‘What?’ Dido exclaimed. ‘You said it yourself – Stefan said the situation may change. And then what?’
‘And why should the German care?’ Mrs Grant said.
‘Mrs Grant,’ Persey said, ‘I do hate to throw stones, but you are rather slow to catch on. He knows.’
And when Mrs Grant protested, Dido cut in, ‘But he’s not going to do anything. Jack owes him a lot. We all do. Especially you, Persey.’
‘I know,’ she said. She knew exactly what it was her sister wastalking about. The torch. The woods. The soldier who’d sworn he’d seen her and then who’d spotted her in Candie Gardens. Had he remembered her in the end? God, she hoped not.
‘What will happen to those who have been hiding those two British officers?’ Mrs Grant continued. ‘I assume they’ve been hiding at home. In plain sight.’
‘Much like Jack,’ Persey said quietly. ‘I don’t know. Stefan says no reprisals. But even he says he’s not sure quite how seriously his superiors are taking that stance. Either way, what they offer them may not be what they offer us.’
‘What do you mean?’ Dido asked.
‘They’ve been generous,’ Persey said. Mrs Grant cut in with a scoff. ‘But they may not be for the next set of Islanders who harbour those who shouldn’t be here,’ Persey continued. ‘The Germans won’t let this happen twice. The next one found may yet be the example.’
‘Jack,’ Mrs Grant said obviously.
‘Yes, Jack. And us,’ Persey said. ‘We may be the example they set to everyone else. If they find Jack, that is. If they understand he’s not meant to be here and they’ll obviously know we’ve harboured him. I’ll talk to Doctor Durand about amending Jack’s medical records, backdating them in his files to reflect his heart condition story. Perhaps the doctor can mark the date down prior to Jack’s re-emergence here. If there’s no record of Jack’s re-entry on the island an official medical record might go some way to helping that situation. I need to see Doctor Durand anyway,’ Persey said finally and then wished she hadn’t.
‘Do you? Why?’ Dido asked.
‘I just do,’ Persey said vaguely, realising far too late she had no other plausible reason for visiting the doctor. She could hardly mention Lise’s presence there. It would endanger her friend far too much. ‘I’m not really sleeping,’ she said, which was partially true. ‘I wondered if he might recommend something.’
‘I told you Stefan wasn’t one of them,’ Dido said smugly,reverting to their prior subject. ‘He’s helping us. We’re lucky, really.’
‘We shouldn’t have to be lucky,’ Persey said far louder than she’d intended. Whatever feelings were surfacing after all these years for Stefan, she didn’t need a daily reminder how her heart felt. Anger at far too many escalating situations on the island was the overruling force. ‘If Jack hadn’t come back, none of us would be going through this … this … unnecessary fear.’
‘You can’t blame Jack for trying to help his country,’ Dido said. ‘Trying to help win the war in the only way he knows how.’
‘Of course,’ Persephone said, noticing Mrs Grant was steeling herself to say something else in defence of her son, and probably very loudly too. ‘I’m just annoyed that we’ve been swept up in this and it’s not over yet.’
‘If that Nazi thinks—’ Mrs Grant began, but Persey rounded on her.
‘For heaven’s sake, Mrs Grant. He’s not a Nazi and he’s living in the same house as a British spy, albeit a have-a-go spy but, officially, a spy nonetheless. So do try to go a bit easier on him. Less mustard on his dinner wouldn’t go amiss. I’m not asking you to give him the best cuts but, dear God, can’t you see it might help in some way if you treated him a bit better?’
‘The same could be said of you, actually,’ Dido said quietly. ‘You’re so cold towards him.’
Persey stared at her sister, and in order to stop herself saying anything she might regret, anything that might reveal too much of her heart, Persey walked from the room and went to bed, closing her bedroom door loudly behind her.
‘It’s happening,’ Dido said one morning after breakfast as she read the newspaper. The days were turning colder and while Guernsey’s glorious summer had been bountiful, the autumnal winds had begun. Persey stood by the range door, which she’d opened to warm herself.
‘What is?’ she asked with concern. She no longer took all the news in the paper with a pinch of salt. The paper was rife with German propaganda but now, there was also news of petty sabotage and thefts against the Germans that unsurprisingly the Germans did not like one bit.
‘The Jews are being ordered to register and to have red “J”s marked on their identity papers,’ Dido read.
Persey was silent for a moment, thinking. ‘Nonsense,’ she said. ‘The Bailiff will never agree to this. The States will never pass this,’ she said, referring to Guernsey’s own government. ‘They have some say in what happens to us still, surely? They’ll never let the Germans start harassing the Jews … because if they do, whatever next? What kind of people will we have become? What else will happen to them?’ But really, she knew what they could expect: the Nuremberg Laws against the Jews had allowed for consistent persecution, forced sales of their businesses, rounding Jewish people up and carrying out horrific violence. How easily could that happen here?
Dido shook her head and looked up at her sister, slowly. ‘The States have agreed it,’ she said sadly.
‘What?’ Persey said sharply. ‘They can’t have done. They can’t.’
‘They have,’ Dido said remorsefully. ‘It’s here. It’s in the newspaper. It’s beginning.’
Persey sat at the kitchen table and stared blankly through it.
‘Makes me glad I’m not Jewish,’ Dido said. ‘For everything we have to put up with here, with the Germans breathing down our necks if we dare go outside the front door one minute past curfew, if we dare to own a book that they consider degenerate, imagine being Jewish too. Doesn’t bear thinking about. I wonder how many there are,’ she said absently. ‘Do you think the States knew there were still Jews here when they agreed these measures? Do you think they thought everyone who was Jewish had left for England, maybe?’
