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ACT I

ESCAPE

PARIS, 1942

Chapter One

Ruth wakes with a start, goes very still, listens. Had she heard danger or dreamed it? Light from the streetlamp outside her apartment filters through the shutters, revealing the child beside her. Her daughter’s face is innocent in sleep, tortured when awake with the fear of every Jewish person living in occupied Paris.

How many more times must she bite her lip as she answers the question “Will they come for us today, Maman?” with “I don’t know, ma chère Joséphine. I don’t know.” How she would love to say to her daughter, barely eleven years old, “Of course not, ma chérie. I’ll not let anyone harm you.” But she hasn’t lied yet. She won’t.

She jumps at the sound of the front door of the apartment below being kicked in. She wasn’t dreaming then. She hears angry boots thumping on the stairs. Is that the sound of rifle butts smashing their way in? Joséphine wakes as Ruth scrambles from bed, calling out to her son in the next room.

“Léon, get up, come here.” She gathers her daughter in her arms as her son bursts in. His small, thin frame makes him seem younger than his sixteen years. The three of them stand frozen as he, too, is gathered into the embrace of his mother. They hear their own front door being smashed open, footsteps running down the hallway, and now two Gestapo officers, pistols pointed, rush into the room. Below them they can hear other soldiers continuing the assault on their Jewish neighbors. A gunshot rings out. Joséphine whimpers, turning away, seeking security in her mother’s nightdress.

“Out! Out!” one of the Gestapo yells.

They step from the bedroom into the small living room.

“What do you want?” Léon asks, not leaving the circle of his mother’s arms.

The two Gestapo officers size him up and laugh. One of them steps forward and points his pistol at Léon’s forehead. “You, little boy. You and your family, you will come with us now. Out!”

“Can we please at least get our coats and shoes?” Ruth asks, keeping her voice steady, despite her terror.

Before they can answer, she pushes Léon away. “Go and dress quickly, with your coat and boots and don’t forget a warm hat.”

Ruth takes Joséphine into their room, wordlessly sliding her arms into her thick winter coat and buttoning it up over her thin nightdress. Sitting her on the bed, she pulls socks onto her feet before guiding them into her boots. Standing her up to assess if she will be warm enough, Ruth grabs a scarf and hat from the nearby dresser, wrapping it around Joséphine’s neck before pulling a hat over her long curly hair: There isn’t time to plait it. She grabs her own coat and hat.

“Léon,” she calls out, “Léon, get your gloves too.”

Joséphine lets her mother shove her hands into her gloves. Ruth pauses, allowing herself the memory of dressing her children when they were babies, how unhelpful they could be.

“Hurry up!” one of the Gestapo yells from the next room.

Ruth and Joséphine find Léon standing in the middle of the room, glaring at the soldiers, who are inspecting their things. Seeing nothing of value, they refocus on the small family standing before them. One of them pulls a sheet of paper from an inside pocket, goes to the smashed-in front door, and confirms the apartment number. Returning to the family, he reads out the names corresponding to the number on the door.

“Ruth?”

“Yes,” Ruth replies.

“Léon?”

“Yes,” Léon replies with more bravado than he really feels.

The officer looks at Joséphine and back at his list before walking over to his colleague. They whisper together for a moment before turning back to the family.

“Who are you?” one of them asks Joséphine.

Ruth quickly asks, “Who does it say she is?”

Before the one holding the paper can respond, his colleague speaks. “There is no one else recorded as living here. Who is she?”

“Then she is nobody,” Ruth responds, head held high.

“Never mind, she’s coming too,” he says.

“No, she isn’t,” Ruth insists. “If she is not on your list, then you can’t take her.”