forth on her feet as if she was entertaining the idea of running. He pointed his gun at Marguerite and then at me. ‘What are your names? Carte d'identité!’
I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out my identification. He glanced at it with a discerning eye. ‘Jeanne Calvet,’ he said, ‘and from Lyon.’
‘Where’s yours?’ he said to Marguerite, but she did nothing but stare. The rain-heavy tree branches creaked, and their leaves fluttered like a thousand butterflies from a gust of wind that blew right through us. He lowered his gun and picked at his teeth with his fingernail as two other Gestapo appeared from behind him. Marguerite stopped swaying. ‘We know what you saw.’
He pointed to the muddy hill, the streaks from our bodies sliding down it looked like tyre grooves even in the dead of night. ‘Now, speak up, or I’ll give you something to speak up about.’ He paused, one nail in between his teeth, the buzz of the light drawn upon us as piercing as a mosquito in my ear. Marguerite shook her head very subtly as if to remind me not to say anything.
‘Well, mademoiselles,’ he said with a bit of a laugh. ‘If that is what you are. Looks like we’re going to have to make you talk.’ He motioned at the other Gestapo. ‘Take them to interrogation. Hotel Terminus.’
‘Jeanne,’ Marguerite said, reaching out for me as I reached for her, our hands grasping for each other’s while he stepped in between us and pulled us apart. ‘Jeanne—’
Be strong.
*
The architects of the grand Hotel Terminus would have been appalled at what the Gestapo had done to their building since they took it over as their headquarters. Blood-red carpet runners covered the marble floors, and Nazi flags lined the corridors. Hitler’s portrait hung from every available hook and nail. The guest rooms, which were known for their exquisite furnishings and luxurious linens—even more of a tragedy—had been stripped down to splintered wood floors and plasterboard.
I sat for hours, moaning from not having eaten and enduring a painful, burning sensation to urinate when a woman guard dressed in a mouse-grey uniform opened my door. Her belly was as big as the barrel she held in her hands, which she placed in the middle of the room.
‘Where’s my friend? I demand to see her.’
She laughed before stepping back, and taking a good look at me. ‘Take your clothes off,’ she said in a very thick German accent. ‘All of them.’
‘I will not,’ I said.
She put a hand on her holstered gun. ‘You will.’
I felt my lips pinch, and took my coat off and then begrudgingly unbuttoned my dress.
‘Slower,’ she said, ‘there is no rush.’ A smile slithered across her face as I peeled my wet dress from my shoulders and let it fall to the floor around my feet. She grabbed at my undergarments, flicking her tongue over her bottom lip as she unfastened my brassiere.
Gooseflesh bumped over my arms from standing naked in a bare, cold room. ‘What’s this little gem?’ She snapped my heart pendant from my neck with one quick pull. I shuddered and quaked, feeling as if she had reached into my chest and ripped out my heart for real. She eyed the heart closely in her hand before stuffing it into her pocket. ‘Now, tell me who you are.’
‘Jeanne.’
She laughed. ‘We know your documents were forged.’ She took a few steps back. ‘Get in the barrel.’
I didn’t move.
‘Get in!’ she yelled, her face flattening like a frying pan. ‘Now!’
I stepped carefully into the empty barrel, shivering, as she brought in five metal pails that had been filled with water. She dunked her hand in one and then flicked some water on my back, laughing about how cold it was.
‘I’ve been in water before—’
She dumped the whole pail over the top of my head. I gasped from the shock of the freezing cold water waving over my skin and then shook violently, searching for the right word. ‘Christ!’
‘This is how an angel dies,’ she boasted.
Clumps of sopping-wet hair hung over my eyes, my jaw clattering. ‘Angel?’
‘Isn’t that what you are?’ She took one finger and dug it into her cheek with a twist. ‘Your dimples. Makes you look like a little angel.’ She peered into the bucket to see how much water had filled up inside. ‘Now, tell me who you are.’
I looked straight at the stone wall like Marguerite had taught me all those months ago. Be strong. This was the