TWENTY-TWO
After she returned from the Vizniaks’ apartment, Isabelle lit an oil lamp and went into the salon, where she found her father asleep at the dining room table, his head resting on the hard wood as if he’d passed out. Beside him was a half-empty brandy bottle that had been full not long ago. She took the bottle and put it on the sideboard, hoping that out of reach would equal out of mind in the morning.
She almost reached out for him, almost stroked the gray hair that obscured his face, a small, oval-shaped bald spot revealed by repose. She wanted to be able to touch him that way, in comfort, in love, in companionship.
Instead, she went into the kitchen, where she made a pot of bitter, dark, made-from-acorns coffee and found a small loaf of the tasteless gray bread that was all the Parisians could get anymore. She broke off a piece (what would Madame Dufour say about that? Eating while walking), and chewed it slowly.
“That coffee smells like shit,” her father said, bleary-eyed, lifting his head as she came into the room.
She handed him her cup. “It tastes worse.”
Isabelle poured another cup of coffee for herself and sat down beside him. The lamplight accentuated the road-map look of his face, deepening the pits and wrinkles, making the flesh beneath his eyes look wax-like and swollen.
She waited for him to say something, but he just stared at her. Beneath his pointed gaze, she finished her coffee (she needed it to swallow the dry, terrible bread) and pushed the empty cup away. Isabelle stayed there until he fell asleep again and then she went into her own room. But there was no way she could sleep. She lay there for hours, wondering and worrying. Finally, she couldn’t stand it anymore. She got out of bed and went into the salon.
“I’m going out to see,” she announced.
“Don’t,” he said, still seated at the table.
“I won’t do anything stupid.”
She returned to her bedroom and changed into a summer-weight blue skirt and short-sleeved white blouse. She put a faded blue silk scarf around her messy hair, tied it beneath her chin, and left the apartment.
On the third floor, she saw that the door to the Vizniak apartment was open. She peered inside.
The room had been looted. Only the biggest pieces of furniture remained and the drawers of the black bombé chest were open. Clothes and inexpensive knickknacks were scattered across the floor. Rectangular black marks on the wall revealed missing artwork.
She closed the door behind her. In the lobby, she paused just long enough to compose herself and then opened the door.
Buses rolled down the street, one after another. Through the dirty bus windows, she saw dozens of children’s faces, with their noses pressed to the glass, and their mothers seated beside them. The sidewalks were curiously empty.
Isabelle saw a French policeman standing at the corner and she went to him. “Where are they going?”
“Vélodrome d’Hiver.”
“The sporting stadium? Why?”
“You don’t belong here. Go or I’ll put you on a bus and you’ll end up with them.”
“Maybe I’ll do that. Maybe—”
The policeman leaned close, whispered, “Go.” He grabbed her arm and dragged her to the side of the road. “Our orders are to shoot anyone who tries to escape. You hear me?”
“You’d shoot them? Women and children?”
The young policeman looked miserable. “Go.”
Isabelle knew she should stay. That was the smart thing to do. But she could walk to the Vél d’Hiv almost as quickly as these buses could drive there. It was only a few blocks away. Maybe then she would know what was happening.
For the first time in months, the barricades on the side streets of Paris were unmanned. She ducked around one and ran down the street, toward the river, past closed-up shops and empty cafés. Only a few blocks away, she came to a breathless stop across the street from the stadium. An endless stream of buses jammed with people drew up alongside the huge building and disgorged passengers. Then the doors wheezed shut and the buses drove off again; others drove up to take their place. She saw a sea of yellow stars.
There were thousands of men, women, and children, looking confused and despairing, being herded into the stadium. Most were wearing layers of clothing—too much for the July heat. Police patrolled the perimeter like American cowboys herding cattle, blowing whistles, shouting orders, forcing the Jewish people forward, into the stadium or onto other buses.
Families.
She saw a policeman shove a woman with his baton so hard she stumbled to her knees. She staggered upright, reaching blindly to the little boy beside her, protecting him with her body as she limped toward the stadium entrance.
She saw a young French policeman and fought through the crowd to get to him.
“What’s happening?” she asked.
“That’s not your concern, M’mselle. Go.”
Isabelle looked back at the large cycling stadium. All she saw were people, bodies crammed together, families trying to hold on to each other in the melee. The police shouted at them, shoved them forward toward the stadium, yanked children and mothers to their feet when they fell. She could hear children crying. A pregnant woman was on her knees, rocking back and forth, clutching her distended belly.
“But … there are too many of them in there…” Isabelle said.
“They’ll be deported soon.”
“Where?”
He shrugged. “I know nothing about it.”
“You must know something.”
“Work camps,” he mumbled. “In Germany. That’s all I know.”
“But … they’re women and children.”
He shrugged again.
Isabelle couldn’t comprehend it. How could the French gendarmes be doing this to Parisians? To women and children? “Children can hardly work, M’sieur. You must have thousands of children in there, and pregnant women. How—”
“Do I look like the mastermind of this? I just do what I’m told. They tell me to arrest the foreign-born Jews in Paris, so I do it. They want the crowd separated—single men to Drancy, families to the Vél d’Hiv. Voilà! It’s done. Point rifles at them and be prepared to shoot. The government wants all of France’s foreign Jews sent east to work camps, and we’re starting here.”
All of France? Isabelle felt the air rush out of her lungs. Operation Spring Wind. “You mean this isn’t just happening in Paris?”
“No. This is just the start.”