“I was just thinking of that battle. Something I haven’t done in ages. Like most people who fought in the war, or any war for that matter, whether it be with weapons or some other kind of trauma, we don’t like to talk about it. Reminiscing is painful. Internal scars threatening to tear and break open...” I laughed then. “Can you tell I was married to a writer for years?”
She tapped the stack of letters on the table.
“I think you have always been something of a writer yourself, William. Credit where credit is due?”
“Perhaps.” I shrugged and went on. “Metz. I’d fought before then. And I fought after. But the letter from Kate sat strange with me. It was too bright. Not that she wasn’t often bright in her messages to me. But it felt forced. She listed so many memories we’d made together. And that worried me. It was as if she expected something bad to happen.”
“To you?”
“That’s what I assumed at the time. But then...”
I took a long drink of my beer, rubbing the braid of grass between my fingers once more, my gaze resting on the book of poetry.
“But then what?” she asked.
“But then one after another, my letters to her went unanswered.” I met her eyes across the table, my own burning with emotion at the memory. “I never heard from her again.”
Her breath was soft, her chest rising and falling as she watched me. After a moment, she gave me a small smile and nodded.
“I think I may know why,” she said, and pulled out another book.
24
Kate
France
October 1944
“Ready?” Lee asked.
I took in a long breath, looking around the small but elegant hotel room I’d been in for the past three days.
The last time I was in Paris I’d been thirteen. As usual, my parents had sent Catrin and me off daily with our nanny while my father met with friends and investors, and my mother shopped and met friends for tea. In the evenings, the two of them went out to expensive dinners before attending a myriad of shows they raved about the following morning over breakfast.
On the rare occasion, they hosted a dinner in our penthouse apartment. I’d find a dress and accompanying accessories in my room with explicit instructions.
“At your mother’s nod, you are to curtsy,” Nanny Paulina would tell me. Or, “You are to kiss each of your parents’ cheeks upon entering the room, circulate for thirty minutes, and then return to your room.”
Circulating with a room full of adults was a most excruciating request. I both didn’t know how and didn’t want to start a conversation with any one of them. But I dared not complain. To complain was to be punished later, after the guests had gone, when no one but my sister and Nanny Paulina could bear witness.
When Catrin and I weren’t being put on display, little dollies to be dressed in designer clothes to be shown off, twirled, and pinched, we got to explore the city with Nanny Paulina whom, out of eyesight and earshot of my parents, became my conspirator. My confidante. And many times, my only friend in the world, besides Kitty Cat.
It was strange to return to the city as an adult after so much had happened. But with Paris now back in the hands of the Allies, it was the best starting point to what Lee had planned. Thanks to his connections and work within the government, we were able to fly straight into the city and take two rooms at a hotel he’d chosen “because I am familiar with the staff,” he’d told me.
I knew from a conversation we had before embarking on our mission that he would need to tread carefully in France. While he didn’t expect to run into any of his former German colleagues, “One can never be too careful,” he’d said. And thus, we were staying somewhere discretion could be counted on. As could the information he was given about the comings and goings of other guests.
While he conducted business during the day, about which I asked no questions, having learned early on from my aunt and uncle that sometimes being in possession of information was more dangerous than not, I explored the city, staring up at windows still blackened with paper, empty shop fronts, and piles of trash collected and waiting to be taken away.
Everywhere there were vacancy signs. Homes of those who had left or were taken up for grabs by desperate landlords trying to make a buck. But what if they came back, I wondered? It angered and saddened me to learn what some had done to survive. Something Lee had warned me not to speak of.
“The French, as you probably know, are a proud people. They are not proud that their government chose not to fight. There is a lot of shame. Tread carefully, and if you speak to anyone, I recommend only speaking of the weather.”
But he needn’t have worried. The only words I exchanged were with the young woman waiting tables in the café on the corner when I’d ordered food, which was scarce, rations still in place as the war raged on in other parts of the world. Restaurants where Nazis had frequented, ensuring food was brought in for their own consumption, were still benefitting from the business they’d created. American, British, and French soldiers and high-ranking officers took the enemy’s place at the bars and tables, their uniforms hard to get used to, a reminder of the men who had occupied those spaces for the past four years, but the company admittedly much friendlier. They reminded me of William, and when I’d first seen the American insignia my heart had leaped, thinking maybe he’d be here. But unfortunately I never saw those faded, denim-blue eyes among the many that swung my way.
Even though I was used to being surrounded by soldiers, it felt strange to sit among them in this place, sipping my weak coffee and trying to enjoy the pastry before me when so many in the city were still hungry. And I knew I looked out of place, a young, blonde woman on her own with her clean, pressed clothes, styled hair, and money to buy fresh baked goods. I could see the questions in their eyes, but kept my body language uninviting, my eyes turned toward the window to discourage their approach.
While I’d spent the daylight hours walking the city, giving shops what little business I could to help support them without increasing my load by too much, by nightfall I was back in my room where I waited for Lee to knock on my door at seven with an offer to join him in the restaurant downstairs. I was introduced as his niece and doted on by the staff while he told me a false account of his day in case anyone were listening.
