The Room on Rue Amélie(80)

The changes in Paris as the winter dragged on were unmistakable. The impeccably dressed Nazi soldiers and ingratiatingly polite officers were beginning to disappear, replaced by scruffy, ill-mannered German troops. “They’re sending the decent ones to the front now,” Lucien commented one day. “It’s a good sign. It means the Allies are winning the war, you see. They need all the best men to fight.”

And while Ruby believed Lucien, the presence of the less civilized soldiers also made things more difficult. The Germans grew crueler and more violent in their reprisals. More and more frequently, French people were picked up on suspicion of being part of the Resistance and were shot to death within hours, without any sort of due process. The Germans were nervous, Lucien said, because they were slowly losing their hold on France. But all Ruby could see was that they were tightening their grip.

On the first Tuesday in February, she stepped out into the frigid cold to queue, as she always did, for her rations. She was armed with her own tickets plus some of Lucien’s forgeries, the only way she could provide enough food for Charlotte and the pilots. It was risky to use the fake ones, of course, but it was a necessity she had grown accustomed to.

There was something different about this day, though, something ominous, and Ruby sensed it moments after she’d taken her place in the line. As the women around her rubbed their hands together, trying to get warm, and breathed out puffs of air, two German soldiers approached from the rear and two from the front. The mundane chatter—about the icy weather, about naughty children, about the punishing shortages of coal—died out as the Germans began walking the length of the line, looking at each woman’s face. Ruby held her breath and studied the ground with great interest. What if they were here for her? What if her work on the line had finally caught up to her?

One of the Germans stopped in front of her and reached out to tilt her chin up. His leather glove felt oddly warm against her chilled skin as he turned her head from side to side, as if he was inspecting cattle. He had beady blue eyes, bushy black eyebrows, a mouth that looked too small for his face. “You,” he said in deeply accented French. “Your identity card.”

Ruby could feel the eyes of the other women on her, and for a moment, she was frozen.

“Schneller!” the German shouted after only a few seconds.

Ruby fumbled in her handbag and withdrew her card, the real one that identified her as Ruby Benoit. The German stared at it for a moment and then looked up at her with narrowed eyes. “Do not move.”

He took a few steps to where the other Germans were standing, and as they conferred in hushed tones, examining her papers, she could feel her knees quaking. The others in line had scooted away from her, as if whatever was happening to her was contagious. A few left the line altogether, disappearing down alleys when the Germans’ backs were turned.

Finally, the beady-eyed German returned and thrust her papers at her. “What is your business here?”

“Queuing for barley flour,” she managed.

“Do you know Adèle Beauvais?”

The name didn’t ring a bell at all. Was it someone attached to the escape line, or was this purely a case of mistaken identity? “N-no.”

“She is not your sister?”

“No. I’ve never heard of her. I swear.”

He grabbed her chin again and held it firmly as he looked into her eyes. She refused to blink, to show him any weakness.

“Very well,” he said at last. He turned and barked something at the other Germans, and then he turned back to her. “If I find that you are lying, I will happily shoot you in the head myself.”

And then he turned sharply on his heel, followed by the other three. They got into a car a half block away, and then they were gone. Ruby collapsed to the sidewalk, breathing hard. Only one of the other women in line, a woman old enough to be Ruby’s mother, came to her aid.

“Perhaps if you know this Adèle Beauvais, you should tell her to get out while she still can,” the woman said as she helped Ruby up.

“But I’ve never heard of her.”

“Dear,” the woman said gently, “I can read on your face that you are not as innocent as you would have the Germans believe.”

Ruby opened her mouth to deny it, but then the woman pressed a package into her hand. “Here. My eggs and meat. Go home now before the day gets any worse for you. That was a narrow escape.”

“But—”

“Take it. And if you’re doing something to undermine the Germans,” she added in a whisper, “then thank you. Vive la France.” She turned her back on Ruby, pulling her wool coat more tightly around her. Finally, Ruby stepped out of line and began the walk back to her apartment, haunted by the fate that could have found her by accident.



“PERHAPS WE SHOULD STOP,” RUBY said that night as she and Charlotte ate dinner alone in the kitchen. They were between pilots, and Lucien was out at a meeting, so it was just the two of them. Ruby had told her what had happened that day and how much it had shaken her. “Things are getting more dangerous.”

“But if we stop fighting, we’ve already begun to lose. We have to keep at it until the very end.”

“Yes, I know. But today terrified me, Charlotte. The next time the Germans come, it could be for us. Your parents didn’t leave you with me thinking that I would insert you into the fight for France.”