The Paris Architect: A Novel

But one afternoon when Alain ordered him to buy some tracing paper from the stationers, he went out the door but then came back to get a sample of the paper he’d forgotten to take with him. Because Alain constantly screamed at him for the tiniest mistakes, Pierre let himself back in very quietly. Inside the vestibule of the office, he heard a metallic scratching sound. Alain was working his penknife in the lock of Lucien’s desk drawer. As Pierre watched, he unlocked the drawer and went through the papers very carefully. This seemed odd, and so Pierre kept an eye on Alain from then on.

One morning when Lucien was out, and Pierre was back in the storage closet straightening up, he overheard Alain on the telephone asking to talk to a German officer. This sent a bolt of panic up his spine. Did Alain know about his fake identity? He was such a mean boy, perfectly capable of betraying him and Lucien. He knew Alain hated Lucien; he cursed him all the time when Lucien wasn’t around. And Alain certainly hated Pierre’s guts—he told him that almost every day. Pierre knew that it had been too good to be true that he had found Lucien to take care of him and more importantly treat him like a son. It would all be snatched away from him in an instant, just as he was starting to feel safe in his new life. Why would he be so lucky to get a new home when all his family had been killed? His first thought when he heard Alain on the telephone was to run away, but he had nowhere to go. And he couldn’t go to Lucien because he really had no proof of Alain’s treachery. He decided to stay calm and keep watch on Alain.

But after secretly listening to a few more telephone conversations in the following weeks, Pierre figured out that Alain was talking to a relative, an uncle, of whom he was very fond. He realized that this had nothing to do with revealing his secret identity. Although he’d moved into Lucien’s apartment, he knew that Alain probably continued to go through Lucien’s papers after hours. One day, on his way back to the office after running an errand, he saw Lucien leave the office. Then he saw Alain come out and start walking about twenty meters behind him. He acted like he didn’t want Lucien to spot him. Out of curiosity, he followed Alain and discovered that he was following Lucien. The three of them meandered through the streets of Paris with Alain trailing Lucien, and Pierre trailing Alain. Two more times, including today’s excursion, he followed Alain when he left right after Lucien did. Pierre was certain that Lucien had some sort of secret life that he didn’t want anyone else to know about. He could see that Alain was determined to find out what it was, which meant Lucien was in danger. And that meant he was also in danger.

On his way back home, Pierre took a detour to look at Madame Charpointier’s old house. He had visited it twice before, always hiding in a doorway down the street so none of the neighbors would see him and betray him to the Germans. He never figured out who betrayed them. Staring at the attic window where he’d watched Madame Charpointier get shot on the sidewalk that terrible day made him sick to his stomach. The image of her dropping to the ground would never go away. She had been his protector, and Pierre had been powerless to save her. The shame of sitting there and letting it happen haunted him every day. Pierre vowed that would never be repeated. He had to be a man now; that’s what his father had told him at his bar mitzvah.





51





“He thinks he’s hiding under the floorboards, Paulus.”

“Maybe he’s in that chandelier up there.”

“Could be. Or he could be hiding in the cushion I’m sitting on.”

Captain Bruckner and Lieutenant Paulus lounged lazily in the plush armchairs of a townhouse on rue de Bassano, where they’d been ordered to go by Colonel Schlegal. Luckily for them, their superior was off in the countryside with his French mistress, so they could deal with this matter without him breathing down their necks. One of Schlegal’s informants told him that a Jew was in this apartment. They had decided to study the problem by relaxing in the luxurious salon first.

“You’re not going to have me tapping on the walls, are you?” asked Paulus.

“Hell no. That Schlegal has a screw loose,” said Bruckner. “I’m not going through the same shit we did at that cottage in Epinay. I still can’t believe that. I ruined a uniform tearing through that place.”

“You think that’s bad? I stepped on a goddamn nail.”