Into the Iron Shadows, page 26
“Yes, and now you’re next in line.” Ashmore shrugged and gave him a twisted smile. “The realities of war, my boy. Everyone must have a successor. You’ve been bumped to the top of the ladder.”
“I don’t know what to say to that,” Miles admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. “I suppose I should say thank you, but I’m not sure that would be appropriate.”
Ashmore let out a laugh. “It wouldn’t be inappropriate. No one’s dead yet.”
Miles grinned sheepishly. “I suppose not. Then, thank you.”
“No need to thank me. You’re a terrific pilot and a strong leader. The others like you and, more importantly, they respect you. They’ll follow you anywhere. That’s the sign of a good leader.”
“If you don’t mind my asking, how long was the list that you sent to HQ?”
“Three names in the entire squadron. If we lose more than that in quick succession, then I’m afraid 66 Squadron is in real trouble. God willing we won’t lose any.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Do me a favor, will you?”
“What’s that, sir?”
“Don’t get yourself killed over Dunkirk.”
Miles nodded, his lips curving into a wry smile. “I’ll do my best not to.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Evelyn and Josephine huddled against the trunk of the ancient oak tree, listening to the seemingly endless screams of the deadly dive bombers, followed by explosions and machine gun fire. Screams filtered through the trees from the road, and Evelyn shook uncontrollably, pressing her fists against her mouth. With every wail from a diving Stuka, she waited for a bomb to fall through the trees and find them. They were so close! The ground trembled with each explosion, and her ears rang with the hideous sounds as she squeezed her eyes shut, willing it to end. Next to her, Josephine wrapped her arms around her legs and stared straight ahead, her bottom lip caught between her teeth to prevent a sound from escaping.
After what seemed like forever, but was, in reality, only a few minutes, the machine guns went silent and the noise of the engines drew away. As the airplanes receded into the distance, Evelyn slowly lowered her hands and unclenched her fists.
“They’re leaving,” she whispered. She looked at Josephine and reached out to touch her shoulder. “They’re gone.”
Josephine nodded, letting go of her knees and turning to look at her. They stared at each other in shock for a moment, then Evelyn forced herself to move.
“Come. We must find Finn.”
The mention of Finn seemed to rouse Josephine from her stupor and her eyes widened.
“My God! He’s with the car! What if...” her voice trailed off on a sob and she struggled to her feet. “You’re right. We must find him.”
Evelyn held on to the tree to support her shaking legs as she stood, reaching for the jug of water at her feet. Through her distraction, she noticed that it had, amazingly, landed upright when she dropped it. She turned to look at Josephine’s jug, laying on its side.
“Your jug,” she murmured, staring at it. “It’s empty now.”
Josephine swiped it up in one hand and grabbed Evelyn’s arm with the other.
“Forget about the water,” she said briskly. “Come on. Let’s move.”
Evelyn shook her head, trying to focus, and allowed the other woman to pull her forward. Once her legs began moving, the fog began to clear and she shook her head again. She had to pull herself together.
And then they heard the cries.
The sounds filtered through the trees from the direction of the road, disjointed and sporadic at first before multiplying into a chaotic symphony of pain. Crying, wailing, screams of agony, they all mixed together to form a cacophony of terrible noise that made Evelyn’s blood run cold. She and Josephine looked at each other, and Josephine visibly swallowed. Their steps faltered briefly, then she squared her shoulders.
“Come. We must face it,” she said firmly.
Evelyn nodded and the two women walked resolutely towards the edge of the copse of trees. Evelyn gulped and forced herself to continue walking. Whatever greeted them, it had to be faced, as Josephine said. They had to find Finn, and the car, and then they had to continue on to Bordeaux. A shudder went through her. No matter what confronted them when they came out of the trees, they had to continue.
It was far worse than she could have ever imagined.
Stepping out from the shady protection of the trees, Evelyn stared at the road in horror. Carts were overturned, horses lay dead on their sides, and vehicles had been abandoned in the road, the doors left open as the occupants ran for their lives. Huge craters had decimated several parts of the road where the bombs had fallen, destroying whatever had been there and sending debris, stone, dirt and body parts in every direction. Those who had been caught in the hailstorm of bullets lay dead, scattered about like so many dolls, blood pouring out around them. They were the ones who were silent. The ones screaming with pain were the ones who had survived.
“Mon Dieu,” Josephine breathed beside her, staring.
Evelyn couldn’t bring herself to utter even a sound. A woman stumbled out from behind an overturned cart, blood pouring down the side of her face, screaming for Pierre, while a few feet away a man lay face down and still in the road. She ran to fall over him, screaming and sobbing. Her cries mingled with those of countless others as, slowly, people began to move and try to recover. The screams of the wounded became one with the cries of the bereft, and Evelyn gazed around them helplessly. The number of dead was overwhelming and she felt a lump form in her throat as her eyes filled with tears.
People who had taken cover in the ditches lining either side of the road seemed to have fared better. They crawled out, shaken and stunned, to survey the damage around them. Slowly, they began to move among the debris and bodies in the road, looking for loved ones and trying to help those that were still living.
“They’re just civilians,” Josephine whispered hoarsely. “Refugees. They aren’t soldiers. These are just innocent people.”
Evelyn tore her eyes away from a child, no more than six, laying prone next to a horse. Tears blurred her vision as she raised a hand to her forehead, not knowing what to do. She didn’t know how to move, or how to help. All she could do was stare in shock at the nightmare around them.
“Geneviève! Thank God!”
She spun around to see Finn running along the grass next to the ditch towards them, and grabbed Josephine’s arm.
“He’s all right!” she cried. “It’s Finn! He’s alive!”
Josephine let out a relieved sob. “Oh thank God!”
Finn reached them and threw his arms around Evelyn, half laughing in relief.
“I’m so glad you’re safe,” he exclaimed, releasing her and turning to Josephine. “I couldn’t do anything but dive behind the car and pray that you were safe.”
“We went under the trees,” she told him, smiling tearfully. “And the car? It escaped damage?”
“Yes. After you left, I pulled it off the road and behind some bushes. I thought it would give us privacy to eat something before continuing. The bushes protected it, and me, from the shrapnel.” He ran a hand through his hair and looked around at the carnage around them. “Come. We must leave before they come back.”
“Come back?” Josephine stared at him. “Why would they come back? They’ve already done their damage.”
The look on Finn’s face made Evelyn shudder.
“There are still people here,” he said grimly. “They will be back.”
“Why? To what purpose?” Evelyn demanded. “We’re not soldiers. We’re civilians. Women and children. Why?”
“To spread fear,” he said, gently guiding them both back the way he had come. “It’s what they do. A frightened person is easily controlled. A terrified nation is easily subdued.”
Evelyn swallowed and allowed herself to be led along the road, a strange numbness stealing over her. What kind of person was capable of shooting unarmed civilians who were no threat to anyone? Who were only trying to move to safety? More than that, what kind of government allowed, or even worse, ordered their people to do it? Her lips tightened. She already knew the answer to that one. She’d seen it all too clearly.
“Wait,” Josephine said, shaking her head and stopping. “We can’t just leave.”
“We must!” Finn said.
But Josephine was shaking her head violently now. “No! We must help those that we can. We can’t just leave them like this. They need help!”
“There are others who can help. We don’t have time to stop and spend another half of the day without getting any further ahead,” Finn argued, his voice low. “Geneviève and I must get to Bordeaux. It’s already taken too much time.”
“But all these wounded people!” Josephine protested, looking around. “They need assistance. And the dead need to be moved. We can’t just walk away!”
“We can, and we must!”
Evelyn looked from Finn to Josephine and noted the stubborn set of her jaw. She was beginning to look decidedly mulish.
“Finn, look around,” she said softly, putting her hand on his arm. “We can’t go anywhere until the road is cleared. No one can. We can’t get through, and we can’t go around with all these people moving the...dead...off the road. If we help, it will be cleared that much faster and we can be on our way.”
“We should have already been in Bordeaux,” he replied stubbornly, his dark eyes boring into hers. “We cannot run the risk of getting trapped in France. You know that.”
“Yes, I know. But the state of the roads is all over the newspapers, and I’m sure they’re aware of it in London. They will be expecting the delays.”
Finn exhaled and ran a hand through his hair, leaving it standing up at the back of his head.
“Will we be able to leave?” he asked bluntly, staring at her. “You know your people. Will they get us out?”
“Yes.” She nodded, her voice firm with conviction. “I don’t pretend to know how, but I know that Bill will do everything in his power to get us out, no matter when we arrive.”
Finn stared at her for another moment, then looked at the debris and destruction surrounding them. His eyes went to the road and the overturned carts and dead horses blocking the way and his gaze wavered.
“All right,” he finally relented. “I’ll gather some men and start moving the largest obstacles out of the road. Both of you can help with the wounded. We’ll stay and help, but as soon as there is room to pull around, we continue on. I don’t want to be caught again when the Stukas come back. We may not be as lucky next time.”
Evelyn finished cleaning the gravel out of a deep, jagged wound slashing across a young woman’s upper thigh. Shaking her head, she reached for some clean strips of cotton linen. Someone had presented a pile of sheets to cut up for bandages, and she had a stack of the strips beside her on the edge of the road. The young woman next to her held an infant girl in her arms, soothing her softly as Evelyn worked to clean and bandage her leg. Bullets from the Stuka’s high-powered machine guns had hit the road with such force that chunks of pavement had been thrown up into the air, and into the leg of the woman beside her.
“How old is your baby?” Evelyn asked, glancing up as she folded a piece of linen to press against the wound.
“Five months.”
“And her name?”
“Josephine.”
Evelyn smiled and placed the folded bandage on the wound. “That’s a beautiful name. A dear friend of mine is called Josephine. Do you think you can manage to hold this in place?”
The young woman nodded and shifted the infant to her shoulder where she could hold her with one arm while she pressed the bandage on her leg with the other hand.
“Is your husband fighting?” Evelyn asked, sorting through the strips of linen until she found one long enough to wrap around the leg.
“Yes. I’m on my way to stay with his family in Pau. He thought it would be safer for me, if the Germans came, to go south,” she said, her voice breaking.
Evelyn nodded and began wrapping a bandage around her leg. “Are you traveling alone?”
“No. I am with my friends. They’re over there, trying to help move that automobile.”
She nodded to the other side of the road where a group of people were trying to push a car off the road. Bullets had torn through the engine housing, rendering it useless for travel. No one seemed to know where the owner was, and it had been assumed that the person was one of the dead lining the road. Evelyn glanced at the group and then back at the young woman.
“You’re very lucky,” she told her, tying off the bandage. “The wound is deep, but you will be all right. I cleaned out the rock and gravel as best that I could, but you must try to keep it clean. Perhaps wash it again this evening, if you can.”
The woman nodded. “Thank you. I will.” She watched as Evelyn prepared to stand, gathering her stack of bandages and water jug. “Are you a nurse?”
“No. I’m afraid I don’t have the temperament.”
“You’ve been wonderful with me. Thank you.”
Evelyn smiled and stood, looking down at her. “I only wish I could do more.”
The woman shrugged. “What more can any of us do?”
Evelyn nodded and turned away, looking for Josephine. She was some distance up the road, kneeling next to an old man, wrapping linen around his arm. She started towards her, averting her eyes resolutely from the growing line of bodies in the ditch next to the road. As the bodies were moved from the road, they were placed in the ditch and their faces covered in a feeble attempt at preserving the dignity of the departed. However, in shifting her gaze from one gruesome sight, she inadvertently found herself staring at another. A group of five men were struggling to move a dead horse to the ditch. Bullets had ripped through the animal’s head, and her chest tightened as sorrow and anger rolled over her. Her only comfort was that the poor animal had had no idea what hit it, nor did many of the dead lining the road.
“Please! Somebody help me!”
Evelyn turned, looking for the source of the plea, and found an old man standing in the middle of the road, looking around helplessly. He saw her and took a few shaky steps towards her, reaching out a blood soaked hand.
“Please? Will you help me?” he implored.
Evelyn went forward, scanning him for the source of the blood.
“Of course,” she said, reaching him and taking his arm gently. “What is it? Where are you injured?”
He shook his head, his weathered face lined with age and sorrow. “Not me. It’s my wife.”
“Where is she?”
“Over there.”
He turned and motioned to an overturned cart. The two donkeys that had been pulling it were now untied and next to the road, alternating between chewing on the grass and watching the chaos taking place around them. Evelyn swallowed and nodded, walking beside him towards the cart. It was a heavy, older wooden conveyance with a bench that had room for the driver and one passenger to sit. Bags of clothing, some wooden boxes, and a few pieces of furniture had been thrown to the ground when the cart went over. Large holes, perfectly spaced apart, were in a row along the side where bullets had torn through the wood. The man led her around the backside of the cart and pointed with a visibly shaking hand.
“I know there’s nothing you can do to help her. She’s gone,” he said, tears welling up in his eyes. “I want to move the cart to get her out, but I’m not strong enough.”
Evelyn felt her throat close and her chest tighten once more as she gazed at the lifeless eyes gazing at nothing from an aged and lined face. The cart had trapped the woman beneath it, but the cause of death was quite clearly the bullet hole in the center of her chest.
“I don’t suppose you will be strong enough, either,” the man said sadly, staring down at his wife helplessly.
Evelyn forced back her tears and turned to look at him. She rested a hand on his shoulder.
“I’ll find someone,” she whispered. “Wait here with your wife. We’ll get her out.”
The look of gratitude on his face was almost her undoing and she set down her jug of water and bandages quickly, taking a deep, steadying breath. This was no time for an emotional outburst. This grieving old man didn’t need tears from her, he needed assistance. Turning, she went around the cart, intent on calling on some men to help.
“Ooof!”
She grunted as she walked into something tall and solid. Hands gripped her arms, steadying her, and Evelyn looked up into a lean face towering over her.
“Oh! I’m so sorry!” she exclaimed. “I didn’t know anyone was here!”
“Are you all right, mademoiselle?” The man had a deep, rich voice with a hint of an accent that she couldn’t place. “I heard the man ask for help. Is there anything I can do?”
He released her and Evelyn nodded eagerly.
“Yes! His wife is trapped under this cart. She’s dead, but he can’t move the cart himself.”
The man nodded and followed her around the corner of the cart to where the man was crouching next to his wife. He looked up as they approached and struggled to his feet, almost losing his balance. Evelyn rushed to his side, giving him her arm to help him up.
“Thank you,” he said. “I lost my cane.”
“We’ll see if we can find it once we’ve got the cart righted,” she promised. Then she looked at the tall man examining the cart. “Do you think we need a third? I’m strong, but perhaps you think another man would be better?”
The man turned to look at her consideringly, then shook his head.
“I think we can manage it between us,” he said. “It’s solid, but it’s laying at an angle. Let’s try it ourselves.”
Evelyn nodded and led the elderly man over to the donkeys. She smiled at him gently.
“You wait here and we’ll see what we can do,” she said.
The old man nodded and she turned back to the cart to find the other man examining the back end. As she approached, he turned and nodded to the front end.
