“Madame Gastain would know.” Brad gestured toward the mansion next door. Hers was the next stop, the second for both of them. Brad’s first call had been to Captain Claude Allard, his OSS facilitator and owner of the fishing tour company where he’d been planted. The barnacled old riverboat captain’s jaw dropped when he happened to glance through his office window to see Brad stroll up the walkway to his boat to report in like always. He’d thrown open the door and met him halfway, arms wide and welcoming, exclaiming in French, “My boy! My boy! We thought you were dead!”

Chris received the same shocked, warm welcome when he visited the home of Jules Garnier, retired director of personnel at the Sorbonne. His wife ushered him into the garden where her husband was pruning roses. “Look who’s here,” she said, and Jules turned at her voice to squint at Chris through eyes clouded with cataracts. “Holy Mother of God,” he let out. “Are my eyes deceiving me at last? Can it be true? Herr Bauer, is that you? Are you really alive?”

Brad pushed Madame Gastain’s doorbell, he and Chris wondering aloud if her old butler would answer. Ancient when they knew him in 1942, the longtime family retainer had most likely gone to his heavenly reward. Neither was prepared when Hans Falk answered the door. After sharing a few seconds’ mutual shock of recognition, Hans said with a stiff little bow like always, “Gentlemen, how nice to see you again and looking so well. Should I let Madame Gastain know that you’ve come to call?”

Americans did not stand on ceremony when occasions called for emotional displays. Brad and Chris hugged him, and he returned their hearty embraces, tears in his eyes. They went into the drawing room that Brad well remembered and filled in one another while they awaited Madame Gastain’s entrance. Hans went first. When the general knew he was soon to be arrested, he’d dispatched his aide to the priest’s hole in his neighbor’s house next door. He did not witness Major General March’s arrest and would always regret not being by his side, but that was not what the general had wanted. When his mistress’s old butler died in 1945, he had stayed on as his replacement. He did not wish to return to the country that had executed one of its finest and most dedicated soldiers and general officers. Madame Gastain was well, except for occasional bouts of arthritis. They would find her charming as ever. She’d had to sell most of the house’s Old Masters, but they had fetched enough money to keep the mansion almost in the style to which it was once accustomed. Now Hans wished to hear of Wilhelm. Was the boy happy? Was he getting on well in America? How old was he now?