The Nightingale(67)

“How dare you judge me and what I’ve been through? You’re eighteen years old.”

“Nineteen,” she said. “Tell me, Papa, do you get our conquerors coffee or hail them taxis on their way to Maxim’s? Do you eat their lunch leftovers?”

He seemed to deflate before her eyes; age. She felt unaccountably regretful for her sharp words even though they were true and deserved. But she couldn’t back down now. “So we are agreed? I will move into my old room and live here. We need barely speak if that is your condition.”

“There is no food here in the city, Isabelle; not for us Parisians anyway. All over town are signs warning us not to eat rats and these signs are necessary. People are raising guinea pigs for food. You will be more comfortable in the country, where there are gardens.”

“I am not looking for comfort. Or safety.”

“What are you looking for in Paris, then?”

She realized her mistake. She’d set a trap with her foolish words and stepped right into it. Her father was many things; stupid was not one of them. “I’m here to meet a friend.”

“Tell me we are not talking about some boy. Tell me you are smarter than that.”

“The country was dull, Papa. You know me.”

He sighed, poured another drink from the bottle. She saw the telltale glaze come into his eyes. Soon, she knew, he would stumble away to be alone with whatever it was he thought about. “If you stay, there will be rules.”

“Rules?”

“You will be home by curfew. Always and without exception. You will leave me my privacy. I can’t stomach being hovered over. You will go to the shops each morning and see what our ration cards will get us. And you will find a job.” He paused, looked at her, his eyes narrowed. “And if you get yourself in trouble like your sister did, I will throw you out. Period.”

“I am not—”

“I don’t care. A job, Isabelle. Find one.”

He was still talking when she turned on her heel and walked away. She went into her old bedroom and shut the door. Hard.

She had done it! For once, she’d gotten her way. Who cared that he’d been mean and judgmental? She was here. In her bedroom, in Paris, and staying.

The room was smaller than she remembered. Painted a cheery white, with a twin iron-canopied bed and a faded old rug on the wooden plank floor and a Louis XV armchair that had seen better days. The window—blacked out—overlooked the interior courtyard of the apartment building. As a girl, she’d always known when her neighbors were taking out the trash, because she could hear them clanking out there, slamming down lids. She tossed her valise on the bed and began to unpack.

The clothes she’d taken on exodus—and returned to Paris with—were shabbier for the constant wear and hardly worth hanging in the armoire along with the clothes she’d inherited from her maman—beautiful vintage flapper dresses with flared skirts, silk-fringed evening gowns, woolen suits that had been cut down to fit her, and crepe day dresses. An array of matching hats and shoes made for dancing on ballroom floors or walking through the Rodin Gardens with the right boy on one’s arm. Clothes for a world that had vanished. There were no more “right” boys in Paris. There were practically no boys at all. They were all captive in camps in Germany or hiding out somewhere.

When her clothes were returned to hangers in the armoire, she closed the mahogany doors and pushed the armoire sideways just enough to reveal the secret door behind it.

Her fort.

She bent down and opened the door set into the white paneled wall by pushing on the top right corner. It sprang free, creaked open, revealing a storage room about six feet by six feet, with a roof so slanted that even as a ten-year-old girl, she’d had to hunch over to stand in it. Sure enough, her dolls were still in there, some slumped and others standing tall.

Isabelle closed the door on her memories and moved the armoire back in place. She undressed quickly and slipped into a pink silk dressing gown that reminded her of her maman. It still smelled vaguely of rose water—or she pretended it did. As she headed out of the room to brush her teeth, she paused at her father’s closed door.

She could hear him writing; his fountain pen scratched on rough paper. Every now and then he cursed and then fell silent. (That was when he was drinking, no doubt.) Then came the thunk of a bottle—or a fist—on the table.

Isabelle readied for bed, setting her hair in curlers and washing her face and brushing her teeth. On her way back to bed, she heard her father curse again—louder this time, maybe drinking—and she ducked into her bedroom and slammed the door behind her.