The foreman shook his swarthy, jowly head. “You bourgeoisie never understand. American, French, German—it matters not. You all treat labor like vermin.”
Paul let his gaze burn into the older man’s dark pits of eyes, then he marched upstairs. Same communist rhetoric, over and over. Aubrey Autos offered some of the best wages and conditions in France, and Paul listened to labor’s concerns. Yet they were never satisfied.
Three years earlier, strikes and riots had swept France, and Moreau and his followers had occupied Paul’s factory. To protect himself and his family, Paul had ended up carrying a pistol.
He opened the office door.
“Bonjour, Monsieur Aubrey.” His secretary stood and smiled. “You have a visitor.”
“Merci, Mademoiselle Thibodeaux.” Paul entered his office.
Col. Jim Duffy sat in front of Paul’s desk, and he rose. “Good morning, Paul.”
“Good morning, Duff.” Paul shook the American military attaché’s hand. “I heard you were still in town.”
“Yes. Roscoe Hillenkoetter, Robert Murphy, and I stayed behind with Ambassador Bullitt.”
“Admirable,” Paul said. Bill Bullitt had declared no American ambassador to France had ever left his post due to war. When the French government fled, Bullitt had become Paris’s unofficial mayor and had helped negotiate the city’s surrender.
Paul motioned for Duff to take his seat.
Duff rested his olive drab cap in his lap. More gray laced his dark hair since Paul had last seen him at an embassy party. “I was sorry to hear about Simone. Such a horrendous loss.”
Halfway to his seat, and Paul had to grip the desk for balance.
Only one vision remained—Simone at the American Hospital in Paris, her beautiful legs encased in plaster, broken in acrash that should have caused nothing but bruises. She’d been having headaches, she admitted. Loss of balance. Pain in her limbs. She’d pooh-poohed the symptoms.
The doctors found tumors in her brain, her bones, everywhere. She’d wasted away in a matter of days, begging Paul to take little Josie to the States before the Nazis arrived.
How could he have abandoned his wife to die alone?
Paul sucked in a breath through his nostrils, nodded his thanks to Duff, and lowered himself into his leather chair. “Is this a social call or ...?”
“Business.” Duff crossed his ankle over his knee. “I’ll get to the point. We want you to stay in France and run this factory.”
“Can’t do that.” Paul sipped lukewarm coffee. “The Germans won’t let me build cars. I’d have to convert. But I can’t build military equipment.”
“Of course not. Forbidden under our Neutrality Acts. So convert to something else.”
Paul leaned his forearms on the desk, straining the black armband ringing his biceps, and he gazed at his clenched hands. “My wife ... died. A week ago today. I want to go home. Take my little girl and go home.”
“I understand.” Duff’s voice softened. “But you could do your nation a great service by staying.”
“How?” Paul sat back again and fixed a hard gaze on his friend. “By making—I don’t even know what I could make.”
“Trucks, vans, something of civilian use to the Germans. Something to keep you in contact with Colonel Schiller.”
“You’ve met him.”
His light eyes took on a mischievous look. “Went to Harvard a few years before you. A friendly sort. Talkative. Could be useful.”
“Are you asking me to—”
“Listen attentively. Send me reports on things I might find interesting.”
Paul gripped the armrests. “There’s a name for that, Duff—espionage.”
Duff’s narrow face scrunched up. “You wouldn’t seek information, only pass along what was freely given. And you’re acquainted with men in companies like Renault, Citroën, others that’ll produce military equipment. Schiller’s job is to coordinate industry.”
