A bomb suddenly landed in a house ahead and Cole saw a section of a wall begin to totter. He knew it was going to fall in the street. It was going to fall on him. He downshifted and steered the car up on the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street. He heard a tire blow and he was pretty sure because of the terrific jolt he felt when he hit the curb that he’d broken a spring as well.
He saw the section of wall slowly detach itself from the burning house and begin to fall. Cole tried quickly calculating how much room he had to clear the wall—when the wall would land, where it would land.
He watched in disbelief, as the falling section seemed to grow larger, the disintegrating brick monolith trailing a swirling veil of red dust, reaching out to crush him. The MG shuddered valiantly through the debris, bumping over bricks, timbers, and bits of people’s lives scattered on the sidewalk.
Cole was under the wall, caught in its shadow. He could sense it falling on him, feel its presence grow as it pushed the air out of its way in an attempt to reach him.
He was through.
The world exploded behind him. He felt the MG shake from the concussion and he was enveloped in a cloud of dust so thick he could not see where he was driving. But worse, he could not breathe as the thickness filled his mouth and nostrils. He saw a lorry in front of him and he tried to swerve to miss it, but the MG did not respond. He slammed on the brakes and skidded into the heavy rear wheels of the vehicle. He was dazed but he managed to climb from the vehicle.
He looked around to get his bearings and heard the drone of aircraft engines. He had to get to Rebecca’s house. If he was caught out in the streets he wouldn’t last five minutes.
Cole was three blocks from Warren Square and sanctuary when he began to run. He could hear the demonic whistle of the bombs falling from the sky and then the blast as they crashed into the ground, spewing debris into the air. The horizon was a false sunset with a red and orange tint, flickering as fires raged throughout the city. Above it was the true sky, a natural blue perverted by columns of dirty smoke that rose as monuments to destruction.
Cole tasted the dust and the smoke stung his eyes and nostrils and he heard the frantic clanging of the fire bells. He knew that firemen dressed in long coats and archaic helmets, like those worn by ancient warriors, were out, fighting the fires. But it was no use—the fires were too numerous and widespread and the gallant men in their quaint little helmets must have known that they could not win.
He saw Rebecca’s house and ran across the square, barely avoiding a speeding fire truck. He bounded up the few stairs and tried the handle. The door was locked.
Cole looked up and saw another wave of enemy bombers headed toward him, their throbbing engines echoing off the buildings.
“Rebecca?” he shouted, pounding on the door. “Rebecca? Open the door.” He slammed against it in desperation but it wouldn’t budge. “Rebecca!” He jammed his elbow into the narrow windowpane, breaking the glass. He reached through and found the lock. He flipped it and threw the door open. “Rebecca? Where are you?” He heard the rumble of the approaching planes and knew that they had only moments to reach a shelter. The flak guns began firing, sharp cracks that increased in tempo as they found the range.
“Rebecca?” he called, moving into the drawing room from the hall. He saw her, a filthy, dust-covered ball curled up in the corner, her head pressed tightly between her knees.
He ran over to her and grabbed her wrist. “Come on. We’ve got to get out of here.”
She jerked free and pushed herself back into the corner like a trapped animal, trembling. Rebecca was wild with fright and began to bat and scratch at Cole. He tried to trap her in his arms and lift her to her feet as he heard the bombers getting closer. They were out of time.
“You’re going to get killed unless you get your ass moving. Now get up!” He tried to lock his arms around her waist, but she fought back, slapping at him.
“Leave me be,” she screamed at him. “Go away!”
He stopped and looked up, as if he could see through the roof of the old building, as if the bombers were visible. It was the high-pitched whine of the falling bombs that stopped him. The bombers were here.
Cole’s eyes searched the drawing room and through the open French doors, the dining room, looking for some protection. He made his decision.
He ran into the dining room and pulled the heavy oak table into the opening between the two rooms. With the heavy table and the load-bearing overhead they might just have a chance.
He heard the bombs exploding and the house shook heavily in response.
He took Rebecca by the wrists, jerked her to her feet, and dragged her to the makeshift bomb shelter.
The front windows disintegrated with a blast as Cole pulled Rebecca to the floor and rolled under the table.
The house trembled and clouds of dust filled the room as the world outside exploded. Cole pulled Rebecca close to him as she screamed in fright, her body shaking. The bombs were a constant crescendo, one melting into another until it seemed that there was nothing but one deafening rumble, punctuated only by the high-pitched whistle of the falling bombs or the screams of the terrified little form in his arms. He heard things falling, crashing—he heard the destruction of the world and it went on.
He realized that he was trembling as well and he pulled Rebecca closer. He did not feel frightened, he did not think that he was frightened, but his body shook uncontrollably. He saw Rebecca’s face, saw the tears slowly sliding over her checks, and began frantically kissing her hair and face, hoping to drive the fear away, trying to tell her that he was here, that everything was going to be all right. He tasted dust, tears, and sweat and his kisses became more passionate. She responded and suddenly her mouth was on his and her arms clenched so tightly around him that he found it difficult to breathe.
The explosions continued and the air became heavy with a thick fog of plaster dust. The heavy table bounced into the air several times from the impact on the foundation of the house, and Cole felt the floor shift with each explosion.
Then it was silent in their little shelter.
They lay still and outside all that remained was the mad clanging of the fire engines, the shouts of people, and the roar of a hundred fires. Cole inhaled a mouthful of dust and began coughing uncontrollably. “Are you all right?” he finally managed.
“Yes,” came the muffled reply, her face pressed against him. “I think so.” Rebecca pulled away from him. “I’ve never been so frightened in my life.”
“Join the club,” Cole said. He spat out what he could of the plaster dust. “Sorry. I think I inhaled the living room.”
“There’s soda in the liquor cabinet. Unless you fancy a drink.”
“After that, I fancy two drinks.” He smoothed her hair back out of her eyes. “When I saw those bombers headed for your house …” He couldn’t finish.
“You shouldn’t have come,” Rebecca said, getting up. She looked around. “My poor house.” The clanging of fire bells caught her attention. “I’ve got to be going. They’ll need me at hospital.”
Cole stood. He pulled a sliver of wood from her hair. “You’d better give yourself a minute. You’ve just been through hell yourself.” He didn’t want her to go.
“Why did you come?” she asked.
He looked at her, dumbfounded. “That’s a hell of a question to ask at a time like this.”
Rebecca said, “I wasn’t very kind when we last spoke.”
“I’m just being chivalrous. Don’t read too much into it. You were a damsel in distress, that’s all.” That wasn’t enough—it was much more than that. “It’s just …” He couldn’t find the words and knew that anything that he tried to say would sound false. He laughed. “Yeah, I’m glib all right. I can’t string two words together.”
“You puzzle me at times. I was dreadful to you and yet you came to rescue me. Is that it?”
“Why do you care why I came?” he said.
“That’s the
problem, isn’t it, Jordan? I do care.” She brushed herself off and moved into the parlor, pulling debris away from the liquor cabinet before opening the shattered glass doors. “This was a present from Daddy for my marriage. Not just the cabinet—the house and everything in it. I never fully explained why I became a nurse. I became a nurse because I wanted my own life. I didn’t want to live in my father’s shadow. I wanted to feel needed, that what I did mattered.” She handed Cole a glass. “You can understand that, can’t you?”
“Yeah,” he said, remembering. I feel like an ornament on your arm, he had told Ruth after a few drinks one night. Don’t be a fool, she had replied, rolling over and going to sleep. He never spoke to her again about his feelings.
“Greg was the most charming man that I ever met. Handsome, educated, a vast circle of friends. We had a storybook romance, married, honeymooned in Italy, and when we returned home to this house, which Greg would only live in as a concession to my daddy’s wealth, I prepared to go to work one day. ‘We’ll have none of that,’ Greg said. ‘Not for a wife of mine.’ I love him but I realized that I was just another part of his perfectly balanced, carefully chosen life. I was well on the way to becoming my mother. I was certain, there was no doubt in my mind, that Greg would soon follow the same path that my father had chosen, that eventually I would not be enough for him.”
“You’re working. That should mean something… .”
“Greg’s in Africa. Perhaps he’s dead. No one is certain. Now you’ve come into the picture. Am I a part of your perfectly balanced life thousands of miles from home?”
“Is that what you think?” Cole said, his temper rising.
“I don’t know,” she said. “You reveal so little of yourself.”
“Lady,” Cole said, “it’s not like that. Don’t lump me in with anybody else—not your daddy or your husband, because I’m neither. I’m just a sailor. Okay, I’ve played the field. I told you that. I never hid the fact that I did. I’m here because I was scared to death that you were in danger. When I’m not with you I think about you.”
“That’s all very—”
He moved closer. “I’m not done yet. You talk about need. No one ever needed me. Not ever. I could have been another sofa in the living room for all that mattered. And I’ve made it my business to make sure that I never needed anyone. You said something about half a life. Maybe you’ve got half a marriage, Rebecca, and I didn’t figure that out until just now.” He set the glass on the liquor cabinet and pulled Rebecca into his arms and kissed her deeply. She resisted at first but finally gave in, her soft lips yielding to his.
“Jordan—”
“Listen to me,” he said. “I was alone before I met you. I’m not now. Maybe I’m being selfish about the whole thing but I don’t care. I’ve never felt this way about a woman before. I couldn’t stand to hurt you. I don’t want to lose you. I don’t want to be alone again.”
“You say ‘I’ so very much. Does your world revolve around only what you want? What you need?”
“Okay. So that makes me selfish.”
She laid her head against his chest. “You must understand, darling, not everyone can live their lives for themselves alone. I cannot be that way. Regardless of my feelings for you. Please understand. Please know that I want nothing more than to be with you. It is not as simple as you think.”
Cole held her at arm’s length so that he could look into her eyes. “It is,” he said defiantly, ready to fight to keep her. “We care about one another. That’s all there is.” He wrapped his arms around her protectively, the thing that he had most wanted to do in the square when they first walked together. “That’s all there is,” he said again, but he knew that it wasn’t. There was Rebecca’s devotion to a man who might be dead.
Chapter 8
Coastal Command Headquarters, 21 July 1941
Cole stayed with Rebecca as long as he could before she went off to work. He wanted to make love to her, but he knew it would have been wrong—she would have to be the one to say when. He’d salvaged his MG, changed the tire, and after skirting the worst areas of destruction, pulled up to the sentry post and presented his credentials.
“The Old Lady got it tonight, didn’t she, sir?” the sentry asked.
Cole followed the sentry’s gaze and looked over his shoulder at the glowing horizon. London was burning again. “Yes, she did,” Cole said, thinking of Rebecca.
“Still,” the sentry said, “she’s a tough old bird, she is. She’ll come out of it.”
Cole agreed but the sentry had not seen the carnage that he had seen, and it was that and nothing more: carnage. A woman’s torn body, one arm gone, her head lolling back and forth as if to protest her death as she was passed down from the rubble of what once was her home. A fireman tried to provide the last bit of dignity to the corpse by keeping her legs closed and her tattered skirt wrapped close to her body; there were no words fit to describe that single incident. One of a dozen that Cole saw as he drove back to the base and that stayed with him as he entered the photo analysis room.
He found the bottle that he and Markley had shared earlier. He held it up to the light. A thin film of liquid covered the bottom. Markley had been more than generous to himself.
He took a swig, pulled the bundle of Leka Island photographs from a file drawer, and began methodically laying them, one after another, a studied cadence, on the light table. When he reached the end of the light table he began again, and again, and again until Leka Island covered the surface table. He flicked on the light, lit a cigarette, and began to study the photographs.
Something was going on there, he knew. Or something was going to go on there. He laid the lens on the prints and began his journey up and down the rows of photographs. Antiaircraft sites. He reached without taking his eyes off the images and found a red grease pencil in the track at the end of the table. He marked the site—three of them, all on the east side of the island, covering the cluster of smaller islands. He continued on and found new buildings barracks or structures of some kind. These were better quality photographs than anything he’d seen before. He turned one over and read the stamped date, time, and sortie number. This had to have been N-for-Nancy’s last run.
“Oh, it’s you, sir,” Markley said from the doorway. “Thought we had ghosts about.” He saw the photographs on the light table. “A man’s got to get some rest, don’t you know, sir? A man can’t do a proper job unless he has a good night’s sleep. Sometimes I take a drop to help me sleep, sir, but I always make time for a good night’s sleep.”
“Yeah, I saw the bottle.”
Markley coughed into his palm. “Hair of the dog, I assure you, sir.”
“Must have been a Great Dane,” Cole said. “What about these photographs? They’re new.”
“Yes, sir. Came in from Leuchars. That crew tossed the cameras but not before pulling out the film canisters. Most fortunate for us, sir.”
“Yeah. It’s our lucky day. There’s a hell of a lot more detail here than the other photographs, but it still doesn’t answer my question.”
“What question would that be, sir?”
“What’s all of the shooting about? If there’s nothing there, why make a fuss? I need an eyewitness.”
Cole watched Markley stroke his red mustache with his thumb and index finger in thought. “You know, sir. There’s a Norwegian chap down in Charts and Maps. Got out just before the Germans took over. He’s a sailor, I believe. At least he drinks and cusses like one.”
“Get him.”
“Begging your pardon, sir, but it’s a bit late to be waking someone up, don’t you think?”
“Now, Markley.”
It was thirty minutes later that Cole heard the sound of cursing in the hall. It grew louder and more profane until a short, stocky, florid-faced man filled the doorway. Markley stood a respectful distance behind the Norwegian, his uniform disheveled and a red welt under his eye.
“Who the fuck do you think you are, getting m
e out of a warm bed?” the Norwegian said with a thick accent.
“Have a care with those words!” Markley roared. “You’re speaking to an officer.”
Cole ignored both of them. “I need your help.”
“Fuck you and your help. You aren’t English! Fuck you, whoever you are.”
Cole waved Markley back as the big man moved at the Norwegian. “Lieutenant Jordan Cole, United States Navy.”
“Now the goddamned Americans want to boss me about. First it was the Germans, and then the English. Now the goddamned Americans. What next? The Swedes?”
“Do you know anything about Leka Island?” Cole asked.
The Norwegian turned to Markley in pure despair and jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Who is this imbecile?” he asked the gunner’s mate.
Markley was about to answer when Cole jumped in. “Listen to me, you foulmouthed son of a bitch, I know you can cuss and you can probably drink, but I haven’t got time to listen to your life story. So I’ll ask you again and this time I’ll speak slowly so that pea-sized brain of yours can wrap itself around every fucking syllable. Do you know anything about Leka Island?”
The Norwegian pursed his lips and nodded. “This is a fellow who can grow on you,” he told Markley. He walked to the table. “I captained the ferry that ran between Goteboro and Alborg and I know Leka Island better than you know the hairs on your ass.”
“Okay,” Cole said, handing him the lens, “take a look at the photos and tell me if you see anything unusual.”
The Norwegian looked at the lens in disgust and tossed it against the wall. “I don’t need these fucking things.” He hooked his hands behind his back, bending over the table, and began studying the photographs, blowing out great breaths through heavily veined cheeks.
Finally he stood. “Here’s your problem here, sonny. You’ve got one too many islands in the group.”
Cole almost asked if the Norwegian was sure, but he didn’t want to start him on another tirade. Instead he said, “Which island shouldn’t be there?”
Between The Hunters And The Hunted Page 8
