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condolence, and nothing more.

“She didn't hate you,” Amadea reassured him. “Her family was even worse to her. They wrote her name in the family's book of the dead, and wouldn't let her see her mother when she died, or go to the funeral. My grandmother had come to us two years before, and we got to know her. I never met the others.”

“Where are they now?” he asked, looking concerned, as Amadea took a breath before she answered. The rest was all bad news.

“The entire family was deported on Kristallnacht. Some people thought they were sent to Dachau, but I don't know for sure. My mother and sister were deported to Ravensbrück two years ago. I haven't heard from them since.” He looked horrified by what she had said.

“And you came here?” He looked confused as Armand watched her intently. She was an amazing woman. Armand had no sisters, and wished he had one like her. He was an only child, with no relatives other than his father. They had made the decision to join the Resistance together, all they had in the world was each other, and this house, which was in a genteel state of disrepair as was the property all around them.

“I was in Theresienstadt for five months. Friends hid me before that, after my mother was deported. I was in a Carmelite convent for six years before that.”

“You were a nun?” Armand looked shocked.

“I still am, I suppose,” although that had been questionable for a while. But she was sure again now. Ever since Jean-Yves died. She had found her vocation again. She wasn't sure now that she had ever lost it. She had just taken a brief detour, in extraordinary circumstances. “Sister Teresa of Carmel. I'll go back after the war. I had to leave the convent so as not to endanger the others.”

“What a remarkable girl you are,” her uncle said, putting an arm around her shoulders. “Your father would be very proud of you, if he were alive. I am, and I hardly know you.” And then he looked at her wistfully. “Could you stay longer?” They had a lifetime of catching up to do. And he wanted to hear all about the years he had lost with his brother. There were a thousand things he wanted to know.

“I don't think that would be wise,” she said sensibly, showing Carmelite good judgment, as Serge would have said. “I'd like to come back, if I may,” she asked politely. He could see that she was beautifully brought up.

“I'd be heartbroken if you didn't.” They walked back inside then, and spent the rest of the night talking. They never went to bed, and then finally she went to lie down for a few hours before she left.

She went to kiss the children good-bye, and they cried when she left them. And she, Armand, and Nicolas all cried as she drove away. She had promised to come back, and her uncle had begged her to be careful and take care of herself. She could still see them in the rearview mirror, standing in the courtyard, waving, as she turned and they disappeared out of sight. It had been one of the best nights of her life, and she wished that Jean-Yves and her father could have been there. But as she drove back to Melun, she felt them close to her, along with her mother and Daphne. They were all part of an unbreakable chain, linking the present, the future, and the past.

22

AMADEA'S DRIVE BACK TO MELUN WENT SMOOTHLY. SHE was stopped by soldiers only once, and although they admired her and chatted for a few minutes, they let her drive on fairly quickly. They had scarcely glanced at her papers. One of them waved with a big boyish grin as she drove off.

She was back in Melun at the farmhouse by late afternoon. By the following week, she was back with the others, picking up supplies parachuted in, and following their familiar routine. The British had sent them two more shortwave radios, which were concealed at neighboring farms.

It was late September when Serge came to visit them again. He liked to see the men and women who worked for him face to face whenever he could. He wanted to have a sense of them, to make sure that they weren't putting others at risk, and that they were as loyal as he believed. He had a sixth sense about those things. And this time there