With Each New Dawn, page 27
The small leather pouch of francs he urged her to open the night before he died lay in her pack. But he had bequeathed her something with far more meaning. The faint glow from Madame Chalomet’s barn window highlighted a gold chain threaded through a brooch whose convex glass cover opened and closed.
Monsieur dropped the treasure into Kate’s hand, and she opened the latch. Inside, a hazy photo showed a baby and a toddler on a man’s knee.
“You and my father, with your father?”
She clung to the tenderness in Monsieur’s, “Oui.” That moment would live with her forever, signifying all that mattered most—family. Of course Domingo raced toward his people. If she had a mother or a brother alive in this world, she would do the same.
He leaped a six-foot creek, and as if waking from sleep, turned. His expression displayed fury, terror, willpower, and resolve, but he paused to offer her his hand.
She found a rock midstream and grabbed for him as she made the jump to the steep side. Domingo’s panting exceeded hers, and fear radiated the moist, shady air. His temples wet and his voice shaking, he hesitated.
“Maman—”
Kate longed to somehow ease his anxiety. When her fingertips grazed his forearm, he blinked and lurched ahead.
On the meadow’s far side, they veered left again. Rocks. Brush. Finally, rich green pasture brimming with placid sheep and a small figure armed with a wooden crook. Domingo raced to the diminutive shepherdess and swallowed her in his arms.
The petite, wizened woman dressed in black peered around his thick arm. Domingo swung around, still panting, and swept his hand behind him.
“Our home—Maman.”
That one, simple word razed Kate’s heart. From his mother’s salt and pepper hair to a meadow spiked with rocks, smoke wisps from a stone chimney, and rock walls encircling all, Kate took in the scene. So this was the mother who drew Domingo home. They’d arrived at his place in this world.
She took a slow step forward. “Bonsoir, Madame.” Bright dark eyes greeted Kate, and dry, work-worn fingers squeezed her hand.
Domingo hulked over his mother on the way to the farmhouse. Basque chatter tickled Kate’s ears. Sprinkled with sparse French, some phrases made sense. Spicy fragrance, vetted and laced into a strong stew, welcomed them into the house, and between grandiose bites, she could tell Domingo recovered recent history.
All of a sudden, Kate wanted to know his family name, and scanned the room. There, above the oven—an inscription on stone hung from a leather strap looped over a nail. She refilled their cups from the cook stove’s burbling kettle to get a closer look.
Ibarra.
Domingo Ibarra.
The name made music on her tongue.
Chapter Twenty-eight
S
ongbirds signaled the end of day as Madame Ibarra glanced out the window. “Gabirel should be home by now—he is never late.”
Domingo took a long breath. “Maman, a man in Figeac told us Jean-Luc took him to safety in the Ségala, before the Bosche raided the village.”
She swayed in her chair, and Domingo was on his feet, supporting her. “Edorta did the right thing, I am sure.”
“The gaiztoa zara have come to Figeac?”
“Yes, those evil men left a trail of destruction. But Gabirel escaped. Come, let’s milk the animals.”
He led her across the yard, murmuring in comforting tones like a father with his young daughter. He mixed in enough French so Kate could follow his meaning. Took Gabirel from the schoolhouse—” He was repeating the story to calm Madame Ibarra.
In the stone barn Madame Ibarra pulled a small wooden stool beside a goat. A black and white cat mewed her way to the perfect spot for some milk. Domingo said something to his mother and gestured for Kate to accompany him outside.
“Is she all right?”
Domingo rubbed his forehead, as if it held the world’s troubles, and studied the far north.
“I can stay here with her until you return.”
His eyes traveled to the earth, to a stone animal enclosure, and back to Kate as if unable to comprehend her meaning. Nothing they’d encountered on the trail had this effect on him.
But Kate persevered. “We can find a way.”
“The SS are here among us.”
“They are in the Dordogne too. They’re everywhere—it’s all the same.” She held up her palms. “No place is any safer.”
Domingo huffed and took off for the sheep pen, but she couldn’t let the conversation end like this. “Domingo Ibarra?”
He drew up short and half-turned with a near growl. “You would need to learn a great many things.”
“Then teach me.”
He ran his fingers under his cap. “Let me think.”
She took a step toward the barn, but he reached for her wrist. “No. You are right, Agent Merce—Katarin. Merci—”
He stretched his rippling shoulders, and a deep frown etched his forehead. “However, the sheep do not know you, you understand?” As if to punctuate his statement, a bevy of baahs broke out in the sheepfold. “And I cannot know how long it will take.”
“I will do my best. You needn’t worry about your mother. I will stay with her.”
His eyes held hers, sending a shiver down her spine as he leaned in with the mellow aroma of stew and warm milk. “You are Amerikan, perhaps, but like a Basque woman, stronger than all others.”
He drew back, and a hunger wider than the English Channel catapulted through Kate. She grasped his thick arms, not so much to touch him as to remain upright. A single word left her lips as he let go and disappeared behind the barn.
“Domingo.”
Madame Ibarra shut the barn door and crossed the yard to the house, so Kate followed her. Some time later when Domingo came in, he addressed them both. “For now, we must get some sleep.”
But long after he left the house, Kate lay awake. In the thick of night, she woke to voices drifting from outside.
“—fighters parachuting in. English, Canadians, Americans, even Poles. L’invasion is upon us.”
“We have no idea what day?”
“All depends on the Channel weather, but the attack will come from the north.”
“And our Maquisards will join them.”
“Without question. The ammunition piles rise. In some quarters, we even have bazookas.”
“Do you think Gabirel will stay behind if all the partisans leave the camp? Hardly! I must search him out, but to leave Maman—”
“Jean-Luc arrived back here today, torn between protecting his family and keeping Gabirel safe.”
“He would not make that decision lightly.”
“What about the agent?”
Kate bit her lip. She’d become one more confusing piece in Domingo’s quandary.
“I gave my word to accompany her to the Dordogne—”
“Yet the danger traveling there has worsened, and we need workers too.”
Kate risked rising from her makeshift bed near the hearth. She tiptoed to an open window and resonated to Domingo’s heavy sigh.
“Still, I gave my word, Père.”
So this was the parish priest Domingo quoted when Monsieur died. “Père Gaspard would say the angels carry him away, to rest from his labors.”
“Of course you did. But even the Almighty sometimes changes His mind. Remember, he chose Saul to be king, but later replaced him with David?”
“So keeping one’s word becomes a matter of circumstance?”
Père Gaspard’s deep chuckle caught Kate off guard. He sounded so earthy, so human, so—real.
“The war has taken us over, body and soul, so everything slants toward our deliverance, l’Invasion. You’d think the Allies were the Messiah, though we know they’re mere men.
“But our foundations still stand, Domingo. Some things never topple, though they may shake. Our calling and the channels we must take have altered, and keeping one’s word is more a matter of intent.
“In a way, that hasn’t changed at all, for scripture says God looks on the heart, not the outward appearance. Perhaps this war will help us see as He does. I have no doubt He knows your intentions.
“There I go, pontificating in the middle of the night, when you need sleep. Your way will become clear to you. Let me know what you decide.”
The priest put his arm over Domingo’s shoulder before retreating to the road, and Domingo turned past the sheep pen toward the barn. He stood for long minutes, petting the dog and staring over a hip-high stone wall at a wooly grey mass huddled together against late-May chill.
When he walked on to the barn, Kate crept back to her quilt. Somewhere above, a mouse or bat skittered, and Madame Ibarra’s snore penetrated the south wall—such a mighty noise from her petite form.
Men parachuting in—If only she could listen to the BBC tonight. Mr. T had warned against becoming a radio operator, but at least then she would know what was happening. As it was, she was holed up in relative safety but caused even more turmoil for Domingo.
Her thoughts drifted to the sheep, safe and peaceful in their fold. That image juxtaposed with Domingo’s conversation with Père Gaspard—two men driven by hope, attempting to make their way through events beyond their control.
She sank into her quilt, most likely fashioned by Domingo’s mother or grandmother. Worn cotton fabric as soft as lamb’s wool, held together by single stitches. Parachuting in. Gradually, the rhythm of Madame Ibarra’s snore ushered Kate into sleep.
•
“Harold is not at Greenham Commons. My comrade discovered him in one of the first infantry units scheduled to cross the Channel.”
Glad to see Charles again after three weeks away, Addie wanted to hug him. But the outer office was full of staff, and besides, an old voice taunted her. You’re an unfaithful wife. Your disobedience puts you under God’s curse.
Harold’s severe chastisement, still very much alive in her memory, obliterated the safety of Charles’ office and sent her pulse racing. A stanza from an old hymn quieted her. Still, my soul, be still. The Lord is on thy side.
“I’ve no idea why he wrote his mother about the Air Force, but this puts him farther from London. Rest assured, infantry privates enjoy no leave before the Invasion, and certainly not to London.”
Comforting news, but befuddling. Why would Harold stoop to make up the Air Force story? And why spin it only to Berthea?
By the time she returned from a post box run, Charles’ door was closed, and the rest of the day he remained in his office. At least Addie thought so. But when she stuck her hand into her coat pocket on the way home she found his note.
Sudden call back to coast. Say hello to the vegetables and pull some weeds for me on Saturday.
I will miss you,
Charles
•
When Charles returned on Wednesday, important-looking people visited his office, but five minutes after Addie dove into her stack of filing, he waved her in.
“I have a delivery for Mr. Firth. Do you mind awfully?”
“Not at all.”
He lowered his voice to a whisper, and she couldn’t miss the strain in his expression, despite his outward cheer.
“The cloud cover slows Channel operations and darkens our spirits, but you will brighten passersby, as you do me.”
Heat flooded Addie’s cheeks as she took the large envelope Charles held out. “Do bring me word of our favorite bookseller.”
“I will. And thank you for locating Harold. I didn’t mean to seem ungrateful.”
“I daresay I cannot imagine you so.”
“And I can’t think why he would write such a thing to his mother.”
“I puzzle over that, as well.”
Addie grabbed her sweater. “Mrs. Culver, I’ve an errand for Mr. T.”
“Will you pass a post box? With everyone on the streets in such a dither these days, I’d rather not make the trip.” Mrs. Culver raised an eyebrow toward a pile of mail, so Addie tied it up and descended the stairs.
People headed in every direction. Busses exchanged passengers, office girls streaked by on bicycles loaded down with mail packets and brown cardboard boxes. Charles said young men once held their delivery jobs but now waited at the coast for the day everyone anticipated.
And Harold was among them. It was easier to picture him roaring out of an LST, one of the flat rectangular water vehicles the Allied Command created for the landing, than in a bomber. Surely he knew Berthea would be proud of him being in the Invasion, no matter what his job.
But are you proud? Yes, Addie decided. She could honor his battle exploits without submitting to his ruthless authority. But if he survives the war, what then?
She raised her chin into the cool late May mist enveloping London. She simply couldn’t think about that—it did no good.
Sometimes, though, in the dark of night, a snakelike hiss assaulted her hard-earned tranquility. And on this dismal, drippy day, that marauder worked overtime. Estranged or not, how can you think to chum with another man? Harold was right about you—disobedient and worthy of divine punishment. Truth be told, you deserve the likes of Harold Bledsoe, and you’re stuck with him forever.
This accusation stole Addie’s sleep, yet morning always brought her back to their confrontation in the chicken house after she had painted the kitchen wainscoting. Harold cursed her that day, and claimed God had, too. But Berthea, his own mother, sided with her and so did Jane.
What happened next couldn’t have surprised Addie more. Their church sent Harold to the seminary in St. Louis for the winter months, and there, he kept up his assault on the draft board. Unbelievably, the army finally accepted him, while she ventured to help Kate. Now, she enjoyed her job, and hope ruled her heart whatever the future held.
Reviewing these surprising events lightened her outlook. Besides, now she knew Harold trained at the coast, not at Greenham Commons.
She skipped a few steps, as she and Kate often did en route to Aunt Alvina’s house after school. A breeze blew some papers across the street, and an office worker pursued them in a wild chase. So overwrought by lack of sleep from the bombing, no one else seemed to notice.
When Addie arrived in front of the bookshop, Mr. Firth ushered her in where she piled the letters on his counter. When she handed him Charles’ envelope, Mr. Firth smiled and whispered, “Just in time. The need has grown overnight. Please thank your stateside friends for their aid.”
His assistant, with a butler’s bearing, appeared between two tall shelves like a prairie dog coming up for air. At the same time, the doorbell jangled, and a customer entered in a hurry with an urgent request. Mr. Firth led him down an aisle of shelves.
When he returned, he nodded to Addie and retrieved a slim volume from under the counter. “Please inform your employer that one of his favorites came yesterday.”
“Thank you.” Addie stepped toward the door and Mr. Firth held up her envelopes.
“I shall post these for you at three.”
“Oh, my—thank you.” She pulled her sweater closer against a quickening breeze that forced curls out of her already straggling Veronica Lake roll. Kate had become the queen of that hairdo, but Addie’s early morning efforts led to wayward curls by afternoon.
If only the weather would clear. Tension sobered a jostling crowd of pedestrians, and she searched in vain for a smile. Mrs. T said the tube station queues started midafternoon now, with so many seeking a safe place to sleep.
“After all this time, some older people think of the stations as home. Terrible, yet if they’ve lost their homes, where else can they go?”
Faces all around Addie testified to the dire times, and she had just delivered money to help displaced Jewish people from all over the world. The Allied Command kept calling Charles to the coast, battle would soon begin across the Channel, and Kate—In London’s sea of worried countenances, everything seemed overwhelming.
Nothing changed as she entered the office building. Workers spent their lunchtimes hunched over a radio in the foyer. Addie paused to listen as she rounded the third floor stairwell. “On May 25, Mr. Churchill addressed foreign affairs:
Taking everything into consideration, including men and money, war effort, expanse of territory, we can claim to be an equal to those great Powers, but not, in my view, a superior. It would be a great mistake for me, as head of the British Government, or, I may add—speaking to this Committee as a most respected institution—the Grand Alliance, or for the House, to take it upon ourselves, to lay down the law to all those different countries, including the two great Powers with which we have to work, if the world is to be brought back into a good condition.
This small Island and this marvellous structure of States and dependencies which have gathered round it, if we all hold together, occupy a worthy place in the vanguard of the nations. It is idle to suppose that we are the only people who are to prescribe what all other countries, for their own good, are to do. Many other ideas and forces come into play and nothing could be more unwise than for the meeting of Prime Ministers, for instance, to attempt to prescribe for all countries the way they should go.
Even Mrs. Culver joined the crowd. When she spotted Addie, she leaned out to whisper her response to the address.
“Quite the humbling we Brits have suffered, dear. Once the world was at our beck and call, but my husband always believed we’d gotten too high and mighty for our britches, empiring this and empiring that.”
“Well, we all need each other now. There’s no other way to make it through.”
“Indeed. And now, back to work.” Mrs. Culver hailed another staff member and went on ahead. The radio announcer’s voice droned on, but on the second stair from the top, a gift arrived for Addie—an epiphany about the meaning of her experiences, including the difficult ones.
