The Room on Rue Amélie(64)
In the first week of the new year, they hosted an RAF pilot named Jon Payne, who stared long and hard at Ruby on his first night with them. “I’m sorry,” he said when she caught him looking for the third time. “You just remind me of someone.”
“Who?”
He cleared his throat. “It’s rather foolish, but there’s a fellow in my squadron who was shot down a little over a year ago and helped by an escape line through Paris. He and I roomed together for a little while. He’d have these nightmares, and he’d yell out a name over and over again. When I finally asked him about it, he said he couldn’t talk about the specifics of the escape line—of course that’s one of the rules—but that there was a woman in Paris who had helped him. He told me a bit about her; he thought she was extraordinary. He didn’t realize he was calling out her name, of course. But the way he described her, she sounded just like you.”
“Like me?”
The pilot nodded. “Yes. She was American too, just like you are, and beautiful. But of course you go by Fleur.”
“And what name was he calling out?”
“I’m not sure I should say.”
Ruby nodded and waited. Surely there were other women around Paris helping on the line. And wasn’t it far more likely that the pilot in question was calling out the name of the gorgeous Laure?
“Well,” Jon said after a moment, “all of you go by code names anyhow, don’t you?”
“You’re right, of course.”
“It was Ruby,” Jon said. “The name he said over and over was Ruby.”
Ruby felt her whole body go numb. She reminded herself that the pilot could have been anyone, but she hadn’t used her real name with anyone else, with the exception of Dexter, the first refugee to show up at her door. “Who was the pilot?”
“I suppose I’d better not tell you his surname. But no harm in telling you his first name. It was Thomas. Do you know a Thomas?”
Ruby swallowed hard. “Perhaps.”
That night, Ruby lay in bed, wide awake and staring at the ceiling. The man Jon had mentioned had to be Thomas, her Thomas. But did this really mean he was thinking of her the way she was thinking of him? Or merely that she’d played a role in the most terrifying ordeal of his life? Still, the fact that he’d described her as extraordinary and beautiful, well, that was something.
The next morning, before Laure was due to arrive, Ruby pulled Jon aside. “This Thomas friend of yours,” she said. “He’s all right?”
“He’s just fine, miss. The nightmares are gone, and he’s returned to flying missions over France.” He paused and leaned in conspiratorially. “Though I think he still has a soft spot for the girl he was dreaming about.”
Ruby blinked a few times. “Well, when you get home, would you tell him that Ruby is fine? And that perhaps she thinks of him from time to time as well?”
Jon grinned. “I’d be happy to pass along the message, Fleur.”
Laure came to retrieve Jon just before noon. After he’d gone, Ruby kicked herself for not asking more. Had Thomas been injured in his escape from France? Had he run into any trouble? But to have appeared too interested would only have invited questions she couldn’t have answered. She’d have to rest assured in the knowledge that Jon would make it back to Britain safely and would pass along her message. He’d known who she was, and Thomas would too. Furthermore, now Thomas would know that she had moved and that he should be looking for someone named Fleur if he ever returned.
But then, two weeks later, Ruby and Charlotte received some terrible news. “Philippe asked me to tell you that several pilots and one of the leaders of the escape line were arrested in Urrugne last week,” Monsieur Savatier told them grimly. “They’re all being questioned now. One of them was the pilot who was here just a couple of weeks ago, Payne. There’s a real worry that one or all of them will talk and that the line will be blown.”
“What will happen to them?” Ruby managed, although she was reeling from the news.
“The pilots will be sent to POW camps in the east. As for the French and Belgians accused of helping them? Tortured for information, most likely. Then executed.”
Ruby nodded. Of course she’d known; after all, it had been Marcel’s fate too. It just reminded her anew of the stakes—and of the danger she was putting Charlotte in.
“Philippe wanted me also to tell you that you won’t hear from him for a while,” Monsieur Savatier said. “Nor will you receive any pilots. Just try to live normally. There’s no reason to think that this portion of the line has been compromised yet.”
“But if it has?”
Monsieur Savatier frowned. “I will do what I can to protect you and your cousin. But you need to be ready to run at a moment’s notice.”
FOR DAYS, RUBY AND CHARLOTTE waited. What was happening to the pilots who were shot down over Belgium and northern France in the meantime? Were they wandering around in the freezing wilderness, wondering why no one was coming to their aid? Or had they found refuge with sympathetic farmers and villagers who knew better than to send them on to Paris until they’d received an all-clear?
Despite herself, Ruby worried constantly about Thomas too. Jon Payne had said that Thomas had returned to the skies over France, but what if he was shot down again? What if he tried to get to Paris to find her? What if he made it to her old apartment building only to realize she was gone?