The Nightingale

“A Jew can’t get an Ausweis, and if I got caught…”

Vianne nodded. It was true; running was perilous, especially with children. If Rachel were caught crossing the frontier without an Ausweis, she would be arrested. Or executed.

“I’m afraid,” Rachel said.

Vianne reached over and held her friend’s hand. They stared at each other. Vianne tried to come up with something to say, a bit of hope to offer, but there was nothing.

“It’s going to get worse.”

Vianne was thinking the same thing.

“Maman?”

Sarah came into the backyard, holding Sophie’s hand. The girls looked frightened and confused. They knew how wrong things were these days and both had learned a new kind of fear. It broke Vianne’s heart to see how changed these girls had already been by the war. Only three years ago, they’d been ordinary children who laughed and played and defied their mothers for fun. Now they moved forward cautiously, as if bombs could be buried beneath their feet. Both were thin, their puberty held at bay by poor nutrition. Sarah’s dark hair was still long, but she’d begun to yank it out in her sleep so there were balding patches here and there, and Sophie never went anywhere without Bébé. The poor pink stuffed animal was beginning to spew stuffing around the house.

“Here,” Rachel said. “Come here.”

The girls shuffled forward, holding hands so tightly they appeared fused together. And in a way they were, as were Rachel and Vianne, joined by a friendship so strong it was maybe all they had left to believe in. Sarah sat in the chair by Rachel, and Sophie finally let her friend go. She came over to stand by Vianne.

Rachel looked at Vianne. In that single glance, sorrow flowed between them. How could they have to say things like this to their children?

“These yellow stars,” Rachel said, opening her fist, revealing the ugly little flower of ragged fabric, with its black marking. “We have to wear them on our clothes at all times now.”

Sarah frowned. “But … why?”

“We’re Jews,” Rachel said. “And we’re proud of that. You have to remember how proud we are of it, even if people—”

“Nazis,” Vianne said more sharply than intended.

“Nazis,” Rachel added, “want to make us feel … bad about it.”

“Will people make fun of me?” Sarah asked, her eyes widening.

“I will wear one, too,” Sophie said.

Sarah looked pathetically hopeful at that.

Rachel reached out for her daughter’s hand and held it. “No, baby. This is one thing you and your best friend can’t do together.”

Vianne saw Sarah’s fear and embarrassment and confusion. She was trying her best to be a good girl, to smile and be strong even as tears glazed her eyes. “Oui,” she said at last.

It was the saddest sound Vianne had heard in nearly three years of sorrow.

TWENTY-ONE

When summer came to the Loire Valley, it was as hot as the winter had been cold. Vianne longed to open her bedroom window to let air in, but not a breeze stirred on this hot late June night. She pushed the damp hair from her face and slumped in her chair by the bed.

Sophie made a whimpering sound. In it, Vianne heard a muddled, drawn-out “Maman,” and she dipped her rag into the bowl of water she’d placed on the only remaining nightstand. The water was as warm as everything else in this upstairs room. She twisted the rag over the bowl, watched the excess water fall back into the bowl. Then she placed the wet rag on her daughter’s forehead.

Sophie muttered something incomprehensible and started to thrash.

Vianne held her down, whispering love words in her ear, feeling heat against her lips. “Sophie,” she said, the name a prayer with no beginning, no end. “I’m here.” She said it over and over until Sophie calmed again.

The fever was getting worse. For days now Sophie had been ailing, feeling achy and out of sorts. At first Vianne had thought it was an excuse to avoid the responsibilities they shared. Gardening, laundry, canning, sewing. Vianne was constantly trying to do more, get more done. Even now, in the middle of the summer, she worried about the coming winter.

This morning had shown Vianne the truth, however (and made her feel like a terrible mother for not seeing it from the start): Sophie was sick, very sick. She had been plagued by fever all day, and her temperature was rising. She hadn’t been able to keep anything down, not even the water her body needed so desperately.

“How about some lemonade?” she said.