Camille lowered the camera. “I take it you remember this.”

“Indeed I do. And thank you for e-mailing the photographs you found. It was overwhelming to see them, though less so than this moment.” He didn’t once let go of Papa, and kept staring into his face. “You are as handsome as she was beautiful,” Hank said. “She was very beautiful.”

Papa nodded. “I’m sorry you lost her.”

Hank gave him another hug. “I’ve found you. I couldn’t be happier.”

“Let’s have a toast,” said Wendy. “We can all sit down together and Dad can tell his stories.”

Hank took hold of the champagne bottle and picked up a short, slightly curved saber. “This is something I learned when I was in hiding in France, recovering from my injuries,” he said.

“It’s always been his favorite party trick,” Wendy said.

“Le saberage.” Papa beamed.

Hank nodded, then expertly used the saber to open the champagne with a distinctive pop. “To an incredible reunion,” he said after everyone lifted a glass. Then he picked up the saber again. “This is the only souvenir that survived from that time,” he said. “When the bombs hit, I was lucky to escape with my life. I encountered some Germans on the run, and one of them challenged me. He was a boy like me, and I just had to threaten him with the saber, and he ran away.”

As Wendy and Nils poured and served, Hank grew misty again. “To Lisette,” he said simply, and everyone lifted their glasses.

Papa handed him the fading Mass card with the Sallman Head of Christ. “This was with Lisette’s belongings. There’s something written on the back, but we couldn’t make out what it says.”

“I wrote, ‘You’re my angel.’ And she was. I would have died without her.” In a voice that gradually grew stronger with memories, Hank began to talk, filling in the missing pieces of the story. He had been just seventeen when he was dropped behind enemy lines in advance of the raid in order to do reconnaissance. Healing from his wounds in a remote stone hut, he fell in love with the girl who had saved his life. “Lisette had a hard time during the war. She married Palomar in order to save a partisan from being detained, and to protect her parents. When she discovered he was a collaborator, she was deeply ashamed to be his wife. It was always my aim to bring her home to the States after the war, but in the chaos of the August raids, we lost each other.”

Camille quietly told everyone what they’d learned about that day—that Lisette’s parents had been killed in the bombing, that the Allies liberated the town and had the Germans on the run.

“There was a lot of ground fog that morning,” Hank said. “My hideout was hit in the raid, but I was able to pull myself out of the rubble. I followed the river to the sea and found a Red Cross unit that took me to Marseille. I was delirious with infection by then, and eventually awakened aboard a hospital ship. The infection was nearly fatal, and it took me two years to recover.”