I had no idea what business he’d been tending to when he was gone all day, but I assumed now some of it had to do with the car I’d seen him drive up in only a few minutes before, leaving it at the curb, the doorman keeping watch while he came up to get me. It was time to make our next move.
I grabbed my handbag, gave the room a last look, picked up my valise, and closed the door behind me.
Three weeks, he’d estimated, to get me from Paris, through northern France, to Germany and Hamburg. His plan was to follow in the footsteps of the Allied troops gaining back ground ahead of us. We were to head east first to Nancy, then up through Metz into Germany where we’d cross the border and head to Luxembourg, which was also now controlled by the Allies.
“From there it will possibly get trickier,” he’d warned me the night before over a small berry cobbler I couldn’t believe existed. “My contacts in Luxembourg will direct us on the safest route. But even they won’t be able to be absolutely certain what we’ll come up against in some of the smaller towns. Frankfurt has yet to be taken by our men. We should be okay with our papers and my contacts there, but we’ll need to be alert. It certainly wouldn’t do if we were to hand over the wrong set of papers to the wrong set of hands.”
“And after Frankfurt?” I’d asked.
“Everything north of Frankfurt is still under German control.” He leaned forward then and spoke softly. “Wie ist dein Deutsch?”
How was my German.
I grinned. I knew we would not have left England if he hadn’t been assured by my aunt and uncle that my German was perfect. What no one knew was that the three of us still spoke it at home when no one else was around.
“Gut,”I answered now, receiving a nod in return.
I set my fork on the plate and slid it away from me, resting my elbows on the table.
“Do you have people in Hamburg as well?” I asked.
“I do. It could get precarious though if the Allies are moving in.”
“But won’t that be good for us? For me?”
“It depends. You will be posing as...well...you. Should the Allies come, if you present as a German citizen, you could be jailed or worse. Sent to a work camp...or hurt.” He didn’t expand on that last part before changing the subject. “If you present as an American and they find your German papers, you could be brought in for questioning.”
“For what?”
“For being a German spy.”
I nodded, sweat dampening beneath my arms, my heart racing.
“And should the Germans somehow find you out,” he said. “They will deem you a traitor.” His eyes turned steely, sending a shiver down my spine. “They are not kind to traitors, Kate.”
I took in a shuddering breath.
“So, we will do this as thoughtfully as we can,” Lee said. “I have done my best to think of every situation and outcome, and I will give you names and addresses should you find you need to hide and I’m not around.”
I’d spent much of the night awake after that. And when I woke in the morning after only a couple hours’ sleep, I ran to the bathroom to be sick.
I’d never spent much time in the French countryside, my parents preferring the glamour of Paris or the sea views in Monaco or Nice instead every summer of my childhood. We stayed for a month at a time in beautiful hotel rooms that took up entire floors, our parents out nearly every hour of the day and night, Catrin and me racing ahead of Nanny Paulina as she took us for long walks near the Seine or by the sea.
But it was in the South of France that I got to experience childhood in a way I imagined other kids did. It was there I had freedom to play and explore, sing and dance, and run...as fast as my coltish legs could carry me, Catrin on my heels, Nanny Paulina urging us on from behind. It was there that our parents didn’t force us to join them, their days too busy with their friends to bother with us. And so we flourished, building memories cocooned in laughter, and whispering promises to the setting sun every time we left that one day we’d be back.
I stared out the window of the car Lee drove, remembering those sunny summer days as I took in the barren fields stretched out around us. We drove through towns like La Ferté-Gaucher, Sézanne, where we stayed a night in a small hotel with hardly any staff, and what was left of Vitry-le-François, which, from the looks of it, had suffered a terrible fire. Huts had been erected near the rubble that had once been homes and shops, small faces peering out from windows as we drove slowly by, the American insignia on the car on full display, letting them know they had nothing to fear from the people inside.
Every new town we entered we were stopped and asked to show our identification, questioned about our whereabouts, and the car was checked.
He parked in the newest town we’d be staying the night in, and we retrieved our bags from the trunk, my shoulders sagging a little as we walked into the entrance of the hotel. It was much like the ones before it. Small, quaint, with hardwood floors, flowery wallpaper, a gleaming if slightly shabby front desk, and the person standing behind it looking slightly shocked to see someone not in uniform approaching him.
“Do you have two rooms for the night?” Lee asked.
It wasn’t always guaranteed there’d be openings. Many times soldiers took up the rooms. But we’d only had trouble once so far, when there was a single room available and nothing else. Lee had given me the bed and had made himself a space on the floor. I’d felt a bit uncomfortable, lying in the dark with this man I hardly knew, despite our long hours in a car together. I’d wondered if he did too. But his breath slowed quickly as he fell to sleep, and so I’d turned over and done the same.
“We do,” the gentleman at the desk said. “And a dinner service at six in the dining room. Shall I make you a reservation?”
“Please.”
