He beckoned them inside and Cate gratefully followed Elise, glancing over her shoulder to see if anyone was watching them, but seeing no one.

“Come down to my cellar,” he said. “Away from prying ears and eyes.”

They went down, and Cate was surprised to find a table and four chairs in there, surrounded by bottles of wine and boxes stacked haphazardly.

“I’m so sorry to hear about your father, Elise. He was a good man.”

“We miss him terribly,” Elise replied. “It’s been such an awful year for us, for so many of us.”

“And this cousin of yours?” he said, chuckling to himself.

“She’s a nurse, with the British army,” Elise said, as he opened a bottle of wine without even asking them if they wanted any and pouring more than a splash into three glasses.

“A nurse, huh? And how did you end up with a British nurse for a pretend cousin?”

They all sat down together and Cate spoke, nervous about sharing her secret but seeing that Elise was prepared to put full trust in him. “When the Nazis came I escaped from the clearance hospital I was stationed at,” she said. “I found myself on Elise’s doorstep and she was kind enough to take me in.”

“The story doesn’t end there, though,” Elise said, lowering her voice. “I have two British soldiers in my home, too.”

The old man looked like he was about to fall off his chair and he slapped his palm on the table. “Soldiers?” He made a loud tutting noise and then drained his glass of wine. “You are too kind-hearted, just like Claude.”

Cate could see the pain on Elise’s face at the reference to her father.

“You think he would have done the same?”

“I know so.” He sighed. “And now you need my help to get them home, I suppose?”

A noise upstairs startled them, but the old man shook his head, smiling. “You have your hidden secrets, I have my own,” he said. “Your father and I weren’t so different, but I’m an old man and don’t have as much to lose as you do.”

Cate couldn’t believe it; he had someone, or more than just someone, hidden in his home, too.

“Elise mentioned there was a network of sorts, an underground collection of people?” Cate asked. She lifted her glass and took a hesitant sip of the wine, hoping it would calm her nerves.