For once she knew her hair looked fantastic and she was dressed to match it. Nervous and delighted, she wondered what to do.
He looked dapper and businesslike in a navy blue double-breasted suit. Not like a neo-Nazi. Clotilde had brushed off the lint so the black suit looked runway-ready. A few buttons, remnants of the dumpster, had rained on the floor of the salon, and Aimee had told Clotilde the story as they giggled.
She seriously contemplated raising her arm to hail Yves, when an unmarked Renault screeched to a halt beside him in the small street.
The car wedged him into a doorway. Two plainclothes types pulled him, struggling and kicking, into the backseat. The doors slammed and the Renault screeched down the street.
She leaned against a window, shaken. She assumed they'd been undercover cops. After all, he was a neo- Nazi. . .wasn't he?
HARTMUTH AND THIERRY S AT across from the Victor Hugo Museum by the playground in Place des Vosges. Children's laughter erupted from the swings under the barren-branched plane trees. The vaulted stone arcades surrounding the gated square, filled with fountains and grassy patches, reflected the late autumn sun's last rays. Over the worn stone cobbles wafted the smell of roasted chestnuts. Hartmuth's hands shook as he folded the newspaper he'd been pretending to read.
'I only agreed to meet because you said it's important,' he said. 'What do you have to say to me?'
'Millions of things. You are my father,' Thierry's eyes shone, almost trance-like. 'Let's start by getting to know one another. Tell me about my German family?'
Hartmuth stirred guiltily. 'You had a sister once,' he said after a long pause as he watched the children. 'Her name was Katia. I wasn't a very good father.'
Thierry shrugged.
'Who raised you?' Hartmuth asked.
'Some conservatives who lied to me.' Thierry kicked at a pigeon anxious for crumbs. 'But I've always been like you, believed in what you fought for. Now I know why I joined the
Hartmuth shook his head. He stood up and walked along the gravel path. He stopped at a slow gurgling fountain near the statue of Louis XIII on his horse.
Thierry stirred at the memories of Claude Rambuteau handing him crumbs for the pigeons at this very statue. Why hadn't the Rambuteaus told him his true identity?
'I said goodbye to her,' Hartmuth said. 'Here.'
Startled, Thierry asked, 'Who do you mean?'
'Your mother, before my troop shipped out to the slaughter at the front.' He paused. 'She's still beautiful,' he murmured wistfully.
'How can you say that?' said Thierry, aghast. This wasn't how he imagined his Nazi father would act.
'I loved her and I still do,' Hartmuth said. 'She thinks it's all in my mind. Let me show you where we used to meet.' Hartmuth strode across the square, pulling Thierry along.
None of the scurrying passersby paid much attention to them, a piercingly blue-eyed man and slender silver- haired gentleman, who, if one looked carefully, had a definite resemblance.
Halfway down the rue du Parc Royal, Hartmuth turned and pointed up at the arms of Francois the First, the marble salamander sculpted into the archway.
'I first saw her here, on these cobblestones,' Hartmuth said. 'But over there is where you were conceived, underground.'
'Underground? What are you saying?' Thierry asked uneasily. Opposite, on rue Payenne adjoining Square Georges-Cain, Hartmuth agilely climbed over the locked gate. He started rooting in the plants among the ancient statuary. Thierry could hear clumps of dirt landing in the bushes. He was afraid Hartmuth was losing his mind.
'What are you doing?' Thierry asked, after he climbed in behind him.
'Come help me,' Hartmuth said. He beckoned to Thierry, his eyes shining as if possessed. 'Move this pillar.' Hartmuth tried to push the broken marble column. 'It's got to be around here.'
'You're crazy. What are you going on about?' Thierry raised his voice.
The dusk was settling and the street lamps came on one by one.
'The entrance to the catacombs!' Hartmuth said. 'We'll find it, they've been here since the Romans. They haven't gone away. This city is honeycombed with the old Christian tunnels.' He took Thierry's hand and stared at him. 'I used to hide in them with your mother every night.'
Thierry felt embarrassed by the longing evident in Hartmuth's eyes. 'Why do you call her my mother? I never knew her, she abandoned me, she was a filthy Jew!' His hysterical laugh climbed to a high pitch. 'Filthy, that's perfect! Rutting in the dirt with an Aryan.'
'Odd. She said the same thing.' Hartmuth shook his head sadly. 'You mustn't hurt her. You do understand, don't you?'
'That an Aryan could sleep with a Jew?' Thierry said accusingly. 'Was it because you were far from home and lonely? Maybe she seemed exotic and seduced you?'
Tears welled in Hartmuth's eyes. 'Where did you get all this old hate?'
'I know Auschwitz was a lie,' Thierry said. 'My responsibility has been to expose those death-camp coverups.'
'I smelled the stench of too many of them,' Hartmuth said wearily and leaned against the broken marble column. 'Your grandparents, Sarah's parents, ended up there.'
Stunned, Thierry shouted, 'No, no! I don't believe you.'
A few passersby on the sidewalk turned to stare, then moved on.
'Our regiment troop train was bombed somewhere in Poland,' Hartmuth said. 'We had to rebuild the tracks in the snow while partisans shot at us from the woods. There was a terrible smell, out in that godforsaken forest, that never went away. We didn't know what it was because we saw no villages, only tunnels of black smoke. When the train ran again we passed a spur track. An arrow pointed to a sign saying Bergen-Belsen. Rotten corpses of those who'd jumped off the train littered the side of the tracks. I'll never forget that smell.' Hartmuth spoke in a faraway voice.
Thierry glared at him. 'You're lying, Jew lover!'
He climbed over the fence and ran off down the street. Hartmuth sank to his knees among the ruins but he had no more tears left. From deep inside came the old lullaby that his grandmother sang to him:
He sang the words as he dug earth and moved stones. Long after the streetlights shone he was still digging.
SATURDAY
