The Nightingale

When the government flees Paris, it is clear the city will fall. Julien arranges for Isabelle to leave with another family, instructing her to go to Carriveau while he stays behind. She begs to be allowed to remain as a nurse or ambulance driver; in addition to believing that it is cowardly to leave, Isabelle is reluctant to see Vianne, whom she resents for sending her away after the miscarriage. Julien is adamant, however, and Isabelle soon finds herself in a car struggling to navigate through the crowds of refugees.

The car eventually runs out of gas, and the family must attempt to make it to Étampes (a Parisian suburb) on foot. In the chaos, Isabelle is separated from the others and decides that going to Étampes is pointless: “There would be nowhere to stay in Étampes and nothing to eat. The refugees who had arrived before her would have moved through the town like locusts, buying every foodstuff on the shelves” (48). Instead, she heads towards Tours, taking a trail through a forest where she stumbles across a young man with “longish, stringy black hair” and “tattered and patched” (49) clothes sitting by a campfire.

The man, who introduces himself as

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