Aubrey saw the plane now: it was high up, and banking in a circle. It was a biplane, high enough that the engine could not be heard. It started to descend and the engine’s sound drifted down to her.
“They did follow you,” Lydia hissed.
“From the air, it looks like.” Aubrey shielded her eyes.
“It must be in radio contact with them on the ground.”
There were more sounds of approaching vehicles now, and they could see a cloud of dust rise over the side of the hill.
“We don’t have much time,” Lydia said, and she hurried into the barn after Richard and Lazarus.
Aubrey had to make a decision; in her mind she’d done nothing wrong. She had only gone to a camp and help drive a prisoner away, one who was being released anyway. She had no idea what this band of resistance fighters were up to.
Then again, she was colluding with anarchists, enemies of the state. Would the authorities make the distinction? They certainly hadn’t in the cellars of the Gestapo headquarters, that was for sure. Aubrey ran after Lydia. Richard was helping Lazarus through the barn’s dark interior.
“He’s in no shape to run,” Aubrey said.
“He’ll have to, if he wants to live,” Richard said.
When they emerged from the other side, the first shots rang out. They could see them now: a line of grey-uniformed troopers coming down the slope towards the farm, alternating between crouching and firing, covering their comrades as they descended. There was return fire from Lydia’s comrades in the field.
Then an armoured car crested the hill. Its machine gun started up, and a steady thud of rounds started hitting the house and the barn. Lydia’s comrades returned fire, checking the soldiers’ advance. Not the armoured car, though. It came on slowly, the water-cooled Maxim gun clattering away. Rounds hit the barn, and splinters of wood flew everywhere. Then the gunner trained the weapon on the group as they moved farther into the field.
There were trees, the edge of a forest, at the other side, and they headed towards it. Aubrey and Richard helped Lazarus. He was wheezing heavily and missing every other step.
“He’s never going to make it,” Aubrey said.
“We can’t stop. They’ll kill him, as surely as they’ll kill all of us.”
“Are you a spy, Richard?”
“I serve the cause. The cause that’s just.” He nodded back at the soldiers. “I fight that. I oppose all tyranny.”
“I’m not going to get into a political debate with you in the middle of a firefight, but I read the papers. I can spot a tyrant as well as the next gal.”
“You’re right. This is no time for an argument. Maybe we can have one over coffee some day.”
“Agreed. Let’s just get this man out of here.”
They made it to the trees. The soldiers were at the farm now and taking up firing positions. The armoured car had stopped, and the machine gun was silent. Maybe they had a jam. The squad pursuing them moved past the farm and on towards them relentlessly.
“We can’t go on like this,” Lydia said. As they reached the shelter of the trees, the men took up positions and fired at them, slowly, conserving ammo. Lydia spat off a couple of three-round bursts from her submachine gun, but the enemy was well out of range.
“It’s hopeless,” Aubrey said. “We should give ourselves up.”
Lydia laughed. “And go to that camp Lazarus was just in, if we made it that far? No, we make our stand here. For the revolution.”
“There has to be a way out.”
One of the men produced a classic German potato-masher stick grenade. He pulled the pin and chucked it as far as he could at the advancing soldiers. It exploded with a whump, throwing up a cloud of dirt, and the Nazis stopped and hugged the ground.
“That will give them pause,” Lydia said. “We’re better armed than they thought.”
But how long of a pause? she wondered. Aubrey looked through the trees; she could see buildings on the other side. They looked industrial.
“There’s something over there,” she told the little group. “We should get to those buildings. Maybe we can disperse. Seize a vehicle, get out of here.”
Lydia came to the same conclusion. “Viktor, Ernst, stay here and give us covering fire until we’re clear of the trees. Then follow us.”
The two men looked at Lydia but said nothing, just nodded. Aubrey saw the look in their eyes. Their nods of agreement were brave, but their eyes betrayed their fear.
“Let’s go,” Lydia said. Lazarus had collapsed on the ground and was gasping for air.
“I’ll stay with him. You go,” Aubrey said.
“Not acceptable. Bring him along.”
“He can’t go on; you’re going to kill him.”
“He’s dead anyway,” Lydia said.
Richard and Aubrey lifted the man up. Luckily, he had lost so much weight he was hardly any burden at all. Together, the group moved through the trees: Lydia with two of her men, and Richard and Aubrey carrying Lazarus. They didn’t get to the edge of them before the firing started up again.
“We don’t have much time,” Lydia said.
“They’ll be killed,” Aubrey said, meaning the two left behind.
“They’ll die for the revolution. We all will,” Lydia said.
Aubrey had to admire the young woman’s fortitude, determination. In another time, another place, they might be friends. She had seen these same qualities in the other flyers she knew.
They crossed the field to the buildings. There was a strong odour of meat coming from the place, and Aubrey recognized it for what it was: a slaughterhouse. “Great,” she muttered.
In front of it were trucks with the snouts of pigs jutting out of slots cut in the sides of them. There were no workers, though; they must have fled at the sound of the approaching battle. The firing from
