B004U2USMY EBOK (25 page)

Roger clutched his portfolio to his chest and
shrank back with a pale expression until his back pressed into the
statue of the crane.

“Whitey!” the young man on the ground yelled.
“Roger, help me!”

Roger didn’t move.

As soon as they finished with the hair, the
JPF tore at the zazou’s clothes, then started kicking him in the
ribs. Other zazous fled past, pursued by JPF. One girl was
completely stripped to her panties. A red-faced man pursued her
with a leer. He caught her and pushed her to the ground just out
of view. The girl screamed. More zazous and their attackers.
Nowhere did Gabriela see any of the zazous fighting back.

Christine was crying. “Oh my god, oh my god,
oh my god.”

Gabriela slapped a hand over her mouth. “Shut
up, now.”

And then there were others joining the fray.
Men in gray uniforms and hats with silver skulls and eagles
clutching swastikas. Gestapo. The JPF thugs shrank out of their
way. Time to let their masters do the real work. The Gestapo beat
the zazous with clubs, pistol-whipped one boy who resisted. They
slapped them in cuffs, threw them on the grass. Minutes later,
they were dragging them away, kicking them, hitting them about the
head. The boys and girls were weeping, begging for mercy,
half-naked and filthy. Soon, a quiet descended on the clearing,
disturbed only by the water that spilled over the edge of the
cascade into the pool.

Nobody had touched Roger Leblanc. He sat
frozen with his drawings clutched to his chest until they were
gone. And then he moved with a terror of his own, grabbing his
easel and turning to flee. The drawing on the easel fluttered to
the ground. He didn’t seem to notice.

Gabriela stood up. “Roger, wait! Roger!”

“Go away, just leave me alone.” He fled.

Gabriela rose to her feet and made her way
down the hill. Christine followed.

“Did you see that?” Christine asked. “Did you
see how they went right past him? How did they miss him? He was
right there, they didn’t even see him.”

“They saw him.”

“What are you talking about? They left Roger
alone. If they saw him, why wouldn’t they take him, too?”

“Yeah, why?”

The ground was marred with heavy boot prints,
the signs of a struggle here and there on the grass. Gabriela
picked up Roger’s drawing. The bleak factory, twin smokestacks
that stretched toward a leaden sky.

“Gaby, for god’s sake, can we go now?
Please?”

She’d missed a detail in her initial glance,
something about the red rooster perched on the edge of the
factory, out of proportion to the rest of the scene. It was
detailed for something so small, drawn with pastels. The rooster
wore a gold star on its breast, with the word
zazou
written across the center. The rooster had a beak, feathers on its
head, but wore a human face.

The face of Roger Leblanc.

Chapter Twenty:

Helmut’s face was warm and sympathetic as he
leaned across the private train compartment. He rested his hand on
Gabriela’s. “How did they catch your father?”

“It was my fault. If I hadn’t been there,
Hoekman never would’ve arrested him.”

“Why don’t you tell me about it.”

She would have recoiled from his touch just a
few days earlier. She’d distrusted him, hated everything he
represented. But then, as was usually the case, the truth was more
complex than she’d initially guessed. Helmut was more complex.

Now she found his touch comforting. Of course
some of it was this train ride, the culmination of all her hopes
and fears, that did it. But the truth was, she’d been fighting to
maintain her dislike for some time now. Since the day he gave
Monsieur Demerain the sulfide drugs for his pneumonia, probably
saved his life. It was a relief to just give it up.

Any residual defenses had melted yesterday
when he’d arrived at Alfonse’s flat and handed her an envelope.
“Train tickets for Strasbourg.”

“The occupied zone? Whatever for?”

“We’re going to take a little trip.”

“Why? Seriously, I can’t figure out why you
keep dragging me around the country.”

She thought about what Christine said about
men who tried to rescue prostitutes. Was he acting through some
sort of misguided charity or was it all about Colonel Hoekman? The
last two times she’d seen him he hadn’t mentioned the Gestapo.

“Do you have something better to do?” he had
asked as she retrieved her coat and a bag with a few personal
effects. “Surely you don’t want to sit around Alfonse’s flat all
day, moping about until he comes home.”

“Well, no. But you’re always busy and
working. What am I doing, just keeping you company?”

“I like your company, I admit it.”

“Oh? And why is that?”

“Because when I’m with you I can think about
something other than the war for a few minutes, I can pretend the
world is a simpler place.”

“So you’re bored, that’s all.”

“Not today I’m not.” A mysterious smile
flickered across his face. “Today is a big day for you. I’ve got a
surprise.”

“I’m living in Paris under occupation. I’m
not sure I like surprises. They usually turn out badly.”

“You’ll like this one.”

“Oh?”

“I found your father.”

She caught her breath, felt light-headed.
“Papá? Is he. . .? Is he. . .?”

“He’s alive. Would you like to see him?”

The next few hours had been the slowest of
her life. But finally, the Alsatian countryside clattered outside
her window. It was hilly, with German-looking villages, which was
presumably why Germany kept insisting on ownership. It had been
two years since she’d been more than fifty kilometers from Paris;
she found the escape exhilarating. Now that they were approaching
Strasbourg, her heart was thumping.

Gabriela wanted to share with Helmut; she’d
never told anyone before what had happened. She was very aware of
his hand resting on hers.

“You must love your father very much to keep
searching after so much time,” he said. “Most people would have
given up, but you keep hoping.”

“I have to. He’s the most wonderful man in
the world and he would have done anything for me. You know, I
loved my mother, of course, and my brother, too, but it wasn’t the
same.”

“Tell me about him.”

“I can’t even think of where to start.”

“How about what he did for a living. That
usually defines us more than anything.”

“He owned a bookstore in Madrid before we
came to France. New books, used books. Carried everything you
could imagine. He’d point me to the best novels, sometimes
something subversive. He loved to read, himself. I guess that’s
why people usually go into books, isn’t it? Not for the money.”

“No, I wouldn’t think so,” Helmut said.

“He could read for hours at a stretch.
Anything, like his bookstore. When he wasn’t curled up with an
adventure novel he’d bury himself in philosophy. Too much for his
own good. He loved to talk politics or anything philosophical.”

“He raised you on philosophy? That sounds
dry. And I’m a German, I’m supposed to love that stuff.”

“I know, it makes Papá sound like a bore, but
he wasn’t, not at all. He was a writer too, always making up
stories. And he had a wicked sense of humor. He liked to play
practical jokes. Nothing mean, he just loved seeing people laugh.

“He was an idealist at heart,” she continued.
“Not a compromiser. When the civil war started in Spain, he
published a tract and smuggled it into Nationalist territory. They
tried to arrest him when Madrid fell. They got my mother, and he
turned himself in to serve time in her place, since he was the one
they really wanted.”

“How did you end up in France?”

“Franco won the war, half the country fled to
France. My mother turned Nationalist—at least she claimed as
much—but my father couldn’t, and wouldn’t make pretenses. She came
with us to France, but then went back with my brother. Didn’t
matter if she’d turned Nationalist, the fascists still came for
her in the end. She died ’resisting arrest,’ whatever that means.
My brother in prison, a year later. Typhus, they said.”

“I’m sorry.”

She nodded. Painful memories, not helped by
the estrangement between her parents those last couple of years.
Papá had sent numerous letters from Paris, but mother always
refused his pleas.

“Paris looked like a safe bet at the time. We
spoke French and knew the country well. There was trouble with
Germany, but nobody took it seriously. I mean, if there was a war,
it would probably turn out like the last one, right? Years of
trench warfare with life carrying on behind the lines. We didn’t
count on the
boches
overrunning the country so fast.”

“The Germans, as a people, are frequently
underestimated.”

“Nobody underestimated the Germans. They were
terrified of them. It’s why France fell apart like it did.”

“Sorry, go ahead. Why did the Gestapo arrest
your father?”

“My father got a job for the British embassy,
translating intercepted documents between Madrid and Berlin. They
were worried Franco would join the Axis. The other Spaniards at
the embassy were all former Republicans and anti-fascists. We fled
the city, reached the coast just as the British and French armies
were evacuating Dunkirk. My father bought passage on a fishing
boat—he said it was for both of us—but he lied. He couldn’t get us
both out, so he was going to send me on alone.”

She hesitated at the horrible memories of her
struggle through Dunkirk. The bombings, the dead bodies. The
screaming women and children. A man’s leg, lying in the road.

Helmut said nothing, and at last she regained
control and was able to continue.

“I couldn’t leave him, so I went back.”

“You should have gone. He made a great
sacrifice.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Helmut. And so
was my father. Either together or not at all.”

“And what happened?”

“I begged, threatened, lied my way back to
the hotel where he was waiting out the siege with the rest of the
low-level embassy staff. I got there too late. Or not late enough,
depending on your point of view.”

Was that right? Would it have been better if
she’d arrived ten minutes later, when the Germans had taken
everyone away? If she hadn’t seen Colonel Hoekman, hadn’t known
any of it?

“The Germans had figured out who they were by
then, and were lining them up against the wall. It looked like
they were going to gun them down. I came running, I had to stop
it.”

“Maybe they weren’t going to kill them. Maybe
they were just searching.”

“Well, yes, I know that now. They took some
of them away, but most of them they let go. How could I know?”

“You couldn’t. Don’t blame yourself.”

“As soon as they figured out who I was, the
Germans singled my father out for a more rigorous search.” She
pressed her fingertips to her temples, wishing she could erase the
horrible memories. “It was all my fault.”

“How was it your fault? It was nothing more
than bad luck. You were trying to help.”

“No, it was my fault. Even after that, we
still almost got away. They took out my father’s trunk and
searched it. He had his questionable books and papers but it was
all in Spanish. They didn’t see what he’d written about the
Germans in Spain. They confiscated everything, but you could see
it in the officer’s eyes. He was disappointed, but he was going to
let us go. There were too many other suspicious people, and not
enough Germans to hold them all and they could only fit the most
important embassy staff in the truck.”

“You’re lucky you were in France,” Helmut
said. “In the Ukraine they would’ve taken you off the road, shot
you just to be sure.”

“Yeah, lucky us.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it that way.”

“I know it could be worse. I could be a Jew
or a Pole or a communist. I could be my brother. He’s dead. It’s
just hard to feel fortunate given everything I’ve been through.”

“I understand, it came out wrong. So what
happened?”

“The officer decided to give us one last
humiliation before sending us on our way. He barked something at
his men and they stripped me naked in front of everyone. As soon
as they started groping me, my father lost control.”

She took a deep breath. Helmut squeezed her
hand.

“The officer threw him to the ground. I
begged Papá to be still, but by the time he stopped it was too
late. They beat him. And the officer wanted more. He said his men
would rape me unless Papá confessed everything.”

“Confess what?”

“Exactly. He had nothing to confess. He was
just a translator, he wasn’t a spy.”

“The officer?” Helmut asked. “Was it—?”

“Yes, it was. Hans Hoekman. I don’t think he
was a colonel then.”

“The bastard.”

“Of course Papá confessed. He said he was a
communist. It was sort of true, I guess. He helpfully explained
his books and papers, everything they hadn’t understood before.
’Don’t worry,
hija
,’ he said, ’I haven’t done anything,
they’ll let me go.’ I knew he was lying. It’s not like the
fascists in Spain hadn’t already taught me better.”

“And they arrested him?” Helmut asked.

“Dragged him away and let me go. Hoekman kept
his word. His men left me alone after that. I wish they hadn’t. I
wish they’d raped me and my father had kept his mouth shut. I
could have taken it.”

“That’s a horrible thing to say.” A terrible
look came over Helmut’s face and he looked out the window. When he
returned his gaze, the look was gone. “It was a great thing your
father did. He must love you very much.”

“I know it, I never stop thinking about it. I
looked for him, I wrote letters to the police and to Vichy. I
bribed a French official. I queued for days at the German embassy.
Nobody told me anything.”