The voices were coming closer. My heart beat faster and faster, as I was certain it was the notorious Lafleurs. Surely they had seen Julien and alerted their fellow Nazis. The nearer they got to the barn, the more I could make out their words.

  “Boy, that cripple can move fast. Where’d he go?”

  “Into the barn, I think.”

  To my horror, I recognized one of the voices. It was Vincent. I wanted to call down to Julien, to warn him and tell him to sneak out the hole in the back corner of the barn. But I couldn’t, not without risking being heard and bringing Vincent and his creepy friends into the barn to investigate.

  “Maybe he went into his house?” said another voice. It was probably Jérôme or Paul. Vincent was rarely without his henchmen, who always seemed eager to stir up trouble.

  “I’m telling you, he went into this barn.”

  “Both of you, shut up,” snapped Vincent. “You’re talking too loud.”

  “It looks abandoned,” one of the other boys replied.

  There was a silence. I saw the beam of their flashlight through the slits in the boarded-up windows, presumably as they regarded the barn and tried to decide whether to bother searching it. Walk away, walk away, walk away, I silently willed them.

  To my immense relief, it seemed to work. One of the boys said, in a voice that sounded surprisingly nervous, “Maybe we should just forget this, Vincent.”

  “We’re not forgetting this,” Vincent insisted. “I saw that little cripple take something from Pastor Luc’s office…and he’s going to pay for it, trust me.”

  Creeeeak…

  The barn door slowly opened and three dark shapes lumbered inside. Their flashlight beam danced around the room, from the rafters back down to the floor. I tried not to move, praying that Julien had silently slipped out the back.

  “Oh, hi, Vincent. Jérôme. Paul.” No such luck, I realized when I heard Julien greet them. I looked down and saw him still standing in front of the car’s open hood. Julien was highlighted by Vincent’s flashlight, and he held his own lantern, which was usually stored with the barn tools. It was clear he was trying his best to sound casual and unconcerned, like their visit was a welcome surprise. “What are you guys doing here?” he asked calmly.

  “No, no,” said Vincent, shaking his free hand at Julien. “You don’t get to ask the questions, you little thief. We saw you take something from Pastor Luc’s office. We followed you here.” He pointed accusingly at Julien. The other boys grunted and nodded in agreement.

  My heart was now like a drum in my ears. I don’t know what I would have done if I had been in Julien’s shoes. But somehow, he kept his cool. “Yeah, I did—a book I left in his office,” he said, sounding nonchalant. “So what?”

  “So what?” Vincent echoed Julien’s words as if they themselves were a crime. “I don’t believe you, that’s what.”

  “I can show it to you,” said Julien. Now I truly felt panicked. What if he did show Vincent my sketchbook? In my haste to hide, I hadn’t carried it back to the loft with me. Vincent would instantly know it was my art—that Jew’s art!—and I’d be discovered, no matter how well I hid. Julien continued breezily, “It’s in my house just across the—”

  It suddenly dawned on me that of course Julien had no intention of showing them my sketchbook. I was so proud of his quick thinking that I didn’t realize what was about to happen. Vincent grabbed Julien roughly by the shoulder. He was a full head taller, with the broad shoulders of a man and a significant weight advantage over poor Julien.

  “I told you I don’t believe you!” Vincent bellowed.

  “Hey, let go of me!” Julien twisted to free himself, but it was no use.

  “Give me what you stole or you’ll regret it,” ordered Vincent.

  I could see Jérôme and Paul lurking behind him, adding their muscle to the equation. Three against one—far from a fair fight, even if the one had been fully able-bodied. A lesser person would have cowered, but Julien stood firm.

  “I didn’t steal anything,” he maintained. “Pastor Luc lent me a book, that’s all. I’ll lend it to you, too, if you want to read it.”

  “Are you trying to be funny?” asked Vincent, still holding Julien firmly by the shoulder.

  “No.”

  “I think you are. Get a load of this, guys. Tourteau here is a funny one, isn’t he? A veritable riot!”

  “Hilarious,” said Jérôme flatly.

  “Funny-looking,” added Paul, making the others dissolve into laughter.

  “Be nice, be nice,” murmured Vincent, though kindness was obviously the furthest thing from his mind. He studied Julien, like a cat might examine a mouse whose tail it had pinned under one large paw. “You’re a really funny kid, aren’t you, Tourteau?” he asked. “Joking around like you and Pastor Luc are pals, drinking tea together and swapping books, all cozy like.”

  “That’s not what I said.”

  Julien’s refusal to bow down seemed to set Vincent off again. He passed his flashlight to one of his henchmen, then grabbed Julien’s collar with his free hand. He slid his grip from Julien’s shoulder to his neck so he was now holding Julien tightly with both hands. I feared he might be choking him, but Julien showed no sign of discomfort. Vincent leaned in, spitting his words into Julien’s face. “You think you’re smarter than everyone, don’t you?” he yelled.

  “No, I don’t,” replied Julien softly.

  Vincent scoffed at this response. “They’re only putting you into advanced mathematics because they pity you, because you’re deformed! You’re pathetic and weak! You shouldn’t even be allowed to attend a school with decent people, you know that?”

  At this point Julien seemed to have concluded that denying these evil lies wasn’t worth his breath. He didn’t answer but defiantly held Vincent’s gaze, face to face. It was unsettling to me that he could. I wondered: In his life, had he experienced worse tormenting even than this?

  “You are barely even a person at all. No, you know what you are? A crab. A weak, twisted little crab,” announced Vincent. “And you know what the Nazis do with your kind? Inferior little crabs posing as human beings?”

  Julien stared back, unafraid.

  “They exterminate them. Like the vermin you are. Just like they’re doing to the Jews.”

  His words chilled me to the bone. He had said so many awful and untrue things—how was I to know if this was another of his cruel lies or not? But he wasn’t done yet.

  “And that’s what they’ll do to you. That’s what I’m going to do to you…right now.”

  It happened fast, like the strike of a cobra. Vincent made a fist, pulled back, and threw a punch that landed squarely on Julien’s cheek with a sickening thud. I very nearly cried out in pain on his behalf, but I forced myself to swallow my scream. Julien’s body twisted sideways from the force of the blow, so he landed on the ground on his front.

  “Get up, you pathetic cripple,” said Vincent, kicking Julien with his boot. Julien recoiled, then lay flat again.

  Leave! You’ve done enough harm here! I thought-wished-prayed. But just as I had been unable to use my mental powers to stop them from entering the barn in the first place, I was powerless to end Vincent’s assault on Julien. He grabbed Julien from behind by his suspenders and lifted him into an awkward position, dangling like a marionette.

  “Lookee here, boys!” Vincent called to the others. “I’ve hooked myself a crustacean! Not much meat on it, but good eating nonetheless.” Jérôme and Paul chuckled appreciatively. “Let’s see you crawl like the disgusting crab you are,” Vincent said to Julien, pulling him back and forth in an effort to make him dance like a puppet.

  “Hey, uh, Vincent?” Jérôme piped up.

  Jérôme, thank you! I felt a rush of gratitude. Finally, someone was going to put a stop to this torture!

  “Um, yeah…heh, heh, maybe we should go now?” This came from Paul, the smaller and twitchier of Vincent’s junior thugs. He and Jérôme looked at each other, shifting from foot to foot nervously. Paul’s voice sounded squeaky, like he was suddenly realizing the situation might be getting out of hand. Clearly, neither boy had magically grown a conscience. Rather, they both obviously wanted to leave the scene before someone else came along and they had to answer for Vincent’s actions.

  Vincent responded by putting both hands in the air, as if to show them that he meant no harm. But of course, he had been holding Julien’s suspenders, so when he let go, Julien crumpled in a heap on the ground. Vincent turned and leaned over Julien. I thought for a moment that he might spit on Julien as a final offensive gesture. But instead he grabbed Julien’s throat and lifted him closer.

  “People like you shouldn’t be alive,” he declared. Then he hauled off and landed another blow on Julien’s face. Blood sprayed from Julien’s mouth and nose in a bright red arc. Julien let out a moan of pain when the punch landed. The awful wet sounds made me wonder if his nose or jaw were broken. And worst of all, I heard Vincent mutter something under his breath, and all three of those monsters laughed as Julien lay there bleeding at their feet.

  At that moment, I knew I could not stay quiet any longer. It felt like I was witnessing the maquisard’s murder all over again, and that I could not do. Once was bad enough. I knew only too well how this might unfold if no one stopped Vincent’s rampage.

  Quickly, I considered my options. I could scream, or throw something like a hay bale off the edge of the loft. That would momentarily distract Vincent and perhaps stop the attack on Julien, but it would likely result in both of us receiving beatings or worse. No, I had to think of something else. I racked my brain frantically. If only Vivienne or Jean-Paul or both of them ever came to the barn at night. They were adults—they could stop this. Had they noticed that Julien had never made it home from school? Were they perhaps out looking for him now? If so, they probably would have started at the barn. And wishing for them to come to the rescue was clearly not going to make them magically appear. Think, think, think!

  My brain was stuck on Julien’s parents. I had to alert them, even if it meant the Germans finding me. I quietly shifted my body, parted the hay, and started getting up.

  Just hang on, Julien, I silently told him. I’m going to go get help.

  There was something about me and Julien at this point, though. A sort of connection beyond words. It often felt like I could read his thoughts, and I later wondered if in this moment he read mine. Because as I peeked over the top of the wall of hay bales, I heard a sound coming from Julien.

  “V-v-v…”

  It must have hurt to make any noise, considering what Vincent had done to him. And the blood on Julien’s face, coupled with his refusal to keep silent, served as a red cape before this rampaging bull.

  “What did you say?” roared Vincent, grabbing Julien’s neck once more.

  I leaned forward to cry out in protest.

  “V-vive…”

  But the voice I heard was not my own. It was Julien’s.

  “Vive l’humanité!”

  That triumphant cry took me by surprise. It was louder and more forceful than anything I could have produced, yet it came from deep inside a boy who had been pummeled within an inch of his life.

  And that’s when it happened.

  Floosh! Flap-flap-flap…. Scree! Scree! Scree!

  Suddenly, without warning, hundreds of bats flew out from the rafters and swarmed the barn below. They flew everywhere, shrieking, whooshing through the air like some dark, unholy wind.

  “What the—” Vincent looked up, his hands still wrapped around Julien’s neck. The air—not just in the hayloft but all through the barn—was thick with bats. Darting, dodging, diving bats, and the shadows of bats in flight, everywhere you looked.

  Vincent and his henchmen ran screaming from the barn. I would say they screamed like little girls, but frankly that is an insult to little girls. They screamed like cowards. Evil, cruel cowards.

  “Julien! I’m coming down!” I called, as soon as the coast was clear.

  I pushed my way through the wall of hay and lowered myself to the barn floor. Quickly, I poked my head outside—under other circumstances, this would have been a rare luxury, but I couldn’t allow myself to enjoy it. I looked left and right before closing the door firmly and running to check on Julien.

  He was lying on the floor next to the car. Initially I feared the worst. After all, those had been the maquisard’s final words. I couldn’t let them be Julien’s, too.

  “Where does it hurt? What can I—”

  “Sara, you need to stay in the loft!” replied Julien. He looked at me through eyes that it seemed he could barely open. “They might come back.”

  Ignoring him, I ran to get his crutches. Then I stood behind him and tried to help lift him to a position where he could balance on them. “They’re gone. I checked. I was about to come out of hiding when the bats—”

  “Are you stupid?” Julien snapped. He sounded uncharacteristically angry. “Go up to the loft already!”

  Had the beating affected his brain? “I don’t care if they catch me!” I told him. “I just want to help.”

  “But it’s not just about you!” yelled Julien in frustration. “Don’t you see that? If they find you, they’ll arrest my parents. They’ll execute them!”

  I stared at him, dumbfounded. “Oh, I didn’t know. I mean, I didn’t realize….”

  Now I could see the tears running down Julien’s face and mixing with the blood, causing long pink trails to appear. “No, of course you didn’t realize!” he blurted out, his voice cracking. “Because you’re so self-absorbed! And childish! You’re still the same snobby girl who sat next to me for three years and never talked to me! Not even once….”

  “Julien, please. I’m sorry,” I said. How could I be so stupid? Thinking all the time about how bad I had it, and forgetting that Julien and his family were waiting on me hand and foot. And putting their lives at risk for me, a horrible creature who spent years treating their son like he was a piece of garbage. Or a smelly, scuttling crab. I lowered my head, feeling the weight of my guilt. When it got right down to it, was I any better than Vincent?

  “You’re still the same girl who never even knew my name. Just go back to the loft, Sara.”

  I watched Julien turn his crutches and hobble out of the barn.

  I stood there, wishing the floor of the barn would swallow me up. And all I could think of was that he was right: I was a monster, just like the Nazis claimed. How else could it be that I had inflicted so much harm on the person who meant the most to me in the world? Despite all I had seen Julien endure, from the bullying at school to this violent and brutal attack, this was the first time I had seen him shed a tear.

  I climbed back up to the loft, trying hard not to cry. You don’t deserve to feel sorry for yourself, I told myself bitterly. Julien was the one who had suffered—not me—and I was the cause of much of his pain.

  I lay in my bed that night staring up at the rafters and holes in the roof as I always did. Silently, I thanked the bats for coming out of the woodwork at precisely the right moment. I didn’t know what had made them burst forth like they did. We were uneasy roommates at best, so I had no reason to think they were looking out for my interests. But I felt profoundly grateful that in a moment of need, they had done what I was obviously incapable of: helping Julien.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “I think Pastor Luc should have kicked Vincent out of school,” I told Vivienne. It was the following day, and we were sitting together, my head on her shoulder and her comforting arm around my back. I was still shaken by the events of the previous night, and she knew it. She patted my hands and spoke softly into my hair, like Maman did when I was little.

  “Between you and me, I agree,” she confided. “And in normal times, that’s what might have happened. But you know, maybe it’s better this way? Once Pastor Luc tells Vincent’s father that any further problems will be grounds for expulsion, the threat will keep Vincent in check. And Pastor Luc will be able to keep a close eye on him.”

  “He shouldn’t just be scolded and watched. He should be punished!” I insisted. “What about going to the police? Surely it’s still a crime to attack someone for no reason!”

  Vivienne looked demoralized. “You’re right, Sara, of course,” she replied. “But Jean-Paul and I discussed this last night, and ultimately we decided it was too risky to report it to the police. That’s why we went to see Pastor Luc this morning instead.”

  “And after he heard what happened, Pastor Luc didn’t think you should go to the police?”

  “Actually, he did,” admitted Vivienne.

  “You see? It’s the right thing to do!”

  Vivienne shook her head. “I’m sorry, Sara, but we just can’t. Vincent’s father is connected to the Nazis, so the risk of retaliation is simply too great.”

  “Oh,” I said. I knew there were rumors about Vincent and his family’s affiliations, and hearing them confirmed triggered a fresh wave of guilt. Not only had my presence resulted in Julien getting attacked and nearly killed, but I was the reason this crime couldn’t even be reported.

  “Even though he didn’t automatically expel Vincent, Pastor Luc took the situation very seriously,” Vivienne added. “He was clearly horrified by what Jean-Paul and I told him. He even went so far as to apologize, as if he were responsible in some way—which is simply not the case. I think that as a man of faith, he finds it difficult to reconcile what is going on around us with his belief in a just and compassionate God.”

  I nodded silently.

  “Pastor Luc seems to believe that before things get worse, God will come to his senses and intervene,” continued Vivienne. “I told him, with all due respect, we cannot wait for miracles. Evil will only be stopped when good people decide to put an end to it. It is our fight, not God’s.”