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There were no more trips to Angers that week, and neither Cassis nor Reinette seemed inclined to speak of our meeting with the Germans. As for myself, I was reluctant to mention my conversation with Leibniz, though I was unable to forget it. It made me feel by turns apprehensive and oddly powerful too.
Cassis was restless, Reinette sullen and discontented, and to add to that it drizzled all week, so that the Loire swelled ominously and the sunflower fields were blue with rain. Seven days had passed since our last visit to Angers. Market day came and went; this time Reinette accompanied Mother to town, leaving Cassis and myself to prowl discontentedly through the dripping orchard. The green plums on the trees made me think of Leibniz, with an odd mixture of curiosity and disquiet. I wondered whether I would ever see him again.
Then, unexpectedly, I did.
Early in the morning of the next market day, it was Cassis’s turn to help with the provisions. Reine was fetching the new cheeses, wrapped in vine leaves, from the coolroom and Mother was collecting eggs from the henhouse. I was just back from the river with the morning catch, a couple of small perches and bleaks that I had chopped for bait and left in a bucket by the window. It was not the Germans’ usual day to call, and as a result it was I who happened to open the front door when they knocked.
There were three of them: two I did not recognize, and Leibniz, very correct now in uniform, standing with a rifle slung into the crook of his arm. His eyes widened a little in surprise when he saw me, then he smiled.
If it had been any other German standing there I might have shut the door in their faces, as Denis Gaudin did when they came to requisition his violin. I would certainly have called Mother. But on this occasion I was unsure; I fidgeted uneasily on the doorstep, wondering what to do.
Leibniz turned to the other two and spoke to them in German. I thought I understood from the gestures that accompanied his words that he intended to search our farm himself while the others moved down the lane toward the Ramondin and Hourias places. One of the other Germans looked at me and said something. The three of them laughed. Then Leibniz nodded and, still smiling, stepped past me into our kitchen.
I knew I should call Mother. When the soldiers called she was always more sullen than ever, stonily resentful of their presence and their casual appropriation of anything they required. And today of all days! Her temper was bad enough as it was: this would be the final blow.
Supplies were getting scarce, Cassis had explained when I had asked him about it. Even Germans had to eat. “And they eat like pigs!” he had continued with indignation. “You should see their canteen – whole loaves of bread, with jam and pâté and rillettes and cheese and salted anchovies and ham and sour cabbage and apple – you wouldn’t believe it!”
Leibniz closed the door behind him and looked around. Away from the other soldiers his posture was relaxed, more like a civilian’s. He reached in his pocket and lit a cigarette.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded at last. “We don’t have anything!”
“Orders, Backfisch,” said Leibniz. “Is your father about?”
“I don’t have a father,” I replied with a touch of defiance. “Germans killed him.”
“Ah. I’m sorry.” He seemed embarrassed, and I felt a little swell of pleasure inside. “Your mother, then?”
“Out back.” I glared at him. “It’s market day today. If you take our market stuff we won’t have anything left. We just manage as it is.”
Leibniz glanced around – a little shamefacedly, I thought. I saw him take in the clean tiled floor, the patched curtains, the scarred stripped – pine table. He hesitated.
“I have to do it, Backfisch,” he said softly. “I’ll be punished if I don’t obey orders.”
“You could say you didn’t find anything. You could say there was nothing left when you came.”
“Perhaps.” His eyes lit on the bucket of scraps by the window. “Fisherman in the family, is there? Who is it, your brother?”
I shook my head. “Me.”
Leibniz was surprised.
“Fishing?” he echoed. “You don’t look old enough.”
“I’m nine,” I said, stung.
“Nine?” Lights danced in his eyes, but his mouth stayed serious. “I’m a fisherman myself, you know,” he whispered. “What is it you fish for around here? Trout? Carp? Perch?”
I shook my head.
“What then?”
“Pike.”
Pikes are the cleverest of freshwater fish. Sly and cautious in spite of their vicious teeth, they need carefully selected bait to lure them to the surface. Even the smallest thing can make them suspicious: a fraction of a change in temperature; the hint of a sudden movement. There is no quick or easy way to do it; blind luck apart, catching pike takes time and patience.
“Well, that’s different,” said Leibniz thoughtfully. “I don’t think I could let down a fellow fisherman in trouble.” He grinned at me. “Pike, eh?”
I nodded.
“What d’you use, bloodworms or boluses?”
“Both.”
“I see.”
This time he did not smile; it was a serious business. I watched him in silence. It was a ploy that never failed to make Cassis uneasy.
“Don’t take our market stuff,” I repeated.
There was another silence. Then Leibniz nodded.
“I suppose I could manage to think of some story to tell them,” he said slowly. “You’d have to keep quiet, though. Or you could get me into real trouble. Do you understand?”
I nodded. It was fair. After all, he’d kept quiet about the orange. I spat on my palm to seal the bargain. He did not smile, but shook hands with perfect seriousness, as if this were an adult arrangement between us. I half-expected him to ask me for a favor in return, but he did not, and the thought pleased me. Leibniz wasn’t like the others, I told myself.
I watched him go. He did not look back. I watched him as he sauntered down the lane toward the Hourias farm and flicked his cigarette end into the outhouse wall, its glowing tip striking red sparks against the dull Loire stone.
