Dead Ground in Between

by Maureen Jennings

  She shook her head. “You didn’t. Overstep, I mean. It’s just that you’re comforting me so tenderly I feel as if I’m going to melt.”

  All he could manage was, “Oh.”

  She put her hand on his. “I actually do know what your name is. You said it in court. It’s Tom.”

  “That’s right.”

  If he was breathing it would have taken a doctor to detect it.

  “Are you married?” she asked him.

  “Not any more. I’ve just got divorced.”

  “Are you still in love with your ex-wife?” Her question uncannily echoed that of Mrs. Hamilton, and he gave the same answer.

  “I don’t think I ever was.”

  “I loved my husband.”

  She shifted and leaned her head into the crook of Tyler’s neck. Her breath was warm on his skin and he could feel the wet of her tears.

  “I am so lonely, Inspector Tom, I sometimes feel as if I am going to die from it.”

  He pulled her closer.

  “Do you think it would be possible for you to bed me this night?” she whispered. “Or would that be against all regulations?”

  Tyler began to stroke her hair. “The answer to the first question is yes. To the second, no.”

  “That is most reassuring to hear,” she said, and her body folded into his.

  The plaid wool dressing gown was soft under his hands. The flesh underneath even softer.

  —

  Jan and Pim were curled up together on the cot. Jan had turned down the wick of the lamp to conserve the fuel. The darkness pressed in on them. Pim appeared to have fallen asleep but he moved slightly and muttered through dry lips.

  “Mamma. Mamma. My head hurts so.” He spoke in Dutch.

  “Go to sleep, there’s a good fellow,” whispered Jan. “We’ll be all right in the morning.”

  “Mamma?”

  “Mamma isn’t here. It’s Jan.”

  “Will Mamma be coming soon?”

  “I think so. Just try to go to sleep and you can have a dream about her. A nice dream. Dream that we’re back at home and we’re drifting down the canal on our boat. The sun is shining and Pappa is steering. He’s taken off his jacket. He’s having a fine old time. We’re going to Mr. Benne’s for tea.”

  “I’m so cold, Jan. Will you cover me up?”

  There were no blankets to cover him with but Jan pressed harder against his back to warm him.

  “Will you sing to me?” Pim asked.

  “If you like. What shall I sing?”

  “Anything. But not too loud. My head hurts so.”

  Jan began to hum an old song that their mother used to sing when she was working around the house.

  The only other sound was the hiss of the paraffin heater.

  THURSDAY, DECEMBER 10

  EDIE DIDN’T NEED THE ALARM TO WAKE HER UP. SHE had been lying in bed wide awake for the past hour unable to go back to sleep. She hadn’t cried much since last night. It was almost as if tears would break her in two. All she could think about was Angelo and what would happen to him, to the two of them. Would she even see him again? There was every possibility that she wouldn’t. He could be sent anywhere.

  She’d said Angelo would never harm an old man, but how well did she know him, really? Not at all, truth be told. She loved his skin, his mouth, the way he caressed her, but how much did that count? Unbidden, her mother’s voice came back to her. “You’re too soft by half, my girl. You can’t go through life with stardust in your eyes. The devil himself could come up to you and offer you an apple and I swear you’d take it. Feel sorry for him, most like.” Why had her ma said that? Edie couldn’t remember, but it had something to do with some encounter in the park with an older boy. Her dad had come along “just in time,” according to her mother, although what the boy would have done Edie didn’t understand. Not then.

  But look at her now. She’d been the one to initiate the liaison with Angelo. She hadn’t waited for him to offer the apple, she’d snatched it herself.

  When John Cartwright had said the barn door was not barred, Edie had doubted herself for a moment. Had she dropped the bar when she left? She was certain she had. She had stayed with Angelo as long as she’d dared. They’d exchanged kiss after kiss, so passionate they had made love again. “I must go,” she’d whispered in his ear. “I can’t risk anybody discovering I’m not in bed.” Finally, he’d let her leave, and she’d hurried back to the house, the wind pushing her backward, the rain soaking her. It must have been two o’clock by then and all was dark and silent. She’d undressed and climbed into bed, shivering in the chilly air. She was so happy she half expected she wouldn’t be able to sleep, but she did. A deep sleep that nothing disturbed.

  She reached for her dressing gown now. It was too big for her, an old blue flannel affair that had belonged to her granny. Edie allowed herself a small giggle. Good thing Angelo hadn’t seen her wearing that – a passion-killer if ever there was one. But it was warm, and she was grateful for that as she scurried across the linoleum-covered floor and headed for the toilet. No dawn yet. Nobody else seemed to be up.

  She didn’t even wait to make herself a cup of tea. She could breakfast later. Right now she was so anxious she had to keep on the move. She could start by milking the cows. They wouldn’t mind if she was a bit earlier than usual.

  She shrugged into her overcoat, grabbed her torch, and, fast as she could, she ran down to the cow barn.

  She opened the door. “Morning, girls,” she called out.

  She took one of the lanterns from the hook by the door and lit it.

  A figure rose out of the shadows. She gasped.

  “Don’t be scared, Edie. It’s me,” said Angelo.

  —

  Tyler let himself into the house. He moved quietly, not wanting to wake Rowell. However, he had barely removed his hat and coat when he heard a creak on the stairs and his sergeant came down.

  “Good morning, sir.”

  “God, Oliver, you gave me a fright.”

  “Sorry, sir. I didn’t know if you were you, if you know what I mean.”

  “Right. I could have been a parachutist.”

  “Precisely.”

  They stood awkwardly, looking at each other. What was not being said was screaming for attention.

  “I stayed the night with Mrs. Keogh,” Tyler said.

  “Ah.”

  Another silence.

  “Is that all you’re going to say, Oliver?”

  “I didn’t think it was my place to comment, sir.”

  “Comment away. I give you permission. After all, you were the one who set the example.”

  “Me, sir?”

  “Yes, you, Sergeant,” said Tyler in exasperation. “And you sent me to Mrs. Hamilton, don’t forget.”

  “But Mrs. Keogh isn’t one of Mrs. Hamilton’s clients, sir.”

  “Does that matter?”

  To say he had enjoyed having intimacy with a willing and attractive partner after so long was putting it mildly.

  “I only bring it up because Mrs. Hamilton is quite rigorous about only accepting clients who are what she would call ‘ready for romance.’ ”

  “Mrs. Keogh seemed very willing to, er, to be romantic.”

  “It wasn’t her I was thinking of so much as you, sir. The lady in question has a husband who is presumed dead. Her feelings around love are probably quite, shall we say, cloudy. Timing is important in these matters.”

  “I know what you’re saying, Oliver. I’ll be careful. Both of the feelings of the lady in question and my own.”

  “Of course, sir. Shall I put the kettle on for some tea, sir?”

  —

  Edie extricated herself from Angelo’s arms.

  “What are you doing here? I didn’t think they’d release you so soon.”

  “They didn’t. I have escaped.”

  “Escaped! Oh my God, Angelo. You can’t. You must go back.”

  “I won’t. I’ll hide here. The
war with Italy will be over soon, I know it. I’ll hide until I am no longer considered the enemy. Then we can get married and make lots of babies until we are too old.”

  Edie didn’t laugh. “That’s mad. It could be months, years even before the war’s over. You can’t hide in here for months.”

  “Why not? People have. I’ll live on cow’s milk and what you bring me.”

  “What I bring you? Angelo, for God’s sake. You would be discovered in a minute.”

  “Ah. You don’t love me after all. You gave me your body, your strange territory, but you won’t take the risk so we can be together.” His words were angry but his tone was almost playful and teasing.

  It was Edie who was angry. “Love has nothing to do with it. What you are proposing is insane. Not practical. Fraternizing is not allowed. We’ll both go to jail. I will be seen as a traitor. What good would that do us?”

  Suddenly serious, he caught her face between his hands. “Then let us run away together. We’ll be like cunning foxes.”

  “We don’t stand a chance. We’ll be caught right away.”

  He turned her head toward him and kissed her. “Any time with you, however short, is better than no time at all.”

  Before he could continue, the barn door banged open and Ned Weaver burst inside. He hesitated for only a moment, then raised the revolver he was holding and pointed it at them.

  “Step away, Edie. He’s a dangerous man. Step away from him.”

  Edie had been standing in Angelo’s arms, her back to the door. She turned at once so that she was shielding her lover.

  “No. No. Ned, please, put down that gun.”

  “I’m taking him back where he belongs.”

  In a split second, Angelo responded. He pushed Edie away from him and leaped toward Ned.

  Before he could reach him, Ned fired.

  —

  Tyler was just about to leave for the police station when the telephone rang.

  “I’ll get it,” he said to Rowell, who was still tidying up in the kitchen.

  Captain Beattie was on the other end.

  “Tyler, something serious has happened here. Angelo Iaquinta has apparently gone missing.”

  “What!”

  “His absence was detected this morning at roll call. It looks as if he got out of the window at the back of the hut and escaped that way.”

  “Have you started a search, sir?”

  “I was about to do just that, but I want to keep it under wraps as long as possible. I don’t want to scare the bejesus out of the civilian population. You know how jumpy everybody is about enemy parachutists and so on. I don’t consider the fellow to be dangerous, do you?”

  “Hard to say, sir. If he’s desperate enough, he might do anything.”

  “Bloody stupid to run like that. Where does he think he’s going? He took one of the bikes. He has no currency he can use. No identification, unless you count his uniform. Where’s he heading?”

  Tyler thought he could take a good guess.

  “I’ll get over to the Cartwrights’ right away. Angelo knows the farm, he might be going there.”

  “All right. Good thinking. Call me at once if you get a lead. I’ll see what I come up with this end.”

  Tyler hung up, but before he even moved from the telephone it rang again. This time it was John Cartwright.

  “Inspector! You had better come at once. There’s been an accident here. A terrible accident.”

  His voice was so choked, Tyler could hardly understand him.

  “What’s happened?”

  “Edie’s dead,” John whispered.

  —

  Angelo could barely manoeuvre the bicycle. The wind was fierce and the wound in his right arm was bleeding freely where the bullet had sliced off a piece of flesh. He could hardly breathe with the effort and the force of his feelings. He had to get away. Rationally he knew he couldn’t get far under these conditions, but he was like a wounded animal that has to go to ground – the instinct to run and hide, to stay alive as long as possible, was a powerful one.

  He pedalled as hard as he could up to the crest of the hill. The trees were tossing and heaving in the wind. Suddenly he remembered there were the remains of a shepherd’s hut deep in the woods. He’d come across it in the summer when he was foraging for firewood. He might be able to make himself some kind of shelter. He could hole up there until he made a plan of what to do.

  He turned the bicycle off the road onto the narrow dirt path that led into the woods. There was some respite from the wind there, but in the deep shadow of the trees it was hard to see where he was going. He dismounted. The ground was so rough and uneven that it was easier to walk and push the bike. The tumbledown hut was just ahead.

  What was that?

  There seemed to be a pinprick of light coming from among the loose bricks at the base of one ruined wall. He moved closer. Was it a dropped torch? He held his head up, almost sniffing the air like a dog. Was there somebody else in the woods? The only sound was the creaking of branches. He pulled out the gun that he’d taken from Ned Weaver and cocked the hammer, aiming the barrel toward the dot of light. Nothing moved.

  He risked bending closer. He put the gun carefully on the ground and unhooked the lamp from the bicycle. He flashed it over the wall of the hut. There was a narrow opening at the base, perhaps the size of a postbox slot. Impossible for anybody to get through. But then he realized that a heavy branch had fallen across the lower bricks. He could see that the tiny light was coming from some kind of underground space.

  Quickly, he returned to the bike. He had to get away before anybody saw him.

  —

  The silence on the other end of the line was so profound that, for a moment, Tyler thought they might have been disconnected.

  “Mr. Cartwright? Mr. Cartwright? What happened? Please talk to me.”

  “It was the Italian,” whispered the voice on the other end of the phone. “He was in the barn hiding out. Ned must have heard something because he went in with his revolver. He was afraid for Edie. He was trying to protect her. The Itie shot both of them. And…” John stopped. Then he said, “Ned is seriously hurt.”

  “Is the POW still there?”

  “No. He seems to have taken off.”

  “I’ll send for medical help and I’ll come as fast as I can.”

  “You’d better hurry. I’ve done what I could to stop the bleeding but Ned caught it in the chest. I seen wounds like that in the Great War. I don’t think he can last.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  Tyler hung up and ran back to the kitchen.

  “Oliver. There’s been a shooting at the Cartwrights’.”

  “What the…?”

  “The POW escaped from the camp and went to the farm. Apparently the Land Girl has been killed and the son is badly injured. I’m going there immediately. According to John Cartwright, the Italian was the one doing the shooting.”

  Tyler headed upstairs to his room. “Contact Captain Beattie. Tell him we’ll need a doctor and an ambulance at the Cartwright farm. Say we’ve located Iaquinta but there’s been gunfire. One fatality, one injury. The POW isn’t on the scene but he must be in the vicinity. Beattie should send a search party over there right away.”

  “My God, sir.”

  —

  Tyler drove as fast as he could and he was at the farmhouse in fifteen minutes. John Cartwright was standing at the gate, holding up a storm lantern. The light winked in the dim light.

  As soon as Tyler had stopped the car, John ran over to him.

  “They’re down in the barn. Susan is with Ned.”

  “Is he…?”

  “Barely alive but he’s conscious.”

  Hurriedly, Tyler followed him.

  The body of the young Land Girl was several feet away from the entrance. She was lying on her side. The entire right side of her forehead was a bloody, pulpy mess. Tyler stopped only briefly to check on her. She was obviously dead.

&nb
sp; Farther inside, near the partition, Tyler could see Susan Cartwright kneeling beside her son, who was lying flat on his back. She had a towel pressed to his chest but it was already soaked with blood. As Tyler went over to them, he could hear the gurgling, liquid sound of Ned’s lungs at every intake of breath. Susan looked up. Her face was sheet-white. Tyler dropped to a crouch next to her, and behind him John held up the lantern, which swayed in his unsteady grip.

  “An ambulance will be here shortly,” said Tyler. He gestured to Susan to move back and gently lifted the blood-soaked towel. There was a ragged hole in the centre of Weaver’s chest and blood was pumping out. Tyler replaced the towel and applied pressure.

  “Ned. Can you hear me?”

  The injured man’s eyes flickered open and he made a sort of grunting sound.

  Tyler raised his voice. “Can you tell me what happened?”

  Ned’s eyes focused on him. “Are you a doctor?” he whispered.

  “No, it’s Inspector Tyler. The policeman you talked to before. A medic will be here soon. Can you tell me what happened?” he repeated. “Who shot you?”

  “Itie ran at me. He grabbed the gun. Shot me in the chest.” He struggled to lift his head. “How is Edie?”

  “Not good, I’m afraid.”

  Ned sank back. “Is she dead?”

  “Yes, Ned, she is.”

  Weaver licked his lips. “I’m thirsty.”

  Susan scrambled to her feet. “I’ll get some water.”

  John grabbed her hand. “No water, Susan.”

  She shook him off in a fury. “Didn’t you hear? He’s thirsty.”

  Tyler looked at her over his shoulder.

  “Your husband’s right, Mrs. Cartwright. With a wound of this nature, he mustn’t be given anything to drink.”

  Her face was contorted. “Stop questioning him, then. You’re making him worse.”

  Tyler didn’t want to say “This might be the only chance I get,” but John did it for him.

  “We must know what happened, Susan.”

  “He told you. Leave him be.”

  Ned’s eyes fluttered. “Edie got in the way. Didn’t mean it. Didn’t want to shoot her. He came at me. Grabbed gun. Went off.”

  Tyler glanced around quickly. There was no sign of the weapon.