Brad left next, glad to be out of the stuffy tea shop. He drew in a breath of fresh, bracing air and set his beret firmer while surreptitiously scanning the street. Lodestar would have come back if anything had roused his suspicion, but it paid to be extra cautious in a city where an enemy shadow could melt into dark doorways and honeycombed passageways. Satisfied that the coast was clear, Brad drew on his peacoat and set off. He would walk to the Latin Quarter. The metro would have taken him within a block of his accommodations, but the few times he’d ridden it, he’d been unable to abide the close breathing space in the overcrowded compartments. A great number of trains had been taken off rail lines because of the petroleum shortage, and metro cars were jammed with German soldiers and gaunt, vacant-eyed Parisians giving off the body odors of a population deprived of nutrition and hot water and soap. Now that an unusually cold October had arrived, the mothball smell of woolen coats added to the foul air.

Seeing the team of Dragonfly alive and well, at least so far, had been a lift to Brad’s spirits. God, what a miserable city. Earlier he’d seen six ragtag school-age children moving like a pack of abandoned animals down an alley in search of garbage cans. They’d ventured into the Latin Quarter from the poorer area of Paris in hope of finding food. They’d reminded Brad of his first sight of the orphaned Bobby and Margie on the banks of the White River, hungry and destitute, and a shaft of homesickness had rammed right through him. His family would be wondering where he was, missing him, worrying about him, little Margie with bent head and clasped hands saying her prayers on her knees by her bed—Please, God, keep Brad safe.