He tossed a final, worried look her way, settled his hat on his head, and exited the room. Several long seconds later, the front door to the building slammed closed.
She was alone.
There wasn’t a second to waste. She pulled out a piece of paper and immediately set to work to puzzle through the code, using the poem in circulation among Resistant that week: “Mignonne allons voir si la rose” by Pierre de Ronsard. That done, she went to the Linotype Machine Jean had been instructing her to use and painstakingly plucked at the keys, retyping an article on the bombing of nearby factories. Only this time, she slid the code into words, intentionally misspelling them.
The effort took a considerable amount of time on the strange keyboard. With lower letters on the left, capital on the right, and all the spacing and punctuation in the middle, it would likely be an age before she typed without looking or achieved a speed like Jean’s.
The metal slugs with the lines of text slid down from the machine and cooled while she adjusted the printing sheet. Her pulse roared in her ears as she worked, carefully removing the previous verbiage and fitting the changed ones into the same space.
She readjusted the printing plate into the automatic press as it hummed to life and the papers spun their way through the ink. The first completed page settled onto the tray, followed swiftly by others. She picked it up and scanned the contents, confirming the final product to be exactly how she envisioned. Once the misspelled words were identified and the code broken, her message would be read as:
Jewish mother and child need transport to America.
It was stated as simply as she could word it. Members of the Resistance would know where to go to offer their aid. Marcel would, of course, be incensed by her direct disobedience, especially at the flawed words to the casual observer.
Elaine turned her thoughts to Joseph, to how many Jews he saved by changing their identity cards. And she recalled the woman she had given her own to, who now carried Joseph’s surname.
In her husband’s absence, Elaine continued on in the fight he had sacrificed everything for. And though she was aware he hadn’t wanted her to be in the Resistance, he would have been proud of her.
That thought wrenched at her heart.
A tear plopped onto the page. The fresh ink sucked into the droplet, obliterating the careful lettering and turning her tear a murky black. It was followed by another and another still.
Elaine’s legs were suddenly too weak to hold her upright. She folded to the floor beneath the weight of her profound grief, the pain exploding inside her too unbearable to endure. The walls holding back her sorrow became tenuous, and the dam collapsed as she yielded to the agony of a broken heart.
FIFTEEN
Ava
Ava arrived at the JDC center the next afternoon to return the letter to Otto.
“It was an honor to be entrusted with something this precious and powerful,” she said as she handed it back.
He nodded and tucked the envelope into his tweed jacket pocket, pausing to give it a tender pat with his fingertips. “Petra’s correspondence took several months to find me. I do not even know how it managed to be sent.” Otto looked up at the sky, squinting as he did so. The way one did when trying to conceal the depth of their emotions. “Thank you for recording her words.”
“I’m grateful for the opportunity to do so and would be glad to do more should anyone else have letters such as yours.”
Otto nodded. “I can ask around.” He withdrew another envelope from his pocket and handed it to her. “More newspapers from France.”
She thanked him, promised to come by next week when she would be helping Ethan, then departed for the embassy.
And so it went for the next two weeks, receiving not only French newspapers, but also letters from refugees’ family members and even clandestine publications from other areas of Europe.