The Darkest Hour(72)
She traces a finger along her temple. “What did Dr. Nacht do to me, Lucie? Sometimes I can hear him.” Her finger points at the middle of her forehead. “In here.”
I drop the laces and hug her close. “We’re going to sort this out soon enough. There’ll be an entire hospital of doctors in London to help you get better.”
“I don’t know if that’s possible anymore,” she says, clutching on to me.
“Of course it’s possible.” I touch my forehead to hers. “You’re going to be your old self in no time.” Silently I cling to this hope. Because if the doctors can’t fix Tilly, then, in some way, Dr. Nacht has won.
Tilly and I don our mittens, and Maurice comes up behind us. He’ll be acting as our guide to cross the mountains. “Ready?” he asks. “We better get moving.”
The three of us form a line, with Maurice up front and myself in the back, just in case Tilly decides to wander off. As we start the climb, Maurice warns us to stay silent. We’re not to sneeze or cough or utter a word under any circumstances because we’ll soon enter the zone interdite, the forbidden region between the two countries that’s frequently patrolled by customs officials from France, Spain, and Germany. They’ll be hunting for fugitives like us, their ears tuned for any human sounds. One sentence, one word, could spell our doom.
The mountain air grows brisk, then chilly, then numbingly cold, but Maurice never stops. Far below, the little ski towns disappear from view. and soon all signs of civilization vanish. Our only company is our labored breath and the howling wind that chaps our skin. To keep my mind off my freezing fingertips, I make a list of everything I’ll do when we reach London. I’ll take a hot bath, first of all. I’ll drink a whole pot of tea. Real tea. And I’ll talk to the SOE and blow Dorner’s cover sky-high. He must be so smug, thinking that he has wormed his way into the Brits’ good graces, and the thought of seeing him in handcuffs keeps me fighting through the cold.
I’m thinking about hot tea and Dorner in chains when Maurice yanks both Tilly and me to the ground. My face smacks against the dirt and a rock cuts into my cheek, but Maurice presses a finger against my lips to keep me quiet. It’s for good measure, too, because when I lift my head slowly I glimpse a man leaning on a ledge not far below us. He’s wearing a white hooded parka, and he must’ve dozed off because he should have spotted us coming. I’m not sure if this man is German or French or Spanish, but judging by the size of Maurice’s eyes he isn’t a friendly.
Maurice nudges Tilly. “Keep climbing,” he mouths to her. Then he gestures for me to hold still. It seems like he wants us to continue upward, but more slowly, one-by-one to minimize any noise we might make. Giving Tilly a nod, I watch her crawl up the rise, holding my breath with every inch that she moves. She has almost reached the top of the nearest ridge when her foot slips, loosening a rock that tumbles down the mountainside. I flatten myself against the ground even more, but the damage is done.
“Verdammt!” the guard says, bolting awake from his perch. He lunges for his rifle when he spots us. “You there! Halt!”
“Run!” I shout at Tilly. I jump to my feet and am about to push Maurice forward when I see that he’s reaching for something strapped to his ankle. A gun. He jerks it free and aims, but the guard shoots off a round first. The shot echoes across the peaks.
“Merde!” cries Maurice. He’s so flustered that he drops the gun, but before he can retrieve it I snatch it up.
“Go! I’ll handle this,” I say, hitting the ground again before he can answer. While he scurries up the rise, I wedge myself behind a boulder and locate the guard. He’s shouting at us and scrambling over the rocks to reach us, and a hot panic rises inside me.
Pushing the air from my lungs, I steady my hands before another thought can cross my mind. I pull the trigger and a sharp cry stabs through the bitter air, followed by silence. The guard crumples out of my view, and I start to reposition myself, but Maurice has crawled back to me and pulls at my arm.
“I have to finish him off!” I tell him.
“He’s dead.”
“How do you know for sure?”
Maurice only tugs harder. “No man can survive the amount of blood he’ll lose. Please, you need to trust me. If any of his comrades are nearby, they’re bound to find us if we don’t move.”
I hate the idea of leaving behind unfinished business, but the thought of facing more Nazis is an idea I hate even more. So I tuck the gun in my waistband and hustle after Maurice and Tilly, and I don’t think about the body that we’ve left on a chilly mountainside.
Hours later, Maurice finally announces that we should be in the clear. We’ve seen no other trace of the patrols, and he leads us toward a battered hunting cabin that overlooks a moonlit lake. Reflected starlight glitters on the dark waters, pretty as Christmas candles, but I hardly notice the view. I’m too busy staggering inside and stumbling to find wood to light the fireplace, but Maurice won’t hear of it. Too dangerous, he says. He tells us to get a little rest, and he gets no protest from Tilly and me about that. We fall onto the near-frozen cots, too exhausted to unlace our boots, but it isn’t long until Maurice prods us awake again. By then I’m shivering all over, but I don’t get any pity from him. He merely hands me my pack and swings open the door, allowing the stinging wind to sneak inside and wrap around our ankles.