Does the name Andre Trocme mean anything to you? It rang no bells for me until I read the Author's Note at the conclusion of THE INNOCENTS WITHIN, the riveting novel by that first-rate story teller, Robert Daley (published by Villard).

Trocme's heroics were the inspiration for Daley to create the fictional Pastor Andre Favert, the central figure in this WWII saga. The fictional Favert is a Protestant minister in a small French community near Lyon. He and his family rescue, harbor and protect Jewish refugees hunted by Nazis.

Daily's page turner, which I must note has all the ingredients of a first-rate film scenario, has an American flyer shot down and protected by the Pastor, or rather by a young female refugee living with the minister. The Yank hides in attics and closets, and falls in love with Rachel, the teen-age Jewish lass, and they are rescued in a dramatic flight amidst Nazi guns.

There are a multitude of characters in THE INNOCENTS WITHIN, French resisters whose humanity and daring endangers and sometimes ends their lives, and there are the silent and expedient collaborators. The Germans are of various shades also, those who follow orders and those who thrive on violence, inspired by a fanatic anti-Semitism. One of the great mysteries and tragedies of Hitler's madness was that as the war turned,and he was losing on both fronts, he became even more obsessed about obliterating Jews. There are also a few English and American men and women who, on the other side of the channel, maneuver rescue flights and play heroic roles.

Daley tells us that the real man, Andre Trocme, lived until 1971, and was awarded Israel's Medal of the Righteous of the Nations, which bears the inscription "He who saves one life is considered as saving the whole universe."

There is a bronze plaque opposite Trocme's Protestant temple, which reads "Homage...to the Protestant Community of this Cevenole Region and to all those who followed its example, believers of all faiths and non-believers, who during the 1939-45 War, under the occupation, stood up against the Nazi crime and at the risk of their lives, hid, protected, saved by the thousands, those who were persecuted." It is signed: "The Jewish refugees of LeChambon and the neighboring communities."

A note to film-makers. Put this heroic story on the screen and tell the world about Andre Trocme. If you need any added advice, cast Gerard Depardieu as Trocme. In the interim, there is Mr. Daley's adventure book, THE INNOCENTS WITHIN.