He looked down at his uniform. If I’m caught, I won’t be shot as a spy.
As soon as Bergmann and his men had left, Amélie turned to Ferrand. “That soldier standing next to Bergmann, the one he called Kallsen. He was the one who reached for me on the road yesterday.”
Anger flaring, Ferrand asked, “Did he recognize you?”
“I don’t know. He didn’t seem to. The rain was falling hard, the sky was dark, and I was in my raincoat with a hood.”
“Let’s hope he didn’t. He could throw us under suspicion.”
Amélie nodded. “Where did you hide Jeremy?” Uncharacteristic urgency tinged her tone.
“In the shed,” Ferrand replied.
Amélie started for the back door.
“Listen to me,” Ferrand commanded. His tone arrested her. “You can’t go running out there. Everything we do must appear natural. Hurrying to the shed without being dressed for gardening right after Hauptman Bergmann was here could seem suspicious to neighbors who might see and report you.”
Amélie faced him, fury in her eyes. “You don’t believe that anyone living around here would report us.” Her expression softened as she saw the added stoop of his shoulders and the strain on his face.
“I don’t know,” Ferrand said. “Two years ago, the Austrians had their Anschluss and welcomed this madman Hitler into their country. Why would they do that?”
“Austrians are German,” Amélie replied, “and Hitler came from there. He just joined two countries that should already have been together.”
“That’s the popular view,” Ferrand replied. “Austria took a lot of land from their neighbors before the last war. There was a reason why the Allies wouldn’t let the two countries unite after the armistice.” He paused, gathering his thoughts. “Several months after the Anschluss, the Nazi Brown Shirts destroyed hundreds of Jewish synagogues across Germany. They ransacked over seven thousand of their businesses and huge numbers of homes, hospitals, and schools. The rioters left so much broken glass in the streets from looted stores that they call it Kristallnacht.”
“I remember vaguely, but I was still a teenager.”
Ferrand chuckled. “You are still very young, my daughter, but unfortunately”—he looked at Chantal sitting alone across the room, glued to their conversation— “your generation will have to mature fast.” He sighed. “A lot of people who attacked the Jews had been their friends. Many of our countrymen sympathize with Hitler’s aims.” His tired eyes studied Chantal’s face and then Amélie’s. “We don’t know who to trust. The danger is constant. We’ll survive by acting normal all the time.”
“You mean give in?”
The lines on Ferrand’s face creased in a barely perceptible smile. “If the last day hasn’t proven otherwise, I cannot convince you that I will never give in to les Boches.”
A look of chagrin crossed Amélie’s face. With outstretched arms, she moved to her father and hugged him. “I’m sorry. That was stupid of me to say.” She sniffed and pulled away while patting his chest. “I’ll put on some gardening clothes and go make sure Jeremy is all right. Don’t worry, I’ll putter around before coming back in.”
Ferrand exhaled grimly. “You won’t find him there.”
“What?” Amélie’s voice caught. She whirled around. “Where is he?”
“Gone. He knows he can’t stay here. I drew him a map.”
Startled, Amélie could only utter, “To where?”
“Best that you don’t know. If we are going to keep each other safe during this war, the less we know about what others are doing, the better. Learn that. Jeremy is a capable man, and he needs to get to safe ground, home in England.”
Amélie sat with her eyes closed, not moving for a time. Then, fighting back tears, she leaned her head into her father’s chest. “How will he get there?”
“He’ll have help. I can’t say more.”
For several minutes, Amélie snuggled against Ferrand, who put his arm around her shoulders and held her. “He’ll be all right. I’m sure of it.”
“Oh, Papa, I’m so afraid for him. I close my eyes and I see him, the way he was on the beach, and then when we brought him into the house, and after we cleaned him up. He was strong. When he woke up, he was gentle and nice.” Her chest convulsed with an involuntary sob as tears flowed down her cheeks. “I can’t bear to think that I’ll never see him again.”
“There, there, ma cherie. You feel like you’re in love. This has been an emotional time for all of us, more so for you because you found and saved him.”
“You saved him,” Amélie choked. She shook her head and straightened up, wiping her eyes. “I don’t know what I feel. I only know I—we—cared for him. He fought for us, and we risked our lives to save him. There’s goodness about him.” Her tears continued to fall. “I don’t want him to die.”
4
Two days earlier, June 8
The northeast outskirts of Dunkirk
Lance Littlefield stared in turn at each of his comrades circled inside a thicket at the edge of a dense forest. His stomach gnawed with hunger; his parched throat was thirsty for even a capful of water. How much longer he or any of the small group of soldiers of the 51st (Highland) Infantry Division could hold out was something he dared not think about. The guns had fallen silent a few days back; how many he no longer had the ability to count. The previous day’s storms had blurred his sense of time. He inhaled, fighting despair.
Images of his family plagued him. His parents had been against his enlisting in the army amidst the inevitability of war, but he had been determined to do his bit for king
