Resistance Girl Renée KINDLE [1.24]-2 by Uzrad Ruth

Author:Uzrad, Ruth
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-02-29T00:00:00+00:00

A Girl Named Renée

At the beginning of February 1943, at the height of winter, a girl called Renée Sorel made her way from Grenoble to Moirans. The girl was born in St. Quentin, a town near the Belgian border. Her family moved to Brussels when she was a child, where her father worked as technician in a textile factory. Her mother died and her father married again. Renée didn’t get along with her stepmother. She left home and cut off her ties with her family.

I received papers with the name Renée Sorel from Luciole, a girl active in the Jewish Scouts movement. She also found me work on a farm. Thus, I embraced my new identity so convincingly that I think even a polygraph test wouldn’t have revealed the truth.

Lixie found a job as a maid in Grenoble and Frieda as a caretaker in a children’s home. We parted ways, and each of us had to cope with her own fate all alone.

I chose my new identity myself. Renée, after the initial of my real name, Ruth. Sorel, because it was easy for me to pronounce and I liked the sound of it. I chose the town of St. Quentin because of its proximity to the Belgian border, which would justify my stiff French accent. I carefully constructed my family story in order to support my circumstances as a girl all by herself.

A bus crowded with passengers brought me to the town of Moirans, where I asked people for directions on how to get to the farm. Farms in France were scattered over great distances. The farmers usually visited town on Sundays to attend church or go to a tavern. The small town contained a school, a post office, and several shops selling basic necessities. Upon coming across an unfamiliar face, the townspeople surrounded me and tried to help me find my way.

“You see the tree over there? Don’t go there. The house with the chimney on the left? Don’t go there.” And more of that.

I walked for an hour on muddy roads until I finally saw a courtyard, which according to descriptions and suggestions, belonged to my farmer. I was tired and hungry, glad to have arrived, when suddenly I discovered an unexpected obstacle—a hidden stream, flowing through the dense vegetation, and over it a bridge made of two logs tied together. I had no choice. I had to cross this rickety bridge while the water flowed rapidly beneath me. At the children’s home, it was a well-known fact that if there was a puddle, I would find it. I stood there for a moment, and then, determined and focused, I crossed the bridge without stumbling.

A woman in her late twenties, wearing black and looking much older than her age, met me. “You’re Renée? I have been waiting for you since morning. I’ve soaked the laundry in the bucket. Hurry up. I want you to wash and hang up the laundry before dark.”

That was my welcome. No hello, no time to put down my possessions, and no offerings of food.

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