"Troufion Englishman. Troufion!"1

"Five more minutes," Peter mumbled. He winced as a pair of heavy hands continued to shake him.

"Se hâter, si'l vous plaît. Ze Allemands are coming!"2

"The what?"

"Ze Germans!" hissed the impatient voice. Peter slowly opened his eyes. Daybreak was just close enough that he could make out a plainly-dressed man standing above him. It hit him—the last thing he remembered was spotting a farmhouse, lit against the dark like a beacon to his exhausted and hunger-ravaged mind. He must have passed out in this Frenchman's back garden.

"I'm sorry—er—pardon—I think." As Peter rose, his whole body protested. "I'm just looking for shelter, if you can spare it."

"We have none I'm afraid. Ze Germans would find you here. But I can give you goot close and food and poot you in ze direction off someone who can hide you. Come." The weather-beaten man set off hastily for the house. Peter struggled to keep up.

The little kitchen was warm and homey, but there was not much time to admire it. The farmer reappeared with an armload of clothes. "You get into zat, quickly. It iz not much but it stickz out less zan zat Eenglish uniform you have, eh? I burn it later. Se hâter, and I shall pack zome foot for you."

Peter did so with great difficulty. Not only were his muscles cold and stiff, but some of his wounds were making themselves known again. His right wrist barely moved, and the bullet graze on his shoulder had never gotten properly treated. The clumsy field bandage was falling apart now; he'd have to do without.

The farmer pushed a satchel of food into Peter's aching arms. "Zere, zat should be enough to get you to Jean's. Follow ze woods straight west for two days. You come to eh stream and minoterie3 wiss a white house. Tell zem 'Anri sent you. Now go, ze Germans are searching for soldiers from ze camps."

They moved back outdoors. "Monsieur," Peter whispered. "Merci. For everything."

The farmer simply nodded. "Se hâter!" He pointed Peter to the woods, and then Peter was alone again. A bitter wind came around the farmhouse, sending shivers through his whole body. Soon, the Germans wouldn't be his only worry.

It wasn't long before Peter saw how right Henri was. And how lucky he was to have been pointed to the woods. Several patrols were out in the open, knocking on doors and searching fields. By some miracle, they never seemed suspicious of the bit of woods in which Peter hid. Still, it never failed to make him nervous. He was completely unarmed.

Nights were the hardest. It was all he could do to stay warm with no shelter, and only the clothes on his back. His injuries were also not improving in their current state. At least he had decent food, he reminded himself. Henri had supplied him with bread, fruit, a little salted pork, and a canteen of water. Enough for two days of travel.

At long last, shortly before dark on the second day, Peter sighted the white house. Next to it was a water-run mill, right on the stream. All he had to do was make it across the open expanse between the woods and the buildings.

Halfway there, a dog began to bark menacingly. Lights came on, and a huge man stepped out, carrying a rifle. Peter froze.

"Henri sent me! I mean you no harm!"

The man rattled on in French until he was close enough to survey Peter. Then he abruptly switched to English. "Silly English boy. If you came from zose outposts, zen surely you know zat Germans are all over ze place. Come on, get in here." His handle on English was certainly more accomplished than Henri's.

"Please, sir," Peter said, careful to lower his voice this time. "Are you Jean? Henri said you could offer shelter."

"Oui, oui," Jean answered over his shoulder. "Best leave talk for inside, though." They trekked in silence to what Peter now saw was the back door. An equally large woman in a housedress was waiting for them. She and Jean conversed in French for less than a minute, and suddenly Peter was being ushered inside…and out of his clothes.

"Wait—w-what's she doing?" In the process of being wrestled out of his jacket, Peter's wrist was jarred sharply. He couldn't mask the pain from his face.

Jean surveyed him calmly. "I could tell from your gait and posture zat you were injured. Zis is my wife, Charlotte. An excellent nurse."

The jacket, jumper, and shirt all came off. Charlotte let out a quiet exclamation at the sight of the gash in his shoulder. But Peter drew the line at the request to take his trousers off. Hospitable as they may be, he did not feel comfortable undressing that far with a couple of strangers.

"There's nothing wrong down there that can't be dealt with by rolling them up," he insisted.

Charlotte glanced at her husband, who shrugged. She went back to fetching the necessary supplies. Her methods of cleaning and doctoring were not the gentlest, but they did the job well enough. Even the shoulder wound was cleaned up in no time. At this point, however, she said something in French and left the room.

"She's gone to get heavier thread, a clean sock, and some hard cider," Jean explained.

"Why hard cider?"

"To dull the pain, hopefully. Zat shoulder is going to need stitching up, and she will neet to set your wrist." The big man smiled. "Ze sock should prevent anyone nearby from…investigating."

Charlotte returned. The cider wasn't bad, though it burned Peter's throat a bit. Even with the homemade liquor, however, the sting of the needle on such tender skin was difficult to ignore. He was breaking into a sweat by the time she turned her attention to his wrist. After examining it carefully, she looked up at Jean.

"Try to relax as much as possible." He handed Peter the thick sock, and took up position behind the chair so as to hold Peter still. Peter's breathing grew fast and shallow. Charlotte firmly grasped his hand and lower forearm in her own hands…and pulled.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Exhausted, Caity collapsed into a nearby chair. The mostly close-quarters work of being a nurse allowed her to remain free of her cane for hours at a time, but her duties were no less akin to a marathon. War became a constant presence—daily casualties required longer hours for most of the staff, while food, petrol, supplies, and many other materials had to be divided between the home front and the war front.

It didn't stop there, either. Several nurses, who had received military training for one setting or another, were sent to Europe in mid October. Lizabeth was one of them. As Allied footholds began to strengthen in places, midway hospitals were being set up to provide more immediate care to injured soldiers.

"We've got late arrivals; everyone hop to!"

The whole business tore at Caity's heart. So many young lives altered forever, or simply ended. No amount of nurse's training could prepare her for some of the horrors, physically or mentally, her patients suffered. And all the while, she kept imagining that it was Peter she was holding, soothing, treating…and sometimes, covering with a white sheet.

She cried nearly every night now. Many times she fell asleep clutching that final letter. On her nightstand sat a photograph of Peter and herself from the previous Christmas. What she would give up to have that this year. Her head spun with racing thoughts that refused to go away.

Why can't you just come home?

1 'Mister' (military)

2 'Hurry, please…Germans'

3 'flourmill'