Papa is more relaxed these days – kissing Mother on the head after mealtimes, which I think means he is happy. He said something about the place being safe but I think it has always been safe, as in Paris there were a lot more dangers, like cars.
I look for André in our corner of the schoolyard. He towers over everyone else and his hair looks like one of Clarisse’s mops but he’s not here today. André is my best friend now. He has moved to the desk next to me. He used to sit with Samuel but since Samuel left he sits there. He is brilliant at throwing and catching and has taught me and Dimitri how to fish. He has only really been my best friend for a few weeks and Michel is now my second best friend. André’s been in the village since the start of the war but he came from a place in the east, near the border, and his family fled the Hun and his dad has been sent away somewhere in the north. He likes our house because the garden is huge. Also we can stand and press our faces up against the gate and watch as the tram passes down below. When we press our faces into the railings our cheeks sort of buzz and hum against the metal when it goes past.
I want to tell him about the strange dream I had last night about giant pigeons. André knows all sorts of funny things about the war and he was telling me that the Allies use carrier pigeons when they advance on enemy lines and then send all the details back in little pouches tied to their legs. He told me that the pigeons can fly to England, or other places far away, with all this information and the Nazis can’t stop them because pigeons are so small so most of the aircraft can’t hit them. He says some of them have been awarded medals for bravery. That made Papa laugh and ruffle my hair. It sounds so clever to me, and now I am going to look out for pigeons flying over the village, as you never know – they might be carrying secret information about the enemy that will end this war.
André told me that earlier in the war some men in Germany tried to kill Adolf Hitler by blowing him up but they didn’t succeed and when I asked what happened to them André said he didn’t know. I imagine, much like the pigeons, Hitler would want to shoot them down too. I think about the spies in the forest then. Everything seems all right since we told Papa about the spies so I think we helped. I think the war will probably end soon, what with the spies being caught, and all the pigeons.
It has been so cold this winter and it has dragged on and on. I swear I have icicles hanging from my nose when we are in school. My knees are practically blue with cold by lunch and I pull up my socks to try and keep out the worst of it. My writing has got all squiggly as my hands are so numb. Most of the teachers tend to leave us to it in the cobbled yard we have to run around in at break. There is a stone wall at one end and André and I invented another game the other day, to try and stop from freezing, but it is already banned because stupid Hugues nearly broke his nose. The rule is you have to close your eyes and run at the wall and then stop when you think you are just about to hit it. The closest to the wall wins. But of course Hugues went and ran into the wall and got a nosebleed and his mother yelled at him in front of everyone as she had to leave the hotel where she worked to come and take him home.
Today, however, I’m too cold to play ball games and André isn’t here. He had a sore throat yesterday so he is probably at home, his mother bringing him warm soup. I suddenly wish I had been taken ill. I scuff my shoe on the ground and wait for the bell so I can go back inside. I blow out, my breath making a little puff of smoke in front of me, like the clouds of smoke that hang around the tables in the café opposite, from the men’s pipes. I amuse myself for a few moments pretending I too am smoking and enjoy making the little swirls in the air.
‘Very impressive.’ Mademoiselle Rochard laughs.
I jump and blush a little when I realize who it is. I don’t normally talk to her at break times and now she’s caught me doing something so silly, but her face is kind. She looks a little different, not how I think of her in my head. She still has her long blonde hair, although she has it in a big plait thing around her head. Her cheeks are pink from the cold. She rubs her hands together; she is wearing leather gloves, a faded red colour, they look soft. She hasn’t been my teacher for ages. She teaches the younger ones now, but since the bump went away and the baby came she doesn’t come into school every day.
‘You look older,’ she says.
I don’t know what to say.
‘You too.’
She laughs.
‘How are your family getting on?’
‘Very well, thank you.’
‘Your mother visits our shop and talks about you all.’ She waves in the direction of the high street. I wonder what Mother talks about and hopes she puts me in a good light. ‘I’m sorry if I seem nosey … A bad habit.’ She laughs again.
I smile at her – you sort of can’t help it, she has one of those faces. It is at that moment that a bird flies over and I watch it carefully, wondering if it is a pigeon – it’s about the right size. And suddenly I am telling her all about what André had told me and she laughs too, the way Papa had.
‘England, really?’ she says. ‘How wonderful.’
‘Some have won medals for bravery,’ I add.
The bell goes for the next lesson.
‘I wouldn’t mind being able to fly to England,’ she says, as I turn to go inside. She watches the pigeon fly right overhead and away.
My heart sinks, but I don’t tell her that I was wrong: it is a blackbird. Blackbirds don’t fly anywhere with little messages on their feet for spying, or win medals. In fact, I think they mostly go in pies.