside cabinet at night. It was his most treasured possession.

‘Josette!’ he called. When there was no response, he rose from his desk, irritation etched into his every feature. ‘Josette!’ his voice boomed beyond the door and into the reception area.

A petite, neatly dressed young woman came rushing over. ‘Yes, Monsieur Abadie? What may I do for you?’

‘You may come quicker when I call,’ he snapped.

The secretary apologised and looked downcast, as though she might burst into tears.

He held up his hand and tutted. ‘Alright, enough apologies and sad faces. Do better next time and I won’t need to scold you.’

He issued his order, and she scurried away. When she returned with his coffee in hand, she told him someone had arrived to see him.

Josette took care not to use the dirty word ‘informant’ even though she knew only too well, that was what was going on in her boss’s office.

She would have liked to leave the job, but her salary was all that was between her and her mother falling into poverty, so she shut up and did what he told her. He was not the type to risk insulting.

Privately, she dubbed him ‘Little Hitler,’ and her secret joke amused her.

It was a term she’d heard on a British radio broadcast in the early days of the war.

It was growing too dangerous to tune into any, but the official French permitted channels now.

But that’s what she called Armand, although she didn’t share her mockery with anyone else.

In wartime, it was best to keep such thoughts to oneself.

Armand drank his coffee, and it didn’t cross his mind for a second to offer refreshments to the informants.

After two more trickled in and out to report matters ranging from Jews, they believed should be arrested for flouting the latest statutes, to a discarded weapon left on his desk, wrapped in a muddy handkerchief, and found on the banks of the river.

‘I believe one of the Resistance rats dropped this,’ the man said, disdain spewing from every syllable.

He noted down the incidents and targets of the informants’ venom studiously in his lined blue notebook, which he had procured purely for this purpose.

He referred to it often and was pleased with the quality of intelligence he was collating.

Sometimes incidents and people cross-referenced when he looked back, and he had a growing number of suspects either under surveillance or in line for surveillance when resources permitted.

Armand assembled his own task force with Vichy head office’s blessing, and it was clear, at least to him, he was the only member of the Legion in the Toulouse branch who was making significant progress in rooting out traitors.

The rest of his colleagues of similar standing merely wiled away the time in uneventful long-winded meetings and dull lengthy lunches where they patted each other on the back for their performance in WW1 and found ways to exploit the current system.

Armand suspected some of them were in De Gaulle’s back pocket.

The time would come when Armand would have the ear of the Nazi leadership, and he would know exactly who had to go, so he was playing a game of stealth. Few would pass his loyalty test.

He called out to Josette that he wouldn’t be seeing any more informants until next week and she should not disturb him.

After closing his door, he pulled on the shutters, so the room was in shade, and put his feet up on his desk.

His head nestled comfortably into the back of his chair, which he’d taken from the spoils of a Jew’s requisitioned family home, and he drifted into a deep sleep within minutes, mouth open and snoring lightly.

He dreamt he was marching up the Champs-élysées in full battle dress, his tunic laden with medals glorifying his illustrious past. The Führer sat at the front of the parade and bestowed a new medal on him and thanked him for his service.

Then the dream morphed abruptly, and he saw the injured body of a young man in a trench. The man’s eyes rolled back in his head, and he clutched his chest where a knife was embedded deep in his flesh through the material of his uniform.

Armand still remembered the words Abraham muttered to him with his last breath. ‘ Shema Israel ,’ he gasped.

Armand had later found out what the words meant because no matter how he tried to dismiss Abraham’s death from his mind, the young Jew’s face wracked with pain haunted him.

He discovered that Shema Israel was the name of a Hebrew prayer: Hear O Israel . It was a plea to God that Jews recited, especially when in danger.

Armand’s head lolled to the side, jerking him awake, and his eyes peeled open. He rubbed his sore neck and coughed to clear his dry throat, spluttering.

The vision of Abraham’s lifeless staring eyes had forced his nap to an abrupt end. He removed his feet from the desk, straightened his uniform, and left the building without a word to anyone.

It was time for lunch at the Place du Capitole. Today, he would order something particularly delicious. He hoped he might see the man from the chateau with his lady wife. There was something about those two. He didn’t know what, but he would get to the bottom of it. He always did.

It was only a matter of time.