Free The Sisters of St. Croix by Diney Costeloe Page B

go of the pram and started to turn away.
    “Wait! You can’t…” began Sister Henriette.
    “Look, Sister, or whatever you’re called. They’re nothing to do with me, OK? The mother’s lying dead in a ditch along with several others. I just helped them get to you. Now they’re your responsibility. They’ll be safer with you than they’d ever be with me. I’m on the road… and I’m a Jew. They’re Jews too, for that matter, but you wouldn’t know it to look at them… not if you keep the boy’s trousers on, that is.” She stared into Sister Henriette’s astonished face. “I’m telling you, if the Germans find them with me they’ll be far worse off. And my chances are better if I travel alone.”
    “But wait, maybe we can help you…” cried Sister Henriette.
    “No one will be able to help me if I’m caught by the Germans,” the woman said flatly. “Jews disappear, and I don’t intend to be one of them.”
    “At least just come into the convent for a while and rest,” urged Sister Henriette.
    “If I rest before I’m safe, I’m dead,” the woman replied. “If you want to help people, there are plenty that need it in the village square down there.” She waved her hand in the direction of the village. “Go down and help them. I’m getting away from here,” and turning on her heel she strode on along the lane.
    David, staring after her, saw the last link with his mother disappearing and his face crumpled, tears streaming down his cheeks.
    Sister Henriette, still holding Hannah, reached out her other hand to him. “Don’t cry, little one. You’re safe now. Let’s go and find you something to eat. I bet you’re hungry, aren’t you? And we can get a nurse to look at your sister. She is your sister, isn’t she? Come along now, I need you to help push the pram like you were before.”
    She reached for the handle of the pram and started to push it along the lane to the convent. David tugged at her habit, and struggling manfully against his tears said fiercely, “Give me Hannah.”
    The nun handed him the baby and, giving her full attention to pushing the pram, led them back up the lane to the convent.

5
    Mother Marie-Pierre had summoned the entire community to the recreation room where they squeezed in and listened with growing horror to the news that Sister Henriette brought with her.
    When she had arrived back at the convent with three small children and a pram, Mother Marie-Pierre had hurried out to meet them.
    “These children have been bombed by the Germans,” Sister Henriette told her briefly. “I was told their mother is dead at the roadside, and the little girl,” she indicated Catherine still prostrate on the pram, “has been wounded, though I don’t know how badly.” Hannah was by now making her presence known to Mother Marie-Pierre with ear-splitting wails. Sister Henriette took her from David once more and putting her up over her shoulder, patted her soothingly on the back to quieten her.
    Mother Marie-Pierre looked at the small boy with the dirty, tear-streaked face, and crouching down so that their eyes met easily she said softly, “What is your name, mon brave ?”
    David stared at her for several moments, his eyes huge and dark in his pale face taking in another strange lady wearing peculiar clothes. At last, as if he’d come to some sort of decision, he whispered, “David.”
    “Well, David, I think you are a very brave boy to look after your sisters. Would you like something to eat, while I get the doctor to look at your sister?”
    David nodded and when Mother Marie-Pierre reached for the handle of the pram, he grabbed it from her shouting fiercely, “No! You can’t have Catherine!”
    Mother Marie-Pierre stepped back, lowering her hand. “It’s all right, David. You can push the pram, but we do need to get poor Catherine to the doctor, you know. And the little one, she’d like some milk, I’d expect. What’s her name?”
    David, still grasping the handle