Author's Note
“I have tears in my eyes, and still more in my heart.”
—Marie Bashkirtseff
Their tender farewell marked the end of an incredible love story that still haunts me after all these years.
Surely you would have noticed them—the radiantly beautiful French girl and the young Army officer embracing one another that final time beside his train.
Despite the turmoil surrounding them deep within the cavernous Gare de Lyon in Paris, they kissed passionately until that last moment when he had to board. Then, slowly, his train began steaming away to the south, and suddenly, she was alone.
It was one of those rare human moments one occasionally glimpses that inspires genuine compassion, for here were two young people obviously deeply in love. One knew the young soldier was heading for the grim war in Algeria, and sadly his girl was being left behind. When the train finally curved out of sight, she walked back down the empty quay with tears in her eyes and still more in her heart.
Had you seen them on that cold November afternoon in 1957, I’m sure you would have remembered the girl. Even with just a passing glimpse, a man would have admired her wide, shapely, almost Spanish hips. A woman would have envied her elegant, deceptively simple gray cambric dress. An artist would have caught the blush in her face, her dark eyes and tender mouth as she kissed him that final time.
When the young officer’s train reached Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, he finally found an empty compartment where he could sit alone.
The warm touch of the girl was still very much upon him; but even then, a cold premonition began to gnaw at the very edge of his mind.
The officer was newly commissioned Yann Roussel, a 23-year-old infantry lieutenant from Dijon, who for the past year had been my good friend at a small European university. You would have thought us an unlikely pair to have formed a close friendship; yet despite our distinctly different backgrounds, the strong universal bond of war had drawn us closely together.
I’d just served with the US Marines in Korea while he was now awaiting combat orders to Algeria with the French Army. From the day we met, we were brothers in that external worldwide fraternity of the infantry, and over the past year had formed an almost inseparable friendship.
Even now, I still have a clear picture of Yann in my mind. I remember exactly how he looked that day he left Paris, for he was en route to see me.
Yann was a gentle yet ruggedly handsome Frenchman—taller than most of his countrymen—with the athletic build of a tough, wiry bullfighter. Women found him uncommonly attractive—not just physically—and his quiet, sensitive, almost shy manner fascinated many of the young European girls who were our classmates. They often came to our room to find him, but curiously, he never considered any of them seriously. I’d always figured the specter of Algeria had kept him from forming a close relationship.
Yann’s military deferment ended with our graduation, and before reporting to his regiment, he planned to briefly visit his parents in Dijon and his sister in Paris. I’d moved on to Geneva and had no sooner settled in when Yann called.
“I must see you tomorrow,” he said in his familiar, earnest tone.
“Problem?” I asked.
“No.” He paused. “Not a problem—a girl. It’s important I see you tomorrow. Could you meet the last train from Paris?”
“Of course. I’ll be there.”
We met in Cornavin, the old smoke-stained train station in the heart of Geneva. I suggested a drink at the small bar in the Richemond Hotel, but Yann was intent on finding an even quieter place where we could talk alone. So we drove out against a freezing wind to a small inn at the French border near Villette. There, I’d befriended the patrons and knew that, despite the hour, they would give us a magnificent dinner. As the first wine was poured, Yann took out a thick, well-worn book and began telling me a strange and beautiful love story.
The words that follow are those he told me that night, as closely as I can remember.
