Page 11 of The Resistance Book Club

‘Esther, what are people in the village saying about this Felix L-Lauterborn?’ Margot was so stunned that the Professor’s brother could be a Nazi officer, bringing what looked like an army with him to Cordeval, that she stumbled over his surname. She’d said it and written it in her order book often enough whenever the Professor came to the shop, looking for some obscure piece of music, but connecting that name with a murderer had left her shaken.

‘He has plans for France,’ Esther whispered. The words seemed to hang in the air, chilling the shadows around the flickering candle flames. Then she drew in a deep breath. ‘I don’t know any more than that. We need to be very careful now he’s here.’

‘We’ve already left the banned books around town, though,’ Sylvie said, her voice hushed with worry. She paused halfway through knotting a piece of string round a book. ‘What if this Lauterborn finds out they’ve come from here?’

Brigitte shook her head. ‘I went to see a patient the other day, down by the harbour. I won’t say who it was, but I spotted a copy ofGrand Hotel!’ She smiled, tapping the book she’d just covered in newspaper. ‘They’d hidden it under a sofa cushion, but the corner was sticking out and I knew what it was. I pretended not to have seen it. There’s banned books all over the village. Who’s going to know where they came from?’

‘The Nazis want us to be afraid, and follow every last rulethey force on us,’ Margot said. ‘But we’re not going to let them intimidate us. They’re hunting for Resistance fighters – they’re not going to be worried about a few books.’

She looked at the line of her friends, standing along the table, their faces lit by the little flames around the shadowy cellar. Margot was trying to sound brave, even though inside she trembled. She could see it in her friends’ faces, too; their expressions were a mix of trepidation and steel.

‘Nothing to be scared of,’ Beatrice said bravely, looking around at the women. ‘This is our town, right?’

Margot nodded, even though she knew, like everyone else in that candlelit basement, that if the banned books were traced back to her shop the punishment would be swift and brutal.

‘It is. Our town, our country,’ she replied. ‘And we’ll read whatever books we want.’

SEVEN

LUCY

2025

For a moment, as Lucy awoke, she wasn’t sure where she was. She blinked at the beautiful, light bedroom that looked as if it’d escaped from a spread inGlitzmagazine on French farmhouse style. She was lying in a bed with a brass frame, and on the opposite side of the room she saw a white-painted wardrobe and a chest of drawers covered with stencilled flowers. A bright floral rug lay on the wooden floor and purple wildflowers sprang out of an old milk jug.

It wasn’t the Victorian townhouse she shared with her ex, Andrew, all clean lines and polished surfaces; it wasn’t the sleek hotel in Paris she’d been booked into for the fashion show either.

Normandy. I’m in Normandy, Lucy reminded herself as she fully awoke.I got a letter and I came to the bookshop. I’m going to sell it, but I need to uncover Mémé’s secret first.

But remembering where she was reminded her why she had come here so hurriedly. Yesterday’s pain came rushing back. She pushed away the bedsheets as the image returned to her ofAndrew and Saskia in bed – their bed, the one that she had shared with Andrew.

Lucy lay there, breathing deeply, her hands over her chest as it rose and fell. She wouldn’t waste any more of her tears on him. And yet his betrayal hurt so much. He’d destroyed everything.

They’d met in their last year at university, and they’d supported each other as Andrew had found his feet as an architect, while she’d channelled her love of reading and writing into working on magazines. Their life together in London was fast-paced; a new restaurant opening here, a grand opening of a hotel Andrew had designed there. They received invitations to glittering champagne receptions and fancy dinner parties.

But at home they were themselves, content and intimate. In the evenings, they put their professional lives behind them. Andrew would sit on the sofa watching the rugby, and Lucy would drape her legs across his lap while she read, her designer heels swapped for comfy slippers. He didn’t mind her tottering to-be-read pile by the bed.

A couple of years ago, she’d wanted to start a book club and had hired a back room at a nearby café. Everyone she’d invited had told her they were going to attend. But on the night, no one arrived. She’d sat all alone, surrounded by biscuits and empty cups, nursing a well-thumbed copy ofWolf Hallon her lap.

When she got home she tried to pretend that she wasn’t upset, but Andrew knew. He told her he’d be her book club that evening, and opened a bottle of wine. They sat in the lounge together talking about the Tudors and power, their thoughts ranging wide. Lucy had felt closer to him than ever. How could she not have loved a man like that?

Bitterly, she realised that, if she hadn’t forgotten her passport yesterday morning on her way to the fashion show in Paris, she would have married Andrew. She would’ve had a goldwedding band on her finger, with no idea what was going on behind her back.

That day was a big one for Andrew Brooke & Associates, as they signed off the final designs for the latest restaurant in Saskia Norman’s Michelin-starred empire. Lucy had thought he’d be out celebrating. She had hurried home at lunchtime and gone up to the study to dig out her passport for her trip to Paris. She’d just gone past the bedroom door when?—

She closed her eyes tight shut. She tried to squeeze away the images that were pushing their way through. It hurt so much, as if her heart had been shattered and the shards were left to stab her. Andrew’s arms around Saskia…their tousled hair…their clothes scattered across the bedroom floor.

All thoughts of the wedding evaporated in that one moment. It was all over. The man she was in love with had thrown it all away.

Lucy had stumbled down the stairs with her suitcase. She had hurried out of the front door, tears springing into her eyes as she ran into the street to flag down a taxi. She couldn’t remember anything about the journey to the airport.

She’d mechanically stared up at the departure board, barely aware of the holiday-makers and hen parties jostling past. Her flight to Paris was delayed; then she noticed that there was an Air France plane headed to Caen. It wasn’t far from Caen to Cordeval.

She’d thought of the letter that had arrived a couple of weeks earlier. A notary in France had written to tell her that she’d inherited Mémé’s bookshop and enclosed the shop’s large, brass key. At the time, Lucy had been so caught up with the constant demands of the looming wedding that she’d put them in the bottom of her handbag.

Lucy had thought of Mémé’s smile, and her grandad’s laugh, which had always greeted her childhood visits to the village. She thought of the shelves in the bookshop, stacked withtreasures, and the book-nooks where she’d curled up with stories. She remembered sitting on the beanbags, transported by Mémé’s storytelling, beneath the toy birds and planes that Papi had strung from the ceiling. The shop had ignited her love of reading before she’d even started school, and had led her to pick up a pen and write herself.

She’d thought of the salt on the sea air and the pastries she’d buy from the bakery each morning. All her memories of Cordeval were a warm hug, and she needed that more than anything.