for a part of F Section called the Vesper circuit.” Marie had a lyrical, looping style of speech and it was not hard to imagine her speaking fluently in French. “Our leader was a man called Julian. We blew up a bridge before D-Day in order to make things harder for the Germans.
“But somehow our cell was compromised and we were all arrested, or at least Julian and I were. They shot Julian.” Marie’s face crumbled at this last part, and she almost seemed to relive it as she remembered. Grace’s heart ached for this poor woman, who had been through so much. “I was interrogated in Paris, then sent to prison. I found Josie again there, but she was too far gone to make it.” The grief in her words poured forth, as though she had never shared it before with anyone.
“Josie was another agent?”
Marie dabbed at her eyes. “And my dearest friend. We were put on a train, bound for one of the camps. Josie managed to detonate a grenade and blow up the railcar. After the explosion, I lost consciousness. I awoke weeks later in a barn. The Germans had missed me, or left me for dead. A German farmer found me under the railcar rubble and hid me. I stayed there until I was strong enough. By then, the invasion had come so I found a British unit and told them who I was.”
“And then?”
“Then I went home. My train arrived at King’s Cross. There was no one to meet me. I wasn’t expecting a parade; no one knew that I was coming. So I went and collected my daughter, Tess. We boarded a boat for America straightaway.”
“So you never went back to SOE?”
“Only once. I asked the Director for help expediting our papers to get to America. There was no one left. Eleanor had been dismissed. The others were all gone.”
There was a sudden clattering at the door to the apartment and a girl of not more than eight walked in. “Mummy!” she said with just a hint of an English accent, throwing herself into her mother’s outstretched arms.
Then she pulled back to look questioningly at Grace. “You must be Tess,” Grace offered. The child looked so much like her mother that Grace had to smile. “And I’m...” She faltered, not sure how to explain her presence here to the girl.
“A friend,” Marie finished for her.
Tess seemed satisfied with the explanation. “Mum, my friend Esther in apartment 5J invited me over to play and stay for dinner. May I go?”
“Be home by seven,” Marie replied. “And give me one more hug first.” Tess folded herself into her mother’s outstretched arms for a fleeting second, then bolted for the door. “I’ll never take for granted getting to see her every day,” Marie said to Grace when Tess had gone.
Marie stood up. “I have more photos,” she added, shifting topics abruptly. She walked to an armoire and pulled out a yellowed album. She handed it over hesitantly. Unlike the staid photographs that Eleanor had possessed, these were candid shots and they played out like a movie of the time the circuit had spent together. There was a snapshot of young men playing rugby in a field, another of a group around a table drinking wine. They might have been at Oxford or Cambridge, not on a mission in France. “The boys, they took photos on the tiny little camera we’d been given during training. I pulled the film off Julian that last day. And I kept it in places they would never think to look. Only when I reached America did I have it developed.”
“Wasn’t it dangerous to take these?”
She shrugged. “Certainly. But it’s so very hard to explain what those months in the field were like. It was worth the risk. Someone needed to know.”
In case none of them made it, Grace thought. She imagined the loneliness and terror, how much these bits of camaraderie must have meant. “That’s Julian?” Grace asked.
“Yes. And Will beside him, always. You would not have known they were cousins,” Marie said. Two young men not more than twenty or so. One was fair, with a smattering of freckles and a quick smile. The other was tall with sharp cheekbones and dark, piercing eyes. In another picture, he looked down lovingly at Marie. “He seemed fond of you,” Grace observed.
“Yes,” Marie said quickly, seeming almost embarrassed. “He loved me,” Marie said, her voice full with emotion. “And I, him. I suppose