The irritating thing was she believed that he was being honest. It bothered her. Made it difficult to advance her theory of him as the killer.
The harder part followed. He was a human being who had lost both parents. She'd have to push him to the edge, make him reveal the truth, prove or disprove her theory. She began reluctantly, 'There's no easy way to do this.' She stood in front of Nathalie Rambuteau's photo.
'To tell me I'm adopted?' he said.
She was surprised; how would he know?
'My father told me you would come,' he said. 'Spin me a pack of lies. Now, get out. Play girl detective somewhere else. I know the truth!'
Of course, Claude Rambuteau would try to discredit her. He'd promised as much.
'My father died in my arms,' Thierry said. His voice cracked. 'Leave me alone. I didn't kill anyone!'
'You better read this,' she said. She tightened her hold on the pistol in her pocket as she withdrew the envelope with spidery writing. 'This is for you. Your father planned on blocking the will, but he died and threw everything into probate.'
Thierry looked unsure.
'Of course'—she opened it slowly—'I helped matters along at the lawyer's office. I think your real mother is alive, Thierry.'
'He said you'd try. . .,' Thierry sputtered.
'And you are a Jew.'
Thierry stopped dead. 'What are you talking about?'
'Technically,' Aimee continued, 'since you were born of a Jewish mother. Judaism follows matriarchal lines. But you're German too since your father was an occupying soldier. Probably Si-Po, responsible for the Gestapo who pursued enemies of the Reich.'
He shook his head. 'Why are you doing this?'
'Read it,' she said.
Doubt flickered in his eyes.
'Nathalie wanted you to know your real parentage, Thierry,' Aimee said. 'Her soul couldn't rest after her promise. Secretly, it hurt her to see you hate the Jews. Especially. . .'
Thierry grabbed the letter out of her hands. He went to the window and read it. For what seemed an eternity, she heard the monotonous tick of the kitchen clock.
'How could this be true?' His eyes flashed at Aimee. He sat down and reread the letter. 'All these years? Lies, a pack of lies! Is this why she drank?'
'I can't answer that,' she said. She caught his wild gaze and held it. 'How does this involve Lili?'
'How would I know?' Thierry's voice dropped. 'Nothing makes sense. It's like I've been hit by a wave in the ocean and my feet can't touch the sand. I don't know which way is up for air.' Then he asked simply, 'Why didn't they ever tell me I wasn't theirs?'
He looked devastated. Even though she felt sorry for him, she still had to know the truth.
'Did you kill Lili? Make an example of her death?' She watched him closely.
He shook his head. 'From an airplane? I told you, I flew in from. . .'
'Who did it?' she interrupted.
'Someone's trying to frame me,' he said. He began rummaging through papers near the window.
'What are you looking for, Thierry?'
'Something that tells me who I really am.' Thierry picked up papers, never taking his eyes off her. 'All this reveals is. . .' But he couldn't say it.
'That your mother was Jewish and your father a Nazi?' she finished for him.
'What does this mean?' Thierry said with a strange look. He pulled Nathalie Rambuteau's photo out of the silver frame and lifted up a scrap of paper. 'Is this my Jew name?' He thrust it at Aimee.
She took it.
'Can you believe that?' he said. 'Even with all my work in Les Blancs Nationaux I've never really felt like a Nazi,' he laughed.
He hurled the frame on the floor. Nathalie Rambuteau stared up, filtered by glittering shards of glass.
'Maybe that's because I'm half-Jew,' he said.
SHE HATED going to the Archives of France but if any record of Sarah Tovah Strauss existed, besides in the Centre de Documentation Juive Contemporaine where it was not, that was the only place it would be. The old palace, glacially cold and littered with rodent droppings in its corners, was open late on Wednesdays. Napoleon's records and Nazi documentation along with most of French history filled much of the adjoining mansions, hotel de Soubise and hotel de Rohan. Her level-two access card allowed her entry twenty-four hours a day.
She followed a clerk with a thinly curled moustache who reeked of garlic-laced rabbit stew. They entered a glassed-in lobby, filled with large wooden reading tables.
'The material is quite heavy. Use a cart.' He pointed to a high-tech metal wire construction resembling an Italian sports car.
Off this parquet-floored area, open and light due to myriad skylights, stood racks and racks of leather-and cloth-bound volumes.
She approached the small checkout desk. '
'Something specific?' the librarian asked. 'We have thousands of files.'
'Strauss, Sarah Tovah,' Aimee said.
The librarian clicked on the computer. 'Living or deceased?'
'Well,' Aimee stumbled. 'That's why I'm here.'
'I only ask because some patrons already know.' The librarian smiled understandingly. 'Find the AN—AJ 38 division. The Deceased section is to the left, oddly numbered. Aisle 33, Row W has volumes with the names starting with S. Unknown or nonreported deceased are to the right.' She indicated a much smaller area. 'Please call if you need assistance. Good luck.'
At the entrance to the racks, a sign proclaimed that the blue labels were German Occupation Documents, orange labels were Allied Forces documentation, and green labels were French National Records. Most of the racks were filled with blue-labeled material. Aimee knew the German reputation for recording details but this was staggering. She picked up a sagging blue volume tied with string and read a five-page itemized list of the contents of a clock factory at 34 rue Coche-Perce owned by a Yad Stolnitz. A red line had been drawn through his name. She often walked on narrow, medieval rue Coche-Perce, which angled into busy rue St. Antoine, full of boutiques and sushi bars. Once it had thrived with small Jewish bakeries and falafel stands.
She climbed up the small library stairs and found the Service for Jewish Affairs, the 11—112, of the Sicherheitsdienst-SD, the intelligence agency of the SS. Among the S volumes, 'St-' alone took up sixteen volumes. She loaded up her high-tech cart carefully with yellowed documents and wheeled it to a reading table.
Sadly, Aimee sat and turned page after page, filled with Parisian Jews who were no more. Straus, Strausz, Strauz, she read, going down columns of names. Every single derivation of Strauss had been drawn through with a red line. There was a Sara Straus-man listed but no Sarah Tovah Strauss. After two hours her eyes ached and she felt guilty. Guilty for being part of a race that had reduced generations to ashes or ooze in mass-grave lime pits.
Convoy lists composed most of the Unknown section. Jews who had arrived at death camps were checked off but no further records existed. No Sarah Tovah Strauss listed here either.
Back in the Deceased section, Aimee discovered that the Germans also cross-referenced deportees with their arrondissements in Paris. They had sectioned the city into areas with
Well then, she would start with the 4th arrondissement, the Marais, where most of the Jews had lived.
