The Book of Lost and Found

by Lucy Foley

  The men observe her closely: she feels their gaze upon her. She understands, instinctively, that it is important not to show anything by her expression. She knows she must prevent herself from asking about Georgette and Étienne, about whoever it is that has given them all away. To do so might be to accidentally reveal something they don’t already know.

  51

  New York, September 1986

  ‘They took me to one of Paris’s oldest prisons,’ Alice told me, ‘a place called Fresnes. It was either that or the Cherche-Midi.’

  ‘I’ve heard of it,’ I told her. ‘They tortured people there.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Alice, ‘and perhaps I was lucky in that I had so little to reveal. Fortunate – if it can be described as such – in that my questioner, an older man, was clearly experienced in the art of interrogation. I think he had seen enough to know when someone had something to hide, and he had no qualms about showing me that I was a waste of his time. Others who knew more – like Yves, the leader of our cell – they didn’t fare so well.’

  ‘They let you go?’

  She shook her head. ‘No, that wasn’t how it worked. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was essentially a hostage, one of hundreds. We were being held, all of us, as collateral. There was a sort of mathematics to it. A ratio, I think, of about one to fifty. If one Boche life was taken in a Resistance attack, fifty French prisoners would be executed.’

  52

  Fresnes Prison, September 1941

  The room is less than a room, slightly more than a cupboard, far taller than it is wide. It is almost completely dark, but there is a letterbox-sized hole near the bottom of the door through which a dusty ray falls to illuminate a small rectangle of floor and the mattress, loosely stuffed with straw.

  Alice’s watch has been taken from her, but she is able to mark the passing of the days by the occasional interruption of a meal. The food is always the same: a thin, bitter broth. What it contains is difficult to distinguish. Not much that is edible, certainly. Alice found it hard to swallow, at first, but now she longs for it – more as an interruption to the long hours than as sustenance. It is pushed through the opening in the door, often with some force so that a quantity spills over the top of the bowl. One day, Alice was so hungry that she was tempted to lick up this spilt portion, but managed to stop herself with the knowledge of how ill – and therefore how weak – it might make her.

  In the dark and the silence, thoughts grow loud. There are the good thoughts, those that remove her from her surroundings. These should be encouraged, and Alice forces them into being by invoking that party by the lake, the night she was reunited with Tom. If she focuses carefully enough, she can almost see the white mist that settled upon the surface of the water, and the way it bloomed pink in the new light of day.

  Occasionally she travels back to that time in the boathouse when she first realized Tom’s talent, or to that afternoon tearing down country roads in Aunt Margaret’s motor car, the trees scorched by autumn, the clouds racing above them.

  Every once in a while she allows herself to think of Corsica, or of that morning in her attic room with the sunlight falling through to wake them, the sheets tangled around their feet, his thigh thrown over hers, warm and heavy. She must treat these memories lightly so as not to sully or bruise them, like all delicate things that are damaged with too much handling.

  There are the bleak thoughts too, thoughts that make Alice believe that she will be there forever, that she will never escape, that she will die in darkness upon this very floor without seeing anyone she loves again, without being able to say goodbye.

  It is vital not to let these thoughts take hold. Alice understands that these are the thoughts that could destroy a person more efficiently, more integrally, than anything her captors might do.

  Ten meals have passed before Alice hears it. At first, she assumes that it is inside her head: a projection of her own longing for company. But the more she listens, the more she becomes convinced that it is a real voice. Not just one voice, in fact – another has joined it. And there is a peculiar sound, a scrape and a thump – clumsy, percussive. And in rhythm, she realizes, with the song. And she recognizes the melody, though her thoughts seem slow, and it takes her several bars to name it. They are singing ‘The Marseillaise’.

  53

  New York, September 1986

  ‘They sang it every week,’ Alice told me. ‘It was the most hope-inspiring sound I have ever heard. Those thin voices in unison, the thump of palms against doors, litter pails, bed boards – anything that could be struck. The guards hated it because they were powerless to stop it. Yes, they could mete out punishment at random or single out those seen as inciters, and they could – and did – punish us all. But when everything has been taken from you, everything except hope, it gives you a strange sort of strength. For us, hope could be found in singing that song.

  ‘I learned, too, that there was a means of communication between the cells. I hadn’t been aware of it until I heard a whisper, high above my head. I looked up through the gloom, and I could see then that there was a metal grille there. I had to dismantle my bed, fold the mattress in on itself and stand on top, and even then it wasn’t quite high enough. Still, I could hear the words faintly: a woman’s voice.’ Alice smiled. ‘Do you know, it was at once the most mundane and the most wonderful conversation I have had in my life. It was the sort of conversation you might start up with a stranger on a train. “What’s your name?” she asked me, and “How did you come to be here?” The sort of questions that would pass for inanities elsewhere. But in there, to have a conversation, a normal conversation, was a miraculous thing indeed.

  ‘Her name was Madeleine. She was a simple farm girl from the Cévennes, but she had been involved in brave work, helping to receive parachute-drops of supplies … and sometimes people. One night it had all gone wrong. She said it wasn’t even a particularly important drop: some fairly basic supplies, a small quantity of dynamite. They’d got to her before she had time to take her cyanide capsule, the one that had been given to her by the SOE. Her brother had managed to take his though.’ Alice shook her head. ‘Can you guess how old she was?’

  I shook my head.

  ‘Seventeen. She had barely any education, and no real knowledge of the world outside her small sphere, simply an instinctive understanding of what was right, of her duty.’

  54

  Fresnes Prison, October 1941

  Alice has an image in her mind of what Madeleine looks like, though the girl has never given any indication of her appearance. She imagines solemn dark eyes; a thick, practical braid of hair – a farm girl’s hair – slung over one shoulder. A capable solidity to her, strong arms and thick legs. Perhaps a sheen of prettiness too, or maybe something more profound, drawn from that deep well of character and vigour.

  She hears the tap of a fingernail against the grille: the signal they have chosen to indicate that they have something to say. There is no sense in wasting breath if the other is asleep, or otherwise insensible. Their voices, rendered weak in this place, are precious commodities. Alice clambers her way up.

  ‘I’m here, Madeleine.’

  ‘I thought I’d ask if you wanted me to send a message.’

  ‘To who?’

  ‘To someone inside – in one of the other cells.’

  Of course. For one delirious moment, Alice had imagined she might be able to send a message to Tom.

  The cells are created alike – each with the same small perforated air vent near the ceiling. Briefly, ridiculous though it is, Alice feels a prickle of jealousy that Madeleine – her Madeleine – is in contact with others besides herself. She has long ago discovered that she must be at the end of a line of cells, because there is no grille in the other wall, no sound from the other side.

  ‘Yes,’ she whispers back, suddenly struck by inspiration. ‘I would like to. I’d like to ask a question, actually, if that’s possible.’

  ‘What is it?’
/>
  ‘I’d like to know whether my friends are here – Georgette, and Étienne.’ She uses their real names so that they will know it is from her. ‘I want to know if they’re here, and if they’re well.’

  It takes a few hours for the reply to come. ‘Yes,’ Madeleine tells her, ‘both here. Both well … or as well as can be expected in this place.’

  Good news and bad. So they were found, after all. But they are alive, too, and that counts for something.

  ‘Oh, and Alice …?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Georgette wanted you to know that this isn’t quite how she saw married life turning out.’

  55

  Fresnes Prison, November 1942

  They are led outside, into the yard, a hundred or so of them. It is a grey, dreary day, but they have lived in darkness for weeks – some of them months – and the light sears their eyes. To Alice it seems as though a layer of her skin has been removed, and she feels every breath of wind like an abrasion. She has become a different animal – subterranean, dark-dwelling – some helpless, naked thing. She looks about her at her fellow prisoners, grey-skinned and hollow-eyed, who seem like another species from the guards who flank them. For the first time, Alice sees Madeleine, and she understands that Madeleine would, indeed, once have been that pretty, plump farm girl of her imagination. Not any more though.

  Finally, she glimpses her friends on the opposite side of the yard: Georgette, Étienne – even Madame Beauclerc. Étienne looks like a consumptive. Georgette has lost three stone, at least. As for Hélène Beauclerc: they must have decided she had something to tell them. Or perhaps her interrogator was more than usually sadistic. Alice can hardly bring herself to look at her. There is a thin trail of dried black blood at the corner of her mouth, and her nail-less hands hang limp and purple at her sides like ruined fruit.

  Georgette looks up and catches sight of Alice. She gives an involuntary start, and Alice realizes that she, too, has changed almost beyond recognition. At least Georgette does recognize her, and she smiles.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Alice hears the man behind her murmur to another prisoner. They are being herded into the centre of the yard and then divided into two groups. A small, uniformed woman is in charge. She makes quick annotations on a clipboard as each prisoner steps into place.

  ‘I don’t know,’ the other mutters back, ‘the camps, perhaps.’

  ‘Halt dein Maul!’ Without further warning, a guard steps forward and cracks the second man over the back of the head. He gives a moan and crumples to the ground. The speed, the quietness of it, makes the whole spectacle more shocking. People look, and try not to. Is he dead, or merely unconscious? He is not moving, and there is a wet, blackish stain beneath his head. The other prisoners must step over him to move towards the centre.

  Alice sees Étienne, Hélène and Georgette in front of her. She watches as Étienne and Hélène are sent to one huddle of prisoners, and Georgette to the other. Then it is her turn. The woman looks her over, briefly, and orders her to the first group.

  A shout rings out. At first, Alice isn’t certain where the noise has come from. She turns, and realizes it is one of the prisoners in the other group, one who has suddenly found her voice. The noise cuts though the silence of the yard. ‘My husband!’ she calls. ‘Let me go with him. Please.’ Alice realizes with horror that the woman is Georgette. She waits, hardly daring to look, for a guard to step in and knock her to the ground. But no one moves. The guards seem too taken aback by the outburst to know how to act. ‘Please.’ All watch as Georgette sinks to her knees in supplication. The woman with the clipboard regards her, and looks back towards the other group, to where Étienne stands, his eyes filling with tears.

  The woman shrugs. ‘Fine.’

  She moves to stand before Alice and Étienne’s group, and looks carefully along the front row. She stops at Alice, and runs her eyes over her once more, assessing her according to some unknown criteria. Again, she shrugs, apparently not quite satisfied by what she sees, but not concerned enough to worry overly about it. ‘You,’ she says. ‘Swap.’

  56

  New York, September 1986

  ‘What most of us had assumed,’ Alice said, ‘was that we were being moved on to the camps. That the two groups signified two different locations. Only it wasn’t that. One group was being moved on: the group I was swapped into. We were the ‘fitter’ consignment – those who would be better suited to labour. I was deemed unfit at first, but I was obviously near enough to be swapped with Georgette. It is a matter of small degrees, you understand, among people who have been starved and locked inside for weeks.’

  ‘What about the other group?’

  ‘They were taken to be shot, in a wood outside Paris.’

  I could not stop thinking about the expression on Alice’s face when she told me of her friends’ fate. In fact, I had hardly been able to bring myself to look at her. The grief and guilt was etched on her face, even after all these years, and in some dilute way it became a grief I now shared – for I had begun to feel I knew them too, through her.

  At the same time I was aware of Alice’s strength. She might still carry that pain, just as she carried the pain of twice losing her daughter, but she had not allowed it to destroy her. I remembered my instinct, after Mum died, to stop up my life and let the dust settle over me. I had almost achieved it – would perhaps have done so had Evie not made her revelation. Alice had found it in herself to keep living.

  It got me thinking, too: had I ever had a friend I truly loved, as Alice did Étienne and Georgette? There was Mum, of course – I had always thought of her as my best friend – but discounting this, the answer was probably no. I’d had friends, though, and I saw now how much I had enjoyed those afternoons in the Goodge Street pub, listening to the big talkers in the group and laughing at or with them, feeling a warmth spread through me that had to be due to more than the wine.

  I had liked to tell myself that they had given me up quickly, when Mum died and I stopped coming, but that wasn’t strictly true. Like someone surfacing from a trance, I could now recall the voicemails left unanswered, the envelopes unopened and filed away. They had tried – and they had persisted longer than I had expected. Eventually I had found myself alone: exactly as I had planned. Now the feeling rose inside me, demanding to be acknowledged. I didn’t want to be alone any longer.

  57

  Poland, January 1943

  This is the place, the place that makes her understand that hers is to be a sentence of death, as certain as any more traditional mode of execution. It will merely be a slower perishing, strung out in this wasteland. She will be buried in this frozen black earth.

  There are women of all nationalities here, it seems, including German. Some of them are, like Alice, political prisoners. There are other varieties of criminal here too. In Alice’s quarters there are two murderers, one prostitute and a thief. It is best to avoid drawing attention to yourself. It is important, too, to keep hold of your possessions, meagre as they are. Never to let your shoes or toothbrush stray from your sight, however broken and useless they may appear. Alice’s shoes might once have been a pair of clogs: now only the soles remain, and a piece of rough cloth has been nailed to each to keep them in place. Still, she sleeps with them clasped to her chest, because to be without shoes here is to invite a slow rotting of the flesh through frostbite and gangrene.

  This place operates according to its own set of rules or, rather, according to its own particular variety of chaos. Some of the seemingly healthiest women – though all things are relative – are the first to succumb to the cold, to the lack of food, to one of the many epidemics. While there are those who look as if they should no longer be able to stand or speak, and yet they manage by some miracle to survive the long hours required of them in the freezing fields.

  They are housed in a barracks of cramped, dingy bungalows – ‘more like pig huts in a field,’ says the prostitute, whose name is Berthe, ‘than a place whe
re human beings might be expected to sleep.’ Berthe is small and fierce, with a filthy turn of phrase. The other Frenchwomen are wary of her brash manner, but Alice discovers that she rather likes it. To retain your fierceness here is no mean feat: a clinging to life. And there is something about Berthe – the brilliant dark eyes, perhaps, the quick-witted turn of phrase – that reminds Alice of Georgette.

  She thinks of Georgette often, and Étienne. She hopes that they have managed to stay together. Being with the person you love must make it easier to bear it all – the dirt and cold, the many greater and lesser indignities; must make it easier, in fact, to keep a hold on your humanity.

  Alice thinks of Tom, too. She finds that if she focuses on the details – the scent of his skin; the hard warm plane of his chest beneath her cheek; his irises blue as the Corsican water; those long, clever, artist’s fingers – she can invoke him more effectively than if she tries to conjure him complete, all at once.

  There isn’t time to invoke him when she crawls into her bunk, because she is always so exhausted that sleep crashes over her in a black wave, instantaneously, never mind the hunger. But she thinks of him when she stands in the frozen field at the morning line-up. Every morning, several women fall where they stand, never to rise again. When she feels the cold beginning to permeate to her core, Alice draws upon her memory of those days on sun-warmed beaches, the feel of Tom’s skin against hers.

  ‘You must have someone,’ Berthe whispers to her early one morning when they sit facing each other on the bunk having been shocked awake by the roar of Allied bombers above. ‘To conjure.’