At the Hour Between Dog and Wolf


 Contents
 
 Cover
 Title Page
 Copyright
 Contents
 My Life
 My Friends
 My Faith
 My Family
 My Home
 Acknowledgments
 
 
 
 Guide
 
 Cover
 Title Page
 Copyright
 Contents
 My Life
 Acknowledgments
 Start to Contents
 
 
 
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 At the Hour Between Dog and Wolf
 A NOVEL
 
 Tara Ison
 
 NEW YORK, NY
 
 
 Copyright © 2023 by Tara Ison.
 All rights reserved.
 No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission of the publisher. Please direct inquiries to:
 Ig Publishing
 Box 2547
 New York, NY 10163
 www.igpub.com
 ISBN: 978-1632461-46-9
 
 
 “entre chien et loup”
 —French expression: “between dog and wolf,” i.e, twilight or dusk
 “ To do evil, a human being must first of all believe that what he’s doing is good.”
 —Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
 
 
 
 My Life
 My Friends
 My Faith
 My Family
 My Home
 
 
 
 
 
 MY LIFE
 by Marie-Jeanne Chantier
 
 
 
 10 March, 1941
 La Perrine, France
 My name is Marie-Jeanne Chantier, and I am twelve years old. My parents named me for the Blessed Virgin, and also for Saint Jeanne d’Arc, the young girl who had short hair and saved France from hostile foreign invaders a long time ago. I pray one day I will be that heroic and brave. Maman and Papa died last year in a tragic car accident outside Paris, bringing toys to poor orphans at the convent. Now I live here in the country in La Perrine, with tante Berthe, tonton Claude, and cousin Luc, who were very kind to take me in with good Christian charity and give me such a wonderful home.
 Every morning I love to milk the pretty red cow. I like the warm hay smell of the barn and the cool clay of the root cellar when I help tante Berthe sort potatoes and carrots. We send most of what we grow to the brave German soldiers, of course, who are fighting to save us from the godless Communists.
 But the happiest part of the week is Sundays when it’s holy and I go to church. I always pray first for our dear leader, Marshal Petain, who is saving France for us, and helping us return to honor and good moral order. Then I pray for my dear Maman and Papa, then for the poor children everywhere who aren’t so fortunate as me to have warm clothes or enough to eat.
 I miss my parents, but I’m grateful to our Heavenly Father for all the blessings in my new life. I know Maman and Papa are watching over me with Jesus, the Blessed Virgin, and Saint Jeanne. And one day we will all be together again, in Heaven.
 
 What a joke.
 It’s all lies, every word of it. That made-up girl. A stupid assignment I had to write for school here. I added the “poor orphans” part at the last moment, and my teacher just loved that, he doesn’t see it’s all a made-up story. But that’s good, it means I’m doing everything right. Keeping everyone safe. And he’s so easy to lie to. Everyone in this place is. It’s funny, really. Claire would think it’s funny.
 Claire? Are you asleep? Are you brushing your hair so it crackles? Laying out your pink skirt for school tomorrow? Maybe you’re sitting on the red velvet sofa with your maman and papa, all of you together, listening to music on the radio? I hope so.
 Are you worrying where I am? How I am?
 Maybe if I think to you hard enough, you’ll hear me. Or maybe you’ll feel it, inside, and think back about me, I’ll feel that, too, and it won’t be so empty cold dark all the time.
 I miss you so much, Claire. I have no one to talk to, only people I can lie to, and that’s not the same. I wish I could write you a real letter, not just think the true things to you, but that man Claude says it’s too dangerous, the government opens and reads everyone’s letters now, but that’s good, it’s for our