The Nightingale

Captain Beck was sitting beside her on her bed, in her bedroom. He was holding her hand and leaning forward, his face close to hers.

“Madame?”

She felt his warm breath on her face.

“Vianne!” Rachel said, coming into the room at a run.

Captain Beck got to his feet instantly. “She fainted in the snow, Madame, and cracked her head on the step. I carried her up here.”

“I’m grateful,” Rachel said, nodding. “I’ll take care of her now, Herr Captain.”

Beck stood there. “She doesn’t eat,” he said stiffly. “All the food goes to Sophie. I have watched this.”

“That’s motherhood in war, Herr Captain. Now … if you’ll excuse me…” She stepped past him and sat down on the bed beside Vianne. He stood there another moment, looking flustered, and then he left the room. “So, you are giving her everything,” Rachel said softly, stroking Vianne’s damp hair.

“What else can I do?” Vianne said.

“Not die,” Rachel said. “Sophie needs you.”

Vianne sighed heavily and closed her eyes. She fell into a deep sleep in which she dreamed she was lying on a softness that was acres and acres of black field, sprawled out from her on all sides. She could hear people calling out to her from the darkness, hear them walking toward her, but she had no desire to move; she just slept and slept and slept. When she woke, it was to find herself on her own divan in her living room, with a fire roaring in the grate not far away.

She sat up slowly, feeling weak and unsteady. “Sophie?”

The guest room door opened, and Captain Beck appeared. He was dressed in flannel pajamas and a woolen cardigan and his jackboots. He said, “Bonsoir, Madame,” and smiled. “It is good to have you back.”

She was wearing her flannel pants and two sweaters and socks and a knit hat. Who had dressed her? “How long did I sleep?”

“Just a day.”

He walked past her and went into the kitchen. Moments later he returned with a cup of steaming café au lait and a wedge of blue cheese and a piece of ham and a chunk of bread. Saying nothing, he set the food down on the table beside her.

She looked at it, her stomach grumbling painfully. Then she looked up at the captain.

“You hit your head and could have died.”

Vianne touched her forehead, felt the bump that was tender.

“What happens to Sophie if you die?” he asked. “Have you considered this?”

“You were gone so long. There wasn’t enough food for both of us.”

“Eat,” he said, gazing down at her.

She didn’t want to look away. Her relief at his return shamed her. When she finally did, when she dragged her gaze sideways, she saw the food.

She reached out and took the plate in her hands, bringing it toward her. The salty, smoky scent of the ham, combined with the slightly stinky aroma of the cheese, intoxicated her, overwhelmed her better intentions, seduced her so thoroughly that there was no choice to be made.

* * *

In early March of 1942, spring still felt far away. Last night the Allies had bombed the hell out of the Renault factory in Boulogne-Billancourt, killing hundreds in the suburb on the outskirts of Paris. It had made the Parisians—Isabelle included—jumpy and irritable. The Americans had entered the war with a vengeance; air raids were a fact of life now.

On this cold and rainy evening, Isabelle pedaled her bicycle down a muddy, rutted country road in a heavy fog. Rain plastered her hair to her face and blurred her vision. In the mist, sounds were amplified; the cry of a pheasant disturbed by the sucking sound of her wheels in mud, the near-constant drone of aeroplanes overhead, the lowing of cattle in a field she couldn’t see. A woolen hood was her only protection.

As if being drawn in charcoal on vellum by an uncertain hand, the demarcation line slowly came into view. She saw coils of barbed wire stretched out on either side of a black-and-white checkpoint gate. Beside it, a German sentry sat in a chair, his rifle rested across his lap. At Isabelle’s approach, he stood and pointed the gun at her.

“Halt!”

She slowed the bike; the wheels stuck in the mud and she nearly flew from her seat. She dismounted, stepped down into the muck. Five hundred franc notes were sewn into the lining of her coat, as well as a set of false identity papers for an airman hiding in a safe house nearby.