Under a War-Torn Sky (15 page)

Henry pushed the boy and himself behind a large tree and into a shallow ditch made by its roots. They flattened themselves to the ground. Henry put his arm over the boy and in his ear breathed: “Shhhhh.”

They didn't dare lift their chins from the dirt, but from there they could see feet passing. One, two, three…five, six…eight, nine pairs of feet padding quietly along the pine needles. Who were they? Germans? Collaborators?
Maquis?
Better not try to figure out, just hide until they passed. Please God, let them pass, Henry prayed as he slid his fingers down to the trigger of the gun.

The feet disappeared into the forest. Henry waited. Waited for them to be long gone. Waited for his head to stop knocking with his heartbeat. Waited for the frost of terror to leave his hands and feet.

Slowly he drew himself up and motioned for the boy to follow him. They tiptoed back down the path. As they turned a corner through a thick knot of trees, they came face to face with two men.

Henry shoved the child behind him. He pulled the heavy gun up into firing position just as the barrels of two rifles lined up on his head. Henry held fast, his gun aimed at the chest of one of the strangers. It might be two against him, but he'd take one of the men down anyway. Only over his dead body would they get the boy.

The moonlight was patchy and shadowy, but Henry could tell the men were not Germans. They wore regular clothes, and bandoliers of rifle cartridges across their chests. Still, the three guns didn't budge.

Henry felt the boy peep out from behind him. Then take a step. “Don't!” Henry hissed at him.

But the child moved forward. Suddenly he laughed and threw up his arms. “
Tonton Jacques!
”

Henry kept his eyes on his foes. Hadn't the boy called him Uncle Jacques when they first met on the road? Could he truly have an Uncle John?

One gun was lowered. Its carrier embraced the boy. Henry and the other man kept their weapons aimed at one another.

The boy tugged at the sleeve of his uncle. “
Ne vous inquiétez pas, mon oncle.
” Then he motioned for Henry to put down his weapon.

“Not until he puts his away,” Henry answered.

The uncle waved his hand at his companion. Slowly, the man eased down his gun. Henry did likewise.

The uncle took three quick strides towards Henry. What? Is he going to embrace me? wondered Henry. He'd seen Frenchmen kiss each other's cheeks. Yuck, Henry thought fleetingly.

But instead of a kiss, the uncle whipped back his right arm and punched Henry hard in the stomach. Henry doubled up with pain as he hit the ground and whacked his head against a tree trunk. “Damn!” Henry cried out.

The world spun in front of him, but Henry staggered to his feet. He heard his father's voice, the voice Clayton had used when he had smacked Henry around, supposedly to teach him to box.
Get up, boy, or they'll kick you while you're down.

Henry forced himself to stand tall, his fists level with his face, poised for a fight. “Come on, you bastard. See what I can do when I'm ready.”

The uncle grinned at Henry. “
Pardon, monsieur.
” He shrugged. “A test.” He explained in bits of English, speaking lines he had obviously been taught and practised. Apparently, if you hit a man when he didn't expect it, he'd shout out in his native tongue: “
Nazis, allemand. Américains, anglais.
” The man shrugged. “
Vous êtes vraiment américain.
”

Henry wondered how many other Americans he had slugged. But more importantly how many Germans had he ferreted out that way? So, just because someone spoke English, didn't make him or her safe. He'd have to remember that. He'd also remember that these Frenchmen trusted no one – not even someone who'd lived among them for weeks or who appeared to be protecting a young nephew.

The boy's uncle didn't even say good-bye to Henry. He patted the boy, told him to go straight home, adding, “
La forêt est encombrée ce soir
” – the forest is busy tonight. Then he slid into the darkness of the woods with his companion.

Henry caught his meaning. The
maquis
were on their way to some sort of encounter with Germans or to pick up supplies dropped by parachute from Allied planes. He and the boy didn't want to be in the midst of that.

The boy didn't translate his uncle's statement. He simply tugged urgently on Henry's sleeve and turned for home. He pointed to the rabbit. “
Maman
cook?” – he looked to Henry to see if
cook
was the right word, and Henry nodded – “
demain
.”

“Tomorrow,” said Henry. “Good.” He kept to the boy's small talk and held to the belief that the boy hadn't explained his uncle's statement as a way of protecting Henry from knowing too much. It hurt Henry's feelings to consider that the boy might not completely trust him.

The next night, the boy's mother invited Henry into the farmhouse for dinner. It was a pretty little stone cottage, wrapped in blossoms. By now the roses had erupted into a froth of pink flowers. Purple hollyhocks taller than Henry lined the walls. Each window had a flower box, overflowing with red geraniums. Blue swallows darted in and out of the eaves.

Inside, ancient, exposed log beams held up the low ceilings. The floors were stone. Delicate, hand-crocheted curtains flanked the windows. They were shuttered for the night but were wide and tall and could open like double doors to the outside. Henry could tell that during the day the house filled with cheery sunlight.

He assessed the lamp-lit kitchen. The dark wooden table amazed him. Eight feet long but only two feet wide, it clearly had been hand-lathed out of one piece of a massive tree many years before. Atop it sat a large handpainted vase stuffed with wildflowers. Everything looked spotless, even the copper pots that brightly reflected the light of the fire.

For the first time, Henry felt ashamed of his appearance. He'd only been able to wash his clothes twice during the past few weeks. His straight, blond hair was now long, dirty, and uncombed. He even had a hint of a patchy golden beard and moustache on his chin and upper lip. He looked sheepishly at the boy's mother. She smiled reassuringly and motioned him over to a ceramic pitcher and bowl where he could wash his hands. He scrubbed his face and neck, too. The soap, though, was little more than lard. It made only a small dent in his grime.

Henry stood awkwardly in a corner and watched the mother cook at the huge open fireplace. A small oven had been built into the side of the hearth, but Henry could tell she did a large portion of her cooking in a black kettle hanging over the fire itself. Must be awfully hot work, he thought. He remembered how thrilled his own mother had been when they finally replaced their wood stove with an electric one. She used to wear herself out feeding the fire of that old thing with shucked corncobs and kindling Henry had picked up around the farm.

Ma. Henry had tried not to think much about home; it always made him go wobbly inside. He'd been so all-fired hot to get out and see the world. All he wanted to see now was that sunny kitchen of white cabinets and sweet smells.

The boy's mother hummed quietly as she stirred the pot. The sound threw Henry all the way back to Richmond, to the last time he'd been home, on leave right before being shipped across the ocean.

“Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” had been playing on the radio. Henry had turned it way up, whooping out the bebopping lyrics with the Andrews Sisters: “Come on, Ma, dance with me,” he'd said, grabbing his mother and twirling her around.

Lilly followed his moves, sliding her feet and sashaying quickly.

“This is a pretzel, Ma,” Henry said as he guided her under his arm and tried to twist them out of the resulting knot. “A gal from the USO taught me.”

Lilly kept getting stuck somewhere in the middle of the manoeuvre. The two laughed and laughed. “That's what you get for trying to dance with an old woman,” Lilly had said, pushing him away playfully.

Henry caught her up in a hug and looked down on her head, her own honey-coloured hair was just beginning to grey. “You're only forty, Ma. Besides, I'll always love you, even if you can't jitterbug.”

Henry's eyes clouded up at the memory and he rubbed them with embarrassment. He caught the boy's mother watching him. “Something's in my eye,” he muttered. He nudged the table leg with his shoe and shoved his hands into his pockets.

Smiling again, the boy's mother reached out and squeezed Henry's arm.

“
Que fait-il ici?
” a voice growled. It was the grandfather, staggering through the door supported by the boy.

The mother let go of Henry and answered the old man, saying something about Henry living with the cows long enough. “
Il peut retourner à la grange après.
”

Henry edged towards the door. The grandfather was clearly not happy about his being inside the house. The last thing he wanted to do was cause trouble. But the boy reassured him, “
Maman a dit
okay.”

Henry sat down beside the boy. “
Merci beaucoup, Madame
. It smells,” Henry paused to close his eyes and sniff appreciatively, “wonderful…
merveilleux
.”

She smiled, pleased, and set his plate before him. She had cooked the rabbit meat in wine and finished it with cream and its own blood. The plate also held a large fritter of potato and onion.

“
La spécialité de Maman,
” whispered the boy.

The grandfather humpfed and spoke again in sour terms, “
Je te jure, Marie, il va nous apporter de la malchance.
”

Henry turned red. He could tell the grandfather had said he was bad luck.

The mother ignored the remark. She took Henry's and the boy's hands to say grace. “
Bon appétit,
” she concluded.

Each bite melted in Henry's mouth. The food was rich and warm and delicious. He savoured the taste. He basked in the warmth of the kitchen. He smiled and nodded and attempted conversation. He felt like a human being, not a hunted, hiding thing. He was a guest in a household that, for the most part, seemed to like him. Lord, it felt good.

There was even dessert, a tiny rectangular cake strewn with almonds and a drizzle of honey. Each person had an inch-thick, two-inch-long slice. Henry knew how precious all the ingredients had been. He didn't know how he could ever thank her, for the meal, for his safety, for her kindness this night. He said the first thing that came into his head, “This is heaven, Madame.”

She looked at him quizzically. Henry pointed skyward. “Heaven…mmm…
Dieu maison?
God's home?”

“Aaaah,” the boy and his mother murmured. “
Le paradis.
” They smiled and nodded. The grandfather scowled.

In that moment of peace came a hurried
knock-knock-knock…pause…knock-knock.
The mother's smile froze. Her face turned ashen. She put her fingers to her lips, then pointed to Henry, to the boy, and then to the back door. She hurriedly cleared their plates from the table so that it looked as if just she and the old man were there for dinner. She waited until they had exited and pressed themselves to the shadows of the outside wall before she opened the front door.

An urgent male voice sounded through the cottage. “
Les Boches nous ont découverts! Partez, vite!
” The door slammed shut.

“Nazis,” whispered the boy.

His mother reappeared. She knelt to take her son by his shoulders and spoke hurriedly. The boy was to head for the hills with Henry immediately. She would need to get the horse to carry his grandfather. “
Je te verrai à…
”

The sound of a distant machine gun stopped her short. The Germans must have found the man who had warned her. “
Mon Dieu.
” She grabbed Henry's arm. “
Mon fils, s'il vous plaît. La grange.
”

The barn. Henry knew what to do.

“
Non, non, Maman!
” The child clung to her. “
Je ne veux pas partir!
”

Henry picked him up. The boy struggled to hold on to his mother.

“
Je t'aime, mon chéri,
” his mother covered the boy's face with kisses. “
Vis pour moi.
” Live for me, she told him. She tore herself away and vanished into the house.

Henry raced for the barn, the boy sobbing. He raced as if all the devils of hell were after him.

Henry half carried the boy up the hayloft ladder. He still fought and cried for his mother. “You must be quiet,” Henry urged him, “
pour ta maman
. If they find you, they will use you to hurt her. Shhhh, now.”

The child quietened.

Henry yanked open the hiding closet and dropped the boy in. He repeated what the boy had first said to him: “I will be back for you.
Je reviendrai. Je te promets.
Trust me.
D'accord
?
”

The boy nodded.

“No sound. No matter what you see out that hole.
Tu comprends?
”

Tears streamed down his face, but he nodded.

Henry closed the door. Quietly and quickly, he used his entire body to sweep hay over top it. The pile must be huge and look undisturbed. Within seconds, a golden heaping wall of hay obliterated the child's hiding place.

Henry heard car doors slam, men shouting, one crackling gunshot. Who had fired? Who was dead? Where could he hide?

Henry frantically slid down the ladder. The cows were wandering into their stalls from the back door. How weird, Henry thought fleetingly, that they'd keep to their routine as their owners' world came to an end. Wait a minute. The cows! Henry had an idea.

He squeezed in with one of the cows, which was blissfully chewing hay from a manger attached to the wall. There was just enough room for Henry to slide up underneath the manger and nearly disappear.