Page 72 of Love in the Shadows

“Have they been quiet?” Fabienne asked.

She was so intense, and Johanna knew it was undoubtedly how she coped with getting the job done. But Johanna was grieving, and the distance between them grated against the loss, leaving her raw. “Not a sound.”

“And Schmidt?”

“He is guarding Nanny and Astrid. They went foraging.”

Fabienne glanced out the kitchen window. “Not too far, I hope?”

Johanna touched Fabienne’s back. Fabienne flinched, though she didn’t move away. “No. They’ll stay close to the edge of the woods, and they won’t be very long.”

Fabienne cut the dough into pieces and set the biscuits out on a baking tray. “I need to get some wood for the stove.”

“I think it’s time for Mozart’s ‘The Marriage of Figaro’,” Johanna said. The comedy based on two servants falling in love and getting married to foil the philandering count, thus giving him a lesson in fidelity, would occupy her for long enough to get her head around Fabienne’s distance.

Fabienne smiled, and it made everything seem lighter again. “You play beautifully.” She took the basket outside and gathered up the logs.

Fabienne lit a cigarette and leaned against the wall, thinking through the plan for the second pair of children. The run to the church had been clear, but on the journey back to the cottage there had been new patrols on the streets. As she smoked, she spotted Schmidt across the yard, heading towards the back door of the cottage.

She strode towards him. “Hauptmann Schmidt. Can I help you?”

Linette was sitting by the woodshed, looking out over the fields, nursing Bénédicte. Fabienne stalled, and her heart hit the back of her throat.

“Ah, Fraulein Brun. I was just introducing myself to your cousin, Frau Moreau. What a beautiful baby.” He stared from one woman to the other. “I cannot see the resemblance between you two though.”

Fabienne drew down on the cigarette and blew the smoke skywards, acting calm while her heart pounded to escape her chest. “I wonder, do you look like every cousin in your family, Herr Schmidt?”

He laughed. “I’m afraid I don’t have a large number of cousins to compare against.” He studied them both again. “Maybe the shape of your eyebrows and the colour of your eyes. Hmm.”

“Where are Astrid and Nanny?”

“They went back to the classroom to make a piece of art, I believe.” He shrugged. “It’s such a glorious day, I thought I’d do a little exploring myself.”

“I believe you will enjoy the summer, Herr Schmidt,” Fabienne said, because conversations about the weather and scenery were usually common and safe territory. “The changing colours transform the view from season to season. Mother Nature is the perfect muse, if one is an artist.”

He smiled. “I’d like to see Frau Moreau’s and the baby’s papers, since I’m here.”

The tension became palpable in Linette’s expression. Fabienne smiled at her, trying to convey to her not to panic. Linette turned her attention to Bénédicte, and coughed.

“Did my cousin tell you she has been very ill? It was one of the reasons she came here, to be in the countryside, and why you haven’t seen her before. Tuberculosis, we believe. We are very lucky not to have caught it. I hear many soldiers have suffered from it too, isn’t that so, Herr Hauptmann?”

Fabienne smiled inside as his eyes widened and he took two long strides back from Linette. “I’ll go and get the documents.” She returned quickly and handed them over.

He scanned them and handed them back. “Good day to you both,” he said and marched across the yard like a scalded chicken.

Fabienne turned her attention to Linette. “Are you okay?”

Linette sighed. “I am now.”

“We have more antibiotics. I put them in your room. Hopefully, now he has seen your documents, he won’t come back again.”

She watched the baby suckling, her cheeks rosy, oblivious to what was going on around her. She was healthy, and Linette would be fine with the medication. She could at least get out of the cottage more often now, and the warm summer sun would help her to recover. By the time the routes south were accessible again, she would be fit to leave and set up her new life. The thought squeezed at Fabienne’s heart a little unexpectedly. She stared at the two of them. Linette and Bénédicte had become a part of her family, and she would be sorry to see them go.

30.

JOHANNA WAS HALFWAY THROUGH Debussy’s “Clair de Lune” when Gerhard arrived home on the Wednesday evening.

Sixteen children had been successfully rehomed with families in the town. The final three siblings would leave in the morning. The insecurities she’d struggled with on the first day had been replaced with quiet confidence and an overwhelming sense of achievement that was bigger than anything she’d felt when playing for the orchestra.

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