Monsieur Brunet came shuffling out of the kitchen, eyes blinking as if he’d been asleep. I could hear the clattering of pots and pans coming from the kitchen and the sound of Bernadette talking to her daughters. He said, “Bonjour, Clementine.”
“Bonjour. Any messages?”
“I’m sorry.” This time he didn’t say, “He will come.” He said, “Perhaps he has been delayed.” The way he said it made me wonder if he knew something, and then it hit me that he thought Émile was someone I loved and fancied, that this was why I was so anxious. Monsieur Brunet said, “Did you have any trouble?”
I wasn’t sure what he meant exactly, but I said, “No. I didn’t even take the map with me, and I didn’t get lost once. One of the first things they teach you in the WASP is how to learn your way without one.”
He said, “Good. But you must be careful out there. The Germans are worried about the Allied approach and because of this they are beginning to lose confidence.”
“That sounds like a good thing.”
“They are scared, and when a person is scared he lashes out, like a caged animal. He will fight to the death.” He leaned in the doorframe and I could see he had something in his hand—it looked like a lump of coal. He said, “There are rumors. Hitler hates the Jews and he hates France. He was a corporal in the First World War and here during the surrender. When Hitler came into France in 1940, he made us surrender at the very same place where the Germans surrendered twenty years ago. Some say he wants the city burned to the ground before the Allies arrive and that he has set explosives at all of the major sites—the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, the Sacré Coeur. He wants Berlin, and not Paris, to be the most beautiful city in Europe.”
His words climbed into me like germs, till I was so tired I couldn’t hold my head up. I was suddenly mad at everyone—Hitler, Émile, Barzo, Ray, Perry, Coleman, Jacqueline Cochran, President Roosevelt, Johnny Clay. Especially Johnny Clay, who was nowhere to be found. I was sick and tired of this war.
I laid my hand on the railing of the stairs, on the shiny wooden globe that sat on the first post. I felt the smooth coolness of it against my palm. This wasn’t my city, even if I could find my way in it. These weren’t my people. It didn’t matter to me what happened to them. I thought: Save yourselves. Just leave me alone. I wanted to go upstairs and lie down on my floor and sleep for fifty years. I said, “I’m sorry.”
Monsieur Brunet nodded and said, “Dinner will be at six o’clock.”
That night I lay on the floor of my room, curled up on my side, the pillow folded beneath my head, one eye on the door because I didn’t like to sleep with my back to it. I thought about Johnny Clay and Émile and Perry and Barzo and the others till they became jumbled in my mind and eventually I worried myself to sleep. It was a heavy, dreamless sleep, but I was pulled out of it sometime later by the sound of screaming.
I sat right up and grabbed for my bag, where the knife was that Delphine had given me, and then I waited, watching the door, half-expecting someone to break it down and come inside to grab me. The night was silent and still. I didn’t remember dreaming, but the night was so quiet, I told myself I’d dreamed the noise. I lay back down, my bag to my chest, eyes open and staring toward the ceiling.
Out of the darkness, another scream and then another. At first I thought it was coming from the street or maybe downstairs, that something had happened to Bernadette or one of the girls, but then the night was broken by another scream, louder than the others.
All of a sudden, it stopped short.
The sound of silence after that was worse than the screaming, and I knew then where it was coming from—the Gestapo headquarters just next door.
SIXTEEN
On Thursday, July 27, my fifth day in Paris, I bought a ticket to the theater and went to see a play called Antigone. Inside, the theater had the musty smell of a closed-up church. I walked down the aisle as the lights were dimming, and the only other people were a few young couples, and a mother and her children, and a German in uniform who sat by himself. I wondered if I should leave, if it was safe to be there, but then he looked up at me and I thought it might be worse to turn around and walk out. I smiled at him, just slightly—not too big, the way Americans smiled—and then I took my seat, two rows ahead of him and far over to the side. In a minute, more people started coming in, walking down the aisles, arms linked, until almost all the rows were filled. Who were these people who could stop to see a show in the middle of the day?
The play was in French, and even though I couldn’t understand all they were saying, I figured out that it was about a girl whose brothers were killed in battle. One was buried, but the other was left where he fell, out where the animals could get him. When Antigone tried to give him a proper burial, she was taken prisoner and was told she had to choose life or death. When she chose death, I felt the tears sliding down my cheeks, right off my chin and onto my hands, which were folded on my lap. I didn’t even bother wiping them away. I sat there thinking about Johnny Clay and where he might be and what would happen if I found him and had to bury him, just as we’d buried Perry. It was starting to occur to me lately that I might never find him.
Then I started thinking about Émile and how he might not come back for me. And how there could be dynamite under this theater. It could be set to go off any minute. Hitler could blow up this theater, and I would be gone and no one would know, and Johnny Clay would never get his proper burial. This made me cry harder, and so I cried through the rest of the play, only wiping my face dry when the lights came up again.
I was at the end of the row, close to the wall, which meant I had to wait for the people around me to get up and leave. Everyone stood up, talking, brushing themselves off, and headed out into the day. I fell in behind them and with them, one of the crowd, while the German still sat, staring at the stage. The mother and the children were walking past him now, holding each other’s hands like a daisy chain. The littlest child was kicking each seat as he walked, and when they passed the German, his mother yanked him close to her so he wouldn’t be able to kick his too.
I came out onto the sidewalk and the people started fanning away so that I was by myself again. I blinked in the sunshine. The air smelled fresh and green like rain, but the clouds were disappearing and the sky was a bright blue. I turned to my right, back toward Monsieur Brunet’s. People bustled by in the street, and I was happy to see them, happy to disappear in the crowd.
A minute later, a voice said, in French, “Did the play make you sad?” It was the German, and he had fallen in step beside me.
I thought of shaking my head to let him know I couldn’t speak at all. I wanted to say: Go away. Leave me alone. My heart is broken. But instead I said, in French, “It was a sad story.”
In English he said, “As soon as I saw you, I knew you were American. I would have known it anywhere.”
Damn, I thought. I wasn’t sure what to say to this, so I didn’t say anything. I figured the less I said the better.
He said, “Are you an actress?”
“No.” I was counting the streets we crossed, trying to remember where to turn. With each building we passed, I wondered if there were explosives planted underneath.
“You are beautiful like one.”
In French I said, “I’m a singer.”
“An American singer in occupied France.”
He was still speaking English. In French I said, “My husband was French.” The skin under my collar was growing damp.
“He is dead?”
“Yes.”
“The war?”
“An accident.” Ty’s face flashed before me, like a snapshot. “He was a pilot.”
“I am sorry for your great loss. Why are you still here?” His tone was friendly, but I thought he was asking too many questions. Because I refused to speak English, he had switched back to French.
I said, “The war began and I couldn’t leave, so I am here with my friends.”
He said, “Do I
know these friends?”
I didn’t like the way he said it. My back was dripping wet. I could feel little drops of water on my upper lip and forehead. I hoped he couldn’t see them. Then I thought of what Delphine had said, about letting my smile speak for me. I looked up at him and smiled my brightest smile, the one I’d used when I was little on Sweet Fern when I needed her permission to do something. “I don’t think so. They are simple people, like me.”
He said, “I don’t think somehow there is anything simple about you.” I wondered if he was flirting with me. Except for his accent, he would have been the all-American boy—young and sturdy, with a friendly face as open as a field.
Up ahead, I could see Rue de Courcelles, which would take me back to Rue de la Néva. I held out my hand and he looked down at it in surprise. He put his hand in mine and I shook it. “It was a pleasure to meet you, but I am almost home.”
“But I didn’t get your name.” I wondered if he was going to ask for my papers. I reminded myself to breathe.
“Clementine. Clementine Roux.” I waited for him to say: That’s not your name. Your name is Velva Jean Hart. What are you playing at? Who are you trying to fool? You’re just a mountain girl from North Carolina, and you are trying to fool me, a German officer working for Hitler, the cruelest man in all the world.
He said, “It’s a pleasure, Clementine Roux. I am Fritz.”
I said, “So nice to meet you. Good-bye.” And then I waved to him and walked off, making my turn. I wanted to look back to see if he was following me, but instead I went on, casual as could be, every now and then stopping at a shop window or to pet a dog that was sitting outside on a stoop. At one point, I ducked into a drugstore and bought myself a lipstick—Rouge Ardent, which meant Fiery Red.
I turned onto the next street and the next, and when I was finally on Rue de la Néva, I counted the doors, walking past the Gestapo headquarters, and walked up the steps to Monsieur Brunet’s. Inside, there were happy sounds coming from the kitchen, which was at the back of the house. I followed the sounds and there was Bernadette, in a blue apron with red trim, her sleeves rolled up above her elbows, cutting vegetables, the ones she grew on the roof now that food was so scarce—potatoes and radishes and strange vegetables I’d never heard of, like the Swedish turnip and the Jerusalem artichoke. Because there wasn’t electricity or cooking fuel, she was boiling water in the fireplace, using scraps of newspaper as kindling. The children, Learyn and Annalise, were cutting shapes into the potato skins that fell on the counter and on the floor—stars and rabbits and trees.
Bernadette saw me and smiled. She blew a piece of hair out of her eyes and said, “Bonsoir, Clementine.”
“Bonsoir.” The counters were stacked with loaves of bread and muffins—fatter and prettier than any in a bakery—set out to cool. I wanted to help, so I picked up a knife and a rutabaga, thinking I would slice it for her, but it was heavy and hard, like plaster.
I stared down at the rutabaga and then Bernadette stared down at the rutabaga, and then I looked up at her and she looked up at me. She wiped her hands on her apron and whisked the rutabaga away from me, setting it back into the bowl, careful as could be. She smiled and said, “Non, non. I will call you for supper.”
I said, “Merci,” and turned to go, the laughter and sounds of home fading behind me. My foot was on the first step, going up to my room, when I stopped and turned around. I walked back to the kitchen and said, “Madame Brunet?”
The girls were laughing now, sticking the potato skins on their faces, trying to make them stay there. Annalise said, “Come join us, Clementine!”
Learyn said, “Oui! You must try!” She made a mustache out of the skin and marched around the kitchen like a soldier.
Bernadette watched them, laughing. Her hands were kneading and kneading. She didn’t look up. “Oui?”
“Do you have a pair of cutting shears I can borrow?”
My room was neat and clean but small, just a bed with a flowered blanket, a chair in one corner, large enough to sit in with your knees up, and a chest of drawers. The walls were papered in roses, heavy and fat and red. There was one large window, and through this I could see the Eiffel Tower.
I picked up the cutting shears that Bernadette had given me, and I walked into the bathroom, which was down the hall. I wrapped a towel around my shoulders and then I looked at myself in the mirror. I was freckled and sunburnt from the day’s walk. I looked thin. My hair was wild and too long. I’d taken to wearing it tied back by a scarf.
I took a hunk of my hair and smoothed it against me. It fell to the middle of my chest. I smoothed it as if I were petting a dog or a cat, and then I raised the cutting shears and cut clean through the hair till it fell just over my shoulders. French women—especially the ones who lived in Paris—had short hair and were smart and suntanned and elegant, even those struggling to survive.
I reached for another section of hair, and sliced it away so that it fell into the sink. It was easy to cut it—my heart panged, but only a little—and this surprised me. When I was done cutting, I got out the box of hair dye I had bought on the way home. I covered my head in Brun Foncé, the deepest, darkest brown, nearly black, and I didn’t even stop to think about what I would look like or what I had done. It was time I learned to blend in.
After I was finished, I stood in front of the mirror brushing my hair, trying to get used to the new shape of it. I set down my brush and I looked at the girl looking back at me and decided I didn’t recognize her.
When I went down to supper that night, Monsieur Brunet and Bernadette acted as if they had expected it. Bernadette said, “You are looking lovely, Clementine,” and Monsieur Brunet said, “The dark hair makes your eyes more green.”
All through the meal, I caught Learyn and Annalise staring at me until finally Anna said, “You look like everyone else now.” She sounded disappointed.
Monsieur Brunet said, “Annalise.”
I said, “No, c’est bien.” It is fine. It is good. It is okay. It was what I wanted, to blend in, to become invisible, to disappear. I was trying not to miss my hair, which sat upstairs in the trash can, as dead as Velva Jean Hart.
After dinner, when the dishes were done, Bernadette took the girls to their room, down the hall from the kitchen, to read them a story and tuck them into bed. The bread was stacked on the counter, and, careful not to make a sound, I picked up a loaf. It was heavier than a regular loaf, but only by a little. It smelled like bread but something else too that I couldn’t put my finger on. I set it down, careful as I could, just in case, and then I picked up a muffin. It was also heavier by a little, and also smelled slightly off.
Monsieur Brunet called out, “Bernadette?” The sound was muffled, as if it were coming from inside the wall.
I set the muffin on the cooling rack, just as it was before. There was a blank wall between where the counter ended and the doorway to the toilet began. A calendar of food advertisements hung on this, but that was all.
I stood in front of the wall and studied it, remembering the secret door in the professor’s closet in Rouen. I tapped on the wall, and Monsieur Brunet’s voice said, “Oui? Qu’est-ce que c’est, mon cher?” What is it, my dear?
I pushed on the wall, right at my waist level, just inside the line in the wood, and a door swung open. It was a small square of a room stacked with books and maps and papers. Monsieur Brunet stood, bent over the desk, gathering up his keys and his billfold. He looked up at me, and I couldn’t tell who was more surprised, him or me.
“Clementine.” His eyes darted past me into the kitchen and beyond.
“What is this place?”
He reached past and shut the door behind me with a click. The office smelled of potatoes and onions. As if he could read my mind, he said, “This was once the pantry.”
I said, “And now it’s your office.”
“Yes.”
We stood staring at each other.
He said, “I hear you crash-landed a
team of agents into Normandy.”
“Yes,” I said. “What is it you do for the Resistance?”
He took his time answering, and I knew he was trying to decide what to tell me and how much. Finally, he said, “I am an inventor.”
“What kinds of things do you invent?”
“I make equipment for the Resistance fighters.”
“Spy weapons?”
He raised his eyebrows and then he nodded. “Yes.”
I felt my stomach twitch like it was the first day of school. It was both a good and a bad feeling, but mostly a good one. “Can you show me?”
He sighed. I said, “I’m sure you don’t want me here, especially because of the work you’re doing, but you can trust me. I give you my word, and where I come from, sir, that’s as good as a blood pact or spitting in the dirt.”
Monsieur Brunet smiled at this, just barely, and then he said, “Come.”
He pressed a button on the door and it swung open again, and I followed him through the kitchen and down the hall and into the living room. He walked over to the bookshelves, where there was an entire shelf of record albums. He pulled one out and I could see by the cover that it was Mlle Lucienne Boyer—Dans la fumée. He slipped the record out of its package and held it up, twisting it back and forth so I could see the grooves on its face.
He said, “See there?” He pointed to one of them. “It looks almost the same as the others. But when you place the needle on it, it triggers an explosion.”
He slid the record back into its sleeve and returned it to its shelf. He reached for a pair of white candles in matching gold candleholders, which sat on the fireplace mantel. “These explode when the wick reaches a certain level.” He set them down and waved to the basket of wood. “Fake wood with explosives inside.”
Becoming Clementine: A Novel Page 13