before the war turned the whole world upside down. She was careful to avoid telling him anything that might put her family in danger if he were caught, but it still felt good to share a part of herself with this man and to hear his stories in return.
In a time and place where they had so little, the hours they spent in each other’s company felt like one of the best gifts she’d ever received.
After work the next evening, Claire went out to try and find some extra food. The three girls had each chipped in from their savings, so she had a few francs in her pocket in case the grocer might have anything beneath the counter that could be bought by slipping a little extra money into his hand. Usually the girls avoided the black market and made do with their official allocations of rations, but with an extra mouth to feed they were all hungrier than ever.
By the time she got home there was a satisfying heft to her shopping bag, where a jar of confit de canard was concealed beneath some dusty potatoes and a bunch of wizened carrots. They would have a feast!
On the first floor, she was surprised to hear a low murmur of voices coming from the sewing room. Vivi must be working late, yet again, she thought, but she heard a male voice too and wondered whether Fréd had risked leaving the apartment.
The door stood slightly ajar and through the narrow crack she caught a glimpse of a man’s hand resting on Vivi’s shoulder. It was a gesture of complete ease, of a closeness and a comfortable intimacy which stopped Claire in her tracks. Vivi had never let on that she had a boyfriend. In fact, she rarely went out at all these days and when she did it was usually at Claire and Mireille’s insistence that she join them for a walk or a visit to a local café. If it was Fréd who sat so close to her then he must have made a very fast move. Anyway, Claire had seen the way Fréd’s face lit up whenever Mireille appeared, so it would be all the more surprising if this were him.
The two figures were intent on whatever it was that Vivi was working on and, as Claire watched, the man’s hand moved from Vivi’s arm to point at something on the table.
Claire shifted slightly, trying to get a view of the man’s face, but as she did so the bag of shopping swung a little, pushing the door open.
Two faces looked up at her, startled. And then the man said, ‘Good evening, Claire. It’s nice to see you again.’
‘Bonsoir, Monsieur Leroux,’ she replied.
He stood, and as he did so she noticed that Vivi slipped whatever it was they’d been studying so intently on to her lap.
‘I’m sorry to have interrupted you,’ Claire said, backing away from the doorway. ‘I just wanted to tell Vivi that I’ve got some supper for us all.’ She held up her bag. ‘It’ll be ready in about half an hour.’
‘That’s quite alright. I need to come upstairs to speak to you all, in any case. There is a plan for your surprise guest’s onward journey, but I need to discuss it with you. Here’ – he took the bag of shopping from her – ‘allow me to carry this for you. Vivi will follow in a minute once she’s tidied up here.’
He was certainly a very attractive man, she thought, but Claire noticed that he used the less formal version of Vivienne’s name, and that an undercurrent of understanding seemed to run between the two of them. Maybe Vivi was one of his mistresses, she thought. It would certainly explain how she’d been recruited to work at Delavigne Couture. And then, like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle fitting into place, an image came into her mind of the reflection in the mirror that she’d glimpsed at Brasserie Lipp all those months before. The man sitting at the table with Vivi and the Nazi woman had been Monsieur Leroux. That was why his face had looked familiar when they were subsequently introduced in the Tuileries gardens. Given his closeness to Vivi, he must have known all along that Claire was consorting with a German officer. She felt her cheeks burn at the thought, and was thankful that she was preceding him up the stairs so that he couldn’t see her shame. If she