Odette's Secrets (8 page)

Henriette Melczak, almost three years old

Angels and Demons

One Thursday, my boy cousins aren't home.

Sarah whispers that they have gone swimming,

even though it's forbidden!

“Can you girls take Henriette for a walk?”

Aunt Miriam asks Sarah and me.

But where can we go?

Parks, cafés, and museums are forbidden to Jews too.

So we just wander along the main street.

We look in all the shop windows.

“Let's play a game,” says Sarah.

“We can each choose one thing from every window …

but
only
one!”

We've played this game before.

It's like shopping but without money.

Our favorite place is the chandelier shop.

So many shiny lights,

glittering with diamonds!

Henriette wants them all.

“Don't be silly, Henriette,” says Sarah.

“How could we fit all those lamps over one table?”

When we reach the doll hospital,

Henriette studies ladies, babies, clowns, and sailor dolls.

Then she frowns.

“What if you don't come back right away for your doll?

Will the doll doctor give it to someone else?”

“Never,” says Sarah.

“The doctor knows everyone must have her own doll.”

Henriette nods.

But soon she grows thirsty and begins to whine.

We go to a café and ask for water.

The barman stares at our stars and says nothing.

Sarah puts money on the bar.

“I don't sell water,” says the barman.

“Go away. I can't serve you.”

Henriette starts to cry.

We don't know what to do.

We know Jews must never make a fuss.

When we pass a small basement library,

Sarah thinks of a way to stop her sister's crying.

“Look,” she says to me, “you and I are wearing the star.

But Henriette isn't.

If she were alone, they couldn't tell she's Jewish.

They'd let her in.”

“You can't leave her alone!” I say.

“Of course not,” says Sarah.

“Just watch, you'll see.”

Henriette peers through the library window.

“You go down first, Henriette,” says Sarah.

“The librarian will see you are alone and ask you questions.

Don't answer right away.

She'll try to make you feel good,

show you picture books.

Maybe she'll offer you a drink.

When she's busy with you, Odette and I will come down.”

Clutching the handrail,

chubby little Henriette walks down to the library,

all by herself.

Sarah and I wait a few minutes,

then go down the steps into the library too.

The librarian spots our yellow stars.

She drops the book she's showing to Henriette.

Sarah picks it up and hands it to her.

“Are you her mother?” the librarian asks Sarah.

My cousin's big for thirteen.

“No,” says Sarah, “I'm her sister.

I thought I lost her …

but I know how much she loves books.

I thought she might be here.

And she is!”

Henriette gazes up at her big sister like an innocent angel.

“Sarah, will you read to me?” she asks.

“Please?”

The librarian's eyes dart around quickly.

No one has seen us, or our yellow stars.

“All right,” she says.

She flutters her hands

toward the picture-book corner.

“Take the children over there and stay there.

I'll be at my desk.”

“You're so kind,” says Sarah.

Open books cover our stars like shields.

Henriette forgets she is thirsty.

The librarian, our gatekeeper,

pretends we are children like any others.

All afternoon, we read fairy tales.

In our cave of bookshelves,

we feel safe from the evil giants

marching down the street.

Lies

Someone's crying.

The sound of it pulls me from my dreams.

I open my eyes.

It's still dark.

I go to the window and push open one shutter,

just a crack.

I look down and see little one-armed Noe.

His mother, Leah, helps him put on his jacket.

Rumpled people are being herded down the street.

They all carry bags and bundles.

A bearded man stumbles and a policeman pushes him along.

All the people are “yellow star” people.

All of them are Jews like me.

Madame Marie bursts in.

She wakes Mama by pulling the blankets off her bed.

“Hurry!” she says.

“The police are coming … they're filling trucks with Jews!”

Mama and I pull on our dresses as fast as we can.

Mama grabs a coat and shoes

and we fly down the spiral staircase.

Madame Marie pushes us into the broom closet

inside her small workroom.

She shuts the door just in time.

The doorbell rings.

Loud men trudge into the hallway.

“We're rounding up foreign Jews,” they say.

“We're going to rid France of them forever.”

“Wonderful!” says Madame Marie.

“Those Jews have taken our jobs and money for too long.”

Then she offers them a drink …

to toast their courage, she says.

Frozen inside the dark closet,

Mama and I cannot see, but we can hear.

Madame Marie and the men are just outside the door.

If the door were open,

I could touch them.

Mama's fingers find my yellow star.

Silently, stitch by stitch, she begins to rip it off.

I listen hard.

I hear the sound of drinks being poured.

Glasses clink in a toast.

Chairs scrape around Madame Marie's table,

only a reach away from our hiding place.

The men boast and laugh.

Suddenly someone says to Madame Marie,

“Where are
your
Jews?”

His companions fall silent.

Our bodies stiffen.

Our breathing all but stops.

“Long gone!” says Madame Marie.

“They ran away to their country house.

Good riddance to them, I say.”

More drinks are poured.

But then, stern words.

“You know, Madame, if you lie to us, you'll be sorry,”

one man warns her.

“We'll pack you into a truck along with them

and send you far away!”

My godmother sounds insulted.

“Me? Do I look like a friend of Jews?”

I'm confused …

how can she say such terrible things?

She
is
our friend … one of our
best
friends!

But suddenly, I know she's lying.

She's saying bad things about Jews to keep us safe.

The same voice, still stern,

“Just to be sure, we'll go up to their apartment.”

Mama grabs my hand, squeezes it too tight.

But Madame Marie keeps the men away

from our just-slept-in sheets and blankets.

“Oh, you don't want to do that!” she says.

“You know how those foreign Jews are, filthy as pigs.

When they were living there,

I'd knock on their door only when I had to.

I'd say what I had to say quickly

and hold my breath as long as I could.

Then I'd run back down the stairs

as fast as my old legs would carry me.

Don't go up there if you don't have to.

Their apartment still stinks to high heaven.

Anyway, our bottle's nearly empty.

Why not help me finish it?”

We wait, cold bare toes pressed tight to the floor.

The smell of sour mops is all around.

My body shakes, hard.

But I don't make a single sound.

Finally, the loud men push their chairs

back in to the table.

“
Merci, Madame
,” they say.

“Au revoir
.”

Heavy footsteps echo through the hallway.

The door slams.

Silence.

Madame Marie frees us from the closet.

“How can I thank you?” Mama asks Madame Marie.

She takes my godmother's hands in her own.

Madame Marie shrugs.

She needs her hands back to clear away the glasses.

“No time for that.

We must get Odette to the railway station

as we planned.”

I look up at my mother.

“You'll come with me, won't you, Mama?” I ask.

Torn in Two