The Last Time I Saw Paris - Lynn Sheene [105]
Two tired but frightened faces greeted them as they entered. Martin Oberon locked the door behind them, while Adele tied her robe and flicked on a small light.
Claire tried a smile but failed. “Monsieur, Madame Oberon, I am so sorry to come to you like this, but—”
Adele took one look at the girls. “Mesdemoiselles, give me your coats. Put down your bag. You look so tired, sit here on the sofa.”
Marta nodded gratefully and Anna offered a tentative smile as they complied.
“Have you any toast?” Anna said.
“Anna,” Marta scolded.
“I do have toast. You rest while we get you some.” Adele looked meaningfully at Martin and Claire, who followed her into the kitchen.
Claire gestured to the girls in the next room. “I ask you a favor that is too great to ask, but I don’t have a choice. They are Jewish and on the run. I am trying to get them out of France to a safe place.”
“Their parents?” Adele said.
Claire shook her head in response. She glanced around at the simple kitchen, spare yet welcoming. “You can tell me to leave right now and we will go. I won’t think any less of you. But I thought you might . . .”
A look between Martin and Adele. A conversation in a glance.
“Of course,” Adele said. “They can stay with us, until . . .”
Martin nodded. “Until.”
Claire let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. She felt nothing, she couldn’t, but somewhere inside a piece of her pulled back from the abyss. “I will give you what I can.” She reached for her purse.
“Non,” Martin said.
Claire pulled out all the money and ration cards in her wallet and handed them to Adele. “Girls need things.”
Adele nodded and slipped the money in a robe pocket.
“Thank you,” Claire said. “I will find a way to get them out. I will do what I can to help you until then.”
“They will be cared for here.” Martin grasped Adele’s hand in his.
Claire hugged each girl tight on her way to the door, trying to show in her arms and her eyes what she couldn’t say.
“Don’t promise.” Marta squeezed Claire tight. “Just come back.”
The street was dark and silent as Claire stepped out of the building. Gulping in the cool air, she turned north. Toward the Ritz.
Chapter 11
THE NAZI’S MISTRESS
Place Vendôme. November 1, 1943.
A chill settled over the city as the shrouded sun dropped behind the horizon. A cold breeze that smelled of rain whipped fallen leaves across the open square in the Place Vendôme. Claire pulled her coat tight and glanced up at the mottled sky as the wind ripped at yesterday’s issue of Le Temps, open on her lap.
She sat on the curb at the Place’s north entrance on rue de la Paix, her gaze on the Ritz’s front doors at the northwestern corner of the square. She made a show of stretching her legs and pressing the fluttering pages flat as the soldiers guarding the hotel’s entry watched impassively.
After Claire left the Oberons’ last night, she’d slipped through the darkened streets until curfew was lifted then checked into a small hotel in Saint-Germain. The place lacked charm, but it was cheap and also lacked an inquisitive front-desk staff. She paid for two nights then crawled up the stairs to her room. Rolling up in her coat on the rickety bed, Claire stared at a crack in the wall’s plaster until the street outside came alive. Giving up on sleep, she splashed water on her face and stared into the clouded mirror over the sink.
She was alone, without a plan or resources. But she had a certain way with von Richter, and she knew how to find him. And, no matter the risk, she wasn’t about to walk away from Grey or the girls.
Claire suppressed a shiver as she glanced back to the Ritz, scanning the street for cars. Von Richter had stepped out of a black sedan and entered the hotel nearly an hour before. From what he’d told her in New York about his vacations spent in Parisian cabarets, she knew he would soon be seeking the dark side of Paris’ beauty as the weekend began. And she would make sure he found what he sought—and then some.
A gust of wind ripped the paper from her hands as sleet began to pepper her face.