Becoming Clementine: A Novel

by Jennifer Niven

  One of the guards said, “Give me your bag.” He had wormy eyes and thin lips with a scar through the top one. I wondered if I could knock him down. I would run through the street and I wouldn’t stop running till I got to Spain. He grabbed the bag from me, map and all, and I watched him go through it, my breath frozen in my chest. I thought: Stay calm. Don’t tell him anything. I know nothing. I know nothing.

  The guard said in French, “What are you doing in Paris when your papers say Rouen? When your husband is dead?”

  I know nothing.

  In French, I said, “I’m here looking for work, hoping that someone will hire me to sing at a nightclub or on the radio.” Émile had taught me to say this exact phrase, and also told me to say I had friends who lived here, but I didn’t want to risk them going after Gossie and her aunt.

  He said in French, “You have an American accent.” He looked closer at my card. He said in English, “You were born in the United States?”

  I said, “Yes, but I’m French by marriage. I took my husband’s nationality when I married. I have the right to circulate.” Émile had told me to say this too.

  The guard frowned at me. I said, “If that’s all, I really need to be going.” I tried to sound like I knew what I was doing, like I wasn’t shaking all over, about to faint dead away. I hoped Émile was far off by now, that they hadn’t rounded him up too.

  The guard said, “Not so fast.” He pulled out my lipstick, unwinding it to make sure it was only a lipstick and nothing else. He rustled through the compass, the wooden girl, the chewing gum like they were nothing. He held up the rip cord and squinted at it and then at me before tossing it aside. He held up the map and I sucked in my breath, hoping somehow, by some miracle, he wouldn’t know what it was. I waited for him to say something, for him to show the other men, for him to raise his gun and shoot me between the eyes. But just then, beside me, an old man began to cough, and then he spat into his handkerchief and onto the ground, just missing the guard’s shoe. In French, the guard shouted at the old man, “Silence!”

  He shoved the map back into my bag and handed the bag to me, then he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his shoe till it shone like a new quarter. As he did, the old man looked over at me and winked.

  They loaded us into the truck and the guards climbed in after us, three in front and two in back, sitting in the open door, a leg each bent under their chins, the other swinging off the side. They held their guns with one hand, pointed straight at us.

  The seat was hard and damp, and as we drove over the cobblestones I had to hold on so that I wouldn’t pitch right out of it. Two cars followed along behind us filled with more soldiers and more guns. One of the women was crying. She started wailing: “Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!” over and over. “Ayez pitié.” Have pity.

  Please let Émile find me, wherever they’re taking me. Please don’t let him be captured. I tried not to think about what would happen to me if he were picked up too.

  A little girl sat in the seat next to me, and beside her was a little boy who must have been her brother. She was holding his hand in hers and singing him a song, very low, so that the Germans wouldn’t hear her. The little boy glanced up at me and then he popped his thumb in his mouth. The girl kept singing:

  Où donc est la pleine lune

  Toute en or et en argent….

  I tried not to think about Émile and his mama and the day he sang that song to me. My bag lay at my side, and my eyes flickered over the guards in the front seat. I slid my hand into the bag, keeping it tight and close, and felt around for the map. I thought: This isn’t the plan. It’s only Tuesday. I was supposed to have until Friday. Émile and Barzo aren’t ready. I’m not ready. What if they send me to Germany or Belgium? How will Émile ever find me?

  I touched the cool metal of Ty’s compass and slipped it out, quick as I could, when the guards weren’t looking. I pulled up the hem of my skirt and worked the compass into the lining, and then I plucked a bobby pin from my hair and slid it over the hem, holding it closed. One of the Germans turned around and narrowed his eyes at us over his long nose. He sat like that for a good minute before turning back around.

  I slid my hand into the bag again and this time my fingers touched paper. I began tearing it into bits, right there inside the bag. I ripped it into tiny pieces, and then I felt around for each little shred and gathered them up in my hand.

  The boy looked up at me again and I smiled at him. I wanted to say: It’s okay. Your sister is here. I’m here. We won’t let anyone hurt you. But I didn’t know if this was true because I didn’t know what was happening or why this was happening, and so instead I began to sing.

  When the blazing sun is gone,

  When he nothing shines upon,

  Then you show your little light,

  Twinkle, twinkle, all the night….

  The girl raised her eyes to my face, letting them rest there for a minute. I wondered where her mama was. She said, “Savez-vous les mots dans le français, mademoiselle?” Do you know the words in French?

  “Oui. I think so.”

  Together we sang, our voices hiccupping and skipping with each bump of the truck.

  TWENTY-SIX

  After twenty minutes or so, the truck ground to a stop. I pulled my hand out of the bag, still holding the ripped-up pieces of paper. I stuck my hand in my pocket so no one would ask what I was holding in it, and I followed the woman, the old man, the little girl and her brother, and the others onto a narrow street. By now I didn’t have any idea where we were or what part of the city we were in, but we were standing in front of a white stone building that seemed to take up almost an entire block. I couldn’t tell if it was one huge building or a dozen smaller ones linked together. The number eleven hung beside the door.

  The guards marched us out of the truck and across the three feet of sidewalk through two black iron doors. We paraded across a courtyard and through another door. We walked through the hall to a room at the end, where there were other people rounded up—French men and women and children and Allied airmen, British and American, and French soldiers. Germans in uniform moved through the crowd as if they were at a party.

  I stood with the fourteen others I’d come with, and the old man coughed and wheezed and spat in his handkerchief. Some of the others glared at him, mouths twitching, eyes flinching with each cough or rattle. I knew they wished him dead right then because he was calling attention to us all. But there was so much bustle in the room, with uniformed police walking in and out and so many others rounded up and waiting, that I could see that nobody was paying much mind to us. I bent down, pretending to fix the strap of my shoe, and popped the bits of paper into my mouth. Fast as I could, still bent over, I chewed and chewed. My throat was so dry and the paper was so dry that all I was doing was moving the pieces around and around.

  One of the Germans tapped over to us and I straightened, jaw clenched, trying to look normal and natural. He barked at us to follow him, and we were made to sit on a long bench just inside the door. Another German came up then and took the old man away and out of the room. My eyes were watering and I chewed a little, barely moving my jaw so that no one would see, and then I finally thought to hell with it and swallowed all the pieces whole.

  After what seemed like hours, the old man came back and then the next person was led out of the room and down the hall. When she came back, the next person went and then the next, and the next. I sat with my arm around the girl and boy, studying the other people who were waiting in groups like ours, at the pilots who looked brave but weary.

  A guard walked up and stopped in front of me. It was the same man with the scar on his lip, the man who had looked through my bag. He said, “Come with me.”

  I had to walk ahead so he could watch me with his gun, which he pointed into my back, pushing me. With the nose of the gun, he steered me into a room at the other end of the hall that was large and airy, with two big windows that looked down on the street and a desk
in front of each of them. A man with a flat gray face and sagging cheeks sat in one of the chairs, his desk covered with ink pads and rubber stamps and files and papers. He didn’t even look up when we came into the room.

  The man with the scar said, “Give me your bag.” Without waiting, he took it from me and emptied it upside down on the other desk, the empty one. He said, “Where is the paper?”

  “What paper?”

  “The one you were carrying.”

  I know nothing.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The man behind the desk looked up, his neck sagging around his collar.

  The man with the scar turned my bag inside out. I thought: Please don’t notice the compass is missing too. He held something up and I felt my breath catch in my chest. It was a tiny piece of paper.

  “You ate it.”

  I thought about saying no, I don’t know what you’re talking about, but instead I said, “Yes.”

  The man behind the desk said, “Du bist ein Idiot.” He started laughing.

  The man with the scar snapped at him in German and then moved his eyes back to me so that I could see the fury there. But there was nothing he could do. I knew he wouldn’t want to look like a fool in front of anyone else. He said, “Come with me.”

  In another office, two German women in uniform made me undress. They searched me and then my clothes, patting all around my body and my hair, which was still wrapped in the scarf. As one of them went over my skirt, I prayed she wouldn’t find Ty’s compass. She must not have been looking too hard or too carefully because soon she gave it back to me along with my other things, and I was told to get dressed.

  I was taken to another office, where I was asked a round of questions—my name, age, birthplace, and the whole history of my life: schools I’d gone to, who my parents were, where I traveled, what I did for a living, who was my husband—as a secretary wrote down all my answers. The more I replied as Clementine Roux, the more I could feel Velva Jean Hart slipping away. No one mentioned the map.

  I was sent to another office, where the officer there asked me about the Freedom Line. When I said I didn’t know what he was talking about, he said, “You are involved in this like the other Americans and like the French. I know you are. At night you have to live with yourself knowing that you dare to save the men who cause so much death and destruction. You have been helping murderers.”

  I said, “I know nothing.”

  I was sent to one more office after that, and this last one was larger than all the others. The man it belonged to was probably forty, maybe older. He sat on his desk, his legs dangling off, and a big dog with red fur lay on the floor in front of him, staring at me. The guard with the scar stood at the door, behind me, and I stood before the desk, wishing I could sit down because my legs were as weak as matchsticks.

  The man in charge said, “I advise you to talk because it will make this easier for all of us.” He took his time speaking, like English wasn’t easy for him. “If you lie, I’ll know it. You will probably be shot tomorrow morning anyway. We haven’t had time to judge people since the Invasion.”

  Framed pictures sat on one corner of his desk—different pictures of three children and a blond woman. They sat turned out toward the room, as if he wanted everyone to see.

  He said, “Mademoiselle Roux, what is your profession?”

  “I am a singer.”

  “And where do you sing?”

  “Everywhere,” I said. “I sing whenever and wherever I can.”

  I thought, If they shoot me, they shoot me. I figured they were going to shoot me anyhow, so I might as well not give anything or anybody away.

  “You are a member of the Resistance.” It wasn’t a question.

  “No, sir.”

  “Why were you arrested then?”

  “I don’t know. I was coming out of the shelter with everyone else.”

  “You say you are not in the Resistance, but you know people that are?”

  “Isn’t everyone in France resisting this war in some way?”

  The dog had inched its way over to me on its belly. It stood now and walked to my side and I leaned down to scratch its head.

  The man said something in German to the man with the scar, and then he said to me, “You will be held until your papers are verified.”

  I said, “Is this your family?” I nodded at the photographs on his desk.

  He kept his eyes on me. “Yes.”

  “You must miss them.” I was thinking about how much I missed my family and how I would give anything to see them right that minute.

  “I do.”

  “Your dog is beautiful. My brother had a dog when we were growing up that used to follow him wherever he went. Still does, whenever we’re home. He grew up alongside us just like he was one of my mama’s children.”

  The man glanced down at the dog, which was sitting beside me now, tongue out, smiling. The man said, “Tag. Komm hier.” The dog went to him.

  I said, “What does Tag mean?”

  “It means ‘Day.’” I nodded like this was fine, like I understood. I thought the dog must stand for better days past and better days to come. Even though this man was a German and on the wrong side of the war, it was still the right side to him, and he was probably as tired of it as we all were.

  The man sat looking at me, and then he snapped his fingers at the guard and said something in German. The guard marched out of the room.

  We were quiet for a long time. Finally, the man on the desk said, “My wife is expecting a baby.”

  “When is she due?”

  “February.”

  “Congratulations, sir. A big family is a healthy family.” It was something I’d heard Granny say, once upon a time. He nodded at this, just slightly.

  The guard returned with a bologna sandwich and a cup of ersatz coffee, which was made out of cheap flour and potato starch and, some said, sawdust.

  I said, “Thank you,” and I stuffed the sandwich into my bag because I didn’t know if or when I’d be given food again, and then I drank down the coffee, which tasted worse than dirt.

  I sat on the floor of what must have been a cell, although I couldn’t see anything in the dark. The smell of it was strong and musty and sour, as if something or someone had died there, and a single beam of light slithered in like a snake from a grille in the upper part of the door. It shone down on the floor, making a small white square. I crawled forward and sat in that light and listened to the doors opening and shutting up and down the hall—bolt, key, key and bolt. It was like the rhythm of a song.

  I closed my eyes and tried to remember what it felt like to be beyond the keep, which was something we’d said to each other in Sweetwater, Texas. It was how the other girls and I felt when we were flying—free and strong and beyond the keep of anyone or anything. I pictured myself up in the air, up in the B-17, with nothing but land and ocean and sky below me. I felt the wind against my cheeks and in my hair—my long, wild hair that I missed. I could feel the throttle in my hand, feel the roar of the engine moving through me.

  I still had my bag with me, but I didn’t know how long they’d let me keep it. Feeling my way in the dark, I took Ty’s compass out of the hem of my skirt and then I slid off my blazer and worked the compass into the shoulder pad, which was large and cushiony, and where it wouldn’t be as easy to find. I slid the bobby pin over the opening I’d made and put the blazer on again. When my stomach started growling, I pulled out the bologna sandwich and ate half, and then I wrapped it back up and saved the rest.

  I must have drifted off, because I woke up sometime later to the sound of sirens. I was lying on the floor, the cold stone pressed to my face. It was black in the cell—no shapes, no shadows—but I could hear planes flying overhead, and then a whine of bombs as they fell to the earth, shaking the walls. I prayed for the bombs to shake the cell wide open, but after a while the night grew quiet again and there was nothing to do but lie down on the floor and go back to sl
eep.

  I woke again later, this time to the sound of crying. It was loud at first, then softer, then louder. It was a woman, and she started talking in French, saying the same things over and over, just like she was mad. She would talk and cry, talk and cry, and I could hear other voices trying to quiet her. I wanted to call something out to the person who was doing it, to tell her it would be okay. I wanted to tell her to stop it, to be stronger than that. I wondered what had happened to the old man and to the girl and boy.

  The crying and the talking stopped then and I lay on the cold, hard ground listening to the silence. I rolled onto my back and then onto my side and then onto my other side, and I didn’t sleep again.

  The cell turned light with the morning. I watched it slowly unfold itself in front of me, and what I saw was a dank gray room, stone floor, stone walls, heavy wood door with bars, window with bars, and there, in the corner along one wall, was a body. Its back was to me, and at first I thought it was a dead body, but then I could see the midsection rising and falling. From what I could tell, it was a woman.

  My stomach started to grumble until I was sure I could hear an echo, and I pulled out the sandwich and ate half of the half, saving the rest of it for the woman. I wanted to talk to her, to ask her why she was in there, how long she’d been in there, but instead I set the sandwich down beside her and sat looking around the cell at the window and the walls. A thick metal ring was attached to one wall, and a chain hung from this. A single lightbulb glared down from the ceiling like an eye.