Echoes Page 0,128

was something he wanted to discuss with Amadea. He had heard from others that she had been depressed for a long time about Jean-Yves, and still blamed herself not only for his death, and Georges's, but for the assassination of the four young boys. Even worse, she was afraid that Jean-Yves had died as punishment for her sins. Serge had grown fond of her in the time she had been doing missions for him, and he had a profound respect for her good judgment, great courage, and cool head. He wanted to make sure she was all right, and there was a mission he wanted to talk to her about. As always, when something was delicate, he wanted to speak to her in person. He sent a message to her, and they met at a neighboring farm.

As soon as she walked in, he saw that she looked drawn and tired, and her spirits were still lagging. She seemed to feel haunted by the deaths she felt she had caused, and talked a lot again about how anxious she was to go back to the convent after the war. She ate dinner with him, and filled him in on the supplies they had brought in, some of the new people working with them, and after dinner, they took a walk.

“There's something I want to talk to you about,” he said after a few minutes. “I need an operative in Paris for a special mission. I don't know if you feel up to it, but I think you would be perfect.” He had been asked by the SOE in England to find someone with specific qualifications, and she had them all. They needed someone who spoke German faultlessly, and could pass as a cool, sophisticated, aristocratic German woman. Amadea not only looked the part, but was in fact precisely that. And she could pass equally as French or German. They wanted to pose her as the wife or girlfriend of a high-ranking SS officer who was coming to visit Paris. The officer in question was going to be impersonated by a member of the British Secret Service who himself was half German and was also fluent in French. He needed a perfect match for him, and Amadea was it. The big question was if she would do it, and as always she had the choice.

Serge explained the mission to her as they walked along in the dark, and she listened to him in silence. For a long time, she didn't answer, and he didn't press her.

“When do you need to know?” She wanted to pray about it. She was happy in the countryside, doing what she could for them. It was far more dangerous for her going to Paris, and flaunting herself in the face of the SS. She didn't mind being shot by the Germans stationed in Melun, in the course of a midnight mission. The one thing she didn't want, and feared more than anything, was being deported back to the camps. That was more crucifixion than even she felt ready to risk, or face again. She knew she wouldn't be as lucky again, as she had been in escaping Theresienstadt. So far, not a single soul had escaped from Auschwitz, or most of the other camps. It had been a sheer fluke, the night of the leveling of Lidice, that she had been able to escape the Nazis' “model camp.” They were in fact at that moment preparing to show their “Town for Jews” to the International Red Cross. Deportation to any other camp, or even that one now, was almost certain death, after unthinkable torture. Serge's invitation to Paris, masquerading as the wife of an SS officer, sounded risky to her. Too much so.

“We don't have much time. And you're our only real possibility,” Serge said honestly. “The agent who is running the mission is coming in at the end of this week. I was going to tell you about it tonight anyway. He's coming in with three men.” She already knew what those landings were like, and had assisted them often with Jean-Yves and the others. They landed a tiny Lysander for less than five minutes, while the men got out, the plane took off again, and the men dispersed quickly. They were the same planes that did their supply drops, and sometimes parachuted agents in. The landings were far harder. They came in without lights, and relied on the freedom fighters on the ground to guide

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