“You want to walk with me?” her mother had asked, pausing midway through folding a blanket to stare at Eva in puzzlement. As Eva had thrown herself more into forging documents, her mother had taken over doing all the cleaning and cooking for Madame Barbier. In the summer, Madame Barbier said, there might be guests, but for now, Mamusia was doing her a service by keeping the place tidy for a small fee. Eva wondered if her mother suspected, as she did, that Madame Barbier simply felt sorry for her and was trying to keep her occupied.

“Is that really so strange, Mamusia?” Eva hadn’t intended the edge in her voice, but it was there anyhow.

Mamusia resumed folding her blanket. “I was quite sure you’d forgotten about me, just as you’ve seemingly forgotten that you’re not a Catholic.”

“Don’t talk like that.”

“Like what? Like someone who gave up everything to give you a good life, only to be tossed aside?”

Eva took a deep breath. “Mamusia, that isn’t what has happened.”

Mamusia snorted, but she finally set the blanket down and turned to Eva. “Very well. We can go for a walk, I suppose. But I promised Madame Barbier I would make the stew tonight, so we must be back within the hour.”

Five minutes later, they were walking away from the town center, in the opposite direction of the church and Madame Travere’s home, and for the first time in weeks, Eva felt as if she could breathe. Geraniums were beginning to bud in balcony boxes, soaked by the sun, and even the German soldiers dotting the streets seemed to pay them no attention. She waved to Madame Noirot, who was neatening a display in the front window of her bookshop, and to Monsieur Deniaud, who was out of his butcher’s apron today, but she avoided the gaze of the hawk-eyed gendarme, whose name she had learned was Besnard. His eyes seemed to follow her and Mamusia until they hurried around a corner.

“Madame Barbier has been good to us,” Eva said, just to break the silence between them.

Mamusia gave her a look. “I do good work for her. I keep the house spotless. Don’t make it sound like she pities us.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Good, because Madame Barbier is lucky to have me. In any case, she doesn’t pay me enough. Certainly not what the work is worth. Just like you’re not being paid nearly enough for what you do. They don’t value us, you know.”

Eva sighed. The fact was, Père Clément had offered to give Eva a larger stipend, money that had filtered in from the underground, but Eva had asked that most of the money be sent to the children’s homes instead. There was already a new batch of refugees in Aurignon, waiting for safe passage to Switzerland, and a bit of extra money would help feed them. “We don’t need any more than we have,” Eva reminded her mother.

“Of course we do. I’m putting money away for the future. We’ll need it when we reunite in Paris with your father.” Her mother was still convinced, against all the odds, that Tatu? would return home.

“Mamusia—” Eva began.

“You are your father’s daughter, Eva,” her mother interrupted. “And yet you seem bent on creating a life that will have no room in it for him.”

“That’s not true. I—I will always have room for him. For both of you.”

Her mother snorted and went silent. Eva felt tears of frustration prickle behind her eyelids. “Rémy is gone, Mamusia. I just wanted you to know that.”

Her mother was silent. “And yet you’re still thinking of him.”

“I’m trying not to.”

Again, it was a long time before her mother spoke, and when she finally did, there was a warmth in her voice that Eva hadn’t heard in a while. “Then perhaps you haven’t forgotten who you are, after all.”

* * *

The next day, Eva and Geneviève were working shoulder to shoulder at the table in the hidden library, neither bothering to make small talk as they carefully smudged the fine lines of the lettering they’d just added to a batch of ration cards to make the ink look older, more worn. When they had finished with the ink, they’d need to fold and refold the papers, too, a mechanical process that required virtually no thought but was necessary to make the papers look as if they’d been carried around in someone’s pocket for quite a while.

“What were you before you came here?” Geneviève asked abruptly, the break in the silence startling Eva so much that her hand slipped, creating an ink trail across a card that would now need to be discarded. “Sorry,” Geneviève said, giving Eva a small, guilty smile.

“It’s all right,” Eva said with a sigh, reaching for another blank card. “That one wasn’t my best work anyhow.”

Geneviève nodded, but she didn’t say more. Eva knew she was waiting for an answer to her question.

“Do you mean to ask what my job was?” Eva ventured.

Geneviève nodded again. “You’re just so good at this.” She hesitated. “Plunne, you see, wanted to be a doctor, but the laws prevented him from studying medicine, so he became a typewriter repairman in Nice instead, before he and his mother were forced out. But I think he worked with the precision of a surgeon.”

Eva raised her eyebrows. Not only was Geneviève’s continued reverence for her old mentor a bit off-putting, but so, too, was the ease with which she shared his personal information. Of course, it had already been established that Eva was trustworthy, but they still weren’t supposed to be so carelessly trading identifying details. Suppose Eva was arrested and tortured for information; now she knew where one of the more prolific forgers—someone the Nazis would surely want to capture—had come from, and what his profession had been. “You should be more careful,” Eva said gently. “I shouldn’t know those things about Plunne, though he sounds wonderful.”

Geneviève turned pink. “It’s not his real name, Eva, only his code name. In any case, I’m very sorry. I’m only making conversation.”

“I know. I’m being too cautious.” Geneviève’s deep brown eyes were sparkling with tears, so Eva added, “And to answer your question, I was a student in English literature.”

Geneviève wiped her eyes and smiled. She seemed to realize that the words had been a concession. The truth was, Eva had probably shared too much, but there were plenty of schools in Paris, which would make her much harder to track, even if someone had that information.

“And you?” Eva asked after a moment. “I only know that you come from the Plateau.”

“I—” Geneviève began, but they were interrupted by the door to the secret library cracking open behind them. They both scrambled instantly to hide the ration cards under the books scattered on the table; it was Eva’s reaction every time the door opened when she wasn’t expecting a visitor. She and Geneviève were fish in a barrel.

But danger hadn’t arrived today. Instead, it was Joseph standing there. “I’m very sorry for startling you ladies,” he said, stepping all the way in and pulling the door closed behind him. “Père Clément gave me his key.”

Geneviève looked quizzically at Eva as Joseph gave the dark-haired girl an appraising once-over. Eva realized they hadn’t yet met, though Geneviève had become a part of Eva’s day-to-day life. “Geneviève, this is… Gérard Faucon.” It was still strange to call him by the code name, which didn’t fit the Joseph she’d known in Paris. “And, um, Gérard, this is Geneviève Marchand, my new partner.”

“Ah.” Joseph crossed the room, picked up Geneviève’s hand, and kissed it gently, gallantly. He smiled first at Eva, then at Geneviève, and Eva had to stop herself from rolling her eyes at Geneviève’s reaction. The other woman had turned red and was tittering nervously and fluttering her long lashes. “I had no idea Eva’s new partner was so beautiful,” Joseph added with a grin. “I would have come calling sooner.”

Geneviève giggled. “It’s nice to meet you, Monsieur Faucon.”

“And you, mademoiselle. Please, call me Gérard.”

“Very well. Only if you call me Geneviève.”

“It would be my honor. Now, Geneviève, I hope you’ll excuse me if I borrow Eva for a moment.”

“Certainly.” Geneviève was still the color of a tomato.

“Very well, I’ll return her in no time.”

Joseph led Eva out of the library and gestured to a pew. “We won’t look suspicious if anyone comes in,” he said. “Just two lovers here to pray for peace.”

His words rubbed her the wrong way; was there no other reason a man and a woman could be together in a church? But Joseph’s eyes were dark, his expression serious, and she knew something was wrong. “What is it, Joseph?”

He waited until they were kneeling side by side, pretending to pray. “There were some arrests made in Annecy a few days ago. Your forgery partner, Rémy, was among those picked up.”

Suddenly, she couldn’t breathe. “What?”

“He was escorting a group of children to Switzerland. His papers did not pass muster when he was questioned.”

“Joseph, is he—?” She couldn’t say it.

He looked blankly at her.

“Dead?” She forced the word out. “Did they execute him?”

“No, no. They’re questioning him now, along with the woman he was with.”

The woman he was with. Certainly it was just another passeur, but the words made Eva’s stomach twist with jealousy. She wondered fleetingly if that had been Joseph’s intention. “And the children?” she managed to ask.

“They’re fine. He was arrested on his way back across the border, after seeing them safely across.”