Nanée watched Edouard cross the deck. It seemed forever until the boy found his name, even though he’d just called it, for heaven’s sake. The poor kid seemed puzzled. He’d made a mistake and was sorting out how to cover it up, Nanée thought.
She joined them, saying, “Paul, don’t you have my name on that list too?”
He blanched, the distraction she wanted.
“No,” he said. “I sure wish I did, but someone else has the list with the ladies.”
“I’ll see you onshore then,” she said to Edouard, who took her cue and set off before the boy could see she’d made his decision for him.
She stayed, chatting easily now, as Edouard made his way down the plank, off the boat, and out of sight. Only when he was gone did she set about getting a better look at the boy’s list: Danny’s name, and below it, Edouard’s—names and a very few details, and a final column in which there was a checkmark for Edouard but not for Danny. She scanned up the page to another name with a checkmark.
“What’s that mean, Paul?” she asked.
He looked to the checkmark she was indicating.
“That’s the ones we can’t let go.”
He hadn’t followed the line across the page properly. Danny was meant to be let go, and Edouard to be kept.
“Is the ship to take them somewhere?” she asked, needing to determine how much time they might have to get Danny off, and what the detectives in the lounge might want Edouard for.
The boy shrugged. “I don’t think so. But I just send them one way or the other. That’s all I know.”
BY MIDAFTERNOON, NANéE and everyone but Danny were released and on the trolley, Edouard and André headed for Villa Air-Bel and their daughters while Nanée went into town with Varian to see what could be done about Danny. The streets of Marseille remained festooned with flags and tired bunting. Some of the Garde Pétain still swaggered down streets where the street sweepers were hard at work. The roundups had nothing to do with illegal activity; they’d simply cleared the streets of anyone who might cause a ruckus while Pétain was in town. If it hadn’t been for Jacqueline’s sister’s suitcase, they too might have been spared.
Danny had succeeded in closing the office the morning of the raids so that none of the other employees had been taken into custody. The legal activity of the CAS was in full swing again when Nanée and Varian arrived. A stranger sat in Varian’s office with his feet up on the desk. Varian was so calm about it. So unfazed. He had been expecting this moment, and, in typical Varian form, had already thought through how he would play it. Even as Jay Allen—a newspaper man sent by the Emergency Rescue Committee in New York to replace him—explained that he would be running the CAS part-time and leaving his assistant in charge while he traveled around Europe, reporting the news, Varian nodded as if that suited him just fine. He suggested that Nanée find Captain Dubois to see about getting Danny released from the boat while he turned his desk over to Mr. Allen and Miss Palmer—giving the appearance of helping transition the office to their care, Nanée saw, while buying himself time before he would be forced to return to the States.
Allen was not prepared to allow Nanée to leave quite yet, though. A package had arrived for her that morning, with no return address, and he meant to have her open it in front of them. He clearly wasn’t someone who would break rules or risk his own safety to help refugees.
Nanée suggested that Allen open the package himself, so it was he who pulled Pemmy from the box. When little Joey fell from the stuffed kangaroo’s pocket, startling him, it was all she could do not to laugh. Varian too, judging from his expression.
“It belongs to a young girl I was traveling with,” Nanée explained, staying with the truth.
Who brought it? She had no idea. Also true.
“How do we know it isn’t being used to smuggle something?” Allen demanded.
“In a child’s toy?” Miss Palmer said.
“You’re welcome to examine the poor, overloved kangaroo and her baby,” Nanée said, “to see if you can find any seam that has been tampered with.”
Allen scowled. “I have a train to catch. Miss Palmer, you can deal with this.”
As Nanée, Varian, and Miss Palmer watched him go, even Miss Palmer seemed relieved. Nanée picked up the joey from the floor and offered it to the woman, who declined to take it.
“I’m sure the child it belongs to will be very glad to have it,” she said.
Nanée hesitated. “Do be careful here, Miss Palmer. Not everyone in Marseille is well-intentioned.”
Varian wasn’t about to disclose to Allen and Palmer their secret routes, the places they hid refugees, or how they converted Nanée’s dollar contributions into francs. Nanée could see that. He would transition to these newcomers the legitimate work of providing assistance to refugees in the limited ways Vichy allowed, while his own people continued the work of getting refugees out of France from Villa Air-Bel.
Nanée left Varian with Miss Palmer and went to find Captain Dubois, who was incensed that anyone working at the CAS had been arrested in the roundups. And why hadn’t they contacted him for help? She rode with him back to the boat, but waited onshore. A few minutes later, Danny emerged. He had no more idea why he’d been kept than any of them had as to why they’d been arrested in the first place.
“Just Vichy efficiency,” Nanée said.
Thursday, December 5, 1940
VILLA AIR-BEL
Luki held Pemmy up, then Joey, for Papa to kiss good night. They were all tucked under the warm covers, Papa just finished reading to them from the letters he’d written her even when he couldn’t send them.
“Now, Pemmy,” Papa said, “you keep Luki company, and don’t let her lose another tooth for a few minutes. I have some things to talk about with Mr. Fry.”
Luki nodded. “About going to America.”
“Yes.”
“Together.”
Papa looked the way he did when he was making up his mind. “Together, yes.”
“And we’ll go on a train?”
“We’ll leave on a train. We might have to walk some of the way. And we’ll be on a boat for a long time too.”
“America is very far away.”
“Yes.”
“It’s where the angels live.”
“The angels?”
“Tante Nanée lives there, except she lives here now. That’s what she told me on the train. This is her house. We’ll go on the same train?”
Papa went quiet in that way that always made Pemmy nervous.
“Yes,” he said finally, “this time we’ll leave on the same train.”
“We could take the train Tante Nanée and I rode. It had a whole big bed, and a place to sit, and our own toilet. Will she come too?”
“Nanée?” Papa stroked her hair.
She closed her eyes, his hand gentle on her forehead. She touched Pemmy’s forehead the same way, so she would feel warm and cozy too.
“Would you like that?” he whispered.
Would she like Tante Nanée to come with them? She was afraid both that Tante Nanée wasn’t an angel and that she might be, that she could fly her to Mutti, but then she would have to leave Papa behind.
She whispered, “I wish Mutti could come with us.”
Papa pulled her close. Luki could feel him crying even though he didn’t make a noise.