Tatiana Rosnay - Sarah’s Key

In my dreams, I went back to the Marais, too. In my dreams, sometimes the horrors of the past that I had not witnessed appeared to me with such starkness that I had to turn on the light, in order to drive the nightmare away.

It was during those sleepless, empty nights, when I lay in bed, jaded by the social talk, dry-mouthed after the extra glass of wine I should not have given in to, that the old ache came back and haunted me.

His eyes. His face when I had read Sarah’s letter out loud. It all came back and drove sleep away, delving into me.

Zoë’s voice dragged me back to Central Park, the beautiful spring day, and Neil’s hand on my thigh.

“Mom, this monster wants a Popsicle.”

“No way,” I said. “No Popsicle.”

The baby threw herself face forward on the grass and bawled.

“Quite something, isn’t she?” mused Neil.

JANUARY 2005 ALSO BROUGHT me back, again and again, to Sarah, to William. The importance of the sixtieth commemoration of Auschwitz ’s liberation made every headline around the world. It seemed that never before had the word “Shoah” been pronounced so often.

And every time I heard it, my thoughts leaped painfully to him, to her. And I wondered, as I watched the Auschwitz memorial ceremony on TV, if William ever thought of me when he, too, heard the word, when he, too, saw the monstrous black-and-white images of the past flicker across the screen, the lifeless skeletal bodies piled high, the crematoriums, the ashes, the horror of it all.

His family had died in that hideous place. His mother’s parents. How could he not think of it, I mused. On the screen, with Zoë and Charla at my side, I watched the snowflakes fall on the camp, the barbed wire, the squat watchtower. The crowd, the speeches, the prayers, the candles. The Russian soldiers and their particular dancing gait.

And the final, unforgettable vision of nightfall, and the railway tracks aflame, glowing through the darkness with a poignant, sharp mixture of grief and remembrance.

THE CALL CAME ONE May afternoon, when I was least expecting it. I was at my desk, struggling with a new computer’s whims. I picked up the phone, my “yes” sounding curt even to me.

“Hi. This is William Rainsferd.”

I sat up straight, heart aflutter, trying to remain calm.

William Rainsferd.

I said nothing, dumbstruck, clutching the receiver to my ear.

“You there, Julia?”

I swallowed.

“Yes, just having some computer problems. How are you, William?”

“Fine,” he said.

A little silence. But it did not feel tense, or strived.

“It’s been a while,” I said lamely.

“Yes, it has,” he said.

Another silence.

“I see you’re a New Yorker now,” he said, at last. “Looked you up.”

So Zoë had been right, after all.

“Well, how about getting together?” he asked.

“Today?” I said.

“If you can make it.”

I thought of the sleeping child in the next room. She had been to day care this morning, but I could take her along. She wasn’t going to like having her nap interrupted, though.

“I can make it,” I said.

“Great. I’ll ride up to your part of town. Got any ideas where we could meet?”

“Do you know Café Mozart? On West 70th Street and Broadway?”

“I know it, fine. See you there in half an hour?”

I hung up. My heart was beating so fast I could hardly breathe. I went to wake the baby, ignored her protests, bundled her up, unfolded the stroller, and took off.

HE WAS ALREADY THERE when we arrived. I saw his back first, the powerful shoulders, and his hair, silver and thick, no longer bearing any trace of blond. He was reading a newspaper, but he swivelled around as I approached, as if he could feel my eyes upon him. Then he was up on his feet, and there was an awkward, amusing moment when we didn’t know whether to shake hands or kiss. He laughed, I did, too, and he finally hugged me, a great big bear hug, slamming my chin against his collarbone and patting the small of my back, and then he bent down to admire my daughter.

“What a beautiful little girl,” he crooned.

She solemnly handed him her favorite rubber giraffe.

“And what’s your name, then?” he asked.

“Lucy,” she lisped.

“That’s the giraffe’s name-,” I began, but William had already started to press the toy and loud squeaks drowned out my voice, making the baby shriek with glee.

We found a table and sat down, keeping the child in her stroller. He glanced at the menu.

“Ever had the Amadeus cheesecake?” he asked, raising one eyebrow.

“Yes,” I said, “it’s positively diabolical.”

He grinned.

“Hey, you look fabulous, Julia. New York certainly suits you.”

I blushed like a teenager, imagining Zoë looking on and rolling her eyes.

Then his mobile rang. He answered it. I could tell by his expression it was a woman. I wondered who. His wife? One of his daughters? The conversation went on. He seemed flustered. I bent over the child, playing with the giraffe.

“Sorry,” he said, tucking the phone away. “That was my girlfriend.”

“Oh.”

I must have sounded confused because he snorted with laughter.

“I’m divorced now, Julia.”

He looked straight at me. His face sobered.

“You know, after you told me, everything changed.”

At last. At last he was telling me what I needed to know. The aftermath. The consequences.

I did not quite know what to say. I was afraid that if I uttered one word, he’d stop. I kept busy with my daughter, handing her her bottle of water, making sure she didn’t spill it all over herself, fumbling with a paper napkin.

The waitress came to take our orders. Two Amadeus cheesecakes, two coffees, and a pancake for the child.

William said, “Everything went to pieces. It was hell. A terrible year.”

We said nothing for a couple of minutes, looking around us at the busy tables. The café was a noisy, bright place, with classical music emanating from hidden speakers. The child cooed to herself, smiling up at me and at William, brandishing her toy. The waitress brought us our food.

“Are you OK now?” I asked tentatively.

“Yes,” he said, swiftly. “Yes I am. It took me a while to get used to this new part of me. To understand and accept my mother’s history. To deal with the pain of it. Sometimes I still can’t. But I work at it, hard. I did a couple of very necessary things.”

“Like what?” I asked, feeding sticky bits of crumbled pancake to my daughter.

“I realized I could no longer bear all this alone. I felt isolated, broken. My wife could not understand what I was going through. And I just could not explain, the communication between us was nonexistent. I took my daughters to Auschwitz with me, last year, before the sixtieth anniversary celebration. I needed to tell them what had happened to their great grandparents, it wasn’t easy and that was the only way I could do it. Showing them. It was a moving, tearful trip, but I felt at peace, at last, and I felt my daughters understood.”

His face was sad, thoughtful. I did not speak, I let him do the talking. I wiped the baby’s face and gave her more water.

“I did one last thing, in January. I went back to Paris. There’s a new Holocaust memorial in the Marais, maybe you know that.” I nodded. I had heard of it and planned to go there on my next trip. “Chirac inaugurated it at the end of January. There’s a wall of names, just by the entrance. A huge, gray stone wall, engraved with 76,000 names. The names of every single Jew deported from France.”