The Baker's Secret(40)

She dug in a cabinet and found an umbrella—not for herself but for the bread, which she slid loaf by warm loaf into the green canvas bag of the Kommandant’s aide, hooking the umbrella handle in as well to keep the bread dry.

Two baguettes remained on the drying rack. Could Mémé be trusted to deliver them? Not without risking much more than the bread. Could Emma leave the loaves for later? They might harden, or be seen by anyone passing by. Perhaps if she changed her route, asking certain people to make deliveries on her behalf.

That was it. There were no alternatives. She eased the extra loaves in beside the others, threw the bag’s strap over her shoulder, and set out into the rain. She angled the umbrella to spare the bread, as if the end of the loaf were the face of a baby.





Chapter 19




Emma trudged down muddy lanes, angling against the rainfall. She had brewed extra tea to keep Mémé sedate while she was gone, though it was actually ground chicory and rose-ends, supplies of real tea having run out years before.

Perhaps, Emma considered, she was walking to her execution. She had no alternatives, possessed no weapons. All she had was rage—which might be the better half of courage, but it had never won a war—and fourteen cooling loaves.

Her plan was to drop one baguette with Yves, if his boat was in the harbor, and another with Fleur, who babysat her broken mother in a house near the sea. Each of them was capable of dividing and delivering a loaf, while Emma continued with the remaining dozen to the command post north of Longues.

The Kommandant would see his order obeyed. The Field Marshal would have his sample. Either he would like the bread, allowing her to live, or he would taste the straw, and her days would end. In a few hours Mémé’s tea would run out, she would call for help, and no one would come. Gradually everyone who depended upon her network, from Pierre to Fleur, from Michelle to Marguerite, would lose the necessities that Emma provided. It was not a long walk to the command post, but a slow one with the roads so soggy.

Along puttered a motorcycle of the occupying army, splashing through the puddles. Emma stepped aside for it to pass, but the rider slowed. She gritted her teeth, ready to parry a flirtation or absorb scorn, as the motorcycle came to a stop. The rider lifted his hood and she saw that it was Captain Thalheim.

“Hello, Sergeant,” she said. The days of rapport, of morning visits to the baking shed, were long gone.

He did not so much as blink. “The Kommandant commands me for to give the baguette woman a ride.”

“He doesn’t want me to get wet? What a gentleman.”

“He doesn’t want the Field Marshal to receive soggy bread.” He thumbed at the space behind him. “Climb on.”

Emma had too many loaves. The two extras would give her away before anyone took a bite. As she deliberated, the rain fell sideways across her face.

“The Kommandant’s patience is thin today. Climb on.”

Emma had no alternative. There was no sidecar either, only the back half of his seat. “Look away,” she said, and when he did, she hiked her skirts and threw one leg over the saddle. Angling the umbrella to shield the bread, Emma leaned forward enough that she hoped not to touch him any more than necessary. But Thalheim revved the throttle and popped the clutch so that she nearly fell off, and she was compelled to grab him.

“No talk,” he said, bouncing through the ruts toward the command post, where there awaited the unsuspecting taste buds of a man who could end her life with a nod.



A guard lifted one hand, keeping the other on his machine gun’s trigger, and Thalheim slowed the motorcycle to pull back the hood of his slicker. The guard saluted, which tipped rain off the brim of his helmet, and waved them on. Emma held the captain’s shoulder, still shielding the bread, as they wove through the trucks and outposts to a wide wet field rounded by barbed wire. Finally they arrived at a guarded gate.

“Off,” Thalheim said, halting. “From here we walk.”

Emma dismounted, attempting to smooth her dress, though it was sodden. He led the way through a maze of wires, until they reached a tent in which there was a desk. A soldier there put down his cigarette to salute the captain. While they exchanged words Emma tried to sidle out. Perhaps she could drop two loaves behind a tent flap. But they finished their business quickly and Thalheim hurried past.

“Stay close,” he muttered.

As she followed, another guard tagged along. He sniffed his runny nose, and Emma observed that he was young, perhaps fifteen. He was carrying a strange gun, too—like an ordinary rifle but sealed in all openings except the barrel. He labored under its weight.

“What is happening?” Emma asked.

“An escort, in case you try anything foolish. This area is secure.”

Thalheim’s comment caused Emma to lift her gaze and survey the land around them. Vision blurred by the sideways rain, she could tell that it was vast, two wheat fields in addition to the unmown hay field they were marching across, but what stopped her midstride was the discovery that the farm had been converted into a massive battery. Steel-gray guns, their barrels easily ten meters long, poked out of fortifications that were shaped like giant helmets, but made of concrete two meters thick. Their roofs covered with branches and leaves, the pillboxes arced around the field so that the guns pointed out to sea in all directions, especially the long beaches that interrupted the bluffs and cliffs of coastline.