Two Testaments (36 page)

David glanced back. The whole square was engulfed in red. “Moustafa,” he groaned again.

Philippeville was but a drop of red in the bucket of blood filled up on July 3, 1962. Throughout the cities in Algeria, FLN troops and their supporters stormed the houses of the harki traitors. Men, women, children were murdered, whole families, thrown down on the floors of their houses and slain.

Farther out in the fields, busy soldiers dug deep, wide graves into which the dead bodies could be rolled. The fresh dirt was pushed back over the lifeless Arabs, covered with leaves and sand, camouflaged from the world. No one could count the number. No one cared to know. Not President de Gaulle, not the Algerian socialist Ben Bella. No one.

Yet it was simple to calculate. Soon there would be no harki families left in Algeria. Some would get away, the lucky ones, Ali mused. Some had already fled. But that could be no more than ten, fifteen thousand at best. The vast majority would perish with their throats slit. France would not know, would not care. No one in the outside world would question. But inside Algeria, Ali and his comrades would exchange knowing glances. A hundred thousand murdered. One hundred fifty thousand, easily.

Ali lay in his bed draped in a sheet and gave the orders. Mass graves to be dug and bodies to fill them. The vegetation would grow over them in some areas. In others, the fine, hot sand would drift on top. And the world would not know.

It served the filthy traitors right! They had abandoned their homeland to support the French army. He only wished the punishment, the terror, and the unbearable pain would last a bit longer.

Suddenly Ali slammed his fist on his bed. Hussein! He did not doubt that the boy had made it to France, although he had not received word yet. Hussein was quite capable. What was taking the boy so long?

But there was not time to worry over Hussein; Ali must reserve every bit of his strength for the future of Algeria. The new government. He intended to be part of it! He cursed his wounds and sank down in his bed, and his thoughts returned to the skirmish in the Casbah. Perhaps David Hoffmann and his father would find a way out. But that harki boy, Moustafa. If he hadn’t already died from the wounds he received in the Casbah, there was no worry. He was a harki boy. Dead meat.

Ali closed his eyes and imagined the throngs of happy youth invading the streets, celebrating freedom. The confetti, the loud horns, the dancing. Ali Boudani chose to think of the celebration. The graves would be forgotten. A just end for those who had betrayed their country. Algeria was free!

David and Rémi did not leave Philippeville. Instead they parked among the thick foliage ten minutes out from the port. Rémi had agreed to go back to the square by the port after dark to see. The thought now made David sweat. What did he hope to find? Moustafa lying among the carnage with his throat slit?

Earlier, they had driven recklessly through the town as if their mad flight might somehow bring Moustafa back. Bedraggled and shivering, they had listened to radio reports throughout the afternoon. Tears mixed with seawater. Disbelief and fury. Again and again Rémi cursed the fact that he had not brought his rifles. Why had they been so naive as to think things would go smoothly?

The radio did not speak of the massacre. Its airwaves were filled with victory announcements and news of Ben Bella’s return after five years of imprisonment.

Now they drove back through the night without speaking. Perhaps Moustafa had gotten away. Perhaps they were not all dead. Little phrases of hope. Make-believe hope. They had seen the massacre with their own eyes. No one had gotten away.

Rémi saw the trucks first. Covered, camouflaged trucks leaving the port, driven by silent Arab men. He stopped the Renault by the Place, shutting off the engine and headlights. In the dark of the summer sky, Rémi and David watched the men at work, lifting bodies, tossing them into the backs of the trucks.

Rémi turned the car around and followed one truck, keeping his distance, driving without headlights. David dozed off and on, unable to keep his eyes open. His dreams came in little clips. Guns, knives, red. He woke with a start, blinking to get his bearings. Rémi had stopped the car.

“Would ya look at that,” he murmured. “Just like the rotten Nazis. Dumping them into the ground.”

David leaned forward to gaze out the windshield. Far off he could make out the forms of men emptying their human cargo into wide holes.

They drove silently back to the Place. David stepped into the open air, which was thick, oppressive with the stench of death. The bodies had all been removed. Nothing but dark splotches of dried blood remained on the cobbled stones. For a long moment he walked as if in a trance around the square. Moustafa was gone. Murdered. And he had been powerless to stop it.

When they finally pulled up to Rémi’s farmhouse in the wee hours of the morning, David could not bring himself to go inside. Somewhere in the house, his father lay asleep. Yet he felt more allegiance to Moustafa than to his father. He had no strength to work through that messy relationship. And the older man wasn’t doing well anyway. Maybe David would go inside to find that Roger Hoffmann too was dead.

David turned and walked away from the farmhouse, out to the moonlit orange groves. He cursed this country, this war, this life. The tiny sprouts of faith that had barely broken through the soil in his heart were withering and dying within him. There was no God. It had been a hoax, a cruel joke, a fantasy. He ached at the core of his being, and he could find no comfort.

He tried praying, but his prayers were just angry accusations. “You can’t be omnipotent! Or if You are, You are evil. You are a God who takes. You want my undying devotion while you strip me of all those I care for. Was it not enough to take Greta and Mama? Did you have to take Moustafa? And Gabby and Anne-Marie and Ophélie? Where is the hope?”

He cursed the tears that came to his eyes. The black sky would soon be bidden awake by the first touch of sun. “I hate You, God! Can You hear me? I hate You. Get out of my life! I was doing just fine without You.”

David walked for a long time, coming up to the shell of a house he had known all those years ago. The Duchemins’ place. He felt his pulse quicken, remembered his first encounter with the captain, stiffly shaking his hand with his other arm around Anne-Marie’s shoulder. He remembered the proud allure of Captain Duchemin, and his determination to be equally proud and aloof.

He rammed the door with his foot, relieved to do something with his anger. The door swung inward. Windows were broken, leaving jagged glass edges. He ran his fingers over the dining-room table, tracing a deep gash drawn through the wood, perhaps by a knife. Fine layers of sand covered the few pieces of scattered furniture.

He walked into the kitchen. Broken china lay on the floor. Drawers hung open, empty. He went down the hallway and into Anne-Marie’s bedroom. The sheets had been stripped off the bed and the mattress slashed. In the opposite corner sat an overturned crib with most of the slats broken. And everywhere, the sand, the fine whitish powder, blown in from the Sahara.

David walked back into the dining room and hit the table hard with his fist. Every bone in his body ached. His head wound began to bleed. He fell to his knees and sobbed. “I hate You, God. I hate You.” Then, covering his face with his hands, he whispered, “But help me. If You leave me too, I’ll have no one at all.”

22

Henri Krugler put a paintbrush into a jar of turpentine. He dipped a rag into the potent liquid and rubbed at his blue-stained hands. He washed his hands thoroughly, dried them on a damp towel, and ran his fingers through his thick white hair. He removed his T-shirt and replaced it with a clean, starched button-down, which he tucked into his paint-splattered work pants.

He glanced at his wristwatch. Two fifteen. Locking the door behind him, Henri hurried through the streets of Lodève, nodding politely at those he passed on his way to the train station. Two days earlier a nun called Mother Griolet from an orphanage outside Montpellier had written to him. The handwriting was a bit shaky, but the tone of the letter was serious, businesslike. She had asked if she might come to see him, to discuss “urgent matters.”

He had heard of Mother Griolet from Joseph Cohen and recalled the words Joseph had used to describe her: “The feistiest little nun you’ll ever meet. As determined as she is compassionate.”

The train from Montpellier pulled into the station and screeched to a halt. Several minutes later a small woman with wrinkled skin, dressed in a black nun’s habit, emerged from the train. By her side, helping to steady her, was a striking young woman with long, curly red hair. The nun looked more feeble than feisty.

“Henri Krugler,” he introduced himself, walking up and offering his hand. He felt suddenly big and awkward.

“
Enchantée, Monsieur Krugler.
I am Mother Griolet.” She squeezed his hand firmly, then looked toward the girl. “And this is
Mademoiselle Madison
, a dear friend of mine.”

The redhead smiled, though she looked at him suspiciously. He put out his hand, and she touched it briefly without meeting his eyes.

The old nun cleared her throat. “Thank you for agreeing to see us on such short notice.”

“The pleasure is all mine. Joseph Cohen has spoken highly of you for many years. It’s an honor to finally have the privilege of meeting you.”

The young woman spoke. “Excuse me, M. Krugler. Mother Griolet has recently suffered a heart attack, although she would never tell you herself. Is there a place where we could sit down?”

Henri felt the blood rise in his cheeks as the girl regarded him with her bright, clear eyes. “Of course.
Mais bien sûr
.” He motioned to a bench nearby. “I’ll go back and fetch my car. You just wait here.”

Henri chided himself for not thinking of the car. He had been so wrapped up in his work that he had forgotten the time and then rushed off without considering that an elderly nun would need a ride back to the house. He felt equally embarrassed about his attire and for a moment considered changing his pants, then decided that would be even more awkward. Ever since Louise had died, his clothes were poorly matched. Ah well.

It took no more than fifteen minutes for Henri to return to the farmhouse, drive his gray Citroën to the train station, pick up the nun and the girl, and be back at the house-turned-centre aéré. Henri congratulated himself for at least having remembered to dust off the couch and chairs in the
salon
.

“Please have a seat, Mother Griolet. Mlle Madison. Can I get you anything to drink? A cup of coffee?

“A glass of water would be just fine,” Mother Griolet responded.

“Yes, for me too,” the young woman echoed.

Once the drinks were given and he had taken a seat, Henri felt much less nervous. “What exactly may I do for you, Mother Griolet?”

The nun smiled, and he saw that her eyes were a lively shade of green. Feisty. Yes, perhaps.

“I am interested in what you are doing in Lodève with the centre aéré. Your vision for the harki children. I would like to hear what is on your heart, and then I will tell you what is on mine.”

“I’d be most happy to comply.” He scooted forward in his chair, resting his hands on his knees. His fingernails were stained with blue paint. “I am Swiss-French. For many years I was a pastor in a small town north of Geneva.

“My ancestors were French Huguenots—part of the fourteen thousand refugees who fled to Switzerland. They arrived with nothing, half-starved and naked, and the people of Switzerland welcomed them with open arms. Geneva, which is where my family went, had only about sixteen thousand inhabitants at that time—yet every day they took in hundreds of refugees.”