While Paris Slept

by Ruth Druart

  Terrified of being caught, Sarah slipped out of the queue, glancing around to check that no one was looking. Only Madeleine, a few places behind her in the queue, had noticed, and Sarah felt her friend’s eyes piercing her back as she sneaked off. Any secrets here were best kept locked away in your heart. They had ways to extract information. Terrifying screams often pierced the dark, empty nights.

  A shiver ran down her back as she bent over the lump of bread. The edge of a piece of paper was just visible. Not wanting to waste precious food, she carefully sucked off the stale bread till she could pull the paper out easily. She squinted as she read the writing: Love of my life, you did the right thing. You are brave and true. Stay alive. We will find our son again.

  Tears fell onto the note, making the words run. She wondered what he’d had to do for such a dangerous favor. Pushing the damp paper back into the bread, she ate it slowly. Now David was with her. She would carry him around and he would nourish her more than food ever could. “I will survive. I will get through this,” she whispered to herself.

  Madeleine was suddenly next to her. “What are you doing?” She frowned at Sarah. “Don’t you want the soup?” She raised her spoon, letting the pale, watery liquid fall back into the bowl. “It’s crème de cabbage again.” Her ironic smile didn’t reach her eyes. “You haven’t lost your spoon, have you?”

  “No.” Sarah lifted her top, showing her spoon, which was attached with a piece of old string. She’d had to save her bread for two days to get the flimsy metal implement, but it had been worth it. You couldn’t eat the soup without a spoon.

  “Are you ill?” Madeleine reached out, feeling Sarah’s forehead.

  “No. I’ll get some now.” Sarah walked away quickly before she was tempted to tell her about the message. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust her friend. She did. But she knew they could do things to you that could make you betray even those closest to you.

  The sun shone bright, as if mocking them in their misery. Their thirst was intolerable. Sarah’s jaws felt locked together and her teeth like they were glued to her cheeks. Thirst could drive you mad, and it became an obsession for her. She dreamed of water, she longed for it night and day, would have paid any price for it. One especially hot day, she managed to trade some bread she had saved for a bucket of water. She plunged her head into the bucket and drank it all down. After that, she felt better and the obsession lifted.

  It wasn’t possible to survive alone, not when something as commonplace as losing your shoes meant being sent straight to the gas chambers; after all, it was easier to replace women than shoes. Sarah had a close group of friends, Madeleine, Simone—someone Madeleine knew from her neighborhood—and the young girl from the train, Cecile. They supported one another, and the older women looked out for Cecile, especially during the interminable roll calls. Often they were woken at three in the morning and marched outside, but they wouldn’t be counted till dawn broke. When one of them felt too weak to stand, the other women would gather around to hold her up. When they were finally marched away, there were always bodies strewn across the ground. They would be shot if they weren’t already dead. Sarah scrunched up her eyes when she heard the guns, but never looked back at the fallen women.

  After roll call, they were marched through swampy fields for two hours, then given shovels and hods—wheelbarrows without wheels, which had to be loaded and carried to a ditch to be emptied. All day, except for a break for the watery soup at midday, they dug and lifted and carried. It was backbreaking, but if they paused for a minute, the guards would send the dogs over to snap and bite at their heels, or come themselves to deliver blows. As they worked, they had to listen to shouts and cries of pain, while the guards stood around chatting in groups, even laughing. By the end of the day, they were feverish, and some had dropped, never to get up again. But Sarah and her group of friends always tried to find one another, supporting each other as they began the long march back, the strongest singing “La Marseillaise,” the others joining in if they could. Some days, they didn’t sing at all.

  One evening on their way back, the male prisoners passed in front of them. Sarah desperately scanned them, searching for David. But he wasn’t there. A deep fear gripped her intestines. What if he’d died? How could she survive then?

  As one of the prisoners walked by her, he dropped something at her feet. A pair of woolen socks. She picked them up, stuffing them under her striped dress. Back at the barracks, she took them out and a piece of paper fell from them. Just three words were written on it: Don’t give up. It looked like David’s writing, but she couldn’t be sure. Please, God, she prayed, keep him alive.

  It was clear from the outset that many of the women would die. It was too degrading, too shocking for lots of them to bear. Even going to the latrine was taking a risk with your life, as it meant wading through excrement and crouching over a long open sewer, trying not to fall in. Some had neither the strength nor the desire to adapt to this hell, but Sarah had both. Though her body was shrinking as if feeding on itself, and her breasts had disappeared, her determination to find Samuel gave her the strength to carry on when others dropped.

  While they toiled and fought for their lives on a daily basis, winter drew in. If they fell at roll call now, even if they were picked up afterward, it still meant death. There was no way to change the wet, muddy clothes that froze to their backs. The fate of each one of them depended on those around them, and individualism disappeared. It was this that kept them going. On the raw edge of survival, they rose to do things they never would have believed themselves capable of. Life wasn’t so much about friendship. It was about solidarity.

  Sarah was growing weak. Open sores on her back had become infected. Simone was a dentist for the SS guards and so was able to get extra items of clothing and even medicine from the place they nicknamed “Canada”—so called because they imagined Canada to be a land of unimaginable plenty. She bathed Sarah’s sores in disinfectant when she could get some, but they just wouldn’t heal. Then one day she came with good news. She had managed to get Sarah a job at the infirmary, scaring the rats away from the living and carrying the dead outside. Rats thrived at Auschwitz, and some had reached the size of cats. They even dared to bare their teeth at Sarah as she raised the spade to chase them away. At first, she couldn’t stand to look at them and just waved the spade wildly in an attempt to disperse them, but she soon grew braver, and after two weeks she even killed one, smashing it on the head as it stood on its back legs, staring at her defiantly. It gave her a rush of pride, making her feel powerful in this world where she had no more value than the rats. It was the rat or her, and she had won.

  When she carried the dead outside, she held her breath and closed her eyes, but still it made her retch. If only she could have covered them in sheets or something, it would have helped, but their starved bodies were naked as she took them to the dumpster. How could she do such a thing? Shouldn’t she have refused? Let herself be sent to the gas chambers rather than treat the dead with such disrespect? If it hadn’t been for the thought of Samuel, she might have, but now she had a duty to survive.

  The job saved her from working outside through the harsh winter months, and also gave her the opportunity to steal medical supplies. If she were caught, it would mean instant death, but when Cecile fell ill, she had no choice. The poor child’s fever was burning her up, and she could no longer stand during roll call. They had to cluster around her, propping her up. It was probably typhoid, and only antibiotics could save her. Sarah knew that they were kept in the glass cabinet in the room where operations were carried out. It was normally empty at lunchtime; all she had to do was sneak in there and grab a couple of pills. But the day she planned to do it, the guards didn’t leave the room. There was always someone in there.

  When she got back to the barracks that evening, Cecile was delirious with fever, imagining that she was back home with her family. She held on to Simone. “Maman!” she cried. “I thought you’d left me.”r />
  “You have to get them tomorrow.” Simone looked at Sarah over the top of the child’s head.

  Sarah nodded, determined to find a way.

  But the next day came and went and still the room was never empty. She couldn’t get the drugs. How could she?

  Distraught, she returned to her block that evening. Simone saw her coming and held her arms out to her. “It’s too late,” she whispered. “She’s gone.”

  Cecile’s death affected them deeply. They hadn’t managed to protect the child. Their guilt at having outlived her ate into them all. They stopped singing, and instead of telling one another stories like they used to in the evenings, they hung around other groups, always on the outside looking in.

  They couldn’t go on like this. Sarah understood that they mustn’t give in to apathy; they couldn’t let themselves become like the “musulmen”—those poor creatures with the blank look in their eyes, more dead than alive.

  It was all part of the Nazis’ plan to rid them of their humanity. She wondered if it helped them to no longer see their prisoners as human. How else could they treat them as they did? And on this scale? Beating them, torturing them, murdering them. How had it become possible? These questions spun around and around in her head. No one in the normal world would be capable of imagining how far human beings could sink. She wondered if people would even believe them if by some miracle they ever got out alive.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Auschwitz, January 1945

  SARAH

  Sarah had been at Auschwitz for seven and a half months. She felt like she had aged seventy years. She was no longer the same person. She walked like a long-term prisoner, her head and shoulders stooped forward, pulling the weight of her diminished body, her legs shapeless and swollen, her lips red from bleeding gums. There were no mirrors, of course, but she knew this was how she looked, because they all looked the same.

  The snow had been falling for weeks now, maybe months. It seemed like forever. She was terrified David would catch pneumonia and be sent to the ovens, but he seemed to have good contacts. He managed to send messages to her every few weeks, and she sent her own whenever she could get something from Canada to pay the messenger.

  Rumors were rife all through the winter—the Allies were coming, the Red Cross was negotiating for their freedom, the Russians were on their way—but they never came to anything. Then one night in January they heard artillery in the distance. Sarah and her friends sat up in their bunks, hugging one another tightly. Could they dare let themselves hope? They didn’t sleep the rest of that night, excitement running through their tired veins.

  The next day, Sarah went to the infirmary as usual. The doctor was talking to the patients when she arrived. “Tomorrow night the camp will be evacuated. The sick will remain here.”

  Her heart sank; they were to be sent somewhere else before they could be freed. She watched as some of the sick tried to scramble out of bed, desperate not to be left behind for the Nazis to shoot. Others too ill or too numb to care didn’t move or speak. Sarah collected as many blankets as she could and ran back to her block to warn the other women.

  “They’ll shoot anyone left behind.” Madeleine held on to Sarah’s shoulders. “They won’t want any witnesses. And where will they take us? Do you know?”

  “No. But I brought blankets. We still need clothes, or we’ll die of cold. And shoes! We must have shoes!”

  The guards spent the day burning documents, then they made the prisoners clean out the blocks. “We don’t want them to think you lived like pigs,” they screamed.

  Early the next morning, long before sunrise, thousands of them were marched to the gates. Little more than skeletons, they’d covered themselves in layer upon layer of clothing or blankets, slumping under the weight like exhausted old donkeys. The searchlights came on. Hundreds of SS guards and their dogs surrounded them. The snow continued to fall. “Schnell! Hurry! Hurry! Fall into ranks!”

  The gates to the camp opened.

  Block by block they marched out. Sarah’s group had to wait for the forty or so blocks in front of them to leave before they could get going. She fingered the bread in her pocket. No. Later, she told herself. You’ll need it later. She knew there would be no food or water for the prisoners. What would the guards care if they died in the snow? It would probably suit them—save them the job of killing them.

  “Faster! Faster! You filthy flea-ridden dogs.”

  They all began to run. The blood pumped through Sarah’s veins, warming her up, energizing her tired organs. Her heart beat hard. She was alive! They were leaving Auschwitz and she had survived!

  Like a machine, they marched on and on. They had to keep up or they’d be killed. Many shots rang out on the long march; anyone who tried to run off into the woods was instantly shot, as were those who got left behind, or those who fell, though they were usually just trampled over in the stampede. One foot in front of the other—it was all she had to do. Keep going. But she was so thirsty, so hungry, so tired. A girl near her scooped a handful of snow off the coat of the woman in front, shoving it into her mouth without pausing in her stride. Sarah copied her, holding it in her mouth as it melted. Then she fingered the bread in her pocket again, but she might need it later, tomorrow even. They had no idea how long they would have to go without food.

  More people began to collapse into the snow, giving in to the release of death. The rest marched over or around them. There was no choice—it was a matter of survival. Sarah wondered what kind of a person she would be if she survived now. “Don’t think. Just keep going,” she whispered into the dark. “You have to live.” But the thought of death lingered on. To no longer exist. To cease to be. No more pain. No cold. No exhaustion. Nothing. She was near to giving in, but she knew David was out there somewhere. She could hear his voice whispering in her head. Sarah, Sarah. Love of my life. Come and find me. Find me.

  Without thinking, she tried to break ranks to run ahead. She had to get to him.

  A blow to her head sent her reeling. She closed her eyes as she collapsed into the snow. The soft whiteness felt like a blanket welcoming her. At last, she could sleep. She buried her face in its coolness, knowing she would find David again in her dreams.

  Then hands were pulling her up. “Sarah! Get up!” Simone’s face swam into view.

  “Let me sleep.” Her head was too heavy for her body. She just wanted to slip into oblivion. But where was David? Had she found him? “David. Where is David?”

  “He’s here somewhere. Get up! You need to find him.”

  Sarah felt another pair of hands reach under her arms, pulling her up. A shot rang out, then another. The sound reverberated through her shivering body. She hadn’t died. She had to stay in this world. Whatever happened, she had to keep going—had to forget her feeble body and let her spirit take her. God, carry me through this, she prayed. With the aid of the women on each side of her, she mustered all her strength, ignoring the throbbing in her head, and pulled herself up out of the snow. Kissing her friends on their cold lips, she murmured, “You will live. Promise me you will live!”

  They dragged her forward, and that was their answer. Together they stumbled, they tried to run. At last the sun came up, but it brought no warmth. An icy wind cut through their layers of clothes, slicing through their skin, into their weak and tired bones. Many more women dropped.

  “You’ve done twenty kilometers!” the Kommandant shouted. They had reached an abandoned village, not a soul in sight. “Time for a rest.”

  They crowded into a large building, the roof fallen in. Inside, the snow was thick, but they were sheltered from the cruel wind. Prisoners dropped down into piles, asleep before they hit the ground. But Sarah had to keep going. She had to find David. If she slept, she would die. So she left her group, clambering over bodies, through rooms with broken walls. “David! David!” she called out. If she didn’t find him now, she wouldn’t be able to go on. She had no force left. “David!” Her voice grew weaker
as she searched for him in the blanket of faces.

  “Sarah!”

  It was him! Blood pumped through her veins again. She had found him! The voice was coming from a pile of bodies propped against a wall. She ran toward them.

  It was his eyes she saw first. His dark brown eyes shining out from a sea of snow. She threw herself at him, covering him with her body, her hands reaching for his face. She gripped it in her bony fingers, looking into his eyes. “Is it you? Is it really you?”

  “Sarah, you found me.”

  Chapter Fifty

  Santa Cruz, July 10, 1953

  JEAN-LUC

  After they let him telephone Charlotte, Bradley and the two officers left the interview room, locking it on their way out. Jean-Luc has been sitting there for what feels like hours, but when he looks at his watch, he sees it’s only been fifty minutes. He’s desperate to get to Charlotte. He should never have broken the news to her like that, on the phone. What was he thinking of? It must have been the shock. The guilt.

  An officer he hasn’t seen before enters the room. “You’re on a flight tomorrow morning. You can go home, pack a bag, then you have to come straight back here.”

  “But I haven’t seen a lawyer. I want to see a lawyer.”

  “A lawyer can’t help you. We’re sending you back to France. You can have one when you get to France.”

  “But… but what about my rights?”

  A smile stretches across the officer’s face. “Mr. Bow-Champ, I don’t think you understand the seriousness of your crime. And we have no reason nor wish not to comply with the French. It will be up to them now to decide if it was kidnapping or… something else. The matter is out of our hands. We’ll take you home now; you can have ten minutes to pack.”