Night of Flames: A Novel of World War II (22 page)

After a fi ve-minute walk she found herself standing on the corner of a busy intersection, waiting for the light to change. A familiar voice from behind said,

“Guten tag, Fräulein.”
Startled, Anna spun around. The nurse from the hospital stood behind her, wearing a brown overcoat with a blue shawl over her head.

“Follow me,” the nurse said.

The lights changed and they crossed the intersection, walking in silence for several minutes. They came to a narrow, cobblestone side street, and Anna followed the nurse around the corner. In front of a four-story brick apartment building, the nurse stopped and looked at Anna. Her face was pale. “Your friend isn’t in the hospital,” she said.

Anna felt the tingling, the icy fi ngers. “Where is she?”

The nurse slumped against the building. She spoke softly, and Anna had to strain to hear her. “She’s dead.”

Anna staggered back, grabbing the iron railing on the steps. She stared at the young woman and tried to speak but nothing came out. She took a deep breath, then another, gripping the railing. “What . . . what happened?”

Night of Flames

141

The nurse looked down at her shoes. “I was on duty in the emergency room when they brought your friend in from the train station. She was unconscious and had lost a lot of blood.”

Anna closed her eyes and the image came back . . . Irene on the fl oor . . .

Justyn’s shoes in the blood . . .

The nurse continued, her voice just a whisper. “The doctor on duty was examining her when a policeman and an SS offi cer came in and went into the examining room. The doctor told them to wait outside, that the woman, your friend, was in very serious condition. The SS offi cer . . .” The nurse fell silent.

Anna opened her eyes and looked at her. The nurse glanced around. She looked frightened. “Please, go on. Tell me what happened.”

The young woman wrapped her arms around her chest. “The SS offi cer closed the door. I heard more yelling, but I couldn’t make out what they were saying. Then the door opened and the doctor stormed out. His face was red.

He stripped off his gloves and walked out of the emergency room.”

Anna’s stomach churned. She sat down on the front steps of the building.

The nurse sat next to her. Tears streamed down her face. “They wouldn’t let us help her. They said . . . they . . .
Ach Gott!
. . . I’m sorry.”

They sat on the steps for a while in silence. It had started to snow, but Anna was numb, oblivious to the cold. “What is your name?” she asked.

“Kristina,” the nurse said.

“I’m sure it was dangerous for you to tell me all this.
Danke schön,
I’m very grateful.”

Kristina nodded. “I should be going.”

They stood up and Anna suddenly realized how cold she was. She embraced the young woman and kissed her on the cheek. “
Danke,
Kristina.”

“What will you do?” the young woman asked.

“I’ve got to tell a ten-year-old boy that his mother has died,” Anna said, surprised that she could even get it out. “Then I’m going to get him out of harm’s way.”

Kristina nodded and turned away.

Anna watched the nurse as she rounded the corner and disappeared into the crowd. A moment later the snow covered her footprints.

N E T H E R L A N D S

Maas

River

Antwerp

Ostend

B E L G I U M

G E R M A N Y

Brussels

River

Liege

Schelde

Meuse

River

Charleroi

F R A N C E

LaRoche

L U X E M B O U R G

Anna’s Chalet

PART TWO

Belgium

1943

5

R i v

Port of Antwerp

e r

Merksem

4

S c heldte

8

3

2

Albert Canal

Cit y

7

Cent re

6

1

1

G e r m a n H e a d q u a r t e r s

2

Y s e r b r u g

o BoomT

3

K a t t e n d i j k d o k

N

4

G r o e n e n d a l l a a n

5

K r u i s s c h a n s L o c k

6

C e n t r a l S t a t i o n

0

2 0 0 0

4 0 0 0

7

C a t h e d r a l

Meters

8

B e u k e n ho f s t r a a t

Chapter 27

The dirt road followed a high fl at ridge for more than a kilometer, bisect-ing a fi eld of freshly planted potatoes and a pasture before it disappeared down a gentle slope into a thick pine forest. The valley below extended far to the south and on a clear day it was possible to see all the way to Luxembourg.

Justyn had trekked along this road so often in the last two years, making the trip to and from the tiny village of Warempage, that he long ago stopped paying attention to the view. He concentrated on the wagon he pulled carefully over ruts in the road, trying to avoid tipping it over and spilling its precious cargo of fresh milk, eggs, butter and a smoked ham. It had taken a week of sweat, mending fences on Monsieur Marchal’s farm in the late August heat, to earn the food. Losing any of it along the way was unthinkable.

Justyn pulled the cart down a slope toward the pine forest, where their chalet was nestled in a secluded clearing, when he heard the sound of an airplane from the east. He looked up as an enormous four-engine bomber soared overhead, engines sputtering, trailing a thick plume of black smoke. Justyn stared transfi xed as the mortally wounded American B-17 carved a long, smoky arc in the sky and disappeared in a thunderous explosion deep in the valley.

An instant later an immense fi reball ballooned into the sky, and Justyn dropped to his knees, covering his eyes. When he looked up again, the fi reball had dissipated, and a cloud of thick, black smoke drifted off to the south. Then he noticed the parachute.

The small white umbrella, with a fi gure dangling below, fl oated across his fi eld of vision and dropped out of sight at the far end of the south fi eld. Justyn sprang to his feet, leaving the wagon in the middle of the dusty road, and 146

Douglas W. Jacobson

sprinted across the fi eld. When he got to the south fence line he searched the valley below and spotted the white material fl apping back and forth in the middle of a wheat fi eld belonging to M. Marchal’s neighbor. The burning wreck of the airplane fl ared in the distance. He hurtled the fence and raced down the hillside.

Justyn slowed to a walk as he approached the downed aviator, watching as the man struggled to sit up, his right foot bent backward at a severe angle.

Justyn stepped up to the man, grabbed the parachute lines and gathered up the billowing cloth, securing it with rocks. Then he bent down and unfastened the harness from the aviator’s chest.

The man tried to sit up again but Justyn put a hand on his shoulder and said,

“
Laissez moi vous aider.
Let me help you.”

The man looked confused, apparently not understanding French. He mumbled something that Justyn vaguely recognized as English but couldn’t understand.

“Laissez moi,”
Justyn coaxed.

The aviator nodded and laid back, closing his eyes and clenching his fi sts.

Justyn heard someone shout his name and turned to see M. Marchal and Anna standing at the fence.

The trip by bicycle from Warempage to La Roche normally took Anna a little over an hour. Justyn could make it in less than forty-fi ve minutes, but he was fourteen and had grown tall and muscular. Anna was anxious to get there and fi nd out what van Acker intended to do about the aviator, but it was a warm day and she stopped along the side of the hilly, winding road to rest.

She knelt on a rock alongside a narrow stream fl owing from the hillside and bent over to scoop some water when she paused, taking in her refl ection. Her red hair, now cropped short, was beginning to show a few streaks of gray and her face was thinner than it had been. Had been when? When she last had a normal life? When she had last seen Jan?

Anna cupped her hands, dipped them into the cool water and took a drink.

She splashed some water on the back of her neck then stood up and stared into the stream, recalling his image. It was always the same . . . he was in uniform, blond hair tousled from the wind. He was waving . . . waving good-bye.

It was almost noon when Anna arrived in La Roche. She pedaled along the narrow cobblestone street running through the center of the ancient resort town, Night of Flames

147

turned a corner and parked her bicycle behind van Acker’s butcher shop. It was a simple, single-story structure constructed of the ubiquitous brown and gray shale of the Ardennes region of southern Belgium. Without knocking she let herself in the back door and nodded to van Acker’s assistant who was busy carving a fat hog from one of the local farms. Anna knew that the meat, if it could be hidden from German fi eld agents, would bring at least 3000 francs on the black market.

She proceeded through the cool, damp cutting room, stepping around the pools of blood, to a small offi ce. She knocked twice and opened the door. A rotund, bald man sat behind a cluttered desk, his bloody white apron lying in a heap on the fl oor. He glanced up and waved for her to come in.

Anna stepped into the cramped offi ce, closed the door behind her and removed a pile of dusty newspapers from a chair in front of the desk.

Jules van Acker took off the small, rimless glasses that were perched on the end of his bulbous nose and leaned forward with a smile, exposing a row of yellow, uneven teeth.
“Bonjour, Anna.”
His voice was a gravelly rumble. “A couple of buffoons from the local Gestapo stopped in here earlier this morning. They were asking questions about the crash of the American bomber—wanted to know if there were any survivors. I thought you might fi nd that interesting.”

Anna’s pulse quickened at his mention of the Gestapo. She shifted in the chair and said, “You’ve heard about my new ‘house-guest,’
sans doute.
”

“
Oui, bien sûr.
Marchal told me about it; very gracious of you to take him in. How’s he doing?”

“His ankle was fractured and he has several cracked ribs, but his color is good and he’s eating like a horse.”

Van Acker leaned back in the swivel chair. It creaked under his weight.

“Well, if it’s any consolation to you, I think the incident is quite well contained.

No one here in town seems to know anything about survivors, and Marchal tells me that none of your other neighbors out there noticed the parachute.”

“What about the doctor?” Anna asked.

“Perfectly fi ne, Peeters is one of us. He’s seen a lot more than this. Don’t worry.” Van Acker shifted his bulk in the rickety chair.

“What’s next?” Anna asked, wondering what she would be getting into now that she was harboring an enemy of the German Reich.

Van Acker leaned forward across the small, wooden desk. “In a few days I’ll 148

Douglas W. Jacobson

stop by and have a discussion with your aviator friend. If he is who he says he is, we’ll wait until he can get around, then we’ll link him up with the . . . ah . . .

Comet Line.”

Anna stared at him for a moment then smiled. “I was wondering if it was still in operation.”

“
Oui, oui.
They’re still in operation,” van Acker said. “Very covert, but quite effi cient—transported several hundred Allied airmen back to Britain during the last couple years.”

Anna nodded, her mind wandering, remembering a young, intense woman back in Antwerp.

“You knew her, didn’t you?” van Acker asked.

Anna blinked. “Andree de Jongh? I met her a few months after Justyn and I arrived in Antwerp, February or March of ’40, I think. She was trying to get it started.”