Late afternoon, and Gabirel should be home from Edorta’s by now. “Bring him soon, and keep Domingo safe, too.”
During her first isolated months in France, Kate pleaded the same for Addie, Charles, and his mother when reports of Germany’s new Vergeltungswaffen rocket strikes on London filtered in. Such random news found her in conversations overheard on the street, or through glimpses of forbidden newspapers. She prayed even for Addie’s controlling husband Harold, who prepared to cross the Channel with his unit.
But what of her own service to the Allies? Domingo had brought her radio from the Gaboudet organizer, but she chafed when Gabirel left for Edorta’s this morning. Especially after that visit from the soldiers, she must not transmit without him here. Besides, she had no messages at this point.
The urge to stamp her feet possessed her, rousing a memory. When she was young, this attitude always produced a smile from Aunt Alvira. “Now Kate. Have patience.”
The last silver-pink reflection of day faded into twilight. One more turn around the barn and a sweep of the yard for anything unnatural drew Kate near the back door. One more look for safekeeping.
“Maybe this is what it’s like for people with a home. They feel responsible for everything.”
Home—what did that mean, anyway? She barely remembered her first home. Her mother’s face remained with her, probably because Aunt Alvina displayed her graduation photograph on the mantel. As for Kate’s father, she recalled nothing.
Aunt Alvina had filled her childhood emptiness, but now she was gone, too. If only ... “Oh, what was my hurry to leave that dear woman and the home she made for me?”
Kate rubbed her shoes on the iron boot scraper. Maybe home was an elusive phantom. You enjoyed it until restlessness overtook you or disaster reared its head, and then you started over in someplace new.
Darkness dipped a final covering over sunset’s last shaky fragment, and the sheep shuffled within their fold. For Domingo, such sounds signified the place where he belonged. What would it be like to belong here, to belong somewhere in this world? Wistfulness accompanied Kate into the house, where she barred the door.
Domingo’s mother bent to her knitting. Kate fed the fire and asked questions, though Madame Ibarra’s heavy accent rendered understanding her answers difficult.
Her people originated just over that ridge. She jerked a needle in the appropriate direction. “Providence gave us three boys and a daughter. I prayed for more, but four it was … the will of the Almighty. Now, the eldest has already gone to be with his Maker—my dear Ander.”
“Where does your daughter live?”
“She married an honest man from across the river and is now with child.” Madame Ibarra pointed her needle south.
“Oh, that Ander,” she mused, reverting back to her firstborn. “A fine lad, so like Domingo. I had a bad feeling when he went to fight in Spain, a divine warning. Domingo’s father died there, too.” Her mouth tightened. “And now... Godspeed my other sons’ return.”
A few minutes later, her head dropped forward, forcing black chin hairs into her shawl. Tenderness overwhelmed Kate and she determined to do her best for her.
The fire’s crackle witnessed her silent vow as she peered through the curtains into the yard. Oddly, she felt closer to England here than in Clermont-Ferrand, high in the Haute Loire.
Very soon the Invasion would begin, maybe even tomorrow—how she itched to listen to the BBC! The long-awaited Allied advance would mean more bloodshed, but at least some of it would be Nazi.
Finally, Domingo’s mother stirred. “What can be keeping my Gabirel?”
Had that lorry of feldgraus waylaid Gabirel en route? Madame Ibarra carried the lantern to the back room, so Kate banked the fire and layered thick quilts near the hearth. Her mission had changed again, from courier to guardian of a peasant woman.
Guardian ... what a joke, considering the courage Madame Ibarra displayed with those Germans. For tonight all was well, but what if real trouble arose? Kate’s contemplations joined the fire’s artwork on the wall, like the wispy cloud forms she watched this afternoon.
Some time later, tapping wakened her. A young man built low to the ground, with thick legs and torso, stood outside. When Kate opened the door, Gabirel slipped in like a shadow and hurried up to the loft without looking Kate’s way.
His companion pushed his Breton beret back, uttering a mongrel mix of French and Occidental. Kate gathered he was asking for supplies. “… food for the partisans, en route from Gaboudet. Picked up bicycles at the Ratier factory in Figeac.”
What should she send? Then she realized he also hungered to unburden his heart. Over a glass of buttermilk, he leaned into the doorjamb, a deep weariness reflected in his eyes.
“Today, the SS herded our men into a field. They discovered our hidden Juifs and made them carry rocks back and forth until they fell exhausted. Then they beat them and demanded they carry some more. When they finally loaded the Chosen into lorries, they let us go.”
“Did Gabirel witness this?”
“No, we picked him up at Edorta’s.” He shifted his weight, drawing Kate’s attention to his footwear, worn espadrilles dusted in powdery white and bearing the smell of flour.
“So far, I have been a sedentaire, helping the cause from my home, but today changed everything. I looked into my wife’s eyes—we had heard how the Germans hate les Juifs—now we saw that hate for ourselves.
“She will manage our business while I cook for the fighters. When the time comes, I will fight, too. They say the planes from London drop Sten guns by the carton each night. Whatever the leaders ask, I will do.”
He handed Kate a folded paper, then nodded toward the lorry. Before she could respond, Madame Ibarra bobbed through the main room.
“Gabirel has come home. He’s upstairs already.”
Mrs. Ibarra gave a quick nod before conversing with the visitor. Kate recognized only cochon—swine, and Gabirel’s name.
The partisan tipped his beret and signaled to two others who had waited outside in the truck. They leaped out and commandeered a pig amid squeals wild enough to waken the Gestapo kilometers away in Figeac. With the hapless animal secured on the lorry bed, the old vehicle rattled to life. Blacked out taillights gave the faintest flicker before inky darkness consumed the exhaust.
Madame Ibarra touched Kate’s shoulder. “Domingo may eat some of that cochon.”
“You maintain hope, Madame.”
Domingo’s mother stared out into the night, and her voice emanated from a deep place. “War makes one hopeful.”
“What do you mean?”
“In such times, hope becomes all you have.” Before she retired, her eyes acknowledged her understanding. Gabirel had worked with the Résistance tonight.
In moonlight, Kate unfolded the note—logistics for a landing field. She must call Gabirel to stand watch.
She climbed the loft ladder and shook him. “Sorry to wake you. Will you keep watch while I transmit?”
The smell of evening dew still on his clothes, he leaped from his pallet. Thankfully, her radio responded, so she listened for word from London. Nothing. She sent the messages, and when she descended, bleary-eyed Gabirel made for his bed.
Morning brought no sign of Domingo, but helping with the sheep kept Kate busy. They completed late afternoon chores under a smoky gray and purple sky—the better to hide the partisans. When Gabirel arrived home from Edorta’s, Kate breathed deeper.
“I’m going out to check for messages now.”
Up in the granary, she detected a distant whine, the sound of planes circling, a sure sign of the Invasion. She checked the BBC, but no messages came through. If only she had more notifications to relay to London, but she must be satisfied for now.
Gabirel left when she descended the ladder. At dawn, he reappeared and slept for a while before pasturing the sheep.
While Kate hung clothes on the line in the afternoon, Gabirel came running from the pasture. “I must go.”
He fled, so Kate hurried to the sheep. Domingo would be upset about Gabirel’s activities, but what could she do? Some time later, a peasant wearing a simple homespun vest, tattered trousers and espadrilles approached, gesturing Kate to follow him with the sheep.
At his unspoken command, Le Chien nipped at the sheep’s heels and drove them onward. Over a ridge, he collected the flock like a great wooly blanket. A birdsong cacophony blended with rustling leaves as a timid breeze lulled Kate’s trepidation.
The stranger’s actions indicated some sort of danger, but what? Visions of Domingo’s fragile mother visited by those soldiers again haunted her, but the idyllic scene stilled her wild pulse and bade her speak aloud.
“This could be a sunny day in the English countryside, straight out of The Wind in the Willows.”
Purple and lavender violets, a white daisy-like flower, wild periwinkle iris and some yellow buttons sprinkled the expanse. Addie would surely uproot some to nurture in Mrs. Tenney’s clay-soiled London courtyard.
If Kate let her imagination go, she could visualize Waffen SS troops closing in, so she focused on her instructor’s advice. “Lead your thoughts—don’t let them lead you.” Precisely why she'd brought a book along to read while the sheep grazed.
If this vagabond life taught her nothing else, she’d become less prone to cling to fear. Maybe that stranger warned her because this was the day for of requisitions. He had disappeared now, but Domingo had explained how Vichy constantly claimed food from the inhabitants here.
“Every week, we must tote our share of meat, milk, and produce to the roadside. But often, local Maquisards lock up the lorry driver, pick up the Figeac grain merchant’s employee and deliver the supplies to la Résistance. After they free the Vichy driver, the merchant reports a burglary.”
That day, he’d stood arms-akimbo, eyes sparkling, black waves swarming the tops of his ears. “We fight back however we can.”
Kate gave herself to her book until the same peasant approached from the opposite direction. Le Chien read his signals, and Kate shadowed the flock west for a quarter-mile. The sight of Domingo’s home warmed her, and she recalled Mrs. Ibarra’s comment yesterday.
“You are like one of us already.”
One of us. With her husband Alexandre, their baby, and Aunt Alvira, gone from this world, could Kate claim oneness with anyone on earth? Addie, yes—always. Northern France and the English Channel separated them, but they’d been apart before, and each time, their friendship grew.
With the sheep secure, she entered the barn. Inundated by the dusty grain scent under the barn’s massive rafters, a wordless sensation enveloped Kate, like Aunt Alvina’s country church liturgy so long ago. Even with her incriminating radio and the Gestapo hovering so near, a sense of safety caressed her.
Then, like a surreptitious wind, Domingo stood before her. Kate caught her breath—how had she not heard him enter?
He put his finger to his lips. “Shhh—do not let Maman and Gabirel know. I brought you some messages—highly important, the organizer said.” He pulled at his top lip with his teeth.
“You must move the radio tomorrow. I will return.” He slipped toward the back of the barn. Beyond him, through the window, a mere filament of light still brightened the horizon.
~
Clack, clack, clackety-clack. Pause. Kate’s fingers made far too much noise on the radio keys. Gauzy pale blue dragonfly wings shimmered in feeble torchlight How would such a creature make its way from the creek up into this granary?
“As unpredictably as me tapping out signals from this granary,” Kate muttered to herself.
The local organizer had sent highly sensitive information to her with a wayfarer, so once again, lives depended on Kate’s transmissions. Below, a cow mooed, and some small nocturnal animal sprinted across the yard.
When she contacted headquarters during her wilderness trek with Domingo, an experienced operator oversaw her. But here on the farm, Kate transmitted on her own. Gradually, the details returned.
Messages at least two hundred words long, including a number corresponding to each letter of five words from your chosen poem.
Her instructor called Kate’s chosen poem odd, but it worked. By the shores of Gitche Gumee, By the Big-Sea-Shining-Water …
After long minutes, confirmation arrived, so she relaxed. At ten o’clock, she tuned into the personal BBC messages, and after a few tries, the word ABERNATHY emerged in an illogical sentence.
The code’s unintelligible phrases contained a message designed to throw off Nazi decoders. If they picked up her signal and succeeded in interpreting it, disaster might follow. The other danger, that her consistent clackety-clacks would alert the Gestapo if they drove by, worried Kate just as much.
At least if they cut the electricity to isolate and identify her signal, the battery would still prevail. Still, detection vans or agents with electronically sensitive apparatus might be canvassing the area between the Dordogne and Lot rivers tonight. Why did the enemy have to be so scientific?
When she switched off the machine, footsteps sounded on the ladder. Kate froze, but soon, Gabirel’s black curls showed over the opening in the granary floor.
“Your machine wakes the night.”
“Sorry. Stopping every twenty minutes slows me down.”
“Why do you do that?”
“To break the air waves, in case the Germans detect my frequency.”
“You think the Allies really prepare for l’Invasion?” Gabirel launched his question with an arched brow and the changing voice of adolescence.
His words bubbled freely, unlike Domingo. “Today is June third, right? Nearly a month ago, didn’t the BBC broadcast all the right messages to signify the day?”
Gabirel flicked his hair back. “But no one came.”
“The mission halted only because of bad weather, since pilots require clearance. Perhaps a storm blew up after the broadcast that night, but with so many drops all around us, we can be sure this time.”
“At the encampment, I saw stacks of guns and grenades in crates. Domingo carries one, doesn’t he?” His tone wobbled on the last phrase, finishing the question in a soprano.
“Many do. Did you ask him?”
Gabirel rolled his eyes. “And they carry pills that kill you, so you don’t give away secrets under torture?”
The lipstick Kate’s mentor gave her, with one of those tiny pills hidden at the end, lay in Kate’s pack. No use denying facts.
“Only for impossible situations.”
“Domingo has one?”
“I don’t know, Gabirel.”
“Perhaps the British and Americans, like General Petain, make big promises, but fail to deliver.”
Compassion filled Kate. During the past four years, he endured one after another of Vichy’s broken promises.
“Did partisans talk this way at the encampment?”
“No, but sometimes, I wonder if this war will ever end.”
She touched his fingertips. “Of course you do. Domingo still believes.”
Gabirel blinked “Yes, but tomorrow you both leave.” He scooted down the ladder and murmured to the animals as Kate willed herself to focus on her final transmission.
Toulouse cells cite Waffen SS units heading north from refitting stations. Harassment increases at petroleum plants, coalmines, and railroad bridges. As a result, the Gestapo presses harder on rural departments.
Parachute welcoming committees required on Lot plateaus … high alert from now until Jour-J … le Débarquement at hand …
These reports all confirmed l’Invasion.
Understanding Gabirel’s impatience, Kate sat back and rubbed her temples. After all, hadn’t she eloped with Alexandre in youthful emotion? She clicked off the radio and lifted the gunnysack Domingo’d hung over the granary’s high window. Cool evening air drifted from the darkness covering the countryside, but a full moon lent enough light for the parachute drops to proceed.
She let the gunnysack down, and the fragrance of sweet clover hay, heady straw, and ever-present manure carried her back to Addie’s farm, but Gabirel’s mood still settled over her. Surely, the Allies would come—unthinkable that General Eisenhower and Winston Churchill made all their preparations in vain.
Perhaps the magic words would float to her via the BBC during the next few hours. Kate flipped the switch to listen again.