Page 76 of The Resistance Book Club

‘Nobody’s going—’ Philip began, but Beatrice immediately cut him off.

‘I am,’ she said flatly.

It was Sébastien who said, ‘I’ll go and get your albums, Gran; Lucy, I’ll get your box as well.’ He held up his hand toquash any further dissent. ‘I’ll be twenty minutes. Keep everyone entertained!’

‘I’ll come with you, Sébastien,’ Lucy said, determined. ‘Beatrice, stay here. We won’t be long. You’ve risked your life in those tunnels too often in the past, and it’s our turn now.’

Lucy tried to smile as she followed Sébastien into the cellar. She didn’t want anyone to realise how unnerved she was, but she had to do something to rescue all those stories. She thought of Margot hiding in this very cellar, peering out from the trapdoor. They’d gone through hell, and she wasn’t going to let their memories be destroyed.

They went into the tunnel. There were steps that went down inside the cliff towards the lower part of the village, and Lucy watched the beams of their torches catch the uneven walls through the darkness. The waves sighed in the distance and her heart rushed in her chest.

All those decades which had passed since the war seemed to telescope down and, when Lucy heard an echo of their footsteps, for a moment – ridiculous as it was – she wondered if they were going to meet an SS search party coming the other way.

Cobwebs brushed against her face and made her gasp in alarm. The darkness was so thick, it was as if they could reach out and touch it.

‘I keep thinking of them down here with the Nazis patrolling,’ Sébastien said. ‘It’s— they were so brave. I can’t imagine it.’

Lucy swallowed. Sébastien had been thinking exactly the same thing as her. Despite her anxiety, she smiled. ‘It’s so claustrophobic down here. And there’s nowhere to run to if you came face to face with the Nazis. You’d?—’

Lucy’s words were stolen from her mouth. A terrific roar burst through the tunnel, echoing again and again off the walls in the tight space. It was so loud that she lost her footing, and she clung onto Sébastien.

She knew what it was at once and she couldn’t hold back the sobs that had risen in her throat as she pressed her face to Sébastien’s chest.

The bomb, that had lain in wait all these years in a quiet back garden, had torn itself apart in a massive explosion. Had it destroyed the bookshop too?

FIFTY-FOUR

MARGOT

1941

Of course there’d be an air raid – the middle of Cordeval was lit up with a beacon as the books helplessly burned on the bonfire.

Margot fully intended to get back to her shop and down to the cellar to wait out the raid, but she and Theo were caught in a crowd of people who were being guided by the SS towards the tall double doors of the town hall. There was a public shelter in the old cellars. She wondered if Lauterborn and Göring would shelter here too, but no, she was sure they wouldn’t want to rough it with the ordinary people of Cordeval.

She wished they could somehow slip away – she noticed some figures creeping out of the square, and she was fairly sure she’d recognised Sylvie and Colette with Claudine. But Margot and Theo were caught in a river of people and couldn’t get out.

She tried to subdue her panic as the air-raid sirens went on. The urge to run away as fast as she could, coupled with absolute caution. Don’t trip, don’t fall, just get to shelter.

Isabelle started to cry again as the crowd was shepherded through the double doors. She must’ve picked up on all the fearand horror of the bystanders as the books were incinerated right in front of them, and now they were caught in the terror of the air raid. Margot and Theo tried to shush her, but she kept crying, and heads turned.

‘Just my little niece,’ Margot explained. ‘From Rouen.’

She hoped that would be enough. The entire village knew that she had lived there with her husband, so it should have stalled their curiosity. She just had to hope that no one looked close enough to recognise Isabelle.

Once inside the town hall’s grand reception, they passed the swastika flag that hung incongruously beside the tricolour. A bust of Marianne, the idealised woman who represented France, gazed down impassively at them.

They were sent down the stone stairs that wound into the large, cavernous cellars, which were ancient, older than the building that stood on top of it. They were made from solid stone with a vaulted ceiling and Norman arches. There were nooks and crannies, and it was lit with lanterns; the entire space was a patchwork of light and shadow. Margot had been to dances with Serge in the cellars, and she wondered if she would ever go to a dance down there with Theo.

An assortment of chairs and benches were arranged in the cellar, and Margot and Theo managed to find somewhere to sit in the shadows, shielded by a stone pillar. But so many people kept pouring in that newcomers were forced to huddle on the floor. There was no way for Margot and Theo to creep out unnoticed, and two SS soldiers had come into the shelter as well and were standing by the door.

Everyone brought the smell of burning with them on their clothes and it made Margot cough. The sound of the sirens was muted down here, and Margot wondered how long it’d be before the sound was replaced by the throb of aeroplanes. Through the crowds of people, she could see Beatrice with Joséphine. Brigitte was trying to help an elderly lady strugglingwith a hacking cough, no doubt from the bonfire’s smoke. But they were too far down the other end of the room for Margot to speak to them.

While some of the people taking shelter were content to close their eyes and try to get what passed for rest, others smoked, read a thin newspaper, played cards, sang songs, or argued about fishing nets and apple harvests. A few seats away, a little girl sat on her mother’s lap, playing a clapping game, and Margot felt a sharp pang of sadness for Isabelle and Esther.

She leaned close to Theo, holding Isabelle’s basket across their knees as they tried to soothe her. One of the SS guards was watching them, and she tried to still her panic as she willed him to look away.

She just hoped the air raid wouldn’t last all night and they could get back to Daniel and the twenty souls in her cellar in time.