In This Hospitable Land

by Jr. Lynmar Brock

  Tante Irene said, “I think it’s all right if she walks around a bit.”

  “All right,” Denise agreed. “But be careful and come back quickly.”

  Christel proudly strolled about the graveyard on her own. It helped that lots of people were there. She was careful not to trip over anyone.

  The lights went around and around overhead. It kept getting quieter and quieter. Suddenly Christel noticed two men who seemed much younger than the others. They carried rifles as they walked from one group to another. Though frightened by the rifles she trailed behind them at what she judged a safe distance, drawing close enough to catch snatches of what they said:

  “Have you seen…?”

  “Do you know Madame Roux or her daughter Irene?”

  With a squeal Christel recognized the voices: “Papy! Oncle Alex!”

  Lifting Christel into the air, André felt a rush of joy and relief. For one moment he stopped worrying about the Germans with whom he and Alex had been playing a deadly game of hide-and-seek all day. He felt certain that the cemetery was well-enough hidden by wall, trees, and dark to make Christel’s wail of excitement an inconsequential lapse rather than a serious breach of security.

  Back on the ground, Christel led him and Alex away. A wave of anticipation swept over André as they approached huddled children and adults.

  “Over here,” Denise called in a loud whisper.

  It was a wonderful reunion.

  “Papy!” Cristian called excitedly.

  André could have cried as he lifted the boy into his arms and kissed him. It was the first time he had ever heard Cristian speak.

  When Ida and Christel hugged their father tightly, Denise called hoarsely, “Children, remember we need to stay low.”

  “Well, we’re here,” Alex said, sitting down beside the others, his back against the wall like theirs, his rifle balanced carefully across his knees. “But it wasn’t easy.”

  Without needing any prompting, he reported how he and André had been standing in a field at Le Tronc drinking mugs of ersatz coffee when Léon spotted the Nazi convoy up on the crest and told the brothers to go inform their compatriots while he warned the family. Careful to keep under cover, the brothers laboriously made their way to their most recent Resistance camp in Vimbouches.

  “Vimbouches?” Denise interrupted. “I thought you’d been staying at Les Bouzedes!”

  “We changed camps in February,” André explained, “after Les Bouzedes was betrayed by a colloborateur.”

  “Of course the Maquisards at Vimbouches already knew about the latest German movements,” Alex resumed.

  “They were about to send someone out to warn us,” André added.

  “Eventually we heard people were hiding here and came looking for you.”

  Then all caught up on their doings over the winter. André and Alex had spent much of it going back and forth between Resistance camps serving as messengers—which kept them from their families. They had only gone back to Le Tronc quite recently, hoping and expecting to see everyone again soon.

  “Have you heard anything of Geneviève?” Alex asked Denise abruptly.

  “Not a word,” Denise responded softly. “But I’m sure she and the children are fine.”

  “I miss her so,” Alex said thickly.

  All subsided into silence. André mused that despite the lurking German troops this was the most peaceful moment he had experienced in memory and the longest stretch he had been able to spend with his family since leaving La Font more than a year before.

  All at once Christel cried out, “What’s that?”

  Alex leapt to his feet, rifle in hand, certain Christel must have spied a German soldier. Instead the little girl pointed to a nearby grave and the strange blue vapor rising from it and curling up into the sky. Other similarly odd blue, green, white, and rose-colored apparitions appeared throughout the graveyard, swirling, twisting, and disappearing into the night.

  “I don’t like it,” Christel whispered into mother’s ear.

  “Are they ghosts?” Ida asked her father, unable to conceal her terror yet transfixed by the extraordinary sight.

  André said quietly but dramatically, “It’s just the spirits of the dead escaping.”

  “Papy!” Ida chided, giving him a little push. “What is it really?”

  André was reluctant to convey the details of the chemical breakdown of a corpse—especially one buried in the simplest of wooden coffins and covered with just enough dirt to make a proper grave in the rocky hillside. Instead he said, “It’s the kind of thing you’d see if you spent most every day in a cemetery. Nothing to worry about, though it’s eerie.”

  Alex sat back down and gave a little shiver. “I suppose there aren’t many of us who’ve spent a whole night in a cemetery before. It’s nothing I ever aspired to.”

  “I still don’t like it,” Christel said sullenly.

  “Why don’t you girls close your eyes and try to get some sleep?” Denise counseled.

  “But the Germans are over there,” Christel complained. “I want to stay awake so I’m ready to run!”

  “Me too,” Ida echoed, not to be outdone in bravery by her baby sister. “I’m not tired.”

  “Why don’t you all get some sleep?” André recommended, passing his already sleeping son back to his wife. “Alex and I will stay up and keep watch.”

  “You want anything to eat?” Ernestine asked thoughtfully. “We only brought a little but you’re welcome to it.”

  “Thank you, no,” André said, gingerly pushing the proffered sack back toward its owner. “You keep it. In the morning when we can see better and determine precisely where the Germans are, we’ll go out to get food for everyone.”

  The brothers patrolled the perimeter. Soon all the villagers had drifted off to sleep. Though Christel had nodded off briefly, she awoke again and whispered to her passing father, “If the Germans come up here will you and Oncle Alex shoot them?”

  “Don’t worry,” André said caressing her. “We’ll protect you. You’ll be safe.”

  After a few minutes, Christel was once again drawing the deep, even breaths of sleep. If only André’s concerns could be allayed half so easily.

  About four o’clock in the morning, to judge by the moon’s position in the sky, Denise awoke, uncertain how long she had slept. How oddly peaceful the cemetery seemed with almost everyone asleep and dreaming. In the dead of night would the dead protect her? The thought gave her chills.

  “Hello,” André whispered, crouching by her feet, pointing his rifle away. “Alex thought one of us should get some sleep. Me.”

  “I’m glad,” Denise said. “But be careful not to wake the children.”

  André gingerly positioned himself to one side of Christel. “This is a most peculiar way to spend the night together.”

  “You must be hungry. We still have a little bread in that sack.”

  André broke off a piece, popped it into his mouth, and chewed thoughtfully. “Homemade. A treat. Ever since New Year’s the bread in the camps has been adulterated with sawdust, inedibly hard grains, and just plain dirt. Even so it’s precious.”

  Denise asked whether he ever ran into Max Maurel anymore.

  “Our paths haven’t crossed in weeks. He’s in great demand because of his medical training and travels between camps even more than Alex and I do.”

  “It’s funny that they use outsiders like you as messengers.”

  “I thought that too. But so many resistants know even less of the Cévennes than we do. And since we’re older, well-traveled men with a certain sophistication, the camp commanders trust us to handle unusual, sometimes delicate situations.”

  “And you both blend in now.”

  André laughed lightly. “After three long years we almost pass for natives.” Then he grew serious again. “I think you should get your identity cards reauthorized. Max had us do that some time ago.”

  “Funny,” Denise said. “We had ours stamp
ed again in July.”

  André nodded and then became even more thoughtful than usual. “Would you and the girls sometimes be willing to carry messages for us?”

  “André!” Denise was plainly shocked. “The children?”

  “They wouldn’t be the first. And I think the girls are big enough now to carry hidden slips of paper from one camp near Le Salson to another not far away. Why, Ida walks greater distances to and from school every day. And Christel would enjoy tagging along. It would be a great way for them to feel they’re fighting back against everything they fear.”

  “André,” Denise said severely, “you’re acting as if the Nazis aren’t right across the valley camped out on the Route des Crêtes.”

  “This really is an anomalous situation,” he replied soothingly. “For all intents and purposes we’re practically liberated already.”

  “I’m sitting in a cemetery with searchlights circling over my head. I don’t feel liberated in the slightest.”

  “Because you don’t get around as much as I do. Because you haven’t had access to the information I’ve been privy to these last few months.”

  “Such as?”

  “At the end of last year Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin met in Tehran to coordinate operations against Germany and to plan an Allied invasion of France. It’s coming soon. They’ve placed all the Allied Expeditionary Forces under American General Eisenhower. They sound quite confident.”

  “I’m sure that’s very nice but…”

  “Listen, my dear. Things really are going our way. Since the beginning of this year air warfare over Europe has been dominated by the Allies. We’re wreaking untold damage and destruction on German cities, transportation systems, and all the industries that produce war machinery throughout Germany and German-held territories. Even Hitler’s Chancellery was mostly destroyed after a direct hit during an RAF raid on Berlin.”

  “Francis!” Denise gasped. “I worry about my brother every day.”

  “Then relax. The Americans have taken over most big bombing raids. They’ve even begun attacking German positions in northern France to soften them up for the invasion.”

  “You sound so convinced I almost believe you.”

  “Believe me, Denise. De Gaulle has consolidated power over the Free French forces and the Resistance grows bolder every day. Just last week we sabotaged and halted production at a ball-bearing factory and at an aircraft components plant near Paris. It’s all coming together.”

  Denise could barely breathe. “So you really think this nightmare’s finally going to end?”

  “Of course. But not quite yet. Terrible things still keep happening. I’m afraid I’ve heard Belgian Jews are in great danger now of being arrested by the Brownshirts.”

  “Oh, André. Our family!”

  “I know. But you must believe we’ve got the Germans on the run.”

  Denise shivered. “Irene was in Vialas when they entered the town square.”

  “Right after we derailed that train outside of Génolhac.”

  Denise gasped.

  “Don’t worry, we got all the French passengers off at the station. Then when the train reached the tunnel north of town we set off explosives on the tracks putting that line out of commission for some time to come.”

  “You and Alex were involved?” Denise asked fearfully.

  André chuckled. “I use the term ‘we’ very loosely.”

  Having gone this far, Denise asked, “That rifle. Can you use it?”

  “I’ve only fired at targets,” André said huskily. “Never a person.”

  “Would you?” Denise breathed.

  “I hope not.”

  “I hope not too. I hope you never have to.”

  André pulled her close and kissed her lovingly. Then he leaned back and closed his eyes.

  As André drifted into a light doze, his steady breathing helped steady hers. The sky was beginning to lighten faintly but Denise still couldn’t see her husband’s face clearly. Even so, in that dark moment, she thought she could feel him smiling.

  With the coming of dawn the small crowd stirred and grew restless. Alex was glad of the company. All night he’d been distracted, amazed, and mildly disturbed by the occasional methane flares, their multihued luminescence dancing in the dark. Had Alex, like his brother, been of a more metaphysical turn of mind, he might have been seduced into speculating about an afterlife. Were he not so exhausted and on edge, he doubted he would have given such nonsense even passing consideration.

  Every now and again children cried. Together with the final hoots of a night owl perched in an overhanging branch, they served as a wake-up call for the few remaining sleepers.

  Christel jerked awake and grabbed for her mother instinctively. Then Ida returned to consciousness, shivering and looking frightened as the searchlights swung down and around from the crest. Denise’s eyes popped open wide and André’s body startled. Only blanket-clutching, finger-sucking Cristian snoozed on.

  André stood up slowly, stiff after a couple of hours huddled against the wall and on ground that had grown more damp and cold throughout the night.

  “All right?” he asked, joining his brother.

  “All right.”

  The moon had run its course and the first edge of the rising sun peeped over the farthest mountains. German trucks started up one after another, engines sputtering and catching, churning out a steady growling beat. The searchlights were extinguished. Then the trucks began to roll, slowly heading up toward the pass at Saint-Maurice-de-Ventalon—away from Vimbouches.

  Everyone gathered to stare in hopeful fascination at the curious procession.

  “They’re leaving?” Denise asked, carrying the still-drowsy Cristian.

  “Looks that way,” Alex said flatly.

  “It looks like a retreat,” André agreed.

  Alex snarled, “My guess is the Nazis never meant to come after any of us and certainly didn’t wish to stay the night. One of their trucks must have broken down. Unfortunately for us it took them this long to make repairs.”

  “I bet they were as afraid as we were,” André concurred. “Which explains why they kept their searchlights circling all night—not to locate us but to keep the Resistance away.”

  “Where do you think they’re going now?” Denise asked.

  “No way to know,” Alex spat. “Let’s just hope it’s miles and miles from here.”

  “And that they never come back,” André sighed.

  The crowd stared for what seemed hours. But the great blinding ball of the sun was still only half-visible over the mountaintops by the time the German trucks finally disappeared definitively among the trees lining the valley to the west. Then even the rattling of their engines faded away.

  The pall lifted all at once from the involuntary cemetery guests. Suddenly it felt like the morning after a slumber party. Everyone began chattering loudly at once, their voices betraying relief. Then the bigger children started running around like dogs let off the leash, playing tag and hide-and-seek amidst the headstones. One of the infants set up a wail of hunger in her mother’s arms and the mother didn’t bother to hush her.

  “What now?” Ernestine asked gruffly, startling Alex.

  André grinned. “As promised, Alex and I will go get food.”

  “Hurry up then,” Mamé grumped. “I’m famished.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  INVISIBLE INK

  MAY 11, 1944

  For the next several weeks, the Sauverin brothers labored steadily and contentedly on the Guins’ farm and visited their families in Le Salson and L’Herm. But one evening as the two sat listlessly in the barn, André obsessed about the fact that it was now more than four years since he had peered out of his top-floor apartment in Ixelles to see German dive-bombers bearing down on him. He wondered what could be causing the delay in the Allied invasion of France.

  All signs suggested the war was going well for the Allies and for the Resistance. He and Alex hadn
’t been called on by the Maquis for quite some time.

  Even as he thought this, a sharp knock on the door made the Sauverins scramble for their rifles. But they relaxed when they saw a young, familiar Maquisard who apologized for disturbing them after dark.

  The chief wanted to see André the next day. At another new camp: Champdemergue.

  In the predawn gloom of Friday, May twelfth, André stopped by the farmhouse to inform Léon and Yvonne that he would be going away again.

  “But you’ll be back?” Léon asked querulously.

  “Let’s hope so,” Yvonne said kindly.

  “Soon I trust,” André agreed.

  Starting off along the familiar trail, he soon diverted himself to a little-used pathway following directions to the recently installed camp.

  Approaching the new facility he was first startled then relaxed seeing Max Maurel sitting on the side of the road, waving happily to him.

  “Morning, André.”

  “Max. What are you doing here?”

  “I could ask the same of you.”

  “I have no idea,” André answered shaking his head. “The chief always wants me to come to him before I know what I’m in for.” They laughed and André asked, “What have you been hearing? We have plenty to eat at the Guins’ but we’re starved for information.”

  “Still expecting the Allied invasion any day,” Max replied, “but it’s impossible to say when that day may be. Bombing runs continue against German sites in the north: the coastal batteries in Normandy, marshaling yards and railway workshops in Juvisy-sur-Orge, Noisy-le-Sec, Rouen, Tergnier…Meantime rumors have swirled for months that Hitler was either dead or in an insane asylum since he hadn’t been seen in public for a time. Then he showed up at a funeral in Munich but didn’t speak. Maybe something’s seriously wrong with him—besides mental and moral degeneracy I mean.” Then Max asked, “What did Denise say about her stay at Villaret with Madame Guibal and Simone?”

  The question struck André as odd since Max had delivered André’s family into the care of Georgette Guibal. “I know Denise was grateful, and fond of them,” he said. “But she certainly prefers Le Salson. More freedom of movement.”