Waiting for the Violins (38 page)

Dear God, he even remembered her name.

“Good day, Herr General. Oh, but it’s Generalfeldmarschall now, isn’t it? Congratulations on your promotion.”

“Yes, the titles they give us to keep us fighting. At least those of us in uniform. Our enemies in the Resistance have a different system.” He smiled ironically, as if they shared a secret, then got to the point.

“So, Madame Toussaint, how can I be of service?”

She tilted her head just slightly, hoping her coyness was sufficiently subtle. “I knew you were in France, carrying out your duties, but when I learned you were in Bayeux I couldn’t believe my good fortune. I wonder if you could spare a moment for me.”

“Dear lady, I am…uh…fighting a war, as you can see.” He swept his hand in an arc ending at the wall of sandbags. Then he seemed to reconsider. “But I always have a spare moment for an attractive woman.” At his nod, one of the guards opened the door to the entryway of the building. Once inside, to the equal bafflement of the officers who awaited him, he leaned past her and opened a door to a private room. “Please, come in.”

“Lieutenant, would you bring us some tea?” he said over his shoulder, then extended a hand toward the chair before his desk. “Please have a seat.” Several maps were open on the desk, but he carefully folded them and set them aside.

“Madame Toussaint, this cannot be purely a social call,” he said with an eyebrow slightly raised.

“Uh, no. You’re quite right. In fact, it has to do with my…uh…delicate situation in Brussels.” She studied his expression, looking for traces of suspicion. Everything depended on his not knowing she had been arrested and sent to Breendonk. Something a front-line soldier might not know, even if the Gestapo did.

They were interrupted by a quick rap and the entry of the adjutant with a tray of two steaming porcelain cups and a dish of sweets. He waited for her to take a cup and then reached for the other. “Yes, go on.” He blew into his tea, the porcelain cup looking tiny and fragile in his meaty hand.

“I was, well, I suppose you could say, compromised. Perhaps you will recall the concert reception where we met, along with Baron von Falkenhausen. After that evening, he offered me his…protection. That was a great comfort. However, of late, he has been absent from Brussels a great deal and many Belgians view me as…Well, I have to come out and say it. As a collaborator.”

He had begun to squint slightly, and she feared he’d seen through her lie. “I am aware of General von Falkenhausen’s visits to Berlin. He’s an important man and you must expect such back and forth. But it’s a shame that he left you so vulnerable.”

“Yes, without the Baron’s protection, I was in great danger from the Resistance, so I fled here to France, where I have friends.”

“A judicious move, and you were lucky—or very clever—to be able to travel so far without problems. So what do you need from me?”

“A permit to reside. Surely you have the authority to issue that, or to have the local administration issue it. This part of France is the only place that will be safe in the next few months.” She sipped from her own tea, then set the cup down when she realized her hand was shaking. Did he notice?

“What makes you say that?” He gave her a penetrating look. It seemed that she had hooked him, if only lightly.

“I have friends who have friends who are informed. You know how it is. Most everyone agrees that all the fighting will be farther north. Plus, I confess, I listen to the BBC.”

He chuckled. “I do too. So what did you hear?”

“Then you know about the attacks planned in Norway and at Calais. I want to stay where it’s quiet and try to ride out this war. Can you help me? You’re my last resort.”

He turned his teacup on its saucer and smiled like a rich uncle about to make a gift. “The quiet in the midst of the storm, eh? I’ll see what I can do. If you’ll stop by here tomorrow afternoon, perhaps I’ll have something for you.”

She relaxed with an exaggerated sigh. “What a relief. I can’t tell you how grateful I am.”

He seemed to relax as well. “So, you remembered our reception in Brussels. A pleasant evening, wasn’t it?”

“Yes, and the wonderful violin concerto. You confessed you played the violin. That was a surprise.”

He laughed again. “So you remember that I played violin, not that I lead tanks. Ah, how I love the mind of a woman. Do you play violin yourself?”

“Uh…no. But my brother Laurent did. He carried the musical banner in the family and had visions of being a soloist.”

“And he stopped playing because of the war?”

“He stopped playing because he was killed. Just before the Belgian surrender.” For the briefest moment, her bitterness surfaced and she swallowed with a dry throat.

“By German fire, I assume.”

“Yes.”

He dropped his eyes and nodded gently. “I’m sorry to hear it,” he said with apparent sincerity. “I also have a brother who ‘carries the musical banner,’ as you so beautifully put it. Gerhard. He aspires to be an opera singer. But of course he’s in service now.”

“A shame, isn’t it? The war started and all the music stopped.”

“It will start again. It always does.” He emptied his cup.

“Can you imagine playing again after the war?” she asked. Was the question impertinent, or did he still imagine a German victory?

“Perhaps. If not, at least I’ll go to another violin concert. My wife loves them. I do look forward to that time.”

“We’re all waiting for that time, aren’t we?”

Something rumbled in the distance and they both glanced up. It was impossible to tell whether it was thunder or bombardment.

“True, but until then, one has one’s duty.”

The thunderclap came again.

“A storm seems to be coming up,” he said. “Perhaps you can listen to your violins tonight on the radio.”

“You too, Herr Feldmarschall. Surely with the storm, there won’t be any activity along the coast either tonight or in the next days.” She drank the last of the tea and set the cup down lightly on his desk. “A good night to visit your wife, even.”

“She’d like that. It’s her birthday tomorrow. Perhaps I’ll surprise her.”

“Women love being surprised,” she said, and stood up to conclude the conversation.

He leapt up and drew the chair away from behind her, then helped her on with her coat. “Thank you for the pleasure of your company, Madame Toussaint. As for your permit, I will arrange for my adjutant to have it ready for you tomorrow evening, in my absence.”

“You are very kind. Please give my felicitations to your wife. She’s a lucky woman.”

*

Once on the street again, she all but wiped her brow. Had she really convinced the field marshal of the western front to stand down for a day? And would that even be enough? Forty-eight hours, Lew had said.

A light drizzle still fell and, barring obstacles, she calculated arriving in Arromanches before dark, with plenty of time to find her way to 200 avenue de Verdun. At least she was safe from German soldiers near Bayeux. She smiled to herself. Collaboration, even the semblance of it, had obvious advantages.

Drawing up the collar of her coat, she set off at a good pace toward the main road leading northeast. It was early evening, but the heavy cloud cover made it seem like night. The road would be long, but at least it was direct, and she wouldn’t have to look for directional signs.

As the darkness increased, more thunder rumbled in the distance, and she could hear now that it was bombardment. She glanced up, wondering if she could catch sight of the bombers.

At first she could see only the waves of wind-blown clouds, but then something caught her eye and she stopped. Gliders, black against the gray sky, dozens of them. No, hundreds. Like a vast flock of sleek birds, passing silently overhead toward some inland destination. Coming from the north, it could only be the Allied forces, embarked on a strategy she couldn’t imagine. She wished them well, and hurried to reach her own destination.

It was almost two in the morning when she arrived in Arromanches, and it took her another half hour to find 200 rue de Verdun. The door opened immediately to her knock and Antonia embraced her tightly.

“Where were you? I was terrified something happened to you.”

Lew appeared behind her, unemotional. “What took ya?”

“I stopped for a cup of tea with Rommel,” she said.

“This is no time for wisecracks. Things are about to explode.”

“Yes, I know. I saw hundreds of gliders arriving. By now they’ve landed south of here. I’m sure it’s the first wave.”

Antonia sent a final message reiterating the false information and then turned off the wireless. Exhausted, all three of them dropped onto their mattresses and slept fitfully.

Around five in the morning, sleep became impossible as the sound of bombardment became more pronounced. Instead of the intermittent thud, they heard a continuous rolling thunder of explosions.

Lew stood up, rubbing his face. “The bombers will be covering the beach areas now, trying to knock out the defenses.”

Antonia was on her feet now too, pulling on a sweater. “You think they’ll be landing this morning, then?”

Sandrine laced up her shoes. “I have to see that. Is there any place we can look out over the sea from here?”

“Yes, upstairs. The attic has a window facing the channel.”

They filed up the stairs, and Antonia threw open the window so the two of them could stand shoulder to shoulder.

“There they are,” Antonia said.

A dim gray dawn was just breaking, but against the dull morning light she could easily make out the swarm of aircraft edging toward them. Scores and hundreds and thousands. Her mind couldn’t take it all in. She dropped her eyes to the steel-gray surface of the channel. There, more deadly still, the black line of an armada stretched across the horizon.

“It’s the beginning of the end, isn’t it?” Sandrine asked, rhetorically. “The Nazis are finished.”

“Oh, I hope so. But listen. This may be a terrible time to do this. Or maybe it’s the perfect time, before all hell breaks loose. I’ve been wanting to do this for a year but never came across any gold in the Siroux forest.”

“What are you rambling on about, dear?” Sandrine asked.

“This.” Antonia took hold of her right hand and slid the heavy object onto her ring finger.

“What? You’ve given me a wedding ring?” Sandrine held it up to the light and studied the wide band of etched silver with an irregular width and edges in a filigree of gold. Only the fact that its ends overlapped rather than joined revealed it was once something else.

“I made it myself, from an antique fork, just a couple of hours ago. It took my mind off worrying about you. It’s not fine art, but the metal’s precious, and it’s better than string.”

“Oh, it’s gorgeous. Like something made for an ancient princess. I love it. But you’ll have to wait a bit for a ring from me. I want to give you a family ring, but we’ll have to see if it survives the war in a bank vault.”

Antonia encircled her from behind, pressing her face into the amber hair. “Another reason to win this war and get back to the Château Malou.”

They stood awhile in the embrace, while the wind lifted Sandrine’s hair, and even the presentation of the ring could not dispel their trepidation.

“We’ve lost so many,” Sandrine murmured. “Laurent, Andrée, Florentino. Celine. And in a little while, a lot more are going to die in front of us. If I close my eyes, I can see them down there on the beach already, falling in the thousands.”

Antonia held her more tightly and let the ocean wind blow into the room, over both of them. She murmured her own litany of ghosts. “Aisik, Rywka, Moishe, all the others on that train. All the other trains.”

They were silent for a while, speechless at the staggering truth as the sky overhead continued to darken. Sandrine swept her glance across the terrifying panorama and cupped her ears

“Listen to the sound. A sky full of droning. Heartbreaking.”

Antonia nodded. “Yes. Like the sobs of violins.”

Postscript

The story of the French and Belgian Résistance during World War II is inspiring and tragic, and the sexual preferences of its heroes would have been irrelevant. Nonetheless, in this tale, which holds close to historical reality and uses real names, I have taken the liberty of highlighting a love that was surely present, even if invisible.

Occupied Belgium had no single entity called “the Resistance,” but rather a tangle of organizations with various and sometimes contradictory goals that merged and separated continuously as the war went on. They fought as much against collaborationist fellow Belgians as against the Germans, and included Communist veterans of the Spanish civil war, soldiers who escaped and formed Free Belgian troops, Jewish groups, remnants of Belgian political parties, people fleeing labor conscription, and ordinary people who aided escapees and sheltered Jews or their children.

Three of those organizations were the Armed Jewish Partisans, the Comet Line, and the maquis of the Ardenne Forest. I have the honor of knowing descendants of resistants from two of these groups, who gave me permission to use the actual names and tales of their heroic relatives. Given that the events in question may be esoteric for some readers, I list here a few brief descriptions of the entities. In all cases, a trip to Google will give you much more information.

Armed Jewish Partisans (Partisans Armés Juifs)
An association of mostly non-Belgian Jews who engaged in actions primarily against collaborationist Jews and Belgians and only secondarily against the Germans. Most were Communist or leftist-identified. My source was
Temoinages
, a book of interviews of thirty-eight members, published by their descendants. A monument to one of them, Jakob Gutfrajnd (called Kuba in the novel), stands near my house.

Breendonk
A concrete Belgian fortress built in 1909 between Brussels and Antwerp that the occupying Nazis expanded into a concentration camp. It is maintained today as a museum.

Café Suèdoise
(La Cantine Suèdoise
).
A charitable canteen that neutral Sweden established in Brussels to provide food for children. Its local managers, who were active in the Comet Line, gradually made the canteen into their headquarters. In the same building, civilian clothing was collected and distributed to disguise escaping aviators. The constant activity in the canteen provided good coverage for the arrival and departure of strangers.