Chapter Twenty-Five
TWENTY-FIVE
Isabelle crept through the empty streets of Carriveau dressed in black, her golden hair covered. It was after curfew. A meager moon occasionally cast light on the uneven cobblestones; more often, it was obscured by clouds.
She listened for footsteps and lorry motors and froze when she heard either.
At the end of town, she climbed over a rose-covered wall, heedless of the thorns, and dropped into a wet, black field of hay.
She was halfway to the rendezvous point when three aeroplanes roared overhead, so low in the sky the trees shivered and the ground shook.
Machine guns fired at one another, bursts of sound and light.
The smaller aeroplane banked and swerved. She saw the insignia of America on the underside of its wing as it banked left and climbed. Moments later, she heard the whistling of a bomb—the inhuman, piercing wail—and then something exploded.
The airfield. They were bombing it.
The aeroplanes roared overhead again. There was another round of gunfire and the American aeroplane was hit. Smoke roiled out. A screaming sound filled the night; the aeroplane plummeted toward the ground, twirled, its wings catching the moonlight, reflecting it.
It crashed hard enough to rattle Isabelle’s bones and shake the ground beneath her feet; steel hitting dirt, rivets popping from metal, roots being torn up.
The broken aeroplane skidded through the forest, breaking trees as if they were matchsticks.
The smell of smoke was overwhelming, and then in a giant whoosh, the aeroplane burst into flames.
In the sky, a parachute appeared, swinging back and forth, the man suspended beneath it looking as small as a comma.
Isabelle cut through the swath of burning trees. Smoke stung her eyes.
Where was he?
A glimpse of white caught her eye and she ran toward it.
The limp parachute lay across the scrubby ground, the airman attached to it.
Isabelle heard the sound of voices—they weren’t far away—and the crunching of footsteps. She hoped to God it was her colleagues, coming for the meeting, but there was no way to know. The Nazis would be busy at the airfield, but not for long.
She skidded to her knees, unhooked the airman’s parachute, gathered it up, and ran with it as far as she dared, burying it as best she could beneath a pile of dead leaves. Then she ran back to the pilot and grabbed him by the wrists and dragged him deeper into the woods.
“You’ll have to stay quiet. Do you understand me? I’ll come back, but you need to lie still and be quiet.”
“You … betcha,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.
Isabelle covered him with leaves and branches, but when she stood back, she saw her footprints in the mud, each one oozing with black water now, and the rutted drag marks she’d made hauling him over here.
Black smoke rolled past her, engulfed her.
The fire was getting closer, burning brighter. “Merde,” she muttered.
There were voices. People yelling.
She tried to rub her hands clean but the mud just smeared and smeared, marking her.
Three shapes came out of the woods, moving toward her.
“Isabelle,” a man said. “Is that you?”
A torchlight flicked on, revealing Henri and Didier. And Gaetan.
“You found the pilot?” Henri asked.
Isabelle nodded. “He’s wounded.”
Dogs barked in the distance. The Nazis were coming.
Didier glanced behind them. “We haven’t much time.”
“We’ll never make it to town,” Henri said.
Isabelle made a split-second decision. “I know somewhere close we can hide him.”
* * *
“This is not a good idea,” Gaetan said.
“Hurry,” Isabelle said harshly. They were in the barn at Le Jardin now, with the door shut behind them. The airman lay slumped on the dirty floor, unconscious, his blood smearing across Didier’s coat and gloves. “Push the car forward.”
Henri and Didier pushed the Renault forward and then lifted the cellar door. It creaked in protest and fell forward and banged into the car’s fender.
Isabelle lit an oil lamp and held it in one hand as she felt her way down the wobbly ladder. Some of the provisions she’d left had been used.
She lifted the lamp. “Bring him down.”
The men exchanged a worried look.
“I don’t know about this,” Henri said.
“What choice do we have?” Isabelle snapped. “Now bring him down.”
Gaetan and Henri carried the unconscious airman down into the dark, dank cellar and laid him on the mattress, which made a rustling, whispery sound beneath his weight.
Henri gave her a worried look. Then he climbed out of the cellar and stood above them. “Come on, Gaetan.”
Gaetan looked at Isabelle. “We’ll have to move the car back into place.
You won’t be able to get out of here until we come for you.
If something happened to us, no one would know you were here.
” She could tell he wanted to touch her, and she ached for it.
But they stood where they were, their arms at their sides.
“The Nazis will be relentless in their search for this airman. If you’re caught… ”
She tilted her chin, trying to hide how scared she was. “Don’t let me be caught.”
“You think I don’t want to keep you safe?”
“I know you do,” she said quietly.
Before he could answer, Henri said, “Come on, Gaetan,” from above. “We need to find a doctor and figure out how to get them out of here tomorrow.”
Gaetan stepped back. The whole world seemed to lie in that small space between them. “When we come back, we’ll knock three times and whistle, so don’t shoot us.”
“I’ll try not to,” she said.
He paused. “Isabelle…”
She waited, but he had no more to say, just her name, spoken with the kind of regret that had become common. With a sigh, he turned and climbed up the ladder.
Moments later, the trapdoor banged shut. She heard the boards overhead groan as the Renault was rolled back into place.
And then, silence.
Isabelle started to panic. It was the locked bedroom again; Madame Doom slamming the door, clicking the lock, telling her to shut up and quit asking for things.
She couldn’t get out of here, not even in an emergency.
Stop it. Be calm. You know what needs to be done. She went over to the shelving, pushed her father’s shotgun aside, and retrieved the box of medical supplies. A quick inventory revealed scissors, a needle and thread, alcohol, bandages, chloroform, Benzedrine tablets, and adhesive tape.
She knelt beside the airman and set the lamp down on the floor beside her. Blood soaked the chest of his flight suit, and it took great effort to peel the fabric away. When she did, she saw the giant, gaping hole in his chest and knew there was nothing she could do.
She sat beside him, holding his hand until he took one last, troubled breath; then his breathing stopped. His mouth slowly gaped open.
She gently eased the dog tags from around his neck. They would need to be hidden. She looked down at them. “Lieutenant Keith Johnson,” she said.
Isabelle blew out the lamp and sat in the dark with a dead man.
* * *
The next morning, Vianne dressed in denim overalls and a flannel shirt of Antoine’s that she had cut down to fit her.
She was so thin these days that still the shirt overwhelmed her slim frame.
She would have to take it in again. Her latest care package to Antoine sat on the kitchen counter, ready to be mailed.
Sophie had had a restless night, so Vianne let her sleep. She went downstairs to make coffee and almost ran into Captain Beck, who was pacing the living room. “Oh. Herr Captain. I am sorry.”
He seemed not to hear her. She had never seen him look so agitated. His usually pomaded hair was untended; a lock kept falling in his face and he cursed repeatedly as he brushed it away. He was wearing his gun, which he never did in the house.
He strode past her, his hands fisted at his sides. Anger contorted his handsome face, made him almost unrecognizable. “An aeroplane went down near here last night,” he said, facing her at last. “An American aeroplane. The one they call a Mustang.”
“I thought you wanted their aeroplanes to go down. Isn’t that why you shoot at them?”
“We searched all night and didn’t find a pilot. Someone is hiding him.”
“Hiding him? Oh, I doubt that. Most likely he died.”
“Then there would be a body, Madame. We found a parachute but no body.”
“But who would be so foolish?” Vianne said. “Don’t you … execute people for that?”
“Swiftly.”
Vianne had never heard him speak in such a way. It made her draw back, and remember the whip he’d held on the day Rachel and the others were deported.
“Forgive my manner, Madame. But we have shown you all our best behaviors, and this is what we get from many of you French. Lies and betrayal and sabotage.”
Vianne’s mouth dropped open in shock.
He looked at her, saw how she was staring at him, and he tried to smile. “Forgive me again. I don’t mean you, of course. The Kommandant is blaming me for this failure to find the airman. I am charged with doing better today.” He went to the front door, opened it. “If I do not…”
Through the open door, she saw a glimpse of gray-green in her yard. Soldiers. “Good day, Madame.”
Vianne followed him as far as the front step.
“Lock and close all the doors, Madame. This pilot may be desperate. You wouldn’t want him to break into your home.”
Vianne nodded numbly.
Beck joined his entourage of soldiers and took the lead. Their dogs barked loudly, strained forward, sniffing at the ground along the base of the broken wall.
Vianne glanced up the hill and saw that the barn door was partially open. “Herr Captain!” she called out.
The captain stopped; so did his men. The snarling dogs strained at their leashes.
And then she thought of Rachel. This is where Rachel would come if she’d escaped.
“N-nothing, Herr Captain,” Vianne called out.
He nodded brusquely and led his men up the road.