around. Claire stood up. Girls who had been sipping consommé set down their mugs; others sat still, everyone suddenly very interested. Colmar was a French border city in the Occupied Zone with a long history of having more Germans in it than French. And although we didn’t talk about it, nobody wanted to be friends with a German, even a mixed one.
‘What’s wrong?’ Victoria said.
‘Are you German?’ Claire asked.
‘Claire!’ I shouted.
Victoria squinted. ‘How dare you`!’ she said to Claire.
‘You’re from Colmar,’ Claire said. ‘What else am I to think?’
An eerie stillness hung in the room. Rain ticked the ground outside and against the windowpane. Our eyes swung like pendulums between Claire and Victoria, watching them as they stared at each other in utter silence.
‘You. Think. Nothing.’ Victoria’s lips thinned.
‘Girls,’ Mavis said in her squeaky little voice. ‘We’re all in this together. God’s work, in God’s house.’ She smiled, and a twinkle set deep in her eyes lit up the dark, dank room as if they were lanterns, but none of the girls were paying attention to notice.
‘Listen to Mavis, girls,’ I said. ‘Let’s not talk about the war, the Germans. The convent is too nice and good to bring up such terrible things.’
Nods and a few noises came from the girls, but Victoria and Claire remained locked on each other in a blink-less stare. Victoria’s hands curled into balls, and then in one quick motion she jumped from her seat and lunged at Claire. Girls shrieked, hands to their cheeks, scattering in every direction while I held Victoria back, keeping her from hitting Claire with one of her white-hot fists. Mugs rolled around on the ground, clinking and clanking against each other, spilling the girls’ consommé on the floor. Claire lay on her back, her hands and feet searching the ground for leverage, her face stretching like dough.
‘Victoria!’ I yelled, and she froze, her breath rumbling through her nose and throat like a muffler on a banged-up car. ‘This is not the answer.’ I couldn’t remember why Victoria had come to rehabilitation, but I guessed it had something to do with crime and penitence by the look in her eye and the strength in her lean, muscly arms.
Sister Mary-Francis stood near the stairwell against the stone wall watching the scene unfold, her black habit camouflaging her body against the dark stones. I tried not to look at her and kept my eyes on the girls, as distracting as her willingness to do nothing seemed.
‘We’ve all suffered in this war. And those sufferings most likely played a part in what brought you here.’ I slowly pulled my stiff arm away from Victoria’s chest, just to see if she’d back off from Claire on her own. ‘Bashing Claire’s face in isn’t a remedy to heal old wounds.’
Victoria’s shoulders relaxed and her breathing calmed. Then she burst into tears. I patted her on the back, and she latched on to me much like a young child would. Claire sat down on someone else’s cot, the terror in her face giving way to relief, before curling up into a ball and wrapping herself up in blankets.
‘We’re all here for different reasons,’ I announced, ‘and from different places.’
‘Why are you here?’ Victoria asked between sobs. ‘You’re not taking vows like the postulants.’
Mavis bobbed up from the floor, sopping up spilt consommé with linens from the closet, as if trying to listen to what I’d say. I felt a shiver; suddenly everyone in the convent looked and sounded suspicious, even the girls who’d retired to writing in their journals.
‘Adèle?’ Sister Mary-Francis stepped into the light. ‘Would you help me?’
Victoria got up to brush her wet hair out with a wooden comb while I piled dirty mugs and kettles onto the sister’s tray. ‘Thank you, Adèle,’ she said, and I followed her up the narrow stairwell to the kitchen, carrying the tray.
‘You handled that argument beautifully,’ she said.
‘Argument? Victoria had her fists clenched, Sister.’
She stopped under one of the wrought-iron sconces bolted into the stone wall, its drippy, low-burning candle flickering yellowed light onto our faces. ‘Fight, I should say. At any rate, you handled the situation. You’re very good with them, Adèle.’
‘Thank you, Sister.’
‘I can take things from here.’ She slipped a piece of paper into my hand as she took the tray.
‘Sister?’ I said, but she had turned and charged up the stairs.
The candle on the wall crackled. A message. I unfolded it quickly in the passageway. Meet at lights out, south stairs. Before I