Chapter Fourteen
The sun was sinking in the west, the sky beginning to glow orange and pink and the dark evening shadows creeping across the fields as a lone farmhand trudged along the road from Beautroux towards the crossroads near Lugny. He was dressed like any other working man in the region; the shapeless, sagging trousers betraying their age and long service, a rough canvas workman's jacket slung over one shoulder, a beret on his head and a scarf loosely knotted around his neck. He walked at a slow, leisurely pace, his boots occasionally scuffing on the rough surface sending a stone scuttling across to land in the grassy bank at the edge of the road. He was just an ordinary man heading home after a long day's labouring and hoping for a simple hot meal and perhaps a glass of wine to end the day.
George and Emile watched him approach from their hiding place in the trees some way distant from the crossroads. To the relief of them both the German patrol which had appeared earlier in the afternoon had moved on and after a few anxious minutes waiting alone George had heard Emile give a single whistle and had followed the same route as him and joined him at the edge of the field. Together they had returned to keep watch from the safety of the trees but it had been a long afternoon in which only one car, a farmer with a horse and cart and a priest on a bicycle had passed by. There had been no signs of any other activity but as the light had started to fade they had both silently begun to wonder if they were to be out of luck and no guide was to materialise. Emile had said nothing to George but he was already trying to work out where they could go next and what they could do. It had been his idea to come here and try their luck and if Marcel had simply taken their money or worse still gone to the Germans they would be in an even worse position than they were now.
They both watched the farmhand as he slowly approached the crossroads, expecting him to continue on his way but as he reached the shrine he slowed and bent down to tie the laces on his left boot. It was then that Emile noticed the man was surreptitiously looking around him to the left and right and he began to suspect that this might be their guide. He glanced at George and knew that she had noticed it too. They exchanged looks and Emile whispered, "If he stops to pray then I'll go and meet him. You stay here."
The man stood up and crossed the short remaining distance to the shrine. He appeared to be studying it for a while but finally he bowed his head and closed his eyes and Emile knew that he must venture out from hiding. He was about to move when George caught his hand. She grasped it tightly, "If anything's wrong just run like hell."
He reached into his jacket, took out the revolver that Monique had given him and handed it to her.
"If anything goes wrong then just get the hell out of here yourself. Don't wait for me. No heroics this time, alright?"
The thought was heart breaking but George knew he was right. She nodded. "I love you, Emile."
He smiled briefly and held her gaze, "There's never been anyone else for me, George."
He turned and was gone before she could say another word. She remained hidden and watched him move slowly in the gathering darkness down towards the roadside shrine where the man was still standing in respectful prayer.
George's heart was in her mouth. They had trusted a stranger on the basis of instinct, hope and necessity and in truth had no idea what would happen. Emile was approaching with caution and the man had obviously heard him. He turned his head to observe Emile and appeared to show no sign of surprise. Emile paused a few metres away and said something that George couldn't hear. The man nodded and then waited. Emile reached into his jacket and George could see that he was taking out the money that had been agreed. The man stepped towards him and Emile handed the money over. The man shoved the money in his pocket and then looked around him. George held her breath fearing he was expecting something to happen but then to her relief she saw Emile turn as well and raising a hand he beckoned to her. She slowly ventured towards them, still wary that something could go wrong but as she neared all remained quiet and she felt some of her fears starting to fade. As she reached them the man held out his hand to her and she took it.
"I'm Miguel, your guide."
She heard the Spanish in his accent and was relieved yet again. Up close she could see that he was younger than she had initially thought when she had seen him trudging the up the road the very portrait of a middle-aged man worn out by a life of labouring. Now she could see that he was probably no more than thirty-five but he was short, stocky and of muscular build and had the tanned and weathered look of a man who had spent a lifetime in the mountains. She knew instinctively that he was tough and he underlined it at once with an uncompromising command.
"You must do whatever I say, when I tell you and keep your mouths shut. There are many German patrols in the area and if you argue or cause any trouble I won't hesitate to shoot you myself. Do you understand?"
George and Emile exchanged looks but they both nodded in response.
"You're in charge," Emile agreed.
"Then let's go."
Miguel set off at once, striding ahead with renewed energy and already moving at a pace that George realised would be difficult for them to maintain as the climb became steeper. She looked over at Emile; he was working hard and keeping up but despite the fact that he had rallied considerably in the last few days, she knew that he was far from being the fit young man he had been when she had first arrived in France. The wound and its aftermath had taken their toll on him. He had been right when he told her it was going to be tough. Neither of them was used to the conditions they would have to face but they had no choice and there was no way back now.
X-X-X-X
Dawn was breaking as George, Emile and Miguel approached the place that Miguel had informed them was close to the border. They had been walking over steeply rising ground all night and despite the fact that the temperature had dropped significantly, they were drenched in sweat and breathing hard before Miguel signalled with the raising of his hand that they needed to stop. He crouched down and turning to them ordered them to wait while he scouted ahead. They watched him leave, both of them too tired to utter a word. George looked over at Emile, lying back against the bank, his eyes closed. He was pale and breathing hard, unable to hide the grimacing that must signal that he was in pain. He would never admit it but she knew he was finding it difficult. It would have been tough enough if they had both been fit, well-fed and rested but with so little on their side they had nothing to sustain them but hope.
George gazed into the distance. The sun was beginning to rise and it looked as if it would be a hot day. She was already parched. She tapped Emile on the arm, "Have you got any water left in your canteen?"
Emile reached into his pocket and took out the small flask. There was barely any liquid remaining and she felt guilty about drinking what little they had when she was sure that he might need it more than her.
"There was a stream a little bit further down the hill, over to the left," she whispered. "I'll go back down and fill the canteen up while Miguel is gone."
Emile turned his head to look at her, "That's not a good idea, George."
He still sounded breathless and she shook her head, "Neither is collapsing from lack of water. I don't think Miguel's the sort to stop if anyone falls by the wayside. Do you want to be abandoned up here?"
It was a sobering thought. Emile knew he was suffering from the lack of water and he had no idea how long it would be before they found another source.
"I'll go."
George shook her head, "No you won't. It was my idea and it'll be quicker if I do it. I'll be back before you know it."
She didn't give him time to protest but wrestled the canteen from his grasp and raising herself, slipped away down the track before he could say any more against the idea.
Perhaps her tiredness, thirst and the poor light at dawn had played tricks on her but George was sure that the stream had been closer than it now appeared to be. However, once she had gone part of the way back down the track she could see no point in returning without the water. It had taken her several minutes to locate the stream again but hearing it about thirty metres below the track she scrambled down over the loose scree towards the sound, keen to fill up and return to Emile as soon as she could.
X-X-X-X
Weber paused for breath. It was a steep mountain track and it had been a long while since he had been out in wild country like this. He had set out before dawn with his driver, keen to get an early start and growing conscious that three days had passed since his arrival in the area and despite making substantial enquiries they had turned up no strong leads. At the back of his mind was the bet with Schuster. Time was running out and the thought of handing over a bottle of cognac and seeing the smug expression on Schuster's face irked him. His driver had taken the car around to a checkpoint in one of the neighbouring villages as Weber had decided to venture out with the patrols himself feeling that they would benefit from his personal direction. They were Schuster's men and he wouldn't have put it past him to have suggested to them that they need not be too thorough. He had examined the map this morning and split them into two pairs before sending them out in a pincer like direction to circle around the designated area. He had chosen to take the rough track through the centre. It hadn't looked too steep at the outset but he had been breathing hard by the time he reached a junction in the path where he could pause for a rest.
Dawn had broken and the sun was starting to rise in the east. Weber removed his cap and taking a handkerchief from his pocket wiped his brow, removing the beads of perspiration that had formed there. He undid the top button of his tunic, and grasping the material shook it slightly glad of the cooler air on his skin. It was going to be a warm day. He was about to sit on a boulder nearby when his attention was caught by some movement to his right. He could hear the sound of trickling water in a small gully below and saw the ferns near the water start to rustle as if something was pushing a path through them towards the water. He anticipated it was an animal and, with the instincts of man who had hunted since his youth, watched for the first sight of what he assumed would be a goat or possibly a mountain deer. The prey, when it revealed itself, caused him a sharp intake of breath.
A woman was down below at the water's edge and appeared to be filling a vessel of some kind with water. He instinctively crouched down behind the boulder, determined not to be seen and curious as to whom it might be. When she stood up again and turned slightly to retrace her steps back up the steep bank of the gully, he recognised her at once. An involuntary smile came to his lips. He waited only long enough for her to move out of his sight before he started to hurry up the track in the direction from which she had come. He thought of Schuster again and this time the smile spread to a broad grin. He was going to win his bet. Luck was definitely on his side today; he had found his quarry.
X-X-X-X
George climbed out of the gully and reached the main track before pausing to take a drink from the refilled water canteen. She knew she had taken much longer than she had anticipated and she ought to hurry back up to the place she had left Emile before Miguel returned. She had no doubt he would take a very dim view of her excursion and wasting no time turned to go.
"Marie Bouchard!"
The sound of a loud male voice coming from somewhere behind and below on the track startled George. She froze in her tracks. It was vaguely familiar. The tone was authoritative and the French pronunciation was good but there was also the hint of an accent.
"Or is it Louise Aubert or maybe Yvette Laurent? Are any of them your real name?"
George slowly turned in utter dread, knowing now who it would be.
Weber was standing about twenty metres below her on the track with a revolver in his hand pointing directly at her. His immaculate uniform, the shine on his boots and the fact that he looked impossibly well-groomed in spite of the fact he was half-way up a mountain track in the middle of nowhere, bizarrely struck George as very odd as he looked so utterly out of place here. Having only met him once on the train to Courcelles, she found herself struggling to comprehend why he was here at all but he swiftly saved her the bother.
"I've been on your trail for several weeks and I knew I would find you, eventually. I just didn't think it would be this easy. I was standing a little way below, looking at the view and you appeared. What are the odds of that do you think?"
George thought briefly of playing innocent and pretending she had no idea what he was talking about but she realised at once that it would be pointless. He knew who she was or at least who he thought she was.
"So, Marie, Louise, Yvette …which are you?"
She shrugged, "It doesn't matter."
Weber considered this, "Well, let's just continue where we left off many weeks ago. I think I'll call you Yvette."
George looked him squarely in the face and could see that he was excited somehow by the fact that he had her at his mercy. She briefly recalled the conversation on the train and realised that he was clearly a man who enjoyed the sound of his own voice and, she fancied, he considered himself civilised with his attempts to engage her in what he probably thought of as conversation whilst all the time he pointed a gun at her. She sensed that all of this was a game to him, one which he used in an attempt to distance himself from the reality of his actions and from his colleagues whom he probably considered thugs in comparison.
"I don't care what you call me."
He affected a look of mock surprise, "Would you prefer me to call you a terrorist?"
Despite her fear George felt anger too, "I expect you'd like to be called a gentleman," she retorted, "but giving someone a name doesn't make it true."
She saw a flash of annoyance in his eyes, clearly the remark had hit home but he quickly recovered his composure.
"Your opinion is irrelevant but the actions of you and your comrades are not." He looked around him. "Tell me, Yvette, where is your companion?"
It was obvious now to George from the fact that he had admitted pursuing her that he knew a lot about her and he knew she was with Emile. He must have been following both of them since they left Neuville. She wondered briefly whether Bernard or anyone else had talked but reasoned almost at once that no one could have known that they had been planning to go to Spain. She thought of Emile waiting for her to return and knew that as soon as Miguel discovered she'd gone he would demand that Emile continue without her. All was lost. She could do nothing for herself now but play for time and give them an opportunity to get away.
"I don't know what you mean."
Weber raised his eyebrows in a gesture of exasperation, "Don't patronise me, Yvette. I knew where I'd find you and I know you're with a man."
She shook her head, "Not now. We've gone our separate ways."
She couldn't tell if he believed her as his expression gave very little away but all the time he had been talking he had been slowly moving towards her with the gun still pointed at her.
"We'll wait here, shall we, until my men have carried out a sweep of the area. I've no doubt we'll find your companion too."
He was now only a few feet away and he levelled the gun at her. Perhaps it was her defiance or her attempt to insult him that was to blame but now that he was close to her George could tell that something had changed in his demeanour. The conversational tone was gone.
"Get on your knees."
It was an order, there was no mistaking the menace in his voice and she wondered if she had completely underestimated him, that he wasn't the type to leave the dirty work to someone else and that he actually intended to kill her or at the very least threaten her into revealing Emile's whereabouts. For the first time a wave of desperate hopelessness washed over her and she could see no way out of this situation. It took every ounce of her inner strength to stay calm. She took a deep breath and began to lower herself to her knees when with a sudden jolt she remembered the open water canteen she was still holding in her right hand, the one from which she had been about to drink when Weber had disturbed her. With a sudden upward thrust she threw the contents of the canteen into his face.
Weber was startled, shocked by the cold, drenching water and thrown off balance. In those brief seconds, remembering her training, George took advantage of his discomposure and stamped on his foot with the heel of her shoe whilst grabbing the arm holding the gun in both hands and banging it sharply against her knee. His fingers flexed and lost their grip and he dropped the gun. George scrambled to reach it but Weber, recovering from the surprise, was too quick for her. He caught her by the wrist and twisted her arm, causing her to cry out. She continued to struggle with him, despite the pain, and kicked out with all her might but still he held firm and it was with an ever increasing sense of frustration that she realised she had probably blown her one chance to break free. He was holding her arm fast, twisting it ever more to keep her under control but also reaching out with his left arm for the gun still lying on the ground. She could see it from the corner of her eye and tried to stretch her foot out to kick it away knowing that in a second or two he would have it back within his grasp and he wouldn't make the same mistake twice.
A shot rang out, piercing the silence and echoing around the steep mountainsides. Weber froze for a moment and stared uncomprehendingly at George, blinking in astonishment before reality overcame his shock and inevitably he sank heavily to his knees. His grip started to loosen on her wrist before his fingers slipped away entirely and he released her as he crumpled to the ground. A long drawn-out gasp escaped from his mouth as blood began to flow freely from the wound in his chest.
George's legs felt like heavy blocks of wood as she tried to take a few steps away from him, shocked by the turn of events and almost overcome by the sudden realisation that she'd been handed an opportunity to escape when all hope seemed to have disappeared. The sound of running footsteps stumbling over the rough ground and scattering loose stones in every direction, however, brought her to her senses and she turned her head, fearful it would be one of Weber's men. With a gasp of relief she saw that it was Emile running back down the track towards her, the gun that had fired the fateful shot still in his hand.
"Come on," he yelled waving his hand, urging her to run towards him, "Before any of the patrol return."
The sound of his voice galvanized her into action. Life came back to her limbs and she started to gather pace as she ran towards him. He reached out a hand to her urging her on and as she drew level with him she grasped it in total relief, "You came back for me!"
"Yes," he gasped starting to run back up the track almost pulling her behind him, "I knew I shouldn't have let you go."
They struggled back up the track all the time expecting soldiers to appear or firing to start but when they finally reached the resting place they found only Miguel looking as if he was ready to tear both of them limb from limb, such was the blazing fury in his eyes. They both knew it was a miracle that he hadn't abandoned them altogether at the sound of the gunshot.
"You fucking idiots," he hissed at them. "We'll have every German within ten kilometres here soon. We've got only one chance to get over the border and it's right now while they're trying to work out what the hell's going on." He looked away for a few seconds, taking a few deep breaths and clearly trying to control his temper. George realised that only their precarious location was preventing him launching a full-scale tirade of abuse in their direction. When he spoke again his voice was deadly quiet and neither of them was in any doubt that he meant what he said. "If you do anything like that again, anything at all between here and Bilbao… I'll kill you."
George said nothing. She understood his anger, she would have felt the same had she been in his shoes but she also knew with certainty now that there was nothing he could do that would be worse than what had almost happened.
Miguel was right; the sound of the gunshot echoing around the hills created unwanted activity and brought the patrols in the area out. George knew that when they discovered the dead or dying Weber, they would start combing the area in earnest. However, in the immediate aftermath of the shooting it was also evident that there was disorganisation too and a lack of coherence to their search efforts.
For several hours they played what seemed like a deadly game of hide and seek as they sought to keep out of the way of patrols moving around the area. This was interspersed with frantic ascents along narrow mountain paths led by Miguel who kept up a ferocious pace and had no intention of waiting for either of them if they fell behind. Nothing in her training had ever been as tough as this and George felt as if her lungs would explode by the time Miguel finally turned to her and Emile and announced very quietly and without any humour, "Welcome to Spain."
Emile was, if anything, more shattered than George by the time this news was delivered but the fact that they had somehow made it over the border despite the odds couldn't help but bring a smile of relief to his face and he was swiftly joined by George. Miguel watched them, wondering how on earth they had made it considering that they had attracted the attention of every patrol in the area. He shook his head at them knowing that although they had crossed the border they still had a long way to go over difficult terrain and their problems were not over yet.
"This isn't the time to relax. You have a lot of hard work ahead of you. This may be Spain but you can't afford to be caught by the Civil Guard."
Nevertheless, he relented for a few minutes and allowed them to stop for a short rest while he went off to check the path ahead.
In spite of their exhaustion George and Emile struggled to their feet and stood together in silence looking north across the mountains and back into France. Thoughts rushed through George's mind, thoughts of everything that had happened since the Lysander had ferried her into occupied territory so many weeks ago, the people she had met, the ones she had left behind and the struggle to escape in the last few weeks. They had both come so far but it had almost ended in disaster a few hours ago. The realisation of how close they had come to capture almost at the point of liberation because of her actions hit home. For the first time in many weeks she felt on the verge of tears and had to fight hard to stop her voice from shaking.
"Emile, I'm sorry that I put everything at risk earlier. I don't know what I was thinking…"
"I do," he replied at once. "I know that you did it for me."
She looked as though she was about to protest but he reached out, gently cradled her face in his hands and silenced her with a kiss. She tried to smile but every emotion she had attempted to suppress for so long was straining to reach the surface, desperate to find expression and she was afraid that if she started to cry she might never stop. Her response was little more than a whisper, "Whatever the reason, I still owe you, Emile."
He looked into her eyes, "You owe me nothing, George. Have you forgotten? I made you a promise that I'd never let anyone hurt you again and I'm a man of my word."