Sentimental Journey (38 page)

“Really?”

“Really.”

“Well, I like to fantasize. It gives me something to walk toward. Like the idea of a long bath. I’m going to sit in the tub until my skin is as wrinkled as a prune. How ‘bout you? If you could be anywhere right now, doing anything at all, what would it be?”

“Me?” He turned back at her. “I’d be sailing in
Narragansett Bay
. Near
Newport
.”

“I thought you had a
Rhode Island
accent.”

“What ah you tahking about? We don’t hahve ah ahccent.”

She burst out laughing.

Four hours later, however, nothing was funny anymore. She was feeling the strain of the walk, the strain of everything. At the summit, there had been thick slabs of ice on the rocks, but the air wasn’t unbearably cold, because the sun was out. However, the ice was melting and slick. She had trouble walking.

But the worst section to cross was the pass, where there were rocks everywhere. She knew she slowed him down. She’d slipped and stumbled almost every other step, until they figured out a routine. He would climb down the rock. She would slide down and into his arms and he’d set her on the next one.

Her arms were scratched, and she felt bruised all over, but her butt was the worst. Silently, she kept going, until she felt as if her legs were made of rubber and she had to say something. “Can we stop for a minute?”

“We can, but we’re only about a hundred yards from the end of the pass. That’s not much farther.”

“Okay. Let’s go on.”

For the next five minutes he held on to her arm, at least until they left the rocks and hit more solid ground, which was muddy and sticky from last night’s rain and sucked at her shoes.

“You can stop. We’re on the other side.”

“Can you see the coast? What do you see?”

He didn’t say a word, and that was more telling than anything.

“Cassidy. Please. Tell me what you see.”

“Desert. More goddamned desert. There’s no coast in sight.”

She swore.

“Before you give up, I’m using the binoculars.”

“Do you see anything?”

“Yeah. I see something in the distance.”

“What?”

“I don’t know. I’m trying to focus. The terrain and the sun can play havoc with your eyes.” He paused, then said, “Interesting.”

“What?”

“I think I see a road.” He faced her when he spoke. “Don’t get too excited. It could be a mirage. We’ll rest here and then move on. Here’s the canteen.”

She drank and handed it back. “I’m starving.”

He laughed. “See? You bring up food.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, Cassidy, we’re lost and close to starving. Even you have to be hungry.”

“Yeah, I am. I’d guess you’ve changed your tune and that snake or a squirrel would taste pretty good right now.”

“Anything would taste good right now. I swallowed a fly a little while ago and didn’t even gag.”

“If you keep walking with your mouth open, Kincaid, you might not be hungry anymore.”

She groaned. “I’m not quite that desperate. Do you think there’s any nutritional value in a fly?”

“Who knows? Maybe we’ll get lucky and come across another snake.”

“Never in my life did I think I’d be looking forward to coming face-to-face with a snake.”

“You ready?”

“Sure.” He took her hand and they did what they’d been doing for days. They walked across the desert in the hot sun and the great silence. They didn’t talk much. She just concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, and figured he was doing the same.

He stopped and handed her the canteen. “How you doing?”

“I’m okay.”

He took the canteen back and clipped it to his belt. “Good, then let’s pick it up. We’re not that far away. From what I can see, it still looks like a road to me.”

His steps picked up, and she stayed with him, until they were almost running. But the ground was hard and flat and she didn’t care. “Can you see it?”

“Yeah. Come on.” He pulled her with him; then a few minutes later he stopped so suddenly she almost ran into him.

“What is it?”

He said nothing.

“Dammit, Cassidy. Tell me why you stopped.”

“Here. Take about four steps.” There was a smile in his voice. “Feel that.” He placed her hand on a hot stone the size of a cantaloupe that was level with her waist.

“You know what that is?”

She brought her other hand over and felt up and down the pile of tall round rocks. “It’s a marker?” She moved her hands over it quickly. There were smooth spots that felt like paint. “One of those desert road markers, the kind made of stones?”

“You got it, and it says, ‘
Cairo
, four hundred twenty-three kilometers.

“
Egypt
? We’re in
Egypt
?”

“Or near the Libyan border. The road looks like it’s headed northeast.”

She started laughing. “We made it!”

“Yeah, Kincaid, it looks like we did.” He grabbed her and spun her around again like he had before, but this time she didn’t tell him to put her down. All she could do was hold on to his shoulders and laugh.

He stopped spinning with her and slowly set her onto the ground. “We’ve still got a long walk.”

“I don’t care. At least I know we’re headed somewhere.”

“We were headed somewhere before. We just didn’t have a clue where.”

She placed her hands on his scratchy, stubbled cheeks and stood on her toes and gave him a quick kiss on the mouth. “Thank you, Cassidy. Thank you, so much.”

He didn’t say anything. Next she felt his hand slide to the back of her head, his other hand around her waist. He kissed her, and not a quick smack on the lips.

She moved her hands to his shoulders, then one hand to his neck as he pulled her hard against him and separated her mouth with his tongue.

Is this crazy?

She didn’t care. She just kissed him back, the two of them standing there together under the hot sun, hands everywhere, petting as if they were standing on a front porch back home.

She heard something, or thought she did, a distant sound, then one she recognized: the same rattle-slap noise she’d heard in the marketplace—rifles going from shoulder to hand.

“Achtung!”

Cassidy broke off the kiss and swore under his breath.

“Nicht bewegen!”

“Ja!
You two. Do not move!”

“You know, Kincaid, looks like you might just get that hot dog . . . or at least the sauerkraut.”

“MACHEN WIR’S DEN SCHWALBEN NACH”

Rheinholdt was examining the contents of a mortar crate when he heard a commotion. He straightened and turned to see three of his men leading a man and a woman toward him at gunpoint. They looked as if they had been in the desert for days.

“We found them while patrolling the road, Herr Leutnant.
Engländers
.
”

Rheinholdt faced the couple. “What is this? You are English?” He used their language.

“No. American.” The man grasped the woman’s hand. “My wife and I were in a small plane. We flew into a storm. The plane went down in the desert. Southwest of here. We’ve been walking for four days.”

“They have no papers, Herr Leutnant,” Dietrich said.

The man turned to Dietrich. “We barely got out of that plane.”

Rheinholdt observed in silence. He saw that the woman stared at him with an oddly blank look in her pale eyes. She wasn’t looking directly at him, but past him. He cast a quick glance over his shoulder.

“My wife is blind.”

Rheinholdt turned back and studied the man who was looking at him so grimly. He had a thick dark beard, a few days old, and hair that was golden blond like his own. His skin was as burned by the sun as any one of them.

It was odd, because his clothes looked military-issue. However, he knew pilots wore jumpsuits and boots. The man wore no chain around his neck for military identification tags. The woman was quite pretty, with hair true black and light blue eyes. Her skin was uncomfortably red, and she was in a ragged, filthy dress that was the style Heddy would wear out to lunch. She wore broken shoes. But somehow she did not look broken.

He felt something like sorrow—he knew it wasn’t pity—when he looked at her. It wasn’t her affliction that made him feel something like compassion toward her. It wasn’t even that she looked as if she’d been dragged here through miles of desert. There was something about the way she stood, this woman, in a place where you seldom saw women, that made him remember a courtesy too easily forgotten in a desert post comprised of men.

He walked over to her. “Please,
Fraülein
, sit down before you fall down.” He turned to the husband. “I will have the men get you both something to eat and drink.”

“Thank you,” she said quietly. She raised her hand to her head and rubbed her forehead. She looked as if she might faint then and there. Her husband slid his arm around her, and she leaned against him.

Rheinholdt turned to Dietrich. “Get them some food and water.”

There was something possessive about the way the man held her and led her to a stool a few feet away in the shade of a truck. Rheinholdt followed and watched them together for a moment, noticing that neither of them wore rings. “I am Feldleutnant Frederich Rheinholdt.”

“James Cassidy,” the man said, squatting in front of her. “And this is Kathryn.”

“Yes, well, here comes Dietrich. You are fortunate. The supply caravan was here just days ago. We have bread and cheese and fresh water.”

“Lieutenant?”

He faced the woman. “Yes,
Fraülein
?”

Her head was bent down and her hands clasped in her lap. “Thank you for sharing with us.”

“Certainly. Please. Eat.” Rheinholdt turned and moved toward the tent that housed the radio transmitter.

“AUF WIEDERSEHEN”

J.R. paced in front of Kitty. “What do you think they’re going to do?” she whispered.

“I don’t know. The lieutenant was watching us very closely. I’m not certain what he was thinking. I don’t think your buddy from the Kasbah could possibly be in touch with an army unit this far away. They’re probably looking for us on the coast. This Rheinholdt really has no reason not to believe we are what I say we are.” He stopped in front of her. “That was some performance, by the way.”