Nouan-le-Fuzelier
July 22, 1942
They drove most of the way in silence. Jacob and Moses intuited that the Magnés simply missed their sons and had wanted to shelter these new boys as long as they could. In a way, it would have been a good choice. They had no way of knowing if their parents were still in Valence, if they had perhaps gone to look for the boys in Paris, or if they had ended up sailing to South America. If Jana and Eleazar were still in Valence, there was no guarantee they could take care of their children again.
From the back seat, Moses stared at the forests and lakes that little by little gave way to wide, cultivated fields and empty prairies. As they approached Bourges, the impressive towers of the cathedral began to grow in the distance. The building was the pride of the entire region and one of the most breathtaking churches in France.
“We’re almost there,” Magné said.
The children were openmouthed at the sight of the medieval city with its half-timbered houses with plaster walls. They turned off the main road and came to a small plaza near the church of Saint-Pierre. They parked the car, one of the few visible in the area, and walked toward an ancient-looking house. Magné took great strides, as if anxious to rid himself of a troublesome burden. With two fingers he knocked with the rusty knocker on the door.
They heard footsteps on a wooden floor, then the door creaked open loudly. An elderly woman with a face crisscrossed in wrinkles received them with little to-do. Magné, Jacob, and Moses followed her down a narrow hallway. The dusty, musty walls had seen better days. The woman led them to a small room, muttering something they could not hear.
“The collier Bonnay is a good man,” Magné said at last. “He’s a widower. His wife died two years ago, and his sons are around your ages. I don’t think you’ll be able to stay long, but he will help you figure out how to get into the unoccupied zone and then to Valence.”
“Thank you, Mr. Magné. Again, please tell your wife how grateful we are,” Jacob reiterated.
The small room was stiflingly warm, and the thought of staying there long put Jacob on edge. He would rather spend the night, then leave immediately the next day.
The collier was busy with deliveries at the moment, but a dark-haired boy poked his round, cross face through the door.
“Father won’t be back ’til lunch,” the boy said, pronouncing the words rather awkwardly, as if a toddler were speaking through the body of an older child. He was a bit shorter than Moses but looked hardy enough.
“What’s your name?” Moses asked, eager to see someone near his age.
“Paul,” the boy answered.
“I’m Moses.”
The old woman, who up to now had remained silent, said, “You boys go play out back ’til your father gets here.”
Moses ran, following Paul out to the small yard, but Jacob preferred to stay and wait.
“You can go out too,” the woman said.
“Thank you, but I’d rather wait here,” Jacob answered.
She turned to Magné. “Sir, you can go now. My son will take charge of the boys.”
Magné hesitated a moment, then put his hat on and knelt to say goodbye to Jacob.
“I want you to know we’re not angry with you. We understand what you’re feeling. You have a noble desire. But if you ever need any help at all, write or call us. Here’s our address and phone number. If you find yourselves in trouble, though, destroy this paper. Do you understand?”
Jacob sighed and tried to hold back his tears. The Magnés were some of the kindest people he had ever met. Their home and family had been a refuge in the midst of danger.
“I will, Mr. Magné. Thank you.” He stood and hugged the pharmacist, who, tense at first, eased into it and returned the embrace.
“You and your brother are good boys, and things will turn out for you. It may be that this world just gets messier, but you’ll always be able to find good people in it. There are more generous hearts than we might think.”
Magné stepped out of the room and covered the distance through the hallway to the door with his great strides. He was tempted to try to take the boys to Valence himself, but he knew it would be impossible. If the Germans did not stop him at the checkpoints, then the gendarmes would. It was better to let fate play out as it would.
For hundreds of years, the confident stone church of Saint-Pierre had seen generations come and go, all the while safeguarding its grandeur and mysteries. It now seemed to laugh at the smallness of Pierre Magné and his goodwill. But in Jacob’s eyes, looking through the dirty windows of the Bonnay home, the man was a veritable giant.
At noon, the grandmother served them a light lunch of soup with noodles and beef sausage that was past its prime. It was nothing like the delicacies at the Magnés’ home. The collier’s children slept in a damp room with a large straw-mattress bed and a broken mirror. There were no toys besides a slingshot and a sort of scooter their father had put together with wheels and a wooden steering wheel.
When they heard the front door, Paul tore down the stairs and threw himself into his father’s arms. Bonnay was a middle-aged man with a beard and a blue sailor’s cap. His shirt was blackened with soot from the bags of coal he transported all day.
“You’re going to stain your clothes, son.”
The boy, heedless, nestled his face further into his father’s neck. Jacob and Moses felt hollow as they watched. How long had it been since they had hugged their father?
“And you two are the boys?” Bonnay asked with his deep voice.
“Yes, sir, good afternoon. I’m Jacob, and this is my brother, Moses.”
“You’re here a bit later than I expected. Unfortunately, just yesterday a small group of refugees crossed over into the unoccupied zone. They were hidden in a transport truck and made it near to Vichy, but the truck has come and gone, and there’s no way they can take you now.” He sounded annoyed.
“It wasn’t in our control,” Jacob apologized.
“Of course not. You can stay here as long as you need to. We’ll find a solution. You’ll go with my son Marcel to help me at work, and the younger two will stay here at home. From now on your names are Jean and”—he pointed to Moses—“Martin.”
Marcel stepped forward from his father’s shadow. He was taller than Jacob and had much wider shoulders though he was slightly younger. His blue eyes and long, curly blond hair were dazzling despite the soot stains on his face.
“You boys go play a bit before supper. Tomorrow we’ll have to be up very early, but it would be better for you not to go out in those nice clothes. People will wonder. Grandmother will get you some of Marcel and Paul’s clothes,” Bonnay told his guests.
Jacob and Moses changed quickly. They were eager to get out and run through the streets of a new town, a new place to explore. The sons of the collier would be the perfect hosts. Paul opened the front door, and they all four ran down a narrow road toward the Auron River. Huge trees separated the old road that followed the river’s edge toward an old mill with a waterwheel. The boys sat on the bank and started throwing rocks into the water.
“Where are you from?” asked Marcel, who—with a clean face and clean clothes—now looked like an eleven-year-old boy.
“We lived in Paris, and now we’re going to the unoccupied zone,” Jacob said.
“Everybody wants to leave, and I don’t get it. Beyond the fields of Bourges, the grass is just as green and the sky is just as blue as here.”
Jacob knew Marcel was right. He had never understood what borders did, much less one that split a single country into two parts.
“Well, we don’t really care what they call that side of France. We’re just looking for our parents.”
“Why did they leave you?” Marcel asked, grabbing a handful of dry grass and choosing a piece to chew.
Moses frowned. “They didn’t just abandon us. They left us with Aunt Judith.”
“Where’s your aunt?” Paul asked. Paul had already decided Moses was the best thing to happen to him.
“Um . . .” Moses looked down, preferring to avoid the truth. “We’re not sure.”
“You want to go into the mill? You can see the river really close from the window, and it’s a good spot to aim at the birds in the trees,” Paul said, trying to cheer his new friend.
The boys ran to the old stone bridge. The arch looked weary, but it had withstood the current of water for hundreds of years and would endure many more.
The walls of the building itself were barely standing, and the roof had fallen in ages ago. The old millstone was the last remaining vestige of the place’s one-time function. They went up to the window and watched the current. In the summer, the river flowed more slowly, and the boys could see the rocks at the bottom, even under the thick shade of the trees.
Marcel aimed at a bird perched on a branch overhead, but Jacob jostled his arm to wreck his aim.
“Hey, what’d you do that for?” Marcel complained.
“That bird didn’t do anything to you, and you’re not going to eat it. So why do you want to kill it?” Jacob’s tone took Marcel aback.
“Well, why not? It’s just a bird. There are thousands of them.”
“That’s not a good enough reason.” Jacob huffed.
“Oh yeah? Says who?” Marcel stuck his face right into Jacob’s and bumped the older boy with his chest.
“Quit fighting,” Paul intervened. “I’ll tell Father.”
“You little snitch!” Marcel turned and pushed Paul hard. The boy lost his balance and fell through a gap in the wall to the lower part of the millhouse, to where the old waterwheel still turned with its paddles. Only a few teeth remained in the wheel, but Paul’s shirt got caught in one, and the force of the water started to lift him. “Help me!” he cried.
Not stopping to think, Jacob threw himself into the water and caught Paul by his clothes. But the wheel kept turning and pulling him upward, where he would eventually be trapped within the gearworks.
Marcel watched, helpless, from above. He did not know how to swim, but he rummaged among the remains of the millhouse until he found an old rope. He tied it to one of the standing wooden supports of the building and threw it into the water.
Jacob grabbed the rope and yanked hard on Paul, but his shirt was stuck in the wheel. Paul tried to rip the shirt, but the fabric wouldn’t budge.
Moses tossed them a stick to jam up the wheel. It would not withstand the force of the water for long, but maybe it would give them a few seconds. Jacob jammed the stick in, and the wheel groaned to a halt. It gave Jacob both the time and the leverage to yank Paul free. The younger boy clung to him as Jacob hoisted them both back into the millhouse with the rope.
Despite the heat of the day, Paul trembled with cold and fright. Marcel folded him into his arms. “Thank you,” he said, looking at Jacob. “I owe you.”
Just then they were startled by the sound of footsteps. The four boys withdrew to the darkest recesses of the millhouse. They heard voices, then two blond boys appeared and went up to the window.
“It’s the Germans,” Marcel whispered in Jacob’s ear.
“Germans?” Jacob’s blood froze.
“The sons of the commander and the captain of the garrison. They’ve come for the summer,” Marcel explained.
“Do you know them?”
“Nobody goes near them. We call them the dirty Germans. Normally their nanny or a soldier is with them. I’ve never seen them alone before.”
The German boys said something in their language and then laughed, but they were startled into silence by the sound of a board creaking in the shadowed part of the millhouse. One of them pulled out his slingshot and fired into the dark.
“Ouch!” Moses yelled, when the pebble whacked his neck.
“Who’s there?” one of the German boys asked in a thick accent.
Marcel stepped out into the light with his slingshot raised. He was much bigger than the two German boys. “What are you doing in our hideout, you little Deutsch maggots?”
The boys froze, but before Marcel could fire at them, Jacob grabbed his arm.
“Leave them alone.”
Marcel frowned. He could not understand this rich city boy. The whole world knew the Germans were the enemy.
“They’re kids just like us. The war is between adults,” Jacob said.
The German boys threw down their slingshots in surrender. They looked truly frightened. Their parents had warned them about lurking dangers, but they had run off at a moment when no one was looking in order to explore the old mill.
“We’re not going to hurt you,” Jacob said in German.
Their eyes widened in disbelief.
Marcel’s did too. “You speak German?” He was incredulous.
“Yeah,” was all the explanation Jacob gave.
“We didn’t mean to hurt you,” the older boy said to Jacob.
“You can go, and don’t forget your slingshots.”
“Thanks,” the boys said in unison. But before leaving they turned back and asked, “Do you want to play?”
The four boys looked at one another. It was one thing to not attack the Germans, but it was another thing altogether to play with them. Moses finally stepped forward and said, “Sure, we can play, but we should go outside. It’s kind of dangerous in this millhouse. Paul just fell.”
The Germans nodded. They knew French, so games with their new playmates would come easy.
Sometime later, the church bells rang out loudly, and Paul reminded them to go home for supper.
“Will you be back here tomorrow?” one of the German boys asked.
“I’m not sure. We’ve got some things to do,” Jacob answered.
“How do you know German?” the smaller boy asked.
“I learned it in school.” Jacob found a lie more prudent than the truth.
“You sound German. You don’t have an accent. So we’ll try to come back tomorrow at the same time, and I’ll bring a ball,” said the older boy, before turning and running off toward the commander’s residence.
Jacob, Moses, Paul, and Marcel ran back toward the Bonnay house. As they neared the plaza, Jacob could not stop berating himself for his critical error. Surely the boys would tell their parents they had met a boy who spoke German. He did not know what had made him do it, but it was too late now. He would have to warn Bonnay of the risk they were now running.
Once home, they washed up and waited impatiently for supper. Jacob could hardly eat, however. When Bonnay went out to the patio to smoke his pipe, Jacob followed him.
“Mr. Bonnay, may I speak with you?”
The man grunted and then patted the stair with his hand for the boy to sit. “What is it, my boy? I hope you haven’t gotten into trouble on your first day.”
“I’m afraid I have. We ran into two German boys near the river. Marcel threatened them with his slingshot . . .”
“Well done. My Marcel doesn’t put up with these blasted Deutsch.” Bonnay smiled proudly.
“Yes, but I stopped him, and I spoke to them in German to calm everything down.”
“You did what?” he said, taking his pipe out and turning toward the boy.
“I spoke to them in German.”
“To the children of the commander and the captain of the garrison? Have you lost your mind?”
Bonnay scratched at his scalp. His hair badly needed to be cut. The gray was steadily encroaching upon his bushy brown head.
“I’m sorry,” Jacob said.
“Well, there’s no way around it. We’ll all have to leave tonight. My mother can stay. She’s in no danger. We’ll take my coal truck and take a shortcut over the lines. It’s by cattle trail . . .”
“I’m really sorry,” Jacob repeated, on the verge of tears. He hated himself for putting this family at risk.
“Calm down, lad. Many times I’ve thought about crossing over. The Nazis are stealing coal from me every day, and I’ve thought one too many times about shooting the whole lot of them. The boys are the only reason I haven’t done it yet. I’ve got family in Roanne. From there you can go to Lyon. Then it’s not far to Valence, just over sixty miles.”
Bonnay stood up. He seemed even taller and stronger than the first time Jacob saw him.
“Marcel, Paul, come!” he called as he entered the house. He put out his pipe and emptied it in the kitchen.
“What is it, Father?” Marcel asked.
“We’re going to Roanne tonight to see our cousins. It’s been a long time since we visited Uncle Fabien.”
Marcel and Paul stared at him, puzzled. Since their mother’s death two years ago, they had never left home.
“We’re leaving in the middle of the night?” Marcel asked, connecting the dots. “Is it because of those German boys?” Then he grabbed Jacob’s collar. “You little Jews, you—”
Bonnay’s great hand pushed Marcel, and he fell flat on his back. “You will never speak like that again, do you hear me? In our family, there are no Jews or Christians. We’re socialists, and all people are our brothers and sisters.” He pointed at the boy with his pipe to mark the seriousness of his words.
Bonnay went upstairs and spoke briefly with his mother. After filling two small suitcases, he lifted a wooden plank and retrieved his savings. It was not much, but it would be enough to start a new life somewhere else. For years, he and his wife had scrimped to save enough to send their boys to good schools—but none of that mattered now. What chances did a collier’s sons have in a world ruled by Nazi swine? Such thoughts ran through his mind as he put on his coat and secured the money in a secret pocket in his pants.
The boys were waiting downstairs. They were dressed, including shoes, and holding their jackets. Jacob had gotten his bookbag from the room.
“I won’t miss these old walls too much. We’ve been very happy in this house, for sure, but also rather unlucky. Your poor mother worked herself to the bone trying to turn this pigsty into a home, but she’s not here anymore.” Bonnay’s eyes focused on something far away, but only for a moment. Then he picked up the suitcases again.
The truck was parked at the back, and not a soul walked the streets. The mandatory curfew forbade the townspeople from venturing out at night. They had to get out of the city as soon as they could. And no one knew the country roads like a coal man.
All five of them piled into the cab. The two younger boys sat by Bonnay, and the older boys beside them. It took them a while to get settled, then Bonnay turned the ignition. The vehicle roared in the surrounding silence, and Bonnay looked around through the dirty windows nervously. None of the neighbors were looking out their windows. He eased the car into gear and started out slow, leaving the plaza and heading for the road that ran along the river. If they could just get a few miles down, the Germans would have no way of finding them. The night was so clear he could drive without the headlights.
He managed to sneak through the narrow streets of Bourges, then take a smaller road that ran along some cornfields. There he sped up to get away from occupied France and to the made-up border that turned half of the French into Hitler’s slaves and the other half into his bootlicking subjects.
The truck sped through the prairies and cornfields. As soon as they got to the unoccupied zone, it would be less dangerous. He had their papers in order and could say he was taking his nephews back home after a visit.
As the truck drove away, a group of Germans advanced lightly toward the church of Saint-Pierre. A sergeant knocked at the Bonnay home. It took the elderly Mrs. Bonnay some time to put on her robe and make her way down the steep stairs and through the hallway. When she opened the door, the Germans pushed her aside and began searching the house. Smarting, the woman went to the small living room and sat down to wait.
The sergeant entered and in basic French asked, “Where are the children?”
“What children?” she asked quietly. She was calm. At her age, death was more a gift than a threat.
“The one who speaks German.”
“My grandchildren don’t speak German. A week ago they went to see their cousins in Orleans.” This kind of lying, anything to throw them off a scent, came easy to her.
“You’re lying. They were playing today down by the river.” The sergeant grabbed the front of her gown.
“I’m not afraid of you. I’m just an old woman,” she said.
The sergeant dropped her. They were wasting their time. He considered sending a search party, but it was late, they had not eaten, and this whole row was over some children. He would look for them tomorrow. The little fish always slip through the net, he thought, then pushed the grandmother down hard for good measure.
The soldiers left the house in disarray, and the grandmother listened to their boots on the stone pavement of the plaza until they faded away on the main road. She got to her feet slowly, closed the front door, and went to her room. She prayed for her son and grandchildren. She knew the cost of war—her uncle in the war with Prussia, one son in the Great War—and she desperately hoped God would spare her one remaining son. She had little left to give the world. It had been a difficult life: poverty, hunger, death, and sadness were etched into her face and looked out through her downcast, cataract-clouded eyes. Yet for some reason just then she had the fleeting sensation of the first dance she shared with the man who became her husband. The vibrancy and hope of youth still nested in her worn-out heart. She understood immortality to be becoming young again, shaking off the smothering mantle of age, as one shakes off dirty, threadbare clothes, and running toward all those who had gone before her. She closed her eyes and saw her husband’s smile, her mother’s freckled face, the grin of her dead son, the blundering frame of her uncle. She longed for the paradise of the gone generations, where time made no difference and tears did not exist.
Under the star-studded night sky in France, at some point in the middle of the mountains, the world still felt like a happy place, where joy and peace orchestrated the lives of the inhabitants. It was a secret place, surrounded by dense forests and green meadows, where the monster of war seemingly had not yet arrived.