The Keeper of the Walls Read online

  It took time to set up desks and chairs and to send for books and notebooks, and there wasn’t sufficient space to hold all the students at the same time; and so the boys were thrown in with the girls, in the American fashion; and the older students worked from nine to noon, the younger ones from two to five. And to replace a certain lack of hours, classes were also held on Thursdays, which, until then, had always been France’s free day for students.

  All the young people of Saint-Aubin would gather together at the tail end of the village, and walked as a group the two kilometers to the hotel in neighboring Langrune. Lily, watching them sometimes, was reminded of a marching regiment, and her skin would rise up in gooseflesh.

  One didn’t really feel the war. But friendships that otherwise might not have flourished among the restrained, reserved French, developed over the fences of the summer cottages. Normandy, that fall, was gray, smelling of salt that clung to the skin. Lily and Sudarskaya gave some piano lessons, and stayed for warm mugs of coffee and radio bulletins in their students’ homes. And while Poland was being savagely defeated, the women knitted to ward off the bitter chill—and people laughed, to hear the echo of their own voices raised in joy: to ward off worry and fear.

  Almost from the beginning, Nicky and Kira brought their friends home to study with them. Lily, who had so seldom been permitted, as a child, to bring anybody home, never pointed out that food was expensive, and that, at noon, there were most often extra places to set. Raïssa Sudarskaya loved young people. She played the piano for them and told them outrageous stories of her youth in Russia, thrusting out her pigeon breast and proudly recounting tales of former glory. They laughed, but with, not at her. She was the village eccentric, and it took several months before some conservative parents stopped thinking of her as a flaming Red. Lily had made a point to let it be known that they were French—all of them; but still, people referred to them as ‘the Russians,’ because of the sonority of their names, and were at first diffident about befriending them. Like Misha, Sudarskaya had never changed her citizenship; but Lily felt it would do no good to let people know this.

  Nicky spoke perfect German, and had been promoted to a higher level in this course. His teacher was a middle-aged man called Gauthier Voizon, whom Lily had only perceived from afar. In the group of students that walked to and from school together, there was a young girl a little older than Nicolas, who sometimes stopped in for a bite, or to study with him. Her name was, absurdly, Trotti. Nicky had explained to his mother that she was the daughter of his German teacher, and that her real name was Raymonde. As a toddler, she’d trotted everywhere: hence the odd nickname. She was tall, somewhat large of frame, and her nose was just a little too long, her mouth a little too generous, for her to have been pretty. But she possessed a cascading mane of luxuriant black hair, beautiful dark eyes, straight white teeth, and a clear, healthy complexion. “She’s very smart, Nicky told Lily. “She’s first in the eleventh form, and we’re tied for first place in German. Her dad’s especially tough on her—so I think that in Paris, she would have beaten me out.” But he said it with a rather happy smile.

  Trotti’s manners were nothing if not excellent. At the beginning she was hardly a regular visitor, and Lily paid little attention to her. And then, slowly but surely, she began to make her presence felt. She would sit at the large kitchen table and help Kira with her algebra. Or she and Nicky would take their German books into the living room, and work together by the small oil lamp. Sudarskaya said one day: “I made rice pudding today, and Trotti didn’t come for a snack. What happened?” And it was then that Lily came to with a jolt: Trotti Voizon had, imperceptibly, fit herself into all their lives. She wondered if this was for the good, or a questionable situation.

  She had never met Trotti’s mother, but had seen her several mornings at the market. She’d recognized her by the little dog with long yellow hair that Nicky had described. Trotti was an only child. Sometime in November, Madame Voizon smiled at her and tilted her head: undoubtedly, Trotti had described her too. But the families’ socializing stopped at that. Afterward, Lily and Trotti’s mother always exchanged smiles—but nothing further.

  Nicky and Trotti were together for a large portion of every day, and for almost every evening. More often than not, he would go to her house after supper, some books under his arm. “Do you think he loves her?” Kira asked, her green eyes suddenly intense. “She loves him—you can tell immediately!”

  Lily blinked. Was it then so obvious that even a little sister could perceive it? But, strangely enough, Kira was way ahead of her brother in the matter of the opposite sex. Lily thought, with poignancy, of the letters Pierre Rublon had carefully sent to them all: letters that inquired about his best friend, Nicky, about his best friend’s mother, even about Sudarskaya. Then, somewhere in the middle, a specific question directed at Kira.

  Nicky would read the letters aloud, then leave them on the table, casually. And Kira, cleaning up the dishes, would remove the onionskin papers with quick, deft fingers, then disappear for forty-five minutes in the bathroom. Sometimes she emerged with red-rimmed eyes; but she never spoke about it. She had her father’s secretiveness, and also, Lily suspected, his wounding vulnerability.

  Nicky, turning fifteen, looked older, but was still an innocent. Like Lily, he was a much more trusting nature. Shortly before the winter vacation, he seemed troubled. When they were alone at the kitchen table, he glanced down at his hands, cleared his throat, and asked: “Mama ... do you think I can kiss Trotti? Or would she be angry?”

  The open naïveté of the question took her breath away. She felt certain that Pierre had already kissed her daughter, and that she hadn’t thought to confer with her mother about it. But she answered, in an even voice: “Darling, you must know this better than I. I’m not sure where you two are in your relationship at this moment. Maybe she’s expecting a kiss —or perhaps it would affront her. It’s up to you to figure this out, and to feel if the right moment has come.”

  The next day, he came into the house, his face alight with pleasure. “Mama!” he cried, somewhat breathlessly. “I kissed her!” Shyly, he turned slightly aside and added: “And she was happy.”

  The winter of 1939-40 proved uneventful on the western front. The war still appeared to be acted out in the dim distance. It was difficult to summon excitement over the fate of the distant Finns, invaded by the Soviet Union. Sudarskaya, still a Russian citizen in spite of Lily’s assurances to the contrary, had to be fingerprinted again at the police station. Édouard Daladier was forced to resign in favor of the economist Paul Reynaud, over his failure to send help to Helsinki. But still, he remained in the Cabinet as defense minister. Old Marshal Henri Pétain was given the post of vice-premier.

  In April, the improvised force sent by the French and British to help the Norwegians defend themselves against Hitler, was roundly defeated. Chamberlain was unseated, but Reynaud remained. Nicky said to his mother: “The French don’t care. All this is still too far away.”

  From the start of the school year, Nicolas had amazed all his teachers with the agility of his mind, his gift for languages, and his astounding memory. Then, toward Christmas, he spoke to Lily. “With the war on, I want to make sure I get as far as I can with my studies,” he explained. “Who knows how long I’ll have the luxury of being a student?”

  “Don’t Nicky.”

  “But we have to face reality. Mama, I already had a discussion with our principal. He’s going to let me accelerate, so I can take my first baccalauréat exam this June, instead of next.”

  For the students, the bac’s were a trial by fire. They lived in dread of them all through their high school years, and many brilliant students failed them unexpectedly. Lily considered Nicky’s age: at fifteen, he wanted to forge ahead, taking on a monstrous load. But he was right. She didn’t want to think that he might eventually be drafted. She preferred to imagine that they might have to flee from Saint-Aubin in the middle of an important semester. Ha
d it been Kira, she would have vetoed the acceleration. But she knew that Nicky could handle this strain, and even thrive under it. And besides . . . now he would be thrown in with Trotti Voizon all the time.

  “If this is what you feel you can do, it’s all right with me,” she told him, smiling.

  Maryse had written that in Paris, it was becoming more and more difficult to admit to being a Jew. Left and right, their Jewish friends were running away, to the United States and to Britain. Yet the quotas were so tight that many of them were being turned away. Wolf didn’t want to move. “It’s as if his experience in Vienna has emptied him out,” she wrote to Lily, honestly adding: “He’s changed so much that half the time, I don’t recognize my husband, always so vibrantly alive, in this still, frozen shell of a man . . . suddenly so old.”

  It was then that Lily’s mind captured the thought, holding it like a palpable object, that she hadn’t been with a man in over two years. And the image that came to her was, strange as it may seem, a remembrance of Mark walking through the garden of the Schwindgasse, one hot night in Vienna. How long ago had this moment been? Six years ago. She’d been lonely then, too, without the warmth of a man’s body in the night, without the thrill of a man’s fingers running trails over the languorous softness of her skin. All at once, thinking about this aroused her. Filled with an unaccustomed bitterness, she sat down, momentarily defeated. Years ago . . . sixteen, to be exact . . . she’d unburdened herself at confession of her physical desire for a man. Now, she thought, she’d hardly know what to say anymore to a Catholic priest. She’d let her old religion fall like a relic by the wayside . . . like a broken object for which she had no further use. She could recite all the Jewish prayers, like delectable incantations. But she couldn’t put feeling into the Pater Noster nor the Ave Maria. And she didn’t feel guilty now about wanting to be touched, wanting to be loved, wanting to love a man with all her body and soul.

  Later in the spring, Nicky and Trotti had their first serious disagreement. Some of their friends had planned a bicycling outing to the city of Caen. “We’ll go, too, with picnic lunches,” the young girl said.

  “I can’t. I have to prepare for the physics exam.”

  “But we’ll study together, on Saturday! Everyone’s going to go ... and it’s time we spent a day together, without our parents around.”

  Her black eyes, insistent, bored into him. She placed a hand on his arm. “Come on, Nicky.”

  He was aware that her insistence was over more than just a trip to the big city. He could feel her strength, her femaleness, so close to him, and it caused strange stirrings inside him. Part of him was suddenly, mystically excited; but the other part, the mental one, seemed to fight back. Trotti wanted to do things her own way. She was older. And he didn’t intend to let himself be manipulated. Suddenly, the fact that her breasts were only inches away from his elbow, was a reason to withdraw, instead of responding. “Look,” he told her, his voice tight, “I’ve got two years to do in one. It

  won’t be enough for me to study on Saturday. I skipped a grade so I could pass my bac, and to me, that’s the most important thing in the world.”

  She folded her arms over her chest, and said, sarcastically: “How pretentious, Nicky! And . . . how unromantic. I thought you’d be sweet enough to spare my feelings, and at least pretend that I’m the most important thing in your life!”

  Turning red, he replied: “You’re not a ‘thing,’ anyway, Trotti. You’re a person, and you know I like you. But I’m not going to let you bully me into an outing when I know I’d be risking a poor grade in physics. It’s my worst subject.”

  “We never do anything,” she shot back at him. “All the others go places and have fun, and we just study. Don’t you know that they make fun of us at school?”

  His brown eyes met hers, calm and steady. He was not about to show her how her stinging words had hurt him. Instead, he sighed. “Look, Trotti. I know you’re disappointed. I’ll try to make it up to you sometime when I’m not swamped with work. But—” Suddenly, his control broke. “You can’t understand! I have to pass my bac, I have to start my life, because I’m the only one who can do anything for my family! You’ve got a father. Mine abandoned us! That’s the reason I wanted to rush through my studies ...so I can start earning some money for Mother and Kira.”

  But Trotti merely shrugged, still sullen. And then, seeing that his concerns, his life, seemed less important to her than an afternoon with her friends, he turned his back on her and strode into his house, feeling an ache so deep that for a moment, tears burned on the edges of his lashes.

  In the weeks that ensued, Nicky’s habitual evenings at the Voizons’ were not resumed. Madame Voizon, for the first time, stepped out of the line for fresh bread, and walked up to Lily and Sudarskaya, who were waiting for a pound of dry beans. “I’m not sure what’s happened,” she said, and Lily noted how cultured her voice was, and how soft-spoken. Trotti’s was harsher, somehow: she didn’t possess her mother’s refinement. “We miss Nicky. My mother had taken to him, and used to play a game of dominoes with him every night. And then ... he was so considerate. To save us all from the humid nocturnal air, he made it his job to walk the dog before going home.”

  Lily was surprised. If Trotti had inserted herself into the Brasilov household, how much more, it seemed, had Nicky into the Voizons’! Trotti was sixteen, Nicky a year younger. She wondered then how hard her son must be taking the separation. Her heart contracted for him.

  That noon, when he returned home from school, his face was pale, drawn, with unnatural circles beneath his eyes. She waited for him to confide in her; when he didn’t, she remained tactfully silent. For the next few days, she watched him circumspectly. He was eating very little, and appearing distracted and, she thought, distressed. Was it all over this headstrong young girl? Lily asked herself.

  That evening, she took her daughter aside, and asked: “Do you have any idea what’s been upsetting your brother? Was it something at school?”

  Kira shook her head. “He had an argument with Trotti. Now she won’t even speak to him. But he hasn’t told me why.”

  “Then, do me a favor,” Lily said, on an impulse. “Ask her to come by the house tomorrow afternoon. I’ll send Nicky on an errand, and she and I will talk-”

  Lily wondered if she was doing the right thing. Nicky was fifteen, and might resent her unbidden interference. Yet she also knew that her son’s unhappiness could only be resolved by an adult’s getting to the heart of the matter. She wasn’t sure Trotti would come, and she wasn’t even sure she liked the girl. But she knew that adolescent pain could sometimes run deeper than the situation warranted.

  The next afternoon, she sent Sudarskaya out with both her children, in the hope that Trotti would come. And she did, promptly and politely. Lily took her jacket and drew her into the kitchen, where she’d set up teacups and a brewing pot. “Kira said it was important, Madame,” she said, a bit awkwardly. It was the first time that the two of them were alone, speaking one-on-one.

  “You and Nicky have quarreled,” Lily stated. “And now he’s brokenhearted. I just wondered, Trotti, if there was any way I could help.”

  The girl appeared surprised. “Help? But how? Nicky just doesn’t want to do anything fun. I like him, really I do—but I’d also like to go out sometimes, with our friends. He’s so ... intent ... so obsessive, about his studies.”

  “Perhaps the fault is mine. Nicky’s taken on more than his share of responsibilities. But he’s always been ambitious, Trotti. He’s so conscientious. He knows that the only sort of man who can succeed in a career is the one who’ll work diligently to achieve it.”

  “He says it’s because he has no father.”

  Lily was shocked. Trotti’s face had set into lines that were almost ugly. It was, Lily realized, as if she’d just accused her of putting too much on Nicky’s shoulders. And maybe she was right. “It’s been difficult for all of us,” she answered, her voice trembling. “But
hardest of all, I suspect, on Nicky. He’s such a fine young man, Trotti! He wants to take care of us ... even of the old piano teacher, Raïssa Markovna. You have to admire him for this, not criticize him. He doesn’t give up where most adults would have, months ago. And this business of two grades in one has been a big burden.”

  “Then . . . why d’you let him go ahead with it?”

  “Because,” Lily replied quietly, “he’s old enough to make some important decisions on his own.”

  She poured them each a new cup of tea, then eyed the girl levelly. “You and Nicky had such a nice, open friendship. I suggest that you make up your disagreement, instead of letting it ruin the rest of the year for both of you. And, Trotti—don’t make him the focal point of your free time. Enjoy yourself. You have other friends. If Nicky has studying to do, there’s no reason you shouldn’t be out with Diane Boucher, or Charles, or Émile. You’re a nice group that’s always doing things together.”

  “But excursions aren’t the same when he’s not with us.”

  “Each of us has to do what’s right for himself. Don’t ruin a perfectly good relationship over such a small matter. You’re older than he is, Trotti: it’s up to you to be the wise one.”

  Lily smiled then, and Trotti, shrugging, had to smile back.

  In the days that followed, slowly but surely Trotti and Nicky began to put back the jigsaw pieces of their friendship. And, two weeks later, what his mother had hoped for took place: once more, after dinner, Nicky went to play dominoes with the old grandmother, and Trotti stopped by to borrow his German grammar book because she’d left hers at school.

  The friendship had resumed, although of course not with its initial trusting freshness. On May 10, 1940, Hitler made a clean sweep through the Netherlands and Belgium, and on through the Maginot Line. It seemed inevitable now, given the paucity of resistance the Germans had encountered, that they would eventually penetrate to Paris. Now the war was felt, and everybody quaked. But Nicky and Trotti were busy preparing for their baccalauréat examinations, and almost as busy with each other. Lily saw their heads touching, their hands linked together. It might no longer have been the intense emotional communion they had shared in the beginning: but now, the two young people appeared to have gained a new physical awareness of each other. A new phase of the relationship had opened up.