The Tale of the Rose (33 page)

Consuelo Suncin Sandoval de Gómez in 1930.

Consuelo and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s wedding, April 23, 1931, at Agay, his brother-in-law’s chateau on the Côte d’Azur. Already twice widowed at thirty, Consuelo wore black.

Consuelo and Tonio at El Mirador, their home in Nice, just after their marriage.

Together in Paris in the early 1930s.

Radio broadcast from aboard ship in 1936, after Saint-Exupéry’s terrible crash and disappearance in the Libyan desert while attempting to fly from Paris to Saigon. Consuelo is almost sick with anxiety.

Consuelo and Tonio in Paris in early 1938, boarding a train for Le Havre. From there they embarked on different boats—she bound for Central America and he for New York, for his epic flight to Tierra del Fuego.

Consuelo with her dog at La Feuilleraie in 1939, just before the German invasion.

Captain Antoine de Saint-Exupéry at the wheel of his car in the early years of the war.

Saint-Exupéry kept this photo of Consuelo, taken at Greta Garbo’s house in New York, on him at all times. On the back, Consuelo had written, “Don’t lose yourself, don’t lose me.”

Consuelo’s favorite photo of her husband in uniform. She said he looked as if he were dancing.

A photo of Consuelo taken in 1942 in Montreal, where she was with her husband.

A note and drawing left for Consuelo by Tonio one night when he waited up for her and she didn’t come home: “Consuelo, Consuelo my love,” it says. “Hurry back home…”