Resistance

by Christopher Nicole

‘I am afraid so, mademoiselle. We have told the people it is best to remain, but they will go. Too many of them remember 1914. But you must stay with them. Two so handsome women... It is best to have company, eh?’ He regarded Aubrey for a moment, but clearly saw no reason to alter his advice. ‘Good fortune.’

  The march was stopped, and the Rolls crossed the road. The poilus cheered. ‘What did he say?’ Aubrey asked.

  ‘He said we won’t do better than following the mob,’ Liane said.

  ‘For how long? You looked at your gasoline gauge recently? You’re under half.’

  ‘It’ll get us to Paris, if we don’t find a service station first.’

  As the captain had suggested, in half an hour they came to another crossroads, at a village, and encountered another moving wall of humanity; the people in the village had caught the contagion and were also packing up. ‘It’s going to be a long way back to Paris,’ Liane remarked.

  ‘Will we make it tonight?’

  ‘I shouldn’t think so. It’s going to be dark in a couple of hours, and finding our way through this mob in the middle of the night without hitting somebody will be next to impossible. Open another bottle, Aubrey. Now is no time to be sober.’

  Gently she eased the car into the stream, to the accompaniment of much comment and some abuse. ‘Are you scared?’ Joanna asked.

  ‘Should I be?’

  ‘Well, these people. They’re hostile.’

  ‘They are poor; I am obviously rich. They’ll get used to us.’

  They accepted glasses of champagne from Aubrey. ‘I only came to be with you,’ Joanna said. ‘I never really knew Amalie. Are we... well... going to get together?’

  ‘I don’t think this is the time.’ Liane jerked her head at the back seat.

  ‘He has to grow up some time.’

  Liane shot her a glance. ‘He doesn’t...?’

  ‘For Christ’s sake, of course not. We only see each other a couple of times a year as a rule. Whenever I’m home he’s at college. This is a one-off.’

  ‘I wish you two would stop whispering,’ Aubrey said. ‘There’s some guy trying to attract our attention.’

  Liane realized there was someone knocking on her window; when they had joined the throng they had rolled up the glass. Now she rolled the glass down a couple of inches. ‘Can I help you?’

  ‘You have a big car.’

  ‘That’s true.’

  ‘It is empty.’

  Liane considered him; they were only moving at walking pace anyway. He was poorly dressed and hadn’t shaved for a day or two. ‘There isn’t room for everyone.’

  ‘My wife is pregnant. And she is very tired.’

  Liane looked at Joanna. ‘Okay by me,’ Joanna said. ‘Make room, Aubrey.’ Liane braked. The door was opened, and the woman — who was certainly pregnant — and her husband got in, bringing with them a strong scent of unwashed humanity. But then, Liane thought, they were pretty unwashed themselves.

  ‘You are very kind,’ the woman said.

  ‘Have a glass of champagne?’ Aubrey invited.

  There was more banging on the window. ‘There is room for more,’ someone shouted.

  ‘Fuck off,’ their new passenger suggested.

  ‘I reckon we’ve got ourselves some protection,’ Joanna said.

  Progress remained impossibly slow, and by eight o’clock it was growing dark. Many people were by then so exhausted they simply lay down on the road; others sought the fields to either side. ‘I’m pretty tired myself,’ Liane said. ‘All right if we stop for the night, monsieur?’

  ‘I think that is good. You have food, eh?’ He was looking at the hamper.

  ‘Yes, we have food. Supper, Aubrey.’

  ‘I need to go,’ Joanna said. ‘How do we go?’

  ‘Just open the door. But stay next to the car.’

  ‘But those people...’

  ‘They’re all too busy doing it themselves to worry about you. Anyway, it’ll be dark in half an hour.’

  They ate, and then settled down for the night. They were surrounded by stealthy noise, while in the distance they could still hear the rumble of gunfire. But the night itself was quiet; inside the car the main sound was that of their male passenger snoring. Joanna slept with her head on Liane’s shoulder. ‘This is the weirdest situation I have ever been in,’ she whispered.

  ‘I seem to remember you were always looking for new experiences.’

  ‘Not like this. What’s going to happen, Liane?’

  ‘Tomorrow we’ll get to Paris.’

  ‘I meant, the whole thing. Your guys don’t seem to be doing very well.’

  ‘Our guys haven’t started to do anything yet. They’ll get going tomorrow.’ Now that she had stopped driving, her arms felt as if they were about to fall off. For all her many and varied experiences she had never slept sitting up in a car, even a well-upholstered Rolls Royce. But she did so now, heavily, to be awakened by someone shouting. Several people, she realized, opening her eyes and then using her hand to wipe the condensation from her window before rolling it down in consternation. Several black men were running down the road, waving their arms and shouting. They wore uniform, but it was not one Liane had ever seen before: a khaki tunic and short pants; then bare knees before leggings and boots. None of them carried rifles, although bayonet scabbards hung on their hips. ‘Sauve qui peut!’ they shrieked. ‘Sauve qui peut!’ A gigantic rustle spread through the refugee column as people woke up to the cries of disaster. ‘Hey!’ Liane shouted. ‘You! Why are you running? What has happened?’

  ‘The Boche! They are over the river! The tanks! They are coming! Sauve qui peut!’ The soldier resumed running.

  ‘What did he say?’ Aubrey asked. ‘Something about a river?’

  ‘It must be the Meuse,’ the man said.

  ‘That can’t be possible,’ Liane objected, if they are across the Meuse already, then...’

  ‘We have lost the battle, mademoiselle. France is lost.’

  ‘Rubbish!’

  ‘Then why are those men running away?’

  ‘Because they are cowards. They should be rounded up and shot.’ She started the engine. The entire column was moving, more quickly than on the previous evening, but most people were soon exhausted again and progress slowed as the sun rose out of a cloudless sky.

  ‘It’s going to be a great day,’ Aubrey commented.

  ‘You reckon that firing is closer?’ Joanna asked.

  ‘It’s certainly louder,’ Liane agreed.

  ‘What happens if they catch us up?’

  ‘What happens if the sky falls? Why can’t these goddamned people get a move on.’

  ‘They’ve caught us up,’ Aubrey said, looking over his shoulder through the rear window. Others had seen the approaching squadron of planes, and a great wail was rising.

  ‘Are they ours?’ Liane asked, trying to avoid hitting people who had suddenly stopped to peer skywards.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Stukas!’ said their passenger.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Joanna said. ‘They look more like fighters. Shit! They’re coming in.’ The wail grew louder and people started to leave the road, throwing themselves down the parapets to either side.

  ‘Out!’ Liane shouted. ‘Take cover.’ She opened her door and half fell out of the car. Someone tripped over her and she found herself on her face. Now she could hear both the roar of the engines as a Messerschmitt passed immediately over her head and the chatter of machine-gun fire. She gained her feet, cast a hasty glance behind her, where there were already several bodies lying on the road, watched the surface breaking up as if cut by a jagged knife coming straight at her, looked up at the plane, then hurled herself to one side, right across the road, to go tumbling down the parapet. She camp to rest in the midst of several people, men, women and children, pressing their faces into the earth and screaming. She hid her own face.

  But the sound was already dying. Those sounds. She was surrounded by shouts a
nd shrieks, groans and moans. It didn’t make sense. No one could possibly have mistaken them for a retreating army. She got to her feet and had her ankle grabbed by the man next to her. She kicked at him, and he tugged harder. ‘They’re coming back.’

  She realized he was right; the roar was growing again. She fell back to her stomach, pressed her cheek into the earth, still damp from the overnight dew, and heard a deep boom from immediately above her head. Shit, she thought. Papa will be furious. The aircraft were gone again; the sounds of distress were back.

  Liane climbed up the parapet and fell over a dead body — her passenger, cut to ribbons by bullets. Her stomach rolled and she looked past him at what was left of the car. Bullets must have hit the petrol tank: the entire back of the Rolls had disintegrated; the front blazed.

  She staggered forward. Someone attempted to grab her arm, and she threw him away with a sweep. But she could go no closer because of the heat. The pregnant woman! But she was not to be seen. Had she managed to get out? But then, Joanna! Her heart leapt when she heard a scream. ‘Liane!!!’

  She ran behind the car, looked down the other parapet. Joanna knelt at the foot, Aubrey in her arms. Liane slid down the slope, landed beside her. ‘Is he bad?’ There was blood everywhere.

  ‘He’s dead!’ Joanna cried. ‘Dead! My brother is dead!’

  Liane crawled to her, and gulped; Aubrey’s back seemed to have been opened in the same way as the road — she could see his shattered spine. She sat down. For just about the first time that she could remember in her entire life, she simply had no idea what to do. For the dead or the living. Joanna continued to kneel, rocking slightly, Aubrey’s head hugged into her breast, moaning. Liane had never known her so distressed, either. She had never supposed that Joanna, always so brash and boisterous, could be so distressed. There was movement around her. Those people who were unhurt were resuming their flight. They helped the wounded up, and carried them where necessary; no one appeared to have any medical supplies, and shirts and dresses had been ripped to make rough bandages. They seemed to have accepted that nothing could be done about the dead, and they were concerned with saving their own lives. The children were mostly shocked into silence. ‘Jo,’ she said. ‘Listen. We must get on.’

  ‘A church,’ Joanna said. ‘We must find a church.’

  ‘I don’t think a church will keep the Germans out.’

  ‘We have to bury Aubrey.’

  ‘Jo! That’s not possible.’

  Joanna looked left and right, at the other dead bodies; dogs were already nosing about them. ‘You want to leave him here? My brother? To be eaten by dogs?’

  ‘Jo, no matter what we do, he is going to be eaten, by dogs up here, or worms under the ground.’

  ‘I hate you! You are a filthy beast!’

  ‘I am trying to save our lives,’ Liane said patiently. ‘You must be real about this. I am terribly sorry about your brother, but there is nothing we can do for him now. We have no means of burying him. And if we don’t move, we could be overtaken by the Germans. That is going to be one whole lot of shit.’

  ‘I’m not going,’ Joanna said. ‘I can’t leave Aubrey.’ Tears were streaming down her cheeks.

  ‘Well, stay then.’ Liane scrambled up the embankment. The car had just about burned out, and the last of the refugees were several hundred yards away. She looked back down. ‘Joanna! For God’s sake.’

  Slowly Joanna laid Aubrey on the ground and stood up. The entire front of her dress was soaked in blood. She climbed the slope to join her friend. ‘I need a bath.’

  ‘We both do. Let’s go find one.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Paris.’

  ‘How far is it?’

  ‘We’ll get there by this evening.’

  ‘Like this?’

  ‘I don’t think we’ll be unique.’

  They walked for a while; the rest of the refugees had entirely vanished. ‘Where do I join up?’ Joanna asked.

  ‘Say again?’

  ‘I wish to join your army when we get to Paris.’

  ‘You can’t do that. You’re not French.’

  ‘What about the Foreign Legion?’

  ‘They’re men. Our whole army is male, apart from a few secretaries.’

  ‘Look, all I want to do is kill Germans. Why should they stop me doing that? Isn’t that the whole idea?’

  Liane squeezed her hand. ‘I know how you feel. Believe me. But killing is men’s work. We just have to grin and bear it. Shit! Planes.’ She forced Joanna off the road and they lay in the ditch, and waited for the aircraft to fly over. Then they heard the crump of bombs and even at a distance the wails of the victims.

  ‘Why are they doing that?’ Joanna asked. ‘Killing civilians. Murdering civilians.’

  ‘They’re trying to break our morale.’

  ‘Will they?’

  ‘Of course not. We’ll beat them.’

  ‘But you won’t let me help.’

  ‘I told you, that’s men’s work.’ They regained t,he road and walked in silence, passing another scene of desolation: dead bodies, human and animal, shattered belongings.

  As if the sight reminded her of her own situation, Joanna said, ‘I’m starting to stink. Aubrey’s blood! My God, Aubrey’s blood. And I’m so thirsty. And hungry.’

  She was on the verge of a breakdown. Maybe, Liane thought, she’s already having one. And she didn’t know what to do. Except... ‘There’s a loaf of bread.’

  It had fallen out of the satchel of a man lying beside it, surrounded by a pool of blood. ‘You can’t be serious,’ Joanna said.

  ‘You said you were hungry.’

  ‘I am. But I can wait until we reach Paris.’

  ‘Paris is at least a hundred kilometres away.’

  ‘You said we’d get there tonight.’

  ‘That was if we could raise a lift. Now that doesn’t look likely. So it could be a couple of days.’

  ‘Did you say days?’

  ‘Look, we just have to face facts.’ Liane knelt beside the man, carefully extracted the satchel from his shoulder, avoiding touching any of the blood.

  ‘Liane de Gruchy,’ Joanna commented, ‘robbing the dead.’

  ‘Liane de Gruchy, staying alive.’ She opened the satchel and found some meat wrapped in paper. ‘Eureka!’

  ‘You can’t eat that. It’ll give you diarrhoea.’

  ‘It’s smoked ham. Shit!’ The planes were back.

  They lay in the ditch while the aircraft droned overhead. They were flying very low, their black crosses clearly visible, but they obviously could see nothing worth attacking on this stretch of road.

  ‘If I had a rifle,’ Joanna said. ‘I could hit one of those.’

  ‘And five minutes later we’d be dead. Anyway, you don’t know how to fire a rifle.’

  ‘I do. I belong to a rifle club back home. I’m one of their best shots.’

  ‘You learn something every day. Let’s make a move.’

  They walked through an empty afternoon. ‘What happens when it gets dark?’ Joanna asked.

  ‘We wait until it gets light.’

  ‘You mean, we sleep in the open?’

  ‘It’s not raining.’

  They actually stopped well before dusk, utterly exhausted. More importantly, they had come to a stream. ‘My feet hurt,’ Joanna said. ‘These shoes weren’t intended for long-distance walking.’

  ‘Join the club.’

  ‘Mine are swelling.’

  ‘Ditto. But we can at least bathe them.’ She took off her sandals and dangled her feet in the water, then lay on her stomach to drink. And then scoop the water over her head. ‘I don’t think you should drink that,’ Joanna advised. ‘You’d rather die of thirst?’

  Joanna made a face, but lay beside her to drink. Then Liane divided the last of the bread and ham. ‘Are you going to tell anybody about this?’ Joanna asked.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘Well... robbing that dead man.’
/>   ‘He didn’t mind.’

  ‘How will you put it to the priest next time you confess?’

  ‘So when do you reckon is the next time I’ll be able to confess? Or feel like it?’

  They slept in each other’s arms. Living very separate lives, they had only done that on a couple of occasions since school in Switzerland, but even Liane wanted only comfort this night. ‘Did you really fuck that Limey?’ Joanna asked.

  ‘He was a treat. Such a gentleman.’

  ‘I thought he was rather a wimp.’

  ‘He didn’t go much for you, either. But I got the impression he was tougher than he looked.’

  Joanna giggled. ‘You mean harder. Say, what day is it?’

  Liane considered. ‘I think today is Sunday.’

  ‘Holy shit! Won’t your folks be worried?’

  ‘My folks will be going mad. What about yours?’

  ‘They don’t know yet. I’ll have to tell them. About Aubrey.

  Oh, my God, Aubrey.’ She burst into tears, and Liane held her close.

  Next morning they drank some water and then resumed their walk, very slowly and painfully; their feet were now definitely swollen. Now they might have been the only two people left in the world; there were not even any bird calls to be heard. But the day was overlaid by the steady rumble of gunfire from behind them.

  ‘That is definitely coming closer,’ Joanna said. ‘What are we going to do?’

  Liane squinted. ‘I see houses.’

  ‘Oh, God! Do you think they’ll have a bath?’

  It took them half an hour to reach the village. It was difficult to determine whether it had been looted by the refugees or just abandoned in great haste; all the doors were open, some wrenched from their hinges, and various articles were scattered on the street. There were also several bodies lying about, which had been there long enough to be distressing; at least all the dogs had departed. Liane pointed to the two craters and the shattered roofs. ‘The bombers were here.’

  ‘There’s the pension.’ Joanna stumbled across the street, and Liane limped behind her. The inn door was open. Inside the chairs and tables were scattered about, but most of the bottles behind the bar seemed to be intact. ‘No water!’ Joanna exclaimed.

  Liane located the pump, and filled two mugs. They drank greedily. ‘Do you think there’s a tub?’ Joanna asked.