The Children Return

by Martin Walker

Sami tugged at Bruno’s sleeve, looking confused, and asked, “Fabiola?”

  “… and with the violent rape of Iphigène Vaugaudry on or about May 10, 2006,” the procureur went on. “And with the attempted rape of Monique Jouard on March 2, 2007; each of these young women being in statu pupilari of you as an accredited member of the medical faculty of the University of Marseille and all the said offenses having been committed in that city.”

  “Fabiola?” Sami repeated. “He did bad thing to Fabiola?”

  “This is ridiculous,” Deutz declared calmly. “I demand to consult a lawyer.”

  “Yes, he did a very bad thing to Fabiola,” Bruno said distractedly to Sami, trying to pay attention to the drama before him.

  The procureur was stiff with anger, and Deutz was looking at him with his usual arrogance mixed with contempt. He was leaning against the battlements, hands still in his pockets, the picture of a man who might be the victim of some foolish misunderstanding but wasn’t in the least worried by it.

  “What did he do to Fabiola? He hurt her?”

  “Yes, he hurt her,” Bruno whispered, trying to shush Sami.

  Suddenly he felt Sami thrust Balzac into his arms and, before he could react, Sami had taken off like a sprinter, head down and arms pumping as he closed the ten or so meters between him and Deutz and launched himself at him. There was a sound like an ax striking flesh as Sami’s head collided with Deutz’s chin. Deutz reeled back, off balance and unable to steady himself with his hands tangled in his pockets. The back of his hips caught on the lower level of the wide battlements, and he began to topple backward as Sami held on to him.

  Bruno ran forward to grab them, but he lost a vital half second in putting Balzac down. Sami had the power of rage as his bare feet gripped the stone floor and powered on, his hands tight around Deutz’s neck and his height and momentum pressing Deutz farther back and farther back. Deutz’s legs slid out from under him, and he was about to go over the edge.

  Bruno launched a flailing dive in an attempt to grab Sami’s legs. But he was too late. His hand just brushed Sami’s heel as the young man went over the battlements still clutching at Deutz. Bruno landed hard, sliding forward, his head going into the stone wall. He groped a hand up, still groggy, and felt cloth and then a leg, sliding through his grip. Then he felt an ankle, gripped it hard and rolled to get his other hand onto the foot.

  He heard a high scream and then a thud and then a scrambling of bodies and other men were beside him, one of them in uniform, helping hold the weight that seemed to be hauling his arms from their sockets.

  “It’s all right, we’ve got him,” came the procureur’s voice.

  Bruno scrambled to his feet and joined the procureur and the soldier as they hauled Deutz back over the battlements. A long, keening cry came from just along the wall, where Momu was leaning out and staring down. His face ashen, Deutz crumpled in the arms of the two men who held him, trembling and panting as if he’d just run a race.

  “Can we get a doctor here?” the procureur cried.

  Knowing he had saved the wrong man, Bruno turned to the battlements and looked over at the sprawled and broken body in the courtyard nearly thirty meters below. Soldiers were running to the place where Sami lay, one of them the medic with his Red Cross armband. He knelt down, careless of the blood spreading from Sami’s head, and after a moment looked up and shook his head.

  From behind him, Bruno heard a short bark from Balzac and then, for the first time, the tone turned into the full-hearted, deep and mournful bay of an adult dog. As Bruno continued looking down and saw the soldiers drape a blanket over Sami’s corpse, he felt a cool wind on his face and the sky darkened. The sun had finally set.

  Epilogue

  It was a cold, gray November morning, and the German sky promised rain when the small passenger jet with the U.S. Air Force markings landed at the Ramstein Air Base. Three cheerful congressmen filed off first with their escorting officer, and Bruno brought up the rear. A minibus in air-force blue waited on the tarmac as the three men’s baggage was unloaded and they all climbed aboard, Bruno squeezing in beside a large man wearing a Stetson with a blue turquoise jewel at his collar instead of a tie. Bruno had learned he was a congressman from Arizona who seemed to know Nancy and described Bruno to the others on board as “the French cop who saved the life of Jeff Sutton’s little girl.”

  The caller from the embassy in Paris had told him to board the plane at Bergerac, where it would make a special stop for him on its journey from the French naval base at Toulon to Ramstein. Another U.S. military aircraft would take him back to Bordeaux airport that evening, he had been told, along with some American sailors who were doing an exercise on maritime patrols with the French navy. The minibus took them to the Landstuhl Medical Center and the congressmen each gave Bruno a crushing farewell handshake as they left with an army colonel who commanded the fifteen thousand personnel who ran the biggest military hospital in Europe. A young lieutenant with a clipboard came up to Bruno, who was wearing his full-dress police uniform as instructed, and asked, “Chief of Police Courrèges?”

  He led Bruno into a big concrete building, functional and depressing in its blocks of gray with slits for windows, and into a lobby with a bewildering array of signposts, most of them in acronyms. Bruno’s command of English was adequate to help lost tourists and record details of mislaid passports, but the jumble of speech coming from all the brisk American voices left him lost. He followed closely behind the lieutenant as people around them, some in military uniform, some in green or blue medical clothes, stared at his French uniform curiously.

  “This facility is one of the biggest organ donor centers in Europe,” the lieutenant said. “And we average two to three births a day.” Bruno murmured a polite acknowledgment, though he hardly understood. They took the stairs up to a long corridor as the lieutenant explained they preferred to reserve the elevators for wheelchairs and stretchers. They entered a lobby area with potted plants and soft music. Bruno thought it was quite a contrast with the grim French military hospital where he’d been taken after Sarajevo. Suddenly they were out of the fluorescent lights and walking past windows into a corridor with doors on each side like an apartment building. A reception desk guarded the way, but it was unoccupied. The lieutenant sighed, consulted his checklist and started looking for numbers. He stopped at 174-A and knocked.

  “Agent Sutton,” said the lieutenant, opening the door and showing Bruno inside.

  “Your visitor, ma’am,” he said, touching his cap, and left, closing the door behind him.

  Nancy was using a cane to rise from an easy chair by the large window that looked out onto a lawn and some trees. The light coming from it was bright enough that Bruno could hardly see her face. He advanced, saying something bland about how well she looked to conceal his nervousness, and kissed her on both cheeks.

  “I don’t think that will do, Bruno,” she said, and kissed him warmly on the lips. “I have a memory of you talking endlessly about kissing me and me thinking why doesn’t he just shut up and do it.”

  “I didn’t think the medic would have approved, given your condition.” He helped her back into her seat and pulled up a smaller straight-backed wooden chair to sit beside her. She gave off the scent of toilet soap and shampoo, almost austere amid the scents of flowers in the room. Her hair had been recently done and she was wearing makeup, which she had never worn at the château. It reminded him of the time he’d first seen her at the airport in Périgueux, when she had looked coolly elegant and Parisian, and rather forbidding. She was wearing a dark blue silk dressing gown. As she sat, she stretched out her legs to reveal ivory-colored silk pajamas and red velvet slippers.

  “You look wonderful, like the queen of a literary salon receiving her admirers. How do you feel? How long before they let you out of here?”

  “I’m well enough to get through dozens of layers of bureaucracy to get you here. How did you like the congressmen?”

  “They had v
ery impressive handshakes and were less self-important than our own politicians. They seemed to know my name.”

  “Yes, I made sure of that, and they were told what you did. And thank you for the flowers you sent.” She gestured around the room where every flat surface seemed to hold a vase, each with an impressive bouquet of roses, carnations, lilies or some exotic flowers he didn’t recognize.

  “I don’t think I sent all those,” he said. His own modest offering now seemed very much less than adequate.

  “Those roses are yours,” she said, pointing to a smaller vase with roses that were long past their best. “I refuse to throw them away. The brigadier sent some, and Isabelle. Most of the others are from Maya and Yacov. They send a new batch every week. What’s in that bag?”

  He’d almost forgotten, putting it to one side as he’d drawn up the chair. He felt confused by her presence, not sure what to say, nor what he should ask about her wounds and her future. The drama that had drawn them together in St. Denis and in the Rolls-Royce seemed a long time past.

  “Foie gras, a fresh baguette, a bottle of Château Tirecul Monbazillac that we ought to chill and a bottle of my own vin de noix to build you up.” He forced some jollity into his voice. “A glass each night as you go to bed and you’ll sleep well. At Bergerac airport I thought they might not let me onto the aircraft with them. A congressman from Arizona told them not to be so foolish.”

  “He’s a friend of my dad, who sends you his regards and thanks. It was kind of you to call him. You beat his official notification by two days, so he was here the day after my first operation.”

  She gave a nervous smile and asked if he’d like some coffee or a soda. Like him, she seemed to be on edge, wondering how this reunion might go.

  “I keep expecting one of the nurses to drop by,” she said, with a laugh that sounded forced. “They’re very curious about this dashing French visitor of mine.”

  “How many operations did you have?” he asked.

  “Four, one to put some reinforcement grafts on my artery and the rest on my knee. But I was lucky to have you and the medic on the chopper and to have Fabiola work on me when we landed. The doctors here were impressed with what she’d done. The artery is fine, and they’ve given me a new knee. I can stand and walk, and it gets better every day. They say I’ll soon be almost as good as new except that my skiing days are over. I’m doing physical therapy and swimming every day and they promise to have me home with my family for Christmas. I’ll even be able to dance.”

  “And then?” He swallowed, thinking his remarks sounded pathetic. He’d spent the flight composing far more eloquent speeches, and now he could barely summon a single word.

  “Three months’ convalescent leave and then back to the embassy in Paris. They want to capitalize on my new reputation with the French. Apparently the brigadier is being unusually helpful. But tell me about St. Denis. I heard about poor Sami. How are Momu and Dillah?”

  “They are still grieving, but they send you their best wishes. They know Sami thought of you as a friend. I think they know that there could never have been a normal life with Sami. Momu is back at work; Dillah helps Rashida with the grandchildren. And Fabiola is blossoming now that Gilles has moved in with her while he works on his book. That solemnity she always had seems to have lifted.”

  “That’s good. When does Deutz go to trial?”

  “Next month. He’s had one hearing that confirmed he will still be detained, but they’re having trouble finding a place secure enough to keep him alive. Word seems to have spread about him among the Muslims in prison. He knows it, too. I saw him at the hearing and he’s lost weight, looks haunted and gray, he seemed to be years older.”

  “Just as important, his fate seems to have helped discredit those damn techniques of his. My dad went ballistic when he learned Deutz had freed one of the guys who shot me. What happens to Deutz now?”

  “The procureur is going for the maximum sentence, ten years.”

  She nodded slowly, and they fell silent, looking at each other. Suddenly each one started to say something simultaneously and then stopped. “Go ahead,” she said.

  “I was going to ask where you were spending your convalescent leave.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “January and February, I’ll go to my uncle’s place in Florida and get some sun. It’s a condo, right on the seafront at Longboat Key, full of palm trees and one of the best beaches I know. It’s just a few minutes from Sarasota airport. Have you ever been?”

  He shook his head, feeling a touch of envy. Then he steeled himself to take the risk. “What about March, before you start work at the embassy again? You’d have a hero’s welcome if you’d like to come to St. Denis. I was wondering if I might see you again. Don’t forget that I promised you a dinner.”

  “I haven’t forgotten, and I’m going to take you up on it,” she said, and took his hand. “In the meantime I’d like to try some of that foie gras.”

  He let go of her hand to rummage in the bag and looked around for a knife and plate. She pointed to a small cabinet that held everything he needed including glasses, a corkscrew and a bucket of ice. As he began opening the bottle of Monbazillac, she cleared her throat.

  “You’ve never cooked for me yet, and Isabelle said that’s a treat not to miss,” she said. “I was wondering if you’d like to spend some time with me in Florida. My uncle has a very sophisticated kitchen.”

  He handed her a glass, kissed her lightly on the lips and said, “That sounds wonderful and I’d love to cook for you. But the kitchen is not the attraction.”

  “So you’re coming for the palm trees and the beach?”

  “No,” he said. “For this.” And he kissed her again.

  Acknowledgments

  This is a work of fiction, and all living characters are invented, although as always their inspiration owes a great deal to my genial neighbors and friends in the enchanting valley of the Vézère River. There are, however, references to a number of historical characters involved in the Resistance and in saving Jewish children from the Holocaust. I have tried to stick with the known facts of their work, knowing that no words of mine could hope to do justice to their nobility and their courage.

  Although the tale of David and Maya Halévy is invented, their experiences as described here were not uncommon for those Jewish children in France who survived the Second World War. The roundup of July 1942 at the Vélodrome d’Hiver did take place, and the heroic efforts of the Jewish Scouts under Robert Gamzon to save the children are exactly as related. The Protestant communities of southern France played a noble role, and the old Huguenot village of Le Chambon-sur-Lignon found refuge for more than three thousand Jewish children. The woman I call Tante Simone existed; the name Simone Mairesse is inscribed among the names of the righteous. The town and Simone and many other heroic figures were finally given the honor they deserved in their homeland by President Jacques Chirac at a ceremony at the Panthéon in Paris in January 2007.

  The two battles of Mouleydier in June 1944 took place much as I describe them, although there are confused and contradictory accounts in the various memoirs of those who took part. These disputes reflect the bitter political antagonisms between the rival Francs Tireurs et Partisans, mainly Communists, and the more conservative and Gaullist Armée Secrète. I relied on the memoirs of René Coustellier, leader of the Resistance Group Soleil; on Guy Penaud’s Histoire de la Résistance en Périgord; Pierre Louty’s Histoires Tragiques du Maquis; and on Christian Bourrier’s La Résistance en Pays Lindois. As so often, I am grateful to my friend Jean-Jacques Gillot, a distinguished local historian, for his invaluable encyclopedia, Résistants du Périgord. André Roulland’s La Vie en Périgord sous l’Occupation, 1940–44 was of great help in constructing the lives of David and Maya on the farm. I would also like to thank several friends in the Périgord, including Jean-Pierre Picot, Collette and Joseph da Cunha and the Bounichou family of Lalinde for sharing with me their recollections of those heroic bu
t tragic days.

  For the story of Sami, I read widely in the available journalists’ accounts of modern Afghanistan, but I have not visited that country for over twenty years. Abdul Salam Zaeef’s memoir, My Life with the Taliban, and the more recent Facing the Taliban, the memoir of Anoja Wijeyesekera, a Sri Lankan woman who worked for the United Nations, were informative. My account of the horrors of the Algerian civil war is based on a number of sources, including Derradji Abder-Rahmane’s Concise History of Political Violence in Algeria, 1954–2000; Hugh Roberts’s The Battlefield: Algeria 1988–2002; the Amnesty International report Algeria: A Human Rights Crisis; Mohammed Samraoui’s Chronique des Années de Sang; and Habib Souaïdia’s La Sale Guerre, an extraordinary memoir by a member of the Algerian special forces.

  The Toulouse mosque, its imams and its security services are pure inventions for literary purposes, and so is the report on Islam and jihadist recruitment in French prisons. But having visited mosques in Paris, Toulouse and elsewhere in Europe and the Middle East, and having published several articles on Islam in Europe (see, for example, “Europe’s Mosque Hysteria,” Wilson Quarterly, Spring 2006), I know something of the terrain. I am grateful to Professor Tariq Ramadan of St. Antony’s College, Oxford, and to the French scholar of Islam Professor Olivier Roy for sharing with me their insights into the challenges and prospects of Islam in Europe.

  My friend Linda Stern, a truly gifted psychologist in Washington, D.C., helped me to understand something of the challenges and features of the range of difficulties we call autism. I am most grateful for her help, but any errors in the description of Sami and his behavior are entirely my own.

  The château to which Sami is taken is an invention, drawn in part from the Château de Campagne, now splendidly restored as an archaeological research center, and partly from the Château de la Roque des Péagers near Meyrals. There are more than a thousand châteaux and historic manor houses in the Dordogne and Vézère Valleys, so we fortunate local novelists have a wondrous range of locations from which to choose.