The Tiger Claw (74 page)

“Someone brought this to me in the camp at Drancy, the night before I was deported. I don’t know how or at what cost Noor sent it. I thrust it between the layers of bandages on my hand and held it close all the way to Auschwitz. Read it. Read what she wrote on the tissue.”

Kabir put on his glasses and leaned closer to the faded ink.
Je t’aime, toujours
, he read. Beneath it, the word
Adieu
—struck out. And on the third line,
Au Revoir
.

Maybe the Au Revoir was not from Noor. It could have been written by Rivkin himself, desire turning to fantasy. But no. The writing—definitely Noor’s. And Vogel had said Noor wrote to someone whose name began with “A.”

“When I believed I had no one, nothing to live for, I felt her love, her spirit urging me to live.”

Rivkin rewrapped the tiger claw. With that pendant in Rivkin’s hand, Kabir and Zaib could no longer say that Noor never loved him, that pity for a Jew had moved Noor to associate with him. Resting in Rivkin’s hand, it became instead proof of a love so great she would brave a world war to reach him, a love that had outlasted Vichy and the German Raj. Kabir had never given or received such love.

Deep blue eyes, young in Rivkin’s gaunt, lined face, met Kabir’s.

“I told you I would tell you someday.”

Revenge by silence. For fifty years Rivkin had kept this trace of Noor to himself, for himself.

“Why did you not show this to me all these years?” Kabir’s voice sounded accusing. But he had no right to be accusing. He hadn’t asked Rivkin for his interpretation of Noor’s papers or offered a glimpse of them in twenty-five years.

“You might have asked it from me,” said Rivkin.

This being true, there was nothing Kabir could find to say.

Maybe the time had come to tell Rivkin about Noor’s papers, if only to share a memory of Noor.

“Will you join us for tea?” he asked, as if a ritual cup of shared cardamom chai could help them begin anew.

Rivkin shook his head and returned the tiger claw to his pocket. “It’s a little late for that,” he said.

Light faded over Mont Valérien.

Nothing finishes
, thought Kabir.
It’s fifty years and he hasn’t forgotten
.

But then, how can he?

Rivkin hadn’t shared the tiger claw with Kabir; Kabir wouldn’t share Noor’s papers with him. Yes, it really was too late now—Rivkin’s stooped figure was already receding, crippled fingers hidden in his coat pocket.

In these fifty years, explanations of Noor’s actions had multiplied, amoebic in their overlappings. Myths were stretched to clothe the first skeletal narrations: Noor was the colonial spy fighting bravely for the mother country. Then Jeanne d’Arc on a mission to crown de Gaulle her king. After Renée Garry’s trial she became a female Jesus, betrayed for ten thousand francs without the Judas kiss. Later still, after half the
SOE
files were destroyed in a fire, some information surfaced: she was a doomed spy, an innocent, slaughtered for the unworthy cause of imperialism; very naive, extremely idealistic. People debated in print and Parliament if Madeleine was braver than other agents or a trusting, unwitting pawn. No wonder Noor had been captured, they said—she had ignored security procedure by returning to Suresnes. They tut-tutted that she had been captured with her code books, as if no other wireless operator was ever arrested with code books in hand; that she’d asked for her valise from Madame Aigrain’s home and caused the arrest of Émile Garry, as if no other agent took a suitcase to prison. That
salaud
Vogel, now a retired bank clerk in Munich, was asked his opinion, interviewed several times to answer if Noor had failed as a soldier or had succeeded by failing.

The whole damn war of competing nationalisms was the first failure.

If Mother were still alive, she would have invented a common version of Noor’s story and assigned it to her children for the telling—but she was not, and Kabir had spent years speculating about Noor’s possible motivations at every step. Today, Rivkin had presented proof Kabir could not refute, proof that changed Noor’s story yet again.

The actress Odile Hoogstraten and her husband Louis de Grémont were sitting under the trees deep in conversation with Josianne Prénat and her fourth husband. And there was Monique, survivor of Ravensbrück, whose husband, Émile Garry, had been executed yet who came every year to commemorate Noor.

Monique brought Renée Garry to mind. Renée Garry, whose husband Guy had returned in time for the shock of attending his wife’s trial. By the time Kabir found it in himself to meet the acquitted Renée, she was a grandmother of ten, but having learned of Noor’s Indian heritage during her trial, spent the entire meeting lecturing Kabir about overpopulation in India. When she heard Kabir now had two sons, she began lecturing on Muslim overpopulation in France. And she who had run a safe house for resistants had become proud to mention she’d voted for fascist Le Pen.

Renée Garry must live with her deeds, Kabir with his.

Other guests had gone inside, so Kabir followed. Thanks to Zaib, every corner of Afzal Manzil was decorated with vases full of Noor’s favourite forget-me-nots and burning scented candles.

In Abbajaan’s recital room, guests greeted him, bowing. A woman took her seat cross-legged on a carpet, drew a veena before her. Her
zikr
rose over the drone of the veena as if she were breathing through sound. Zaib’s idea too, no doubt—it wasn’t his.

Too reminiscent of Noor.

More would happen. What was yet to be written would supplement the spoken stories, the spoken would bring sound to the written, and memory would twine itself about the stronger
of the two. Truth was buried somewhere in and between the scraps of Noor’s words, truth as only she knew it. But Pir Kabir Khan would tell the story of Noor the rest of his days. Re-create Noor that she might live on in the world’s memory.

Imagine that
.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

T
HE SUPPORT
and contributions of many people brought this book into being.

In France, I thank members of the extended family of Noor Inayat Khan for their hospitality, hours of discussion, and correspondence. To Anne Freyer of Editions du Seuil France, my gratitude for her encouragement, travel companionship to Le Mans and guidance as the book matured. My thanks to Florence Libert for her coordination of travel and research interviews, and translation assistance. Thanks for the kind assistance of Madame Semence, librarian at L’École Agronomique de Grignon, the personal memories and research of Madame Vanderwynckt, the guidance of Monsieur Trouvé and the memories imparted by Monsieur de Ganay.

In Germany, Susana Fernandez and Hede Mettler of Pforzheim’s information bureau made it possible for me to visit Noor’s prison cell. Christian Milankovic of the
Pforzheimer Zietung
accompanied me, providing translation assistance and discussion of context.

In Canada, I was privileged to attend the Banff Centre for the Arts Writer’s Studio, a residency made possible by the Adele Wiseman scholarship fund and a travel grant from the Canada
Council. Grateful thanks to Bonnie Burnard and David Carpenter, who were generous enough to read and comment on the manuscript in progress; and to Greg Hollingshead and Edna Alford, who believed it possible, sometimes more than I did. I warmly acknowledge the financial support of the Canada Council for the Arts during the writing of this book. Thanks very much to writer Corie Johnson for sharing research documents and speculations. Many thanks for the support of my agents, Bruce Westwood and Nicole Winstanley, who believed in this book from raw text to publication. I appreciate my editors Diane Martin and Louise Dennys whose questions challenged me to go deeper, tell the story more fully. I am indebted to John Sweet and translator Barbara Collignon for their excellent copyediting.

In England, intrepid Andy Forbes provided research assistance and companionship for my visits to museums and sites in Noor’s life. His Web site
64-Baker-Street.org
describes the fifty women volunteers who worked for the
SOE
. Thanks to the late Group Captain Hugh Verity and to Mrs. Audrey Verity for their hospitality and candidness. My thanks to librarians of the Public Records Office at Kew and the Imperial War Museum.

In the U.S.A., many thanks to Gaston Vandermeersche for sharing vivid memories of his incarceration at the avenue Foch both in interviews and in
Gaston’s War
. Holocaust survivor Edel Ullenberg shared her memories of her time in Dachau; Marc Collignon his memories of life in occupied France. Werner Juretzko gave me details from his memories of incarceration in Germany. I am grateful to Nighat Kokan for her patience and meticulous research for meanings and transliterations from Urdu. The Ragdale Foundation in Illinois supported me for a five-week residency. This project was supported in part by a grant from the Wisconsin Arts Board, with funds from the State of Wisconsin. Sincere thanks and appreciation to Tim Baker, reference librarian at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Library in Washington, D.C., and to the librarians at the Milwaukee
Public Library and Marquette University Memorial Library for their patience in filling my incessant requests for international interlibrary loans. Many thanks to Elaine Bergstrom (pen name Marie Kiraly), Beatrice Armstrong of the Alliance Française de Milwaukee, Amy Waldman, Pegi Taylor, Judy Steininger and members of my novel writers’ group, who read the manuscript at various stages. Thanks also to the Safe House espionage theme restaurant in Milwaukee, a haven for meetings and interviews.

In India, my cousin-sister Ena Singh assisted with research travel and interviews in Delhi, and commented on the manuscript. I greatly appreciated Sardar Shamsher Singh’s memories of the Princely State of Baroda (now Vadodara). Dr. Kimberley Chawla acted as Noor’s long-distance medical consultant. Many thanks also to the Indian members of Noor Inayat Khan’s extended family in Vadodara, who gave me a tour of their home, Noor’s ancestral home.

Michael Sell’s translation of the Al-Fatiha surah from
Approaching the Qur’an: the Early Revelations
is used by permission of White Cloud Press, Oregon. Quatrains in the epigraph are from
Unseen Rain
, translations of Jalal-ud-din Rumi’s poetry by Moyne and Barks. They are used by permission of Threshold Books. Lines from “Je suis seul ce soir” are from the
album Les Chansons sous l’occupation: French Songs of WW II
published by Arkadia Records. The line from Rabindranath Tagore’s Gitanjali was translated from Bengali by the author, and is used by permission of Macmillan India. Allusions to the
Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám
are based on Edward Fitzgerald’s rendering into English verse, published by Collins Press, London. Quotations from the Ya Sin are from
Holy Qur’Aan:
Text, Translation and Commentary
by Abdullah Yusuf Ali, and are used by permission of Wordsworth Editions UK.

I owe too much to mention to my husband David Baldwin, always game to discuss, edit and burrow through his collection of espionage and history books for yet another arcane detail. He
hauled and shipped research books to my writer’s residencies, and accompanied me to Paris, Pforzheim, Munich and Dachau. His patience, love, humour and understanding help me daily in every way.

S
HAUNA
S
INGH
B
ALDWIN
was born in Montreal and grew up in India. The story that was to become her bestselling first novel,
What the Body Remembers
, was awarded the Saturday Night CBC Literary Prize.
What the Body Remembers
received the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Book (Canada and the Caribbean region).
English Lessons and Other Stories
received the Friends of American Writers award.
The Tiger Claw
was a Giller Prize Finalist in 2004. She is the co-author of A
Foreign Visitor’s
Survival Guide
to America, and presently lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

VINTAGE CANADA EDITION, 2005

Copyright © 2004 VICHAR

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Published in Canada by Vintage Canada, a division of Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto in 2005. Originally published in hardcover in Canada by Alfred A. Knopf Canada, a division of Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto, in 2004.

Distributed by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

Vintage Canada and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House of Canada Limited.

www.randomhouse.ca

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Baldwin, Shauna Singh, 1962–
The tiger claw: a novel / Shauna Singh Baldwin.

I. Title.

PS8553.A4493T44 2005     C813’.54     C2005-901306-0

eISBN: 978-0-307-36839-3

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