In This Hospitable Land (42 page)

“I can’t eat any more, Mommy,” she said pitifully, letting her head sag.

Denise took Christel’s hand, held it, and pulled her daughter’s head against her own shoulder. “It’s okay,” she said softly.

“Here, Simone,” Georgette said, motioning to her daughter for assistance. “You help the little ones out of those cold coats.” Then she told Denise, “We have a room overhead I think will work for you.” She turned to Max. “And you need to stay here tonight too. It’s too dark and dangerous for you to hike about these mountains one minute more.”

Max nodded, too tired to protest.

“You’re most kind to take us in,” Denise said gratefully to Georgette, retrieving her youngest. “I don’t know where we would have gone or what we would have done if you hadn’t.”

“Someone else would have helped you,” Georgette said graciously. “Max has been such an aid and comfort to so many in the little hamlets and villages hereabouts almost anyone would have answered his call.” She bowed her head. “It’s always good to have a man around, especially when it’s been so long since one’s seen one’s husband.”

“My father’s been away a long time,” Simone said simply and sadly.

Max glanced surreptitiously at the Sauverins to gauge the effect of these words on those who suffered similarly if not yet for such great duration. He was glad they made no comment and asked no questions because he knew how painful it was for the Guibals to discuss the absence of the man of the house who had joined the Resistance when he, like so many, became aware of the danger of being rounded up.

Simone guided the little ones up narrow steps to a small room with a window facing the other houses of Villaret, which could clearly be seen through the intervening limbs of trees still bare of leaves. Beyond the hamlet and the stream below, the barium mine also was visible.

“You have to be careful,” Georgette warned Denise downstairs. “No light in that room and don’t let anybody go in front of the windows ever. It’s most important that no one suspect anyone else is here besides Simone and me.” She pulled her shawl more tightly around her shoulders since the room had grown cold after the fire died away. Georgette lowered her voice as if someone might draw near and overhear. “The children can go out to play only at night and if we are all very careful and keep a close watch for strangers. Even then they must play only inside the barn.”

Max smiled in silent agreement. He knew Georgette would look out for her guests as if they were family—which was important to him since that was how he felt about the Sauverins himself.

Albertine loved her customers. As the frosty sun reached above the iced-over rocks of the mountains on the far side of Vialas, slowly wearing away the rime and exposing the grasses, there they were as always—in the café at the same early hour.

The small place was nearly full. Despite the depredations of war, a dozen men above the age of seventy sat at the few tables talking quietly, slurping unselfconsciously from tiny cups of what passed for coffee: a mix of coffee beans, roasted chestnuts, and a smaller quantity of the Brignands’ “secret ingredient”—blackened soybeans—a trick Albertine had learned from André Sauverin, who had supplied the unusual legume from the fields of La Font.

Sweetened only by a few precious granules of rationed sugar, the coffee was ersatz. Fortunately for these old-timers the marc was still real.

The men were real too—
real
men—but the Germans and the French authorities who served the Germans neither understood nor appreciated their value. To the Gestapo these men were too old to work—worthless but harmless. Yet the foolish Fascists could not have been more wrong. These old men were more robust than most men half their age, their bodies having been strengthened by long years of strenuous farming which they continued to this day. And despite their indulgence in marc their minds were clear. They were cunning, alert, and thoroughly aware of everything going on around them and—insofar as possible given their remote location—in the outside world too.

Word of the latest events had reached them as it always did. No one could explain how news passed from one to another for nobody could ever be seen or heard talking about the Resistance, the Maquisards, or the present movements of the police and the Milice. Yet all the old men knew what they needed to.

Which was why they listened so attentively that morning. From afar they heard the coughing motor of a small van winding around the curves the road cut into the side of the mountain. The sound got louder and then softer, muted by the shoulder of the mountainside, and then it gradually got louder again until the van they all expected rolled slowly into view, stopping in front of the café.

Two men climbed out and entered wearing the blue uniform of French gendarmes. Everyone eyed them warily, measuring their every move. But Albertine remained unperturbed.

“Good morning,” the older of the two said immediately.

“Good morning,” Madame Brignand replied, ready to begin an elaborate charade. She recognized the policemen as Officer Pellet and Brigadier Salager. She knew from Pastor Donadille that they were the ones who had warned of the danger to the Sauverin men and they had probably sent word about the women too. But she would pretend she knew nothing of them. It was important not to give the game away so the game could continue.

“Coffee?” she asked Pellet.

“If you please.”

“I’m afraid it’s not very good,” she said, drawing it. “There’s a war on you know.”

No one laughed or cracked a smile. A couple of old-timers rose without a word and shuffled to the back, leaving a table open for the police. But none of the regulars was about to leave. The appearance of these gendarmes was a momentous event in Soleyrols. Everyone wanted to see what would happen.

The gendarmes took the seats politely vacated for them. Albertine brought over small white cups of coffee. Brigadier Salager took the first sip.

“Very good,” he said without irony or flattery. “Better than the stuff in my own house, which we only drink Sundays because bad as it is that’s all we can afford.”

Officer Pellet sipped his coffee too but instead of commenting on it asked Albertine, “Can you please tell us if and how we might drive our van up to the farm known as La Font?”

Albertine’s customers glanced at each other knowingly but the policemen’s eyes remained focused on her.

“Turn off the road just up here,” she said, pointing, “then take the first gravel track off to the right. I wouldn’t recommend it, though, especially at this hour when it’s slick from melted frost.”

“I suppose we must risk it,” Pellet told Salager, finishing his coffee with a smack of his lips. “Duty is duty.”

“The bill please,” the brigadier requested, slipping into patois—thereby tipping his hand to the regulars. “A cold morning,” he said as Albertine handed him
l’addition
on a little tray. “But no snow. Which is good. Our van’s tires are too smooth to hold a snowy road.”

The officer placed a few coins into the tray but neither he nor the brigadier made any effort to go.

“We have orders to bring in the Sauverin family,” the brigadier said heavily and softly enough to simulate confidentiality. No one else talked or missed a single word.

“Do you know them?” the officer asked.

“Everyone knows everyone else in Soleyrols, Monsieur,” Albertine allowed.

“Are they up there?”

“Perhaps.”

“Maybe we could have a little glass of brandy?” Pellet asked his superior. “To protect us against the cold.”

The brigadier nodded.

“Right away,” Albertine said smiling.

She brought the gendarmes their marc. All eyes were trained on them as they lifted and slowly drained their glasses in one fluid motion. Salager shook his head a little as the warm sharp spice of the local brandy coursed down his throat. Then he licked his lips as if to capture the smallest drop that might have attempted escape and finished by smoothing down his well-trimmed handlebar moustache with his fingertips. Meanwhile the younger officer put a little more money into the tray to cover this extra fortification.

“Now we must be off,” the brigadier announced easily as he stood, straightened his belt, and pulled his greatcoat tightly about him. “Madame,” he said to Albertine, bowing formally.

When the officer and the brigadier stepped back outside, the inhabitants of the café listened attentively as the van stuttered back to life and shuddered off. When it had achieved a safe distance, the café came alive with chatter and laughter.

“What was that all about?”

“They certainly took their time.”

“I think they know more than they let on.”

“Madame Brignand, what do you think?”

Albertine said nothing, but she couldn’t keep a sweet, pleased smile from pulling up the corners of her mouth. She hummed quietly to herself as she washed out the grounds that had settled and dried hard in the bottoms of otherwise empty coffee cups.

The old men lingered, anxious to learn what would happen next. But as the minutes ticked by, habit reasserted itself, and the hardworking men of Soleyrols gradually left the café to resume the familiar routines that filled their every working day.

Forty-five minutes later Albertine heard the van roll back down the road. The brigadier opened the café door and she stepped over to him since he seemed reluctant to cross the threshold.

“Madame, there were only a couple of Spaniards there and we weren’t sent for them.” The brigadier sounded relieved but Albertine knew he would never admit it. “I still need to make a report.” He pulled a small notepad and a special pencil out of his coat. “Do you know where the Sauverins are?”

Albertine shrugged her shoulders. That was all the answer she was willing to give and it was all the answer the brigadier needed or expected.

“Well then,” he said making note of it, “another family has disappeared.” He sighed so ostentatiously Albertine felt certain it was intended for show—in case some other official came by to inquire into the tenor of the brigadier’s investigation.

Salager gave Albertine a little salute and turned to go. As the van shifted into gear again, Albertine looked out the window and watched it putter off. She could have sworn the brigadier allowed her to see the hint of a grin.

The following morning the café was as busy as ever with the same old men in their accustomed seats. But this morning the conversation was much livelier than usual.

“I hear the Sauverin women’s RAF fighter pilot brother came in the middle of the night and flew them away.”

“I heard a racket that disturbed my sleep some nights back.”

“I bet he put the plane down in the valley to pick up their husbands too.”

“Those Brits are very clever.”

“Surely they’re all safely in London now.”

Albertine listened with enormous satisfaction. She knew better than to believe what she heard—and she knew that her customers knew better too. They were very very clever—more clever than they suggested the British must be—because they had a tremendous talent for generating and spreading useful rumors. Far better that the authorities in Mende believe the Sauverins were living in England than to suspect them of hiding out in the nearby mountains—like Roux the Bandit.

Denise awoke unknowable hours later still terribly tired but unable to get back to sleep. She dressed again, threw on her coat, and slipped back down the stairs.

“Sleep well?” Georgette asked much too energetically.

“I suppose. I hardly remember lying down.”

“You had a long day and there’s another ahead as always.”

Georgette brought out coarse mountain bread, a little butter, a pot of honey, and a cup of coffee for her guest and spoke of awaking early despite going to bed so late because the work of the farm had to go on. Simone had also gotten up early for school.

Brushing aside ash to start up the morning fire, the mistress of the house chattered about bleating goats and chickens that spent their days scratching around the outbuildings for grubs and bugs and the remnants of dry brown grasses revealed beneath the recently melted snow.