The Keeper of the Walls (51 page)

It was the start of the month of July, and in the evening, the men hovered near the radio. The question of rights to the Free City of Danzig was starting to come up more and more frequently, and Great Britain was starting to growl back at the encroaching fingers of the Reich. Kira stood behind her brother, and listened to the tense words of the broadcaster without really hearing them. She was glancing down at the back of Pierre Rublon's head, remembering their brief moment together, alone, on the beach. And she hoped that war wouldn't come, so that they might all stay here, in Saint-Aubin, until the end of September.

On July 4, the voice of the broadcaster was lifted in hope. Germany, he reported, was being quiet, reacting to Britain's anger. And so the small group began to relax. Wolf's face remained the only dark, tense one. “One can never underestimate Hitler,” he said, and then Kira was afraid. She walked alone on the edge of the water, wondering what a war could be about, and remembering all that she had heard from Wolf and his mother, and even Maryse.

When Nicky and Pierre came to join her, it was already dusk, and the sky over the seawall was a soft coral hue lined with threads of orange gold. She knew that the adults hadn't meant to be overheard, but now she said to her brother: “They send the Jews away to horrible places. And—we're—” The sentence died in her throat, as she remembered that Pierre was there, and that her grandparents hadn't wanted anyone to know that they were part Jewish.

“It's all right,” Pierre said gently. “Nicky already told me. You're Jews.”

“On my mother's side. We're only one-quarter Jewish, really,” she added defensively.

“Don't worry about it, Kira. I don't care about what you are—or Nicky. I like you both. You're my friends.”

“But if your parents knew, they wouldn't let you stay with us,” she accused him.

He regarded her blankly. “My parents aren't like that,” he said, a twinge of hurt creeping into his voice.

“Oh.” She fumbled with the sash of her sun dress. Suddenly she cried: “My father hates the Jews! Maybe that's why he went away! Because we're Jews, too!”

For a moment the two young boys stood staring at her, and then Nicky turned away, striding off toward the house. “You've made him angry,” Pierre chided her. “He doesn't like to speak endlessly about your father, and why he might or might not have left. How can you know, Kira? People act strangely sometimes, and we don't know why.”

Her young face crumpled, and she said: “But I can't help it! There are moments when I hate the memory of Papa. But other times ... I wish he'd send for me, so I could be with him again. You don't know! You don't know how he loved me! He didn't love Nicky in the same way, and so it's easier for him to hate him. But nobody's ever going to love me the way my father did.”

The wind was blowing around her face, and soft wisps of hair rose and fell about her neck and cheeks. In the setting sun, her dark green eyes were so ineffably sad that he was certain they were the saddest eyes he'd ever seen. Without knowing why he did it, he let his hand go to her face, his fingers touching her cheek.

Like a frightened cat, she drew back, and the green eyes blazed her shock at his touch. He shook his head, puzzled by his own behavior, and abruptly asked: “How old are you now, Kira?”

“Almost fourteen.”

He breathed in and out, and turned aside. He could feel her near him, like a shadow.

Smiling, he looked at her then, and shook his head. “I don't know.” He sighed, and continued: “I'm scared, Kira. I don't want there to be a war. Because if there is ... Nicky and I will be called up within two or three years. And I don't want to die, like the million and a half that died in the last war.” When he finished speaking, he wasn't smiling anymore, and his tanned, healthy young face seemed contemplative and almost brooding.

Impulsively, Kira moved closer to him, and began to play the piano on his arm, lightly. “Don't think about it,” she said quickly. “That's what being grown up is all about. Sadness, and death. Think about the sand, and the sea. If Nicky's still mad at me, will you go swimming with me tomorrow?”

He moved with sudden sureness, and caught her deft fingers in his own hand. Slowly he pulled her close to him, and peered into her eyes, his own breath held. Then he bent down, and touched her lips with his own. When he released her, she was still staring at him, and she said: “Don't leave us, Pierre. Always be our friend.”

“How could I leave,” he replied, “when you're the most beautiful part of my summer?”

But neither of them knew that by the end of August, their summer would be over. It wasn't till the first of September that it hit them all, adults and young alike. At 1:00
p.m.,
a general mobilization was announced in reply to the German invasion of Poland. Posters were pasted on the walls of all public buildings in the village, requisitioning all horses and all vehicles. And on Sunday the third, though the picturesque streets of Saint-Aubin remained calm and normal, war was officially declared by the French government, and news came that there was heavy fighting in Poland already.

Pierre's father came, to take his son back to Paris, and stayed two days. There was fighting on the Siegfried Line. Warsaw was being heavily bombed. Jacques, Monsieur Rublon, and Wolf stayed by the radio, anxiety painted on their faces. And then Lily announced that her stepfather, Sudarskaya, and the Steiners would have to go to the city hall to be officially fingerprinted, with the other foreigners of Saint-Aubin. And everybody laughed, sudden mirth erupting among them, as Nanni said: “Is it like playing Thief? Do they really think we're
thieves?”

And then Monsieur Rublon and Pierre, surrounded by luggage, were standing in front of their car, and everyone was crowding around them. Nicky stood close to his sister, and she thought, I'll never be alone with him again. It's over, everything is
over.
The car door was opening, Monsieur Rublon was stepping inside, and then she saw Pierre's eyes, on her, on her only. For no more than three seconds, he looked at her, and she stared back intently. And briefly, he smiled, and nodded, imperceptibly. Then he opened his own door, and sat down, and closed the door, and the car revved its motor and took off in lifting motes of dust and sand.

Later, in the house, she took the dishes in and soaked them under the hot water, letting the heat scald her soft hands, as if in punishment. She felt her mother near her, but kept her face averted, to the sink. Lily's hand touched the back of her neck, and she murmured, “Time will pass quickly, my darling. You'll see him again—soon.”

Kira turned, and Lily saw the fresh tears on her cheeks. “But with the war . . . Are we going to go back to Paris? And maybe he'll forget me. I'm just his friend's little sister.”

Lily sighed. “I really don't know what we're going to do, Kira. Grandma and Grandpa, and the Steiners, want to go home. But I'm afraid. I feel we'd be safer here, away from everything ...far away from any possible fighting. There's talk around the beaches about setting up five lycées in the reception rooms of the large hotels on the coastal area near Caen. Many vacationers, like us, were caught by the war, and are electing to remain here. And some teachers on holiday don't want to go back to the capital either, so there wouldn't be a staffing problem for you young people.”

Kira bit her lip, and shook her hands free of the soapsuds. “But . . . if we stay here . . . then Pierre—” Her voice suddenly broke, and she cried, “He really will forget me! And maybe we won't ever see each other again!”

Intensely moved, Lily wrapped her arms around her young daughter, and held her silently. The strength of Kira's despair made her feel how far away she'd come from her own youth, from her own first love. But had there ever been a puppy love, like Kira's now? Or had she lived so far removed from the mainstream of society that the first time her heart had felt the rapture and the fears of romantic involvement, had been when she'd met Misha Brasilov? She tried to cast her mind back to her years in the convent school, to the time when she'd been, like Kira, close to fourteen. She decided that both her children, because of the instability of life around them, had grown up much faster than she had. Their childhood was gone, and suddenly, she regretted it.

Lily knew that Kira was expecting her to say something, and so, tangling her fingers in the girl's long hair, she finally whispered: “I wish I could tell you when you'll see him again. War changes all sorts of plans and habits, turns people's lives upside down sometimes. But there
is
one thing I
can
promise you: he will always remember, Kira.”

Then she closed her eyes against her own overwhelming sadness, a nameless sorrow.

C
laire said to Lily
: “But you'll be so alone here, just with Sudarskaya. I don't feel it's right, your staying behind.”

“I can't explain it, Mama, but I just don't want to return to Paris. And I wish you and Jacques, and Wolf, wouldn't insist on going back. The butcher said it was a madhouse there, with fighting in the streets and the constant clamor of the cannon. People are going crazy over there! But here ... we can hardly feel the difference. We can't
feel
the war.”

“At least, in Paris, we'll feel connected. We'll know exactly what's going on. And Wolf says he has some patients there, emigrants like himself. It's important for him not to lose contact with his profession.”

“I remember the last war. Papa kept me in Brittany, and there, with the nuns, I felt protected. I don't want Kira and Nicky to have their lives completely disrupted by riots, and by food shortages, and other ways Paris will be affected. We'll stay here, at least for a few months. And because it will be the off-season, the villa will cost us very little.”

Claire shrugged, clamping down on her irritation. “Sometimes,” she remarked tersely, “you're a very stubborn woman, Lily.”

Lily smiled. “It's an inherited trait.” She walked out to the living room, where everyone else stood around piled up cartons and stacked up luggage. She felt strangely relieved that she had made her decision. But she was sad that everyone was leaving, except for the small Russian piano teacher.

“Well,” Jacques declared. “The car's ready, and I suppose there isn't any reason to dawdle. The roads are clogged up enough as it is, and we'll be on the road for days.” Taking two suitcases in his hands, he began to walk out to the large Rolls-Royce that stood waiting. Behind it was Wolf's smaller Peugeot.

“I'll miss you, Aunt Lily,” Nanni cried, throwing her arms around her neck. “But you'll write, won't you?”

“Of course, cookie. And we're not at the other end of the world, you know.” Gently, she helped the little girl climb inside the Peugeot. The small, plump hand stayed entwined with hers, and Lily felt a tremendous pang of sadness. Still, she'd made up her mind.

Hours later, when the children had helped her straighten up the house, she felt the silence of the empty rooms. Sudarskaya, sidling in beside her, said: “It won't be the same without them. Such a jolly time, all of us together. I was thinking, when the war ends, you and I could start running a
pension
together. The children would love it, and it's a good business.”

“And when will the war end, Raïssa Markovna?” Lily smiled at her, suddenly grateful for her company.

“It will end when the powers that be take a good look around them, and decide that enough young men have died. Like the last time.”

But last time, the war lasted four years, Lily thought, a dreadful anxiety twisting her heart. And in four years Nicky will be nearly nineteen. He'd have been inducted by then. . . .

“Are you all right, Lily?” Sudarskaya was asking. “Is anything wrong?”

“I'm glad you're here,” Lily said, and squeezed her arm. “We'll keep each other company.”

Sudarskaya sighed. “I have no one else,” she simply stated. “That's why I stayed.”