I had no idea this was happening when I volunteered to drive Madame LeVerrier to Le Puy to stock up on supplies before the snows make the roads too treacherous. Now I wish I hadn’t come, but I have a secret errand of my own that can’t wait. Monsieur Kohn gave me a packet of passport photos from the OSE for endangered children who need falsified identity cards. I need to affix photos onto the forged documents, and I’m out of glue. I also need more ink and tracing paper. I’ve already been seen buying these things in Paulhaguet and Brioude, and Travert says it’s safer not to buy supplies from the same shop twice.
So I park the car, then Madame LeVerrier and I go our separate ways, and all the while people are muttering darkly on the street.
“The Nazis may do to us what they want—but to take our general!”
“We can’t let them get away with it. No, they won’t have him.”
“But what can be done?”
By the time I’ve made my purchases, a German band has begun playing a Christmas concert for an empty square; no one wants to listen. And the statue of Lafayette is lying in a gutter to await transport. A bronze figure with a sheathed sword, hat in one hand, patriotic tricolor in the other, lifted to the heavens. It’s a beautiful piece—dramatic and lifelike. Maybe that’s why the Nazis wrapped the hero of old in ropes so he looks like he’s bound and gagged. I stare with a bellyful of bile until I can finally tear myself away to meet Madame LeVerrier at a nearby café.
But as I make my way to meet her, I get a prickly sensation that I’m being followed. I pick up my pace, passing military vehicles and ducking under a snow-dusted awning before risking a glance over my shoulder.
“Sam?” I hiss in surprise, not having seen him for weeks.
“Keep walking,” my old friend says, taking my arm. I fall into step, passing frosted shop windows as his voice drops low, muffled by the winter air. “Do you trust your husband? Do you really trust him, Marthe?”
Travert and I have been married a year now. I should have a quick and easy answer, but trust has never come quick or easy to me. “Why?”
“The truck the Germans brought to haul Lafayette’s statue to the forge isn’t big enough. They’ve called in help from the gendarmerie in Brioude and Paulhaguet to come pick it up after dusk.”
Clever bastards. The Nazis want to make French police do the dirty work when it’s dark and there aren’t so many angry people milling about.
Sam takes a deep breath as if he isn’t sure if he should say more, but then he does. “There’s a plan afoot. No one wants to see gendarmes caught in the crossfire, but we’re not going to let them take Lafayette. He belongs to us . . .”
I come to a sudden halt on the sidewalk, realizing that he’s trying to tell me Travert is in danger. “What plan?”
“Keep walking,” he says, tugging me forward so we don’t draw attention. “I’m only telling you because . . . I don’t want you to lose someone again. Not after Henri. So if you trust your husband, tell him to convince the gendarmes not to show up on time. If they do, they’ll be ambushed on the road. If you don’t trust him, but want to keep him out of danger, think of some lie to make him late.” Sam glances at his watch. “Whatever you do, just do it fast.”
* * *
—
I take the slippery hairpin turns from Le Puy like a madwoman, terrifying Madame LeVerrier in the backseat. “I’d ask if you were drunk, Marthe, but there’s nothing left in France now to drink!”
“Just trying to get back early,” I say, pushing the motor hard. “It’s a busy Christmas season!”
It can be nearly an hour’s drive from Le Puy to Chavaniac in winter conditions, but I make it in nearly half the time. I help Madame LeVerrier unload the packages, but instead of parking in the carriage house, I peel out of the castle drive and head straight for Travert’s house, where he’s plucking a chicken for our holiday dinner. Last Christmas, our marriage, and the occupation, was too new to celebrate. But this time he insisted on a tree and trimmings, and he’s in a jolly mood when he says, “I didn’t expect you—”
There’s no time for pleasantries. “Are you on duty tonight?”
“Oui,” he says, watching me stomp snow off my feet. “I have to go to Le Puy for a few hours, but don’t worry, I’ll be back in time for midnight mass.”
“And do you know what the Germans are doing in Le Puy?”