Code Name Hélène

In March 1943, Nancy attempts to contact O’Leary from the train station to let him know that she is going to Toulouse. She does not reach him, but she speaks with Françoise. When she gets off the train in Toulouse, the Vichy police arrest her and question her about where she is going and why. They accuse her of being a sex worker and slap her. After a few hours, O’Leary arrives and she is released from her cell, much to her relief.

Back in Marseille, Henri is drinking at the bar at the Hôtel du Louvre et Paix when Marceline arrives. She tells him she is working with the Vichy government and knows Nancy has left. Paquet arrests him and they put him in a police car.

O’Leary tells Nancy that he told the Vichy police that she was his mistress. He has fake papers saying he is a member of the Milice, the Vichy paramilitary fighting against the Resistance. Then he takes her to Françoise. The next day, O’Leary wakes her at dawn and tells her he is meeting a “new recruit” who may be an informant named Roger le Neveu. If he is not back by noon, she is to leave without him. Later that morning, Françoise tells her that O’Leary was arrested by the Gestapo at the meeting and is being sent to the concentration camp at Dachau.

On July 1, 1944, Nancy wakes up very sore and is told that a Colonel Pierre Segal is here to see “Madame Andrée.” Colonel Segal says he is there to take over command of the camp under the orders of Charles de Gaulle. Nancy tells him, “I will not fund you or provide arms to you or anyone in your command. I answer to London only. Not de Gaulle. And certainly not you. Now leave my camp” (345). After he leaves, Nancy tells everyone that they need to get one last large airdrop of supplies and then split up. Jacques, Louis, Hubert, Denis, and Nancy will go with their men to Montluçon to meet up with Tardivat. As they discuss their plans, Louis arrives and tells them that three women, German spies, have been found in Gaspard’s camp.

Nancy questions the first two women. One of them tells her she was sexually assaulted by five men in Gaspard’s camp. She directs Hubert to bring her the men and to send the women home. Then she realizes the third woman is Marceline. Gaspard and Judex come to the tent, furious, and she tells them she will be executing his men for their actions. Three of the men escape, but two are captured and held while they wait for a firing squad. Nancy questions Marceline, who tells her she was sent to kill Nancy under orders of Paquet.

On March 4, 1943, Nancy is on the train to Perpignan when a railway official warns them that the Gestapo is going to stop and search the train. Nancy and her three companions jump off the train. As they run away, the Gestapo shoots at them with machine guns. She has left everything on the train, but at least she is alive.

Meanwhile, Henri is chained up naked in Fort Saint-Nicholas. Marceline tells him that they are looking for a woman named the White Mouse, who has “a five-million-franc price on her head” (356). She tells him that she knows that Nancy is the White Mouse and that she has been keeping the information to herself in the hopes that Henri will agree to be with her. He refuses, and when Paquet comes into the room, Marceline tells Paquet Nancy Fiocca is the White Mouse.

Nancy walks to Perpignan and meets her contact, Bastian. He tells her to rest until their group leaves at midnight. At midnight, they walk to the edge of town and then hide in a coal lorry to get through the military zone. About an hour later, they stop at a farmhouse where they are to sleep until their guides across the mountains meet them at dawn. Early in the morning, Jean and Pilar meet the group and they begin the trek across the mountains. As the hike goes on, the group realizes they have been infected with scabies from their stay in the barn. Eventually, hungry and cold, the group reaches the other side of the mountains and the border with Spain.