He led her to dinner where they were served soupe à l’oignon, coq au vin and ended with a decadent chocolate soufflé. Ava ate until the narrow waist of her dress began to squeeze at her full stomach. When they had finished and the mix of a fine port weighed down the airy sips of her champagne, they departed the Palacio.
Ava’s pulse quickened as the car was brought around, a large manila envelope evident on the passenger seat. She practically fell into the vehicle in her haste to see its contents. Conscious of the valet nearby, she left the packet in her lap, its heft seemingly significant. Or perhaps that was simply her imagination.
Once James pulled away, however, she opened the flap and drew out several pages of newsprint. They were smaller than expected, the size of a piece of office paper, with Combat written at the top with the familiar Cross of Lorraine emblazoned across the bold C. There were eight issues inside, their dates two weeks apart. The contents detailed the Nazi wrongdoings in France, mothers whose bread rations weren’t enough to feed their babies and the failure of a program called relève, which claimed to send captured French soldiers home as it exhorted free labor from the women wanting to save their men. One newspaper from April even detailed a horrific event in which the Nazis set up a trap to capture Jews on the one day a week they were allowed the charity of food and medical assistance.
She couldn’t help but recall the American newspapers with buried articles about Hitler trying to eradicate the Jews. The mention of numbers killed had been exorbitant to the point of disbelief for those in America who were so far removed from the crises.
But Ava had always suspected there was something candid and awful in those harrowing words that others refused to believe. Reading Combat now made those seeds of trust sprout, the roots settling deep within her.
“This is incredible,” she murmured to herself.
“I knew you would find Lamant helpful.” James glanced at her as he drove.
“Very much so.” She lowered the stack of precious pages. “But why give them to me when you could be using them?”
“My assignment here is a little different,” he replied easily.
Before she could press him for more details, he continued, “Theo and Alfie are too busy for me to send these their way and they don’t read French. I thought you could truly appreciate them.”
“It is such an honor to be entrusted with these.” She glanced down at the collection of clandestine newspapers in her lap.
What she now held in her hands was the real truth. This was a newspaper men and women risked their lives to write, to create, to distribute. One that could actually change the tide of war.
This was why she had agreed to come to Lisbon, to do something for America and all the rest of the world.
TEN
Elaine
The days ran together as scenery did on a swiftly moving train. In that stretch of June becoming July, Elaine had no word of Joseph, but that didn’t mean he left her thoughts.
Through all the newspaper drops and message deliveries and transferring of supplies to and from the Maquis, Joseph weighed on Elaine’s mind, leaden with many regrets.
The foremost of which being the realization that she had put too much faith in Etienne.
If she had known she would not see Joseph until the war ended, she would have found a way to go to him while he was in prison. Or written a note that hid his culpability but still conveyed the depth of her feelings.
Now it was too late.
On one overly bright morning where the sun splintered off the Rh?ne like shards of glass, Elaine arrived earlier than usual at the apartment on Rue d’Algérie. A slight creak of the wood floors from inside announced someone had entered before her.
Etienne came to the doorway of the living room as she toed off her shoes. It was the first time they had seen one another since she’d learned that Joseph had been sent to the work camp. Silence burgeoned between them as the blade of grief cut through her.