At least he looked curious. “Why should she want to know?”
“Because of our mutual friend. He has a brother named Jonah.”
He didn’t easily dismiss the name or her, that much was clear. He studied her a moment longer. “Come with me.”
Isa was at his heels before he finished his last word.
She recognized the small, barren entranceway. The man entered the inner door without even a knock and Isa followed. Moments later a woman appeared under an archway across the comfortable room. Isa pushed the thoughts from her mind but they came nonetheless: this was Rosalie. The woman Edward depended on at least for his identity. Someone he trusted.
Isa stepped forward, but even as her lips opened, words faded. Edward entered the room behind Rosalie: the Edward she knew, without a trace of the makeup marring his skin.
“Isa! How did you get here? What are you doing here?”
She wanted to fly to his arms, but her feet were firmly rooted in the spot near the door. She was the outsider in this cozily relaxing home where he was so at ease with two people who were strangers to her. Even as he stepped fully into the room, she saw that he had a cup of something in his hand, which he set aside on the nearby table as he approached.
“What is it?” He was near her now and placed his hands on her arms.
His voice shook away her selfish thoughts. “Oh, Edward, you must come with me. It’s Jonah. The Germans have taken him!”
“What? But why?”
“He was taken from school, they said to St. Gilles, but I’ve just come from Mr. Whitlock’s, and I was told Germany is seizing young men to be deported to Germany for work.”
He looked behind him at the man and Rosalie, then back at Isa. “We’ve heard they were taking men from the provinces and expected it here, too. But Jonah . . . it hardly makes sense. He’s just a boy.” He turned from Isa. “I must go.”
Isa stepped closer to his back. “Yes! Your mother is trying to track him down. But, Edward, the Major . . . he mustn’t see you as you are. He doesn’t stay in his room anymore. When I left, he was with your mother.”
“With her? What do you mean?”
“I believe he was trying to help. He sent me to the Kommandantur with a note.”
Edward’s face reflected Isa’s skepticism. But they both knew the obvious: Edward couldn’t go to his mother with a German Major lurking in the same room.
He looked at the other man as if seeing how inadequate were their disguises, even in the dim light of a home illumined only by candle. Suddenly he faced Isa again. “I need you to do something for me.”
She nodded.
“I’ll need money. What do you have other than the jewels? And do you still have immediate access to wherever you’ve hidden it?”
“I have five thousand Marks, and some Belgian francs, too—a thousand in smaller notes. And a one-thousand-franc note. It’s safe in the room I told you about. No one could possibly find it there, I promise you that.”
No time to see if any one of them found the amounts impressive—Edward was already leading her to the door. “Go back; retrieve a thousand in German notes, five hundred in Belgian francs. You must bring it here and return home before curfew. Will you do it?”
“Of course.”
“I’m going to the church,” Edward said. “Go now, Isa. And hurry.”
She turned away and would have dashed, but Edward held her back. For a moment he simply looked at her. “Be careful.”
She smiled and nodded. Then flew from the room.
She ran nearly all the way, slowing only when footsteps neared, fearing to be stopped with a demand to check papers. But God had sent her peace; He would do something to save Jonah, and He would do it through Edward.
15
Let us present a strong, united, yet peaceful resistance as we await the day of our deliverance. In this way we prove the vast inferiority of what they call German Kultur.
La Libre Belgique
* * *
Genny sat beside Major von Bürkel in the backseat of the black motorcar driven by a young German soldier. The Major, beside her, had the grace not to look her way, for which she was thankful. Ahead, she saw only the black, white, and red colors flying on the little flags affixed to the hood of the motor. Colors of the Second Reich. Her head ached; her heart pounded; her