How Huge the Night (35 page)

Nina could feel it in Maria’s voice, that bone weariness; she could feel it in her weary heart.

“We got sick. Both of us. The influenza. It killed more people than the war. I was delirious with fever for days. When I woke up I was alone.”

Nina’s stomach tightened. Tears were welling in Maria’s eyes.

“I ran through the house, calling for him, calling ‘Papa, Papa.’ It was so quiet. I thought he had left me while I was sick—that hurt so much … I ran outside to the chestnut tree where my mother’s grave was—you know
grave
?” Nina nodded. The tears made bright tracks down Maria’s cheeks. “There were two graves,” she whispered.

“All,” breathed Nina. “All your family …”

Maria nodded. They looked at each other for a moment. Then Maria took a breath.

“I was alone,” she said, not looking at Nina, her voice growing harsher. “The neighbors on the next farm came and left food for me. They left it outside the door. They were afraid of the sickness. I sat on the floor, I didn’t eat the food, I didn’t sleep, I didn’t see the light. I wanted to die. And then I looked up and in the doorway there was a man with a gun.”

Nina froze.
No.

“A soldier—Austrian. He was dirty. His uniform was torn. He said something in German, and he pointed his gun at me. I didn’t understand.” She was gesturing as though she had a gun. But her eyes were looking into the darkness of the barrel. Nina saw it too, that deep blank eye. They were kneeling on that floor, together, in that dark.

“He yelled at me. He took the bowl of soup out of my hands—it was cold; I’d had it for hours. He drank it.” She lifted an imaginary bowl, tipped back her head, drinking savagely. Nina could see the soup spilling out the sides of his mouth. She could feel his hunger. “He threw it at the wall, and it broke. He yelled at me again. I was starting to cry.”

She grabbed Maria’s hand; they were both shaking. “And he—he
looked
at me, Nina. Do you know what I mean?” Maria’s face twisted with that look—ugly: lust and scorn and desperation. Nina drew back, shaking her head no, no. “And then he stopped. And he looked around.” The nervous eyes of a deer in an open field, the quick turning of the head. “There was nobody. But … he looked out the door and then looked at me and”—Nina’s mouth was open, she was leaning forward, tears wet on her face—“and then he was gone.”

Gone.

“Out the door. I was alone. Nina—I was alone for days. In the empty house. The door was broken. The neighbors who brought the soup had gone. Nobody came,” she whispered. “Nobody came for days.”

You have never been alone.

Maria’s eyes were closed. Her face was very still. Nina reached out a hesitant hand as if to touch her cheek—her throat hurt, she could hardly breathe, the salt taste of tears was in her mouth. Maria spoke, and she drew back. Her voice was very low.

“I escaped. Others didn’t. I don’t know why he left.”
It was pure, blind luck.
“But I learned what I learned, about the world. I have not told my children this story, Nina. I am afraid to tell them what I learned. But I have told you. Because I think you know.”

“Yes,” whispered Nina. “I know.”

“Nina.” Maria opened her eyes. They were very dark. “I have told you my story. Will you tell me yours?”

Story. As if it was something with a meaning. An end. She stared at Maria. Maria looked quietly back. Her face was so—open. Open like the door to a firelit house at the end of a long and terrible journey. Story. Nina swallowed, gripped a fold of the cover in her fist, and opened her mouth to speak.

It was bright and bitter cold. The boys in the schoolyard shuffled and stamped their feet to keep warm. Monsieur Astier stood before them with his bullhorn, his face very serious.

“I won’t keep you long. But I have something very important to tell you. It’s news you won’t read in the papers or hear on Radio Vichy. It’s news you have a right to know.”

Julien rubbed his hands together and wished he were somewhere where none of this was happening.

“I love my country,” said the principal. “I know you all do too. So it’s difficult for me to tell you this, but you have a right to know. As do your parents. You have a right not to be led blindly where our country seems to be going.

“Before I tell you this story, I want to emphasize that Pastor Alexandre and I heard it directly from an eyewitness.”

Julien’s throat was dry.
Hurry up.

“You may know that the Nazis have persecuted the Jews in Germany almost from the day they came into power. It appears that now they want to be rid of them completely. They’ve been deporting many of them east into occupied Poland. But three weeks ago, they decided to send a trainload of deportees to France. To Lyon.”

Lyon! Julien and Roland looked at each other. Were they coming here?

“They didn’t tell our government their plans. Not a word. They just packed the train with Jews they had rounded up, and sealed the cars from the outside, and sent them. When the train arrived in Lyon, officials there were shocked to find it packed with people— men, women, children, the elderly—all Jewish.

“You have to understand,” said Monsieur Astier slowly, “that the Germans were breaking the armistice by doing this. And that the officials were afraid that there would be more. And you can
imagine
they asked themselves, what will these people eat?”

The crowd stirred. Everybody understood
that
question.

“Yes,” Monsieur Astier said heavily. “What will they eat?” He looked away for a moment. “So our government in Vichy stood firm and refused to accept them. They insisted the Germans take them back. But the Germans didn’t take them back.” His voice grew heavier. “And that train sat in a corner of the Lyon train station for three days,
shut
. Nobody was let out. Nobody brought them food or water. Nothing.”

The schoolyard had gone dead silent.

“After three days, they sent it on to an internment camp, without opening it. When it arrived, some of the people inside were dead.”

He would never tell Benjamin.

“Our eyewitness watched the bodies being unloaded. Many of the living were so weak they had to be carried. None of them were taken to a hospital; they all went directly to the camp. Where it’s said the conditions are so harsh that even healthy people are at risk.”

Julien was light-headed. How many times did he have to say,
I never imagined this?
Was this the future?

There was a long silence.

“We can still be shocked,” said Monsieur Astier, “at seeing human beings treated in this way. The Nazis have not finished their work on France. But how long? When does our government start to resist? Do any of us really believe this won’t happen again?”

Julien and Roland looked at each other. Roland looked sick.

“I do not believe,” said Monsieur Astier slowly, “that our new government is going to resist. They are cooperating with the Nazis. And the Nazis will expect them, and us, to get used to seeing
certain
people treated this way. To find it normal, to shut up. I felt I had to tell you this, boys, because you as much as your parents have a right to the truth. To make your choices in the light of day. Boys, it’s not just our government that has to decide what to do with the people who come in on the train. It’s us.”

There was silence.

“Let’s take a minute to think,” said Astier. “The podium is open, if anyone has a response.”

A powerful hush settled over the schoolyard. The flag was flying high in the cold bright air, red as blood and blue as Henri’s eyes. Julien closed his eyes against it and wondered, for a moment, if there really was a God. When he opened them, someone stood at the front, holding the bullhorn.

Henri Quatre.

“Let me tell you a different story,” said Henri in a clear voice.
No
, thought Julien,
no. When does this stop? It doesn’t stop. Nina is only the first. This is the future.

“Old
père
Pallasson, who lived out at Le Chaux some years back,” said Henri, and Julien lifted his head. “Have you heard about him? He never set foot out his door all winter for fear of the cold. And then come spring, the snow melted, and
père
Pallasson looked out his window at the sunshine and thought it was summer—and he opened the door and walked out into the
burle
without a coat. May he rest in peace.”

There were a few chuckles from the crowd.

“I got up here to tell you,” Henri said, and he paused. Julien stared, his heart in his throat. A dark flush was coming over Henri’s face. “I got up here to tell you that
père
Pallasson is me.” His quiet voice rang into the silence. “When the armistice was signed, I thought we’d be okay. That it was spring, that it was back to
normal
. And it turns out,” he said slowly, “that the
burle
is blowing harder than ever.”

No one whispered. No one moved. The entire school was staring at Henri Bernard. Julien was faint, he was light, he would dissolve at any moment into the cold, clear air.

“Monsieur Astier is right,” said Henri, loud and clear. “The Vichy government isn’t resisting. They are cooperating with the Nazis.” His voice was harsh. “I hate to say it, and I hate to think my country is doing this, and I’d put my hand to the fire that if the marshal knew what was going on, he’d stop it. But I’ve made up my mind. I trusted them. But I can’t trust them anymore.” Julien was numb. Benjamin would never believe him.

“And we know.” Henri’s voice began to ring. “We know about persecution here in Tanieux. We know what to do with a government that makes unjust laws, laws that go against the law of God. We haven’t forgotten the Huguenots—we still sing their songs; we haven’t forgotten how our people came here fleeing the king’s soldiers, hounded and driven out because someone thought they were the wrong kind of people. And so we know how it feels. And I’m here to say”—there was the tiniest tremble in his voice, and his fist clenched and he raised it up—“that I have made my choice. I’m here to say—”

There was a pressure in Julien’s head, in Julien’s heart. He could feel them all around him, the heads thrown back, the faces turned up toward him, toward Henri Bernard. Who knew exactly what he was doing. Who was king of France again just like
that
, and always would be. His eyes burned.

“I’m here to say,” said Henri fiercely, “that anyone who wants to put people back on the train and send them somewhere else is not going to get any help from me!” Julien looked at him, at the clear blue sky above his head.
Someone’ll tell him. You know that, don’t you.
In Roland’s eyes was awe.

“We’re not going to keep refugees out of Tanieux!” Henri was shouting now. “It’s going to be what it was then:
un abri dans la tempête
—a refuge! We did it once, and we can do it again!” He stopped—Julien saw his throat working—and looked around. Monsieur Astier was stepping up to Henri, his hand held out; he was shaking Henri’s hand. Henri Quatre.

It should have been me, but it was Henri Quatre. Oh God. You’ve bested me again.

And Louis beside him began to clap.

And Roland clapped. And Jean-Pierre clapped, and Philippe clapped, and Pierre and Dominique clapped, and then it swelled, and it swept through the crowd, and the boys were cheering and stamping their feet, and Julien threw back his head and laughed out loud.

“Tanieux!” somebody yelled. “
L’abri!
” Someone else took it up, in rhythm, and then they were calling it out on the one-two beat: “Tanieux!
L’abri!
Tanieux!
L’abri!
” And Roland shouted and Louis shouted and Pierre shouted, and Julien shouted, at the top of their lungs.

Nina was crying. Hard sobs that shook her, her head held tight against Maria’s chest. Maria, who had heard her, who knew it all now. Who had been with her on the border in the dark; who had wept with her in her cell. Maria, Marita, the arms of a mother,
holding
her tight. The grief and fear shaking her, and the anger, like waves of the sea: they crashed over her, sucked her down, and lifted her again. Maria’s arms gripped her and took the shaking, and the waves washed her clean.

Slowly, the sobs wore themselves out, and she breathed.

The light from the window fell on the white bedspread. It glowed. It fell on Maria’s face that bent over her, her cheek bright, her eyes dark.

“Maria,” she whispered. “I was right. Wasn’t I. About the evil men.”

“Yes,” said Maria quietly.

“But I think maybe. Maybe.” She looked Maria in the eye, hard, searching. There was so much light. “Maria … is there a God?”

Maria looked at her, her dark eyes deep and steady. Then she smiled. That glowed too. “I didn’t tell you the end of the story,” she said. “Gino came home. My brother. One week after the man with the gun, my brother came home alive. We went to France. I got married. I had children.”

Tears filled her eyes. They filled her eyes with light.

“Is it—true?” Nina whispered. The light said it might be. The light said this woman would not lie to her, ever, while the earth went round. “Am I … safe … here?”

Maria bent over her. Her eyes were very dark. “Nina,” she said, “I am not God. I cannot say, ‘You are safe.’ But I can tell you two things: There is a God who loves you. And if they take you, they must take me too.”

Outside the window was the sky. She could see up and up, so far, she could see forever into the blue, and the sight amazed her; as though the edge of some huge shadow had passed over her, and was now gone.

It wasn’t until lunchtime, on the way out of school, that Henri caught Julien by the sleeve and pulled him aside.

“I wanted to shake your hand, Julien.”

Julien looked at him. Henri and his honest blue eyes looking straight back at him. “I’d like to shake yours,” he said. And there at the gate, as the boys walked past them on their way home for lunch, Henri Bernard and Julien Losier shook hands.