Whisper on the Wind (40 page)

Isa bowed her head, afraid her face might give something away. She followed him, the blanket clutched around her shoulders in tight fists.

Another soldier stood just outside the holding cell. A huge man. She would not have looked twice except that the presence of the Major made her curious about everything involved in her exit from this prison.

And then she knew, without doubt, that the Major had not come simply to comfort her in her last hour.

It was Henri.

Isa’s knees weakened. Every steady thought was washed from her mind, and yet she kept still until the moment she had to step behind Henri and follow him out.

What were they doing? Risking their lives—for her? How could they? She alone was to die this day.

She heard little from the cells they passed, except occasionally someone said her name as a salute.

When she stepped outside for the first time in what suddenly seemed an eternity, she relished the fresh, cold wind. She was alive.

A cage sat on the back of a wagon, and she gave a quick look to the driver. But he sat with the traditional stiffness of most German soldiers, staring straight ahead. Were his shoulders as broad as Edward’s? Should she even hope for such a thing?

Isa got in first, her gaze drawn to the coffin. She sat opposite it, even as Henri boarded and sat atop it as if it were nothing more than a bench. The Major followed with surprising ease and slammed the door shut with a bang.

The wagon lurched forward and she nearly lost her seat—not from speed but rather from her own instability. In a moment they stopped at the front gate. She wanted to talk to the Major, ask him what was happening, but dared not say a word. She would not do or say anything to endanger them.

The sentry at the gate waved them outward, and Isa watched as the driver slowed but never stopped. In the next moment they were outside the last set of bars that had separated her from freedom, except for the ones on this very wagon.

Prison torches fell behind as the driver flicked the reins for the horse to pick up the pace down the narrow, snow-covered street, the only road leading from the prison. On either side of the road were deep ruts, so that only the middle appeared safe to travel.

She looked at the Major at last, wondering if he might speak, but he raised a hand for her to remain silent.

Only minutes from the prison, headlights shot at them from ahead and the driver pulled on the reins.

“Halt! You will halt!”

Isa looked for the source of the command. At first she wasn’t sure the driver would obey. A black motorcar with German flags affixed above its headlights stood crooked across the road before them, barring passage.

In a moment Isa saw the man who issued the cry. She held her breath even as, out of the corner of her eye, she saw the Major turn away, taking a seat on the coffin so Henri blocked him from view of the approaching man.

Hauptmann Rudiger von Eckhart approached, and he had a look of a madman. Or a drunkard.

“You are early! This was not to take place for another
hour
. What is the meaning of this?”

The driver spoke in a gravelly voice in perfect German. “Orders, sir. Only following orders. She’s the first of three today.”

“Yes, and it was to begin at dawn, and they were to be transported together. It is not dawn!”

Isa could not stand the sight of the Hauptmann shouting and standing there without even a coat. “It doesn’t matter, does it, Hauptmann? An hour, more or less? What’s that in a lifetime?”

“Fräulein Lassone!” He rushed to the side of the cage, pulling on it and shaking the entire wagon as if it would open. “It is unacceptable that the orders have been changed. You were to have until dawn—”

She nodded but couldn’t guess if he saw her. Suddenly she heard the whip and the horse bolted forward. She flew along behind, this time unseated and landed with a thud over Henri’s massive legs. The Major skidded beside her, except his wooden leg had caught in one of the bars and it swung him back to the edge of the cage like a life-size doll.

Fighting to regain her seat with Henri’s help, she looked at the Major. “What is going on?”

He too was holding on, for the horse hadn’t stopped picking up speed. “That’s Edward,” he said, taking one hand off the bars for the barest moment to point at the driver.

Isa’s heart soared.

42

In the distance we hear the beat of the guns, sometimes slow, sometimes fast, sometimes steady. It is the heartbeat of this war.

La Libre Belgique

Edward shouted the horse to a run, the animal’s footing sure on the icy road thanks to the nails. They dashed down the deserted, slippery streets in the cold predawn hour.

“Halt! Halt!”

Edward ignored the shouts. No simple command would stop him from his destination. Sentries scattered from their huddle around a fire barrel, some yelling to make chase. Edward slapped the whip again, harder when he heard the pop and whistle of gunfire. The foot soldiers were no match for the strong and agile horse Edward had paid a fortune for.

And then he saw the headlights. From behind the wagon, two beams illumined the street and Edward heard an engine roar.

Shouts sounded—Isa’s voice, then the Major’s. In a moment the cage door banged open. With a quick glance, Edward saw two things: the vehicle gaining on them and Henri thrusting the empty coffin out the back. It hit the front of the motorcar with a whack, breaking one of the headlights and splintering to pieces as the heavy, unstoppable menace rolled over it.

Edward stood in his seat, cracking the whip again as they raced down the dark hill, nothing to light the way. But Edward saw the trees in the waning moonlight and counted them along the road: four, five, six . . . That was it. He pulled hard on the reins and the horse—an animal accustomed to the chaos of battle—turned instantly to the left. The horse maneuvered easily over the bumpy ground through the park, avoiding trees and bushes. Finally they approached the last hurdle, a low rise that bordered the road running along the canal’s bank. Edward nearly lost his seat over the bump, but they reached the road—one von Eckhart’s motorcar would be hard-pressed to find.

The nails affixed to the horse’s hooves worked just as Edward hoped. Like a giant polar bear with claws on the ice, the horse might as well have been on one of the smooth roads of Belgium. Ahead, everything was clear.

Edward ventured a glance behind. No sign of the single headlight on the motorcar. Edward shouted the horse on to greater speed. The drunken Hauptmann wouldn’t easily give up, and they had miles to go.

The narrow canals of Vilvorde and Brussels fed into the wide River Senne, now just northwest of them. Soon they would abandon the wagon and go the rest of the way on foot to meet the boat that would carry them to freedom.

Edward plowed through each set of sentries, grateful for their speed not only for those caged behind him but for himself as well. He’d left behind the ruckus of gunfire but sentries could be around any corner to offer more. No one on foot could follow, and there were so few motorcars in the city anymore, he had little need to worry over any but von Eckhart’s.

The trees on each side of the road opened at the river.

And then he heard it . . . subtle at first, and then louder—the sound of a motor, soon followed by the light of one beam. The motorcar was nearly upon them.

Edward had no choice. The river widened along this route, with a walkway along either side meant only for foot traffic. It might accommodate them. . . .

He whipped at the horse, urging him where he obviously had no desire to go, so close to the water’s edge and in such slippery conditions. Edward needed only to get to the rendezvous, and yet how could he with a German officer on his heels? Even a drunken one could give away the boat’s hidden cargo.

The headlight behind bounced off buildings and trees.

“Henri! I’m going to stop. I need you!”

Edward pulled the reins, alighting before the wagon had even come to a stop.

“I’ll have to face him. You’ll have to continue on to the rendezvous. Get her there. Don’t let anything stop you.”

But even as Henri freed himself from the back of the cage to come around to Edward’s place, the Major hobbled down as well.

“Go on, Edward. Go to your mother. I’ll face von Eckhart.”

“But he hasn’t seen you yet! One look at you and they’ll know—”

“We haven’t time for this. Just go!”

Edward scrambled into the back of the wagon—not before seeing the motorcar hurtling toward them. Edward barked at Henri to hurry but there wasn’t time. Von Eckhart tried a screeching halt, only to have the wheels catch on ice. The sole headlamp beamed one way, then the other; the black vehicle skidded until its back wheels left the road and the motorcar stopped with a metallic crunch, the underbelly teetering on the edge of the walkway.

It tipped upward, until it shone like a beacon into the sky.

Then it toppled over backward and was gone.

“Go, Henri!” the Major shouted behind them.

“No! Wait!” Isa called. “You’re coming too, aren’t you, Major?”

He still clutched his cane and shook his head. “No. Now go. You’re free.”

“I—I don’t know how to thank you.”

“There’s no need for that. Go now; you haven’t much time to make it to the rendezvous.”

She reached out through the open bars, long enough to draw him into half an embrace, perched as she was above him on the wagon.

“Thank you, Major. I’ll never forget—Oh! Major! Look!”

Behind him, from the edge where von Eckhart’s motorcar had gone into the river, appeared none other than von Eckhart himself.

The Major turned to him. “Go now,” he said over his shoulder again as he walked at an uneven—but quickened—pace toward von Eckhart.

But Henri, from the seat, waited for Edward’s nod.

Without looking at Isa, Edward jumped from the back of the wagon. “Go now, Henri! Get her there.”

The wagon lurched and Edward had just enough time to close the cage door once again.

“Edward, no! We’ll all go together.” Isa pushed the cage door; it wasn’t locked, but the latch was stiff. “I want to stay with you!”

“We don’t have time to argue,” Edward called. “Keep going, Henri. Take her and don’t let anything stop you.”

Without waiting for a response, he ran toward the Major just as the wagon pitched forward.

His first glance at the Major spun Edward’s head. He lay on the ground, his foot at such an odd angle he knew no one could withstand such pain. Until he realized it was the artificial foot, loosened from its proper position. The Major might have struggled to regain footing with the help of his cane if von Eckhart weren’t hovering over him, shaking him by the lapels of his jacket.

Edward approached from behind.

“You shouldn’t have stopped me, Max,” the Hauptmann said. “I had to stop you, didn’t I? Didn’t I?”

“Now who’s the loyal type, von Eckhart? Not me, but you.”

“That’s right! My loyalty is where it belongs—not to a woman but to our country!”

“Yes, but it’s over now. You’ve done your duty, and I did what I needed to do. I’ll face a tribunal, and you can play the hero.”

“True enough!” Von Eckhart let Max go, stepping back and reaching for the gun holstered at his side. “You are under arrest.”

The Major laughed. “That thing is soaked. What makes you think it’ll work?”

“I think it
will
work, my friend. Not that I need it to overtake you.”

Edward pressed the nozzle of his own gun against one of von Eckhart’s ears. “Mine will surely work, Hauptmann,” he whispered. “So you may drop yours.”

The Hauptmann stiffened, then let his own gun fall, but before it reached the ground, he swung around. Edward took a blow to his jaw, aimed far more squarely and solidly than he would have thought possible from a man so deep in his cups. Perhaps the frigid water of the Senne had reinvigorated the man’s senses.

Von Eckhart grabbed for the gun and Edward pulled back, caught by the force of the Hauptmann’s lunge. His gun fell harmlessly to the ground.

Edward dodged a second punch and managed a single blow to the side of the man’s head—a reflex action from the pain he’d already suffered. It was clear already that Edward’s relatively sheltered upbringing by a pacifist father left him no match for von Eckhart’s training, even marred by whatever alcohol he’d consumed.

Edward blocked yet another strike but his return missed von Eckhart altogether. He took a second swing and that connected, but he didn’t move quickly enough to miss von Eckhart’s fist to the same jaw he’d already hit.

Another swing—another miss. And yet von Eckhart went down. His head hit the pavement behind them with a crack and he lay there, unmoving.

Edward looked behind him, where the Major, still on the ground, held up his cane. He’d landed it to the Hauptmann’s middle, who was just unstable enough to be knocked off-balance.

Edward stood over the fallen opponent, seeing he was unconscious.

He went to the Major, who was shifting his artificial foot back into position and tightening the straps. “You have no choice now, Max. Even drunk, he’ll identify you. If you go back now, you’ll lose everything.”

“I already have,” Max said.

“No. You haven’t.” Even as he spoke, he reached to help the Major up. “You’re coming with me.”

Edward shoved one arm under the Major’s weak side and pulled him along. It wouldn’t be long before guards from the prison found their trail or some street sentry caught up.

“Leave me, Edward,” the Major said. “You’ll never make it in time hobbled to me like this. Go.”

“Shut up and run like we’re in a three-legged race.”

And despite his protest, the Major ran.

* * *

The boat wasn’t large, little more than a tugboat.

But this boat was headed south, not north. Isa wasn’t at all sure Henri had taken her to the right place.

“Henri,” she said at the gangplank, “this can’t be right. It’s headed the wrong way. The North Sea is
north
.”

Henri shook his head, pushing her forward but not stepping onto the plank.