She had asked her mother why some of the neighbors didn't like Jewish people. Her mother had shrugged, had sighed, bending her head over her ironing. But she had not answered the girl. So the girl had gone to see her father. What was wrong with being a Jew? Why did some people hate Jews? Her father had scratched his head, had looked down at her with a quizzical smile. He had said, hesitatingly, "Because they think we are different. So they are frightened of us." But what was different? thought the girl. What was so different?
Her mother. Her father. Her brother. She missed them so much she felt physically ill. She felt as if she had fallen into a bottomless hole. Escaping was the only way for her to have some sort of grip on her life, on this new life she could not understand. Maybe her parents had managed to escape as well? Maybe they were all able to make their way back home? Maybe. . . . Maybe. . . .
She thought of the empty apartment, the unmade beds, the food slowly rotting in the kitchen. And her brother in that silence. In the dead silence of the place.
Rachel touched her arm, making her jump.
"Now," she whispered. "Let's try, now."
The camp was silent, almost deserted. Since the adults had been taken away, there were fewer policemen, they had noticed. And the policemen hardly talked to the children. They left them alone.
The heat pounded down on the sheds, unbearable. Inside, feeble, sick children lay on damp straw. The girls could hear male voices and laughs from farther on. The men were probably in one of the barracks, keeping out of the sun.
The only policeman they could see was sitting in the shade, his rifle at his feet. His head was tilted back against the wall, and he seemed fast asleep, his mouth open. They crept toward the fences, like quick, small animals. They could glimpse green meadows and fields stretching before them.
Silence, still. Heat and silence. Had anybody seen them? They crouched in the grass, hearts pounding. They peered back over their shoulders. No movement. No noise. Was it that easy, thought the girl. No, it couldn't be. Nothing was ever easy, not anymore.
Rachel was clutching a bundle of clothes in her arms. She urged the girl to put them on, the extra layers would protect their skin against the barbs, she said. The girl shuddered as she struggled into a dirty, ragged sweater, a tight, tattered pair of trousers. Who had these clothes belonged to, she wondered, some poor dead child whose mother had gone, and who had been left here to die alone?
Still crouching, they drew near the small gap in the rolls of wire. There was a policeman standing a little way off. They could not make out his face, just the sharp outline of his high round cap. Rachel pointed to the opening in the wire. They would have to hurry now. No time to waste. They got down on their stomachs, snaked their way to the hole. It seemed so small, thought the girl. How could they possibly wriggle through, not cut themselves on the barbed wire despite the extra clothes? How did they ever think they were going to make it? That nobody was going to see them? That they'd get away with it? They were crazy, she thought. Crazy.
The grass tickled her nose. It smelled delicious. She wanted to bury her face in it and breathe in the green, tangy scent. She saw that Rachel had already reached the gap and was gingerly pushing her head through it.
Suddenly the girl heard heavy thuds on the grass. Her heart stopped. She looked up to a huge shape looming over her. A policeman. He dragged her up by the frayed collar of her blouse, shook her. She felt herself go limp with terror.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?"
His voice hissing in her ear.
Rachel was halfway through the rolls. The man, still holding the girl by the scruff of her neck, reached down and seized Rachel's ankle. She fought and kicked, but he was too strong, pulling her back through the barbed wire, her face and hands bleeding.
They stood in front of him, Rachel sobbing, the girl straight-backed, her chin up. Inside she was trembling, but she had decided she would not show her fear. At least she was going to try.
And then she looked at him and gasped.
It was the red-haired policeman. He recognized her instantly. She saw his Adam's apple bob, felt the thick hand on her collar quiver.
"You can't escape," he said gruffly. "You must stay here, you understand?"
He was young, just over twenty, massive, and pink-skinned. The girl noticed he was sweating under the thick dark uniform. His forehead was glistening with moisture, his upper lip, too. His eyes blinked, he shifted from foot to foot.
She realized she was not afraid of him. She felt a sort of strange pity for him, which puzzled her. She put her hand on his arm. He looked down at it with surprise and embarrassment.
She said, "You remember me, don't you."
It was not a question. It was a fact.
He nodded, dabbing at the moist patch under his nose. She took the key from her pocket and showed it to him. Her hand did not waver.
"You remember my little brother," she said. "The little blond boy with the curly hair?"
He nodded again.
"You must let me go, Monsieur. My little brother, Monsieur. He is in Paris. Alone. I locked him in the cupboard because I thought-" Her voice broke. "I thought he'd be safe there! I must go back! Let me go through this hole. You can pretend you never saw me, Monsieur."
The man glanced back over his shoulder, toward the sheds, as if he was afraid someone might come, someone might see them or hear them.
He put a finger to his lips. He looked back at the girl. He screwed up his face, shook his head.
"I can't do that," he said, his voice low. "I have orders."
She pressed her hand down on his chest.
"Please, Monsieur," she said, quietly.
Next to her, Rachel sniffed, her face clotted with blood and tears. The man glanced over his shoulder once more. He seemed deeply perturbed. She again noticed that strange expression on his face, the one she had glimpsed the day of the roundup. A mixture of pity, shame, and anger.
The girl felt the minutes go by, leaden, heavy. Endless. She felt the sobs, the tears growing within her again, the panic. What was she going to do if he sent her and Rachel back to the barracks? How was she going to go on? How? She would try to escape again, she thought fiercely, yes, she would do it over and over again. Over and over again.
Suddenly, he said her name. He took her hand. His palm felt hot and clammy.
"Go," he said between clenched teeth, the sweat trickling down the sides of his pasty face. "Go, now! Fast."
Bewildered, she looked up to the golden eyes. He pushed her toward the hole, forcing her down with his hand. He held up the wire, shoved her through violently. The barbed wire stung her forehead. Then it was over. She scrambled to her feet. She was free, standing on the other side.
Rachel stared, motionless.
"I want to go, too," Rachel said.
The policeman clamped a hand on the back of her neck.
"No, you are staying," he said.
Rachel wailed.
"That's not fair! Why her, and not me? Why?"
He silenced her, raising his other hand. Behind the fence, the girl stood frozen to the spot. Why couldn't Rachel come with her? Why did Rachel have to stay?
"Please let her come," said the girl. "Please, Monsieur."
She spoke with a calm, quiet voice. The voice of a young woman.
The man seemed ill at ease, restless. But he didn't hesitate long.
"Go then," he said, pushing Rachel away. "Quickly."
He held the wire as Rachel crawled through. She stood next to the girl, breathless.
The man fumbled in his pockets, pulled something out, and handed it to the girl, through the fence.
"Take this," he ordered.
The girl looked at the thick wad of money in her hand. She put it in her pocket, next to the key.
The man looked back toward the barracks, his brow furrowed.
"For God's sake, run! Run now, quick, both of you. If they see you. . . . Take off your stars. Try to find help. Be careful!
Good luck!"
She wanted to thank him, for his help, for the money, she wanted to hold her hand out to him, but Rachel grabbed her by the arm and took off, they ran as fast as they could though the high golden wheat, straight ahead, lungs bursting, legs and arms helter-skelter, far away from the camp, as far away as possible.
A
S I GOT HOME, I realized I had been feeling nauseous for the past couple of days. I hadn't bothered about it, caught up in researching the Vel' d'Hiv' article. Then, last week, there had been the revelation concerning Mame's apartment. But it was the soreness, the tenderness of my breasts that made me pay attention to my queasiness for the first time. I checked my cycle. Yes, I was late. But that had happened, too, in the past years. I finally went down to the pharmacie on the boulevard to buy a pregnancy test. Just to be sure.
And there it was. A little blue line. I was pregnant. Pregnant. I couldn't believe it.
I sat down in the kitchen and hardly dared breathe.
The last pregnancy, five years ago, after two miscarriages, had been a nightmare. Early pain and bleeding, then the discovery that the egg was developing outside the womb, in one of my tubes. There had been a difficult operation. And a messy aftermath, both mentally and physically. It had taken me a long time to get over it. One of my ovaries had been removed. The surgeon had said he was dubious about another pregnancy. And, by then, I was already forty. The disappointment, the sadness in Bertrand's face. He never spoke about it, but I felt it. I knew it. The fact that he did not want to talk about his feelings, ever, made it worse. He kept it bottled up, away from me. The words that were never spoken grew like a tangible being between us. I had only talked about it to my psychiatrist. And with my very close friends.
I remembered a recent weekend in Burgundy, when we had invited Isabelle and her husband and children to stay. Their daughter Mathilde was Zoe's age, and then there was little Matthieu. And the way Bertrand had looked at that little boy, a delightful little fellow of four or five. Bertrand's eyes following him, Bertrand playing with him, carrying him around on his shoulders, smiling, but something sad and wistful in his eyes. It had been unbearable to me. Isabelle had found me crying alone in the kitchen while everybody was finishing their quiche Lorraine outside. She had hugged me hard, then poured out a hefty glass of wine and turned on the CD player, and deafened me with old Diana Ross hits. "It's not your fault, ma cocotte, it's not your fault. Remember that."
I had felt incompetent for a long time. The Tezac family had been kind and discreet about the whole thing, but I still felt like I had not been able to provide Bertrand with what he wanted most badly, a second child. And, most importantly, a son. Bertrand had two sisters and no brothers. The name would die out if there was no heir to carry it on. I had not realized how important that factor was for this particular family.
When I had made it clear that despite being Bertrand's wife, I was still to be called Julia Jarmond, I was greeted with surprised silence. My mother-in-law, Colette, had explained to me with a wooden smile that in France that sort of attitude was modern. Too modern. A feminist stance that did not go down well here at all. A French woman was to be known by her husband's name. I was to be, for the rest of my life, Madame Bertrand Tezac. I remember smiling my toothy white smile back at her, and telling her glibly I was going to stick to Jarmond. She had said nothing, and from then on, she and Edouard, my father-in-law, always introduced me as "Bertrand's wife."
I looked down at the blue line. A baby. A baby! A feeling of joy, of utter happiness, took over. I was going to have a baby. I glanced around the all-too-familiar kitchen. I went to stand by the window and looked down at the dark, grimy courtyard the kitchen gave onto. Boy or girl, it didn't matter. I knew Bertrand would hope it was a son. But he would love a girl, too, I knew that. A second child. The child we'd been waiting for, for so long. The one we had stopped hoping for. The sister or brother Zoe had given up mentioning. That Mame had stopped being so curious about.
How was I going to tell Bertrand? I couldn't just call him and blurt it out on the phone. We had to be together, just the two of us. Privacy, intimacy, was needed. And we had to be careful after that, not letting anyone know until I was at least three months pregnant. I longed to call Herve and Christophe, Isabelle, my sister, my parents, but I refrained. My husband was to be the first to know. Then my daughter. An idea came to me.
I grabbed the phone and dialed Elsa, the babysitter. I asked her if she was free tonight to watch Zoe. She was. Then I made reservations at our favorite restaurant, a brasserie on the rue Saint-Dominique we had been to regularly since the beginning of our marriage. Finally, I called Bertrand, got his voice mail, and told him to meet me at Thoumieux at twenty-one hours sharp.
I heard the click of Zoe's key in the front door. The door slammed, then she walked into the kitchen, her heavy backpack in her hand.
"Hi, Mom," she said. "Good day?"
I smiled. As ever, like every time I laid eyes on Zoe, I was struck by her beauty, her slender height, her lucid hazel eyes.
"Come here, you," I said, engulfing her in a wolfish embrace.
She pulled back and gazed at me.
"This has been a good day, hasn't it?" she asked. "I can feel it in your hug."
"You're right," I said, longing to tell her. "It has been a very good day."
She looked at me.
"I'm glad. You've been weird lately. I thought it was because of those kids."
"Those kids?" I said, brushing her sleek brown hair from her face.
"You know, the children," she said. "The Vel' d'Hiv' children. The ones who never came home."
"You're right," I said. "It made me sad. It still does."
Zoe took my hand in hers, twisting my wedding band round and round, a trick she had since she was small.
"And then I heard you talking on the phone last week," she said, not looking at me.
"Well?"
"You thought I was asleep."
"Oh," I said.
"I wasn't. It was late. You were talking to Herve, I think. You were talking about what Mame had told you."
"About the apartment?" I asked.
"Yes," she said, looking at me at last. "About the family who lived there. And what had happened to that family. And how Mame lived there all those years and didn't seem to care much about it."
"You heard all that," I said.
She nodded.
"Do you know anything about that family, Mom? Do you know who they were? What happened?"
I shook my head.
"No, honey, I don't."
"Is it true that Mame didn't care?"
I had to be careful.
"Sweetie, I'm sure she did care. I don't think she really knew what happened."
Zoe twisted the band around again, faster this time.
"Mom, are you going to find out about them?"
I clasped the nervous fingers pulling at my ring.
"Yes, Zoe. That's exactly what I'm going to do," I said.
"Papa won't like it," she said. "I heard Papa telling you to stop thinking about it. To stop bothering about it. He sounded mad."
I pulled her close, laying my chin on her shoulder. I thought of the wonderful secret I carried within me. I thought of tonight at Thoumieux. Bertrand's incredulous face, his gasp of joy.
"Honey," I said, "Papa won't mind. I promise."
E
XHAUSTED, THE CHILDREN AT last stopped running, ducking behind a large bush. They were thirsty, out of breath. The girl had a sharp pain in her side. If only she could drink some water. Rest a bit. Get her strength back. But she knew she couldn't stay here. She had to move on; she had to get back to Paris. Somehow.
"Take off the stars," the man had said. They wriggled out of the extra clothes, torn and tattered by the barbs. The girl looked down at her chest. There it was, the star, on her shirt. She pulled at it. Rachel, following her glance, picked at her own star with her nails. Hers came off easily. But the girl's was too tightly sewn on. S
he slipped out of the shirt, held the star up to her face. Tiny, perfect stitches. She remembered her mother, bent over the pile of handiwork, sewing on each star patiently, one after the other. The memory brought tears to her eyes. She cried into the blouse with a despair she had never known.
She felt Rachel's arms come around her, her bloody hands stroking her, holding her close. Rachel said, "Is it true, about your little brother? Is he really in the cupboard?" The girl nodded. Rachel held her harder, stroked her head clumsily. Where was her mother now? the girl wondered. And her father. Where had they been taken? Were they together? Were they safe? If they could see her at this very moment . . . If they could see her crying behind the bush, dirty, lost, hungry . . .
She drew herself up, doing her best to smile at Rachel through her wet lashes. Yes, dirty, lost, hungry, perhaps, but not afraid. She wiped her tears away with grimy fingers. She had grown up too much to be afraid anymore. She was no longer a baby. Her parents would be proud of her. That's what she wanted them to be. Proud because she had escaped from that camp. Proud because she was going to Paris, to save her brother. Proud, because she wasn't afraid.
She fell upon the star with her teeth, gnawing at her mother's minute stitches. Finally, the yellow piece of cloth fell away from the blouse. She looked at it. Big black letters. jew. She rolled it up in her hand.
"Doesn't it look small, all of a sudden?" she said to Rachel.
"What are going to do with them?" said Rachel. "If we keep them in our pockets, and if we are searched, that's the end of us."
They decided to bury their stars beneath the bush with the clothes they had used for their escape. The earth was soft and dry. Rachel dug a hole, put the stars and clothes inside, then covered them up with the brown soil.
"There," she said, exulting. "I'm burying the stars. They're dead. In their grave. Forever and ever."
The girl laughed with Rachel. Then she felt ashamed. Her mother had told her to be proud of her star. Proud of being a Jew.
She didn't want to think about all that now. Things were different. Everything was different. They had to find water, food, and shelter, and she had to get home. How? She didn't know. She didn't even know where they were. But she had money. The man's money. He had not been that bad after all, that policeman. Maybe that meant there were other good people who could help them, too. People who did not hate them. People who did not think they were "different."