by Sharon Maas
‘Juliette is my best friend! She is my sister!’
A knowing look passed between all the other people in the room. Maxence, Margaux, Jacques, Hélène: they all looked at each other, but in particular, Maxence and Margaux held each other’s gaze, and nodded.
It is time, that gaze seemed to say. Victoire saw the look: ‘What’s the matter? Why are you all looking at me that way? What’s going on?’
Margaux stepped across the room to Victoire, took hold of both her hands and said: ‘Victoire, look at me.’
Victoire did as she was told.
‘It’s time we told you. It’s been a secret much too long. Juliette really is your sister.’
Victoire looked up at her mother, her forehead creased in confusion.
‘I don’t understand… what do you mean?’
Margaux let go of her hands, turned away, gestured towards Maxence.
‘Your turn, Max.’
Maxence took a step closer. ‘Because I am your father, Victoire.’
‘I still don’t understand,’ said Victoire. She looked from Margaux to Maxence and back again. ‘The two of you – you…’ She couldn’t say the words. It was just too preposterous. Her mother and Uncle Maxence, together, making a baby, her? The very thought embarrassed her. She blushed, and said, ‘You committed adultery, Maman? With Uncle Max?’
Maman was an upright Catholic; a rebellious and outspoken one, to be sure, but one with a deep sense of morality, which was why she so abhorred the Nazis.
‘We loved each other, always have,’ Margaux said now, eyes eloquent with an emotion Victoire could not decipher; for the intuition on which she so depended failed her here. ‘It’s all in the past, chérie, I promise you. We are now just friends. We slipped up, just the once, and you were the result.’
‘But, Maman— That means…’
‘It means that I am your father and Juliette is your sister.’
She couldn’t look at the man she had always called Uncle Max. Eyes fixed on Margaux, she said: ‘She’s always been my sister! This makes no difference! But why? Why are you telling me now? Of all times, why now? Why not earlier? Have you always known, Unc…’
She couldn’t say the word Papa. Not yet. But she couldn’t say Uncle Max, either.
‘Always,’ he said. ‘You’ve always been my daughter.’
She turned now to Maxence, met his eyes for the first time. ‘But if you knew, why didn’t you…? I would have liked to know! I needed a father! I missed having a real one!’
‘Believe me, there was nothing I would have loved more than to claim you as my daughter. But she –’ Maxence pointed to Margaux ‘– she didn’t want it. And she’s the boss around here. She told me to wait, wait until you’re ten, wait until you’re fifteen, and so on.’
‘Does… does Papa know? I mean, I mean…’ Confused, she glanced at Maxence and then away. It was so perplexing. The man she knew as Papa… was not. But Margaux understood what she meant.
‘Of course he knows, Victoire. He has always known. It was pretty obvious.’
Victoire said, almost to herself, ‘So that’s why he never liked me.’
‘Oh, he likes you all right; he just knows you’re not his.’
‘And that means that you, Tante Hélène, you’re…?’
‘Yes,’ said Hélène. ‘I’m your grandmother!’ She held out her arms, but Victoire wasn’t finished. ‘Did you know, Jacques?’
Jacques nodded, rather shamefacedly.
‘Why didn’t you say! Did everyone in this family know except me? The one who most ought to know? Does Marie-Claire know?’
Margaux shook her head. ‘Marie-Claire doesn’t know, and Leon and Lucien don’t know.’
‘But why? And why now? Why are you telling me now, of all times, when we should be worrying about Juliette! My sister!’ She choked. ‘Why now?’
Margaux and Jacques exchanged a meaningful look. Margaux waved to Jacques to speak. He said: ‘I’m sorry, Victoire – I know it’s all sudden and especially now, today, it’s all a bit much, first the news about Juliette and now this. But, well, I insisted.’
‘Jacques always wanted you to know,’ said Margaux. ‘Because you’re his sister too; he wanted you to know he was your brother. Blame me for insisting we kept it from you. But now – now he absolutely demanded we tell you, now, specifically now. Because of Juliette.’
‘Victoire – we think you can help. We’re hoping you can help. We want you to talk to Marie-Claire.’
‘What’s Marie-Claire got to do with Juliette being captured?’
‘Well, Marie-Claire happens to be married to one of the top dogs at the Natzweiler-Struthof camp,’ said Jacques. ‘And almost certainly, both Juliette and Nathan were sent there. We hope that Marie-Claire can help. Help get information; but better yet, help release them. And you’re the only one who can talk to her.’ He turned to his father.
‘I know this is all news to you, Papa, and I’m sorry. I’ve tried to keep it from you but now – now I’ve failed. Failed Juliette, failed to keep her safe.’
‘I still don’t understand. How can I help, exactly?’ said Victoire.
‘It’s a long shot, especially as we’ve all cut ties with Marie-Claire, or she with us. Maman has practically disowned her, and she’s not talking to me. You’re the only one. The only one who’s not at loggerheads with her. We – that is, Maman and I – we’ve been talking about it all afternoon. We’d like you to go to Strasbourg and see if you can persuade Marie-Claire to help. You’re the only one of us she speaks to, the only one she actually likes.’
‘Yes, but she doesn’t like Juliette. They were never close.’
‘We all grew up together. We were all friends, when we were small. Brothers and sisters; she must remember those days. She must, deep inside, care! I can’t believe she’s taken on Nazi ideology, that she’s on their side. I can’t believe she’s heartless. I believe in her; that she’d be shocked to hear of Juliette’s capture and would want to help. And if anyone can speak to that part of her, it’s you, Victoire. You’re the only one.’
Margaux, always so outspoken and assertive, looked at Victoire with pleading, bloodshot eyes. It was plain that she had been weeping.
‘Juliette is like a daughter to me. She is my daughter. You know how you were all raised, it wasn’t just blood ties. I was mother to all six of you. Max was father to all six of you. We are one family. Just that Max and I aren’t together, as a couple.’
‘Not yet,’ added Maxence.
Margaux continued: ‘Juliette is Marie-Claire’s sister too, Victoire. You’re the diplomat of the family. If there’s anyone among us who can mend this rift, this horrible, horrible cleft in the family unit, it’s you.’
‘But Maman, surely you’re the one who threw her out, because of what she did, marrying a Nazi. That letter you sent – it was harsh. Surely you’re the one who should make amends, forgive her?’
‘I do – I do forgive her! I just want us all to be together again! All one family! Juliette free, and Marie-Claire my daughter, once again back in my heart! But – but I can’t. After the things I said, in the letter – I need a… a mediator. A go-between. You’re the one to do it, the only one.’
‘You’ll be our ambassador,’ Jacques said. ‘We want you to go to her and – well, talk. Just talk to her. Marie-Claire is not evil. She’s not a Nazi. She never was. She’s just silly, and ignorant. We don’t know why she married this Nazi. We don’t know what’s behind it all. We don’t know if she has any influence on him. But you can go up there and try. Let’s repair this family.’
‘You could write her a letter, Maman, take back what you said, apologise. Tell her you love her!’
Margaux shook her head. ‘It would look bad, as if I’m only approaching her because I want her to help release Juliette. She’ll see right through it.’
‘But it’s true, isn’t it?’
Margaux let out a wail of utter despair.
‘No! It’s not tru
e! I want Marie-Claire, my daughter, back! In spite of everything, I want her back! Tell her I love her, I really do! Tell her I’m sorry, for everything! Tell her we’re a family and have to stick together! There’s nothing a child can do, nothing, to really break a mother’s love. She has to know this!’
‘But you still want her to save Juliette?’
‘Because Juliette is her sister too. Marie-Claire is a part of us, just like Juliette. She’ll want to save Juliette, once she knows. I know she will. Tell her I’ll do anything. Bribe him, her husband. He can have my entire wine cellar. All the very best wine, the wine I hid. Just let Juliette go. These Nazis will do anything for good wine. Marie-Claire is the key to the Nazi door.’
‘And Victoire, you’re the one to turn that key, to open the door,’ Jacques said.
‘It all sounds – well, as if we want her back in the family just to save Juliette, not for her own sake. Kind of – manipulative. She might see it that way.’
‘No. It’s not like that. Juliette’s capture may have opened the wound in this family, but it’s also the reason we can heal it, bring us all back together again. Please, Victoire. Please do it. You can find the right words, you always could. You’re the family ambassador.’
Silence settled on the group as all waited for Victoire’s reply. Only the trusty Kachelowa hummed loyally and steadily in the background, a calming presence in the fraught atmosphere. Victoire closed her eyes as if in deep concentration, or even prayer, but tears escaped and trickled downwards, across her cheek, leaving snail’s trails. She sniffed, opened her eyes, caught Jacques’ gaze and said, ‘Very well, I’ll talk to her. Of course I will. How will I meet her? Where does she live?’
Jacques breathed a sigh of great relief. Everyone did.
‘I’ll find out, and let you know,’ he said.
Fifty
Marie-Claire
And then, out of the blue, came the letter. She couldn’t help it; a frisson of excitement gripped her as she read it. Victoire was coming! Victoire, the only member of her family she could bear to talk to, the only one who had not condemned her, right from the beginning, and put her into the Nazi box. Who had not judged her as contemptible. There had been that one incident about that cursed book, Mein Kampf, but Victoire had admitted her prejudice and made amends; Victoire had been consistently sympathetic towards her, had always been considerate and kind.
If anything, it had been she, Marie-Claire, who had rejected Victoire, not the other way round. When Victoire was very small, very curious, very talkative, Marie-Claire had thought her a nuisance, and had constantly tried to escape the little puppy-dog girl always at her heels, asking questions, looking up at her with adoration in her eyes.
And she had deliberately palmed that little girl off on Juliette, pushed her away, sometimes with an unforgivable brusqueness. Juliette had taken Victoire in with open arms. And in the end Juliette and Victoire had become an inseparable team, and the boys, of course, had banded together with Jacques as their leader, and she, Marie-Claire, had been the outsider, the black sheep of the family.
Worst of all, Maman had rejected her. With good reason, Marie-Claire now realised. Maman had warned her, but she, Marie-Claire, had known better – thought she’d known better. She thought with a shudder of Maman’s final letter to her, on the occasion of her marriage. It had been final, indeed. Maman had shut the door on her. She’d never forget that letter:
You are no daughter of mine. You have betrayed everything we hold sacred in this family. You have betrayed us all, betrayed your nation. How could you do this, Marie-Claire? Do not ever set foot in my house again.
She was no longer a member of the family that had nurtured and nourished her. She was an outcast, homeless except here, in Strasbourg. With him. This brute of a man stinking of death and putrefaction. How had she got herself into this situation? How, indeed. She needed to know.
Marie-Claire, forced into an unprecedented course of self-reflection and self-criticism, was now alone in the world. Her present misery now forced her to peel away the outer layers of pride and even conceit that had protected her for so many years; she had cocooned herself away from her family and gone her own way, not ever evaluating her own behaviour. They had all warned her against taking a job at the Mairie, but she had pushed ahead with typical arrogance. One thing had led to another and now here she was, married to the worst Nazi of them all, with no way out.
But now! Victoire had asked to come. Victoire was coming – today! Victoire, who, in spite of having been rejected by her, Marie-Claire, as a child, had never been offended or upset; who had shrugged off Marie-Claire’s snubs and still always been her natural kind self. No matter what, Victoire always reverted to kind; there was something inherently, deeply, good about her. She could not be anything but kind.
Marie-Claire had never been much of a cook and certainly had never baked a cake in her life, and so she had ordered some sweet specialities from a German Konditorei who baked specifically and only for the Nazi contingent of Strasbourg. Today, they had managed to fulfil her order for a Schwarzwälder Kirschkuchen, a Black Forest cake, which, Marie-Claire remembered, had always been Victoire’s favourite back in the day. And she had real coffee. A treat for her little sister. In the days leading up to today a certain nostalgia had swept through her, a longing for the cosy comforts of home and family, the delicious warmth of a Kachelowa. A sister’s love. Sometimes, even, the idea of a mother’s love nipped at the edges of her heart— but no. Not that. The fissure there was far too deep, could not be crossed. Yet still: a longing, a yearning for female nurturing had opened a different kind of yawning gap in her being, one that longed to be filled.
The telephone rang. That would be the concierge – or rather, to give her the correct title, the Hausverwalterin – an absolutely terrifying ramrod-backed dragon called Frau Frank.
‘Your visitor is here, Frau Kurtz. She says her name is Fräulein Viktoria Gauss.’
‘Yes, yes, thank you very much, Frau Frank. I’ll come down.’
She hurried to the apartment door. There in front of her was the lift-well, like a metal cage in the centre of the hall, a dark tunnel vertical through the bowels of the building, next to the stairwell. She had decided she would go all the way down to the bottom to welcome Victoire into her home.
The lift, a clanking metal pen pulled up by cranks and shafts, axles and chains, groaned and clattered into action. It was only two storeys down, and soon it had scraped itself into position on her floor. She pulled open the outer concertina doors, stepped inside and pressed the down button. The inner gridded door clanged shut and the lift shuddered and groaned and began to move downwards.
There was Victoire, standing in the ground-floor lobby, waiting. Frau Frank stood in the doorway of her own ground-floor apartment, arms folded, beady eyes watching, making sure that everything was in Ordnung. The metal cage of the lift ground to a halt, the doors opened. Marie-Claire opened her arms wide for her sister. Victoire, startled – for this was not the Marie-Claire she was expecting – took a step back, but Marie-Claire leaned in and drew her close.
‘Victoire! Victoire! I’m so happy to see you!’ she cried, and pulled her sister into a close embrace. An arm round an astounded Victoire’s waist, she nudged her into the lift, pushed the button. The lift door groaned shut, the cogs and chains creaked into action, the lift rose slowly through the innards of the building.
‘Oh,’ said Victoire, as, a few minutes later, they stepped into the apartment. ‘This is… different.’
‘Oh, yes,’ enthused Marie-Claire. ‘It’s in the art deco style, built in the thirties, very modern.’
‘Really?’
‘Oh, yes. We’re very lucky to have found this place. We did consider a villa in the older part of town but in the end, Dietrich said this would be more convenient. We’ve been here since the summer.’
She chattered gaily as she showed Victoire around, small talk that would hopefully break any ice between her and her
sister. She was desperate – frantic, even – to bridge the long uneasy silence that had kept them apart, and the guided tour provided a welcome frame of reference, something to hang her words on. The apartment was impeccable, thanks to the cleaning lady who came every morning for three hours to clean and cook Marie-Claire’s lunch. Her name was Elke. But she was Alsatian, so Marie-Claire had taken to calling her by her French name, Esmée, and speaking to her in French – a private rebellion of her own. In fact, she preferred Elke’s company to all the Gudruns and Helgas of the world. Marie-Claire told Victoire all these details, as if Victoire’s sole purpose in visiting was to catch up on Marie-Claire’s domestic situation.
‘We also have a balcony! I really enjoy sitting out here in the summer,’ said Marie-Claire, leading Victoire outside.
‘Hmmm,’ said Victoire, a sound that could be interpreted as either appreciative or derogatory; Marie-Claire couldn’t be quite sure. Victoire had been less than enthusiastic up to now. One had to admit, though, that the balcony wasn’t particularly inviting: a narrow concrete thing, with a view of the courtyard and car park below and similar buildings and rooftops beyond.
‘Well, it’s nice to get some fresh air and sunshine,’ said Marie-Claire weakly, leading Victoire back inside. ‘Come, let’s have some cake. I ordered it specially for you. There’s this Konditor who can get all of the ingredients – it’s incredible!’
They sat down at the oblong dining table, already laid for the mid-afternoon snack. There was no tablecloth; the sharp-edged surface of the glass-topped table, the matching chairs with tall, perpendicular backs, were quite in keeping with the rest of the apartment’s décor. Marie-Claire was anxious to know Victoire’s verdict on the style – after all, she, Victoire, was the artistic one of the family – and so asked her directly. Victoire chuckled.
‘Well – it’s all horizontal and vertical, isn’t it? I’m afraid I prefer softer, rounder shapes, a more cosy style, but of course I’m terribly old-fashioned, very behind the times, so don’t mind me.’ She dug into her cake with a small, geometrically formed fork and said, to mollify Marie-Claire, who had frowned, ‘Mmmm! This is absolutely delicious! A real treat! Thank you so much, Marie-Claire!’