A Picture of Hope by Liz Tolsma

Author:Liz Tolsma [Tolsma, Liz]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-63609-021-4
Publisher: Barbour Publishing, Inc.
Published: 2021-10-14T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“Are you going to stand there with your mouth hanging wide open, or are you going to let me in?” Vater’s thick, dark eyebrows lowered as he frowned.

With few other options, Jean-Paul opened the door wider and stepped back so Vater could enter. “What are you doing here?”

“That’s an inane question.”

Jean-Paul couldn’t argue with him.

“Did you truly believe you could come here without any orders, use my name, and not be discovered? The moment I was called into my superior’s office and told that I was in this village in France, I hopped on a train and made my way here.”

Jean-Paul hobbled to the couch. “I would offer you coffee, but as you see, I’m supposed to be resting my sprained ankle.”

“Bah.” Vater waved away Jean-Paul’s complaint. “You were always a crybaby. I thought I had beaten that from you.”

Jean-Paul clenched his jaw. Those unpleasant summers he spent with Vater, despite his pleading objections to Mère, were far behind him. Though Vater continued to hold plenty of power to harm him.

“The question remains as to what I’m going to do about you. There’s a reason you used an assumed name. There’s a reason you didn’t want to be discovered. What is it?” He sat in the armchair across the coffee table from Jean-Paul and folded his arms across his still-solid chest.

He’d done that hundreds, maybe even thousands, of times throughout Jean-Paul’s life. There was little point in waiting him out. Jean-Paul had tried that before. It never worked.

But he couldn’t share the truth with Vater. He wouldn’t hesitate to turn Jean-Paul in. Probably would haul him back to Berlin and throw him into the deepest hole. That French prison where he was would look like Versailles compared to where Vater would take him.

“Your brother is serving honorably not too far from here. He does our family proud.”

The implication was not to be missed. Vater wasn’t pleased with Jean-Paul’s decision all those years ago to forsake the glorious Fatherland and all it had to offer him, the sweet temptations of power and glory, to follow his French roots. When he was called up for service in the German military, he’d fled to the forests and joined the Maquis. For many long years he’d managed to avoid detection.

It was not a matter of whether he would regret slipping up and blurting out Vater’s name when Weber had asked. It was only a matter of when. When had now arrived.

“You know my stance. I refuse to fight against my own people.”

“Your people are the Germans.” Vater’s voice, so deep and authoritative, rumbled in Jean-Paul’s chest.

“I have no desire to be associated with them or their barbaric acts.”

Red gushed into Vater’s face, and the vein in his neck, the one that always indicated his anger, stood out to a degree Jean-Paul had never witnessed. “You are a coward. A disgrace.”

“I am proud of my decision. Nothing you can say or do to me will change that.” He allowed his tongue free rein. He

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