The Lost Vintage

by Ann Mah

  “Vite!” Rose hissed, her eyes enormous. The sound of Madame G.’s footsteps grew louder. Rose raised her arms. Without thinking, I tossed the jar, an underhanded lob that arched up, up, up over the Bunsen burners before falling down, down, down—so poorly aimed, Rose was forced to lunge for it. She held it triumphantly aloft, whisking it behind her back just before Madame G. swished through the door. My legs were shaking so that I could hardly stand, but I managed to cross my arms and slouch against the wall in an attempt at nonchalance.

  “Is something going on here that I should be aware of?” Madame G.’s voice cut through the air.

  “Non, Madame,” we replied in a dutiful chorus.

  Her eyes darted toward my hands, which were empty. Before she could look at Rose, I kicked over a stool. “Oh!” I gasped. “Sorry—I’m so horribly dizzy all of a sudden.” I staggered forward and Madame G. dashed over and caught me by the arm.

  “Sit down for a moment. Do you want some water?” She guided me to a chair.

  A few seconds later, Rose was by my side. “Did you eat lunch?” She fanned me with a notebook. “I know, the hunger, it’s so terrible—c’est affreux. I also get taken with these spells from time to time.”

  “I’m fine, ça va.” I closed my eyes and willed my heart to slow. When I opened them, they were both staring at me. “I’m fine,” I repeated, as I stood and moved slowly toward our workstation.

  For the rest of our time in the laboratory, Rose and I spoke to each other in murmurs as we worked. Madame G. graded exams at her desk, slashing her pen across the pages. Focusing on the experiment calmed me, so that by the time Rose and I had finished and tidied away our equipment for the day, the jaws of terror gripping the nape of my neck had loosened.

  Before we left, we paused as usual before Madame G.’s desk to say goodbye. “Merci, Madame. Au revoir.”

  “Au revoir,” she replied without looking up from her stack of papers.

  We had almost left the room when her next sentence came hurtling toward us like an arrow. “You know, I will get in trouble if anything is missing,” she said.

  We froze in the doorway, but Rose turned back and I forced myself to follow. Madame G. put her pen down and stared at us. My conscience grabbed me by the throat and squeezed so that I couldn’t breathe. Madame Grenoble, who has always been so generous with her time, so willing to offer extra help—how could we endanger her? The silence stretched long and wobbly before I saw Madame’s eyes move to the star that Rose now wears sewn to her coat. I remembered the petition I’d seen on her desk and a flash of fury coursed through me.

  I arranged my features into an earnest expression. “Of course we wouldn’t take anything,” I said sweetly. “You know you can trust us.”

  “D’accord.” She nodded slowly, but her face was still clouded.

  We forced ourselves to walk slowly out of the classroom, strolling down the hallway as if we hadn’t a care in the world. I kept expecting to hear running footsteps or the crack of Madame G.’s voice, to feel the clap of a hand on my shoulder. But we were out the door, then moving across the courtyard, reaching for our bicycles, bidding each other farewell, pedaling away. Rose’s satchel was slung across her back, the bottle of sulfur an indistinguishable lump through the thick canvas.

  But still, I worry: Did we really get away with it?

  22 JUILLET 1942

  I am frantic with fear. Where is Rose? I haven’t seen her for a week, nor received word. She didn’t appear at the laboratory—Madame G. was deeply suspicious when I claimed she was unwell—and then she missed the circuit meeting, where previously she had missed none. The others also have no news of her and we dare not go to her house. Though he tries to hide it from us, I sense Stéphane is concerned, enough to put out discreet inquiries with his contacts at the prison. But surely we would have heard if she had been arrested?

  I keep wondering if she was detained for taking the sulfur. Did Madame G. turn her in? But, then, wouldn’t I also have been questioned? These thoughts go round and round in my head, tormenting me, so that I can barely keep an even keel. Today I was so distracted I dropped an entire bowl of porridge on the floor. It crashed in a heap of steaming mush and shattered crockery and Madame very nearly tore my head off while the boys sobbed with hunger.

  I feel the walls of this war closing in on me, not only fear, starvation, deprivation, but endless uncertainty—and guilt. How long can this go on before I crack?

  24 JUILLET 1942

  I received word to meet Rose at the usual spot, in the park on the banks of the river Bouzaize. I waited for an hour and no one came. Today, I returned at the same time, waited and waited until someone finally appeared: Stéphane.

  “What are you doing?” I asked, as he threw his arms around me.

  “Pretend we are lovers,” he whispered, and bent his head. His cheek scratched mine and he kissed me, softly at first, growing to an intensity that took me by surprise. When we pulled apart, I clung to him until my legs had stopped trembling.

  “Viens,” he murmured, leading me to the bench and wrapping an arm around me.

  “Where is—Simone?” Just in time, I remembered to use Rose’s code name. “I’ve been distraught. I keep asking myself why we stole the sulfur. We should never have taken such a risk.” As I braced against his shoulder, my emotions spilled from me—a flood of anxiety combined with the headiness of the unexpected kiss—so that I found myself weeping.

  “Tiens.” He felt in his pocket and handed me a handkerchief, surprisingly spotless. “Simone and her family are safe.”

  “Oh, thank God.” I could have sobbed with relief, but instead I blew my nose and thus composed myself.

  “We got a tip last week and managed to get them into hiding before the Gestapo turned up.” He stared straight ahead. “But you are right. It was the sulfur that raised suspicions. Your professeur—did you know she is involved with a German officer?”

  “Madame Grenoble?” I gasped. “But what about her husband?”

  “War breeds strange indiscretions.” He shrugged, matter of fact. “Écoute, Marie, listen. Simone and her family are safe for the moment, but we’ve got to get them out as soon as possible. You know about the Vel’ d’Hiv roundup a week ago?”

  “But that was in Paris.” The BBC had reported on the thousands of Jews who had been taken in the middle of the night—not only men, as before, but also women and children—shuttled by bus to the Vélodrome d’Hiver, an indoor racing track in Paris. They were held for days in squalid conditions before being transported to internment camps. Papa and I had listened in horror, though very few details were available.

  “They’re coming here. The roundups. Not only for men, now everyone—entire families.” Stéphane’s arm tightened across my shoulders. “We have a source who says they will start in a few days. Simone and her parents, her brother—their names are on the list, and this accusation from your professor makes their situation even more precarious. We’re trying to assemble forged papers for them to escape south.”

  I twisted the handkerchief around my fingers until the tips turned white. “South?”

  “Simone’s father has family in the United States. If they can reach Portugal, they’ll have the chance of passage to New York. Frankly, they should have left months ago—years ago. But right now they need another safe house, a place where they can wait indefinitely until their documents are ready.”

  “You mean the domaine,” I said slowly.

  “Your father made it clear that he needed to stop his activities for a while. But these circumstances seem extenuating.”

  “Of course they must stay with us,” I said with as much confidence as I could muster, even as my stepmother’s hard face flashed before my eyes. “Don’t worry, I’ll see to it.” I gazed at the river, studying the algae blooming in great green clouds beneath the surface of the water, remembering the afternoon Rose and I had first sat here plotting and planning. Could it have been only a year ago? It seems like five
lifetimes have passed.

  “Merci, ma chère Marie, always so thoughtful of everyone else.” His arm around my shoulders relaxed, but he didn’t pull away.

  “You know, you could have just asked my father,” I said. “He would have said yes. You didn’t have to take the risk of meeting me here.”

  “I wanted to see you. I know you’ve been desperate with worry.”

  “Who told you that?” I frowned. I’ve only shared my concerns here, cher journal, not with anyone else, not even Papa.

  “I didn’t need anyone to tell me. It’s been eating me alive, and I guessed you would feel the same.” He rested his cheek on my head and this time it didn’t feel like playacting. For a fleeting moment, I closed my eyes and pretended that we were the young lovers we appeared to be—that this was an ordinary summer day, and I was an ordinary girl with lips tingling from her first kiss. But it was too dangerous to linger, so I pulled away before such frivolity brought us to peril.

  29 JUILLET 1942

  They are here, all four of them. In the end, it was easier than I had anticipated because Papa and I agreed that we simply would not tell Madame about Rose and her family hiding in the basement. Yes, God forgive us, we will deceive her until our noses fall off, if it means safe passage for the Reinachs.

  On Sunday morning, I told Madame I was feverish and would stay home from church. Papa, who never goes to Mass anymore, drove out in the donkey cart and returned with the Reinachs covered over in the back with burlap sacks. We snuck them downstairs before Madame and the boys returned for lunch. My “grippe” has proved a useful excuse for skipping meals so that I may save my portion for the four refugees. I slip below with food, fresh water, linens, and other assorted items as often as I dare.

  Though her parents and brother remain stoic, I am worried about Rose. She has a bad cough—which is surely exacerbated by the cold, damp cellar—and too often I catch her doubled over with the effort of trying to suppress it. She assures me her strength is returning, but I fear for the journey ahead—so many arduous kilometers to Spain, and then onward still to Portugal, and from there a ship across the ocean. Even in the best of circumstances, it seems Herculean, and we are in far from the best of circumstances.

  This morning, when I collected the eggs from the henhouse I slipped one into my pocket. I plan to boil it with our dinner, and bring it down to Rose later tonight. She will say it’s too much, but I know the truth—that it is not enough, and that there will never be enough.

  27 AOÛT 1942

  I began this journal as a record of facts, and so I report them now, even though I can scarcely bear this documentation. And yet I keep going over the events in my mind, over and over again, examining each terrible moment, wondering what I could have done differently.

  Of course we knew our risk was increasing with each day that Rose and her family remained at the domaine. But four sets of forged documents are not easy to obtain—and so the days turned into a week, and then crept into a second and then a third, the Reinachs moving silently about the secret cave, emerging for light and air only when Madame and the boys had left the house. By the time we received the papers, the moon had grown full and bright. We decided to wait two more weeks for it to wane, so that Papa could guide them to their next stop under cover of darkness.

  After more than a month, Papa decided that the Reinachs must be offered baths again. “They absolutely cannot look like refugees while in transit. It would be be a dead giveaway,” he said firmly. We waited until the boys had gone to the neighbor’s house, and Madame had departed for one of her infernal Cercle du patrimoine meetings (yes, cher journal, I, too, cannot believe they still continue—at this point, what heritage does France have left?). Down in the cellar, I invited the Reinachs upstairs to bathe and they gathered a change of clothes before clamoring out of the wardrobe and trooping to our bathroom on the second floor.

  Madame Reinach went first, then Rose, Théo—when each was done, they joined the rest of us around the kitchen table. Papa poured wine—“For nourishment,” he said—and I began preparing a simple lunch of boiled potatoes, coddled eggs, and a salad of dandelion greens. By the time Monsieur Reinach was finished with his bath, we were all quite cheerful. I had left the back door open so that a light breeze blew through the room, stirring the tablecloth, and setting adrift the scent of ripe peaches from the bowl on the windowsill.

  What a stupid idea it was, to leave that door open.

  She saw us before we spotted her. Our merry conversation obscured the sound of her footsteps, so that Madame watched us unobserved through the gaping door for several minutes. She stayed still—quiet, listening—and none of us knew she was there until her slender frame filled the doorway. Her shadow fell across the table, and the room turned airless.

  “Oh, chérie ! You’re back early. How lovely!” Papa forced a smile to his lips. “Do come join us! Please!”

  Madame stepped into the kitchen. There was a peculiar look on her face—one I’d never observed before, in all my years of observing Madame—a fixed fury as hard and cold as marble.

  “You remember Rose, n’est-ce pas ?” said Papa. “She and Hélène were at the lycée together. And these are her parents, Monsieur and Madame Reinach, and her brother, Théodore. We were just having some lunch. Léna”—he turned to me—“set a place for your belle-mère.”

  “Edouard.” Madame practically spat Papa’s name. “I will talk to you in the salon. Now.” She stalked from the room, not pausing to see if he was behind her.

  “Of course, chérie. Pardon.” Papa offered the Reinachs an apologetic smile and followed her to the next room.

  It was hard to breathe, all of a sudden. I glanced at the Reinachs and saw their faces blanched to a deathly pallor. “Come, have some more wine,” I urged them. “The potatoes are just ready.” Quickly, I tossed the salad, removed the potatoes to a bowl, and started coddling eggs. “Let’s start before the food gets cold. Papa won’t mind.” Truthfully, I wanted them to eat a good meal, in case Madame threw them out of the house.

  From the sitting room, I could hear their voices, a low murmur of repressed rage.

  Madame: “What are these people doing here? Why are they in my kitchen? Why are they eating my food?”

  Papa: “Virginie, where is your mercy? These people are your daughter’s friends. You would turn your back on them? How can you call yourself a Christian?”

  Madame: “My daughter? She is not my daughter. And, yes, these people—how can you allow them in our home? How can you welcome them? Edouard, I know I turned a blind eye once before—but at least those other men weren’t Jewish.” With this last sentence, Madame dropped the pretense of politesse, screaming the words in a crazed frenzy. I turned away from the table so that I didn’t have to see the look on the Reinachs’ faces.

  “They must leave this house,” Madame declared at full volume.

  “Chérie, of course they aren’t staying here permanently. We’re waiting for the moon to wane. As soon as there’s a dim night—”

  “They must leave this house,” Madame repeated, more quietly. “Or I will go see Michel at the station and tell him to come and remove them. I hope you haven’t forgotten that my nephew is a police officer.”

  My head grew light and spots swam before my eyes, until I realized that I had forgotten to keep breathing. Madame Reinach, too, looked like she might faint, the color drained from her cheeks, her dark eyes huge and panicked.

  “Just give us a few days—it’s not safe otherwise. Please, Virginie, just another day or two until the moon is not so bright,” Papa pleaded.

  “No.” Her voice rose, hysterical. “They will leave tonight!” There was the pounding of heels up the stairs and the crash of a slammed door, and the conversation was over.

  At this point, none of us had any appetite, but I dished up the food and urged the Reinachs to eat. “You don’t know when you’ll have another hot meal,” I told them, and they forced down a few mouthfuls and then went downs
tairs to prepare their things. As soon as they left the table, I began boiling more potatoes and eggs, before ransacking the cupboards for any scraps of food that I could pack up and send along with them.

  Full darkness descended at nine o’clock, but Papa waited until midnight before setting out. I begged him to let me come, too, but he convinced me that they would be safer without me. “You don’t know the route, ma choupinette,” he pointed out. “If we need to run or hide, it will be easier if I don’t have to worry about you.”

  We said goodbye in the cellar so that our voices would not wake my brothers, who were sleeping upstairs. I embraced Monsieur Reinach first, then Madame Reinach—two formal cheek kisses for each of them—a hearty squeeze of the arm for Théo. Finally Rose and I exchanged a hug.

  “When this is all over, you’ll come to New York,” Rose said. “I’m going to finish my degree at an American university, and I expect you to join me.”

  “Les États-Unis!” I exclaimed. “I’ll never be able to speak English well enough.”

  “Pff, c’est facile,” Rose scoffed. She affected an American drawl: “’Ow DEW yew DEW?” We giggled a little hysterically.

  “We need to go.” Papa pulled a dark cap on his head, buttoned a black jacket to his chin. “The patrol changes shifts at midnight and we must take advantage.”

  We made our way to the kitchen, silent as they adjusted their clothes one last time and heaved packs to their shoulders.

  “Don’t worry, ma choupette,” Papa whispered to me. “At this point, I’ve made the journey a hundred times. C’est rien.” He wrapped an arm around me and dropped a quick kiss on the top of my head. “I’ll be back by breakfast. Save me a cup of that terrible barley coffee, d’accord?”