“Well then, once the war is over, and we are back, your parents can bring you up with them, and you and Franchise will spend a long, long holiday together.”
“And if Mme. Duclos, the dressmaker, is still in business,” Maman said, “I will take you over to see her, Nicole, and she will make you a beautiful dress. She is very expensive, but nobody can do the kind of embroidery she does, or add the special, little scallops on the hems.”
Mme. Rosten was interested. “What is her name? Where did you say she had her shop? Let me write it down, and I will certainly look her up.”
“There was a green dress she made for a customer— you see, I worked for her when I first came to France, but I never could do the kind of work she did—with beads and embroidered flowers around the neck. I have never forgotten that dress. She offered to make my wedding dress when I married David, but there was no time. And so she said she would make me a dress as a wedding present any time I wanted one. So many years have passed, and I never asked her for it, but she is still working—at least, last time I was in Paris she was—and so once the war is over I will take Nicole to Paris and introduce her to Mme. Duclos and say, “‘Now I am ready for my wedding present.’”
Maman giggled like a young girl.
“But, Maman, will she do it?” I cried. “Will she remember?”
“Of course, she will remember.”
“And, Maman, I want a green dress just like the one you described, with flowers and beads around the neck.”
Mme. Rosten said she thought I should have a white dress embroidered with pearls and silver thread around the neck. Or perhaps a pale yellow one with pale blue and gold embroidery.
“I will go along with you,” said Mme. Rosten, “and we will talk it over with the dressmaker. Nicole has such lovely dark hair and eyes. I do think white or yellow would be perfect for her.”
“Maman,” said Jacqueline, “will I have a dress too?”
“Of course,” Maman laughed, pulling Jacqueline against her. “When you are older, we will have Mme. Duclos make a dress for you too.”
“But Maman,” Jacqueline said, a worried look on her face, “Mme. Duclos only promised you one dress.”
“Yes, yes,” Maman laughed, “but after the war we will work very hard and become very rich, and there will be enough money by the time you arc thirteen or fourteen for you to have a dress too.”
All of us spoke and laughed a lot that night. We would not be seeing the Rostens again until after the war ended. Nobody spoke of the separation, but when it was time to go, Françoise and I clung to each other, and both of us wept. Mme. Rosten invited me to come home with them and spend the night with Françoise. She said I could go on to school from their house in the morning. Maman agreed, and I hurried to get my schoolbooks and pajamas. The grownups lingered on the landing outside our door.
Once I had gathered my things together, I joined Françoise on the staircase below the landing. We waited for the grownups to finish talking. Finally we heard Mme. Rosten murmur, “Au revoir” and begin to move toward the staircase. I remembered that in the excitement I had forgotten to kiss my parents good night, and I turned, looking for my mother on the landing. But she was not there, and I saw the Rostens moving toward me, down the staircase. The wedge of light that flowed out of our apartment into the dark hall narrowed until it was gone. I could hear the door shut. Then I turned and followed Françoise down into the street, happy to be with her.
November 1943
I was wearing Françoise’s little gold ring with the initials FR carved on it when I came home for dinner at noon the next day. Before I left for school, she and I had exchanged gifts. I gave her my most precious thing—the locket Papa had made for me. It had his and Maman’s picture inside it, and Françoise said she would leave it that way. Wearing it would make her feel like me.
All morning at school I was eager to get home and show Maman the ring. I was feeling guilty about parting with Papa’s locket but I hoped he would understand.
Jacqueline was not at school that morning. Another one of her mysterious sore throats, I thought. Between Jacqueline’s sore throats and her dislike of school, she managed to stay home on many days. It did not seem surprising to me then that she was absent. What did seem surprising, and painful, was the sight of Françoise’s empty seat.
Nobody was home. The kitchen was perfectly neat with no traces of the preparations for last night’s supper party. Maman must have stayed up late, cleaning.
But right in the middle of the living room floor lay the cut-glass pitcher that Mme. Rosten had given to Maman. Only its handle was intact. The rest had shattered in hundreds of tiny, sharp fragments.
What could have happened? Perhaps Jacqueline had knocked over the pitcher and cut herself so badly that there was no time to clean up. Perhaps Maman had rushed her off to the hospital.
I hurried out to the veranda, and looked up and down the street. Neither of them was in sight but nothing was out of place. Some of the stragglers from school were still walking home for dinner. Across the street, Mme. Claude was washing her windows, and you could clearly hear the sounds of laughter and conversations from passers-by. I felt comforted as I usually did on the veranda, and I sat down and began to wonder what I should do next. Perhaps Mme. Barras, our landlady, who lived downstairs and knew everything that happened to everybody on our street could tell me.
I headed back through the apartment. The door to my parents’ bedroom was open. Nothing was in place there. Every drawer in their chest had been pulled out. Papers lay scattered all over the room. My mother’s coat with the fur collar lay on the floor—hats, jackets, dresses, and sweaters twisted together in a pile on their bed. On top of the whole thing lay our family’s photograph album with some of the pages torn out.
All I could think of doing was to put those pages back in place. I picked one up—it was of Jacqueline when she was a year old. There were four pictures of her on the page, and one of them had come loose from its hinges and was hanging at a crazy angle.
“Nicole! Nicole!” somebody said behind me. It was Mme. Barras. She had both hands cradling her face and was rocking it back and forth.
“What happened?” I cried. “Where’s my mother and Jacqueline?”
“Nicole,” said Mme. Barras, “you have to get away. You can’t stay here. They were looking for you too. How lucky you were that you were not home. But go now! Don’t stay! They are coming back.”
“What happened ?” I cried again.
“The Germans. They came. Last night. First they knocked at my door. It was late—maybe two or three in the morning. Two of them came in, and two stayed outside in the car. ‘Where are the Jews?’ they asked me. "I don’t know," I told them. "I don’t know about any Jews." 'Where are the Niemans? We are looking for them. Take us up to their apartment.' What could I do, Nicole?” Mme. Barras was crying now. “They pushed me up the stairs ahead of them, and they began banging on the door. Your father opened the door, and they pushed him out of the way, and came inside. Ah, Nicole, Nicole! Your poor mother! She got down on her hands and knees to those animals. She begged them to take her and leave Jacqueline and your father, but they kept asking where you were. Finally your father “said you were staying with friends in Chambéry. Then the Germans arrested them and told them to take only a few clothes. One of the Germans asked for money, and began looking through all their things. But the other said to wait, and they would come back later. Don’t stay here, Nicole. They are coming back. Hurry! Go away!”
“But where are my parents? Where did they take them?”
“I don’t know, but you must go and hide someplace before they catch you too.”
“Where should I go? Where can I hide? Perhaps in the cellar?”
“No, you can’t stay here! They will be back, and will certainly search the whole house. They warned me not to let any more Jews live in my house again or I would be arrested too. It’s not safe, Nicole. You must go now!”
She
was pulling my arm, and I reached out and grabbed the album of pictures and ran down the stairs. I was frightened and my panic made it hard for me to breathe. My bicycle was leaning against the outside of the building. I dropped the album into my bag and then leaped onto the seat.
“Nicole! Nicole!” from across the street. It was Mme. Claude, washing her windows, twisting on the ledge to see me. “Nicole!” It was a whispered cry that could be heard up and down the street. “Run, Nicole! They are looking for you. Run!”
Stiff with terror, I rode away from that street. What brought me to Berthe and Isaac’s place, I don’t know. They lived in a small apartment behind a cabinetmaker’s shop. There was an entrance through the store, and one through an outside alley. I rode my bike through the alley and leaped off, pounded on their door, and cried, “Berthe! Isaac! Berthe! Isaac!” over and over again. No one answered. The door was locked. I looked through the window which was on street level, and saw the clothes and papers scattered on the floor, and one chair turned upside down.
I must have laid there on the ground, crying, for more than an hour. Gradually I became aware of the sound of the cabinetmaker’s hammer. There were other sounds—pots and pans rattling in an upstairs kitchen, and a woman singing. Nobody heard me.
The terror had gone. I began to think. Where could I go where I would be safe, and where I could find out about my parents and help them ? Who knows how many Jews had been rounded up last night. It would be pointless for me to try to find out. Where should I go then? My parents had friends in town who were not Jewish. Which one of them should I appeal to?
None, I finally decided. I got on my bike and began pedaling. I would go to the Durands. They lived about five kilometers out of town, far enough away for me to be safe, but not so far that M. Durand could not find out where my parents had been taken.
I knew they would help me. Even though we had been away from them for five years, Jacqueline and I still visited them several times a year, and each time Mme. Durand called us her girls, and said how tall and beautiful both of us were growing. Even Hitler became crazy whenever we came, leaping all over Jacqueline and licking her with his long, rough tongue.
They were kind to me that night. Mme. Durand filled me full of hot soup, and held my hand, and promised that they would help. I must not worry, said M. Durand. He would go into town first thing tomorrow, find out what had happened, and see what he could do to set matters straight.
That night Mme. Durand put me to sleep in the little room Jacqueline and I used to share. She sat there on the side of the bed and chatted about how Célestin had fallen off his bike and broken his elbow a few months ago, and how Jean-Pierre was growing so fast, none of his clothes fit him for more than a few months. Nothing seemed real to me except for the soft bed and the warm feather comforter. I fell asleep.
M. Durand was gone when I woke in the morning. The boys had already left for school. I stayed with Mme. Durand all day, helping her cook and clean. I stayed close to her, comforted by her familiar warm, sweaty smell. She assured me many times that day that she was like a second mother to me, and that until my parents returned, her home was my home.
M. Durand returned in the middle of the afternoon. Twelve Jewish families, he said, had been rounded up that first night my parents were taken, and five more last night. Most of the Jews left in town, he understood, were now in hiding. He had not been able to find out where my parents and the other prisoners were taken. Perhaps they had already left town, headed possibly for Drancy, the prison camp outside of Paris.
But it was not safe to ask too many questions now. Perhaps in a week or so he could go back and make further inquiries. The Germans were instituting a general reign of terror. He was told that not only Jews were being arrested, but others too. Christians—who were suspected of having ties with the underground or those who hid Jews wanted by the Germans. Christians were being arrested— and all their family with them—children too.
Next morning M. and Mme. Durand told me I could not stay with them. It was not safe for me, they said, since the Germans would certainly be out their way looking for me. M. Durand said he had an old uncle, a widower without children, who lived out in the country near Gap. He had decided that the safest thing, for me, would be to stay with his uncle or with somebody else in that area. Later that afternoon, he said he would take me out to his uncle and make all the necessary arrangements.
“No,” I said, “I don’t want to go.”
“But why not, Nicole? You will be safe in Gap.”
“It is too far away. I want to be here when my parents return.”
“We will be on the lookout for them, and we will tell them where you are.”
“Why can’t I stay here?”
“It’s not safe.”
“I could stay in the little cellar room behind the closet. Nobody would ever think of looking there.”
“Impossible. You must do what we say now, Nicole. It is not safe for you to stay here.”
“Not safe for whom?” I asked, and then I was sorry I said it. Nobody answered me. A little later, when both of them were not looking, I left the house, got on my bicycle, and rode back to Aix-les-Bains.
There was a lock on our apartment door, and when I asked, Mme. Barras said the Germans had put it there, and she did not have the key. She asked me to go, and closed the door.
I went to the house of M. and Mme. Bernard, friends of my parents. It seemed to me there was a fluttering of the curtains when I knocked at the door but nobody answered.
There was no one at M. Henri’s house, and the baker who had a shop downstairs said he thought they had gone to visit their married daughter in Annecy.
Mme. Latour opened the door when I knocked but did not let me in. She said she was a sick woman, and M. Latour had a bad heart. She said I should go and ask the Henris to help me.
“But I have gone there, Madame, and they are not at home.”
“Try again later,” she said, and shut the door.
All day I rode my bike through the town but there was no place to go. I passed the Rostens’ house but did not stop. I did not know until weeks later that they had found their way safely to Switzerland. Then I was afraid of what I might see if I looked through their windows. The day was warm and clear but as night came the temperatures dropped. I saw children playing, men hurrying home from work, women with bundles in their arms. I rode all over town, and everything seemed as it had always seemed. Nothing had changed. Only I was no longer a part of it.
I had eaten nothing since breakfast. I had no money to buy food. I was tired, hungry, and so cold that I believed if I stopped bicycling I would freeze to death. There was a blank in my mind about where to go and what to do. I only knew that I would not go back to the Durands whatever happened. I would not leave town. I would not lose my parents like M. Bonnet’s children. I would look after myself until they returned to me.
As long as I could, I bicycled, past the baths, the park, the Arc de Campanus, along the Jake, the Palais de Savoie ... It seemed finally that nothing else moved that night except for me.
On the Rue de Sévigné, a half block from my school, I could go no farther. I dragged myself to the entrance and huddled against the door. I knew that the building was locked and empty at this hour, but there was no place else for me to go.
I woke and slept, woke and slept, woke and slept all through the night. There were warm and happy dreams that I awoke from with my teeth chattering and the tears still wet on my face. I drifted back and forth from cold to warm, from despair to joy. It was an endless night with dreams that finally became all beginnings and ends, and a cold that grew to be a part of myself.
Mlle. Legrand found me there in the morning and pulled me inside the building.
“My poor Nicole,” she said, embracing me, “my poor child, why didn’t you come to me at once?”
She helped me into her office and made me some tea on her hot plate. She told me I could stay at the school and sleep in the dormitor
y with the girls who came from the country. She would arrange for me to get a set of false papers.
“Nobody would help me,” I told her. “None of my father’s friends. Nobody.”
“They were afraid,” she said.
“Aren’t you afraid?”
“Perhaps,” she said. “But it is my duty to help you, and that is more important than being afraid. You are my student and have been under my care since you were small. You are also French, and so am I.”
Later some of the girls said she took me in because she knew the Germans were losing the war, and that she would be charged with collaborating. But if she could prove that she had hidden a Jewish child then perhaps she could ask for clemency.
I cannot tell. All I know is that she took me in when there was no other place for me to go.
December 1943
Three weeks after it happened, Mme. Sorel came looking for me at school. It was late in the afternoon, and I was working in the study hall, recopying a passage out of Pascal’s Pensées.
“I want to talk to you,” she said. She looked cautiously at the other girls in the room and lowered her voice. “Alone,” she said. “Outside.”
She raised her eyebrows at me in a significant way, and I understood that she did not trust the other girls. It was hard not to smile. All of them knew what had happened to my family, and that I was hiding at school, using false papers.
Marie and Hélène were smiling at me, and Hélène blew out her cheeks, imitating Mme. Sorel, who was very fat. I came quickly around the table where I was working, took my jacket and followed Mme. Sorel out into the garden.
It had been raining that morning, and there was an icy bite in the air. The stone bench under the wild chestnut tree was too wet to sit on, so we walked around the small garden. As soon as we were outside, Mme. Sorel pulled her scarf tightly around her head, put on her gloves, and started crying. She made a lot of noise, and I was glad there was nobody else to see or hear her. It was just as well that we had come outside because the girls would surely have made funny faces and perhaps even made me laugh.
A Pocket Full of Seeds Page 8