“Geez, Alan! He’s my friend!”
Alan glared at September Rose. “We talked about this!”
“Not in front of our guest, Alan,” Mrs. Walker said sternly. “You can stay and have pie with us all, or you can go to your room.”
Alan sat down with a thud. Feeling uncomfortable, Gustave excused himself and headed toward the bathroom. He took a long time in the little room, splashing water on his face and drying it on a pink embroidered towel. He walked back hesitantly.
“He goes to my school,” he heard September Rose hiss as he approached the kitchen. “You said that was all right.”
“I said it was okay to be friendly to the white kids at school. Out of school is different. You could get yourself into trouble, especially with a boy. Granma, tell her!”
“I’m the one who invited him in,” Mrs. Walker murmured. “He talked to Seppie at the door one day when he was delivering for Quong’s. Miss Noelle got me all worried over it.”
“He’s from France, anyway. He’s not American,” September Rose jumped in. “It’s different.”
“People won’t know that just seeing you and him together.”
“He seems like a very nice boy, Alan, very polite,” Mrs. Walker said. “Anyway, hush! He’s our guest right now. We’ll discuss it later.”
Gustave hesitated in the kitchen doorway. Mrs. Walker turned and saw him. “Would you like another piece of pie, Gustave? Seppie is having one.”
“Go ahead, Gustave. You don’t have to go just yet, do you?” September Rose asked. “Granma’s trying to fatten us up a little.”
Alan scraped his chair back loudly and crossed his arms, scowling. “You all know I have a Negro Youth Group meeting here at five-thirty,” he said. “It’s going to be crowded enough in the apartment with just us.”
“Oh, that’s today?” September Rose reached for the papers. “Are those the flyers? Let’s see! ‘Democracy—At Home and Abroad,’ ” September Rose proclaimed, holding one up for Gustave to see. “Ooh—they’re swell!”
“Here are the other two,” Alan said, pulling flyers from the stack.
“ ‘Don’t Buy Where You Can’t Work!’ ” she read, holding one up and then the other. “ ‘Victory Abroad, Victory at Home!’ ”
Gustave leaned closer and looked at the two “V”s on the third flyer. “What is ‘Victory at Home’?” he asked September Rose quietly.
Alan snorted.
“Victory against race discrimination,” September Rose said. “Like the theaters Josephine Baker won’t sing in because they don’t let Negroes be in the audience. Places we can’t live. Jobs they won’t hire us for. Stores that won’t let us try on clothes.”
Gustave nodded, feeling a bit sick. It sounded all too familiar.
September Rose turned to Alan. “Where are you going to post the flyers?”
“Around Baumhauer’s Department Store, on One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Street,” Alan said. “I dressed up and applied for a job there last week. So did Willie and Roberta. ‘We don’t hire coloreds,’ they said. They wouldn’t even let Roberta use the customers’ restroom as we were on our way out. But they’re happy to sell us stuff and take our money.”
“Alan, honey.” Mrs. Walker looked at her grandson worriedly. “I don’t know if that second flyer is such a good idea. ‘Don’t buy where you can’t work?’ They aren’t going to like that, if people stop shopping at their store.”
“That’s the whole point, Granma. We’re going to picket too. If they lose enough money, maybe they’ll finally hire some of us.”
“Your daddy went and got himself a good job without doing any of that. Paid well too. Thirty-eight dollars a week before he went off to war. That’s real good wages.”
“Sure, Granma. But I don’t want to drive a garbage truck.”
“Sanitation truck,” said September Rose.
“That’s just a fancy name for garbage, Seppie,” said Alan. “I know it’s good money. But even Dad says, ‘It’s good money, but it smells!’ And who knows if he’ll be able to get his job back when he comes home.”
“I wish you’d let me join your group,” September Rose said. “I’m old enough.”
“You’re just a kid. It could get dangerous. You don’t understand anything!” Alan threw a glance at Gustave. “I changed my mind about the pie. I’ll wait for supper.” He left the room.
“I didn’t know he applied for that job, did you, Granma?”
“No, I sure didn’t. But it was asking for trouble. Everyone knows they don’t hire our kind. I wish that boy had more sense.” Mrs. Walker began clearing up. “Say goodbye to your classmate. His mother’ll be expecting him.”
“Thank you for the pie, Mrs. Walker,” Gustave said. “It was delicious.”
“You come again now, hear?” She smiled at him. “Anytime.”
Mrs. Walker started to hum the Chiquita banana song as she ran the water.
September Rose watched until her grandmother had turned her back, then ran her finger over her plate and licked it, grinning conspiratorially at Gustave. “Anyhow, that’s probably what you’re doing wrong.”
“What is?”
“The bananas. That’s probably why they didn’t ripen. Like the song says, ‘You never put bananas in the refrigerator.’ ”
“We don’t have the refrigerator. I put the bananas on the windowsill.”
“You don’t have a refrigerator? Why not?”
“Seppie—hush!” Mrs. Walker swatted her with a dish towel.
“What? Anyway, probably too much cold air is coming through the window glass. Try someplace warmer.”
She walked him to the front door.
“Could my father get that kind of job, the garbage job?” Gustave asked her.
“If they’re hiring. And if he’s strong enough. The workers have to jump up and down from the back of the truck all day.”
“Oh. No, he has a bad leg. He can’t jump,” Gustave said.
The two of them were standing alone in the living room. September Rose dropped her voice to a whisper. “I’m sorry Alan said all that. He’s just being bossy and overprotective. When I started junior high, he told me I could be friendly to white kids in school, but not outside of school, especially boys. He said when a girl was in junior high or older, it was asking for trouble.”
“Why? What kind of trouble?”
“Oh, you know, sometimes people might yell dumb stuff at you on the street or whatnot. I just tell Alan, ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh,’ and then I do what I want where he can’t see. I mean, nearly all the kids at our school are white. What am I gonna do, not be friends with anybody except Lisa and the people from our church?”
Gustave nodded.
She smiled a little shyly. “Anyway, I’ve been meaning to say, you can call me ‘Seppie’ if you want to. That’s what my family calls me, and my friends. Hey, maybe one day soon after school we can go to the library to work on our reports for history. You’ve probably never been there, right? I could help you get signed up for a library card.”
“I did go, once, but I didn’t get a card. That would be swell!”
September Rose laughed. “You’re learning to talk just like an American!”
Gustave felt himself smiling as he pedaled away from September Rose’s building. “That’s what my friends call me,” she had said. He hadn’t misunderstood. She had said it twice. When Alan had walked into the kitchen, she had told him, “He’s my friend!”
21
“I just don’t know who to do this stupid history report on,” Gustave said as he carried the soup to the table.
“Does it have to be someone American?” Maman asked, ladling the soup into three bowls.
“No. Anyone in the world. Any historical figure you admire. A lot of kids are doing athletes and stuff.”
“That’s a funny kind of historical figure! You should do someone more significant. How about Napoleon?” Papa took his bowl of lentil and potato soup from Maman. “You us
ed to have a book about him, I remember.”
“Yeah, when we lived in Paris. Maybe I could do it on him. I’d have to find some new books.”
“Or what about Joan of Arc?” Maman asked. “You could teach those American kids about the important Frenchwoman their school is named after.”
“I don’t know. They might think I was showing off about France or something.” Gustave blew on his soup too hard to cool it, and some spilled out the other side of the bowl.
“Careful!” Maman said, mopping it up. “Well, I think you should do it on someone from France so you already know something about the topic, don’t you? That will make reading the books in English easier.”
Papa broke off a piece of bread and handed the loaf to Maman. “What about the man who designed the Statue of Liberty? Do these American kids know she was a gift from France? What was his name, Lili?”
“Bartholdi. Or what about Gustave Eiffel, who designed the Eiffel Tower?”
“I just don’t want to give a speech in English, with everybody listening and looking at me.” And wearing weird French pants, Gustave thought. So far he had been able to save sixty cents from his earnings and tips, but that was a long way from the two dollars the pants cost at Mr. Quong’s. He stirred his soup vigorously.
“I know you can do a good job, Gustave,” Papa said. “Just memorize the speech ahead of time and then deliver it.”
“We’re amazed when we hear you speaking English now,” Maman said. “And you understand the radio broadcasts so well. I was telling our night-school teacher, Mrs. Szabo, about it, and she says to be patient, because grown-ups learn so much more slowly.”
“Ah, to be young!” Papa said, ruffling his hair.
“Huh. That’s what you think,” Gustave said. “If you were young, you’d have to do an oral report.”
Maman giggled as she cleared away the soup bowls. “Ai-yai-yai, what a disaster that would be! Who’s ready for some dessert?”
Gustave peered at the bowl of fruit salad Maman handed to him. These days Maman had a new trick: she’d buy cheap pieces of old fruit that they were going to throw out in the markets, and she’d use the good bits to make fruit salad. Too often he had spooned up mealy apple or orange pieces going sour. Today it looked all right. He took a bite.
“I need to talk to you about something else,” he said.
“That sounds serious!” said Papa.
“It is. One day when I came home, I saw that your New American book was open to the citizenship questions. Were you studying them? Are we going to stay in America forever?”
“We don’t know, chéri,” Maman said slowly, setting her teacup down. “So much depends on what happens with the war. Lately we’ve been thinking that even if the Allies win, we might stay.”
“We’ve been talking with people at night school,” Papa said, taking a sip of tea. “There may be a better future for you here.”
“In any case, it takes five years to become a citizen,” Maman said. “Nothing is happening right now. But what do you think? Can you see us becoming Americans, all of us, together?”
“Maybe.” Gustave bit into a sour piece of fruit, grimaced, and pushed his bowl away. France was home. But France was also the place where he had seen that vicious graffiti: “Jews out of France.” It was where Philippe, a cruel boy at school, had left a note on his desk saying “Hitler was right. Death to the Jews.” And where the police had raided their house, destroyed their things, and threatened his parents. Only some French people were like that, of course. Other people, like Nicole and her father, risked their lives to help Jews. And being French was who Gustave was.
Right now, he couldn’t imagine living in France. But he also couldn’t imagine never living there again.
“Of course, when you’re grown up you can make up your own mind. You may want to go back one day,” Papa said.
He might. If the Allies won the war. If there was still a France.
—
The next Boy Scouts meeting was closer, at Father René’s church on West 23rd Street, so Gustave only needed a nickel each way for fare. As he pulled open the heavy door of the Church of St. Vincent de Paul and walked into the velvety hush inside, he realized that he had never been inside a church before. He had to walk past a crucifix hanging on the wall to get to the stairs that went down to the basement, where the Boy Scouts met. The eerie, tormented figure on the cross made Gustave shudder. He was glad when he’d found his way to the big, plain room in the basement. He was a few minutes late, and all the other scouts were there, sitting at a long table, talking in French. Some of them were eating sandwiches and some were practicing knots. There were several boys he didn’t know, ones who hadn’t been on the earlier scout hike. “Come join us, Serious Camel!” André called. “How’s your figure-eight knot?”
Father René smiled a welcome. “It’s just me again today. The rabbi’s mother has been ill,” Father René explained to Gustave. “He’s usually more involved.”
Father René was a whiz at knot tying. By the end of the meeting, Gustave could do a good half hitch, a half-knot, a square knot, and a figure-eight knot. The figure eight, with its intricate symmetry, was his favorite.
“Two weekends from now, your schools have Thursday and Friday off,” Father René said at the end of the scout meeting, “so we’ll be going on our annual March camping trip. We’ll assemble early Thursday morning and drive up to Osprey Lake.” The boys whooped in excitement. Father René turned to Gustave and Jean-Paul. “We go every year. There’s a grand estate up there with an abandoned mansion on it. The man who owns it was a Boy Scout himself when he was young, and for years he has been letting scouts go and camp there—on the grounds in summer and inside the old building when it’s cold.”
“It’s fantastic!” Bernard said. “We make a fire in this huge old fireplace in this gigantic empty room. We cook over it and sleep next to the embers, because it’s really cold up there in the mountains. Sometimes it snows and we get to play in it in the morning. I can’t wait!”
“I have some spare sleeping bags for anyone who needs one,” said Father René. “But bring your warmest clothes, and everyone bring a warm blanket too. Do you each have an old blanket to bring?” he asked Jean-Paul and Gustave.
“Sure,” said Jean-Paul. Gustave nodded. The one he slept under was definitely old.
“Good. So we’ll see each other then.”
“I’ll bring the potatoes again, Father René,” André said. “They are so good roasted when it’s cold out.”
“Sure. Anyone who wants to can bring something for our feasts. Rabbi Blum and I will make sure there’s enough food for us all.”
“Can you bring marshmallows again?” Maurice asked Guy.
“Definitely!”
“Ooh, yeah! Bring lots!” said Xavier.
“Just don’t eat the whole bag yourself this year, Tenacious Sponge!” said André.
“Then you better try a little harder to keep up with me, Talkative Chipmunk!”
—
When Gustave got home after Scouts, Papa was alone in the apartment, sitting on the sofa drinking a cup of tea and reading a French newspaper. Classical music was playing on the radio. “Ah, Gustave,” he said. “Good to see you. There’s a letter here for you, from France. With no return address.”
“From Nicole?” Gustave threw his coat toward the hook on the wall, not bothering to pick it up when it missed and fell to the floor. He ran to the table. It was Nicole’s handwriting! Trying to ignore the tape on the ends showing that the censors had already read it, Gustave slit open the light blue envelope. As he did so, he looked in distaste at the stamp. It was a new one, but it wasn’t one he wanted to save for his stamp collection. It had a picture of Maréchal Pétain, the new leader of France, the one installed by the Nazis. Pétain was French, but he did everything the Nazis wanted him to do. Awful things like passing laws making life hard for the Jews. Gustave looked more closely at the stamp and grinned. Ever so lightly,
someone had drawn a line across Pétain’s face, crossing him out. Yes, this letter was definitely from Nicole. He drew the fragile paper out carefully.
10 February, 1942
Cher Gustave,
I haven’t heard from you since my last letter. Write to me! Tell me about your glamorous life in America! I’m sure pretty soon you’ll see a movie star in a fur coat. Do people ride around everywhere in shiny cars? Do you have steak and chocolate cake at every meal? There’s no important news for you, but I will try to make this a colorful letter anyway. We’re short of food and fuel in our village, but everyone is getting by, just barely. My fingers are blue as I write this, because we have had no charcoal for the last week. We are burning wood to keep warm, but we don’t have much left, so Papa is rationing it. We only use a tiny amount each day, which means I’ll be lucky if my ink doesn’t freeze. And I need the ink to stay thawed because after I finish this letter, I have to do my homework for our oh-so-wonderful new teacher, Monsieur Faible.
Speaking of Monsieur Faible, he talked to our class indignantly last week about something that happened in the cinema in There had been rumors about a No one knows where they were taken.
Later, there was an unfortunate occurrence at the cinema in the city of The German-made newsreels that play before films now, as you can imagine, are very informational in telling us about the fine contributions the Germans are making to France these days. This newsreel showed Hitler giving a speech. The audience was very eager to hear Hitler’s inspirational words translated into French for their benefit. Unfortunately, however, it seemed many people in the theater had bad colds or maybe even bronchitis or pneumonia, because there was so much sneezing and coughing throughout the newsreel that it completely drowned out the words and it was impossible to understand what was being said. What a shame!
Monsieur Faible went white and then bright red as he was telling us about it.
In other news, I have been riding my bicycle often, sometimes with Claude. You remember him, I’m sure. He’s nice.
Skating with the Statue of Liberty Page 12
