Noah's Child Read Online Free Page B

our refugees! They can turn up their toes and die!’
    â€˜No, Mademoiselle Marcelle, people have to agree to take this risk of their own free will. They could be sent to prison for colluding . . .’
    Mademoiselle Marcelle spun round towards me.
    â€˜How would you like to be a boarder at Father Pons’s school?’
    Knowing there was no point in replying, I didn’t even move but let her carry on.
    â€˜Take him to the Villa Jaune with you, Monsieur Pons, even if that is the first place they would come looking for hidden children. But, damn it, with the papers I’ve made for him . . .’
    â€˜How will I feed him? I can’t ask the authorities for any more extra ration tickets. You know the children at the Villa Jaune are underfed as it is.’
    â€˜Hmm, that’s not a problem! The burgomaster’s coming here for his injection this evening. I’ll take care of him.’
    After dark, when she had wound down the metal shutter outside her dispensary (making as much noise as blowing up a tank), Mademoiselle Marcelle came down to the cellar to get me.
    â€˜I might well need you, Joseph. Could you come upstairs and stay in the coat cupboard without breathing a word?’
    She was annoyed when I didn’t give her an answer.
    â€˜I asked you a question, damn it! Are you stupid or what?’
    â€˜Yes, that’s fine.’
    When the doorbell rang, I slipped in between the heavy hanging fabrics with their smell of mothballs, while Mademoiselle Marcelle took the burgomaster through to the room at the back. She took his raincoat and rammed it against my nose.
    â€˜I’m finding it more and more difficult getting hold of insulin, Monsieur Van der Mersch.’
    â€˜Yes, times are hard . . .’
    â€˜To be honest, I won’t be able to give you your injection next week. Shortages! Hold-ups! It’s all finished!’
    â€˜My God . . . my diabetes . . .’
    â€˜There’s nothing I can do, Sir. Unless . . .’
    â€˜Unless what, Mademoiselle Marcelle? Tell me! I’ll do anything.’
    â€˜Unless you give me some ration tickets. I could exchange them to get your medicine.’
    â€˜That’s impossible,’ the burgomaster replied in a panicky voice, ‘I’m being watched . . . the local population has grown far too much in the last few weeks . . . and you know exactly why . . . I can’t ask for any more without attracting the attention of the Gestapo . . . it . . . it would have repercussions for us . . . for us all!’
    â€˜Take this piece of cotton wool and press firmly. Harder than that!’
    While she gave her curt instructions to the burgomaster, she came over towards me and whispered quickly and quietly between the cupboard doors, ‘Take his keys from his coat, the ones on the metal ring not the leather one.’
    I wasn’t sure I had heard her correctly. Did she sense that? She added between gritted teeth, ‘And get a move on, damn it!’
    She went back to finish the burgomaster’s bandage while I fumbled in the dark to relieve him of his keys.
    Then, after her visitor had left, she let me out of the cupboard, sent me down to the cellar and set off into the night.
    Very early the following morning Father Pons came to bring us the news:
    â€˜Action stations, Mademoiselle Marcelle, someone’s stolen the ration tickets from the town hall!’
    She rubbed her hands together.
    â€˜Really? How did they manage that?’
    â€˜The looters forced the shutters open and broke a window.’
    â€˜Goodness! Has the burgomaster been damaging his own buildings?’
    â€˜What do you mean? That he stole . . .?’
    â€˜No, I did. With his keys. But when I put them back in his letterbox this morning I felt sure he would fake a break-in so no one would suspect him. Here you are, Monsieur Pons, have this book of ration tickets. It’s yours.’
    Although she was surly and incapable of