The worst thing was not knowing. There was no way of finding out unless I risked a journey to Kermaria to find Josef Auffret—and that would put him in danger as well as myself. The thought of going on living at the convent, agonizing over Jack, was unbearable. I knew with absolute certainty that I couldn’t return to my old life. The person I had been before the shipwreck was gone forever. It wasn’t only Jack that I yearned for. I longed for Mermaid’s Cove—for the salt tang of the breeze and the sound of the waves, for the lush valley and the warbling of birds in the green canopy of leaves, for Ned’s laughter as he stamped through snowdrifts of fallen petals, for cozy evenings chatting with Merle in the library. Cornwall called to me like a siren. I had to get back. But how?
The next morning, I asked to see Mère de Saint-Philippe. I had to tell her that I couldn’t stay at the convent—that no matter what the danger, I had to find a way of getting back to England. During the night I’d come up with a plan. If I could go south to Spain, a neutral country, I could find a boat that would take me back to England. But for that I would need money. The only option was to beg for a loan, to be repaid on my return. I knew it was a lot to ask: the money they had was meant for much more worthy purposes, and if anything happened to me along the way, they might never get the loan back. But I was desperate.
The Mother Superior listened to my request without interruption. When I’d finished explaining she sat silently contemplating for a moment before she spoke.
“Cet homme—êtes-vous amoureux de lui?”
My breath caught in my throat. She wanted to know if I was in love with Jack. Was I so transparent? “I . . .” I dropped my head. She must think me very weak—and that I had strayed very far from the vows I’d taken. I looked up at her, shamefaced. But before I could frame any reply, she said something equally unexpected: that being in love with Jack didn’t mean that I loved God less.
“L’amour entre un homme et une femme est sacré aussi,” she said. The love between a man and a woman is holy, too.
It felt as though she were giving us her blessing, as if she somehow knew that Jack was alive and that, with her help, I could reach him. She said that she would have to discuss the question of a loan with the senior sister who dealt with the finances. I kissed her hand as I left the room, not knowing what was about to unfold: that within hours I would be leaving the convent without so much as a centime in my pocket.
I was feeding supper to one of the elderly ladies in the infirmary when Sister Therèse, the nun who had helped me dress for my mission with the Resistance, came to find me. She told me that someone was waiting to see me in the nuns’ recreation room. When I asked her who it was, she put her finger to her lips. She took the spoon from my hand and motioned for me to go.
I made my way along the passageway that connected the infirmary to the main part of the convent, wondering if the Mother Superior had somehow already got word to the Resistance that I needed to get to Spain. Merle had told me that there was a whole network of teams operating across occupied France, with established escape routes overland, as well as by sea. Perhaps the person waiting for me would be able to tell me how to find a courier who was heading south.
I had the shock of my life when I opened the door to the recreation room.
“George?”
“Miss Alice? Is that you?”
I ran and hugged him, almost knocking his white stick from his hand. “I can’t believe it! How on earth did you get here?”
“In Leo Badger’s boat.” He smiled. “Didn’t reckon ’e’d be needin’ it for a while yet, so me an’ ’Is Lordship painted out the name an’ turned her Froggy like. La Patelle, she’s called now: that means limpet in French, ’e tells me. Anyway, ’e sent me to tell you ’e’s waitin’ for you down at the ’arbor.”
Frantic with joy, I was barely coherent when Mère de Saint-Philippe came to say goodbye. George and I walked out of the convent arm in arm. What could have looked more natural, more normal, than a nun helping a blind man along the streets of the town?
On the way to the harbor he told me how the plan to rescue me had evolved. He was careful not to raise his voice above a whisper—he seemed to sense when people were about to pass by, even when they were still yards away. It had been his idea, he said, to use Leo’s boat. Jack had contemplated taking the motor launch across the Channel, but it would have attracted too much attention. It had been a rough crossing in such a small boat, but they knew she could make it to France because Leo had done it before: he’d been one of dozens of fishermen who had answered the call to rescue retreating British troops from Dunkirk in 1940.