The French War Bride (30 page)

I told myself it was the suggestibility of it all. The man taking our photo had referred to me as Jack's wife. The man thought he was taking a family photo—and yes, we were married in name. Still, it was both a relief and a letdown when the photo was over and we pulled away from each other.

It was a few moments, that was all, less than a minute in total. And yet being that close to Jack for even that short a time—well, it changed something. I found myself increasingly, uncomfortably aware that he was a very attractive, appealing man.

2016

S
he has finally admitted it. “You were attracted to him!”

“I didn't want to be,” Amélie says. “I didn't want to think of him that way at all. I knew he was taken.”

“But you were attracted. And you were willing to go to Montana and tell these poor people who had lost a son that you were the mother of their granddaughter? You were willing to pass Elise off as their blood kin?”

“I wouldn't say I was willing, no.”

“But you were going to, all the same.”

“That was Jack's plan, yes. At that moment, I didn't know what to do but go along with it.”

“Good heavens! The deceit!”

“Well, I was in a difficult position. I had the baby. And my biggest fear was that Jack was going to march me back to the Red Cross and put Elise and I on that death boat.”

Oh, but that they had! I am fairly quivering with indignation. “In the meantime, I was sitting in Wedding Tree, expecting Jack to come home and marry me, and I didn't have a clue what was going on!”

“I know he called you that night.”

Oh, I remember that call! I'd been waiting and waiting for it. He'd called when he'd first landed in the U.S., but it had been a very unsatisfying conversation. He had been at a USO club and it was noisy, with a lot of confusion in the background and a five-minute time limit. Mother
and I had wanted to go meet him, but he'd flown to San Antonio, where he'd been put to work at a burn unit at the base hospital. He said he was living on base and he was very busy and wouldn't be able to spend time with us.

When he called from New York, I was surprised to learn he'd left San Antonio—and I didn't learn until later that he'd already mustered out of the service. I was shocked when he told me he was heading out west.

“Military orders?”

“Um, not exactly,” he'd said. “I'm going to see the family of the man who saved my life.”

“Oh, Jack, no! Just write to them. That should be good enough.”

“I have something I need to take them.”

“Good heavens. Why don't you just send it?”

“This is something that needs to be delivered in person. I'll tell you all about it when I get to Wedding Tree.”

“Well, I don't understand,” I'd told him. “Not at all. And Mother is wanting to know which date is the best for the wedding.”

“As I told you, it's going to take a few weeks to finish up my obligations. Then I'll come home and see you, but I need to do six weeks' training in Reno before we marry.”

“How many weeks, in total? Do you know how long I've waited? All our friends are already married!”

“It's not a contest, honey.”

“I know, I know. It's just, I'm so eager . . .”

“I know, darling. I understand. Truly. Say, can I speak to your father?”

“Yes, of course.”

It was a relief to turn the phone over to Daddy. Mother had immediately demanded, “Did he give you a date?” I'd shaken my head. She'd bitten her lip, all agitated.

I halfway listened to Daddy. “The womenfolk here are in a tizzy about the wedding plans, wanting a firm date.”

He was silent for a long time. Apparently Jack was talking at length.

“I see. Well, do what you have to do. I respect your opinion. Maybe we should tell them to just set a summer date.”

“Summer? No!” I practically stomped my foot.

When Daddy hung up, I was immediately all over him.

“What did he tell you?”

“Same thing he told you, I'm sure. He had some business in New York, and now he's headed out to see the family of the man who saved his life. Then he's coming here, but he'll have to go back for a six-week training stint in Nevada before you marry.”

“Well, I think the trip to Montana is ridiculous.”

“I think it's very admirable,” Daddy said.

“I think he's being inconsiderate.”

“Depends on whom you want him to be considerate of.”

“Of me, of course! I'm his fiancée, and I haven't seen him in nearly a year!”

“Listen Kat—he's been through a lot. He's seen people shot. He's pulled bullets and shrapnel out of young men who will never be the same. You have no idea how difficult war is, how it changes a man. You can't expect the same carefree person who left here to just sashay through the door. He has a lot to sort out. He has to learn how to live with the fact that he's alive and a lot of good men aren't.”

“I just feel something is wrong, Daddy. I feel like he doesn't love me like he did.”

“Well, I don't imagine he feels about anything the way he did before he left. War will do that to a man. But it doesn't mean he won't bounce back.”

But I knew something wasn't right. I lay in bed that night, staring up at the ceiling, and I thought I should get on a train and go meet him—maybe catch up with him in Whitefish. If his love for me was growing cold, maybe I could reignite it.

“He seemed so different, and I thought it was up to me to help him, to pull him back to the way he'd been before,” I find myself telling Amélie. “I felt it, and I didn't act on it. There was something I should have done that I didn't do. Do you have any idea what that feels like?”

“I do,” she replies. “I felt like I let down Yvette and Joshua and my parents, although in reality, there was nothing I could have done to save
them. But because I'd felt that way, I was determined that I was not—absolutely was
not
—going to let down Elise. She had her whole life ahead of her. Thank heavens Jack also wanted to make sure Elise found a home in America.”

“That was because he thought she was Doug's child.”

“Yes.”

“But she wasn't.” My chest is hot with indignation. “So how could you let him take you to Whitefish to meet Doug's family?”

“The question I asked myself at the time was,
How can I stop him?
If I told him the truth and he learned the extent of all my lies—if I did that, then and there, he would put me back on that ship, and Elise might die. I only saw two courses of action: forward with Jack, or back on the boat. I couldn't get back on the boat. I saw no other option.”

“There's always another option,” I hiss.

“Oh, yes?” Her gaze is sharp as a hatpin. “What would you have done?”

“Well, I wouldn't have gotten myself in your situation in the first place,” I huff.

“And I would not have been in yours,” she says. “Because if I had been you, I would have married Jack before he left home.”

I feel as if all the air has been sucked from the room. It takes me a moment to regain my breath. How dare she? It is a blow straight to the heart, a direct hit to my most vulnerable spot. It is, quite possibly, the one regret of my life—or would be, if I allowed myself to believe in regrets.

Amélie leans forward. “Are you all right?”

I have to unclench my teeth to answer. I will not—
not
—let her know that her remark had cut me to the quick.

“Yes,” I say at length. “Please go on with your story.”

1946

O
nce I started adjusting to the idea of going to Montana, I began thinking, would it be so bad, really, if Elise grew up believing that these strangers were her grandparents? It was a place to go, and these people were likely to love her. But could I tell such a lie to such vulnerable people? Could I live such a lie for my entire life? I doubted it.

When in doubt, buy some time.
It was a lesson I had learned in the Resistance. I didn't have to decide about Doug's parents right now; right now, I simply had to get away from that dreadful ship until it had set sail.

Not knowing what else to do, I went along with Jack's suggestions. We took the cab back to the hotel where he was staying. Along the way, he held Elise and jollied her out of a bad mood. He charmed her completely; he had been able to do that, even in Paris. Jack had a way with her; he talked softly, he smiled, he held her gaze. He treated her the way I began to wish he'd treat me.

When we got to the hotel—it was a nice place, not overly fancy, but with doormen and bellmen—there was not another room to be had.

“Well, then, we'll just have to share,” Jack said to the clerk.

The man peered over his glasses, his mouth pursed, as if Jack were suggesting something immoral. “Are you two married?”

Jack's ears turned pink. “As a matter of fact, we are.”

“I will need to see some identification.”

Jack asked me, in French, to hand the clerk my passport, which had been changed to my married name.

The clerk's face was red as he handed it back. “I'm sorry. It's just that this hotel has certain standards, and since you first asked for separate rooms, I thought . . .”

“My wife has just arrived from France, and . . . and . . . it's been a long separation,” Jack awkwardly explained. “I thought that perhaps she and the baby would be more comfortable in their own room this evening.”

“I see.” The clerk was clearly as discomfited as Jack. I was amused that an American hotel would try to police the morality of its guests. “Well, I can send up a crib for the baby.”

“That would be very helpful. Thank you.”

Jack put his hand on the small of my back and steered me toward the elevator. We went up to the twelfth floor—far higher than I was accustomed to.

“You take the bed,” he said. “I'll sleep on the sofa.”

The room had—merci Dieu!—its own bath. After the ship, it seemed like an unimaginable luxury. I bathed Elise, then put her in the crib. When she fell asleep, I went in the bathroom and drew a bath for myself. I sighed with pleasure as I sank into the warm water.

Through the door, I heard Jack on the phone. I heard him murmur in a low tone. I thought I caught the word
darling
. A stab of envy shot through me. The woman whom he was to marry was a lucky girl. She would have stability and a home. Her children would have a caring, loving father and never have to worry about their next meal.

And she would have Jack in her bed. This last thought made my stomach flutter.

He tapped lightly on the door. “I'm going to run down and get some extra blankets,” he called. “I'll be back in a few minutes.”

I murmured my assent. I came out, wrapped in my old robe, and was glad for the chance to brush my hair and climb into bed without him in the room.

He let himself in with the key a few minutes after I had settled myself
under the covers. The bed was soft and lush and large, with clean-smelling sheets. It felt like heaven. I realized I had not been in a bed that comfortable since before the war.

Jack made up a bed on the sofa across the room, then went into the bathroom and showered. I was exhausted and by all rights should have fallen asleep right away, but I was keenly aware that he was naked on the other side of the door. He came out, bringing soap-scented steam into the room, and settled on the sofa.

“
Bonne nuit
,” I whispered.

“Bonne nuit,” he replied.

I could hear his bedclothes rustling, then hear him breathing—not the regular, slow breathing of someone asleep, but the breathing of someone lying awake in the dark, just like I was.

I thought about saying something, but I couldn't figure out what to say, so I just lay there. I listened to the city—a city very different from Paris—a city with different sirens, louder traffic, and people speaking English. I listened to Elise's slow, somnolent puffs of air. I listened to Jack's steady breathing in the dark. I listened to the overly loud pounding of my heart.

Sometime in the early morning hours, I must have fallen asleep, because when I was awakened by water running in the bathroom, sunlight was streaming in the window.

1946

J
ack came out of the bathroom freshly shaved and smelling like toothpaste, wearing a sleeveless undershirt. His chest was broad and his arms were muscled. Our eyes met, and he froze.

“Bonjour,” he said.

“Bonjour.” I saw his gaze lower to my chest. I realized my nightgown was washed thin, nearly transparent. I rapidly reached for my robe.

Almost simultaneously, he grabbed a shirt from his suitcase and pulled it on, then turned his attention to Elise, who was sitting up in her crib, cooing. “Good morning, sunshine!” he said.

I struggled into my robe and tightly belted it. “I'm sure she's a bit cloudy in her diaper.”

He smiled. “I'll take care of it.”

I was surprised, but I welcomed the opportunity to visit the bathroom myself. When I came out, his shirt was buttoned and tucked in, and he was leaning over Elise, who was now lying on a towel-covered part of the sofa.

His face was a study of concentration as he tried to insert a diaper pin. “I'm afraid of poking her or making the diaper too tight, but instead, I end up making it too loose.”

“I'll get it.” I reached over. My arm brushed his. His skin was warm where it touched mine. We both pulled back abruptly.

“This isn't something they taught in medical school,” he said.

“Maybe they should.”

He grinned. “Probably so. That diaper pin is as sharp as a scalpel.”

“It doesn't require the same degree of expertise.”

“Elise would probably disagree.” We smiled at each other for a moment. “Why don't I go find us some breakfast? That way you'll have a chance to get dressed in private. “

“That would be very nice.”

He brought back tea, coffee, milk, juice, fruit, and an assortment of pastries. I mixed Elise's formula with the water from the teapot. We sat at the table, with Elise on my lap, sipping from her bottle and eating bites of muffin and fruit from my plate.

“When did you wean her?” he asked.

“Wean?” I wasn't sure what he meant, since she was still drinking from a bottle.

“Stop breastfeeding her.”

“Oh! I, uh, never did that.”

“Really?” The surprise in his voice put me on high alert.

“I heard that formula was better.”

“Some doctors—and I'm one of them—think that nature is always best.” He looked at me intently. “How did you afford it? Wasn't it hard to come by?”

“Well, um, one of my friends . . . she became pregnant, too. Her baby's father acquired a shipment of formula and stockpiled it for her.”

“He stole it?”

“I don't think it is stealing if it belonged to the Nazis.” I had to think fast. “Anyway, she miscarried—and . . . and I got it.”

“I'm surprised the father didn't want it back to sell it.”

“He was gone by then.”

“He was caught?”

“We think so.” Oh, why couldn't my mind work more quickly? “In the war, people sometimes just disappeared. He worked for the Resistance.”

“I see. This friend . . . where did you know her from?”

“We met at the hotel where I worked.”

“This was before Elise was born?”

I was getting in over my head. I didn't know when he thought I'd started working at a hotel. “Um . . . yes.”

“So you were in Paris before Elise was born? I thought she was born in Normandy.”

Oh, la; I was getting in deeper and deeper.
Stick to the truth
. “She, um . . . no. Elise was born in Paris. I went there after my parents' home was bombed.”

His brow creased. “But you said the she was delivered by a midwife. That's why she didn't have a birth certificate.”

“She was delivered by a midwife in Paris. I was very poor. Life was very grim. I didn't have money for a hospital.”

“I see.”

What he saw, I feared, was that I was lying. I gathered Elise onto my lap and made a show of looking at the clock on the bureau.

“Oh, my—look at the time! The morning is slipping away. Shouldn't we be heading to the train station?”

“Yes, we should.”

We moved on to packing up our things and talking about other topics, but I could see that the doubts he'd had about me since my arrival had rekindled in his mind.