The Nightingale (35 page)

She had seen buses outside of the prefecture of police, dozens of them parked in the courtyard. “Papa…” Before she could finish, she heard footsteps coming up the stairs outside of the apartment.

A pamphlet of some kind slid into the apartment through the slit beneath the door.

Papa left the table and bent to pick it up. He brought it to the table and set it down next to the candle.

Isabelle stood behind him.

Papa looked up at her.

“It's a warning. It says the police are going to round up all foreign-born Jews and deport them to camps in Germany.”

“We are talking when we need to be acting,” Isabelle said. “We need to hide our friends in the building.”

“It's so little,” Papa said. His hand was shaking. It made her wonder again—sharply—what he'd seen in the Great War, what he knew that she did not.

“It's what we can do,” Isabelle said. “We can make some of them safe. At least for tonight. We'll know more tomorrow.”

“Safe. And where would that be, Isabelle? If the French police are doing this, we are lost.”

Isabelle had no answer for that.

Saying no more, they left the apartment.

Stealth was difficult in a building as old as this one, and her father, moving in front of her, had never been light on his feet. Brandy made him even more unsteady as he led her down the narrow, twisting staircase to the apartment directly below theirs. He stumbled twice, cursing his imbalance. He knocked on the door.

He waited to the count of ten and knocked again. Harder this time.

Very slowly, the door opened, just a crack at first, and then all the way. “Oh, Julien, it is you,” said Ruth Friedman. She was wearing a man's coat over a floor-length nightgown, with her bare feet sticking out beneath. Her hair was in rollers and covered with a scarf.

“You've seen the pamphlet?”

“I got one. It is true?” she whispered.

“I don't know,” her father said. “There are buses out front and lorries have been rumbling past all night. Isabelle was at the prefecture of police tonight, and they were collecting the names and addresses of all foreign-born Jewish people. We think you should bring the children to our place for now. We have a hiding place.”

“But … my husband is a prisoner of war. The Vichy government promises us that we will be protected.”

“I am not sure we can trust the Vichy government, Madame,” Isabelle said to the woman. “Please. Just hide for now.”

Ruth stood there a moment, her eyes widening. The yellow star on her overcoat was a stark reminder of the way the world had changed. Isabelle saw when the woman decided. She turned on her heel and walked out of the room. Less than a minute later, she guided her two daughters toward the door. “What do we bring?”

“Nothing,” Isabelle said. She herded the Friedmans up the stairs. When they reached the safety of the apartment, her father led them to the secret room in the back bedroom and closed the door on them.

“I'll get the Vizniaks,” Isabelle said. “Don't put the armoire in place yet.”

“They're on the third floor, Isabelle. You'll never—”

“Lock the front door behind me. Don't open it unless you hear my voice.”

“Isabelle, no—”

She was already gone, running down the stairs, barely touching the banister in her haste. When she was nearly to the third-floor landing, she heard voices below.

They were coming up the stairs.

She was too late. She crouched where she was, hidden by the elevator.

Two French policemen stepped onto the landing. The younger of the two knocked twice on the Vizniaks' door, waited a second or two, and then kicked it open. Inside, a woman wailed.

Isabelle crept closer, listening.

“… are Madame Vizniak?” the policeman on the left said. “Your husband is Emile and your children, Anton and Hélène?”

Isabelle peered around the corner.

Madame Vizniak was a beautiful woman, with skin the color of fresh cream and luxurious hair that never looked as messy as it did now. She was wearing a lacy silk negligee that must have cost a fortune when it was purchased. Her young son and daughter, whom she had pulled in close, were wide-eyed.

“Pack up your things. Just the necessaries. You are being relocated,” said the older policeman as he flipped through a list of names.

“But … my husband is in prison near Pithiviers. How will he find us?”

“After the war, you will come back.”

“Oh.” Madame Vizniak frowned, ran a hand through her tangled hair.

“Your children are French-born citizens,” the policeman said. “You may leave them here. They're not on my list.”

Isabelle couldn't remain hidden. She got to her feet and descended the stairs to the landing. “I'll take them for you, Lily,” she said, trying to sound calm.

“No!” the children wailed in unison, clinging to their mother.

The French policemen turned to her. “What is your name?” one of them asked Isabelle.

She froze. Which name should she give? “Rossignol,” she said at last, although without the corresponding papers, it was a dangerous choice. Still, Gervaise might make them wonder why she was in this building at almost three in the morning, putting her nose in her neighbor's business.

The policeman consulted his list and then waved her away. “Go. You are no concern to me tonight.”

Isabelle looked past them to Lily Vizniak. “I'll take the children, Madame.”

Lily seemed not to comprehend. “You think I'll leave them behind?”

“I think—”

“Enough,” the older policeman yelled, thumping his rifle butt on the floor. “You,” he said to Isabelle. “Get out. This doesn't concern you.”

“Madame, please,” Isabelle pleaded. “I'll make sure they are safe.”

“Safe?” Lily frowned. “But we are safe with the French police. We've been assured. And a mother can't leave her children. Someday you'll understand.” She turned her attention to her children. “Pack a few things.”

The French policeman at Isabelle's side touched her arm gently. When she turned, he said, “Go.” She saw the warning in his eyes but couldn't tell if he wanted to scare her or protect her. “Now.”

Isabelle had no choice. If she stayed, if she demanded answers, sooner or later her name would be passed up to the prefecture of police—maybe even to the Germans. With what she and the network were doing with the escape route, and what her father was doing with false papers, she didn't dare draw attention. Not even for something as slight as demanding to know where a neighbor was being taken.

Silently, keeping her gaze on the floor (she didn't trust herself to look at them), she eased past the policemen and headed for the stairs.

 

TWENTY-TWO

After she returned from the Vizniaks' apartment, Isabelle lit an oil lamp and went into the salon, where she found her father asleep at the dining room table, his head resting on the hard wood as if he'd passed out. Beside him was a half-empty brandy bottle that had been full not long ago. She took the bottle and put it on the sideboard, hoping that out of reach would equal out of mind in the morning.

She almost reached out for him, almost stroked the gray hair that obscured his face, a small, oval-shaped bald spot revealed by repose. She wanted to be able to touch him that way, in comfort, in love, in companionship.

Instead, she went into the kitchen, where she made a pot of bitter, dark, made-from-acorns coffee and found a small loaf of the tasteless gray bread that was all the Parisians could get anymore. She broke off a piece (what would Madame Dufour say about that? Eating while walking), and chewed it slowly.

“That coffee smells like shit,” her father said, bleary-eyed, lifting his head as she came into the room.

She handed him her cup. “It tastes worse.”

Isabelle poured another cup of coffee for herself and sat down beside him. The lamplight accentuated the road-map look of his face, deepening the pits and wrinkles, making the flesh beneath his eyes look wax-like and swollen.

She waited for him to say something, but he just stared at her. Beneath his pointed gaze, she finished her coffee (she needed it to swallow the dry, terrible bread) and pushed the empty cup away. Isabelle stayed there until he fell asleep again and then she went into her own room. But there was no way she could sleep. She lay there for hours, wondering and worrying. Finally, she couldn't stand it anymore. She got out of bed and went into the salon.

“I'm going out to see,” she announced.

“Don't,” he said, still seated at the table.

“I won't do anything stupid.”

She returned to her bedroom and changed into a summer-weight blue skirt and short-sleeved white blouse. She put a faded blue silk scarf around her messy hair, tied it beneath her chin, and left the apartment.

On the third floor, she saw that the door to the Vizniak apartment was open. She peered inside.

The room had been looted. Only the biggest pieces of furniture remained and the drawers of the black bombé chest were open. Clothes and inexpensive knickknacks were scattered across the floor. Rectangular black marks on the wall revealed missing artwork.

She closed the door behind her. In the lobby, she paused just long enough to compose herself and then opened the door.

Buses rolled down the street, one after another. Through the dirty bus windows, she saw dozens of children's faces, with their noses pressed to the glass, and their mothers seated beside them. The sidewalks were curiously empty.

Isabelle saw a French policeman standing at the corner and she went to him. “Where are they going?”

“Vélodrome d'Hiver.”

“The sporting stadium? Why?”

“You don't belong here. Go or I'll put you on a bus and you'll end up with them.”

“Maybe I'll do that. Maybe—”

The policeman leaned close, whispered, “
Go
.” He grabbed her arm and dragged her to the side of the road. “Our orders are to shoot anyone who tries to escape. You hear me?”

“You'd
shoot
them? Women and children?”

The young policeman looked miserable. “Go.”

Isabelle knew she should stay. That was the smart thing to do. But she could walk to the Vél d'Hiv almost as quickly as these buses could drive there. It was only a few blocks away. Maybe then she would know what was happening.

For the first time in months, the barricades on the side streets of Paris were unmanned. She ducked around one and ran down the street, toward the river, past closed-up shops and empty cafés. Only a few blocks away, she came to a breathless stop across the street from the stadium. An endless stream of buses jammed with people drew up alongside the huge building and disgorged passengers. Then the doors wheezed shut and the buses drove off again; others drove up to take their place. She saw a sea of yellow stars.

There were thousands of men, women, and children, looking confused and despairing, being herded into the stadium. Most were wearing layers of clothing—too much for the July heat. Police patrolled the perimeter like American cowboys herding cattle, blowing whistles, shouting orders, forcing the Jewish people forward, into the stadium or onto other buses.

Families.

She saw a policeman shove a woman with his baton so hard she stumbled to her knees. She staggered upright, reaching blindly to the little boy beside her, protecting him with her body as she limped toward the stadium entrance.

She saw a young French policeman and fought through the crowd to get to him.

“What's happening?” she asked.

“That's not your concern, M'mselle. Go.”

Isabelle looked back at the large cycling stadium. All she saw were people, bodies crammed together, families trying to hold on to each other in the melee. The police shouted at them, shoved them forward toward the stadium, yanked children and mothers to their feet when they fell. She could hear children crying. A pregnant woman was on her knees, rocking back and forth, clutching her distended belly.

“But … there are too many of them in there…” Isabelle said.

“They'll be deported soon.”

“Where?”

He shrugged. “I know nothing about it.”

“You must know something.”

“Work camps,” he mumbled. “In Germany. That's all I know.”

“But … they're women and children.”

He shrugged again.

Isabelle couldn't comprehend it. How could the French gendarmes be doing this to
Parisians
? To women and children? “Children can hardly work, M'sieur. You must have thousands of children in there, and pregnant women. How—”

“Do I look like the mastermind of this? I just do what I'm told. They tell me to arrest the foreign-born Jews in Paris, so I do it. They want the crowd separated—single men to Drancy, families to the Vél d'Hiv.
Voilà!
It's done. Point rifles at them and be prepared to shoot. The government wants all of France's foreign Jews sent east to work camps, and we're starting here.”

All of France? Isabelle felt the air rush out of her lungs. Operation Spring Wind. “You mean this isn't just happening in Paris?”

“No. This is just the start.”

*   *   *

Vianne had stood in queues all day, in the oppressive summer heat, and for what—a half a pound of dry cheese and a loaf of terrible bread?

“Can we have some strawberry jam today, Maman? It hides the taste of the bread.”

As they left the shop, Vianne kept Sophie close to her, tucked against her hip as if she were a much younger child. “Maybe just a little, but we can't go overboard. Remember how terrible the winter was? Another will be coming.”

Vianne saw a group of soldiers coming their way, rifles glinting in the sunshine. They marched past, and tanks followed them, grumbling over the cobblestoned street.