The Room on Rue Amélie(15)

“One day,” she said to the baby, “this war will be over, and we’ll have a good life, you and I. Your papa will be there too,” she added as an afterthought. “He’s going to love you very much.”

She smiled at the sharp kick that she could see through the wall of her belly, and then, with her stomach rumbling, she got out of bed to begin her day. Ruby often awoke with a drumbeat of movement deep in her womb now, making her feel less alone. She had decided that the baby was a boy, that he would look very much like Marcel, and that when Marcel first laid eyes upon him, it would change everything. Perhaps she was as na?ve as he accused her of being, but she preferred to think of it as hopeful.

She had just put on her dress–one of three empire-waist cotton maternity dresses she’d sewed from a pattern—when there was a knock at the door. She answered and found a small, bald, middle-aged man with thick glasses standing there, clutching his hat to his chest. He stared at her for a moment, and she at him. His clothes were rumpled, but there was something about his posture and bearing that hinted at a dignified station in life. “Can I help you?” she asked.

He glanced from her face to her belly and back again before clearing his throat. “I’m looking for the man of the house,” he said, his flawless French inflected by an accent that Ruby couldn’t quite place.

“He’s not here right now,” Ruby said. “Perhaps I can assist you with something.”

The man hesitated. “I hadn’t realized Monsieur Benoit had a wife.”

“May I ask how you know him?” The man’s repeated glances at her belly were making her uneasy.

“You are expecting a child, I see?”

“You are quite observant,” Ruby said.

When the man looked up, apparently startled by her tone, she thought she saw something like kindness in his eyes for an instant, but then it was gone. “He should have informed us.”

“Who are you?” Ruby demanded. When the man didn’t answer, she added, “You are not French.”

“Of course I am.” The man was already backing away.

“Wait! Won’t you tell me who you are?”

But the man had already turned and was hurrying down the stairs. The last thing she saw before he disappeared out the front door was one final concerned glance at her belly, as if she was concealing a bomb that could explode at any moment, destroying them all.



BY THE TIME MARCEL RETURNED, late that night, Ruby had gone over the strange encounter again and again in her head, and with each repetition, she’d felt more unsettled. The man’s accent had been hard on the consonants, a bit like the way Nazi soldiers spoke when they were barking orders. My God, she thought, her stomach turning. What if Marcel is helping the Germans?

And suddenly, the pieces were falling into place, and Ruby felt ill. His long absences. His lack of regard for the German regulations, as if they didn’t apply to him. The war of morals she could see going on inside him. It all made sense. But how could he do such a thing? To collaborate would be unconscionable.

“You had a visitor today,” she said when he slipped in the door. He visibly startled; he hadn’t expected to find her glaring at him from the dining table.

“What are you doing out of bed?” It wasn’t the reply of an innocent man.

“Waiting for you.”

He stared at her across the flickering darkness. “What do you mean I had a visitor?”

“A man,” she said slowly. “A man who seemed stunned to realize I existed.”

As Marcel opened and closed his mouth like a fish, she could feel her heart hardening. He had put them in danger, Ruby and the baby, and he had the gall to stand there looking affronted.

“Well, who was it?”

Ruby looked him straight in the eye. “Your handler, I assume.”

“What?”

“Or perhaps that’s not the right term. Der Meister, is it? Is that not how they say it in German?”

His face turned white. “Der . . . what? The man who came here was German?”

Ruby stood slowly, her hands cradling her belly. “You’re going to deny it, Marcel?”

He blinked rapidly. “How do you know he was German, Ruby? What did you tell him?”

“What did I tell him? Nothing. He just seemed appalled that you had a pregnant wife. I’m sorry if I’m getting in the way of your Nazi scheming. How inconvenient.”

Marcel stared for another moment before moving toward her. She took a step back, putting her hand protectively on her belly, and he halted. “I’m not going to hurt you, Ruby.” He sounded suddenly weary. He took a seat at the table and gestured to the chair she’d just vacated. “I would never, ever hurt you. Sit. Please.”

Ruby moved the chair away from the table, putting some distance between them. “What could you possibly have to say that would make this all right?”

“I’m not helping the Germans. I would sooner die, Ruby.”

“Don’t lie to me. He certainly wasn’t French.”

He bit his lip. “You must take me at my word. I need to leave you out of this. For your own safety.”

“It’s hard to feel safe with Germans at our door.”

“He wasn’t German. For the love of God, Ruby!”