It all happened in a matter of seconds. The soldiers pushed Matis against a tree. He didn’t resist; he just looked at me with those eyes I knew so well now, eyes that said, “Forgive me. Forgive me for not being able to save you completely.” The sergeant laid Henri on the ground in the snow, like a worthless package, and took out his pistol. He aimed at Matis’s head. I closed my eyes. I heard the shot, but it wasn’t the sergeant’s pistol. It was a rifle fired from the ridge above us. The sergeant collapsed, a bright red flower blooming on his chest. The two other soldiers whirled around, searching for the source of the shot, and two more shots rang out. They fell. Silence. Then voices, voices in French. “Don’t move, hands up!” Six or seven men, armed and dressed in civilian clothes, came down from the ridge, wearing tricolor armbands. Resistance fighters. They surrounded us, wary, rifles at the ready. An older man, around fifty, with a beard, approached Matis. “Are you German?” It wasn’t a question. Matis nodded. “Yes.” The resistance fighter cocked his rifle. “Then you’re dead.” I cried out, “No! He saved me! He protected me, please!” The resistance fighter looked at me, looked at Henri crying in the snow, looked at Matis tied to the tree. “Explain yourself quickly.” Matis told me everything: the camp, the night he untied me, the escape, the weeks on the run, Henri’s birth, the attempt to reach Switzerland. The resistance fighter listened, impassive. When Matis finished, there was a long silence. Then the resistance fighter said, “You deserted to save a pregnant woman?” Matis nodded. The resistance fighter spat on the ground. “The Germans killed my wife and two daughters in Oradour. Give me one reason not to shoot you in the head right here and now.” Matis said nothing; he just looked the resistance fighter in the eyes, without fear, without anger, just resignation. I spoke: “Because he chose to remain human when everyone around him was becoming a monster. Because he risked his life for a baby that wasn’t his. Because if you kill him, you become just like them.” The resistance fighter stared at me for a long time, then lowered his weapon. “We’ll take you across the border. After that, you’re on your own. And you,” he pointed at Matis, “you take off that shitty uniform and burn it. If I see you dressed as a German again, I won’t keep my promise.”
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