said, his face stained with chocolate.
Jacob wiped his brother’s face, then took a sip of the milky coffee. It tasted bitter at first, after the crepes, but Marie offered him a pinch of sugar, and he loved the combination. Perhaps growing up meant having new experiences and making decisions. Jacob longed to grow up, to become an adult, yet he was still drawn to so much from childhood, and he did not want to give up his playing.
“Mrs. Magné, I thought we’d be leaving soon, but no one came to wake us up this morning.”
“Pierre is totally tied up. We had not been planning on taking a trip, you see. With the way Mr. Leduc . . . Well, it’s been an unfortunate occurrence. We’ve never had anything like this happen before.”
“Have you been helping . . . people . . . for a long time?” Jacob asked.
“Since the Germans arrived in France. Once the Nazis entered Paris, countless people fled to the south. They were afraid of retaliation. Nearly every rural area swelled up with refugees, but after the first few months, most Parisians returned home. Since then, there’s been a constant trickle of people who needed to escape or just preferred to be in the unoccupied zone, or Allied pilots the Nazis have shot down. Someone comes through our home pretty much every week. We don’t usually keep people here. We have a small farm just outside of town. If we house someone here, people start asking questions and meddling, but what happened yesterday was an exception. On the other hand, children don’t stand out as much. They’re practically invisible to most adults.”
“Children are a nuisance,” Moses said with all seriousness.
“But why would you say that?” Marie asked, with a curious smile.
“We’re just a burden. Adults think we’re loud, wild, and inconvenient.” Moses spoke with utter sincerity.
“Dear me, well, that must be because the adults don’t remember when they were children,” she answered.
“When do you think we’ll leave?” Jacob asked.
“Perhaps tomorrow, or the day after next, at the latest. Are you in a hurry?”
Jacob shook his head. “No, but our parents are waiting for us.”
Marie nodded with a long face, then got up, served herself some black coffee, and looked out the window. It was cloudy. Dark storm clouds moved in from the north, making the hot air feel stifling. “It’s going to rain,” she said at last. “Probably tomorrow as well. Pierre will tell us when it’s best to leave. He also wanted to make sure Mr. Leduc had not been captured or given anyone away.”
She took another sip of steaming coffee, then fished in her white apron, pulling out a small key that she contemplated for a moment.
“Would you children like to see the playroom our boys used to use?” she asked, her voice chipper once again.
Despite their eagerness, Jacob and Moses were slow to get to their feet, the bounteous breakfast having required most of their energy. They followed Marie to a stairwell, listening to their collective footfalls on the wooden steps that took them to a spacious attic. Inside they saw a fully assembled electric train set up to run through a model town. There were swords, armor, and all sorts of toys.
“Why don’t you play up here until lunch?” she suggested. “No one will hear you. The house next door is vacant.” She left them to their imaginations.
Jacob and Moses raced to the train and spent the morning lost in play.
“Wow,” Moses finally said, unable to shake the feeling of disbelief. “I’ve never seen a room like this.”
Jacob nodded, his hands busy with everything they could touch. “But we should leave tomorrow. I don’t want to get there too late.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Well, we don’t know how long Mother and Father will be in Valence. Maybe they’ll have to flee from there and, if they learn that Aunt Judith is dead, maybe they would try to go look for us,” Jacob said.
“Oh, I hadn’t thought of that.” The seriousness had returned to Moses’s voice.
“If we leave two days from now, I hope we get there before the end of the month. It’s just that news travels faster than we can.”
“What will we do when we get to Bourges? It’s not even halfway there.” Despite the toys, Moses was discouraged again.
“We’ll figure something out. We’ve got some money. Maybe we could take a bus or the train.”
“Wouldn’t that be dangerous?”
“I’m guessing that things are a little better in the unoccupied zone.”
The boys sat