THE CORPORAL WAS ON HIS FEET, HANDS CUPPED to his mouth. ‘Ola! Ola!’ he shouted, and the echo resounded around the valley. The patrol stopped. ‘Ola! Ola!’ and he waved both arms in the air. The soldiers were looking about them in alarm, their rifles at the ready. The Corporal laughed and shook his head. ‘I think it is Rudi’s patrol,’ he said. ‘We call them “the grandfathers”. They are even older than I am.’ Jo looked beyond the boulder into the trees. Benjamin had vanished. One of the soldiers had seen them now and was pointing excitedly. ‘Maybe we should go down to them,’ said the Corporal, ‘so that they can see who we are. We do not want them to think that we are escaping over the border, do we? Come on, Jo.’ And he helped him to his feet. The soldiers were running up towards them. ‘It’s Rudi. No one else runs like Rudi. You know what he is, Jo? He’s, how do you say, a taxidermist. You know what they do? No? I tell you then. He is someone who stuffs dead animals, fish perhaps, birds even.’ Jo was not listening. He was straining to find some movement amongst the trees beyond the boulder. There was none. Benjamin had gone. He was sure of it now. He was safe. Jo heard his heart pounding in his throat and swallowed to stop it. ‘Was ist los?’ said the Corporal. ‘Something is wrong, Jo?’ Jo shook his head. ‘You don’t look so good.’
‘I’m all right,’ said Jo. ‘I’m all right.’ The Corporal took Jo by the elbow. ‘Come, we go down. Poor old Rudi, it would give him a heart attack if we made him come all the way up here.’
There followed a laughing reunion half-way up the slope. Jo could not understand much of what they were saying but he could see that the Corporal was explaining all about the eagle’s nest and by the way they looked at him all about Jo too. There was lots of nodding, lots of ‘ ja ja ’s and more laughing, and then as if to prove the point the eagle shrieked right above them, circled once and soared away over the peaks, the soldiers’ binoculars trained on her. But Jo’s eyes were still searching the trees. ‘Quick Jo,’ said the Corporal, ‘you will miss it.’ But in the time Jo took to lift the binoculars to his eyes and focus, the eagle had gone and the sky above the peaks was empty.
It was late afternoon before they rounded the bend in the track and saw Hubert sitting where they had left him on his rock. Rouf lifted his head off his lap and yawned. He stretched and came plodding towards them. Hubert didn’t hear them until the sheep moved in closer together, then he turned and saw them. He was clearly more pleased to see the binoculars than anything else. In a trice he had them around his neck. The Corporal smiled and began to walk away.
‘What about your binoculars?’ Jo called after him.
He walked backwards for a few paces as he spoke. ‘He can keep them. They make him happy, yes? And I have another pair, my army ones, much better, much stronger. Those are my own, yours now, Hubert. Auf Wiedersehen.’
It took some time for Hubert to believe that the binoculars were really his but when he did everyone in the village had to know and everyone had to look through them and share in his joy. He wore them around his neck constantly, even when he was milking the sheep. His father said he often slept with them on at night.
More than ever now the Corporal was held in genuine affection throughout the village, for the gift did not smack of bribery but of open generosity. His spirits seemed to recover quickly in this cocoon of warmth – perhaps a little too quickly some said, Madame Soulet for one; but Jo knew this not to be so.
The two of them, the Corporal and Jo, often sat for long hours together on the rock. They were not allowed up into the mountains again the Corporal told him – Lieutenant Weissmann had forbidden it. But anyway they were content to be where they were. They watched the sheep and the birds, and Jo felt the raw pain of grief in the Corporal’s long silences. The Corporal never again spoke of his dead daughter, except once when he said it would be her birthday soon. It was that day that Hubert came stumbling along the track towards them, his binoculars around his neck as usual. He seemed unusually awkward and shy as he sat down beside Jo and rocked back and forth. He often seemed to do this when he was tense. Quite suddenly he stopped rocking and took a deep breath. He reached inside his shirt. Jo had expected him to produce a frog or a toad perhaps, but when his hand came out he was holding a packet of cigarettes. He reached across Jo and offered one to the Corporal.
The Corporal shook his head and smiled. ‘No thank you, Hubert. Since the war began I smoke too much. In my letters I promise my wife not to smoke. If I promise then I can stop, you understand me, yes?’ Hubert frowned and insisted, holding the packet closer to the Corporal. ‘Very well, Hubert, just this once then,’ he said, and he took the packet.
Hubert drew his knees up and rocked again. The Corporal opened the packet and when Jo saw the cotton wool he knew what it was all about. Hubert had his hands over his eyes as the Corporal tugged gently at the cotton wool until it came free. He seemed to guess now what it was and pulled away the cotton wool with the utmost care. It was a tiny white chalice, and as the Corporal turned it slowly in his hand on the bed of cotton wool Jo could see that around it flew two golden eagles, their spread wings touching.
‘He makes them,’ said Jo.
The Corporal nodded. ‘I know,’ he said, holding it up to the light. It was translucent. ‘Hubert’s father,’ he went on, ‘he showed me his collection.’ He folded it in the cotton wool again and slipped it back inside the cigarette packet. He slipped down off the rock and stood in front of Hubert. He reached out and took Hubert’s hands away from his face. He leaned forward and kissed Hubert on both cheeks, patted him on the knee and walked away.
‘He liked it,’ said Jo, but Hubert had spotted a limping sheep and was off after it, shadowing it with Rouf into a corner of the field until they had it boxed in. He caught it by the back leg, picked something out of the foot, smacked its bottom and sent it bleating on its way.
They brought the sheep back in early that day because it was coming on to rain. Everyone else had the same idea so there was a muddle of sheep in the narrow village streets before they managed to drive them at last into the walled yard in front of the house. Jo thought he was a few sheep short and was counting them when Grandpère came to the door and called him in. Something was up, he could see it in his face. The sheep moved aside as he walked through them. Grandpère stood on the doorstep, a cigarette hanging between his lips.
‘Is it the children?’ Jo spoke softly.
‘Nothing like that,’ said Grandpère throwing away his cigarette. ‘Indoors, I’ve got something to show you.’
‘What about the milking?’
‘The sheep can wait, Jo,’ he said. ‘Come on,’ and he took his arm.
As Jo went into the kitchen his suspicions were confirmed. Something was wrong. Christine was sitting silently on her mother’s lap. Christine never sat on anyone’s lap and was never quiet. She was staring across the room. Maman rested her chin on Christine’s head. There were tears in her eyes. ‘Jo,’ she said, and then Jo saw the man standing by the window. The stranger had his back to him, his hands deep in the pockets of a long, dirty coat. As he turned round the evening light fell across his face and Jo saw at once it was his father. It was not the father he remembered from nearly four years before, but a smaller man, a thinner man, whose hair was no longer black but quite grey, and when Jo hugged him he could feel the sharp shoulder blades through his coat.
‘Let me look at you, Jo,’ said Papa, and he held him at arm’s length. ‘You’ve grown,’ he said. The skin was stretched like paper over his cheekbones. ‘Not that bad is it, Jo? You do recognise me, don’t you?’
‘Of course, Papa,’ said Jo.
‘More than your sister did. Still, that’s not her fault is it? She was no more than a babe when I left.’
‘They let him out, Jo,’ said Grandpère. ‘Sent him home.’
‘Don’t go thinking it was out of the kindness of their hearts,’ said Papa. ‘They’d had all of me they wanted, used me all up.’ Jo turned to his mother for an explanation.
‘Papa’s sick, Jo. Tuberculosis,’ she said. ‘They sent him home because he couldn’t work any more.’
‘It was the damp,’ said Papa. ‘There were dozens of us like it. No use to them any more. So they sent us home. You know Michel, Michel Maurois? They sent us back together, him and me. He’s not grumbling, and neither am I, I can tell you. What’s a bit of a wheezy chest when it’s a passport home. Just give me a week or two and I’ll be right as rain.’
They sat long together over supper that evening while Papa tried to catch up on the years he’d missed, and as the hours passed Christine ventured closer and closer to him. By the time she was taken up to bed she let him kiss her goodnight.
‘That’s the best thing that’s happened to me in a long time,’ he said.
Grandpère tried to ask about the prison camp but Papa would say nothing about it except to say that ‘you learn things about yourself you never wanted to know’. There were long silences when he seemed to drift away into a world of his own. A mere mention of the soldiers in the village made him immediately angry and even the subject of Grandpère’s pigs seemed to irritate him. Until he asked after the sheep Maman had said very little.
‘Jo stepped right into your shoes,’ she said, and Jo saw Papa’s face darken suddenly. ‘I told you in my letters, didn’t I?’ she went on. ‘You’d have been proud of him. Maybe he missed school more often than he should but Monsieur Audap understood. Thinks very highly of our Jo does Monsieur Audap.’
‘Monsieur Audap?’ said Papa.
‘His teacher,’ she said. ‘Don’t you remember?’
‘Oh yes,’ said Papa and he looked away. He seemed to have forgotten so much about the village, about everything, and Jo could see that it hurt him to know it and to know that others knew it. Jo wished Maman would stop talking about how useful he’d been. Every word she spoke seemed to shrivel Papa up, but still she went on. ‘Hubert helped him of course. We couldn’t have managed without him. You remember Hubert?’
‘Of course,’ Papa snapped. ‘Of course I do.’
Grandpère tried to make light of it. ‘And me,’ he said. ‘What about me? Did I sit on my backside for four years, eh? Who took the sheep up on to the summer pastures? I did. Who moved the sheep when he was at school, eh? I did. Your old father, that’s who.’ He got up and poured Papa some more wine. ‘And now you’re back again I can hang up my boots.’
‘Not yet you can’t,’ said Maman. ‘We’ve got to get him well first. Good food and a warm house and plenty of rest. That’s what he needs.’
‘Don’t fuss me,’ said Papa, and he drank down his wine as if he hated it.
Grandpère leaned forward and tapped his knee. ‘I’ve been courting, son,’ he said, and Papa’s laughter filled the house for the first time.
‘It’s true,’ said Maman, ‘everyone knows it. He’s up and down to that old woman’s house. Talk of the village it is.’
‘What old woman?’ Papa asked.
‘Widow Horcada,’ said Maman, ‘the Black Widow.’
‘You’re not serious?’ Papa was still laughing.
‘And why not?’ said Grandpère in mock indignation. ‘Cleverest woman in the parish. She never parts with a penny she doesn’t have to. She even pays Jo with honey doesn’t she Jo?’
‘What for?’
‘For carrying her shopping,’ said Grandpère.
Jo sat in silent admiration. In a few moments he had cheered Papa and explained in advance all the comings and goings to and from the Widow Horcada’s house. Papa was still chuckling as he got up.
‘I can see I came back just in time to stop my father from making an old fool of himself.’
‘Too late for that, son,’ he said. ‘I’m a smitten man and there’s nothing you nor anyone can do about it.’
Papa was putting on his coat.
‘Where are you going?’ Maman said.
‘Out,’ he said. ‘You know, whilst I was in the camp I looked forward to a lot of things, to seeing you, to being home again.’ He frowned suddenly. ‘You won’t believe this,’ he said, ‘but sometimes I even forgot what you all looked like, all except Rouf there. And you can’t look forward to what you can’t remember. What I wanted to do most was to walk the hills at night, to feel alive again, to feel free. So that’s what I’m going to do.’
They looked at each other frantically as he walked towards the door. ‘But you can’t,’ said Maman. ‘You’re tired. You’re not well. You’ll catch a chill.’
‘I’ll be all right,’ he said, opening the door. ‘I won’t be long.’
Grandpère was beside him. He took his arm and shut the door firmly. ‘You can’t go out,’ he said. ‘There’s a curfew.’
‘Curfew?’
‘After nine thirty. If the Boche catch you outside after nine thirty . ’
‘What’ll they do?’ said Papa, the fury rising in his voice. ‘Put me in prison? Shoot me? Let them. I’ve been shut up for four years and now I’m home I’m not letting any Boche make a prisoner of me in my own home. I’ll come and I’ll go as I please. Now out of my way, Papa. Out of my way!’ Grandpère stood aside and Papa opened the door, pulled up his collar and walked out into the darkness.
They sat up and waited for him, dreading the sound of running boots, of shouting voices or even a volley of shots. The longer they waited the more terrible their fears became. When he did come back an hour or so later, all he said was: ‘I saw them but they didn’t see me.’ The walk seemed to have dissipated the anger in him.
Jo lay in bed and listened to the murmur of voices from his parents’ room next door. Papa really was back home. The last few hours had been no dream. Then came the coughing, fits of coughing followed by silences long enough to let Jo drift into sleep before the next fit began. But the coughing woke Christine and she was up and down the passage all night. Jo gave up all attempts to sleep and waited for the first sound of the dawn chorus.
The next day the village was alive with new joy and hope. No one doubted that the war was being won; it was only a question of time now, that was all. Two of their sons had been returned to them, good enough cause for celebration. In such times any excuse for celebration was seized upon eagerly. Hubert was sent beating his drum around the village, his binoculars still around his neck, and everyone gathered in the Square to hear the Mayor’s formal welcome. Papa and Michel Maurois stood either side of him, but Jo thought they endured rather than enjoyed the speech. It finished with a typical flourish. ‘We await the day,’ said Monsieur Sarthol, ‘and it will surely not now be long, when the rest of our fathers and brothers, our uncles and nephews are returned to us once again. Vive la France!’ Jo looked about him as everyone clapped and cheered and laughed – there wasn’t a soldier in sight.
When Jo arrived at school the next morning they crowded around him to congratulate him. He was not sure what he had done to deserve it all, but he enjoyed it just the same. Not everyone, though, wanted to share in the general rejoicing. There were baleful, even resentful looks from across the playground, reminding Jo that many of the children still had fathers in prisoner-of-war camps. Laurent seemed to bear him no grudge, but then Laurent was not like that, and besides he had his reasons. ‘I can’t stand my father anyway,’ he said, ‘and neither can my mother. The longer they keep him there the better.’ Laurent always said exactly what he thought however it reflected on him, and Jo admired that in him; but now it made Jo feel even more of a fraud. Papa was back home and Jo wished he wasn’t. That was the truth of it. No matter how hard he tried to feel differently, he could not. Papa was a stranger to him and not a particularly welcome one either. It wasn’t that he hated him, he just did not know him any more.
On Sunday Father Lasalle played a thundering triumphal march on the organ, and thanked God for their deliverance. That evening Jo was in the café when Papa and Michel got up and danced together on the table. The dancing spread out into the Square. Monsieur Audap sang songs nobody thought he ought to know and Hubert wrapped himself in the bearskin from the wall and ran growling and roaring after the children through the streets.
When the Corporal and two other soldiers walked into the café no one took a blind bit of notice. The Corporal nodded and smiled at Jo as he sat down at the table in the corner. Jo smiled back. Suddenly Papa was on his feet, kicking his chair back against the wall. The awful silence was punctuated by distant roars and shrieks out in the Square. Michel tried to hold him back but Papa would not be stopped. He shook himself free, glaring at the three soldiers.
Grandpère stood up beside him. ‘Let’s go home,’ he said.
‘Not just yet,’ said Papa, and then in a loud voice, ‘Well, well. Look what’s come to welcome us home, Michel.’ He picked up a bottle and walked across the room towards where the soldiers were sitting. ‘Guten Abend,’ he said, the sneer quite evident in his tone.
‘Good evening,’ said the Corporal without looking up.
‘You must join our little party,’ said Papa, his voice heavy and slurred with drink. He poured wine into each of their glasses.
Grandpère was trying to pull him away. ‘That’s enough,’ he said. ‘Come on, come home.’ But Papa ignored him.
‘There,’ he said, ‘some good French wine.’ He raised the bottle in the air. ‘To victory,’ he said.
The soldiers sat, heads bowed, motionless. Then the Corporal stood up and he faced Papa, his glass in his hand. ‘I drink to peace,’ he said and he drank down his glass and put it on the table.
At that moment Hubert appeared at the door, the bearskin draped over his head and Laurent clutching an arm. Hubert beamed at the Corporal. Papa reached out and caught the swinging binoculars around Hubert’s neck. ‘Nice,’ he said. Hubert laughed and put them to his eyes. He scanned the room until he focused on a stuffed buzzard on a shelf above the bar. He pointed at it. ‘Bang!’ he said. ‘Bang! Bang!’ and he laughed and then everyone laughed and was glad of it.
‘They’re his,’ said Laurent. ‘The Corporal gave them to you, didn’t he, Hubert? You can see anything. I’ve seen the mountains on the moon.’
‘Have you?’ said Papa acidly. ‘So now we accept presents from them do we?’ Jo ran over to him. He had to explain. Papa had to know about the Corporal, about how kind he had been, about what happened to his daughter.
‘Papa,’ he said, touching his arm.
Papa turned on him, eyes full of fury. ‘So he’s a friend of yours too, is he?’ Jo backed away.
The Corporal picked up his cap from the table. ‘Good night,’ he said and he passed Hubert on the way out putting a hand on his shoulder. The two soldiers followed him. Papa began to cough violently until he was doubled up. Grandpère took the bottle out of his hand and put an arm around him.
‘We’ll get him home, Jo,’ he said.
In the weeks that followed Papa took very little interest in the farm or in anything else much. He tramped the hillsides all day to return each evening grim and sullen. The evenings he would spend with Michel in the café and Grandpère would go with him to be sure of getting him back before curfew, and when he did come back he was always drunk. Jo remembered him coming home drunk before he went away to the war but then he’d come back happy with the world and singing, now he would sit by the stove and brood darkly. Jo did not even dare to catch his eye for fear of encountering the look of accusing disapproval that he felt was following him wherever he went. The father he’d grown up with, with whom he’d shared the shepherd’s hut all summer long, was not the man now sharing his house. They had a stranger living with them and all of them knew it.
Once Jo had come home to find Maman crying in the kitchen. Jo put his arms around her but could not find the words to comfort her. Grandpère did better. ‘He’ll come out of it, Lise,’ he said, ‘you’ll see. You’ve got to put yourself in his place. It’s like he’s come back from the dead – that’s what it’s like for him. He comes back home expecting everything to be the same and it isn’t. You’re not the same. I’m not the same. Jo here has grown as tall as he is. There’s a lot of bitterness in him, Lise, a lot of poison; but it’ll come to a head and then he’ll be free of it. Just give him time.’ But time seemed only to make matters worse. Even Grandpère’s valiant efforts to cheer him fell on deaf ears.
For both of them the journeys up to the children’s cave with supplies brought welcome relief. Jo would often go off into the forest with Benjamin to gather firewood. They would talk of the bear and wonder together how big it must be by now and where it was living. And Grandpère would tell his troubles to Widow Horcada who never seemed that sympathetic.
One afternoon they were on their way back home from the cave when Hubert came running up to them pointing behind him into the bracken and grunting with excitement. He took off his binoculars and handed them to Jo. All Jo could see at first was Rouf’s tail, and then a wild boar charged out of the bracken and across the field. Hubert went galloping after him. The last they saw of him he was bounding into the bracken, a stick in his hand, and shouting ‘Bang! Bang!’ They laughed and turned for home.
Papa was sitting alone in the kitchen. He looked up as they came in. He had a glass of wine in his hand. ‘Where’ve you been?’ he said. A frown came across his face as he caught sight of the binoculars. He stood up and lunged for Jo, catching him by the straps of the binoculars. ‘What’s this then?’ Until that moment Jo had forgotten he still had them.
‘Hubert’s binoculars, Papa. He lent them to me. We saw this boar, didn’t we Grandpère?’
‘I’ve been hearing things I don’t like, Jo,’ said Papa, pulling him closer. Jo could smell the drink on his breath. He tried to pull away but found himself held fast.
‘Leave him be,’ said Grandpère.
‘You stay out of this,’ said Papa. ‘He’s my son. You and her, you’ve done enough harm as it is. Only four years I’ve been gone and look what you’ve turned him into.’
‘What do you mean, Papa?’ said Jo.
‘Collaborator, that’s what I mean.’ Jo shook his head. ‘I’ve been told so don’t you go denying it. You went off with that Boche Corporal didn’t you?’
‘I was only watching the eagles.’
‘Damn you! Don’t lie to me!’ The blow came without warning and sent Jo reeling backwards into Grandpère who staggered but held him upright. Jo put his hand on his cheek. He could not feel it. He licked his lip and tasted blood. Grandpère stepped in front of him as Maman came running in. She rushed over to him.
‘What’ve you done?’ she cried.
Grandpère sat Jo down in a chair. ‘He’ll be all right,’ he said.
‘How could you?’ she said. ‘He’s your own son. What’s happened to you? What did they do to you in that camp?’
‘You want to know what happened?’ Papa was breathing hard. ‘I’ll tell you what happened. They gutted me like a fish. Don’t you understand? They took away four years of my life that’s what they did. And when I come back, what do I find, eh? The whole lousy village playing lovey-dovey with them and my own son making friends with the filthy Boche. That’s what they are, don’t you know what they are? Don’t you know what they’ve done?’
‘We had to live,’ said Maman reaching for his hand and holding on to it when he tried to pull away from her.
He was crying openly now. ‘My own son a collaborator. Do you know what those binoculars are? They’re a badge of shame. Hubert’s a halfwit. You can’t blame him; but my son, my own son . ’ And he could say no more.
Grandpère pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and gave it to Jo. ‘Here,’ he said, ‘we don’t want blood everywhere do we?’ He knocked a cigarette out of a packet and offered one to Papa who shook his head. ‘Sit him down, Lise,’ said Grandpère firmly, ‘and give him a brandy.’ She led Papa to a chair. ‘And I’ll have one too. We’ll all have one, to celebrate. You don’t know what we’re celebrating do you? Well, I’ll tell you, but you won’t like it. I haven’t talked to you like this since you were a little boy and I shouldn’t be doing it now in front of Jo, but I’m going to do it anyway.’ Grandpère took his brandy. ‘Sit down, Lise. You’d better hear this too. You won’t like it much either but for a different reason perhaps. Let me tell you something about this boy of yours, this “collaborator” as you call him.’
Jo knew what he was going to say. ‘Don’t Grandpère,’ he said. ‘You mustn’t.’
‘Yes I must, Jo,’ he said. ‘I’ll not have him thinking of you like that, nor of me, nor of any of us.’ He turned back to Papa. ‘This boy of yours may not look like much, doesn’t make a lot of noise, he just goes on quietly; but I’ll tell you something for nothing. Singlehanded, until just a few months back, single-handed mind you, this boy has been taking Widow Horcada’s supplies up and down the mountain. Not much in that, you’d say; but do you know who it’s really all been for? Well, I’ll tell you then. There’s twelve children – Jews – hiding away in a cave up in the forest, waiting to be taken over into Spain. Some of them have been waiting for near enough two years, and all that time they’ve needed feeding and all that time your Jo’s been doing it. Without that boy of yours, that “collaborator”, they’d not have stood a chance. He’s kept them alive and he’s kept his mouth shut.’ Maman had her hand to her mouth. ‘He couldn’t have told you, Lise, he couldn’t have. He’d given his word, and anyway you’d have only tried to stop him.’ He turned back to Papa. ‘Now, you may not know it where you’ve been hidden away, but there’s a law hereabouts, laid down by our Boche friends, and it’s this: anyone who’s caught aiding or abetting the escape of fugitives will be shot. Jo’s known that all the time he’s been doing it. Every day of his life your son could have been taken out and shot.’
As Jo listened he was suddenly terrified, retrospectively terrified. Of course he’d known it but he’d not thought about it, not properly. It had never sunk in until now. It was as if Grandpère had been talking about someone else. There had been no real intention on his part. Things had just happened. When Grandpère had finished he looked at Papa. He was leaning forward, his head in his hands.
‘Jo,’ he said, ‘what have I done to you? What’ve I said?’
‘Nothing that can’t be undone,’ said Grandpère. ‘Nothing that can’t be unsaid. On your feet the two of you,’ and he drew them together.
After they hugged, Papa held Jo by the shoulders, and smiled through his tears. ‘You’re taller than me,’ he said, and he turned away. ‘The children,’ he went on. ‘They’re still up there then, up in the cave?’
‘Still up there,’ said Grandpère, and he told him all about Benjamin and Widow Horcada, and how they were waiting for the right moment to take the children over the mountains.
Papa walked to the mantlepiece and leant on it for a moment. Then he turned round. ‘You’re crazy, crazy,’ he said. ‘At any moment a patrol could stumble across that cave. What have you been waiting for – a miracle? For the war to end? For the Boche to fall asleep?’
‘I told you,’ said Grandpère, ‘there’s patrols out everywhere. Benjamin’s seen them. I’ve seen them, and besides some of the children have been too weak to move.’
‘Weak or not,’ said Papa vehemently, ‘they’ve got to go. If necessary they’ll have to be carried, but they’ve got to go.’
‘Just tell us how,’ said Grandpère. ‘You tell us how to do it and we’ll do it. Don’t you think we haven’t thought about it?’ Papa said nothing.
‘Maybe,’ said Maman quietly, ‘maybe the children could pretend to be someone they weren’t.’
‘What do you mean?’ Grandpère said.
‘I don’t know,’ she said, ‘I was just thinking aloud really. But I remember when I was little I was told some story about a one-eyed giant, and there were all these men in a cave and a giant was waiting outside to kill them as they came out, and there were some sheep sheltering inside the cave with them.’
‘I know it, I remember it,’ said Papa, and he went on. ‘When the sheep come out of the cave they’re all clinging on underneath and he doesn’t see them. You’re not suggesting . ’
‘No, of course I’m not,’ said Maman, ‘but sheep need shepherds don’t they? It’s been a warm spring. There’ll be plenty of grass by now on the high pastures. By my reckoning there must be two thousand sheep in the village, a hundred cows or more, fifty horses maybe, and your pigs too, Grandpère. When the time’s right, and after all we can choose when the time’s right, they’ll all be moving up into the mountains for the summer won’t they? No one will notice a few more children shepherding them will they? And once you get up to the hut, well, it’s like you always say, Grandpère, you’re so close to Spain up there you could almost spit into it.’
They all looked at her.
‘Just an idea,’ she said.