It was two weeks since the rubbish had been collected and a nauseating haze hung over the quarter. The Zonards waited stoically for the municipal sanitary services to carry out their irregular cleaning operations but there was a lack of labour and the Zone was their last consideration.
Ennis watched the Clodos digging in the heaps that lay on every street corner. The population he saw was mostly composed of old people, sick, lame, with few children. It was if he was in slums of Calcutta or Cairo. The women were working at their menial jobs in the hotels, restaurants and prestige business offices of the City whilst the older men worked in the sanitary municipal services and other lowly jobs that the Gallos refused.
The Zonard workers were subject to quotas in the different districts of the City avoiding the potential risk of their concentration. Besides there were few healthy young men admitted to the Zone and even fewer into the City, they were considered as an unnecessary and undesirable risk.
Swarms of huge black flies took off as the Clodos and scavengers advanced through the garbage. Abandoned children searched for food in the bins of the miserable cafés and greasy spoons.
The old autobuses rumbled past spitting a nauseous cloud of black smoke from a mixture of half burned bio-fuel and recycled oil from their tired motors, a smoke that ate into the filthy black stone facades of the buildings. The streets were an advanced state of disrepair, there were huge pot holes filled with pools of filthy black water that leaked up from the broken sewers.
Many of those in the crowd were in an advanced state of pauperisation, men looked furtively at each pile of rubbish in the hope of finding something that would change their dismal day and women looked at the merchandise on the dilapidated stalls in the desperate hope of finding something affordable to feed their family.
Ennis was overwhelmed by the misery of the vision before him, men, women and children excluded without rights or hope, driven out of their homes by men like Boublil into a ghetto where they were parked and exploited waiting for a permanent solution.
The solution was the great question that occupied France and its government over the preceding decade, as did its ‘lost provinces’ as had Alsace Lorraine after its loss to the Prussians in the nineteenth century.
Ennis had difficulty in deciphering the rusted enamelled panel that hung on the brick wall at a crazy angle on the corner of the Rue Avron and Rue de la Volga. On the small square lay the carcase of a van that had been transformed into a shelter for two aging Alcolos who watched Ennis with an air of suspicion.
The buildings were in ruins, windows were broken, there were holes in the rendering of facades, and the paint peeling off doors. Grass and weeds grew in the cracks on the balconies, the blinds and shutters had ceased to work years before. The pavement was in a state of advanced disrepair and the gutters were flooded with wastewater that flowed from the broken pipes from the old apartment buildings and derelict shops.
A snotty child appeared from nowhere and pulled his sleeve and pointed to a slim young man who stood casually by a doorway.
Ennis waited a moment and then followed the young man down a side street along the broken pavement, past the ruins of shops with their rusting metal blinds closed and the piles of bricks and burnt facades. After thirty metres or so he slipped into the doorway of a very run down building. Ennis hesitated in the sombre door.
“Welcome to our modest refuge,” a voice said in the half-light.
Ennis straining his eyes could make out face of his follower it was determined but wore a sad smile.
“Welcome John Ennis, welcome to the Front.”
“Ah, the Front.”
“Yes the Republican Resistance Front, we welcome all fighters to our battle for the Restoration of the Republic. No more questions, just follow me,” he said softly placing a finger on his lips. He turned and disappeared into the dark hallway.
He followed him up a staircase half blocked with debris and old papers. The first floor was covered with old wood planks and rusting pipes. A door slammed.
Guiglione had not spoke of the movement and though there was a nagging doubt about the meaning of ‘battle’ Ennis felt that he was in safe hands for the moment.
“Let me introduce myself, I’m Philippe,” said the young man softly. “We are going to help you so that you can tell the world the truth about the le Martel’s France.”
He nodded and waited unsure of himself.
“But before you will see how those expelled have been replaced by a new sub-population excluded politically and economically, without the most basic human rights.” He slowly looked left and right. “They are described by that criminal Boublil and his cronies as Clodos and Drogo-alcolos, parked in the Paris Zone and the other Zones surrounding Paris, waiting for his solution.”
The great artisan of the Ethnicity laws was Henri Boublil who obeyed the war cry of the Renaissance Party ‘the Nation the Motherland of the Gallic race will never be abandoned to the foreigner’.
Ennis could not help a rising feeling that he was a political hostage but now on the other side on the Barrier.
“We most be most careful, Boublil’s Zionist agents are everywhere even here in the Zone.”
“Zionists!”
“Yes, Paris is full of Jews, led by Boublil and his torturers, it’s they who have imprisoned us in this ghetto!”
Albignac’s Plan
Le Martel’s government had clamped a censure on the repeated attacks and incursions into France from Algharb by terrorist groups, both Islamists and Republicans.
Le Martel had patiently rebuilt the Army of the Nation and the State Security Forces after years of decline and lack of funding under the defunct Republic. The state of decline of the Armed forces and its lack of will had been an important factor in the inability of its generals to prevent the Catastrophe. The Republic had perceived danger as beyond Europe and not within. For two generations the forces of law and order had been paralysed by legislation and political appeasement that had prevented them from executing their duty giving power to the forces of crime and disorder.
To John Ennis, Rudi Steubler was a typical German, pushy and full of himself, Rudi had his opinions and had no doubt that they were right but in spite of that Ennis found him likable.
“Let me tell you John, is the just the start. Le Martel and his followers have never accepted the loss of part of France and his intention is to take it back by whatever means necessary.”
“That won’t be so easy, he can’t wage war without the intervention of the Union.”
“That’s where you’re wrong he doesn’t need the Union, at least not all of it, but he is counting on the help of Germany.”
“Germany!”
“Right, our information is that Affentranger won’t oppose his plan, at least Germany won’t intervene, in fact Affentranger will support le Martel’s plan. Germany has its own problems, millions of jobs have disappeared in the last few years, he has to find a solution for the excess population.”
“How?”
“The rumours of Germany’s ambitions in Africa are not unfounded. It has been clear for some time that Affentranger is backing the South African government. Our sources indicate they will start by providing logistical assistance to help them to absorb Namibia and Botswana into the Republic of South Africa. Part of those territories will be conceded to Germany administration, which will provide colonists. The question is who are those colonists? Who wants to go to Namibia? What we think is that Affentranger is waiting for le Martel to announce his plan and when the dust starts to settle he will implement his own programme for South Africa using their own unemployed, though Germanised, population.”
“So that’s why they’ve increased military spending.”
“Yes, the Luftwaffe has acquired an additional fleet of long distance troop carriers, it’s easy to transport large numbers of troops to Windhoek, only a ten hour flight from Frankfurt.”
“But what has that got to do with Algharb, le Martel does not want those people?”
“No, for the same reasons as the Germans. But he wants his territory back so he has got to move them.”
“Where?”
“He’s going to ship them to the Mediterranean islands to give them their own country, a real country!”
“Mediterranean islands?”
“Corsica and Sardinia.”
“Corsica! Sardinia! But that’s crazy!”
“Think about it! It’s a great idea, real islands...surrounded by sea. Corsica has been nothing but a thorn in the side of France for more than fifty years, the independentists have never hesitated to use Algharb against Paris, it will be le Martel’s revenge!”
“But Sardinia?”
“No problem he’s made a deal with the Nova Fascists.”
“My God, won’t that mean civil war!”
“No ... Corsican trouble makers will be shipped to Senegal where their labour will be needed. As for the Insurgents if Corsica doesn’t appeal to them, they can take the short boat trip home to the Caliphate.”
“How can they ship eight million people to Corsica?”
“First, not all of them will go to Corsica, all the blacks will go to the new territories in Africa. Secondly, most of the Arabs and Islamists, about five million in all, will be shipped to Corsica. The plan will be carried out in phases, Algharb will be split into zones, the army will use ferries, troop carriers and the like. They estimate that the plan can be carried out in eighteen months, it even has a name, Transco, or