Prologue

                                                July 30, 1919

            The moon descended and the sun rose as I sat on the swing slowly rocking back and forth. The sun hit my cheeks so perfectly they began to glow. I hummed a song my Yiddish grandmother always sang to me. I softly started to sing the words:

                                 Shlof mayn kind, mayn treyst mayn sheyner,

                                        Sleep my lovely child, my comfort.

          I breathed in what was probably the last breath of 1919’s summer air I will have this year. I stood up and began to return home to my duties in the kitchen. On my way in, I stopped by the mirror in the bathroom to make sure my dress was not messed up in any way.

          My black hair was up in a bun that was the fashion statement of the century for black women such as myself. My dark brown eyes, my Father’s dark brown eyes and my Mama’s smile made me look almost as beautiful as her. I had on a blue dress that when down to the center of my shins with an apron tied at my waist laid perfectly on top. I smoothed out my dress and apron and made sure my makeup was still intact before I nodded in approval and walked out of the bathroom, towards the kitchen to prepare a meal for my family and our special guests.

          This was a treat for us black folks, to have such highly ranked people under your roof. Our little Maryland home was small and sweet, always blooming with children and flowers. I was the middle child of five, but the oldest of those who still lived with mama.

          Mama wiped away her tears as she saw me walk into the kitchen. I went over to her and wrapped my arms around her, resting my chin on her head. I sighed and whispered softly, “It’s ok, Mama, I’m sure they will love us.” She shook her head with a soft grin making her almost nonexistent face wrinkles appear, “Oh no, my child. I’m not worried. These are happy tears, tears for how much you have grown from my little baby Mary Ann Clementine.”

          I chuckled softly, “Mama! You should not cry over the women I’ve become, I may just need to join in. I do miss the days of being a child just as much as anyone else would. Adulthood is just so stressful!”

Mama giggled at my innocence, “Oh Mary Ann, how I love you so.”

          I sighed and gave her a tight squeeze before I finished up some lunch for my little siblings. Mama watched me for a moment and then decided to go upstairs and dress my siblings to be nice and neat.

Clarence and Katherine came downstairs in a hurry to eat. I giggled at them and quickly scooped up Katherine and looked in her blue eyes, Mama’s eyes. She laughed and I tickled her before asking, “What’s the big rush to eat, little Katherine?” She smirked reminding me of Father. Her tiny voice cracked as she spoke, “Well Clarence and me-”

“Clarence and I.” Mama smoothly interjected from the other side of the room.

Katherine huffed, “Clarence AND I are going to Ernest and Rosalie’s house for dinner.” Mama smiled in approval making me chuckle before I nodded to Katherine and set her down to put some sausage and Couscous onto their plates.

          After Katherine and Clarence had left for their friend’s house, I found myself knitting on the couch with Mama. She sighed and muttered in Yiddish, a thing she does when nervous. Nervous, that is what I should be, but for some reason I never was. Mama always said I was insanely calm in wild situations. Mama glanced up at me and her knowing gaze made me shudder.

          “Dear Mary, why do you not leave your poor Mama to be married and live happily?” She finally asked.

          I searched her face then stared at the ground before responding, “Well I have this feeling I need to stay here to find my purpose,” I paused for a moment to think, “And besides I find it fun to take care of my siblings.”

          Mama searched my face for answers and she only sighed and began speaking Yiddish the only word I caught was ‘fortune-teller’. I sighed knowing I would not get a reply and almost jumped out of my skin at the sound of a knock on the door. “Mama,” I muttered to awake her from her Jewish trance. I held her hand as we walked to the door to welcome our suspected guests. I took a deep breath and opened the door after letting go of Mama’s hand.

          I grinned at the mayor, John, and his dashing son, Luis. I curtsied and introduced Mama and me before letting them in glancing around behind them as if expecting the Malach Ha-Mavis or something… worse.

          Mama passed around the mashed potatoes and okra. I sighed to fill the awkward silence. Mama leads us in a Jewish but could be considered Christian, prayer. John cleared his throat and being a blunt man spoke first, “I won’t beat around the bush for you, Mrs. Barbara Hammel. Your husband Edwin Lee Hall has… passed on.”

          I comforted Mama as she begins to sob and wiped her tears away with the napkin. She clung to my waist with grief unlike any other. It was fierce and radiating out of her heart. I could feel it through her skin and it made me melt and then my tears began to trickle down my face.

          We looked broken sitting there at the table with such highly ranked people in front of us. I almost heard the shut of the door as they left us to sit at our table and mourn. When Clarence and Katherine returned home I had just laid Mama down in her bed and kissed her forehead.

          I sat for a while on the porch thinking what had we done to deserve this? Where was God? Or Elijah? Is he having wrath on us as the Nazis have had on our siblings in Europe? Would I feel this stabbing pain in my heart forever? “God said we were sacred, but he treats us foolishly,” I hissed through anger.

                                                  January 22, 1933

          “Stop being such a girl and grow up,” Edward had said to me that morning. I almost scoffed as I replayed it in my mind. If only he knew how wrong, he was. I can shoot a buck, it does not matter that I am a girl. I huffed loudly as I softly walked toward a shifting creek. I crouched behind a bush and waited.

          I began to softly whistle which turned to hum then switched to a whisper,

                                      Shlof mayn kind, mayn treyst mayn sheyner,

                                             Sleep my lovely child, my comfort.

          I sighed and stopped and listened intently to the crunching of leaves nearby. I prepared my gun and flicked the safety off and almost seconds later my finger slipped and set off the gun on automatic. I panicked and forgot to take my hand off the trigger. It shot me once, twice, three times before I finally let go of the gun.

          I screamed in pain, but I was too deep in the forest for anyone to hear. It was impossible. I grunted and sat there hissing in pain, applying pressure to my leg. Almost every single shot had entered just below my left knee and shin area. I applied pressure with some of the bandages from the First Aid Kit.

          Blinded with tears I clung to survival and finally, a nearby camper heard my cries. The camper ran over and thankfully happened to be a doctor. He used tweezers to get the big bullets out of my leg. I groaned as he got the last one out and began to apply pressure.

          I felt myself slip from consciousness and ventured to a world of my own. I was dancing with Mama and Father. I was holding Clarence’s hand and we skipped through the garden. Then reality set in and I began to cry. I must be in Heaven. I must be dead, but I don’t want to be dead. I pinched myself until cold blood ran between my fingers. See! I can’t be dead, you don’t bleed in Heaven. Right?

          I finally started to wake up from my nightmare and watched as my older siblings stood over my bed and Katherine laid beside me. She was so young and innocent. An equal comparison to a dove with golden feathers and a beak trimmed with silver. And those eyes. Those big, blue eyes. I don’t know how she wasn’t everyone’s favorite.

          I lifted up my sheets to stand up and hug my siblings. I tried to stand but my entire body was against the small thought of trying. I had watched my life flash right in front of my eyes. I sighed and began to rethink my whole life plans. This injury definitely put a hole in some things I wanted to do.

          But I had seen them. Mama, Father, and Clarence. Murdered by the brutal German Nazis.

                                                           Chapter 1

                                                        May 10, 1942

                                                        Paris, France

            Don’t talk. Never trust anyone. You’re on your own. No one is your friend. These four rules have kept me alive in France for I don’t know how long anymore. All I knew is since the Second World War had started my life did a flip on itself.

          The French Resistance. The only people who see the inhumanness of the Nazis. The world was on fire all around us, but everyone else was fooled. As my Rabbi from back home used to say, ‘The snake smiles, but it shows no teeth.’ My ultimate motto as a spy.

          I am one of the main pawns of the French Resistances’ offense. The Gestapo knew what we had been up to for the past two years, and they must have been working hard to find out who was behind their defeat. I have most Germans and the French fooled with my facade as the charming, beautiful wife of the French Industrialist.

          I was awaken from my thoughts by the clicking of someone’s throat. A warning. Gestapo. I narrowed my eyes; I knew they were coming, but not this early. We weren’t ready. We needed more time. Well now, we don’t have the luxury of time. I jumped up silently and grabbed the men closest to me, throwing guns into their arms. I grabbed a long rifle for myself before aiming into the darkness from behind a building.

The streets were wet from a past rainstorm and the moonlight bounced off the water in fractions. It was… eerily beautiful. At least that is what I would call it if I wasn’t about to be murdered for plenty of German illegal stuff. I hear the click of their heels hitting the cobblestone road. I took a deep breath and prepared to fire.

I didn’t want to take someone’s life, I didn’t enjoy their death being on my hands. I just always get those thoughts in the back of my mind telling me how similar we are. The bad guy and me. I mean how do we really know who’s bad and who’s not? I looked down the gun awaiting our enemies. I put the thought that angered me most in the front of my mind to make myself pull the trigger.

Out of the dark, my 13 maybe 15-year-old best friend ran out of the darkness. I prayed for it to be just her. Just sweet Cherry Abadie, my blonde-headed, grey-eyed best friend. However, the thought was short-lived as I heard people running and yelling in German. “Schnell! Schnell!” One commanded. The others barely speeding up on the cobblestone.

As the Germans rounded the corner, I shot, once, twice, three times and hit two guards in the upper chest area. As more of the Resistance members were killed, the more Nazis showed up.

That was the French Resistance’s signal to depart from Paris. The Nazis had taken France and there was nothing we could do. Sooner rather than later, most of us departed to Britain or Spain.

Only a week after the incident did I find out my Abadie was captured. The Nazis were scared of what a black, Jewish woman such as myself could do. Not many women like me can say that. They were threatening me with her capture. No doubt about it, I was now a threat to the Nazis.

I was sitting on the train and humming my Yiddish lullaby as I twirled my cross necklace between my fingers. A cunning trick to be perceived as Christian rather than Jewish. I continued to softly hum as a Gestapo officer boarded the train.

I yawned and leaned back in my seat. The Gestapo smirked and walked up to me looking cocky. I was not in the mood for this. My head was still spinning with this weeks events.

“Meine Dame, hast du die schönen Klänge gemacht?” He smirked like a fox teasing it’s prey, “Es klang… jüdisch. Welche Sprache sprechen sie? Jiddisch?”

I opened my eyes, narrowing my brown orbs at him, and then shrugged and went back to my thoughts.

He must’ve assumed I didn’t understand what he was saying and fixed his mistake, “My lady, did you make the beautiful sounds?” He smirked and paused again, “It sounded… Jewish. What language do they speak? Yiddish?”

I pretended to be an uneducated woman and that I couldn’t understand him the first time and replied, “No sir, I am not Jewish if that is what you are suggesting. I wear the necklace of God you see?” I held the cross necklace up for him to see, “I do not know of Yiddish. I am here to visit my husband and care for our children.”

He hissed inaudibly in German and stormed away as if disturbed he couldn’t catch me in a lie… or that I had a husband.

I returned to my thoughts and wondered what life is like for my poor brother and sister Jews. Do they still celebrate Chanukah or Seder? Are they scared to?

                                                  Are they allowed to?