The Beekeeper's Promise

by Fiona Valpy

  ‘Goodbye then, Eliane, Francine.’ Jacques’ smile took in both of them. As he was moving off, the mayor’s secretary bustled up to him.

  ‘Good morning, Monsieur Lemaître,’ she said. ‘I have that newspaper article that you were asking about the other day. I hope you will find it interesting.’

  ‘Why, thank you, madame. That is most thoughtful of you and greatly appreciated. I’m sure I shall.’ He took the rolled-up newspaper that she pulled out of her shipping bag and tucked it under his arm. ‘Good morning to you all, ladies.’

  And then Jacques walked briskly across the square, purposefully making for the door to his tiny apartment above the baker’s shop.

  The next day, Sunday, Eliane was scattering some scraps for the chickens, assisted by Blanche, who was now a sturdy two-and-a-half-year-old. The little girl laughed as the rooster flapped his wings, trying to assert his authority over the hens – who ignored him and carried on pecking busily at the ground. Both of them were surprised to see Jacques Lemaître walking down the track towards the mill.

  ‘Good morning, Blanche and Eliane. Are your parents and Yves at home?’ he asked as he approached.

  ‘Of course. Please come in.’ Having ushered him inside, she offered him a seat at the table and went to find Lisette, Gustave and Yves. ‘They’re just coming,’ she told him on her return. ‘Can I offer you something to drink? Our so-called coffee is made from acorns these days I’m afraid. But there are tisanes – lime-blossom or lemon balm?’

  He accepted a lime-flower tea, breathing in the summer scent of the dried blossom as she set it before him to steep. Eliane pulled up a chair and sat Blanche on her knee. Jacques watched the pair as they began to play a game of pat-a-cake and Blanche giggled, demanding that they do it ‘Again! ’ as soon as it was over.

  As her parents entered, she gathered Blanche into her arms and stood, intending to leave them in private, but Jacques gestured to her to sit down again.

  ‘What I’m going to say concerns you all,’ he said, his expression grave. ‘Ah, bonjour, Yves.’ He stood to shake Yves by the hand, clapping him on the shoulder in a way that implied a greater degree of friendship than Eliane had been aware existed between the two young men.

  ‘I have received a copy of a list.’ Jacques turned to address them all, without preamble. ‘All Jews registered in the commune of Coulliac are to be rounded up for deportation to camps in the east. It’s part of a much wider programme that is planned throughout the occupied sector.’

  Eliane gasped, unwittingly hugging Blanche so closely to her that the little girl wriggled and protested.

  ‘There are several people on this list who are your friends and neighbours.’ Jacques’ eyes met Eliane’s.

  ‘Francine.’ She whispered her friend’s name, her blood running cold suddenly, despite the warmth of the day.

  He nodded. ‘Her and two others in the immediate area. We are trying to get word to the other people on the list, too, to warn them.’ Here, he stopped and glanced at Yves, who nodded.

  ‘Just tell me who they are. I’m meeting a friend for a bike ride this afternoon. We’ll work out the route to pass their doors.’ As Yves spoke, Eliane looked at him in surprise. Her little brother suddenly seemed to have grown up into someone she hardly knew.

  Jacques nodded. ‘Thank you, Yves. We have very little time. But remember, take no risks.’

  ‘I know the drill. Don’t worry.’

  ‘But for Francine and the other two,’ Jacques continued, turning back to Gustave and Lisette, ‘I’ve been able to get word to a passeur – an agent who will guide them to a safe house. From there, they’ll be moved through the network to safety. However, we need to get them across the river and through a stretch of the unoccupied zone that is patrolled. The Germans have stepped up their vigilance there lately, so it’s more risky than ever.’

  Gustave glanced at Lisette, who had been listening with her head bowed. ‘We can get them across the weir,’ he said, ‘but then how can they get to the rendezvous point?’

  Lisette purposely avoided returning her husband’s look and instead raised her head to meet Jacques’ steady gaze.

  ‘I’m the one who has the permit to cross into the unoccupied zone. And it just so happens I have a patient on a farm near Les Lèves – in fact I’m overdue a visit to Madame Desclins. When are you planning on going?’

  Jacques reached across and squeezed her hands, which were clasped, as if in prayer, on the table before her. ‘Thank you, Lisette. You know we wouldn’t ask unless there were no other alternative. But we’re going to have to move fast. It has to be tonight.’

  ‘It will be an emergency visit then. I know Madame Desclins will be pleased to see me – she’s an anxious first-time mother. I have some medication that I need to deliver to her.’ Lisette smiled as she released her hands from his and stood up. ‘Nothing out of the ordinary. Let’s do what we have to do.’

  ‘Stop!’ Gustave’s voice broke as he stepped forward and seized her arm to prevent her moving away from him. ‘Lisette, I can’t let you do this. The risks . . .’

  She put her hand gently on his and smiled at him, although there was a sadness behind the smile. ‘You know, Gustave, my attitude has always been to try to carry on as normal, ignoring the war as much as possible, just concentrating on getting my family and my patients safely through it. But there’s a question I ask myself every day.’ She looked past him, out of the window towards the weir. ‘When do you cross the line? What does it take to reach that point? For your country to be threatened? Your way of life? Your neighbours’ homes? Or your own? For your friends to be in danger? Or your children?’ She turned back to face him. ‘Every one of us has to make that decision for ourselves. Whether we win or lose this war, we will have to live with the consequences of our decisions. I’ve asked myself: “What will be on your conscience when all this is over? What will your decision be when you get to that crossing point?” Well, I’m at that crossing point now. And I’ve made my decision. Just as all of you –’ she glanced around at Eliane, Yves and Jacques – ‘have done already.’

  Gustave released his grip on her arm and nodded. But Eliane had never before seen such a look of anguish on her father’s face.

  A young couple slipped into the mill house just as dusk was falling. Eliane recognised them from the market – a young man who had made his living mending watches and clocks before the war put an end to such luxuries, and his pretty, vivacious wife. Lisette greeted them warmly. ‘Daniel. And Amélie – how is the morning sickness now?’

  ‘Much better, thanks to those tisanes you gave me,’ the girl replied. Looking more closely, Eliane could just make out a slight rounding of her belly; although, like most of them now, the woman was so thin that her ribcage and hip bones protruded above and below it.

  There was a gentle tap at the door and Eliane went to answer it. Without saying a word, she enfolded Francine in her arms and drew her into the kitchen, quickly shutting the door behind her. She held her friend tight, as Francine wept.

  ‘Courage,’ Eliane whispered. ‘You will all need to help each other in order to stay strong . . . And to help my mother to do this.’

  Francine nodded, wiping her eyes and making an effort to pull herself together. She turned to Lisette, who was pulling on her boots. ‘Madame Martin, we cannot thank you enough.’

  Lisette smiled reassuringly at Francine. ‘Don’t worry. You will be safe. The journey to freedom won’t be easy for any of you, but I know you’ll make it.’ She picked up her basket of essential oils and the leather case containing her midwifery kit.

  Yves put his head round the door and said quietly, ‘The truck is ready, Maman. We’ve secured the tarpaulin in place.’

  Eliane could hardly bear to watch as Gustave embraced Lisette before she clambered into the cab. The look on his face was one that wrenched at her heart – a tortured mixture of pain and fear. Lisette just smiled at him as she drove out of the yard and reached a hand through the
truck’s window to pat his shoulder on the way past. She appeared her usual calm, capable self. ‘I’ll be back soon,’ she promised him.

  The others waited for a few minutes in the safe haven of the kitchen, allowing enough time for her to negotiate the checkpoint on the bridge at Coulliac. She would have her documents examined thoroughly when her turn came to cross, and it was very likely that the truck would be searched too. All would be in order: just the local midwife making an urgent visit to one of her mothers-to-be on the other side of the river.

  When the time came, Francine hugged Eliane as if she would never let her go. ‘I won’t ever forget what you and your family have done for me. For all of us,’ she choked.

  ‘Go now,’ urged Eliane. ‘Maman should be waiting for you in the lane on the other side of the field any minute now. Good luck. And Francine – I know I’ll see you again one day.’

  Francine, Daniel and Amélie picked up their boots and stepped, barefoot, on to the weir. Gustave led the way, reaching out a helping hand to Amélie as she scrambled up the bank on the far side. Hurriedly, they pulled on their boots and fastened them.

  ‘Stay in the trees along the edge of the field,’ Gustave whispered. A dimmed set of headlights could be seen coming along the lane on the far side. They flickered off for a second and then on again. ‘That’s her. Go now, dépêchez-vous!’

  The three figures slipped along the line of acacias that bounded the field and then cautiously made their way along the hedgerow, crouching to keep their heads below the cropped line of hawthorns. The truck pulled up beside the gate and its headlights went out, so that the only light was from the pinpricks of stars in the night sky above them. Lisette got out of the truck and came around to loosen the cover and lower the tailgate. Daniel jumped up and then reached back to help Francine and Amélie scramble into the back. Quickly and quietly, Lisette pulled the tarpaulin cover taut again, sliding the toggles through the loops that held it in place. Without a word, she climbed back into the cab and pulled away, putting the headlights on once more as she navigated her way through the country lanes and back roads that she knew so well.

  At the mill, Gustave walked back across the weir to where Eliane and Yves stood waiting in the doorway of the darkened kitchen. He nodded at them. ‘And now we wait. And we pray.’

  Abi: 2017

  I can’t begin to imagine the courage it must have taken Francine and the others to leave. I suppose that they had reached a crossing point of their own, just as Lisette described. For them, though, it was also the point of no return: flee or be sent to the death camps. The possibility of life or the certainty of death. There was no choice left to be made.

  I know how living in a state of fear creates an inertia. It saps your strength and drains your energy, until you become trapped like a fly in a spider’s web. The more you struggle, at first, the tighter the silken threads are woven around you, until finally escape becomes impossible.

  Why didn’t I leave Zac? It’s a question I’ve asked myself often, since. I can see people thinking it, too, in physiotherapists’ treatment rooms and in survivors’ support groups. The counsellors and psychologists explain it to me in their clinical terms of codependency, a lack of self-esteem, a secret, shameful belief that I deserved the emotional and physical abuse, which was delivered with an addictive mixture of just enough attention and love (of a kind) to keep me there.

  But maybe my reality was simpler than that: I had nowhere else to go. I had no family, no job, no friends. And by the time things got so bad that I should have left, I’d lost the strength to do so. The fear of the unknown world on the other side of the plate-glass window became stronger than the fear of what might happen within the four walls of the apartment. That’s why I stayed.

  That, and maybe, too, the tiny flicker of hope inside me, which he never quite succeeded in extinguishing – a hope that things would get better. That somehow, if I just did this or wore that, the way he wanted me to, he would change. That’s what made me stay.

  Eliane: 1942

  It was the longest two hours of their lives. A feeling of panic was beginning to flutter in Eliane’s chest, like a trapped bird, when at last they heard the crunch of the truck’s wheels on the gravel of the track.

  Both Yves and Eliane scrambled to their feet.

  ‘Wait!’ ordered Gustave. His son and daughter exchanged a frightened glance, realising that she might have been followed; or that perhaps it wasn’t even their mother who was driving the truck if she’d been caught.

  After what felt like another small eternity, they heard footsteps and then the door opened. Lisette set her bags on the floor and bolted the door carefully behind her.

  Then she smiled an exhausted smile. And she nodded at the three of them and said, ‘Another successful delivery by the local midwife.’

  In the golden half-hour before dusk, when Eliane was shooing the last recalcitrant chicken into the hen house and Gustave and Yves were closing up the mill for the night, the Germans arrived.

  From the window of the grain loft, Yves had caught sight of the jeep and the army truck coming along the road at speed. As he’d watched, the vehicle slowed and turned into the track, picking up speed again as they careered towards the mill.

  ‘Papa!’ he shouted. ‘The sluices!’ He almost tumbled down the ladder in his haste to get to the mechanism that closed the gate to the channel beside the mill wheel. It took Yves and Gustave’s combined strength to shift the gears against the powerful force of the water, but just as the Germans pulled up in front of the barn, the river reared above the top of the weir in a thrashing torrent.

  Eliane’s hands shook as she slid the bolt into place to lock the chicken-shed door. Taking a deep breath, she stepped forward to meet the soldiers, giving Gustave and Yves an extra moment or two to finish what they were doing. The general got out of the jeep, accompanied by Oberleutnant Farber. Half a dozen more soldiers jumped out of the truck, their loaded rifles at the ready.

  ‘Good evening, Mademoiselle Martin,’ Oberleutnant Farber said. His tone was even, but the look in his eyes was grave. ‘Messieurs.’ He acknowledged Gustave and Yves. ‘Is Madame Martin at home?’

  Lisette appeared in the doorway, soothing Blanche, who’d been startled by the sudden, angry roar of the river when the sluice gates closed, as well as the sounds of screeching brakes and slamming doors,

  ‘Please, Madame Martin, you will come with us.’ The officer took a step towards her.

  ‘May I ask what this is all about?’ Lisette asked, calmly. Eliane could scarcely hear what her mother said above the rushing of the river and the frantic pounding of her own heart.

  ‘We rather hope you will be able to tell us, madame.’ His words were almost pleasantly conversational in tone, although the glower of the general standing behind him was in marked contrast.

  ‘Eliane,’ Lisette beckoned her daughter. ‘Please take Blanche and get her ready for bed.’

  Gustave stepped forward as Lisette walked to the jeep. ‘I’ll come too.’

  One of the soldiers raised his rifle, sliding off the safety catch, and took aim at the miller. Lisette gasped.

  ‘Lower your weapon, sergeant.’ Oberleutnant Farber’s voice was still calm and reasonable. ‘Monsieur Martin, that will not be possible at the present time. You and your son will stay here. This work party –’ he gestured to the group of soldiers behind him – ‘have a job to do. It would be in everyone’s best interest for you not to hinder them. We are taking extra precautions to seal off further potential crossing points along the demarcation line.’

  The soldiers began unloading rolls of barbed wire from the back of the truck.

  ‘But it’s impossible to cross here, as you can plainly see,’ objected Yves.

  The general glared at him and barked a stream of German, guttural and angry.

  ‘Nevertheless,’ said Oberleutnant Farber, ‘the river will be sealed off here. After all, one cannot be too careful these days.’

  Gusta
ve, Yves and Eliane stood and watched, helplessly, as the jeep disappeared back up the track, carrying Lisette away from them.

  As the remaining soldiers began to hammer stakes into the riverbank and stretch the vicious-looking, spiked wire along it, Blanche’s sobs mingled with the sound of their blows and the roar of the river.

  That first night, when they’d taken Lisette away, there could be no sleep for Eliane, Gustave and Yves, left behind at the mill.

  During the day, Eliane tried to calm Blanche and sing her to sleep, but the little girl was frightened and fretful, disturbed at having witnessed her ‘maman’ being taken by the soldiers – and by the sounds of hammering, which went on even as darkness fell.

  At last, the men climbed back into the military truck and it rumbled off up the track. Eliane drew the blackout curtain aside cautiously and looked out. Her father stood there looking wretched, his strong, capable hands hanging uselessly at his sides, as he surveyed the riverbank. In the moonlight, the barbs of the wire winked with malice, glinting their threatening message into the darkness. It needed no translation: attempt to cross here and you will be cut to ribbons.

  Without Lisette, it felt as though the very heart of the mill house had been torn out. Eliane’s own heart felt tight and heavy and it raced with the fear of what might be happening to her mother. Where was she? What would they do to her? Had someone seen her smuggling Francine, Daniel and Amélie across the unoccupied zone to the rendezvous with the passeur? You couldn’t trust anyone nowadays: neighbours would denounce neighbours for any number of reasons – to gain privileges, to settle old scores, to protect members of their families or to save their own skins. But if the Germans had known for certain that the weir had been used as a crossing point then they’d have arrested Gustave, and probably Yves as well.