The Siren of Paris (9 page)

A single woman with a cart walked past a burned-out storefront. An old man stared aimlessly at an overturned truck crashed into a building. A cabinet full of dishes was open to the street and the wallpaper blew in the wind where the edge gave way. The filmed spanned house after house where walls had been blown apart, revealing the personal items of the people who once called them homes. People shifted from side to side as they studied the screen in a trance. The wind was the only sound on the film, then the noise of a plane passing overhead. Marie let go of Marc’s hand and put it in her lap. Marc looked straight ahead and did not turn to her. A young child began to cry a few rows in front of them, complaining that she wanted to see the cartoon.

On the screen, young school boys in uniform searched through the broken walls of their school. A man grabbed bicycles out of the wreckage of his business. An old woman and her daughter loaded a cart outside of a two-story building with pock holes all across the front. The screen flashed scenes of young and old men, women, and children picking through their houses, loading what they could carry.

Two minutes passed before there was a single voice on the film. The room felt like it was holding its breath. Marie’s hand covered her mouth. Marc grew uncomfortable with the silence. A mother got up with her son and made for the rear of the theater. By now, a few of the children in the theater had become upset.

A man sat outside his house with a bandaged foot. Another man pulled on the jacket of someone dead in the street. A woman with a head bandage wandered through the wreckage. Policemen pulled at bricks, trying to free a trapped person. Others carried a man down the street on a stretcher. It was too much for another woman and her two children sitting near the front. They got up and walked down the aisle. A second person followed her as she cried, pulling the children who complained bitterly of not staying to see the film.

Marc studied the screen as a church appeared with part of the roof gone. In the pews was a briefcase and purse left in a haste. The wall collapsed into the pews until it reached the lectern, like an ocean wave rising upon a beach. Marie could not look away from the screen. Another man near them got up and left the theater, pushing through the crowed back rows of standing people. The newsreel continued without a single voice. Marc wondered if the projectionist would check the film to make sure it had fed correctly. He was puzzled by the lack of voiceover. Rapid gunfire barked out in the distance. The wind whispered through the speakers.

A sign outside a building said “no school today.” People swept the floor of a building clearing debris. “May 10, eating too much will make you ill,” flashed as it was left scrolled in French on a school chalkboard, followed by “5689 divided by 23…” A woman got up from the center aisle with a crying young girl. Marie whispered, “My God,” under her hand as the shock of the scene overtook her. A child’s bag hung on a peg. Another student’s bag rested on the top of a desk dusted with shattered glass.

A child with an eye bandage cried on a hospital bed. A young boy with a head and nose bandage smiled to the camera. Nurses cared for another bandaged woman covered in a bed. She was wearing smart clothes, as if she had been at the bombed-out church.

Five eternal minutes passed before a single voice was heard over the speakers. The march of raw footage across the screen had become too much for many of the parents and children in the theater. A few tried to calm down their children, but even some of the adults struggled to hold back their emotions. Marie got up and started for the aisle. Marc followed her out through the people standing three deep at the rear doors.

“They lied to us,” Marie said to Marc in the lobby. “They lied in the papers. They tell us what we want to hear.” She started to cry.

“I am sure the truth is someplace between the two. They don’t tell us everything, because they don’t want people to panic, but it looks like they hold back too much,” Marc said, as he realized he could not sugarcoat what he had just experienced. He wanted to comfort Marie, but was not even sure if it was wise.

“We are going to lose. We are going to become those people on the screen,” Marie continued to cry.

Marc tried to calm her down as they left behind a mother with two young children.

“That will not happen, Marie, please.”

“Marc, how can you promise that?”

O
n the morning of May 20, the ambassador called the staff together. “This is not a solution to our problem and it is not meant to cause a panic.” The staff stared at him stoically.

“We need to do something to give people confidence, and I know you may believe this absurd, but,” he went on as the morning light filled the room, “if they are insistent they must stay, then this will give at least some identification to them.”

The staff stood silently looking at the table in front of them. Stacked were bundles of red tickets.

“Take their names, businesses, locations, everything you can get about them on these forms,” the ambassador said. “Then copy the key information onto one of the red certificates and give this to them, and they are to put it on their door fronts.” The ambassador scanned the faces of the staff to discern their morale.

He watched them as they looked at the forms with total silence. He closed his eyes for a moment.

“Does anyone have any questions?” he asked the staff.

“Do we have any assurance from them?” Marc’s voice cracked with emotion.

“What do you mean?” the ambassador responded.

“Is there any diplomatic assurance that these certificates will be respected?” he asked in a quiet and low tone.

“I am not going to lie. We have nothing, but this. We are remaining open. If it comes to the point that they arrive here in Paris, I will be in a position to directly communicate the meaning of the certificates,” the ambassador’s voice stammered. “I cannot force Americans to leave, but I cannot abandon this post, either, so this is a solution that helps me to know who is left in Paris, and gives me some ability to identify and represent them to the occupying forces.”

“When does this start?” Marc choked out another question.

“This morning. I put the notice out to the papers last night. I expect they will find their way here over the next few days, but we should be ready this morning,” the ambassador finished.

Marc went with the secretary to unlock the doors. To his surprise, there were already forty to fifty people outside waiting to come in.

“Take this and then place it on your door,” Marc said to Nigel after filling out the form. Nigel took the certificate in his hand and looked it over with an odd expression. He then took something from his pocket and pressed it into Marc’s hand.

“What is this?”

“It is yours if you need a place to go. The rent is paid up for the year,” Nigel said to Marc without any smile. “Do you have the latest on travel?”

“Wait here.” Marc went back to his desk and looked through the notices. “Genoa, June 2, but that is far away. If you miss that one, they are sending the
George Washington
to Lisbon and Bordeaux.” He then looked at the other dates on the paper. “Well, you can afford it, I am sure, so May 28 out of Genoa, the
Rex
is leaving, along with the Conte.” He then looked up. “Bet you wish you’d gone with David now.”

“Yes, I feel like an idiot for not going with him.” Nigel’s face squinted as if he had swallowed a lemon.

“Look, that is not going to help you now. Do you think you could get to Genoa in eight days?” Marc asked him next.

“It is tricky, Marc. I’m not sure. The train station is a mob right now, and there is no petrol, but I might be able to make it,” Nigel said.

“Well, I just think Genoa is a good bet, because there is the Italian Line and the United States Line running, so, if you are going to get stuck someplace—” Marc stopped and looked further.

“Look. Bordeaux is just for Americans. At least that is what we believe right now. But that is not until June 10. What about the
Clipper
?” Marc asked him next.

“Well, I don’t know. Lisbon is damn far away and through Spain. I guess I am just going to start out and see how bad it is out there and wherever I am closest, I will choose at that time.” Nigel then left the embassy, but before leaving Paris, he stopped off at his flat to nail the red certificate to his door.

That night, Marc put the keys in a bowl of colored glass from Biot he bought in the summer of ’39.

“Which side of the doorway?” Dora asked Marc the morning of June 1.

“Whichever. It doesn’t matter.”

“Well, I want to make sure I do this right. I have not ever had to do this before in all my years here, so I figure I have only one chance to get this right.”

“Dora, I wish this was a time for jokes, but, you know.”

“Oh, I know. I know all too well.” She then took out an envelope and gave it to Marc.

“What is this?” He opened it and looked at the bundle of francs. “Oh God, what is this for?”

“In case you need it for anything, because these are yours.” She then passed him the keys to her apartment in one of the exceedingly nice districts of town off of Foch Street.

“So all that talk of staying to the end and fighting off the Germans was just talk?” Marc balked.

“Oh, damn right, it was. This is no place for me. I am smart enough to know better, and I sure wish some other stubborn Jews would see the same now.” She then looked up. “This Goldilocks is ditching the Three Bears and heading south.”

“Do you have a plan?” Marc asked next.

“Lisbon. It is too late for Genoa,” she said. “I think I would miss it, but Lisbon, at least, has options. Yes. So, I would leave you the car but I need it, even though I am not sure where I am going to get petrol yet. There is more than enough money for anything the apartment might need, and you, my friend.” She kissed him goodbye and she left the morning of June 1.

That night, Marc locked up the francs in his dresser drawer and put the keys with Nigel’s in the glass bowl.

“Stay here, and try to act American,” Marc said to Marie as she reached the line for the red certificates. He returned then from his desk with a completed form. “Here, sign this,” Marc pushed the form across to her.

“But my name is not Elda?” Marie asked, perplexed.

“Miss, these certificates are for Americans only, so please do not share them with your French neighbors,” Marc said with an official tone.

“Absolutely not. I would never do that,” Marie said, trying to sound convincing.

Later that afternoon, the ambassador said to Marc, “I do hope Elda will be safe here in Paris.” Marc froze, searching for words to explain.

“How many have taken up the certificates?”

“Just over five thousand Americans, sir.”

“That we know of, and if a few French have need, well, who is to judge? It is war, after all.”

“Yes, I think I understand.”

“Marc, don’t forget.”

“Forget what, sir? I am not sure I understand.”

“Don’t forget to fill one out for yourself. Unless, of course, you have made other plans.”

“Oh, yes, thank you. I am rather tired and would have forgotten.”

June 2, 1940
Genoa, Italy

D
avid walked down the narrow streets of the old port of Genoa, past several of the small vendors, reaching the steps of a large Moorish-styled church. Upon entering, he sat quietly in the back as he watched what appeared to be some kind of small, private ceremony. Time stood still as he stared at the front of the church but never gazed up at the cross. After about an hour, he got up and walked back again to the train station to look at the board and consider his options.

“David, David! Is that you?” called out a voice behind him. He turned and it was another American friend of his from Paris.

“Larry? What are you doing here?” David said as Larry moved through the crowd with his wife, his young son, and even younger daughter.

“What do you think? I’m here for the same reason you are. Trying to get home,” Larry answered back. “It’s good to see someone we know. It has been a mess getting here and I didn’t think we’d make the ship.” David looked down at Larry’s two children and then caught the eye of his worried wife.

“Are you on the Italian Line? We can walk down together.”

“It’s canceled. They are all canceled,” David said, trying not to look panicked, but his face turned white with fear.

“What? Are you sure?” Larry asked in disbelief.

“Look, go, go right now down to the US Line’s desk and get on the list for the SS
Manhattan
.” Larry’s face was serious as he heard David’s emphatic tone. “Do you have your passports? They will even take just tax papers.” David waved his hand toward the docks. “Go, now. I will meet you down at the dock in an hour or so,” and, as he said these words, Larry and his family quickly disappeared from him in the crowds of refugees coming from the latest train into the station.

David walked back toward the church again. He meandered slowly down the narrow streets and passed underneath the medieval gate towers until he came to a small courtyard. He climbed the steps of an unusually small chapel, its interior made of rose-colored marble. It had five rows of chairs inside and, as the door shut and the sound of children playing outside subsided, he saw that he was entirely alone.

He sat down again in the back row, looking forward, slowing raising his eyes until he saw the cross. After twenty minutes, he kneeled. His stomach rumbled, as if he were going to vomit up all of his fears. Then he whispered the words to a god he had not spoken to for twenty-two years. “Oh God, please, help me get home.”

June 2, 1940
Vichy, France

“Dora, the
Post
wrote that the State Department says, if you missed the
Manhattan
on June 2 from Genoa, to go to Bordeaux for the
George
Washington
,” her sister said from the other side of the Atlantic. Dora cupped her ear to drown out the noise of the callers in the busy international phone exchange. The room was packed and crowded with all manner of travelers speaking different languages.