“That’s interesting,” she murmured to herself.
“What?” Daniel asked, sounding vaguely annoyed.
“We’re passing the twelve stations of the cross.”
“What’s that?”
“They represent Jesus’s final hours to his crucifixion.”
From the front seat, Franc turned around and asked, “Do you know the story of Mont Sainte-Odile?”
“No, please tell me.” Slim put her hand around Daniel’s sweaty neck in an attempt to steady him as she responded.
“It was operated both as a convent and a monastery dating back to the seventh century. It’s surrounded by ten kilometers of walls,” Franc began.
“Who was Sainte Odile?” Slim asked.
“Yes, what’s her grim story?” Daniel asked wryly.
“Sainte Odile of Alsace was born blind to a noble family. Her father rejected her because she was a girl, so her mother had her brought up by peasants. When she was twelve, she was baptized and regained her sight. Her younger brother brought her home, but this angered her father so much that he killed his son in a fit of rage. She was able to revive her brother, but then fled and hid in a cave. Time went by, her father fell ill, and she went back to nurse him. He finally accepted and rewarded his daughter by building the monastery and convent. She lived there until her death.”
“I imagine Mont Sainte-Odile has many visits from pilgrims who are seeking to restore their sight,” Slim noted.
“Yes, of course, but the monastery is also known for something else.”
“What?” Slim asked.
“How well do you know Catholicism?” Franc asked.
“Fairly well. I was brought up Catholic,” Slim replied.
“Inside the chapel, there is a twenty-four-hour Eucharist devotion presided over by the faithful.”
“What in God’s name is that?” Daniel said with his head between his knees.
“The host, or the Eucharist, as it is called, is displayed on an altar and worshiped by the faithful. The devotion was started in 1933,” Franc explained.
“The year the Nazis took power,” Slim noted.
“Yes, Alsace was given to the French after World War I because the Austro-Hungarian Empire no longer existed, but all bets were off once the Nazis took power.”
“So you’re telling me that people have prayed continuously to a piece of bread since 1933?” Daniel asked.
“Yes, and they also prayed to Sainte Odile for sight, but in this case, people prayed for more than just sight. They prayed for insight,” Franc said.
“And they didn’t stop after the war?” Slim asked.
“How could they, after all the atrocities that had happened? Ah, here we are.” He parked the car outside the walls. “It is not permitted for me to drive inside the gates.”
Slim helped Daniel out of the backseat. He leaned against the car. “Give him some water,” Franc said, handing Slim a thermos.
Daniel took a sip and coughed. They waited a couple of minutes until Daniel was ready, and then they walked into the cobblestone courtyard and saw a statue of a nun in the center.
“That is Saint Odile. Look at the book she is holding. Do you see the two eyes carved on the cover? It is so the blind may find the knowledge they seek.”
“This view is incredible,” Slim said, more interested in looking beyond the walls.
“You can see Alsace, Struthof, the Rhine, the Black Forest to the east, and the Vosges Mountains to the west. Today, since there are no clouds, you can see out to more than a hundred and fifty villages.” Franc pointed out each region.
“May I help you?” A monk approached them.
“I am just showing some friends around,” Franc explained.
“I am sorry, Mont Sainte-Odile is closed today. Perhaps it is possible for you to come back tomorrow?” the monk said.
“I’d like to speak to the head rector alone. Is that possible?” Slim asked.
“Is there something I can help you with, Madam?” asked the monk.
“How long have you been here?” Slim asked.
“This December will make it a year, Madam.”
“I need to speak with someone who was here during the war years. It is of the utmost importance,” Slim said with an air of urgency. She didn’t want to wait until Mont Sainte-Odile was open to pilgrims. She wanted to find out if Marie Claire was still alive today.
“Then you need to speak to the rector, Madame. If you wait here with your companions, I will find out whether that is possible. What is your name?”
Slim told him, and he left.
“Do you think they’ll tell you whether Marie Claire is here or not?” Daniel asked, the color beginning to return to his face.
“I won’t find out unless I ask.”
“True.” He looked around and shrugged. “I never really understood these kinds of places.”
“What? Monasteries and convents? What don’t you understand?”
“Why would you want to spend your whole life praying to a piece of bread?”
“That piece of bread symbolizes the body of Christ. Regarding this monastery and convent, I think for some, it’s a means of escape from the world that is too chaotic to make sense. My belief in God tells me—”
“How can you believe in God after all that’s happened?” Daniel interrupted her before she could finish.
“God was not responsible for what happened during the war. Man was. Man has free will,” Slim said, quoting Catholic doctrine.
“Free will? I hope that’s what it is. If there were a God, the Allies would have bombed the train tracks to Auschwitz. There is no God. There is nothing. Praying to a piece of bread twenty-four hours a day couldn’t prevent the murder of six million people in the war. Praying is futile.”
“The war ended,” Slim pointed out.
“The war ended because Hitler invaded Russia and the United States entered into the conflict.” Daniel looked at her. “Wait a second. You don’t believe in all this mumbo jumbo, do you?”
“God is the construct on which I’ve built my belief system.”
“If you had been in Auschwitz, you would know there is nothing to build a belief system upon.”
Daniel walked away, and Slim was left alone. She wondered if she could be married to a man who was as reactive as Daniel. If they had children, she would want them raised in faith, be it hers or his. As she watched a nun walk across the courtyard and head into the Chapel of Tears, Slim understood why someone like Marie Claire might seek solace within these walls.
Ten minutes later, the monk returned and motioned for Slim to go toward him. “The rector will see you. However, he is elderly and sick, so please, if you could, keep the visit short.”
“Of course, thank you so much for helping me,” Slim said.
He led her through a side door into the Hohenburg Abbey and then walked her down an arched hallway to a battered wooden door held together with iron braces. The monk unlatched the door and led Slim inside. The rector was seated in a wheelchair with a blanket around his knees, warming himself by a fire roaring in an enormous stone hearth. He looked toward his visitor and smiled weakly. “I wish, my child, that I could stand to greet you, but alas, my legs are like toothpicks, ready to snap.”
“Thank you for seeing me, Father.”
“Sit, child. Would you care for some tea?”
Slim nodded and took a cup gratefully. “I will serve myself, if that is all right, Father.” She poured the fragrant liquid into a simple earthenware mug.
“Now tell me, my dear, what brings you to the abbey today? I was told that only I could help you. So how may I be of service?”
“Father, is it true that you were here during the war years?”
The wizened man nodded. “Yes, I was here during those dark years.”
“Father, was a young woman brought to your abbey by a doctor from the Natzweiler camp?”
“Why do you want to know?”
“I was hired to fin
d her.”
“You are a private detective?” He arched his left eyebrow, not quite believing her.
“My job is to find lost people. The woman I am trying to find was a spy for Britain during the war. She was captured and sent to Natzweiler. The doctor who was supposed to kill her said he brought her here. Her name was Marie Claire. Was she brought here, and if so, do you know what became of her?”
“I am sorry, no one was brought here from Natzweiler.”
“Are you sure?”
There was a long pause, and then the rector said, “Child, I may be old, even ancient, but my mind is as sharp as a tack.”
Slim could see that she had offended the elderly monk and said apologetically, “Forgive me, Father, I didn’t mean to question your memory.”
“‘Forgive me, Father,’ the first words of confession.” He smiled kindly. “Are you a Roman Catholic, my child?”
“I am.” Slim still considered herself Catholic, despite or perhaps because of her failings. “Can you help me find Marie Claire, Father?”
“I wish I could assist you, my dear child, I do, but I cannot give you information about something I know nothing about.”
“Could anyone else be of service to me?”
“Do you mean was anyone else here then?”
“Like one of the nuns, perhaps?”
“Child, there haven’t been nuns in Mont Sainte-Odile for centuries. Only monks reside here.”
Slim looked at him quizzically. She’d just seen a nun hurrying across the courtyard. Why was the rector lying?
Disappointed she had hit another dead end, she stood up. “Thank you for the tea, Father. I am sorry you can’t help me. You were my last hope, but alas, some people remain lost. Others don’t want to be found. It is a shame, though, because Marie Claire’s mother’s dying wish is to see her daughter. I wish you a good day, Father.”
Slim tried to see if her little speech had moved the rector, but his face remained implacable. “I am very sorry that I cannot help you, my child. However, on your way out, you might want to stop at the Chapel of Tears.”
“Isn’t that where the perpetual adoration of the Eucharist is?”
“How did you know about that?”
“My friend who drove me up here said it started in 1933, the year the Nazis came to power.”
“Yes, we hoped that people would feel God’s presence, even if it felt like the Almighty had abandoned us.”
“Some say he did. I have a friend who was the only one of his family to survive Auschwitz; he said God didn’t exist there.”
“The Almighty Father gave us free will.”
“Yes, I know the Catholic argument . . .”
“Child, it is not an argument; it is church doctrine. Perhaps you can pray for your friend so that he may regain his faith.”
“He’s Jewish.”
“We are all children of God. He hears all of our prayers.”
“Then why is he so helpless to answer them?”
The rector sighed. “I don’t know. Maybe the human race has to bring Earth close enough to hell so that we may rise to discover our goodness.”
“Good day, Father, and thank you.” Slim bowed slightly.
“Good day, my child.” He turned toward the fire and lifted his shaky hands to warm them.
Slim walked out into the courtyard and thought of the nun hurrying past her several minutes before. Could that be Marie Claire? She pushed open the heavy wooden door of the Chapel of Tears. The murmuring prayers of pilgrims greeted her, praying in shifts to the Eucharistic host, held up by a gold stand and illuminated by candles. Before the altar, a nun knelt, reciting the rosary. Slim made her way up the aisle, genuflected, and knelt beside her.
“Marie Claire?”
The nun stopped mid-prayer, looked at Slim, and said, “What took you so long?”
Chapter Fourteen
1949
An hour later, they were sitting on a blanket, having a picnic lunch that Marisol had packed for them. The men had gone for a hike, leaving the two women alone.
“I guess you want to know why I never left Mont Sainte-Odile,” Marie Claire said. “I could have left anytime. At first, I stayed because the war was still going on, and then I found peace here. I didn’t want to leave.”
“Dennis and the others knew where you were all the time, didn’t they? That’s why they kept feeding me misinformation, isn’t it?” Slim asked.
“Yes, they all knew, except Amelie.”
“Did you know Amelie betrayed you?”
“Yes, I believed she did. I certainly gave her a good enough reason. Do you know why she did it?”
“Because you were sleeping with Françoise Derrain,” Slim said.
“You know that?” Marie Claire asked, surprised.
“Françoise works for me. She recognized you from the photo Miss Chapman showed me.”
“I wanted to punish Amelie. I wanted her to be tortured by the idea that I had been killed by her carelessness. By now, I have forgiven her for what she did, and I want to tell her that.”
“You can’t, Sister, she’s dead. She hanged herself after she thought you were burned alive in Natzweiler.”
Marie Claire gasped and wound her rosary beads tighter around her hands until her knuckles became white.
“Sister, she was a very ill woman. Yes, she was haunted by her betrayal of you, but she was also very sick.”
“I blame myself. I should’ve forgiven her long ago; I should’ve—”
“Sister, she sent Miss Chapman a series of messages in code, pretending to be you. That’s why Miss Chapman hired me; she thought she was receiving messages from you.”
“What did the messages say?” Marie Claire asked.
“‘You said you’d find me.’ Amelie also tried to kill me. She was very ill, and I didn’t realize how disturbed she was until she hanged herself.”
“But still, I should’ve . . .”
“She might have been relieved, or she might have tried to kill you as well. Who knows? She was unpredictable, and Françoise found out she had been in and out of mental hospitals since the war ended. Turning you in became an obsession, a focus for her illness. You weren’t the cause of it. Now I can understand you not wanting Amelie to know if you were alive or dead, but why not let Miss Chapman know? Do you think she was the mole? Dennis does.”
“Dennis thought she was. I didn’t contact her because I knew she’d contact my mother.”
“But didn’t you want your mother to know you were alive?” Slim asked, incredulous.
“I know this is probably hard for you to understand, but I’ve taken care of my mother since I was seven years old. If I told Chapman that I was alive, I would have to go back to my mother. I would have to leave my work. I don’t just lead the devotionals to the Eucharist; I work in the orphanage in our village. It’s not an ordinary orphanage; we have children who are either mentally retarded by birth or who have been made severely disturbed by the war. The children are my life. If my mother found out that I was alive, I’d have to leave them. I wanted my life to mean something after all the carnage. So how did you find me, Miss Moran?”
“Dr. Brandt.”
“Dr. Brandt is still alive? I thought he’d been executed after the war.”
“He escaped and is living as a monk.”
“I don’t know why he helped me, but he did, and I am here. If my mother is dying, then I’d like to see her.”
“I can arrange that,” Slim said.
“I’d also like to see Chapman.”
“I think she’d like to see you.”
Marie Claire reached into the side pocket of her habit and pulled out a dragon pin made of blue rhinestones.
“What’s that?”
“It’s something I need to give back.”
“Whose pin is it?”
“Chapman’s. She gave it to me the night I took off for France.”
England, 1942
Inside the airplane hangar,
Chapman did the final check on Marie Claire. Chapman always made sure that she was the last person her girls saw before they boarded the Lysander.
“What are you looking for?” Marie Claire asked as Chapman picked through her pockets.
“Anything that might reveal you’re from England: a matchbox, a label on your jacket, a scrap of paper, anything.”
She searched Marie Claire’s pocketbook next and then the suitcase with the wireless set.
“You’ll be picked up in a field outside of Paris by Invictus’s organizer, Dennis . . .”
“Yes, I know,” Marie Claire said, trying not to sound nervous.
“He will be with Invictus’s courier, Amelie.”
“Did you train Amelie as well?”
“No, Amelie is French. I don’t know her. Dennis recruited her.”
“You don’t seem to care for her.”
“I don’t know her. OK, I think you are ready to go.”
“I like your pin,” Marie Claire said, nodding to a blue rhinestone pin of a dragon’s head on Chapman’s lapel. “Where did you get it?”
“My father gave it to me. Our family crest is a dragon spitting fire. Here, why don’t you take it for good luck?”
“I couldn’t.”
“I’d like to give it you,” she said as she unpinned it from her lapel and put it on Marie Claire.
“But your father gave it to you,” Marie Claire protested.
“Yes, and now I’m giving it to you.”
“I don’t feel right about taking it.”
“How about we do this: I’ll loan it to you, and when you come back from France, you can give it back to me?”
A man ran in. “Ladies, the Lysander’s ready.”
“Are you ready, Marie Claire?”
“Yes, I am,” she said.
Marie Claire nodded, picked up her thirty-pound suitcase, and walked out of the hangar. She saw the full moon illuminating the Lysander and the pilot waving her forward.
“You promise you will find me if anything happens?”
“I promise.” Chapman kissed her on both cheeks and adjusted the dragon pin. “Bon chance.”
As the plane ascended, Chapman wondered if she’d ever see her again.
The Lost Spy (Slim Moran Mysteries) Page 24