Water Song (6 page)

Jack awoke and looked up at Claudine, who was mopping his sweaty brow. "You were dreaming again," she said in French that was heavily accented with her native Flemish. "What terrible dreams they must be to make you sweat so."

"You speak French?" he questioned, speaking with his own Louisiana version of the language that so many spoke in the French city of New Orleans. Although he wasn't fluent like Emma, he spoke enough to understand and make himself understood.

"I am learning more every day," Claudine confided. "I want to help our cause, and to do that I must speak French or English but the English is too difficult. I need your help because you speak both French and English."

"Emma speaks both," he pointed out.

Claudine shook her head. "I don't want to endanger 
her. She's so young. Do not tell of this. It is best that she does not know. I have to tell you quickly before she comes in. Right now she is down in the stable helping Willem groom the horse. She has a fondness for horses."

"What can I do?"

"They are bringing more supplies and ammunition here every day. They are preparing for something. When I go to market, Willem and I know people there who can pass that information on to the Allied armies across enemy lines. We need the information to be put in a code and in English. You are a soldier. Do you know what kind of codes the British would understand?"

"I was delivering a coded message when I got caught in the gas attack," he told her. "I know how the code worked."

"Very good. Then I can count on you?"

"A hundred percent."

One week later, Emma awoke to find Jack sitting up with his legs slung over the side of the four-poster bed. For the first time he looked strong enough to actually get out of bed and it appeared as though that was what he intended to attempt next. She wondered if he'd be strong enough.

Standing, he crossed to the mirror above the dresser and inspected his image for the first time since he'd arrived, smoothing his wild black curls. His peeled skin was healing and the blisters on his lips, though papery and raw, were improving. The swelling of his eye area was almost, though not quite, gone.

Emma decided he looked like a complete wild man. But, though she would never admit it, she found something attractive in the wildness--a thing raw and vibrant with energy. Considering that he had been half 
dead when she first encountered him, he now seemed more alive than anyone she'd ever known.

Judging from the grin spreading across his face, he was pleased with what he saw. Turning to her, he pointed at his image in the mirror. "Who is that handsome devil?" he asked playfully. "I'd say he looks good enough to kiss. Want to try?"

"Would you please stop it?" she exploded, all the more distressed by the request because he seemed to have realized she had been privately assessing his attractiveness. It unnerved her, this ability of his to intuit her thoughts. She refused to believe he could actually read her mind no matter how much it seemed to be the case. Nonetheless this power of his was uncanny and she didn't like feeling he had any power over her. "Stop asking me for a kiss," she insisted. "If you haven't figured it out by now, let me tell you again--it is never going to happen!"

"Ah, I guess you're too fancy to kiss a guy like me," he said lightly, "even though it would be so nice."

He was too impossible! He delighted in underlining the fact that he was uneducated and without refinement of any sort. When she mentioned even the most commonplace nicety, such as the fact that she missed having afternoon tea, he laughed his low, chortling chuckle, joking, "Ah, well, I wouldn't know about any of that, sug. I'll have to go ask the queen."

When he mocked her that way, it made her want to strangle him. It was as if he saw her as some 
upper-class twit, an image of herself that she did not want to hold, even for a moment.

"I bet you don't even know the queen's name," she'd challenged him one afternoon.

"Queen Mary of Teck, wife of George the Fifth," he answered correctly. "You sure do think I'm dumb, don't you?"

"I think you only say the things you do in order to make me angry because, to you, it's some sort of amusement."

"That's not so," he disagreed. "I ask for a kiss because I want you to kiss me and show you like me a little."

"You
don't
want a kiss at all," she insisted. "You only say it because you think it's funny to upset me."

"Your eyes do go wide with shock and alarm," he admitted.

"See! I knew it!"

"But they're such pretty eyes."

Even now she couldn't tell if he meant it or if he was only making fun of her. "Why does it delight you so much to tease me?" she demanded.

"Ah, come on, sug, don't be that way," he said now, settling back on the bed. "I'm only playin'. We're stuck here together like this. I just want to be friends with you."

"Then you don't really want me to kiss you?"

"Yeah, I want a kiss!" he insisted emphatically. "But it could be a nice friendly kiss. It don't have to be a kiss you'd read about in a romance novel."

"I wouldn't know. I've never read one."

"But you get the gist of my meaning," he insisted.

She realized from the new energy that had come into his movements and his voice that he really was much stronger than he had been. He was probably even finally strong enough to go down into the well to search under the water for her locket.

"I don't want to fight with you," she began in a new, conciliatory tone of voice. "You're right. Under the circumstances, we should try to be friends. I enjoyed hearing about your boyhood. It's so interesting that you're able to hold your breath for so long. How did you come by that ability?"

"I've always loved to swim," he said. "My mam taught me when I was a baby, before I could even walk."

"I thought you were in a home for orphans."

"Not always. My daddy was never around, but my mam took good care of me before she passed on when I was ten. She taught me a lot."

"Like how to hold your breath under water?"

That made him chuckle. "Naw. That just came to me natural. An old fisherman taught me how to pump the air up from the bottom of my lungs when ... ah, never mind. You don't want to hear it."

"I do," she insisted. She was interested in anything that had to do with his ability to stay under water.

"Why do you want to know about my breath-holding ability?" he asked, as if reading her mind yet again.

"The day I found you in the well, I was searching 
for a locket I had thrown down there. I would very much like it back and I was wondering if--when you're strong enough, of course--you could manage to retrieve it for me."

He studied her skeptically. "What's so special about it?" he asked. "Got a picture of your boyfriend in there?"

"My parents."

"Then why'd you throw it in the well?"

"I forgot the picture was in there at the moment I threw it. I was angry about something else. I regretted it the instant I remembered that their picture was in the locket," she replied.

He nodded, studying her. "Why should I get it for you?"

"I thought you wanted to be friends."

"If you're my friend, then give me the friendly kiss I asked for," he countered.

"If you're
my
friend, you'll get the locket for me," she said.

"Uh-uh," he said, shaking his head. "You first."

They stood for a moment looking at each other stubbornly, locked in a silent battle of wills.

"Then we are obviously not meant to be friends," she said, breaking the deadlock.

He turned away from her and spoke without facing her. "If I were to get this locket for you," he went on, his voice quiet and with intensity she had never heard there before, "would you then become my friend?"

"Of course," she agreed eagerly.

"Don't answer me so quick, sug," he said, his voice still low and earnest. "Make sure you understand what I'm really asking. Would you become my dearest, most loyal soul companion?"

This new seriousness in him frightened her. Why was this so important to him? "I could promise you that I would sincerely try," she replied, "to be friends, that is. I can't promise anything more than friendship."

"True friendship," he pressed. "You're sure?"

"Yes! I promise!"

A distant boom made her jump. "Another attack!" she gasped.

"Calm yourself, sug," he said. "It's only thunder."

It rained all that night but on the next day, while Jack napped, Colonel Schiller opened the bedroom door and beckoned for Emma to join him in the hallway. "You heard nothing in the marketplace the other day?" he inquired, getting directly to his point.

She hadn't, but it might help her situation to have something to tell him. "I overheard some farmers saying that the Americans are secretly sending supplies to England." Even though she was sure he already knew this, she wanted to seem compliant.

"Ach!" he scoffed. "That is not news. Tomorrow our submarine U-20 will torpedo an American cruise liner that is smuggling in arms. We know all about that!"

The news hit Emma like a punch in the stomach.

There would be innocent passengers on a cruise liner.

"Arrogant Americans," he said. "Our embassy even warned them that we're onto their tricks and we intend to torpedo the liner. Only one passenger out of over a thousand canceled his ticket. Is your husband like his countrymen, so full of foolish pride?"

"My husband is not like most Americas," she said, thinking that Jack was not like anybody she'd ever met.

"I suppose you think he's special just because he is your husband."

"Perhaps," she agreed just to be polite. "I'm sorry the news isn't valuable to you. I am not really up on world events or political issues."

He looked her over and nodded. "That is not surprising in one so lovely as you. In the future, tell me all that you hear and I will decide what is important. You've done well enough for your first trip out."

"I'm glad," she said as sweetly as she could manage. "Do you think I might take a walk just around the outside of the estate? It's such a beautiful day, and I would love some air."

"There are guards all around the property. It will do you no good to attempt to escape."

"I won't. Thank you." She hurried down the hallway, grabbed her light coat from the closet, and went out. It was even warmer than the day before, perfect weather for what she intended to do.

Jack had intimated that he might go down the well to get the locket for her but he hadn't mentioned it in the last three days. She'd asked him again just 
that morning but he'd pretended he hadn't heard before turning his head and feigning sleep. "Will you go or won't you?" she'd demanded, shaking his shoulder.

"The time isn't right," he'd replied before shutting his eyes again.

If he wouldn't go down the well to search for her locket, who needed him? She'd do it herself.