All of them are Jews like me.

Madame Marie bursts in.

She wakes Mama by pulling the blankets off her bed.

"Hurry!" she says.

"The police are coming ... they're filling trucks with Jews!"

Mama and I pull on our dresses as fast as we can.

Mama grabs a coat and shoes and we fly down the spiral staircase.

Madame Marie pushes us into the broom closet inside her small workroom.

She shuts the door just in time.

The doorbell rings.

Loud men trudge into the hallway.

"We're rounding up foreign Jews," they say.

"We're going to rid France of them forever."

"Wonderful!" says Madame Marie.

"Those Jews have taken our jobs and money for too long."

Then she offers them a drink ...

to toast their courage, she says.

Frozen inside the dark closet, Mama and I cannot see, but we can hear.

Madame Marie and the men are just outside the door.

If the door were open, I could touch them.

Mama's fingers find my yellow star.

Silently, stitch by stitch, she begins to rip it off.

I listen hard.

I hear the sound of drinks being poured.

Glasses clink in a toast.

Chairs scrape around Madame Marie's table, only a reach away from our hiding place.

The men boast and laugh.

Suddenly someone says to Madame Marie, "Where are your Jews?"

His companions fall silent.

Our bodies stiffen.

Our breathing all but stops.

"Long gone!" says Madame Marie.

"They ran away to their country house.

Good riddance to them, I say."

More drinks are poured.

But then, stern words.

"You know, Madame, if you lie to us, you'll be sorry,"

one man warns her.

"We'll pack you into a truck along with them and send you far away!"

My godmother sounds insulted.

"Me? Do I look like a friend of Jews?"

I'm confused ...

how can she say such terrible things?

She is our friend ... one of our best friends!

But suddenly, I know she's lying.

She's saying bad things about Jews to keep us safe.

The same voice, still stern, "Just to be sure, we'll go up to their apartment."

Mama grabs my hand, squeezes it too tight.

But Madame Marie keeps the men away from our just-slept-in sheets and blankets.

"Oh, you don't want to do that!" she says.

"You know how those foreign Jews are, filthy as pigs.

When they were living there, I'd knock on their door only when I had to.

I'd say what I had to say quickly and hold my breath as long as I could.

Then I'd run back down the stairs as fast as my old legs would carry me.

Don't go up there if you don't have to.

Their apartment still stinks to high heaven.

Anyway, our bottle's nearly empty.

Why not help me finish it?"

We wait, cold bare toes pressed tight to the floor.

The smell of sour mops is all around.

My body shakes, hard.

But I don't make a single sound.

Finally, the loud men push their chairs back in to the table.

"Merci, Madame," they say.

"Au revoir."

Heavy footsteps echo through the hallway.

The door slams.

Silence.

Madame Marie frees us from the closet.

"How can I thank you?" Mama asks Madame Marie.

She takes my godmother's hands in her own.

Madame Marie shrugs.

She needs her hands back to clear away the glasses.

"No time for that.

We must get Odette to the railway station as we planned."

I look up at my mother.

"You'll come with me, won't you, Mama?" I ask.

Torn in Two.

Mama's sad eyes turn to me.

"No, Odette," she says, "I must leave you now.

It's time for you to go to the country, with our friends."

Mama's brown curls quiver just a little as she tries to smile.

She takes me in her arms and rocks me back and forth.

Then she kisses my cheeks three times.

She wipes off my tears with her fingers in between.

With one last quick hug, she leans over and begins to tie her shoes.

"Mama!" I scream.

I clutch her, hard.

"Don't go!"

Mama puts her finger to my lips.

"Shhh, Odette," she says.

She drops her coat, then kneels next to me.

We look at each other, face-to-face.

Mama's fingertips trace my cheeks, my ears.

"I must go now, right away, cherie," Mama says.

"Maybe I can warn your aunt and cousins about the trucks."

"Let me come with you!" I beg.