Page 24

“We must do something,” Colette’s mother had said again and again since the morning after the raid, and she looked as if she hadn’t slept a wink.

While Papa quickly went back to business as usual, heading into his office to prepare for the commencement of a new school year, Mum disappeared for hours at a time, coming back with her eyes bloodshot.

“There was a transport yesterday,” Mum said on the fourth morning after the roundups, as Colette and Liliane ate breakfast in silence. Papa had already gone to work; Mum was floating around in a fog, opening and closing drawers like she couldn’t remember what she was looking for.

“A transport?” Colette repeated.

Mum turned and looked at her, her gaze unfocused. “Probably a thousand people, moved out of the Vél’ d’Hiv on buses. I stood there and watched, Colette. It was terrible. The children were crying, there were elderly people who could barely walk…” Her voice trailed off.

“But… where were they taking them? Surely those who are very young or very old aren’t able to work for Germany.”

Her mother’s eyes filled. “I don’t know, Colette. I can’t imagine that the Germans have anything good in mind for them. And at the rate they were moving them, my guess is that they intend for the entire population of the Vél’ d’Hiv to be sent away in the next few days.”

“Did you see Madame Rosman there?” Colette asked. “Or her family?”

“I was too far away. But perhaps if there’s another transport today…”

“Let’s go,” Colette said instantly. When her mother looked at her blankly, she added, “Perhaps we can find Tristan, too.”

Mum rubbed her temples. “I can’t bring you and Liliane there, darling.

The conditions inside…” Mum trailed off and drew a ragged breath.

“One of the members of Le Paon’s group went in as a Red Cross volunteer, and she says there’s barely room to move.

People are desperate. They can’t breathe.

They’re starving. Illness is spreading like wildfire, children are screaming, and there are no toilet facilities.

It’s hell on earth, and it’s so crowded that it’s impossible to know who’s in there. ”

“Certainly those guarding the Vél’ d’Hiv must have a list,” Colette said, her voice small.

Mum shook her head sadly. “It’s chaos. Le Paon is doing his best to find the names of those who were arrested, but so far, we have nothing, no confirmation that the Rosmans were taken at all.

But they aren’t in their apartment, and Madame Rosman wouldn’t have fled without leaving word.

” She hesitated and added, “I persuaded the Rosmans’ concierge to let me into their apartment yesterday, Colette.

Everything is gone, all of Madame Rosman’s beautiful jewels, all of Monsieur Rosman’s diamonds. ”

Colette bowed her head. “Please,” she said. “Let’s try the Vél’ d’Hiv today. Maybe we’ll find them this time. Maybe we can catch sight of them if they’re scheduled for a transport.”

Mum looked like she was wavering. “Very well. But you and your sister must stay by my side the whole time, and if I have any sense that we’re in danger, we’ll leave immediately. Do you understand?”

Colette nodded vigorously. “Thank you, Mum.”

“Don’t thank me yet, Colette,” her mother replied, tears shining once more in her eyes. “I suspect that what we see there today will haunt us for the rest of our lives.”

The scene at the Vél’ d’Hiv was even worse than Colette had imagined. When she, Mum, and Liliane drew closer to the stadium, a fifteen-minute walk from the La Motte-Picquet metro station, the odor of sweat, fear, and human waste greeted them several blocks before they caught sight of the building.

“How can the police treat the arrestees like this?” Colette asked as they drew closer and the smell grew more pungent. “It’s inhumane.”

“The world has gone mad,” Mum said, her voice hushed with horror. “ Kyi-kyi-kyi ,” she murmured as they rounded the final corner, the high brick facade coming into view.

“ Kyi-kyi-kyi ,” Liliane replied, equally subdued. Though the little girl was too young to understand everything that was happening, it was clear she could sense the distress of her mother and sister.

“ Ko-ko-ko ,” Colette concluded their familiar call, and as she caught Mum’s eye, she wondered if her mother was thinking, as was she, about the way that descendants of Robin Hood had always been called to great adventure, in service of a greater good.

Both she and Mum had been doing their best to make a difference here in Paris, but the din rising from the stadium ahead of them, clearly the voices of thousands, was a signal that their work had been largely for naught.

There were five large buses idling outside the Vél’ d’Hiv’s gates as they approached the front of the stadium, and Colette’s stomach twisted in knots. “You were right,” she said. “They’re taking them somewhere.”

“It looks that way.” Mum hesitated and then bent to Liliane. “I want you to stay right here, holding Colette’s hand, my love.” Then she straightened and said to Colette, “Don’t move. I’m going to see what I can find out.”

Before Colette could protest, her mother had slipped away and was hurrying across the street to the front of the massive building.

Colette watched as Mum exchanged words with one of the French policemen out front, a baby-faced fellow who looked hardly older than Colette.

His cheeks were pink, and he was shaking his head vehemently as Mum peppered him with questions.

Just then, an older officer emerged from the stadium, his uniform pristine, his scowl plainly visible even from across the street.

He barked something at Mum, shooing her away from the door, and when she tried to stand her ground, he shoved her, hard, sending her stumbling backward.

Colette gasped and took a step forward out of instinct, but her mother looked up, met Colette’s gaze, and shook her head firmly.

Colette forced herself to stay still, holding Liliane’s hand, though every molecule in her body wanted to cross the street to defend her mother.

Mum said something to the senior officer, who sneered and raised his hand as if to strike her, lowering it a second later with a look of disgust. He muttered something back, and Mum nodded and hurried back across the street to her daughters.

“Are you all right?” Colette asked, rushing forward as Mum rejoined them.

“I’m fine,” Mum said, her words clipped. “They’re about to move some of the prisoners.”

No sooner had she said the words than the large doors of the Vél’ d’Hiv opened, and people began to shuffle out toward the buses, surrounded by a line of police officers, who looked on menacingly and shoved those who weren’t moving quickly enough.

Colette’s mouth went dry with panic and grief; it was clear that the prisoners had suffered greatly during their four days in captivity.

Most looked weak, disheveled, and frightened.

Children’s nightclothes were filthy; many adults wore fine dresses and smart trousers that had been soiled and torn.

Some were crying; some looked dazed; some appeared stoic, others furious.

Colette, Liliane, and their mother inched closer, made anonymous now by the crowd of Parisians around them who had stopped to watch the show.

Some looked on with pity, some reached out to touch the hands of prisoners, perhaps to give those poor souls the comfort of human contact, but others sneered and barked out taunts and slurs.

“Go back to where you came from, Jew!” yelled a teenage boy who’d shuffled up beside Colette, and before she could stop herself, she spun into him and kneed him hard in the groin.

When he grunted and doubled over in pain, she feigned embarrassment.

“I’m so very sorry!” she exclaimed sweetly.

“I must have stumbled. Perhaps you’d be better off if you went back to where you came from. ”

“Colette,” her mother hissed through gritted teeth. “This is not the time to make a scene.”

Colette glanced at the boy, whose face was still red, and who was backing away from her and muttering obscenities under his breath. “I’m sorry, Mum,” she said. “But I don’t think I was the one making the scene.”

Her mother sighed and shook her head. A second later, she gasped and started forward. “Hélène!”

Colette followed her mother’s gaze to the middle-aged woman who’d just emerged from the Vél’ d’Hiv.

She was tall and thin with bobbed hair that hung limp and lifeless.

There were dark circles under her eyes, her face was pale, and her violet dress was filthy.

She looked up dully at the sound of her name.

“Hélène!” Mum cried again, her tone anguished. Colette clutched Liliane’s hand and followed her mother forward.

“Mum, be careful,” Colette said as they drew closer to the prisoners. “Please, you’ll get yourself in trouble.”

But Mum ignored her. “Hélène!” she said for a third time, and the woman finally found Mum in the crowd, her eyes glassy and unfocused.

“Hélène, where are your children?” Mum called out desperately. “And your husband? Aren’t they with you?”

Madame Rosman shook her head. “The children—taken yesterday,” she called back quickly, which earned her a shove from a police officer. “Salomon—” Her voice broke. “Already gone.”

“Keep moving,” the officer barked.

“Gone?” Mum repeated, her voice hoarse with emotion.

“The Germans,” Madame Rosman choked out.

“Mum, please, you must be careful,” Colette said, still holding tight to a trembling Liliane with her right hand while trying to pull her mother back with her left. Mum shook her off and surged forward.

“Here,” Madame Rosman said as the nearest officer turned his attention momentarily to a wailing toddler shuffling forward alone.

She tripped forward, seeming to lose her balance, but at the last second, she tossed something small to Mum, and Colette realized that the stumble hadn’t been an accident.

“It’s all I have,” Madame Rosman said, locking eyes with Mum.

“Sewn into the hem of my dress, just like you said. They took everything else.”

“Even the bracelets?” Mum asked.

“All of it.” Her tone was hollow. “It’s why they came for us.” She was almost to the bus door. “An officer named Mockel. He knew exactly who we were.”

“I’ll find the bracelets, Hélène!” Mum called out, her voice shaking. “I’ll find them, and you’ll have them back when you return. I promise.”

Madame Rosman gave a small nod as she was shoved onto the bus, where she disappeared from view. Mum finally allowed Colette to pull her back into the crowd surging behind them. A moment later, the bus’s door slammed closed and it pulled away.

“She’ll be back, Mum,” Colette said, trying to project a confidence she didn’t feel. She’d been searching faces desperately for any sign of Tristan, but so far, she hadn’t seen him. Her heart felt heavy. “The Rosmans will be back.”

“Will they?” Mum asked as the bus turned the corner and disappeared from their view. The next bus in line was pulling out now, puffs of black choking from its tailpipe, the wails of its passengers muted by the closed windows.

“Of course they will,” Colette said, but as the third bus pulled away and she locked eyes with a crying child whose face and palms were pressed to the glass, the last of her hope went up like the exhaust from the bus, disappearing into the air. “Won’t they?”

“I don’t know,” Mum said, her voice hushed, and then the street fell quiet, the last of the buses gone, the passengers on their way out of the city they’d thought was safe, the city they’d called home, the city that had turned its back on them. “I honestly don’t know, my darling.”

Then, and only then, did Colette begin to cry.

“ Kyi-kyi-kyi ,” Liliane said, her voice small. She squeezed Colette’s hand more tightly. “ Kyi-kyi-kyi , Colette. Say the thing, Colette. It’ll make you feel better.”

“ Ko-ko-ko ,” Colette replied through her tears, not feeling better at all.

Three weeks later, Le Paon obtained a list of all the Jews arrested in the roundup, and among them were all four members of the Rosman family, as well as a boy named Tristan Berousek, aged fifteen, who lived on the rue Ternaux, just a five-minute walk from Colette’s apartment.

Tristan was such an unusual name in France that when her mother gently gave her the news, the last of Colette’s hope vanished.

The boy who wrote her beautiful poems had undoubtedly been taken, along with more than thirteen thousand others on that terrible summer’s day.

Those who’d been held in the Vél’ d’Hiv had been moved over the course of four days to camps in the department of Le Loiret, including Pithiviers and Beaune-la-Rolande.

In the first week of August, mothers had been separated from their crying children and been sent east, most to the camp of Auschwitz; the children had followed on trains a week or two later.

Years later, Colette would learn that of the more than seventy-six thousand Jews sent from across France to death camps during the war, a mere twenty-five hundred survived.

A decade after the war, Colette was heartbroken to find Tristan Berousek’s name on a list of deportees who had died at Auschwitz in the autumn of 1942.

She had known him for barely a month, but his memory was with her always, along with the memory of losing her mother and sister, all of them reminders of why it was so important to remember the past and try to do good in the world, for in doing so, it might just be possible to turn back the darkness.