The Book of Lost Names(15)

With Eva toting the suitcase and Mamusia hurrying along a step behind, they wove away from the square as if they knew where they were going. In truth, Eva felt more lost than ever, and while she forced herself to walk casually, she scanned the alleys for a sign for a boardinghouse. Surely there was something available close to the center of the small town.

But it took four more fruitless turns before, finally, a shingle hanging ahead announced the location of a pension de famille. Eva sighed in relief and surged forward, her mother following behind her.

The door was closed and locked, the curtains pulled tightly over the windows when they arrived in front of the narrow stone building a block and a half from the main square, but Eva knocked anyhow and then knocked again, more insistently, when no one came to the door. She pounded on the door a third time and was just about to give up when it swung open, revealing a short, portly woman in a dotted housedress, glaring at them. Her gray hair was spiky and wild, and her cheeks were as round and red as tomatoes.

“Well?” the woman demanded by way of greeting, her eyes blazing as she looked back and forth from Eva to Mamusia. “Which one of you was making such a racket?”

“Um, madame, hello,” Eva said uncertainly, forcing a smile as the woman turned on her, her nostrils flaring. In that instant, she looked just like a wild boar. “We—we were looking for a boardinghouse with a vacancy.”

Some of the indignance seemed to drain from the woman, but she didn’t budge. “And you think you can just show up here, demanding a room?”

Eva looked at the pension de famille sign and then back at the woman. “Well, this is a boardinghouse, so…”

The woman’s lips twitched slightly, and Eva wasn’t sure whether she was fighting back a laugh or a growl. “And at this hour? What kind of people arrive so late? It’s nearly nightfall!”

“We just stepped off a bus after a very long journey.”

“A journey? From where?”

“Paris.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed, and she crossed her arms. “And what is your business in Aurignon?”

“Um…” Eva trailed off, thrown by the rapid-fire questions. She hadn’t expected the inquisition.

“We are secretaries, here to visit my sister, who lives nearby,” Mamusia said calmly beside her. “But she has three children and lives in a very small apartment, so there’s no space for us.” Eva blinked at her and tried to cover her astonishment. It was exactly what Eva had insisted she memorize, but she would have sworn her mother wasn’t listening. “Now, if you don’t have a room available, we are happy to go elsewhere.”

The woman stared at Mamusia before her lips twitched into a small smile, but her gaze remained suspicious. “I hear an accent, madame. You are not French.”

Eva’s mother didn’t say anything for a few seconds, and in the silence, Eva prayed that her mother wouldn’t get this detail wrong; a slipup here might make the woman summon the authorities, and then the game would be up. “My mother is—” she began.

“Russian,” her mother said firmly, and Eva breathed a sigh of relief. “I left Russia in 1917 in the wake of the Russian Revolution and married here in France. My daughter, Ev—” She hesitated and corrected herself firmly. “—Colette was born here in France a few years later.”

“Russian,” the woman repeated.

“A white émigrée,” Mamusia clarified with confidence.

“You and your daughter Ev-Colette.” The woman smirked, but her eyes were no longer as angry.

“Just Colette,” Eva said nervously.

“I see,” the woman said. She stared at them, but still she didn’t move. “Prekrasnyy vecher, ne pravda li?” she said, smiling sweetly at Mamusia.

Eva froze. The woman spoke Russian? What were the odds?

But Mamusia didn’t waver. “Da,” she said confidently.

The woman’s eyes narrowed. “Vy priexali suda so svoyey docher’yu?”

Eva forced herself to smile politely as she glanced at her mother out of the corner of her eye.

“Da,” Mamusia answered a bit less certainly.

“Mmmm,” the woman said. “Vy na samom dele ne russkaya, ne tak li? Vy moshennitsa?”

This time, Mamusia looked completely lost. “Da?” she ventured.

Eva held her breath as the woman stared for a long time at Mamusia. “Very well, madame. You and your daughter, just Colette, should come inside before it’s dark. We may be in Free France, but it would be a mistake to believe we’re actually free.” With that, she whirled on her heel and stomped heavily into the boardinghouse.

“What did she ask you?” Eva whispered to her mother.

“I have no idea,” Mamusia replied softly. They exchanged wide-eyed glances and followed the woman inside, shutting the door behind them.

In the parlor, the woman was rummaging around inside a small desk when they entered. She emerged with a thin ledger bound in burgundy leather. “Here it is. The guest book.” She opened it up and gestured to Eva with an upturned palm. “Come then, let me see your documents. I haven’t all day.”

Eva and her mother handed over identification cards and stayed silent as the woman examined them with narrowed eyes, nodded to herself, and filled in their details in her guest register. Eva didn’t allow herself to exhale until the woman handed the documents back.