His lips were still cold and chapped with past fever, but Laura knew nothing except that her lover had returned to her. They were starved for each other. She clung to him, kneeling, as he kissed her with an intensity that belied their separation and his recent illness. He let her go for an instant and unbuttoned her shirt with trembling fingers, dragging it off her shoulders and dropping it into her lap. The firelight played over her naked skin, turning ivory to gold, and he bent to embrace her, pulling her across his thighs and reaching for the waistband of her slacks.
Laura lay back in his arms, letting him undress her, lifting her hips as he removed the pants from her legs. Finally she was wearing nothing but sheer cotton briefs, and his expression as his gaze raked over her was one she would never forget.
“Beautiful,” he whispered. “So beautiful.” He set her on her blanket on the floor.
Her eyes were green slits, her limbs pale and slim, her auburn hair backlit by the fire. She raised her arms above her head to enhance his view.
He swallowed hard, bending, and tugged at her underwear. When the pants resisted he ripped them from her body with one savage movement and thrust his head between her thighs.
Laura gasped and stuffed her fist into her mouth to keep from crying out. The pleasure was so sudden and so intense that her mind reeled with it. For long, torturous seconds he enticed her with his lips and tongue until she was pulling on his hair to raise him, desperate to have him inside her.
“I can’t wait,” he rasped, moving over her, fully dressed. She kissed him wildly and tasted herself on his mouth.
“Don’t wait,” she urged, as eager as he. “Don’t.”
He took her at her word, opening his fly and entering her with a force that rapped her head against the wooden floor. She didn’t even feel it. She clutched the leather shoulders of his jacket and wrapped her legs around him, her eyes shut tight against any input but the satisfaction of her body joined to his.
It was over quickly for both of them. They lay panting on the floor, Harris pinning Laura under him. After several minutes their breathing returned to normal.
“I haven’t made love in two years,” Laura finally said dreamily, reaching up to push his damp hair off his forehead.
“And you probably never will again after this experience,” he said gloomily. “I feel like I raped you.” He sat up on his haunches, regarding her anxiously.
“It wasn’t rape,” Laura said, laughing. “Did you hear me protesting?”
“Are you sure I didn’t hurt you?” he asked, still uncertain.
“I’ve never felt better in my life,” she said, smiling, and he relaxed enough to grin back.
“Well,” he said, releasing his breath explosively. “Merry Christmas.”
She giggled wickedly.
“Oh, I remember that laugh,” he said, still grinning. “Nobody could believe that sweet, innocent face after they heard that laugh.”
She launched herself at him, throwing her arms around his neck, and he clutched her to him as if he would never let her go.
“God, I love you, Laura,” he said, his voice breaking. “I love you so much.”
“Even though I’m not as sweet as I look?” she asked archly, drawing back to peer at him in mock severity.
“‘Her hair was long, her foot was light, and her eyes were wild,’” he recited softly. “That’s you.” He ran his hands down her naked back tenderly, rough palms against soft flesh.
Laura tilted her head. “Keats?” she said, surprised.
“Yeah,” he murmured, a little embarrassed. “Don’t look so thunderstruck. I can read, you know.”
“And that’s supposed to be about me?” she asked.
“I always thought so,” he answered, with a sober sincerity that touched her. He hardly seemed the poetic type.
“My hair’s not long anymore,” she said, smiling ruefully.
“That can be corrected, as you pointed out to me.”
“All right, all right, I’ll let it grow. But I must say that I never thought of myself as particularly light footed.”
“Graceful, then,” he said.
“That, either.”
“You are.”
“And wild eyed?”
“Just wild,” he said mischievously, and kissed her. He lifted her into his arms and sat with her in his lap, drawing the blanket around her. They huddled together in front of the hearth, feeling the heat from the flames seep into their bones.
“Warm enough?” he asked.
She sighed comfortably. “Yes. On days like this I really miss American central heating.”
“I didn’t think it got this cold in France.”
“It does,” she said resignedly. “Often.”
“It’s a good thing the old man didn’t come downstairs a few minutes ago. He would have gotten the shock of his life,” Harris said.
“He never leaves his room,” Laura said. “We bring him food, and washing things, and he uses the commode up there.”
“He must be really out of it,” Harris said.
“He is.”
Laura expected him to make some further comment about the suitability of this fate for Henri Duclos, but he surprised her by saying nothing.
“It’s light now and still snowing,” she said, looking over his shoulder at the window.
“Christmas Day,” he said. “I wonder what the folks are doing back in Evanston.”
“Opening gifts?”
“I guess so. Going to church, getting ready for the big dinner. All the relatives come. My Uncle Jack gets drunk and my Aunt Minnie knits everybody things that never fit.”
“I was feeling really homesick yesterday,” Laura confessed. “Missing my family.”
“That’s understandable.”
“And missing Thierry and Alain.”
At the mention of their names his arms dropped, and he looked away from her.
“Things will never be the same for anybody after this war,” he said dully.
“Alain’s like a saint in this town now, the local Jeanne d’Arc,” Laura said. “People revere him.”
“Sure they do,” Harris said, stirring. “That kind of courage is almost mystical. People revere someone who had it because they know that’s the closest they’re ever going to come to it.”
“But not you,” she said softly. “It’s not the closest you’re ever going to come to it.”
“I’m not sure any more,” he said softly. “I’ve seen things, terrible things, and done things, to stay alive...” He paused. “It isn’t all as simple and straightforward as I once thought it was.”
“I know.” She reached up and touched a thick scab on the side of his face, by his ear. “How did you get this?” she said.
“Getting out,” he said.
“Of the camp?”
He nodded. “Barbed wire.”
“And this?” she said, drawing her hand across a welt she could see inside the collar of his shirt.
“Staying in,” he said grimly.
She stared at him.
“One of the guards was a weird kind of guy, a big Czech turncoat with hands like hams. He liked to whip the prisoners when they got out of line. And I mean he really liked it.”
“Did you get out of line?” Laura whispered, knowing the answer.
“I guess he thought so,” Harris said, looking away from her. “I was one of his favorite targets.”
Laura’s mouth went dry when she considered the situation: Harris, young and handsome, at the mercy of... She didn’t want to think about it.
“You might say he was an added incentive to get out,” Harris concluded, pulling her close.
She hung on him for a moment, then drew back and began slipping his jacket off his shoulders.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Isn’t it obvious?” she said, as he shrugged out of the jacket and she started on his shirt. When it was open down the front she began kissing his chest, and he tangled his fingers in
her hair, holding her against him.
“Keep it up, you’re doing fine,” he said hoarsely, as her hands went to his belt. Then he grew impatient and stood to pull off the rest of his clothes, turning to toss them on a chair.
Laura almost cried aloud when she saw his back. It was crisscrossed with scars, some purpled welts, others obviously older and fading. Tears sprang to her eyes and she blinked them away.
He faced her again, his body still beautiful though thin enough for her to count his ribs. But when he knelt to embrace her she forgot everything but his closeness, and she responded to him the way she always had: with complete abandon.
It was much more leisurely this time and they relished it, lingering with each caress, building slowly to a climax that left them both satiated. And so, as the villagers gathered for morning mass or prepared for the holiday, Laura and Harris slept.
Laura woke first at ten o’clock, and realized that Brigitte would be home in two hours. She dressed hurriedly, putting her blanket over Harris where he lay. She built up the fire quietly, being careful not to disturb him, and then picked up his clothes to wash. She heated water in the iron pot hanging in the fireplace and washed them in the sink with brown soap, rinsing them with cold water from the pump. Then she went to the cellar and, shivering, put them through the hand wringer before returning to hang them on a stand in front of the hearth.
Harris, exhausted, slept through all of it. He continued to sleep while she took a tray to Henri and refurbished the old man’s fire, then came back to the kitchen and started readying the midday meal.
They had precious little to celebrate with but she had badgered a chicken out of Pierre Langtot’s wife, which she now cut up with some hoarded vegetables and put in the iron pot to stew. She sliced bread and opened jars of Brigitte’s silvered corn, left over from their last gardening efforts. Laura had even gotten some gateau in Bar-le-Duc, purchased with ration books acquired from Kurt Hesse. He was a big help.
“Is any of that for me?” Harris asked hopefully. Laura turned to look at him; he was sitting up in a tangle of blankets, his hair in an unruly cowlick on one side. He rubbed the stubble on his chin.
“Certainly,” Laura replied.
His nose twitched. “Smells good,” he said, indicating the stew pot. He stood and looked around for his pants.
“Aren’t those still wet?” she asked him as he slipped into them, padding barefoot to her side.
“Dry enough,” he said. “You can cook too?” he said, pretending to marvel at her abilities.
“You wouldn’t think so if you’d been eating with us lately,” she said dryly. “This is a feast.”
“I always seem to make out all right in the food department around here,” he said, picking up a slice of bread and biting into it. “You treated me pretty well when I was hanging out in Pierre’s barn.” He pulled a chair up to the table and sat, watching her work.
“Oh, well, we had to keep you going then,” she said. “For patriotic considerations.”
“And now?”
“Now I have my own reasons for wanting you healthy,” she said, smiling impishly, and he grinned.
“Can’t say I expected to be spending Christmas here,” he said, polishing off the bread and picking up a raw carrot. He bit off a chunk and sat with his legs splayed in front of him, chewing.
“Disappointed?” she said in mock concern, batting her eyelashes at him.
He chuckled. “Best Christmas I ever had. Enjoyed an interesting buggy ride, am awaiting a sumptuous meal...” he indicated the table before him, “and got laid.” He winked. “Twice.”
Laura laughed, flushing. “You’re disgusting.”
“Ah, I’ll bet you say that to all the guys,” he replied, popping the last bit of carrot into his mouth and standing up. “Well, I hate to say this, but I think it may be time for a bath, n’est-ce pas?”
“You can heat the water in the fireplace,” Laura said.
“Nah, take too long,” he said, going to the sink. “If there was one thing I got used to in the camp it was washing in cold water. When I could wash at all.”
He proceeded to dunk his head and torso, scrubbing them with the bar soap, rinsing under the pump and drying on the towel Laura handed him.
“Okay if I shave later?” he asked her, rubbing his ears.
“Dan, I don’t care,” she said.
He shrugged a little sheepishly. “I haven’t been fit company for a lady in so long that I’m sort of out of touch with civilized behavior.” He sighed. “As you may have guessed from my performance this morning.”
“Will you stop talking about that?” Laura said. “It was glorious.”
“Was it?” he said, grabbing her. “Want it to be glorious again?”
She danced away from him. “Down, soldier,” she said, laughing. “You’re supposed to be recuperating from a serious illness.”
“I’m recuperated,” he replied, examining the damp bandages on his hands. “In fact, I think these are going to come off right now.” He peeled away the gauze and studied his fingers. “Looks okay. Some discoloration, like the doctor said, but everything works all right.”
“You got frostbite from exposure?” Laura asked.
He nodded. “The guy with me was just a skinny kid. He had it much worse. I tried to keep him going but I couldn’t.”
“It wasn’t your fault, Dan,” Laura said gently.
“It’s never my fault,” he said flatly. “But people keep dying all around me just the same.”
“Tell me about the missions you went on after you left me in London,” Laura said, to change the subject. “I got a few letters from your sister before Pearl Harbor, but they were vague.”
“To get past the censors.”
“Yes.
“Well, I was up to the same type of thing I did here,” he answered. “Before the U.S. got into the war I spent quite a bit of time in occupied countries, helping out the rebels. I was in Poland and the Netherlands, Norway, lots of places. Met some great people.”
“Anybody like me?” Laura couldn’t help asking.
He looked at her, his blue eyes incandescent. “Nobody like you,” he replied. “Ever.”
Laura knew she would have to be satisfied with that. “And after Pearl Harbor?” she said.
“I volunteered for the Leathernecks, flying missions out of England,” he replied.
“Until you were shot down.”
“Yeah.”
“You were in the camp six months?”
“Just about. I spent most of my time planning to escape.”
“And you did.”
“I almost didn’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“The day I left I was on a labor detail, repairing the roof of the prisoner’s quarters. I’d bribed a guard to let me switch positions to be closer to the gate.”
“Bribed him with what?”
“My watch. I had it in my shoe when they picked me up and they didn’t find it.”
“So what happened?”
“At the last minute they changed guards. I don’t know whether the guy chickened out or what, but there I was with my great escape all planned, at the opposite end of the compound from where I had to be to get out. ”
“What did you do?”
“I fell off the roof.”
“What!”
“I pretended to faint, weakness or whatever, and took a dive. The old parachute roll came in mighty handy.”
“Why?” she asked, intrigued. She was always amazed at how he could turn almost any situation to his advantage.
“I figured they’d bring me to the doctor and they did. They always wanted to keep their slaves in working order. The doctor’s hut was right next to the gate.”
“How did you get away from the doctor?”
“I knocked him out with a medical dictionary.”
Laura started to laugh. She couldn’t believe it.
“It’s the truth,” he said seriously. “I s
at there while he was examining me, looking around his office for the biggest thing to hit him with, and there it was. The thing must have weighed ten pounds. I waited until he turned away and then slammed him in the back of the neck with it as hard as I could. He went down like a curtain.”
Laura continued laughing helplessly.
“It wasn’t funny at the time, take my word for it. I was shaking so hard I could hardly walk, much less run. And the garbage they’d been feeding us didn’t exactly make for super energy, although the guys on the work details ate better than the rest.”
“And your bombardier?” Laura asked gently, sobering.
“He was waiting for me in the kitchen.” He paused. “I shouldn’t have taken him with me. I could see he was too weak. But he wanted so much to go.”
“Better for him to die standing up than to live on his knees,” Laura said.
Harris nodded. “I don’t think he would have lasted much longer in the camp anyway. He chose to go out the way he did rather than to die there.”
Laura put down her knife and went to relight the candles on the tree, glancing at her watch.
“Expecting someone?” Harris asked.
“Brigitte will be here soon,” Laura replied.
“That’s all right, isn’t it? She’s part of the plan,” Harris said.
“Yes, it’s just that she didn’t know we were going to be working today, getting anyone out. And she certainly didn’t know it was going to be you.”
“Did you tell her about me?” Harris asked quietly.
“Of course. She was the one who urged me to meet you in London.”
“I must remember to thank her,” he said softly.
“She works with Vipère now. She’s very useful.”
“Oh?”
“She has...contacts,” Laura said, and let it go at that.
“Can I help you with anything?” Harris asked, peering over her shoulder as she set out the plates.
She looked back at him. “You can sit down and rest. Sister Mary Joel said you were at death’s door two weeks ago.”
“Sister Mary Joel talks too much,” he replied darkly. But he did sit, and Laura noticed that he settled in with a heartfelt sigh that made her regret their recent athletics. But not too much. She felt the utter relaxation, the boneless fluidity of fulfillment spreading through her body, and she couldn’t be truly sorry.
Clash by Night (A World War II Romantic Drama) Page 25
