Crossings (55 page)

It took her hours to write the single page. She sat and stared at the paper and thought that she could never do it. It was more painful than leaving him at Grand Central Station or in the hotel room in San Diego. It was more painful than anything she had ever done. It was like cutting off her right arm. But as the Bible said, “If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out.” And it felt as though that were what she was doing. She told Nick now that she knew that what they had done was wrong, and that she had led him to believe that there was hope for the future, when there wasn't. Armand needed her now. He needed her full support, full attention, full belief. He needed all she had to give. And to do it right, she could no longer betray him. She told Nick that she loved him with her whole soul, but it was a love that neither of them had a right to. She wished him well with all her heart, and she would pray for him each day of the war, but she could no longer write to him. She told him also that if anything happened, she would honor her promise and stay in touch with Johnny.

“But that won't happen, my darling … I know you'll come home. And I only wish …” She could not write the words.

You know what I wish. But our dreams were not borrowed, but stolen. I must return now to where I belong, in heart, in soul, in mind, to my husband. And remember always, my darling, how much I have loved you. Go with God. He will protect you.

With a sob wrenching at her throat, she signed the letter, and walked outside to mail it. She stood at the mailbox for a long time, her hand trembling, her heart breaking, but with a force of will she didn't know she had, she opened the mailbox and dropped in the letter. And she knew that it would find him.

hen Armand returned to his office the morning after the incident in Neuilly, his face was pale, and his palms damp with perspiration, but he did not limp as he walked to his desk, and he sat down at his desk as always. Marchand came to give him a stack of reports to read, forms to fill out, and assorted messages from the local generals.

“Will there be anything else?”

“No, thank you, Marchand.” His face was drawn but his voice was normal. And for the next week he went on with his work, working at a furious speed. The priceless Renoir disappeared from under the building. The Rodin was hidden. The Jewish woman with her child was concealed in a basement in a farmhouse near Lyon, and there were countless other projects he saw to at full speed. He knew he had precious little time. And day by day the leg grew worse. It was badly infected but he had none of the things he needed to care for it. Each day he had to force himself to walk as though nothing were wrong with him. It took more strength than he had ever drawn on before, and he was gaunt now. He finally looked his age, and many years older.

And as he worked furiously every day, he stayed in the office long after the nightly blackout. And he was so anxious to complete his job that he took longer and longer to burn his notes, and it was difficult now to create a reason for making a fire. He often told Marchand, as he rubbed his hands and smiled, that his old bones needed warmth. Marchand only shrugged and went back to his work at his own desk.

There were only four days left until his next meeting with Moulin and he knew that he had to hurry. He left his office after ten o'clock one night, and when he went home, he had the feeling that someone had been in the apartment. He didn't remember leaving the chair quite so far from his desk. But he was too tired to care and the wound in his leg throbbed all the way to his hip now. He would have to have it looked at in London. He looked around the apartment that night, and out at the Place du Palais-Bourbon after he'd turned out the lights, and a piece of his heart ached to know that soon he would be leaving Paris. But he had left her before, and he would return again, and she would be free the next time he saw her.

“Bonsoir, ma belle.”
He smiled at his city and thought of his wife as he went to bed. In the morning he would write to Liane … or maybe the next day … he didn't have time now. But his leg pained him so badly that he awoke the next morning before dawn, and after he lay in bed in vain, he decided to get up and sit at his desk to write to her. He felt the now-familiar chill of his fever as he pulled a sheet of paper toward him.

There is very little to tell since I wrote to you last. My life has been a frenzy of work, my darling.

And then suddenly he realized something and he smiled.

I'm afraid that I've become a shocking husband. Two weeks ago I missed our thirteenth anniversary. But perhaps due to the extraordinary circumstances, you will forgive me. May our next thirteen be easy and peaceful. And may we be together soon.

And then he went on to talk about his work.

I'm afraid the leg isn't doing well. I regret now that I told you about it, for fear that you will worry. It's nothing, I'm sure, but I walk on it every day and that doesn't help. I suppose I've become an old man, but an old man who still loves his country …
à la mort et à tout jamais
… to the death and forever, and at all costs, no matter how dear. I would gladly give the leg, and my heart, for this land I love so much. She lies pinned to the ground now, raped by the Germans, but soon she will be free, and we will nurse her back to health. You will be at my side again then, Liane, and we will all be happy. And in the meantime I am glad to know that you are safe with your uncle, it is a better life for you and the girls. I have never regretted sending you back to the States. You will never know what it has been like to watch France strangle at the hands of the Germans … their hands at her throat, leering as they watch her choke. It breaks my heart to be leaving soon with Moulin, but the only thing that cheers me is the knowledge that I will come back shortly, only to fight harder.

It never occurred to him to stay in England, or to return to Liane. He thought only of France, even as he signed the letter.

Remember to give the girls my love, and keep a great deal of the same for you. I love you very, very dearly,
mon amour
… almost as much as I love France—

He smiled as he wrote

—perhaps even more, but I dare not let myself think of that now, or I shall forget that I am an old man, and run to where you are. Godspeed to you and Marie-Ange and Elisabeth, and my warmest thanks and regards to your uncle. Your loving husband, Armand.

He signed it with a flourish, as he always did, and on his way to the office he left it in the usual location. He had thought briefly of saving it until he left with Moulin, but he decided not to. He knew how anxious she was for letters and how much she worried. He could hear it in the questions she wrote, which still reached him through the censors.

And as he looked up at the calendar above his desk on the opposite wall from the portraits of Pétain and Hitler, he realized that his meeting with Moulin was only three days away. He was frowning as he was deciding what to do next when André Marchand walked into his office with a smile, and an officer of the Reich on each side of him, but neither of them was smiling.

“Monsieur de Villiers?”

“Yes, Marchand?” He didn't recall an appointment with the Germans this morning, but they were always calling him to the Hotel de Ville or the Meurice or the Crillon unexpectedly. He sat where he was and waited. “Am I expected somewhere?”

“Indeed you are, sir.” Marchand's smile grew broader. “The gentlemen of the High Command wish to see you this morning.”

“Very well.” He stood up and picked up his hat. Even in these times he always wore a striped suit and a vest and a homburg, as he had during his years in the diplomatic service. He followed the soldiers outside to the car that had been sent for him. He always went in style, not that he cared. It still turned his stomach to realize what people, whispering “traitor,” thought as he drove by.

But today Armand was not ushered in to the usual office. He was led into the office of the military command, and wondered what ugly new project they had for him now. No matter. He smiled to himself. He wouldn't have time to complete it. In three days he was leaving.

“De Villiers?” The German accent in French grated on his nerves as always, but he was concentrating on walking into the office without limping. He was in no way prepared for what came next. Three officers of the SS stood waiting for him. He had been discovered. A collection of evidence was laid out before him, including half-burned scraps of paper he had burned only the day before, and as he looked into the commanding officer's eyes, he knew. He had been betrayed by André Marchand.

“I don't understand … these are not—”

“Silence!” the officer roared. “Silence! I will speak and you will listen! You are a French pig, like all of the others, and when we finish with you today, you will squeal just like all the filthy pigs!” But they wanted no information from him at all, they wanted nothing. They wanted only to tell him what they knew, to prove to him the superior mind of the Germans. And when the commanding officer had finished his recital, which was pathetically incomplete, much to Armand's relief—they still knew almost nothing, he thanked God—he was led from the room by the SS. It was only then that he felt a tingle in his spine, that the leg dragged, that he thought of Liane, and Moulin, and he felt a creeping desperation. Before that the adrenaline hadn't been flowing too fast in his veins, but now it flowed faster and his mind whirled, and he reminded himself again and again that it had been worth it. That it was worth giving his life for his country …
pour la France
… he said it over to himself again and again and again as they tied him to a post in the courtyard outside the office of the High Command. As they shot him he shouted a single word, “Liane!” and the word echoed as he slumped, having died for his country.

n June 28, 1942, eight German agents were caught by the FBI on Long Island. They had been delivered there by German U-boats, which served to remind everyone how closely the German's hugged the eastern seaboard. Already, since the beginning of 1942, the Germans had sunk 681 ships in the Atlantic, and had lost almost no ships of their own.