Lisette's List (16 page)

What was I to do with it now, my one not-so-precious life?

My new shoes clapped against the church steps, embarrassing me. They had straw uppers that wouldn’t last and wooden soles
that, regretfully, would. All leather had been appropriated for the war effort.

Standing next to Father Marc at the church door, I imagined that people saw me as a figure of the outside world portending sorrow for Roussillon. Everyone passed with downcast eyes, all the men except the constable, who looked at me as though there were words on the tip of his tongue that he held back, all the women except Louise, who raised her chin minutely, encouragement that I should do the same. They had all come to mourn something more than André, the first
Roussillonnais
to fall to German guns. They were here in recognition that the war had touched their village. My own sorrow spilled over to the wives, mothers, and sisters who would come to know the same sorrow as mine.

Other than the white daisies from Mélanie’s porch laid across the cotton-and-lace altar cloth, the interior of the church and its larger-than-life crucifix gave me little comfort. Exaggerated spikes pierced Jesus’s hands and feet, and his imploring expression, as if asking, “My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?,” was more pitiful than inspiring. Nevertheless, my heart burned at the agony of his abandonment and suffering, and my eyes flooded for him, for me, for the sickened world.

The rickety kneelers were in a wretched state, worn raw and splintery. Never having been in the church, André would not have thought to repair them, had it not been Pascal’s last request. Now how long would Roussillon have to wait?

For André to go from creating carved frames for magnificent paintings by well-known Parisian artists to repairing decoratively tooled chairs in the dining hall of the Palais des Papes in Avignon and then to refurbishing the kneelers in this little provincial church might seem like a heartless downward spiral, but André had not looked at it that way. On the surface, he might have seen it as a promise to the man who had loved and raised him, but I knew it went deeper. He would have found satisfaction in doing good in the village of his ancestors.

A plaster Jeanne d’Arc stood forlorn in a corner, lost in her armor, holding a stanchion from which hung a fleur-de-lys flag, the effect deplorable compared to her glorious mounted statue in gold on rue de Rivoli, opposite the Louvre. Oh, for even a whisper of the voices she had heard clear as a clarion call, to give me guidance.

How was I to manage?

Father Marc recited from Lamentations, “ ‘The joy of our heart is ceased; our dance is turned into mourning,’ ” as an introduction to his prayers for André’s soul. At the mention of André’s name, tears flooded my eyes. If only I didn’t hear
André, André, André
echoing from all sides, I might be able to pretend it was just a regular mass on any old Sunday. It was all a wash of words anyway, only one statement of which I could grasp—that trials bring humans closer to God.

Then Father Marc launched into a patriotic oration. “Let us not forget that the people of Roussillon have been blessed. In the Great War of our fathers, no bombs dropped on our village. There were no explosions here. No cries. No houses toppled. No ranks of German soldiers marching up rue de la Poste. Let us pray that God will spare Roussillon again—”

“Amen,” I heard Constable Blanc say behind me.

“And further, that He will guide us in our prayers for our French prisoners of war. Daily, hourly, let us pray that Allied troops will be victorious over the forces of evil and, though the situation seems grim today, that they will eliminate them from our beloved fatherland.

“We
Roussillonnais
have struggled and united before—against locusts and blight, flood and drought—and we will unite again against human locusts, putting aside all of our petty resentments in order to love our neighbors as ourselves, as our Lord Jesus commanded.”

I wondered—Did Father Marc not consider Germany to be our neighbor?

It would have taken only the breath of God to blow that lethal German projectile off its course, or to prevent that evil plane from emerging from the smoke-filled sky, or whatever it was that had killed the man I loved. What part of the field was He succoring the instant André was hit? Was God so absorbed in protecting some German noblewoman’s son whose head was filled with melodies yet to be written, the next Beethoven composing his own “Ode to Joy,” that He forgot the common man whose simple joy was to make picture frames? Or was it that even God could do nothing to deflect the wave of hatred, the hunger to hurt? Sister Marie Pierre would chastise me for thinking that. Hot shame for doubting rose up in my throat.

It was over at last, and the processional moved downhill to the war monument on avenue de la Burlière. Names and dates were inscribed on a stone monolith: 1870, 1871, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, 1918. Léon LaPaille, François Estève, Paul Jouval, and two dozen more who had left wives, children, mothers behind; vineyards and orchards untended; fields unplanted; projects unfinished. Maybe one of them had also intended to repair the kneelers.

Mélanie handed me a wreath of pruned grapevines that she had soaked and curved into a circle and decorated with acorns and lavender. It was a loving gesture. I leaned it against the pedestal. Father Marc said a benediction, and all of Roussillon joined the chorus of “Amen” for this man who was not their native son.

Maurice was so choked up he could not speak. Odette held my one hand, Louise the other. Aimé Bonhomme said to me in a fatherly way, “I’m sorry it had to be you. It was wrong to be you. It should have been one of us.”

Perhaps he understood how alone I was feeling in a place I had not chosen. Perhaps the priest and the constable did also. Certainly Maurice and the women did. Nevertheless, inadvertently, Aimé’s sentiment made me feel like an outsider,
un autre
. A stranger. I would be watched. People would gossip about how I carried my
bereavement. However kindly he meant his awkward little speech that expressed kindness but no logic that I could see, it separated me from this village, which I had been trying, for André’s sake, to love.

A
T HOME, REELING IN A FOG
of excruciating sadness, I added an incomprehensible sixth item to my List of Hungers and Vows:

6. Learn how to live alone.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

PATRON SAINTS

1940

O
N MY WAY HOME FROM THE BAKERY
, I
READ DE
G
AULLE
’
S
speech, which was posted on the coral stucco wall of the
mairie
. As the leader of the Free French, operating in London, he was resistant to German victory, while Pétain’s government in Vichy accommodated German rule. I appreciated the hopefulness of the speech but was afraid the day would come when some German officer would rip it right off the building and plant some Nazi slogan there instead.

Alongside de Gaulle’s speech, a new placard had been mounted:
NATIONAL REVOLUTION
—
WORK, FAMILY, FATHERLAND. MARSHAL PÉTAIN
. Apparently Mayor Pinatel was adopting a neutral position.

Since it was September, there was also a handwritten announcement of the Fête Votive de la Saint Michel, the patron saint of Roussillon, on 29 September, only a few days away. Saint Michel meant nothing to me; he had done nothing to protect André, grandson of a
Roussillonnais
. Instead, de Gaulle’s appeal rang in my ears:
Unite with me in action, in sacrifice, and in hope. Let us all strive to save her
. But what could I do, one lone woman in an isolated village?

I marched straight into Louise’s hairdressing salon. I had seen her scribbled note in the window the day before:
Hair clippings collected for the making of inner soles
.

“Cut it all off,” I told her.

“But you have such beautiful long hair, the color of dark chocolate.”

“All the more for inner soles. The
Résistance
fighters need good boots. Give me a short bob.”

She braided my hair and cut it at the nape of my neck in a hank—it looked like a snake—then shaped what was left.

“No one will recognize you at the fête. You are going, aren’t you?” Louise said, trimming scissors aloft in one hand, comb in the other, waiting for my answer.

André and I had enjoyed the
fête votive
weekends of parades, games,
boules
tournaments, music, dances, and fireworks, and we had even gone once to the
fête votive
of the nearby village of Gordes, but I was afraid my going to the fête now might appear unseemly, as if I were seeking gaiety and recreation. If I were really honest, however, I would have to admit that I didn’t want to be so intoxicated with mourning that I couldn’t have a few hours of respite from my dark thoughts.

“Maurice will pout if you don’t come.”

“What’s to celebrate now, after the surrender? The crowd will probably be pretty sparse.”

“That’s exactly why you should give it your support.”

I had been so unbearably lonely, rattling around in that empty house, that I said, “All right. I’ll go to some of it.”

T
HE MORNINGS OF THE FÊTE
, there would only be the
pétanque
and
boules
tournaments. They didn’t interest me. Since a votive meant an offering or act performed in accordance with a vow, I preferred to stay home and make my own votive. It would have to do with André. I added to my List of Hungers and Vows:

7. Find André’s grave and the spot where he died.

Would I fall apart if I saw either one? Despite my qualms, I let it remain and wrote another vow:

8. Forgive André.

The heaviness of forgiveness descended the moment after I wrote the words. He could have postponed going until he was conscripted. Maybe then he would not have had to fight at all, but oh no, off he had gone with Maxime.

Yet holding a grudge against the man I loved felt terribly wrong. It was entirely against my conscience and would only compound my grief. I would have to forgive him anew each day, in a surge of love, perhaps even begrudgingly at times, until I forgot what I’d needed to forgive him for. At the moment, I could not imagine that day ever coming, though I resolved to try.

W
ITH THAT HOPE
, I went downhill to the church and arrived in time for the processional. It began with a choir of ten giggling girls positioned on the church steps singing the Litany of the Saints. Father Marc led the processional, and behind him an acolyte carried a huge wooden image of Saint Michel, so top-heavy that he lost his balance going downhill on the uneven cobblestones and almost fell, to the gasps of the girls following him.

I was sure the girls had been told to walk solemnly, but the littlest one, Mélanie’s daughter, Mimi, wearing a yellow dress and a single sock, couldn’t restrain herself and skipped down the road out of line. Could that teetering statue deliver me from the depths of despair? No, but seeing Mimi frolicking along like a ray of sunshine did, for a moment. If I could follow Odette’s advice, I would string such moments together into a new life.

As soon as the processional reached place du Pasquier, where the statue would be erected, the girls ran to the schoolyard to watch
the boys’ wrestling matches and to play the bottle game, the three jumps, and the strangle-cat. Crank-handled Victrolas at every food booth issued forth a tangle of melodies, each defiant voice singing loudly to prove that the
Provençaux
had not lost their joie de vivre just because the north was occupied.

People came from farms and vineyards, from Apt, Gordes, Saint-Saturnin-lès-Apt, and Bonnieux. Their odd dressing amused me. Wooden clogs with a suit. A bowler hat with a workman’s smock. A peasant’s straw hat with a jacket and wrinkled, shapeless trousers. Dresses in old styles and plain fabrics. Even so, I recognized a dignity in their unpretentiousness.

Merrymakers greeted those they hadn’t seen for a few weeks with the same exuberance they showed for those they hadn’t seen for years. Yet their gaiety seemed forced, and they soon fell into quiet conversations beneath the plane trees or strolled up to the cemetery to visit their departed.

The advertised symphony concert was performed by a guest orchestra from Apt consisting of nine instruments. I had hoped for the Brandenburg concertos, but hoped in vain. No Bach. No Handel. No Beethoven. Only French composers. Debussy, yes. “Clair de Lune.” Berlioz, yes. The ball scene from
Symphonie Fantastique
, very popular in Paris. And Bizet’s
Carmen
—the sensual “Habanera,” the moving and dreamy pastoral of the smugglers’ trip into the Pyrénées, and the “Toreador’s Song.” Even though the sound was thin, I loved hearing the melodies, and the finale, “La Marseillaise,” made me proud to be French.

Tambourines signaled that the dance was about to begin. Maurice and Louise scooped me up from behind into the
salle des fêtes
, Louise admiring the new hairstyle she had created for me.

“You can’t escape, Lisette. Louise agreed to share me with you for the polka and the waltz. Imagine, a man as round-bellied as I dancing with two beautiful ladies. Even Maurice Chevalier would be jealous!”

Maurice’s knightly bow was charming, but I declined. He
pouted, of course, though I knew he understood. I actually enjoyed watching him waltz with Louise. He was surprisingly light on his feet.

Constable Blanc approached me, holding out his hand, palm up.

“You can’t escape, Lisette,” he said, echoing Maurice, but there was a sharper edge to his voice.

“No, thank you. I prefer watching.”

He continued to hold out his hand. Was that politeness or insistence? Shouldn’t he have known why I didn’t want to dance? Did I have to spell it out for him? A grieving widow does not dance. I turned away, and he did a quick about-face and disappeared into the whirling crowd.