Marie-Claude twisted a pastry apart. “You forget, my dear Véronique. Little Lucie has these silly American notions of love. She’s shocked at my wanton behavior.” She popped a bite in her mouth, eyebrows high in amused defiance.
Lucie stood. “You used to call the Germans beasts. Now you eat their food.”
“This is French food.” Marie-Claude gestured to the spread.
Lucie headed into the bedroom. “I’ll eat my ration.”
“No need to be a martyr,” Véronique called after her. “Enjoy it.”
Lucie pulled out a skirt, a blouse, and a sweater. “No, thank you.”
Marie-Claude flounced into the room. “She isn’t a martyr. She’s a hypocrite.”
“A hypocrite?” Lucie whirled around.
Her roommate glared at her. “Eat your ration? You shouldn’t have a ration in the first place. You don’t belong here. If you went home, there would be more food for the rest of us.”
Lucie gasped. “Parisismy home.”
Marie-Claude’s nostrils flared. “You’re no more French than Klaus is.”
“I—but I’ve lived here—”
“You sell your American books.” Marie-Claude slashed one hand through the air. “You speak your American language and go to your American church for—what did you call it?—the giving of the thanks?”
“Thanksgiving.” Just yesterday at the church Thanksgiving service, she’d enjoyed a concert by the Paris Philharmonic Choir with Edmund Pendleton on the organ. And she’d exchanged sweet small talk with Paul.
Marie-Claude slacked her hip. “You talk about the turkey and the corn—of all things! Only pigs eat corn. No Parisienne would ever eat pig food.”
Véronique gave a long-suffering smile. “We’re your friends, Lucie. But even if you never speak English again, you’ll never be a true Parisienne.”
Eyes burning, Lucie dressed. She’d lived in Paris since she was nine, stayed when leaving would have been safer, and dedicated herself to the city’s welfare by aiding the resistance. Yet her roommates would never see her as one of them.
“Come, Véronique,” Marie-Claude said. “More food for you and me.”
Two sets of footsteps receded. “Don’t mind her, Marie-Claude. We’re just getting by.”
After Lucie finished dressing, she slipped on her coat, hat, and gloves so she could find bread for breakfast before the bookstore opened at eight. Then she grabbed her flashlight, the lens covered with blue tissue to meet blackout regulations.
The Germans had placed Paris on Berlin Time, so the sun wouldn’t rise until nine, but at least curfew ended at five in the morning.
Lucie headed down to the courtyard. Madame Villeneuve’s head was silhouetted in the window of her apartment, and Lucie gave the concierge a nod and swept through the porte cochère to the darkened street.
The blackout persisted even though the RAF had never bombed Paris. They bombed French ports where the German navy had bases, and they passed over France to bomb Germany. But only the Germans had bombed Paris, and only once, during the terrifying days of the invasion.
Her wooden soles clopped on the damp sidewalk, following the pale blue cone of light. She was registered at the bakery on the place de la Sorbonne to buy rationed bread.
With her hand pressed to her empty stomach, she turned a corner. Dinner had been the usual stew of beans and carrots.
“Just getting by,” Véronique had declared.
Getting by meant standing in long lines and finding out which stores had food. Getting by meant occasionally buying on the black market or accepting food from friends in the country. Getting by meant defying silly German laws and growing vegetables or raising guinea pigs and rabbits.
But sleeping with German soldiers to receive food was far more than getting by.
Lucie turned down a narrow lane, praying the bakery hadbread. She needed nourishment to sustain her at work. Any day now, Bernadette would find a new job and Lucie would run the busy store by herself. Although book sales dwindled, resistance messages continued.
After the imposter had tried to intercept a message, she’d met privately with Renard again. For over a week, he’d paused operations and posted lookouts. When he became convinced the imposter was a solitary opportunist, Renard resumed operations but with stronger security. Code phrases changed almost daily, and résistants conducted exchanges only when the store was empty. Renard was also looking for a new letter box, no easy task.
