Page 86 of Daughters of Paris

‘How did you know? Sorry.’

‘No you aren’t. I didn’t hear the door closing, and I know the floorboards in the middle of the room creak. It doesn’t matter. I don’t think you know anything of value. I’m not sure I do, in honesty.’ Fleur’s eyes were wide, making her already fine features look even more delicate.

‘Are you scared?’ Colette asked.

‘A little.’ Fleur pressed her lips together, whitening them. ‘It’s one thing carrying or passing on packages, or even being used as a safe house. It’s something quite different to be going out into the countryside. I’m stepping into the unknown.’

Colette pulled her into a hug. ‘You aren’t doing it alone, though. Laurent will be there. He’ll make sure you are safe.’

‘I know he will.’

Fleur’s expression softened and Colette’s heart flipped over at the vulnerability she saw.

‘Sébastien chose well when he put you two in contact,’ she said.

Of course he had, she thought. She suspected he had deliberately chosen Laurent with the purpose of engineering a love affair. Cunning devil.

‘Will you tell me about last night?’ Colette gave a guilty smile. ‘I heard that too.’

Fleur scowled. ‘I wish you hadn’t. It might endanger everyone. This time I will, as I don’t know enough to be a risk but you mustn’t keep asking.’ She sat back on the sofa. ‘Last night I had a guest overnight in the apartment. An English woman. She is part of a network who are working with the Resistance. British spies in France, can you imagine such a thing? When the customer appeared earlier, I was terrified that he might be asking after her.’

‘To see if she was safe or to try and catch her?’ Colette asked, a shiver running the length of her spine. She sat beside Fleur and threw the blanket over both their laps.

‘I don’t know. Luckily, he was just a boring man who wanted to talk for a long time about the books he was buying. Old histories of the ancient Greeks that cost quite a lot so I did well out of it in the end.’

Colette sat forward, absorbed in the previous story. ‘Tell me more about last night.’

‘I had to meet her at the Gare de Lyon and if anyone asked, I was to pretend she was my cousin. Our papers were checked twice as we crossed the city. Hers were forged, obviously, but they were so perfect that no one spotted it.’

It sounded terrifying, but Fleur talked as if it was a great joke.

‘We stayed up half the night talking. She operated a radio – did you know that a lot of the silly messages on the BBC nightly broadcasts are actually codes meant to tell the agents who is leaving or arriving? I’ll have to listen more closely to see if I can work them out. Anyway, her signal was picked up by the Germans almost immediately after she arrived and she had to abandon it and leave. This morning we walked halfway across the city and I left her at a bus stop going north. I wonder if I’ll ever find out if she gets home safely.’

‘Weren’t you scared?’ Colette asked. She was almost envious of Fleur.

Fleur hugged her arms around her chest. ‘I felt invigorated. I was actually doing something that might help change the course of the war.’

‘I’m so proud of you,’ Colette said, leaning against her.

Fleur’s face lit up. ‘Thank you. It feels good to be useful. And talking of useful, will you go and strip the bedsheets in the second room please? I am going to sweep the rugs. I need to make sure the flat doesn’t look used.’

Colette did as asked, folding the knitted blankets and putting them on top of the wardrobe. She even crawled under the bed to check nothing incriminating had been accidentally overlooked. Her hand came out dusty, and when she mentioned it to Fleur, her friend grinned.

‘I know. It’s deliberate to make it seem that no one uses the room. Let’s go home.’

‘I was thinking,’ Colette said. ‘Do you think the men and women you are helping could use some extra clothes? I have far too many and I’m fairly sureMèreandPapawouldn’t miss some of their old ones.’

‘I think that’s a wonderful idea,’ Fleur said. ‘That’s very generous of you.’

Colette shrugged the compliment away. There were clothes she hadn’t worn for years now. Far from feeling a sense of defiance in wearing elaborate outfits, most of the women in her mother’s social circle proudly wore the same handful of skirts and dresses, displaying their solidarity with the poorer Parisiennes.

They left the apartment for the second time and walked home, talking of any subject except the one that occupied both their thoughts.

Fleur didn’t own any trousers so Colette spent the following morning altering a long wide skirt of her own into a split-skirt so Fleur could at least cycle easily. As Fleur’s time of departure grew closer, Colette’s stomach began to fill with butterflies.

‘I don’t know how you can eat,’ she marvelled at Fleur, who was working her way through a bowl of chicken and barley broth and the end of a baguette.

‘I don’t know when I’ll next get the opportunity,’ Fleur replied.

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