The rain came on. The police came back. Pastor Alexandre had warning again this time, thank God, a stranger’s voice crackling at the other end of the telephone line. Scouts scattered along the gleaming-wet roads, bringing the alert. The river brimmed its banks, brown and foaming, as police in rain gear walked in and out of the houses, leaving slick brown footprints on the floors. As Scouts hurried through the rain, and wet refugee children shivered in haystacks and barns. No one was caught.
This time.
Élise brought her siblings to La Roche once, for Passover. Julien stood guard on the south road that evening, listening to the pine trees drip, glancing back now and then at the lighted windows.
The sun came out. The mud dried slowly. Papa worked long hours at his desk, came out of his study pale and rubbing his face. At the table there were silences, Mama’s eyes on Papa, a shy smile between them that faded more and more on Mama’s face, grew more and more sorry on Papa’s.
Their lights burned late into the night, Papa working, Julien studying for exams. Magali making up homework after long days at Les Chênes training children to answer to false names, to be silent for hours, never to say a word aloud in their mother tongues. “I never know their real names anymore,” she told Julien. “Some of them I don’t find out their names at all. We have kids who’re only here for a week sometimes, waiting for someone to take them farther.” She pointed east with her chin, her shoulders straightening. “A lot of kids have made it across. A lot.”
“How many?” Julien sat straighter too.
“I don’t know.” Magali shook her head. “But there’s always someone more. Always.” She closed her eyes.
The day after the Allies defeated Rommel in North Africa, Julien ran into Pierre in the street, come to town to buy things for his unit. They were moving out of winter quarters, Pierre said, starting to train in the field. They had guns. Pierre smiled to himself when he spoke of his, shaping his hand into an imagined grip on it, then admitted he only took turns with it. But he hoped to see action before summer was done.
“What action?” said Julien.
Pierre only smiled. “Secret. Captain’s orders.” His smile twisted a little. “Tell you the truth, I’m not sure.”
Julien looked at his friend. “You’ll come see me again? When you’re in town?”
“Sure thing.”
The sun shone. The wet brown grass grew dry, and the new green blades came up through it, piercing the earth, life advancing again into the hollows death had left behind. The deep emerald-green of young nettles beside the road was like a shout of joy, like Élise’s rare, bright laughter, precious beyond words. Julien picked them and brought them to Mama for soup. He brought some to Grandpa and Benjamin at the farm. Grandpa let Julien try his hand at plowing, then sent him home, saying he had studying to do and next spring was time enough to learn. Next spring. The thought sent a shiver down his spine. From day to day he could hope for a life still unshattered. But for a year? He did not want to look down that span of days. He did not want the voice of time in his ear, telling him how much he could lose.
The police came back, and back. It was only a matter of time.
Papa came in from work early one evening, taking off his jacket and coming to kiss Mama where she stood at the counter shredding sorrel leaves with a weary, unsmiling face. He sank down in a chair. “There was an arrest at La Roche today.”
Julien’s head snapped up.
“A man named Paul Maier. Not Jewish. A German anti-fascist—a political arrest. I don’t like it. Antoine Duval has been visiting there. Apparently he tried to chat up the cook yesterday on her way home.”
Julien’s chair scraped loudly on the floor as he stood. “The cook? You mean—you mean Madame Ferron?”
“Yes, that’s her name,” said Papa mildly, blinking at him.
“Why would he talk to her?”
“Hoping she’ll let something slip, I’m sure. I don’t like it.”
Julien walked toward the door. Magali said to him quietly, across the space of the dining room, “She’s there right now, cooking. They’ll have told her.”
Julien stopped. They were all looking at him. He kept his face as still as he could, feeling naked.
“Who is ‘she’?” said Papa carefully.
“Élise Fournier,” said Magali instantly and calmly. “The cook’s assistant. You know her, Papa, you got her the job at La Roche because her family has to eat kosher. I’m good friends with her, and she helped us a lot while you were gone. You could say she’s a family friend now.”
Mama was nodding, but her eyes were still on Julien. Papa hesitated and seemed about to speak. Julien turned, trying to keep his face still. “Sorry. I forgot how soon supper is.” He sat down. Took a breath. “She’s a good friend. I wish she would try to cross the border. Everyone I know seems to think they might as well try swimming the Atlantic.” He looked up suddenly, feeling a small fierce flame rise up in him. “Have you thought about going into hiding yourself, Papa? Have you considered that?”
“After being released—”
“Before being arrested would’ve been better.” He couldn’t believe he said it. His heart was hammering.
Mama turned slowly and looked at him.
“I have thought about it,” said Papa heavily. “I don’t believe it is the right thing at this time.”
Now the eyes were on him.
“There is still work to do. And God has been faithful. He has gone over and above. When they summoned us that second time …” Papa shook his head.
You knew you’d done the right thing. Your faith was rewarded. Your life made sense. Some people were shot in the head by the Germans for no reason at all. Some people were released by the French with their beloved integrity intact. Some people were deported because they’d been out on the road at the wrong time. Was it God who chose who? How did He do it? How did He sleep?
Mama watched Papa for a long moment, her face seeming carved out of white stone. Then turned away.
That night after supper Julien went out the door without speaking to anyone, put on his jacket, and went down to Élise’s dorm.
She was downstairs in the common room, sitting by Nicole on the sofa reading homework together. She looked up at him, and he looked at her, ashamed. He should have brought Magali. He didn’t want to embarrass her. He hadn’t thought.
“Is your family all right?” she said.
Julien swallowed, not wanting to lie to her.
She saved him. She said, “I can come over,” and stood. He waited silently as she got her jacket from its hook, and didn’t speak till they walked out into the chilly spring night together, the streetlights making pools of light around them.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s not about my family. It’s—my father told me about, about the arrest at La Roche.”
Her face went still.
He looked at her helplessly. “It’s none of my business—but … I wanted to ask you.”
“Ask me?” She was standing in the dark with him on a street corner. Did she want to be seen like that? She did not move.
“Are you going to keep going there?” he blurted.
“They’re my friends,” she said. “If I should quit, they should …” She made a little scattering motion with her hands.
“Are they going to? Disband the house?”
Élise shook her head. “They wouldn’t have anywhere to go. A lot of them are sleeping in the woods tonight. But they’re on waiting lists for visas, or for—” she pointed east with her chin, and did not say Switzerland. “Two of them are leaving next week.” She glanced around. “I think we should walk.”
“Yeah. Yeah.” He took the way toward his house, and she followed, walking between pools of light. The darkness was better for speaking somehow. As they turned the corner he asked, very low: “Have you thought about trying it?”
She walked without speaking, straight-backed, gathered in on herself. Finally she spoke so low Julien cou
ld barely hear. “I have. They strip-search boys, you know. It would be over, that minute.”
They walked down his street in silence. Away in the woods an owl hooted, and another answered. High above them clouds sped over the moon. Finally Julien whispered, “It could happen here too.”
She stopped, a low flame in her eyes. “I know of ten people who were arrested on the border,” she said. “That’s two more than here.”
“Not if you count my father.”
“That’s true.”
“I didn’t know—ten people?” He looked east. The wind rose, and Élise pulled her jacket closer around her. Julien faced into it, heart knocking in his chest. Don’t send me on that road, Benjamin had said.
“Édouard at La Roche is friends with a passeur. He gets news.”
They were past the last streetlight now on the north road. The wind had uncovered the moon, and the forest was moving. He turned to Élise, and the curve of her cheek, the planes and shadows of her moonlit face made him tremble. He looked and looked at her, at those dark eyes that had seen the barbed wire from the inside and still held a hard, bright flame in the depths of them, at that body whose heart beat moment by moment, that heart that one day, no matter what, would stop. Cold flesh, and silence. In seventy years, in thirty—in a year, a month, a week—
“I’m so afraid for you,” he whispered.
“Don’t.” The word was like a bullet. Something came out from her, some intensity, and struck him like a wave. “Don’t.” Her fists were clenched, the tendons in her wrists standing out like cords. She turned on him a face like a falcon’s. “And don’t tell me you can’t help it, Julien. This is war. This is life. People have to help it.”
“I can help it.” He was looking straight ahead now. Her voice saying his name rang in his mind like a bell, a clear, far, angry music. He glanced at her. “I’m not—whatever you’re thinking.”
She spoke in a low, dark voice. “I know.”
There was silence.
After a moment she started walking again. “Do you know the last thing my parents said to me?” she said in the same voice, not looking at him. “They said ‘Help them keep the Commandments.’ We were in the barracks at Vénissieux. The aid workers had come to get us. My parents had been denied their exemption, they were going to take them away in the morning, it was a few hours before dawn. It was pitch-dark—the Amitié Chrétienne workers came in with flashlights, they came for us. The kids. They said we could get out if they signed us away.” Her voice was trembling. “You know what my parents were afraid of? The one thing that made them hesitate? That if they left us with Christians they’d force us to convert.”
Julien stared at her.
She stopped and looked him full in the face, her eyes like dark pools, reflecting nothing. “You people have been wonderful. No one’s said a word to us. Your pastor lets us use the church annex for prayers. I didn’t know what to expect, and you’ve been as respectful as …” She shook her head. “We’re here—at your mercy. You could …”
Julien opened his mouth hotly, and she held up a hand.
“I know you don’t see it that way. It never occurred to you, and I’m glad. But put yourself in my shoes for a minute. We are.”
Julien looked at her. She looked back. He lowered his head. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry.” He turned back toward Tanieux.
She stood where she was. “I don’t know where they are,” she whispered. “I don’t know if they’re alive. I don’t know—if they’re dead—” Her voice thickened, but she went on. “I don’t know if the dead can see us, or if they know—but God sees, and I see, and I’m going to do what I swore to them.” Her face was all lines and angles in the moonlight now, straining. “I’m going to protect my brother and sister with my life. And I’m going to help them keep the Commandments. And I’m going to keep what’s left of who I am.” Her gaze focused suddenly and held his, hard. “I don’t betray people. And I don’t think you do either.”
He lifted his eyes to hers, terrified that in a moment he would feel tears in them. He had never seen anything as beautiful as her dark shining hair and pale face in the moonlight, her whole soul burning in her eyes. His lips shaped the word slowly. He forced his breath through his throat. “No,” he whispered.
“That’s what I thought,” she whispered back, her eyes still locked with his. He saw the edges of them fill suddenly with tears. One instant, the moonlight turning them to silver; one instant, and she tore her gaze away from him, and turned aside. He swallowed, heart hammering, his whole body singing with joy and longing and pain.
He turned aside too. They began to walk back, two silent figures beneath the wide sky, their steps keeping perfect time.
At the turnoff to his street, she paused and turned, whispered, “See you at school.” He nodded mutely, and watched her as she went on down the sidewalk, through the darkness and the pools of pale light, alone. He stood breathing in the spring night air and watching her, till she was almost gone. He couldn’t help it. Then he took two deep, harsh breaths, and turned away.
He did not sleep half that night, for remembering the fire and silver in her eyes.
Chapter 20
DREAM
HE CAME WIDE awake in an instant next morning, his heart racing, her face in his mind.
And her voice saying, “They’re my friends.”
She wasn’t going to quit. She was going to keep spending hours every day in a house where young Jewish men were afraid to sleep. Why hadn’t he made her—
He rolled over and pushed his face into the pillow, remembering why. That look in her eyes, hard and bright as a sword. He was a fool. Trying to push these people around—people who looked their own deaths in the face every day and made calculations about them …
At school he nodded to her respectfully and went into his classroom. Then he slipped out of class and quietly tailed Duval to the café.
At the door Duval turned and gave him a long, cold look. He went back to school.
He pumped Magali, whose best friend’s parents owned the café; Duval had sat by Marc Fraysse from La Roche and offered him cigarettes he didn’t take. Magali promised to tell Élise.
He would have told her himself. But he was trying to prove to her that he could keep a promise. He hadn’t spoken to her alone since that night.
He hadn’t spent a night nor a morning without lying in bed with the sight of her eyes filling his mind. It hurt. It hurt gloriously. A no—that no—from her. He wouldn’t have traded it for a yes from any other girl in the world. She saw me. She looked at me and saw me—like that.
She was right. She shouldn’t have had to tell him—oh, thank God she had had to tell him. But she was right. What kind of future could they have? He belonged here, and she belonged—
Gone.
The pressure built in his throat and his head. Gone. One way or the other. Oh God, God, God.
He slipped out of bed, the hard boards of the floor under his knees. He clasped his hands together, gripping the blanket, his mind breathing words again and again, filling him, muffled as if deep below the sea: Get her out. Get her out.
Please.
The word caught in his throat like a stone. In his mind was the darkness of a barracks, the faint gleam of flashlights reflected in the tears on Élise’s face. Help them keep the Commandments. That was what they’d wanted to tell her, before men with guns took them away. That was what was on their minds.
God.
And surely—surely—they were not the only ones.
Please, he prayed one more time. Then he lifted his head, his chest filling, the pain in his throat sharpening. He said in a steady voice, “People say that to You every day.”
He rose from his knees and walked evenly over to his closet to get his clothes for the day, without finishing the thought aloud.
And then they die.
On Thursday afternoon he went down to the farm, alone. He ought to be studying. But he needed to bre
athe the same air as his grandfather, even just for an hour. And he wanted to see Benjamin.
Spring was in full cry around him, the chestnut trees in thick, polleny bloom, the little birds twittering their happy loves from every tree. The grass was lush and green, ankle-high in the pastures, the cows and goats turned out on it tearing and munching busily, their mouths stained with green, their calves and kids at their heels, or butting against udders bulging with milk. It wasn’t a rich country, this cold plateau, but it seemed so, always, at the end of May. He passed beneath an apple tree laden with pink and white blossoms slowly, sweetly opening to the sun; the scent made him shudder. He stood under it, breathing in; he closed his eyes and prayed for her. He saw himself standing in a sunlit mountain pass, watching through the thin, deep air as far below she and her brother and sister took step after sure step into the valley. Into the future. And him on the height, his heart singing and breaking: Goodbye.
Losing her. That was his unattainable dream.
He took one more breath of the heady scent, looked up and heard the gentle buzz of bees as they crawled in and out. He swallowed, and made himself start walking again.
Grandpa and Benjamin were planting, Grandpa sowing and Benjamin putting each seed precisely in its place. Grandpa raised an eyebrow and brushed the seed-dust from his hands. “Thought I forbade you to help. Or didn’t you know I’d be planting?” There were crinkles around his eyes.
“Sorry.” Julien shrugged. Of course Grandpa was planting. Everyone was. He looked over at Benjamin.
“Take a break,” said Grandpa over his shoulder. “Pick some mint on your way in, and have yourselves some tea.”
It was a wonderful thing, tea. It let you do something with your hands and with your mouth a dozen times before you had to say anything. And it was warm. Julien put his wind-chilled hands around his cup and blew on it, avoiding Benjamin’s eyes.
“Y’know,” he said finally, abruptly. “It’s your life.”
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