Simple Faith (31 page)

Well, he and the other airmen were. But what about Anja?

The war was not over—might never be over for her. Although he’d had little chance to speak with her since their reunion at the convent, he had no illusions about her intent to go back to Brussels and make sure that her grandparents and friends were safe. No doubt she planned to see Daniel safely to the embassy, hoping that they would protect him while she and Mikel returned to rescue the next wave of Allied airmen. And even when the end came, Anja would face so many loose ends. Like Sam she would forever be haunted by everything she’d been forced to deal with in this war—the brutal murder of her husband and daughter, the guilt she felt over the constant danger for her grandparents, the culpability she would heap on herself if something had happened to Josef or Lisbeth.

No, the war would not end with a surrender or peace treaty—not for Anja. This war that she’d wanted no part in had damaged her life forever. And Peter could not think of a single thing he could do to change that. Sure, he’d had some rough times, but they were walks in the park compared to what she had endured, might yet have to face. He watched her talking in low murmurs with Mikel as they stood next to the couch where Daniel had fallen asleep. Mikel touched her arm and said something to her. She nodded and accepted the plate of food he handed her. Wearily she sat down on the edge of the couch next to her sleeping son.

Peter saw that she was so exhausted that the simple act of raising the fork filled with eggs to her mouth seemed monumental. But she attacked the food as she had attacked every obstacle that Peter had seen her experience these last few months. She wore an expression that said she would not be defeated, and she forced down bite after bite—as Mikel kept watch.

   CHAPTER 16   

T
he day seemed endless. They were all anxious to get going but understood that waiting for darkness was part of the plan. In the early afternoon, the man who ran the safe house—Pierre—sent Mikel to the barn to retrieve sturdy walking staffs, a box of shoes, and blue coveralls like those worn by workers who traveled back and forth across the border. They would need to wear the coveralls until they reached Spain. There, Pierre explained, someone would collect them and return them for use by the next group.

As he shrugged into the coveralls and sat down to change his shoes, Peter noticed that his American friends wore shoes that were worn through at the sole and lined with newspapers. His own shoes were the slick-bottomed wingtips that Gisele had provided. Still, the shoes Pierre pulled from the box did not look as if they could hold up to a climb through the mountains much better than what they were already wearing.

“
Alpargatas
—you may be more familiar with the term
espadrilles
,” Pierre explained in his perfect English as he fitted each of them with a pair. “The Basque shepherds have worn them for hundreds of years. And it’s hard to argue with the success of something that has managed to get dozens of your countrymen to safety.”

“They look pretty flimsy.” Peter examined the construction—cloth and rope. “They are definitely lightweight, so I suppose that’s good.”

“They drain easily, which makes them perfect for maintaining your footing on the trails and when you need to cross water. They are also quiet—no one will hear you coming. And they are easily replaced—you can carry extras with you.”

“Sold,” Peter said. He accepted the extra pair of shoes that Pierre handed him and shook off the feeling he’d had since arriving at the isolated farmhouse that he had seen this man before. There was something familiar about him, but Peter could not figure out what that might be. Pierre wore wire-rimmed glasses that gave him the look of a teacher. His hair was thin and dark and his skin pasty as if it had been a very long time since he’d spent any time outdoors.

“How long have you lived here?” Peter asked.

“Not long. This farm belongs to an uncle.”

“He’s not here?”

Pierre shook his head. “My aunt is quite ill. They had to go away.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

Pierre moved on to the next man.

As it turned out, the meal they had enjoyed when they arrived was all the food there would be for the rest of the day. Pierre distributed packages of crackers and a chunk of hard cheese to each of them and explained that once they were on their way, their guides would know where to find water for them to drink. He said that there were also jugs filled with cognac hidden along the trail. He suggested that they take advantage of the time they had until dark to sleep.

Peter had hoped for a chance to speak with Anja, but she was curled onto the couch next to Daniel, her arms wrapped around him as they both slept. Once they’d been given their coveralls and shoes, Pierre had left the house, saying something about the need to tend the sheep.

One by one, the others found a place to rest for a couple of hours. Peter settled himself on the floor near a window that was open just enough to allow some fresh air into the cramped room, rank with the smell of unwashed bodies, damp clothes in need of washing, and the lingering smell of grease and onions from the morning’s meal. He closed his eyes and counted the ticks on the clock above the mantel as the room grew quiet except for Ian’s snoring.

Unable to sleep, Peter kept watch over Anja. Pierre had left pairs of the special shoes next to the couch for her and Daniel and a walking staff and coveralls presumably for her. She had turned so that she was facing him. Her features were relaxed in sleep, and that calm only made her more beautiful. She looked like the girl he had thought she was that first night when she and her grandfather had rescued him.

From the minute the stranger answered the door, Mikel had the nagging feeling that something was not right. The man who introduced himself as Pierre certainly did nothing to raise suspicion. He asked all the right questions before allowing Mikel and the others to enter the farmhouse. He made them all a hearty breakfast. He questioned the wisdom of traveling with a woman and her child. Other than that, he went about the business of running the small sheep farm and at the same time making preparations for the group to start over the mountains later that evening. And yet …

After breakfast Mikel was able to persuade Anja to lie down next to a sleeping Daniel and get some rest. She was going to need all her strength—as they all were—to make it over the mountains. Mikel was concerned about the other two Americans who had escaped the prison camp. They were thin and nervous in the way of men who had experienced things they never expected to see in their lives. It was obvious that they had been starved and no doubt beaten. Sleep deprivation was a favorite tactic of the Nazis for trying to break a prisoner. The younger one was far too agitated while the older one barely spoke and made Mikel nervous. He worried if they would hold up for the journey, and he could not afford to have anyone lagging behind.

He was standing at the kitchen window considering all of this when he saw Pierre heading for the barn and decided to follow him. With the others all taking Pierre’s advice to get as much sleep as possible through the day, this might be as good an opportunity as he would get to put his concerns about their new host to rest.

As he approached the barn, he heard Pierre talking. Some shepherds and farmers talked to their animals, but this was not that kind of conversation. Pierre’s tone was tense and filled with urgency, and he was speaking German. Mikel slipped inside the barn and followed the sound to a stall at the far end. His German was not that good, and he wished Anja were with him, but he concentrated and put together enough words to understand that Pierre—if that was his real name—was on a shortwave radio and he was talking about the need to come immediately.

“The packages have all arrived,” he said. The wireless went quiet.

They had walked directly into a trap. But for the moment, Pierre was one man against many, and even Mikel on his own had the advantage of a surprise attack. He looked around for something he could use as a weapon. Just as he reached for a pitchfork, he was struck hard from behind, and as he rolled to his back and fought against losing consciousness, he recognized his attacker. This man’s name was not Pierre. He was staring into the eyes of the infiltrator—LeClerq.

From outside Peter heard the bleating of sheep and assumed that Pierre was doing some routine chore to care for the flock. He wondered where Mikel had gone and had almost drifted into sleep when something startled him awake. He glanced around and saw that nothing had changed inside the house—no one else seemed to have been disturbed by whatever had jarred him to wakefulness. He moved to a crouching position so that he could look outside without being seen. The light was waning, and he realized that he must have slept after all.

So what had awakened him?

He wiped his eyes, bleary from too little sleep these last days, and scanned his surroundings. Everything seemed as normal outside the house as it did inside. His senses were all on alert, and he recorded the fact that there were no animal sounds coming from the barn. So neither his sense of sight or sound revealed the cause of his alarm. Then he knew why he had wakened. The scent of pipe tobacco drifted through the half inch of open window. He twisted so that he could see to the sides.

Pierre was standing at the corner of the house, watching the crooked road that wound its way through the foothills to the farm. He was smoking a pipe, and Peter knew instantly why he had recognized the man. This was the guide who had approached him in the alley, had run when the dog came after them, and had disappeared without a trace when Peter had turned to find himself facing the Germans. Pierre was the infiltrator that Roger had told him about.

Peter crawled across the room and gently shook Anja’s shoulder. “We have to go now,” he whispered and handed her the shoes. “Make no sound.”

“Mikel?” she mouthed as she instantly sat up and began putting on the shoes.

Peter shrugged and went to wake the others while she woke Daniel, urged him to be as quiet as possible, and helped him dress for the journey. He mentally reviewed what he had seen of the house. Surely there was another way out.