The Paris Agent

“She used to tell me ‘Noah, you will not bring any one of your loved ones back for even a moment by refusing to live your own life.’”

The intensity of unarticulated emotion in this passage reveals The Psychological Toll of Espionage, for Noah feels both guilt and gratitude towards Geraldine; although she helped him to heal from the deaths of his parents and brothers, the events of his life also led him away from her, and even during the long years of their marriage, he kept many secrets from her. Though scarred by war, Noah must now work to reclaim his former identity.

“But despite all of that I loved children, and desperately wanted some of my own one day. I didn’t begrudge a single decision my mother had made along the way, but I wanted a different life for myself—a house full of laughter and contentment, a loving husband, as many children as my body would allow me to have.”

Because Josie has spent her life battling chronic illness and pain, she develops tremendous resilience and learns to face down any challenge that confronts her, and she also uses her triumphs over her past experiences to calibrate a realistic view of her own dreams and aspirations.

“After all of that, it was heartbreaking to think that within two days of my arrival, a stranger on the streets had identified me as a visitor simply from a handful of words. I told myself to be grateful—that this wasn’t a failure but a blessing. Now that I knew about my accent, I could be careful how I spoke, and even when I spoke.”

Eloise left Paris as a teenager to join her father in London. She assumed that her Parisian background would benefit her as an agent, but in this moment, she is shaken to learn that her taxi driver immediately recognizes that she is not a native Parisian. Although the situation is not a crucial one for her mission, it nonetheless inspires new worries and an increased sense of vulnerability, for the safety of undercover agents is only as good as their ability to embody the details of their cover stories.