Sins of the Flesh. Fern Michaels

should keep on going,” Yvette said fretfully. “If everyone is gone, that means the Germans are close. I want to go on. I don’t care how hungry I am. I’d rather starve than be caught by those bastards.” She spat on the ground as she cursed the murderers of her husband.

      Mickey shivered. Yvette was correct in her assumptions, she knew, yet she wanted to stop, to gather food for…Philippe. When she looked toward him in the darkness, he nodded his head to show he agreed with Yvette. With a sigh Mickey moved forward, keeping to the shadows of the village street. “We’ll find food tomorrow, perhaps something left behind in someone’s abandoned root cellar. Perhaps a fat frog or two as we get closer to the water.”

      “How much farther to the château, Maman?” Philippe whispered.

      “Another day and a half if we haven’t lost our way,” Mickey whispered back. “Possibly sooner if we can travel by daylight. It is difficult to see familiar landmarks in the darkness. Are you tiring, Philippe?”

      “No, of course not. It is you and Tante Yvette I am worried about. She showed me her blisters last evening. I don’t know how she can walk.”

      “She’s walking because she has to. One does what one must do, Philippe. Always remember that. Neither I nor Yvette have any desire to be sliced to pieces by some dirty German’s cursed bayonet. Nor do I want to see you marched off to some camp. We walk,” she said briskly.

      They moved on steadily after that, so Mickey did not see the expression on Philippe’s face at her last statement. At last he had a clue to his mother’s innermost fears for him, he mused—she didn’t want him to be marched off to some camp. There had been rumors, ugly, disquieting rumors, of some type of labor camps believed to be located inside Germany, established for the imprisonment of enemies to their country’s ideals.

      Suddenly, from nowhere, a thought surfaced that made his skin crawl. It was no secret that the Germans considered Jews a threat to their basic ideals—and he was a Jew. He stumbled and almost fell, then reassured Yvette with a wave of his hand as she looked back at him. In that instant he understood his mother’s concern, if not her actions. He hoped she knew what she was doing.

      They continued on for the next two days, stopping to rest, greedily picking at the sparse berries that lined the roadside. When they reached the crest of their village, Mickey held her hand up to slow Philippe and Yvette.

      The town was strangely quiet, the streets empty of people. From her position at the top of the hill Mickey could see no sign of activity, French or German. Where were the people, the neighbors she knew by name and had shared meals with, sat next to in the village church? Had they left or were they hiding? The church—she looked to the end of the small town square where the old white church loomed, alone and solemn, its spire stretching upward as though in supplication. Where was the curé? Where were the children, the laughter, the dogs and cats that roamed? The silence was eerie and so total that she felt as though she could reach out to it. Philippe and Yvette joined her, looking down at the village.

      “We’re home, but I fear our friends and neighbors are gone. Listen to the stillness. Even the birds are quiet today.”

      “A bad omen,” Yvette said tartly. “When the birds and small animals leave, it is a bad omen. Pay attention, Michelene.”

      “I am, old friend. We have seen no Germans for three days. I think we are safe for the moment. Come,” she said, “we are going home.”

      Mickey looked neither to the right nor to the left as she led her son and friend through the small main street. The sight of the boarded-up shops made her want to weep. She could smell the fear, probably because it was her own. Suddenly she turned, startled, when she heard her name called. She backed up a few steps to the boulangerie when she saw Monsieur LeForge waving to her. She walked over and embraced him. “It is good to see you again, old friend,” she said warmly. “Tell me, what has happened here? Where is everyone?”

      “The men and the boys…most of them are gone. I was too old to…join the fight with them…. The others, they stay in their houses waiting for the sound of boots to come marching in. They said the soldiers will be here in another week or ten days. How did you get here, madame?”

      “With the help of our countrymen. Thank you for being brave enough to greet us. You remember my friend Yvette and my son, Philippe?”

      LeForge tipped his cap and smiled at Yvette. He looked long and silently at Philippe. “The boy is a man now.”

      And he should be fighting with his countrymen, Mickey added silently, reading the old man’s thoughts. Philippe began to speak, but Mickey stopped him. “We will wait…for word…. He will do what he can, as I will,” she said sharply. “We are patriots the same as every Frenchman.”

      “Not all are patriots,” the old man snarled. “There are those among us who…Never mind, go. Go to your château and don’t talk to anyone, that is the best advice I can give you.”

      “And I will take it, old friend. Au revoir.”

      It was less than a mile to the château. No word had been spoken as they approached their destination. Mickey felt the tension emanating from her son and was torn between the wonderful sight of her beloved estate, nestled in its ancient foliage and welcoming her home, and Philippe’s obvious torment.

      At the door Philippe uttered his first words through clenched teeth. “How long will we stay, Maman?”

      “We shall see,” Mickey whispered.

      The heavy doors creaked as Philippe shouldered them open. To Mickey’s ears it was the loveliest sound in the world. She was home, safe at last to wait for Daniel. Surely God was on her side now, making sure they all stayed alive until her American friend came. And he would come. He had to come. Then and only then could she deal with Philippe.

      Everything in the château was miraculously intact. Obviously no German had crossed this threshold.

      “Philippe, see to the beds for us while Yvette and I find out if we have anything to eat. Come and join us in the kitchen as soon as you have done so.”

      In the root cellar Mickey and Yvette gathered turnips and potatoes and boiled them with a large bunch of onions into a hearty, nourishing soup. As the fire warmed the kitchen, the two women bustled about chatting amiably. Ten minutes later Philippe joined them, carrying a second armful of fresh wood for the fire. There was no bread, but a vintage wine from the wine cellar accompanied the hasty meal and brought a sigh of contentment to their lips.

      Mickey reached across the table and enclosed her son’s hand with her own. “Philippe, you look exhausted, why don’t you try to get some rest now. We can all think more clearly with food and rest. Go.”

      “All right, Maman. Do you need anything else?”

      “No. Yvette and I will be fine.”

      “Bonsoir, Maman, Tante.” Philippe rose heavily to his feet. The two women watched as he left the warmth of the kitchen. They looked at each other, eyes full of unspoken words when he was gone.

      They sat side by side, soaking their blistered feet in a smelly concoction of water, oil, and herbs. An equally vile-smelling ointment would be applied once their feet were dried. “I don’t know which is worse, the pain or the remedy,” Mickey said flatly.

      Yvette grimaced. “What will we do if Philippe refuses to leave with Daniel? You must decide what will be said at that time, my friend.”

      Yvette’s words bolstered Mickey momentarily. Her friend was speaking positively about Daniel’s arrival. “We’ll deal with that if and when it happens,” she said quietly.

      Yvette watched her friend’s eyes fill with tears. “Do you see how he looks like his father?” Mickey murmured. “We’ve not been here for two years, and in just that amount of time the resemblance has settled onto him as if carved in granite.”

      Yvette knew exactly what Mickey was saying. When