The Nightingale(53)

“Madame Mauriac,” he said, rising quickly. “What a most pleasant surprise.” He came toward her. “What may I do for you?”

“It’s about the teachers you fired at the school.”

“Not I, Madame.”

Vianne glanced at the open door behind them and took a step toward him, lowering her voice to say, “You told me the list of names was clerical in nature.”

“I am sorry. Truly. This is what I was told.”

“We need them at the school.”

“You being here, it is … dangerous perhaps.” He closed the small distance between them. “You do not want to draw attention to yourself, Madame Mauriac. Not here. There is a man…” He glanced at the door and stopped speaking. “Go, Madame.”

“I wish you hadn’t asked me.”

“As do I, Madame.” He gave her an understanding look. “Now, go. Please. You should not be here.”

Vianne turned away from Captain Beck—and all that food and the picture of the Führer—and left his office. On her way down the stairs, she saw how the soldiers observed her, smiling to one another, no doubt joking about another Frenchwoman courting a dashing German soldier who had just broken her heart. But it wasn’t until she stepped back out into the sunshine that she realized fully her mistake.

Several women were in the square, or near it, and they saw her step out of the Nazis’ lair.

One of the women was Isabelle.

Vianne hurried down the steps, toward Hélène Ruelle, the baker’s wife, who was delivering bread to the Kommandantur.

“Socializing, Madame Mauriac?” Hélène said archly as Vianne rushed past her.

Isabelle was practically running across the square toward her. With a defeated sigh, Vianne came to a standstill, waiting for her sister to reach her.

“What were you doing in there?” Isabelle demanded, her voice too loud, or maybe that was only to Vianne’s ears.

“They fired the teachers today. No. Not all of them, just the Jews and the Freemasons and the communists.” The memory welled up in her, made her feel sick. She remembered the quiet hallway and the confusion among the teachers who remained. No one knew what to do, how to defy the Nazis.

“Just them, huh?” Isabelle said, her face tightening.

“I didn’t mean it to sound that way. I meant to clarify. They didn’t fire all the teachers.” Even to her own ears it sounded a feeble excuse, so she shut up.

“And this says nothing to explain your presence at their headquarters.”

“I … thought Captain Beck could help us. Help Rachel.”

“You went to Beck for a favor?”

“I had to.”

“Frenchwomen do not ask Nazis for help, Vianne. Mon Dieu, you must know this.”

“I know,” Vianne said defiantly. “But…”

“But what?”

Vianne couldn’t hold it in anymore. “I gave him a list of names.”

Isabelle went very still. For an instant she seemed not to be breathing. The look she gave Vianne stung more than a slap across the face. “How could you do that? Did you give him Rachel’s name?”

“I d-didn’t know,” Vianne stammered. “How could I know? He said it was clerical.” She grabbed Isabelle’s hand. “Forgive me, Isabelle. Truly. I didn’t know.”

“It is not my forgiveness you need to seek, Vianne.”

Vianne felt a stinging, profound shame. How could she have been so foolish, and how in God’s name could she make amends? She glanced at her wristwatch. Classes would be ending soon. “Go to the school,” Vianne said. “Get Sophie, Sarah, and take them home. There’s something I need to do.”

“Whatever it is, I hope you’ve thought it through.”

“Go,” Vianne said tiredly.

*

The chapel of St. Jeanne was a small stone Norman church at the edge of town. Behind it, and within its medieval walls, lay the convent of the Sisters of St. Joseph, nuns who ran both an orphanage and a school.

Vianne went into the church, her footsteps echoing on the cold stone floor; her breath plumed in front of her. She took off her mittens just long enough to touch her fingertips to the frozen holy water. She made the sign of the cross and went to an empty pew; she genuflected and then knelt. Closing her eyes, she bent her head in prayer.

She needed guidance—and forgiveness—but for the first time in her life she could find no words for her prayer. How could she be forgiven for such a foolish, thoughtless act?