The Nightingale

Getting out of bed was not appealing, but neither was starving to death. More and more often this winter, their ration cards were useless; there was simply no food to be had, and no shoes or fabric or leather. Vianne no longer had wood for the stove or money to pay for electricity. With gas so dear, the simple act of bathing became a chore to be endured. She and Sophie slept wrapped together like puppies, beneath a mountain of quilts and blankets. In the past few months, Vianne had begun to burn everything made of wood and to sell her valuables.

Now she was wearing almost every piece of clothing she owned—flannel pants, underwear she’d knitted herself, an old woolen sweater, a neck scarf, and still she shivered when she left the bed. When her feet hit the floor, she winced at the pain from her chilblains. She grabbed a wool skirt and put it on over her pants. She’d lost so much weight this winter that she had to pin the waist in place. Coughing, she went downstairs. Her breath preceded her in white puffs that disappeared almost instantly. She limped past the guest room door.

The captain was gone, and had been for weeks. As much as Vianne hated to admit it, his absences were worse than his appearances these days. At least when he was there, there was food to eat and a fire in the hearth. He refused to let the home be cold. Vianne ate as little of the food he provided as she could—she told herself it was her duty to be hungry—but what mother could let her child suffer? Was Vianne really supposed to let Sophie starve to prove her loyalty to France?

In the darkness, she added another pair of holey socks to the two pairs already on her feet. Then she wrapped herself in a blanket and put on the mittens she’d recently knit from an old baby blanket of Sophie’s.

In the frost-limned kitchen, she lit an oil lamp and carried it outside, moving slowly, breathing hard as she climbed the slick, icy hillside to the barn. Twice she slipped and fell on the frozen grass.

The barn’s metal door handle felt burningly cold, even through her heavy mittens. She had to use all of her weight to slide the door open. Inside, she set down the lantern. The idea of moving the car was almost more than she could stand in her weakened state.

She took a deep painful breath, steeled herself, and went to the car. She put it in neutral, then bent down to the bumper and pushed with all of her strength. The car rolled forward slowly, as if in judgment.

When the trapdoor was revealed, she retrieved the oil lamp and climbed slowly down the ladder. In the long, dark months since her firing and the end of her money, she had sold off her family’s treasures one by one: a painting to feed the rabbits and chickens through the winter, a Limoges tea set for a sack of flour, silver salt and pepper shakers for a stringy pair of hens.

Opening her maman’s jewelry box, she stared down into the velvet-lined interior. Not long ago there had been lots of paste jewelry in here, as well as a few good pieces. Earrings, a filigree silver bracelet, a brooch made of rubies and hammered metal. Only the pearls were left.

Vianne removed one mitten and reached down for the pearls, scooping them into her palm. They shone in the light, as lustrous as a young woman’s skin.

They were the last link to her mother—and to their family’s heritage.

Now Sophie would not wear them on her wedding day or hand them down to her own daughters.

“But she will eat this winter,” Vianne said. She wasn’t sure if it was grief that serrated her voice, or sadness, or relief. She was lucky to have something to sell.

She gazed down at the pearls, felt their weight in her palm, and the way they drew warmth from her body for themselves. For a split second, she saw them glow. Then, grimly, she put the mitten over her hand and climbed back up the ladder.

*

Three more weeks passed in desolate cold with no sign of Beck. On a frozen late February morning, Vianne woke with a pounding headache and a fever. Coughing, she climbed out of bed and shivered, slowly lifting a blanket from the bed. She wrapped it around herself but it didn’t help. She shivered uncontrollably, even though she wore pants and two sweaters and three pairs of socks. The wind howled outside, clattering against the shutters, rattling the ice-sheened glass beneath the blackout shade.

She moved slowly through her morning routine, trying not to breathe too deeply lest a cough come up from her chest. On chilblained feet that radiated pain with every step, she made Sophie a meager breakfast of watery corn mush. Then the two of them went out into the falling snow.

In silence, they trudged to town. Snow fell relentlessly, whitening the road in front of them, coating the trees.

The church sat on a small, jutting bit of land at the edge of town, bordered on one side by the river and backed by the limestone walls of the old abbey.

“Maman, are you all right?”

Vianne had hunched forward again. She squeezed her daughter’s hand, feeling nothing but mitten on mitten. The breath stuttered in her lungs, burned. “I’m fine.”

“You should have eaten breakfast.”

“I wasn’t hungry,” Vianne said.

“Ha,” Sophie said, trudging forward through the heavy snow.