The Nightingale

“I found her chalking V’s on the German posters,” said the swarthy man who’d caught her. Didier.

Isabelle fisted her right hand, trying to rub the orange chalk away without them noticing.

“Have you nothing to say?” said the old man standing in the corner. He was the boss, obviously.

“I have no chalk.”

“I saw her doing it.”

Isabelle took a chance. “You’re not German,” she said to the strong man. “You’re French. I’d bet money on it. And you,” she said to the old man who was seated by the boy, “you’re the pork butcher.” The boy she dismissed altogether, but to the handsome young man in the tattered clothes, she said, “You look hungry, and I think you’re wearing your brother’s clothes, or something you found hanging on a line somewhere. Communist.”

He grinned at her, and it changed his whole demeanor.

But it was the man standing in the corner she cared about. The one in charge. She took a step toward him. “You could be Aryan. Maybe you’re forcing the others to be here.”

“I’ve known him all my life, M’mselle,” the pork butcher said. “I fought beside his father—and yours—at Somme. You’re Isabelle Rossignol, oui?”

She didn’t answer. Was it a trap?

“No answer,” said the Bolshevik. He rose from his seat, came toward her. “Good for you. Why were you chalking a V on the poster?”

Again, Isabelle remained silent.

“I am Henri Navarre,” he said, close enough now to touch her. “We are not Germans, nor do we work with them, M’mselle.” He gave her a meaningful look. “Not all of us are passive. Now why were you marking up their posters?”

“It was all I could think of,” she said.

“Meaning?”

She exhaled evenly. “I heard de Gaulle’s speech on the radio.”

Henri turned to the back of the room, sent a glance to the old man. She watched the two men have an entire conversation without speaking a word. At the end of it, she knew who the boss was: the handsome communist. Henri.

At last, Henri said, turning to her again, “If you could do something more, would you?”

“What do you mean?” she asked.

“There is a man in Paris—”

“A group, actually, from the Musée de l’Homme—” the burly man corrected him.

Henri held up a hand. “We don’t say more than we must, Didier. Anyway, there is a man, a printer, risking his life to make tracts that we can distribute. Maybe if we can get the French to wake up to what is happening, we have a chance.” Henri reached into a leather bag that hung on his chair and pulled out a sheaf of papers. A headline jumped out at her: “Vive le Général de Gaulle.”

The text was an open letter to Maréchal Pétain that expressed criticism of the surrender. At the end it read, “Nous sommes pour le général de Gaulle.” We support Général de Gaulle.

“Well?” Henri said quietly, and in that single word, Isabelle heard the call to arms she’d been waiting for. “Will you distribute them?”

“Me?”

“We are communists and radicals,” Henri said. “They are already watching us. You are a girl. And a pretty one at that. No one would suspect you.”

Isabelle didn’t hesitate. “I’ll do it.”

The men started to thank her; Henri silenced them. “The printer is risking his life by writing these tracts, and someone is risking his or her life by typing them. We are risking our lives by bringing them here. But you, Isabelle, you are the one who will be caught distributing them—if you are caught. Make no mistake. This is not chalking a V on a poster. This is punishable by death.”

“I won’t get caught,” she said.

Henri smiled at that. “How old are you?”

“Almost nineteen.”

“Ah,” he said. “And how can one so young hide this from her family?”

“My family’s not the problem,” Isabelle said. “They pay no attention to me. But … there’s a German soldier billeted at my house. And I would have to break curfew.”

“It will not be easy. I understand if you are afraid.” Henri began to turn away.

Isabelle snatched the papers back from him. “I said I’d do it.”

*

Isabelle was elated. For the first time since the armistice, she wasn’t completely alone in her need to do something for France. The men told her about dozens of groups like theirs throughout the country, mounting a resistance to follow de Gaulle. The more they talked, the more excited she became at the prospect of joining them. Oh, she knew she should be afraid. (They told her often enough.)

But it was ridiculous—the Germans threatening death for handing out a few pieces of paper. She could talk her way out of it if she were caught; she was sure of it. Not that she would get caught. How many times had she sneaked out of a locked school or boarded a train without a ticket or talked her way out of trouble? Her beauty had always made it easy for her to break rules without reprisal.

“When we have more, how will we contact you?” Henri asked as he opened the door to let her leave.

She glanced down the street. “The apartment above Madame La Foy’s hat shop. Is it still vacant?”

Henri nodded.