The bad man said, “No one without every document in order may be allowed to continue on. Not even a child.”
Tante Nanée stepped out of the room and closed the door behind her. Luki stared at the door, her eyes wide open now. She wanted to call out to Tante Nanée please not to leave her. She didn’t want to be alone in the dark, without even Tante Berthe’s voice outside the hiding trunk. Papa wasn’t here. Mutti was with the angels. Even Pemmy was gone. Pemmy was a princess, and Joey was a prince. No one would hurt them because they were with the queen in the castle. But without Tante Nanée, Luki didn’t know how to get to Papa. Papa wasn’t at the dreaming log. Luki didn’t know where Papa was.
Saturday, November 30, 1940
VILLA AIR-BEL
Edouard held Luki in a long, desperate hug, afraid to let go, afraid to crush her, to suffocate her, to lose her again. Luki held on as tightly, his every concern that she might not remember him washed away in her embrace. He held her just a little bit away, finally, to see in the light splashing out from the villa onto the belvedere the same caramel hair and startling blue-black eyes. She had been old for her years ever since Elza’s death, but now she looked like an ancient soul peering out from a child’s face. She was exhausted. He needed to get her something to eat and tuck her in bed. He might stay up all night, watching her sleep.
Behind him at the French doors to the villa, everyone stood watching. They had just finished dinner and were moving into the Grand Salon to listen to the radio when Edouard saw Luki and Nanée from the window, in the moon shadow as they walked across the car park. Only Dagobert ran out with him, the little dog now climbing all over Nanée, a few feet away.
Luki threw her arms around him again and began sobbing. He kissed her head, breathing in the slightly sour scent of a child too long on the road. “It’s okay,” he said. “We’re together now. That’s all that matters.”
“I didn’t disappear,” she blubbered.
“No,” he said. “No. You’re here with me.”
“I wanted to see Mutti, but I was afraid to disappear,” she said, or that’s what it sounded like, but it was hard to make out, her words so racked with sobs.
He held her for a long time, repeating “You’re here with me” over and over.
She didn’t have Pemmy. Had she outgrown the kangaroo? The idea made him inexplicably devastated. He held her back a little and looked her straight in the eyes, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket, and wiped her face.
“Did Pemmy take a bath and have to ride in your suitcase again?” he asked.
She giggled a little. He had never heard a sound so glorious.
“Pemmy stayed with Joey,” she answered, wiping her running nose with her sleeve. “They’re going to be a princess and a prince until the queen can send them to us. She’ll help them write letters. We had a suitcase, but we left it behind in the woods by the tomb.”
Edouard looked over her head to Nanée, with Dagobert now in her arms.
“We slept on the train, in a whole big bed!” Luki said. “Much bigger than when I left Paris with Tante Berthe. The train was supposed to come this morning, but it was very late. Tante Nanée took me a secret way after we got off the train. Did we surprise you?”
Without waiting for him to answer, she turned to Nanée. “Will you live here with us, Tante Nanée?”
Nanée laughed her easy, deep laugh. “This is my house, Luki. Look, this is my dog, Dagobert. Remember, I told you about him?”
Luki smiled now, and looked into Edouard’s face. “Like in the song,” she said, and she began to sing the nursery rhyme, “‘The good king Dagobert put his pants on inside out.’” She giggled and exclaimed, “Except this Dagobert doesn’t even wear pants!”
God, this girl would break his heart.
Nanée set Dagobert on the ground and said, “Daggs, this is our new friend, Luki.”
The dog looked from Nanée to Luki, then approached Luki carefully, as if he meant to be sure not to scare her. Luki touched Dagobert’s ear the way she forever touched Professor Ellie-Mouse’s kangaroo one. Dagobert shook his head quickly a few times, which startled Luki. She laughed, and the dog put his paws up to her and began licking her face, and she laughed even more.
Edouard said, “Shall we show you your room?” Luki was wound up now, but would soon crash. “Mind you,” he said, “it might not be your room for long. We’re going to go on a grand adventure together, you and I. Very soon.”
“But this time, you’ll come with me on the train,” Luki said.
Edouard hesitated.
“The princess train me and Tante Nanée took was very pretty,” Luki said, “but every time we stopped, a man banged on our door.”
“Every time the train stopped?” Edouard asked Nanée.
“Pffft, extra security, because Pétain will be here Tuesday. They were quite concerned Luki might be planning to blow a bridge just to embarrass the man, but of course a smile and a few francs are so often all that’s needed to address such concerns.”
“Well, Moppelchen,” he said, “we may not even take a train. We might just walk to Spain!”
“To Spain?” Luki said. “That’s a different country!”
“It is,” he said. “You are a very smart girl.”
“Can Dagobert come to Spain with me?”
Nanée knelt down to Luki’s level. “You haven’t even met Madame LaVache yet, and already you’re planning to leave?”
“Madame LaVache!” Luki exclaimed. “Papa, can we meet Madame LaVache now? Tante Nanée said I can milk her.”
Edouard wished he had a camera with him, wished he could capture this moment. He scooped her up and stood, basking in the touch of her arms around his neck, her legs wrapped around his waist, her breath on his cheek.
“I suppose the moon is bright enough to light our way out to visit Madame LaVache.”
He pulled Luki to him again and hugged her tightly, suddenly desperate. To leave, yes. To get this child somewhere safe.
“THIS COW WILL be awfully confused, us coming to haunt her in the dark,” André said, but it was clear in the way he said it that the adventure amused him. Edouard trooped with everyone across the uneven field toward the little milking shed and Madame LaVache, Aube and Peterkin continually asking Luki if she still had the sugar cube, and teaching her to call to Madame LaVache, “Woooo, cow!” Jacqueline admonished Aube again and again to watch for cow patties—impossible to do in the moonlight—before Varian found one with his foot. As they neared the fenced enclosure and the shed, a dark mound rose. Ah Madame, we disturb your slumber.