She remains rooted in place, horrified. She’d come close to having her passport, money, and train tickets stolen by a pickpocket. Her initial surprise when the woman approached her should have alerted her not to fall for the woman-with-baby ruse.
She almost cries with relief when she spots the two men standing behind a column, befuddled as abandoned puppies. They’re in their late twenties, their skin cured by sun exposure. Gideon, who has an unruly crest of hair, is a mechanic, and she notices the black oil embedded under his nails. Oded, shorter with broad shoulders and a shaved head, is an electrician.
“I’m Sharon,” she says in English. “If you need to ask me anything, do so in English.”
Oded whispers in Hebrew that they can’t speak English.
“Well, no more talking, then,” she replies in English. Anyone who studied under Israel’s national school curriculum understands that much of the language. “That’s an order,” she adds in an officer’s tone. Sharon hopes that the men will keep their mouths shut for the next five hours.
Walking to the train, she catches a glimpse of Alon. She stops and turns toward him. Of course the young man—of medium height and built, wearing a navy-blue uniform, a military duffel bag slung over his shoulder—can’t be her dead fiancé.
Once they’re all on the train, her charges—Gideon to her right, Oded a few rows down, facing her so she can keep an eye on him—fall asleep in minutes. Sharon sits by the window, and her breath catches at the lushness of the fields, woods, and hills. The emerald and jade patchworks of green look as if God had poured buckets of paint on the world. Farmhouses and silos are built from thousands of small fieldstones fitted together in a calculated but haphazard-looking way, what Sharon guesses is a centuries-old style that uses local materials.
She shifts her gaze back to scan the passengers on their way to and from the bar car. Could she have been followed?
Her eyelids droop, and she almost dozes off, then shakes herself awake. If only she knew what could go wrong, what she’s gotten
herself into—and what risks she might be taking.
Chapter Five
Claudette
Loire Valley, France
June 1940
Claudette lowered her mending on the porch swing at the sight of a bedraggled family coming down the sloping street. Their horse, pulling a covered wagon, lurched down the hill, and all six members of the family used their combined weight to stop it from stumbling and falling. As their wagon rolled up in front of the house, Claudette noted their roughly sewn peasant clothes. An older man, shoulders stooped from exhaustion, asked her for water.
“Of course.” She waved toward the well in the yard. She grabbed Belle’s collar and commanded her to be quiet.
Everyone was on edge, even the dog. The French government had fled from Bordeaux to Vichy. Monsieur Lefebvre told the crowd at the tavern that at least, with the surrender agreement and the installation of the Nazi sympathizer Philippe Pétain as prime minister, the Germans would not invade the Loire Valley, where their village lay.
With this new development, Monsieur Lefebvre changed his military strategy. “The French Communists are our best recourse to chase out the Nazis. Every bridge blown up, every supply convoy ambushed—it’s their doing or the Maquis’.” The Maquis were guerrilla fighting groups that attacked the Nazis from the forest underbrush. Claudette would have left a basket of produce and eggs by the back gate for these brave men if she had known it would somehow reach them.
But if all France could do was rely on the despised British, the distant Canadians, and the local rebels, where was there hope? Claudette went to the church daily to pray to God, Jesus, and Mary to save France.
The family pumping water in the yard hadn’t finished filling their canister when Claudette saw a man walking beside a bicycle loaded with packages, from handlebars to the back wheel. Beside him, two boys dragged their feet in obvious fatigue. As they began their descent toward her, more people appeared at the curve in the road. Belle strained against Claudette’s hold.
“Mémère!” Claudette called. “Mémère!”
“We are leaving,” said the man in the yard. “Thanks for your generosity.”
Mémère came out. She watched the family walk out, then, gazing up the street, went to the front gate and latched it. The neighbor next door did the same, sending over a look of warning. Released, Belle ran to the fence, barking.
“Quiet!” Claudette scolded her. Alarmed, she appraised a crowd now streaming down the road. They were dressed like her townsfolk, yet seemed deflated, and their carts were piled with furniture and farm machinery rather than produce. “Who are they?”
Mémère sent Claudette to fetch a tin mug from the kitchen while she filled a bucket of water, then she placed both outside the gate.
Up the road, a cart tipped over, spilling clothes, mattresses, housewares, and equipment. A cooking pot rolled into the ditch. The family bundled up only the blankets and trudged on, leaving the rest of their belongings behind.
By nightfall, over two hundred refugees had gathered in the market square. Claudette picked all the ripened tomatoes in their garden and brought up cabbage, onions, and potatoes from the cellar. Mémère sliced, boiled, and filled bowls with food, and the two of them walked to the plaza to feed the newcomers. Their neighbors also brought platters of food.
Claudette moved among the groups seated on the ground and handed out pieces of bread to those too exhausted to stand at the makeshift food table.
“The Wehrmacht entered our village with their tanks. They confiscated everything—sheep, cows, chickens,” a woman nursing a baby told Claudette.
“The Boche shoot anyone who defies their orders,” added her husband, a man missing an arm. He lifted a piece of bread to his wife’s mouth.
Wehrmacht. A new foreign word, as was Boche, the derogatory term for the German soldiers. The words made Claudette shudder.
“They moved into our home,” said a woman seated on a blanket rocking a whimpering toddler. “My father couldn’t walk much. He died on the road.” She broke into sobs. “We had to escape.”
This woman had left her father’s body on the road? Stunned, Claudette sought Mémère’s eyes for solace, but her grandmother, next to Solange and Solange’s mother, Dorothée Poincaré, was busy doling out food.
Even though it was summer, the evening was cool. Some townspeople took in the refugee children for the night. As Mémère and Claudette walked back home, more figures appeared in the dark. When they reached the house, Mémère waited until they’d passed before she opened their gate, then she locked it behind them.
“Let’s take in a family—” Claudette started.
Mémère cut her off. “They are desperate. I’m old and you are crippled. Let’s be kind only to the extent that we can.”
Belle barked all night at the commotion outside. At dawn, agitated and tired from lack of sleep, Claudette buckled on her leg brace and went out to milk Rosette. At her side, Belle jumped and yipped. “Stop it, Belle,” Claudette snapped at her. “You’re giving me a headache!”
She froze at the entrance to the cowshed. In the dim light, she saw a young man milking Rosette. Claudette yelped.
He jumped, grabbed his bucket, and, with milk splashing, ran, elbowing Claudette out of his way and knocking her to the ground.
Anger boiling in her, Claudette got up and hobbled to the cow. She hugged her neck as hot tears flowed from her eyes, feeling betrayed. Mémère was right to be guarded with the refugees.
