The Book of Lost Names(44)

“Have you ever heard of the Fibonacci sequence?” Rémy asked.

“I don’t think so.”

“I’ve always loved math. You see, the Fibonacci sequence starts with the number one, then the number one again. Add those numbers together to get two. Then add one and two together to get three. Two and three make five. Three and five make eight. And the series continues like that, adding the two previous numbers to get the following number. Do you understand?”

Eva squinted at him. “I understand the math. But I don’t understand what this has to do with an old book.”

He grinned. “Stay with me, Eva. Now, continue the sequence, if you will.”

“Rémy…”

“Just trust me.”

She sighed, feeling as if she were back in l’école primaire, being given a surprise quiz in mathematics. “Very well. One, one, two, three, five, eight, thirteen, twenty-one, thirty-four…” She trailed off.

Rémy was jotting down the numbers as she said them, then he handed her the paper with the numbers he’d just written. “Now, go to each of those pages and find the dot. Write down on this sheet of paper the letter beneath it.”

Eva frowned, but she did what he said. On page eight, there was a dot over the a in ap?tre. On page thirteen, there was a dot over u in suite.

It wasn’t until the dot over the b in considérable on page twenty-one that she realized what she was writing. “Is this my name?”

“Very good. It’s a way to keep a record of who you are, so that you’re never erased.”

She looked up at him in astonishment. “Rémy…”

“It’s not foolproof, I suppose. But who will be looking in an old Catholic religious book to find the names of missing Jewish children? And who would think to decode the stars and dots this way? It should be easy enough. Each name will begin on a new page, and we’ll simply add that number to each number of the series. For example, the second name will begin on page two, and then on to page three instead of two, page four instead of three, page six instead of five, page nine instead of eight, and so on. If there’s already a dot on the page, well, simply proceed with a new dot, and it will just make the code that much more difficult to decipher if anyone ever tries.”

Eva’s head spun. “But what about the false names we’re giving the children? How will we keep track of those without making the children discoverable?”

“Simple. Just start at the back of each person’s sequence and encode the false names in reverse order. Let’s take you, for example. The book goes to numerical page six hundred eighty-eight, so the last number that would fit in the book from your sequence would be six hundred ten. We’ll start there with a triangle over the first e, then over the v on page three hundred seventy-seven, the a on two hundred thirty-three, and we’ll start your false surname, Moreau, on page one hundred forty-four. So on like that until we have the whole name down, in reverse, on the very same pages we put your real name. If we run out of room in either direction—if there are more letters than there are pages—it’s fine. The beginnings of names should be enough to jog our memories in those cases. You see, Eva? It’s nearly perfect.”

He grinned at her and she felt breathless. She looked back at the book, and then at him. “You just came up with this?”

“I was up all night. You were right, Eva. We can’t erase the children who might not be able to speak for themselves. We’ll keep a list of all of them.”

“I—I don’t know what to say.”

“You could say, ‘Rémy, you’re a genius.’ Or, ‘Rémy, you’re devastatingly handsome.’?”

Eva laughed, surprised to feel tears in her eyes. “Yes, both of those things. And also, Rémy, you’re a hero. This is remarkable. But what if Père Clément is right about the dangers of keeping the list?”

Rémy shrugged. “He is. And that’s why this system will work. I’m sure of it. No one will discover the book, and if they do, the stars, dots, and triangles won’t mean a thing. Besides, we’ll keep it in plain sight on the shelves; who would think to look inside for anything suspicious anyhow?” He paused. “The pages will fill up fast, so we’ll start with black ink, and if we run out of room in the book, we’ll go back to the start and use blue.” He opened the book once again to the first page and pushed it gently toward Eva. “But we’ll never start another name on page one. That will only be for you.” When Eva looked up at him, his expression was somber.

She met his gaze and then glanced down at the book, her cheeks warm. “I don’t know how to thank you for this, Rémy.”

“Yes, well, you’ll owe me forever, of course.” His easy grin was back.

Eva smiled and picked up the pen he’d left on the table. Wordlessly, she turned to page two and drew a tiny star over the r in feront and a dot over the é in étoit. On page three, she etched a dot over the m in Romains and on page four, a dot over the y in il y a. When she looked up again, Rémy was staring at her.

“You’re writing my name,” he said quietly.

“Yes,” she replied. “Page two is only for you.”



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