Max looked down at her, his expression wry. “One less German in the world.”
“Don’t be an idiot,” retorted Aurélie, and she had to tilt back her head to look up at him. “You know that’s not how I think of you.”
“Isn’t it?” He was so close, she could feel his breath against the hair bundled in a disorderly pouf on the top of her head. “I am German, you know. No matter how well I speak your language, I will always be a foreigner.”
“I know but—” She pushed lightly against his chest. “You’re not one of those Germans. You’re different. You’re . . . you’re . . . you.”
Standing with her at the back of her mother’s salon, ready with an umbrella in the rain outside the Louvre, delivering toys to the children of the village because he couldn’t let them think Father Christmas had abandoned them. Because he was Max, just Max, and she couldn’t imagine anyone else in the world like him, with the strength to be kind in a world that drew power from cruelty, with a deep-down goodness that transcended allegiances and uniforms and all the nonsense men used to justify their baser instincts.
She was going to lose him; either he was going to leave or they were going to kill him, and she couldn’t bear to think of it, of Max not being there, not loving her. She couldn’t for the life of her understand why he would love her, but that he did—he seemed not to have the slightest bit of doubt. That certainty was like a raft in the middle of the ocean, the one solid thing among the waves and the sharks and the howling winds.
“Please,” she said, and she wasn’t sure whether she was begging him to stay or to go. “Please. Don’t let them hurt you.”
“I won’t,” he promised, and she knew it was nonsense, that he was just what he’d accused her of being, an honorable man, and what defense did he have against evil?
All she could do was reach up and cup his face in her hands, memorizing every feature, the texture of his skin, the freckle above one brow, the way the color of his eyes changed from blue to gray in the lamplight. Because this, this might be all they would have, all they would ever have, and she wanted this, this memory to hold on to once he was gone, the one man in the world who loved her really, and truly, and just for herself.
“Aurélie,” he said, and that was all, but it was enough.
With one hand, Aurélie reached and extinguished the lamp, turning down the wick until only the faintest ember still lingered before it winked out against the smoke-stained glass. And then they were in darkness, safe in the darkness, in this room that was shuttered and still and entirely their own.
“Shh,” she said when he started to speak, and she hooked her fingers through his braces to pull him close.
Chapter Twenty-One
Daisy
Avenue Marceau
Paris, France
July 1942
The apartment was quiet and dark, husband and children far away, and Daisy felt like the only person in the world. She sat in the armchair in the drawing room that was nearest to the foyer, so she could jump up as soon as Monsieur Legrand’s tap sounded on the door. Certainly it wouldn’t do for him to linger outside! She must be ready for his arrival. On the mantel, an ormolu clock ticked sharply. Daisy fixed her hands on her lap and tried not to count the seconds.
When they parted in the Tuileries that afternoon, Legrand hadn’t said anything about how he would gain access to the building, or evade the concierge, or make his way to her floor without awaking suspicion. These were details she left to him, as a man trained in such things. Daisy was just an amateur, a woman playing at spycraft. She was a mere housewife waiting alone in her apartment—the apartment in which she lived with her husband, her beloved children—for a real spy, a genuine agent, to slip inside and steal that husband’s secrets. A betrayal of her marriage, certainly, and also a crime for which she could be condemned to death. Daisy stared down at her hands, which were clasped so tightly that the gold wedding band bit into the flesh of her ring finger. Ticktock, the clock said. Daisy grasped the ring and yanked it free. She was so thin, the metal slipped down her finger without effort. She opened the drawer of the lamp table and dropped the ring inside, and as she pushed the drawer shut a hand came down on her shoulder.
Daisy gasped and jumped to her feet and wheeled around, all at once, nearly falling over the edge of the armchair. Legrand stood there in neat, dark clothes and a hat. A leather satchel hung from across his chest, like a messenger bag. As she opened her mouth to speak, he laid his finger over his lips. She caught herself.
“How did you get in?” she whispered.
He shrugged and smiled a little, and Daisy realized the stupidity of her question, the stupidity of waiting here in this darkened room, in the armchair that was nearest the foyer, when he was a trained agent, of course. He could unlock doors and break into apartments at a whim. Whereas she, Daisy, was in this business far above her head. She put her hand to her chest and said, “You shouldn’t sneak up on me like that.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize I was sneaking.”
There was no teasing note to his voice, no inflection, no gleam in his eyes or arch in his eyebrows to suggest how long he had stood there, and whether he’d noticed what she had just done, to put her wedding ring away in a drawer. He stood very close. He must have washed, because he didn’t smell of pipe smoke or anything, except perhaps soap. Daisy inhaled carefully through her nose. Yes, soap. And toothpaste. She stepped back a pace.
“No, I don’t expect you did,” she said. “This is all second nature to you.”
Legrand’s eyes traveled rapidly around the room behind her, taking in the size and scale of it, the ornate decoration, the gilded furniture, like some kind of professional.
“I hate it,” Daisy said.
“I’m not surprised.” Legrand’s gaze returned to her. He inclined his head to the foyer. “Shall we proceed?”
“Yes, of course. Please follow me.”
Legrand stepped politely aside, as if they were together at a cocktail party, and Daisy led the way into the foyer and down the corridor toward Pierre’s study. She had some idea that she should walk softly, not make any noise, but wouldn’t that seem more suspicious to the neighbors than if she walked about as she always did? Legrand would know. This was second nature to him. Breaking into people’s apartments, sneaking about with restless housewives. All in a day’s work, confident that he was in the right, that these petty betrayals were all committed in the service of a higher cause.
Whereas Daisy, floundering in some moral swamp . . . whereas she . . .
They reached the study. Pierre had left the door locked, of course, but Daisy had made a copy of the key, to Legrand’s own instructions, when they had first moved in. When Pierre’s back was turned, she’d pressed the key in a wax mold that Legrand had given her and taken this mold to a locksmith, who hadn’t asked any questions, had simply made up the key for her and taken her ten francs for it. Now she took it from her pocket and fitted it in the lock and opened the door for them both.
The air inside the study was warm and stuffy and smelled of Pierre. Daisy went to the desk and switched the lamp on. “The safe’s right there in the cabinet,” she said, pointing.