Simple Faith (5 page)

“Lie still,” the female said now, speaking in English. “We will roll you onto the parachute. Just be very still, all right?”

He grunted as he noticed the man folding the parachute into layers and placing it next to him. The man’s movements were those of an old person—stiff and slow. The woman moved quickly, and she was very small—surely no more than a teenager. Perhaps she was the man’s granddaughter and the sister of the boy who had found him. How she and the old man were going to move him, he had no idea. Then he saw the cart—a rustic old wooden wheelbarrow-type, but deeper.

“Which leg is hurt?” she asked.

“Left,” he replied, wondering how she knew. The boy of course. He had sent them. He had kept his promise to go for help. “I was hit—wounded.” He realized that he could no longer feel his leg.

It was so dark that he could not read her expression, but he saw the way she glanced at the man, who shrugged as the two of them knelt on the ends of the parachute to keep it from blowing and together slowly rolled him out of the ditch and onto the smooth, cold fabric. The morphine was wearing off but still had some value. At least he was able to remain mostly silent as they moved him.

Next she instructed him to make himself as small as possible, and in spite of the pain, he eased his knees closer to his chest and tucked his arms close to his body. The old man brought the cart closer and tilted it, dumping out a pile of straw while the girl wrapped the chute tightly around Peter. Then the two of them bent and lifted him into the cart, dropping him like a sack of potatoes.

He could not swallow a yelp.

“Shhh,” she ordered and then began quickly covering him with straw that she and the old man scooped up with both hands.

“Let’s go,” the girl said, her voice betraying her nervousness. She led the way while the old man pushed the cart. The ride was bumpy, and twice the cart almost turned over. But after what seemed like a very long time, Peter saw the glow of a lamp through the mat of straw that covered his face. Then he saw a woman standing in the doorway of a small house, her arms around a boy.

The boy broke away and ran to meet them. He blurted out a question in French. Peter’s French was of the high school variety, but he understood the word
mort
. The kid was asking if he was dead.

“
Non
.”

Well, that was good news. He had begun to wonder if all of this was some kind of delirium—a dream that would precede him freezing to death. The way his head was swimming and his eyes refused to focus, he wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

Instead of wheeling the cart up to the door, the old man headed around the side of the house toward a dark outbuilding, and once the girl had pulled the door open against a drift of snow blocking it, he rolled the cart inside. Using the slickness of the parachute for leverage, the man and girl turned Peter until he was facing backward, and as the man tipped up the cart, Peter slid out and onto a pile of fresh and fragrant hay.

The woman from the house was now standing in the doorway of the shed with a lantern, and the last thing Peter saw before he passed out was the face of the girl as she knelt next to him and gently unwrapped him. She was quite beautiful, and when the boy bent to help her, calling her
Mama
, Peter realized that this was not his sister—this was the boy’s mother.

The man was heavy, but Anja was more concerned about his height. She was already thinking ahead, making a mental checklist of what they would need to do to move him along to the next stop on the escape line. His height meant that he would stand out even in disguise. Americans tended to be taller than most Europeans with a lanky build that was in direct contrast to the bulkier physique of even the most athletic males in Europe. But she was getting ahead of herself. Before they could get him moving on the escape route, he would have to be able to walk—to hike long distances over rough terrain. She stood over him, hands on her hips, as she reasoned out what they needed to do over the next few hours.

He had finally lost consciousness—whether from loss of blood, sheer exhaustion, or a combination was hard to say. His dog tags identified him as
Trent
,
Peter S
. Numbers were stamped under his name and what she assumed was his blood type—O+. In the lower right corner was the letter
P
to indicate that he was Protestant. She wondered if he was a religious man or had simply indicated the faith he’d been raised in as a boy.

Did it matter? In her experience it did. If the man died, she hoped he would do so having felt himself held in the Light—or whatever version of God’s Spirit that would bring him peace in his final hours.

But he wasn’t dead—at least not yet. So in spite of her own weariness, she pushed herself into action. Her grandfather had tied up the horse that usually occupied this stall outside. Daniel had brought extra blankets from the house. And Ailsa had brought some broth and a bottle of iodine. Anja suspected the man was seriously dehydrated. Hours had passed since Daniel first found him, and who knew how long before that it had been since he’d taken in any liquids or nourishment. She worried that he might also be suffering from hypothermia, but her first concern had to be that leg.

With the experience of having hidden dozens of Allied airmen trapped behind enemy lines, she cut away the leg of his uniform and held up the lantern to examine the wound. The bullet had done more than graze him; it was embedded. The area was also covered with dried blood as well as dirt and debris. She cleaned it as best she could then doused the whole area with the iodine and bandaged it. For now she had done all she could, so she covered him and arranged the hay so that he was invisible in the corner of the stall. Extinguishing the lantern and working without light, she settled herself next to him and cradled his head in her arm. She wondered if he was married—if he had a wife and children back in America who were unknowingly depending on her and the others to bring him back to them. Surely, even if he were single, he had parents and siblings, not to mention friends.

Using an eyedropper that her grandmother had brought rather than a spoon, she placed a tiny amount of the broth between his lips. Instantly his tongue came out to capture the liquid, but he did not wake. She repeated the process a half dozen times, thinking as she did so that this was so very like the way her late husband had fed a sparrow they had found in the park when Daniel was just a baby. The little bird’s wing had been broken. Her husband—her Benjamin—had nursed that little bird back to health and set it free. She wondered if Peter Trent would be so blessed—if he would ever fly again.

As she waited for him to wake and take more of the liquid, she stroked his dark sandy hair. It was thick and at the moment matted with sweat from his ordeal, and he was definitely running a fever. When she had held the lantern over him, she had noticed a bruise on his cheek and a variety of minor cuts and abrasions on his face and hands. She suspected that there would be more injuries, but her primary concern had to be infection. By now her grandfather would have sent word for Josef to come as soon as possible, but when Josef would arrive remained anyone’s guess. No doubt the Nazis had set up extra roadblocks and checkpoints throughout the area. It was perfectly normal for Josef to come to the farm during the day. He came to buy eggs and milk for the café. But it would not be light for hours yet, and for Josef to travel before dawn would raise suspicion.

Ailsa had told her that while Anja and Olaf were out rescuing Peter Trent, there had been gunshots and then shouting. She and Daniel had watched from an upstairs window as the Germans captured four men—presumably members of the crew—and marched them off toward town. “One of them seemed badly injured,” she reported in a whisper.

Recalling once again the body she had seen hanging in the tree and the unlikely chance that the pilot had survived the crash, the prisoners being marched off to town accounted for all of the crew—but one. And if there was even one man missing, Anja reminded herself, the Nazis would not rest until they found that missing crew member—the man lying next to her moaning softly in his sleep.

Figuring that Josef would not be able to reach the farm for hours yet—if at all, given the activity and the certainty that checkpoints were on high alert, Anja prepared to spend what was left of the night in the shed with her patient. If he woke and was disoriented, he might try to escape in spite of his wounds. If the Nazis found him anywhere near her grandparents’ property, they would no doubt take the entire household—including Daniel—into custody. She had escaped from them once before. She had been reunited with her grandparents. She had found her son. She was determined to outlast the Nazis.

And if they come back and find me here with Peter Trent?
She closed her eyes. It wasn’t difficult at all to imagine the officer aiming his gun carefully at her head—at Daniel’s head.
Will this terrible war never end?

She pulled the blanket higher around the airman and then pulled the parachute free. It was evidence of the most incriminating type, and while it had served them well in moving him here, it had to be destroyed. With the shears they kept hanging in the shed that she’d used to cut the evader’s trouser leg, she began methodically cutting the silky fabric into strips. The task was tedious, for she could not risk simply tearing it lest someone be lurking outside and hear the rip of the fabric. Cutting it up into strips that could be used for bandages would pass the time and hopefully keep her alert until her grandfather came to relieve her at first light.

After feeding Peter Trent the drops of broth, she had gently guided him so that he could rest his head in her lap. As she sliced through the fabric, she felt the warmth of his calm steady breath on her hands. Later she would try to give him a little more liquid. For now she would let him sleep—and wait for whatever might come next.

But first she would do one thing more—she would sit in silence and wait for God to reveal His plan for Peter Trent.

Peter fought his way back to consciousness, swimming upstream against the dreams and images that filled his mind. Images of the little town where he’d grown up in the foothills of the Appalachians in southwestern Virginia. The town sat down in a valley and had a railroad running through the middle of Main Street. Most every man living there worked at “the plant”—shift work round the clock, each shift’s ending and beginning announced with a whistle. He supposed when this was all over he’d be working there as well. Every man in his family had worked there.

But he’d always had bigger dreams for himself. He’d longed to learn what lay beyond those hills and that little valley. It was one reason he’d volunteered. The promise of a military career with its opportunity to travel and see the world was something he had just not been able to resist. At the time he’d joined up, everyone had been sure that the United States would never get into the war. But then had come that Sunday in the Pacific—the Japanese attack on the US base of Pearl Harbor. After that there was no turning back.

He smelled chicken and felt something wet and warm on his lips. He captured the drops with his tongue—chicken soup. His mind went instantly to the little tavern near the base in England where he and the others had stuffed themselves the night before the mission with potpies thick with potatoes and onions and broth but not much chicken. He saw the faces of the others—Walker, Haversole, and surely Simpson….

Reality hit him. All three were dead now, and he was no longer dreaming. He wondered if any of the others had escaped and were still out there. Before opening his eyes, he focused on the smells and sounds around him, searching for clues. There was fresh hay, and he was reasonably warm. His leg had gone numb. His cheeks rested against some soft, thick fabric—wool, he thought. Close to his ear, he heard the rhythmic clicking of metal on metal and something more. Then he felt something light touch his face, like a feather brushing his skin or a gnat that he was inclined to swat away. But he remained still, trying to remember more of the rules that Johnstone had read to him from the RAF guidebook on survival. Not that he hadn’t had similar training and preparation, but somehow it was easier picturing Tommy lecturing him.