The World That We Knew

by Alice Hoffman

  In the morning, before he set off, he showed her how to shoot her father’s rifle. It came as no surprise to him that she was an excellent shot.

  “A natural,” he declared. “You’re good at everything.” He kissed her for a long time. “Especially this.”

  When it came time for their goodbyes, Marianne had a sinking feeling. She didn’t want to let him go, and that wasn’t like her. She had never wanted to hold him back, but now here she was, with her arms around him, reluctant to let him leave. He promised he would take on this one last mission and then he would be done. Why was she so worried? The war would be over before they knew it. Had she no faith in him? He reminded her, laughing, that he was the best driver in all of France. He’d be gone only a few weeks. Afterward he would come back to take care of her. Then, he swore, he would never leave again.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  THE MAP

  LE CHAMBON-SUR-LIGNON, JULY 1944

  AT SCHOOL LEA KEPT TO herself. The girls were friendly enough; still she was an outsider, the tall fair-haired girl in the gray dress. When she stood outside her gaze followed the birds swooping through the sky as though she was trying to summon one, but she always walked away disappointed, brooding. The message she was waiting for had yet to come.

  By now she was sixteen. She didn’t want to grow any older. The farther she was from the age she had been when she left Berlin, the more she feared she would forget her past. Who had taught her how to read, who had sewn her clothes, who had told her stories about the wolves she sometimes heard up in the craggy mountains. People said none were left, that they had been hunted to extinction, but some had survived, up where the altitude was so great and the air so thin not even the birds could fly. Who would know you when you were the last one left of your kind? If she could no longer remember her mother and grandmother, would she forget that she had once been loved?

  But time was moving forward, and everything changed. Even in this tiny, isolated village, people had heard about the attack on German forces in Normandy. News was carried by members of the Resistance, and there was a wild conviction that the war had turned. Anything might be possible now, and it seemed that fate might not be set out before them in a straight, unwavering path, but might instead be a curving line marked by chance and choice, infinite in its possible destinations.

  Lea decided she would write a note, to be ready when the heron returned. He was late this year. She imagined Julien waiting to hear from her, one hand thrown up to block the bright light as he scanned the sky, just as she did. One afternoon, as Weitz was out smoking one of his precious cigarettes, which he cut in half, so they would last longer, and Ava was in the yard hanging the laundry, Lea opened the bureau drawer in search of a pad of paper and a pen. She did not expect what she found, and her chest immediately felt hollow. There was a note, folded over itself, tucked away. She steadied herself and took it in her hands. She recognized his handwriting right away.

  Come here as soon as you can.

  She turned over the paper, her heart pounding.

  There was the map. He’d sketched Beehive House, and the winding rutted road, and the pastures filled with flowering genêts. In her hands was the barn and the stone house with its tilted chimney and white shutters, the goat named Bluebell, and the beehives in the field. It had been here in this drawer for months.

  Lea waited until after dinner, when Weitz went outside to paint in the yard in the last of the day’s light. Then she put the map on the table.

  “When did this arrive?”

  Ava glanced at the map. She felt a wave of shame and confusion, emotions she was not supposed to have.

  “You decided to hide it from me?” Lea said.

  “The heron came back just after winter, but the time wasn’t right.” The lie burned her tongue and she flushed, something she had never done before.

  “The heron has been back all this time!” Lea’s mouth tightened. “It’s not winter now, and still you kept a message that was meant for me. You stole it!”

  Ava had often regretted asking the heron to carry Lea’s and Julien’s messages. She’d thought there would be no harm in it, but she was wrong. “You may not understand everything I do.”

  “I understand perfectly. You want to keep me away from Julien, because I’ll leave with him, and you don’t want me to cross the border.”

  “But I do,” Ava insisted. “I promised your mother I would get you to safety.”

  “And yet we’re still here.” Lea held Ava in her gaze. “You and I know why. You don’t want to do what you promised my mother because you know what happens once I’m safe.” Every word Lea spoke was brittle, a sharp broken hook. “You’ve known all along. You know what she wants me to do.”

  “I want the best for you.” Ava felt something sharp inside of her. By now she knew that people always lost what they loved most.

  “I don’t care,” Lea cried. “I’m leaving here. I’m following the map.”

  She went to get her suitcase. Let Ava try to stop her. She would scream her head off if need be. She was nearly as tall as Ava and she wasn’t a girl of twelve anymore. She would never be a child again, and she didn’t have to listen to anyone.

  Watching her, Ava felt as if she were breaking. It was all true. She might have taken Lea to the border a hundred times, but she had done as she’d pleased; she had her own mind and her own desires. She had wanted to remain in this glorious world, despite how wicked those who inhabited it might be. She had let her desire for life affect her vow.

  She had betrayed her maker.

  “You can’t go alone,” Ava said now. She reached for the suitcase. “I’ll go with you. Let me pack.”

  Lea scowled. “I don’t need you.”

  They both took hold of the suitcase, and when they tugged, it flew open. Before their eyes, the lining split in the place where Hanni had sewn a thousand miraculous stitches. Inside the torn lining, hidden there on the day they left Berlin, was a blue dress, perfectly made. Mein Schatz, her mother had written on the note tacked to one sleeve. Für dich.

  My darling, for you when you reach safety.

  Lea sank to the floor, the dress in her arms, her face hot with tears.

  Heart of my heart, love of my life, the one loss I will never survive.

  As for Ava, she was sick with shame. Her emotions were so raw she could feel herself melting, and a pool of muddy water gathered around her on the floor. That was when she decided, they would leave that night.

  Ahron Weitz gave Lea one of his paintings, the night sky filled with stars. She embraced him, but not for too long. They would likely never see each other again, and so there were no goodbyes. Weitz stayed at the window and watched them go. They had thanked their hosts, but thanks could never be enough for people who were willing to risk such danger for complete strangers. Lea said a blessing Bobeshi had taught her at their door, the Hashkiveinu, a petition for safety through the night.

  Lay us down, our God, in peace, and raise us up our King, to life. Spread your shelter of peace over us, and over all of Israel and Jerusalem.

  It was dark, a good night for traveling, for cutting across fields, and finding the twisting road that had been sketched in blue, the same color as the sky when they reached Monsieur Félix’s farm in the pale morning light, for they had been walking all night. There was Beehive House, exactly as Julien had drawn it before Monsieur Félix was murdered, before he worked as the Bissets’ carpenter, before he went to Izieu. The farm was deserted except for a small goat that had been tied to a post in the stable, a creature so delighted to see them that it jumped into Lea’s arms when it was freed.

  The door to the house was locked, so Ava shoved open a window and climbed in. She could smell death, and she called for Lea to wait on the porch. When she placed her hands on the tabletop she could see the image of a body hanging from the beam. She went outside and could see past the barn to Monsieur Félix’s grave. There in the tree was Azriel. The angel usually departed once hi
s work was done, and the fact that he was still hovering nearby was troublesome.

  They had a dinner of potatoes and onions, fried and made delicious in Ava’s experienced hands. She was long past Hardship Soup. She could make a meal out of anything and nothing. She washed the dishes, then made up the bed in the small upstairs bedroom.

  Lea was sitting on the porch in the dark. Things had not turned out as she had wished. The deserted farm had been a huge disappointment, but the fury she had felt at Ava had faded. Why would anyone want to give up life on earth? They both knew where fate led once Lea was safe, and what a sacrifice Ava was expected to make. It was an act of love that only a mother would do for a child, and her companion did not owe her that.

  Ava had come to stand in the doorway. She wasn’t certain this was a safe place. If it was up to her, they would leave right now.

  “He’ll be here,” Lea told her.

  Julien would keep his promise. He would stay alive and walk down the dirt road and when he saw her he would know her and she would know him in return.

  Ava didn’t argue. She knew that Lea’s mind was made up. She came to sit beside her on one of the old chairs Monsieur Félix had made long ago, when his daughter was small, when people kept their doors unlocked and had no fear of their neighbors or of the police. The view was dusky in the fading light. Lea had grown taller and thinner. She hadn’t been a child for quite some time. She looked like the woman she would soon be, and she had a woman’s certainty. She intended to wait for as long as she must.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  THE LAST ANGEL

  HAUTE-LOIRE, JULY 1944

  MONSIEUR CAZALES DROVE FROM A neighboring farm to deliver Bluebell, now in the back of the truck, for she had wandered over to his property, as she often did. He’d already heard from his wife that odd things were going on at the Félix place and had been ever since Marianne had returned. As he pulled up, two strangers, a girl and a woman, came out onto the porch, as curious about him as he was about them.

  “The old man’s not here?” Cazales said. “Or his daughter?”

  “No one was here when we arrived,” Lea told him.

  “And who are you?” Cazales asked, not that it was any of his business. Still, old Félix had been his neighbor for a long time. He supposed he had a right to know. The dark woman was oddly silent and the girl was not someone he’d seen before. His wife had gossiped that the daughter, Marianne, was involved with some young fellow who came and went as he pleased, speeding down the road in some rattletrap car that was likely stolen, scaring the cows in their pasture.

  “We’re friends of the family,” Lea said.

  Cazales shrugged. Maybe this was true, maybe it wasn’t. But they weren’t German soldiers, and how much damage could they do even if they were thieves? Perhaps they were simply homeless, making their way to the border. He wasn’t that interested in other people’s personal lives. If Marianne had a boyfriend, for instance, who was he to care? Let her have a hundred of them for all it mattered to him. People here were entitled to their privacy. Still, there were some things that were quite concerning, the coming storm, for instance. He had already rounded up his cows and shut them in his barn. “Take my advice, tie up the goat so she doesn’t go running off and get lost in the storm. It will be here by dark.” He could tell from the way the wind was rising, from the upturned leaves on the trees.

  They did as he suggested, keeping the little goat in the barn, though she complained about her confinement. It was a good thing she was tied up because the storm that arose suddenly that night was vicious, a swirl of black in the sky that gave way to a drenching rain, and then sudden hail, so that it seemed stones were being thrown on the roof. The wind was dreadful; it shook the house and the trees. Branches broke, haystacks went flying into the air, sunflowers were pulled up by their roots. Anything not tied down rose into the whirlwind before dropping to the ground with a crash.

  Lea curled up and slept through most of the storm, but Ava was more restless than usual. She looked out the window to see the darkening sky. She was thinking about running away. She had been thinking about it ever since they’d come to the farm.

  Erase the e and turn emet into met, truth into death.

  But what would happen then? Would she melt into clay or water, or would she die with all of the pain and agony of a mortal death? She should be satisfied merely to obey her maker’s will, but that had changed. She had awoken to her life, and she didn’t wish to give it up. She had become attached to this world, to fields and trees, to the heron and the sky, to feeling her heart beat, for she had one, she was sure of it now, even if it had begun as clay. She could hear the birds in the trees, telling her to run as far as she could from the world of men. Creatures such as herself were not made to have a soul, they were made to do the bidding of their makers, but she had already lived for too long, just as the rabbis warned, she was stronger now, uncontrollable, making her own decisions, defying what she had been told to do.

  In the morning, the storm was over and the air was heavy and still. Ava went out into the yard. She began to walk. She thought about the moment when she opened her eyes, and the first time she felt sunlight on her skin, and of Paris when they got off the train, and the Seine at night, and the heron dancing in the garden. She was walking faster by now. She was thinking for herself. The world, however cruel it might be, was too glorious to give up. She had no rights to it, she wasn’t human, but neither was the heron, and he had rights no human had, the rights of flight and sight. She stopped at the crest of a hill and turned to gaze back at the farm. There were the fields, and the barn, and in the distance the neighbor’s cow pastures and orchards. Lea came through the door still in her nightgown, her feet bare. Ava felt a catch in her throat to think of how the girl might feel when she realized she was alone. But she was no longer a child, and when Julien arrived they could make their way to the border.

  Ava might have walked over the mountain and vanished, but when she turned she saw that Lea had left the house. As the girl proceeded toward the barn, Ava spied Azriel in the tree beside the beehives, glimmering in the leaves. The wooden hives had smashed open when the wind threw them over and now honey was leaking into the ground. Azriel had been reading from his book of names, but as soon as Lea came near, he gazed up.

  Ava was stricken as the angel moved from branch to branch. It was only at that moment that she realized she could gasp, like any ordinary woman. Her breath came out hot and fevered, burning her throat. Lea was headed toward the barn, a pan of crusts for the goat in her hands. Was it possible that Lea saw the angel? She put one hand over her eyes and stared into the tree, confused. You could not see him unless he came for you, unless he was ready to take you in his embrace, and then you could see him so clearly the rest of the world disappeared in the blink of an eye.

  Ava ran down the hill through the pine forest, her head pounding.

  By then Lea had gone into the barn to let the goat off her rope. Bluebell, intoxicated with freedom after the terror of the storm, dashed out before she could be caught, racing through the field.

  “Come here!” Lea called, chasing after the goat, regretting that she had not slipped on her shoes as she ran over the rough sunflower stalks littering the ground, near the broken beehives. She observed a strange shadow moving through the trees. It seemed to be a handsome man in a black suit. All at once she felt she’d lost her hearing. He had long dark hair and he seemed to know her. Could it be that he was saying her name? The air was alive with a deafening buzzing. The bees were maddened from the storm, in a fury ever since their hives had been destroyed. In an instant they began to swarm over Lea. They were on her arms and legs and lips and all over her scalp, in the strands of her hair. She was numb at first, and then she was on fire. She did her best to escape, running through the field to a small green stream that was cold as ice, but she was running with the buzzing cloud; they were flying together, so fast that the world was a blur. The angel was above her in the air
, his long dark hair loose, his beautiful dark eyes focused on her alone. There was a light inside of him and Lea had to squint to see him, but as he came near she saw him more clearly. He was so beautiful she found she couldn’t speak.

  When she collapsed she was lost inside the swarm, so hidden from sight that when Ava came upon her all she saw was a thousand bees. Ava had all but flown through the field and the uprooted sunflowers. The storm had left the air fresh and sharp, and hawks circled in the sky. The noise of the swarm was terrible and fierce, but Ava could understand it. She spoke to the bees in their language, and when they heard her voice they were comforted, and dispersed in a cloud.

  There was Lea, motionless in the new grass. There was the angel, in the tree.

  “You can’t have her,” Ava told Azriel.

  The angel couldn’t see her. She was neither human, nor animal, nor spirit, but some oddity, and none of his concern. Lea, however, was his concern. He was God’s messenger, known to some as malakh ha-mavet. He plummeted from the trees and stood over Lea, and his light embraced her. Ava went to him and took hold of his coat. He felt her grasp and was annoyed. At last he looked at her, and it was terrifying to be held in his gaze, still she held tight. Azriel wondered why he had never seen her before, and then he knew. God had not created her.