19.
~ "Won't you get into trouble for this?" She asked as he started the Army jeep. It growled into life and her Captain put the monstrous thing into gear and drove steadily away from the hospital.
"No." He said simply as they drove out of the city.
She looked in the back of the jeep. There was a flour sack in the back seat.
"Our lunch." He told her over the roar of the jeep. "I was thinking we might want to stop and eat on the way."
She nodded and didn't say anything. A worry was building in her as he didn't ask for an explanation for her coldness to him over the past few days.
She couldn't pass up the chance to find out if the Family was alright or not. Her letters, while she was in London, were not able to get through. The mail was still not reliable and none of her recent letter had gotten an answer.
She had meant to go and see them, but lacked a car of her own to do so. Arthur presented her with the chance to see if she had any family left after the brutal occupation.
"Thank you." She said once they were out of the city. "You don't have to do this."
"Yes I do." He told her casually. His face not so angry as they rode in silence.
~ About fifteen miles outside of the little village she had called home before the invasion, Arthur stopped for lunch.
He made her wait in the jeep for a long time as he looked over a field. His side arm in his hands. Explaining that the country was still not safe.
She was starving but didn't want to admit it. Her Captain finally coming back, and pulling out a blanket as she took the flour sack.
"I was thinking we could have a picnic." He said nodding to a lonely looking field. A place that didn't look to belong to any farm and had a shady, comfortable place for them to escape to.
Arthur spread out the blanket and didn't say much to her as she unpacked their lunch. He have gotten them a feast of bread, cheese and boloney. There was apples and crackers for them and, her breath caught. A large bar of chocolate.
"A supply truck came in today." He explained to her unasked question. "Brought a lot of food with them."
"Chocolate." She said weakly feeling her mouth water. The bar of Hershey's chocolate was heavy and in her hands as she looked over the wrapper.
"Thought you might want that." He told her. He pulled out a glass water bottle and tin cups. "All we have is water, sorry." He said pouring her a cup as she set the chocolate bar aside and started cutting into the roll of boloney.
"When my cousin Phillip and I were evacuating, we ate and slept out in fields like this all the time." She told him. The smell of food and warm country air bringing her back to that day.
"We didn't pack any food with us because we didn't think the roads would be so blocked up. There were cars all over this very road. Just inching along. A lot of people on bikes like, us or walking."
Arthur said noting as she fixed their lunch. Cutting into the loaf of bread and making the slices thick.
"We were going to our Aunt's home. The Nazis had cut the power to her village. When we finally got there, she and her family had left."
"Where were your Aunt and Uncle? The one you had been living with?" He asked as she handed him his sandwich.
"They had taken the car. They had the younger children and their things. I think the traffic slowed them down too much." She sighed.
"It was beautiful weather. The day we evacuated. Just like today. It didn't feel like we were being invaded at all. Phillip and I found some food at my Aunt's home. We biked on the road with all the traffic. We met up with these students. They were going to try and get to England. It was as good a plan as any, so we stayed with them. We slept outside. The weather was so perfect, it didn't matter if we were outside."
They ate in silence as they watched a dragon fly float amoung the flowers. Summer was almost over and the last of the flowers were dieing away.
"Phillip was worried about his parents. His family." Ariadne explained slowly. "He wanted to go back and make sure they were alright. So he left me with the students."
She was quite for a long time.
"How did you ge tot Dunkirk?" Arthur asked at last.
She seemed pulled from her memories and shook her head.
"We all got on a train. It took us some of the way. Then they told us the tracks had been bombed. So we had to walk. We walked for days. We didn't have any food left. We were afraid to go to villages and ask for food. The Nazis were moving in so fast. They were always in some village or other." She said sadly.
"We ran into other people on the road. They told us terrible things. About finding heaps of bodies. About bodies in a river. It was all so terrible."
Arthur looked worriedly at her as she seemed to lose her appetite.
"My feet were bleeding when we reached Dunkirk. I couldn't walk anymore. We were all so tired and hungry. Lucky for me, Eames found me on the beach and got me on one of the boats. I might be dead now if it wasn't for him."
"What about the others? The students?" Arthur asked.
She shrugged and held back tears from her eyes.
"I don't know what happened to them. I never saw them again." She told him. "I know it sounds awful, but I was just so grateful to be out of there. To still be alive and safe."
"What happened when you reached England?" He asked. Remembering that he was comfortable in his home while she was hurt, alone, scared and starving. He and his father reading about the evacuation in the papers.
"I stayed in the hospital for a few days. I was told I could stay in the country as long as I worked for the war effort. I wanted to be a nurse like the ones who took care of me." She said sitting up a little straiter. "I wanted to be like them." She finished.
They said nothing for a long time. Watching the sun lazily move across the sky.
"Eat your chocolate." He said at last. The meal gone and he wanted to go to sleep on this blanket with her.
"I can't eat it all." She said with a smile.
"Sure you can." He told her.
Ariadne looked over the wrapper. She carefully peeled it back and the smell of the heavenly confection hit her and made her slightly dizzy.
Slowly she ate it. The rush of sugar and magic of chocolate hitting her brain and making her feel very happy.
"I haven't had chocolate since before I left France." She laughed at her own foolishness.
Arthur said nothing as he relaxed on the blanket. Content to watch her eat.
"I'm sorry for ignoring you the past few days." She said meekly.
"Why did you? Why are you pushing me away?" He asked.
She shook her head and looked down at the empty wrapper. Wishing she had more of the candy.
"Are you worried I might try something?" He asked.
"No. It's complicated." She told him.
"You have a sweetheart back in London?"
She laughed.
"No. No I don't have anyone back in London."
"Then tell me. What is it?" He said.
She looked up at the sun and avoid him.
"It's getting late." She said changing the subject. "We should get going."
~ Arthur didn't argue as they packed the jeep up. He was about to start the engine when she leaned over and kissed him.
"Thank you." She said in a soft voice.
~ They drove in silence for a long time. Ariadne was happy to see country side that she recognized come into view. She saw the Family's home peep out through over grown trees and directed Arthur to tune up the driveway.
She wanted so much to see her Aunt come out of the front door. Wanted her cousin, Phillip, to ride his bike up to meet them. Laughing at her for not staying in France.
Instead, the house looked sad and empty. The windows were all broken and the door kicked in and torn away long ago. The once grand house was let to rot in the open weather for years now.
"Stay here." Arthur said stepping out of the jeep. She watched in horror as he pulled out his side arm. Walking around the ghost like house.
Ariadne looked at the stone lions that guarded the front entrance. She and Phillip would sit on them and talk. They looked the same. War had not touched them.
"There's no one here." Arthur said breaking into her memories.
She jumped out of the jeep and marched into the house.
All the furniture, the fine rugs, the paintings on the walls, everything was stripped. Not even the wiring or or wallpaper had been spared.
"What happened?" She cried softly as she looked up the grand staircase. Part of it had been taken apart.
"The Nazis must have looted the place." Arthur said sadly.
"Would the Nazis have take the steps on the staircase?" Ariadne said feeling a rush of anger. Her Aunt would have died before she would have allowed someone to spoil her fine home like this.
Ariadne knew then, with absolute certainty, the Family was dead.
"Our neighbors came in here and stole everything that wasn't nailed down. They burned the stairs in their fires." She said roaming all over the once elegant parlor. The grand piano was gone. The garden doors had been pulled free and exposed the house to the weather even more.
The house was just a shell. Nothing about the Family's home remained. He last thread to them was gone.