A Coming Evil

by Vivian Vande Velde

  "Thank you," Cecile said in her everyday voice. "I just thought of that this morning." She pointed to the room across the hall that looked like an adult's except that it held Rachel's bassinet. Cecile pointed to the doll that lay among the blankets and continued in her formal tone. "And that's Lisette's dumb doll, Mimi." She stuck her tongue out at Lisette, and Lisette stuck hers out at Cecile. The joking helped. A little.

  "So," Aunt Josephine said in her normal voice, "Lisette, if the Germans come during the night or early in the morning when the beds haven't been made yet..."

  "Cecile and I can't stand each other"—that would certainly be easy enough to pretend—"and I'm in the room the girls share."

  "It's the responsibility of whoever takes Rachel out of her bassinet to put a doll in her place so that the bassinet looks like a toy."

  Lisette clicked her heels and saluted.

  "Very good," Aunt Josephine said. "Now the basement."

  When Lisette opened the basement door, there was no light. She felt around for the switch, but when she found it, it didn't work.

  "The light bulb blew out yesterday," Cecile explained in her talking-to-Germans tone, "and Maman hasn't replaced it yet."

  Aunt Josephine was rummaging around under the sink and finally brought out a flashlight. "If the Germans come when I'm not here, search all the other cupboards first," she said, "for the extra time it will give the children."

  Lisette nodded. "But isn't it dangerous, the little ones running down the stairs in the dark?"

  "They use the extra flashlight we keep here." Aunt Josephine indicated the space between the wall and the stairs. "I'll go first. Follow closely and be careful."

  The stairs were wooden slats with no backs, but they were sturdy. And although the basement floor was packed dirt, the place was dry, not damp and musty like the basement of Lisette's family's apartment building in Paris. Aunt Josephine shone the flashlight in an arc that revealed a huge old furnace, wooden crates piled haphazardly against the walls, lawn furniture stacked away now that summer was gone, and probably half the world's supply of cobwebs.

  There was no sign of the children.

  "See if you can find them," Aunt Josephine said. She handed Lisette the flashlight.

  Lisette checked around the crates. "Should I take these down?" She indicated some that blocked others in back. There was no telling what kind of bugs made their homes back there.

  But Aunt Josephine was shaking her head. "We'll assume the Germans will, but don't bother."

  There was a door off to the left. Cecile giggled, so Lisette guessed that probably she wasn't anywhere near the children, but she opened it anyway. It was a coal bin, less than half-full now, with a chute down which the coal was delivered and a wheelbarrow and shovel in the corner for bringing the coal to the furnace. Everything was thickly coated with black coal dust. In fact Lisette had some on her hand just from lifting the door latch. "Do I need to check under the coal?" she asked. She couldn't imagine Aunt Josephine hiding the children there and subjecting herself to all the laundry that would entail.

  "Cold," Cecile said, "as cold as can be."

  "Shh," Aunt Josephine said. "No hints." Then to Lisette, "But no, they're not in here."

  There was another room that had racks and racks of wine bottles. Lisette walked all around the racks and shone the flashlight underneath, but the children weren't there either.

  Other little rooms had shelves holding jars of homemade preserves and canned vegetables. There were burlap bags full of apples, turnips, and onions, though there were many more bags that were neatly folded and empty.

  Lisette found what must have been Uncle Raymond's work area. Tools and a portable utility light with a long extension cord hung on the wall. On the dusty workbench lay a dismantled toaster. Would he ever return home to put it back together? she wondered. Or was he dead already, and nobody even knew it? Stop it, she told herself. The Germans would never come here, and Uncle Raymond was fine. She shone the flashlight under the workbench. Nobody there.

  She returned to the clothes trunks, which she had already dismissed as being too small, and opened them. Off-season clothes packed in mothballs.

  "I give up," she finally announced.

  "Call them," Aunt Josephine said.

  "Come out, come out, wherever you are," Lisette chanted before remembering that was what she'd said just before Gerard had appeared. But neither ghost nor children came. "Louis Jerome." She raised her voice. "Emma and Anne. The drill is over. Etienne." She looked at Aunt Josephine helplessly. The only thing that kept her from worrying that something had gone wrong was the smug smile on Cecile's face.

  "Long live France!" Cecile called out.

  Finally, Lisette could hear stirrings from the children.

  "Long live France is the secret password," Cecile explained to Lisette. "It means everything really is fine and we're not just calling them out because the Germans are forcing us to."

  The children emerged from the room where she'd seen the burlap bags of fruits and vegetables.

  "But..." Lisette protested, knowing there hadn't been room behind the filled bags nor beneath the empty ones.

  "Look," Aunt Josephine said. Then, to the others, "Don't close the secret door behind you." She shone her flashlight on the far wall of shelves, which had swung in on unseen hinges. Behind the storeroom was a small second room, completely lined with heavy blackout curtains, even the dirt floor. "The curtains let the children keep the flashlight on so they don't have to be in the dark," Aunt Josephine explained.

  They'd also help keep the room a bit warmer in the winter, Lisette thought, seeing the blankets that were piled in the corner. On a shelf there were also a jar of drinking water, a tin of powdered milk, and extra diapers. "It's a very good hiding place," she said. "Is there some sort of hidden lock to open the door?"

  "No," Aunt Josephine said as though it were a ridiculous question. "You just push on any of the shelves."

  Cecile demonstrated.

  "It's not meant to be a secret room. There used to be a handle, but I took it off."

  "It's very clever," Lisette said.

  "Thank you," Aunt Josephine said. Then, with a sigh as they started up the stairs, she added, "I just hope we never have to use it."

  Lisette fervently hoped not, too. But she had seen the Germans march into Paris and she suspected the Germans generally got whatever they set their minds to.

  8.

  Monday, September 2, 1940

  Aunt Josephine had plans for what to do no matter when the Germans might come. Always the first part of the plan was that the Jewish and Gypsy children were to go to the basement immediately, not to make a move, not to make a sound until Aunt Josephine, Cecile, or Lisette said "Long live France." The second part of each plan was that it was up to Aunt Josephine, Cecile, and Lisette to do what they could to hide the evidence of the extra children being in the house. Lisette had just seen what to do if the Germans came in the early morning before the beds were made. If the Germans came during the night, it was much the same, except that Aunt Josephine would be shocked and annoyed to see the spare-room beds in such a state, and she would say something such as, "So that explains all the noise you two were making earlier."

  If the Germans came during mealtime, that was the worst, because it meant throwing all the food into the garbage bin; and while there was more food available in Sibourne than in Paris, there certainly wasn't enough to throw away.

  If the Germans came while the children's laundry was hanging up to dry, that was because Aunt Josephine was washing outgrown clothing from Cecile and the cousins from Tours before she donated it to the needy. Diapers were never to accumulate, since there was no explanation Aunt Josephine could think of for a dirty diaper. So, though they only boiled the diapers once a day, each diaper had to be thoroughly rinsed immediately so that they looked like cleaning rags.

  Once school started for Lisette and Cecile the following week, Louis Jerome, being the next oldest,
would be in charge while Aunt Josephine went to market in the morning. It would take her about two hours, bicycling to Sibourne and back. She explained that she couldn't wait until the girls came home because she had no reason for doing so that wouldn't arouse the shopkeepers' suspicions. Lisette decided that the children were probably safer with Louis Jerome than they were with Aunt Josephine, given his inclination to worry about every detail.

  "All right," Aunt Josephine said, "we've gotten a late start today. Lisette and I will go marketing after lunch so I can show her around Sibourne. Meanwhile, Cecile and Lisette, you can make the beds. Louis Jerome, you will help me wash clothes. Etienne, fill the basket on the porch with peas, and Emma and Anne will shuck them for lunch."

  "Why am I always the one who has to make the beds?" Cecile asked. Then, simultaneously, she and Louis Jerome said, "I want to shuck peas." Anne tugged on Aunt Josephine's skirt. "Wash," she demanded. (The way to tell the twins apart, Lisette had come to realize, was by listening rather than looking. Anne generally let Emma do the talking, so Emma sounded older than three, whereas Anne sounded younger.)

  After about five minutes of trying to pair each child with a chore he or she not only wanted but could likely perform, punctuated by Anne's chanting, "Wash, wash, wash," Aunt Josephine's patience snapped. "No," she said. "You will all do what I told you at the beginning. Lisette..." She'd obviously forgotten what tasks she'd originally assigned to whom. "Lisette, take charge. Once everyone's finished, you may all play."

  While Aunt Josephine went to get the washboard, Lisette gave Louis Jerome a gentle push in the direction of the bathroom, where they'd wash the clothes in the tub. "The rest of you," she said, " get on the porch and wait for Etienne to bring in the peas." She grabbed hold of Cecile's arm as Cecile went to follow. "You're helping me," she reminded.

  "I know that," Cecile said. "I was just going to remind them not to make a mess."

  "They'll remember," Lisette said. "And stop stomping your feet," she added as they went up to the bedrooms.

  "I'm not stomping," Cecile said, stepping hard enough that each stair vibrated.

  As they started making the first bed, Cecile tugged so hard on the sheets that she yanked them out of Lisette's hands. Then she shoved the sheets and blankets under the mattress without smoothing out the wrinkles and lumps. By the third bed, Lisette decided she'd get it done faster and better alone, and she ordered Cecile downstairs to help with the pea shucking.

  Now how did she manage that? Lisette asked herself, realizing she'd just given Cecile permission to do what Cecile had wanted all along. But she didn't call Cecile back.

  By the time she finished and went downstairs, the pea shucking was obviously over. She could hear Cecile in the front room, rattling a jigsaw puzzle box, refusing to put it down until everybody sat where she told them to. Lisette tiptoed past the doorway and out through the porch.

  Outside, Aunt Josephine and Louis Jerome were hanging the laundry on the line, although Louis Jerome was spending less time helping than anxiously watching for approaching Germans. Baby Rachel was napping on a blanket in the shade of the laundry basket.

  Someone, presumably Aunt Josephine, had set out a bowl with a few table scraps, and a lovely gray and white cat was eating from it. "I didn't know you had a cat," Lisette said, leaning to scratch it between the ears, which her own cat loved. "What's its—"

  Before she could say "name," Aunt Josephine called, "Don't—" and the cat hissed and scratched Lisette's hand.

  Lisette jumped back, the cat resumed eating, and Aunt Josephine came running to examine her hand.

  "I'm sorry," Aunt Josephine said. "I should have warned you earlier. She's a stray we're trying to tame and she's rather nervous. Those are nasty scratches. You'd better wash them off."

  Rather nervous? Lisette felt betrayed. She returned to the kitchen, where she turned the water on to a trickle so nobody would hear. The second time she went out, she made a wide circle around the cat.

  Aunt Josephine waved, which Lisette took to mean that they didn't need any help, so she walked in a leisurely fashion in the other direction, toward the chrysanthemum field. Aunt Josephine and Uncle Raymond had never been serious farmers; they were city people with farmland. Before the war they had raised flowers in the summer for a little extra income, but this year's crop were leftovers from last year's seedlings. This spring Aunt Josephine had spent her time and energy planting and tending a vegetable garden, and the flowers were overgrown and wild. Lisette spent about thirty seconds looking and sniffing; then she took off at a run around the barn and up the hill.

  "Gerard!" she called breathlessly once she made it to the top. Would she have to get lost again to find him? But the next moment he was standing there beside her. Now she felt foolish and tongue-tied. "Hello," she said in a much more subdued tone.

  But he looked pleased to see her. He looked overjoyed. His mouth formed the words "Hello, Lisette," and he reached to take her hand. She was sure he meant to kiss it, but his fingers passed coldly through hers, and that sobered both of them.

  "I wanted to thank you again," she said, "for helping me find my way."

  He gave that wonderful smile of his and touched his hand to his heart. Apparently nothing could disconcert him for long. He was just a bit too charming to be entirely sincere, she thought, but that didn't make the smile any less appealing.

  "Well," she said— Why am I here? she asked herself; what did I expect from this meeting? —"are you ... all right here? (Can a ghost be all right or not all right? Does he know he's a ghost?) Is there anything you need?"

  He answered something longer than yes or no that she couldn't understand, but he gave up after repeating it twice.

  In the stories she and Brigitte had read together, ghosts haunted places because their spirits had to be set to rest, usually because of some injustice that required righting. She asked, "Do you need me to get something, or do something?"

  The question was not what Gerard expected, she could tell. He looked bemused but took the time to consider—probably so that she wouldn't feel a total fool.

  But she did anyway.

  He shook his head and mouthed the word "No."

  Without any details, she tried to speculate what all the possibilities could be. "Do you need me to tell people something?"

  She understood his answer, "I don't think so"—she could read his lips for something that easy at least. But he suddenly stopped. His eyes widened, he took a deep breath—he seemed to take a deep breath— He's a ghost, you idiot, she reminded herself. "What?" she asked.

  He made the sign of the cross, the first today. "Who are you?" she was sure he demanded. And then—she thought—"What do you want?"

  Why was he suddenly so wary of her? "I'm Lisette Beaucaire. You know that already. You helped me, so I wanted to help you. It only seemed fair."

  He asked something, and she had to have him repeat it. He added gestures this time, pointing to her, then indicating their surroundings. Most likely, "Why are you here?"

  "My parents sent me here, to get away from the Nazis in Paris."

  He looked at her blankly. It probably meant he was more than ten years dead, if he didn't know about Nazis.

  "The Germans," she said.

  Still he didn't understand. She remembered her history lessons and reevaluated. If he didn't know about the Great War with Germany, he was more than thirty years dead. If he'd never heard of Germans, he was older than she wanted to think about.

  "War," she said.

  That he understood.

  "We're at war with the Germans, and my parents thought I'd be safer here."

  He started to say something, changed his mind, reworded it, changed his mind again, and finally asked—she was sure because, of course, it was the only logical question—"What year is it?"

  "1940," she told him.

  Could ghosts pale? She was sure Gerard did. It wasn't that he became transparent or less solid. If anything, he seemed less see-through than
the previous day. But his face went—Lisette suddenly understood the expression—ghostly white. He sank to his knees and covered his face.

  Instinctively, Lisette reached out to touch his shoulder, but there was only the sensation of cold. She crouched down beside him. "I'm sorry," she said, not knowing what she was sorry for, except that she had hurt him.

  He looked up at her, still obviously shaken.

  She took a deep breath, and she asked him the only logical question, which was still: "What year is it?"

  He took a steadying breath, but she couldn't make out his answer.

  She brushed a clear spot on the dirt. "Write it," she said.

  He gave his head a brusque shake, barely a twitch.

  He didn't know how to write, Lisette realized. That pushed his time back even farther.

  "Say it again more slowly," she told him. He did. "One thousand..." He nodded. "Three? hundred..." Again the affirmative. "Fourteen?"

  She moved from her crouch to a sitting position. No wonder he'd had the breath knocked out of him. 1314. More than six hundred years ago. For some reason, his being a ghost was easier to imagine than that he had been alive six hundred years ago.

  He once again rested his face in his hands.

  From down below she heard Cecile's voice call, "Lisette! Maman says it's time to help with lunch!" Even from this distance she could tell by Cecile's tone that Cecile was stomping her feet. "Maman says now, Lisette!"

  "I'll be down in a minute!" Lisette yelled back.

  Gerard jerked upright, startled, and she went cold all over.

  "You didn't hear her?" she asked. "Did you?"

  And, as if she wasn't sure enough already, Gerard glanced the wrong way—back into the trees on the hill rather than down the slope—before cautiously shaking his head. "Hear?" she could see his mouth form. "Her?"

  Lisette watched Cecile run toward the house. She was aware of Gerard following her gaze, then looking back at her. Why was this happening? What was happening?

  "I have to go back," she said. "I'll try to come here again tomorrow." As an afterthought she added, "If you want."