As they unloaded their things and set out blankets, Jimmie felt a deep admiration for Pierre. Despite the man’s fatigue, his will to protect his granddaughter burned bright. He made them feel good about themselves, he inspired laughter under dire circumstances and, perhaps most admirably, he made them feel human. And for that, Jimmie would be eternally grateful.
As night set in, Pierre told Aline a bedtime story about how her parents met. Aline had heard it many times, Jimmie believed, considering that she corrected her grandpapa in a few sections of the tale, and she added a couple descriptions of her own. And it struck Jimmie that Pierre was purposely creating variations of the story to entertain, as well as to encourage his granddaughter to tell the tale. Soon the room grew dark and everyone settled onto blankets on the floor, lined up tightly like tinned sardines. They gradually drifted to sleep, except for Ruth and Jimmie, lying side by side.
“Are you still awake?” Ruth whispered.
“Yes,” Jimmie said.
“What are you thinking about?”
A memory of Hurricanes, chasing away Stukas, flashed in his head. “I was wondering how my fellow pilots and ground crew are doing. It feels like an eternity since I’ve seen my friends—Cobber, Fanny, Benny, and Horace. I hope they are alive and well.”
“You’ll see them again, soon after I get you on a ship.”
“I hope so.” Jimmie moved his injured arm, resting the cast on his stomach. “What are you thinking about?”
“My aunt and uncle, and if the Germans have reached Paris.” She swallowed. “I pray that they’ll be okay.”
“They will,” he said. “Doctors and nurses will be safe.”
“I needed to hear that,” she said softly. “Merci.”
Jimmie peered up into the darkness. “What will you do when we get to Brittany?”
“Hopefully, Lucette and I will see you, Pierre, and Aline board a ship bound for England.”
“I was referring to you and Lucette. Have you thought about where you will go?”
She drew a deep breath. “I’ll travel with her to Toulouse, where her parents live, until it’s safe to return to Paris. Toulouse is not far from Andorra and Spain, so we can escape from France if needed. In the meantime, we’ll find a way to support what remains of the French Army, or join resistance fighting. I must do something, other than run away.”
He turned on his side to face her, the outline of her body illuminated by a bit of moonlight coming through a window. “Come with me to England—you and Lucette.”
“Non,” she said. “Lucette needs to see that her parents are safe, and I don’t want her to make the journey on her own.”
“You’re a good friend to Lucette,” he said. “Selfishly, I want you to be far away from the conflict, but I understand and accept your decision. To be honest, I’d do the same thing if I were you.”
Ruth rolled onto her side. “It doesn’t mean that I don’t want to be with you.”
Jimmie reached out his good hand and found hers. He felt her fingers intertwine with his, and a deep yearning tore at his heart. “When this is all over, I will find you.”
She nuzzled next to him. “I’ll wait.”
CHAPTER 34
VAIGES, FRANCE—JUNE 13, 1940
An intense morning sun beat down on Jimmie as he walked between Ruth and Lucette on a dusty, unpaved road filled with thousands of refugees. The clopping of hooves—coming from a mule that was pulling a wagon with Pierre, Aline, and two young boys—filled his ears. He rubbed the back of his neck, stinging from sunburn, and continued his trek through the countryside.
“How far do you think we’ve come today?” Lucette asked, adjusting the strap of a leather bag on her shoulder.
“Ten, maybe eleven kilometers,” Jimmie said. He wiped sweat from his brow and wondered if he and the others had the stamina, given the heat and humidity, to walk until sundown.
Ruth slipped a folded map from her pack and, while continuing her pace, scanned their route. “Ten is about right. There’s a village up ahead. We should stop for water and something to eat.”
“Sounds good,” Lucette said.
Jimmie approached the cart with Aline and Pierre. “In a little while, we’ll be stopping at a village.”
Aline nodded. She nudged Pierre, curled on a shallow layer of straw in the back of the cart. “Grandpapa, we’re getting out soon.”
Pierre cracked open his eyes and patted his granddaughter’s hand.
The past two days had been grueling. The unseasonably warm weather and lack of cloud cover slowed the progress of the exodus. Scores of people, stricken with exhaustion, lined the sides of the road. Some people sought a reprieve from the heat by setting up camps under the shade of trees, but the masses—driven by the fear of Luftwaffe air raids—carried on with their pilgrimage toward freedom.
The sound of gunfire had dissipated, Jimmie believed, due to their increased distance from Paris, and he had little doubt that the German Army was closing in on, if not already breached, the country’s capital. Although their immediate threat of Panzers had dwindled, the Luftwaffe continued their relentless air raids on towns, villages, and roadways. Several times, the grind of German aircraft engines sent Jimmie and his group scrambling for cover under trees. They’d avoided direct gunfire and bombs from the Luftwaffe, but other refugees were not as fortunate.
The day before, they’d walked upon a series of demolished wagons and a lone, burned-out automobile that was riddled with bullet holes. Near the roadside were six fresh mounds of dirt and makeshift crosses constructed from fallen tree limbs. The worst part, for Jimmie, was recognizing that two of the graves were half the size of the others. He’d attempted to block Aline’s view of the atrocity by walking next to her, but she’d already spotted the burials.
“Some of them were children,” Aline said, looking up at Jimmie.
“Oui.”
“I hope they didn’t suffer.”
“Me too,” he’d said, his heart breaking. “Nothing is going to happen to you. You’re going to be safe.”
She nodded, removed Piglet from her backpack, and clutched him to her chest.
Encounters with the Luftwaffe weren’t the only barrier to reaching the coast. They were nearly out of food and well water was hard to come by, so most of their drinking supply came from streams or ponds. The rations that Colette and Julian had given them, which was everything in their pantry, didn’t last long. They had to barter a good deal of food to convince people to allow Pierre to ride in the back of their wagon. While Pierre received a few lifts as a gesture of compassion and good will, many people were unable or reluctant to add another body to their wagon, overflowing with family members and possessions from their abandoned homes. Jimmie hoped that he’d never reach a point where he’d turned down someone in need, but he also understood that fear of starvation or the pain of having one’s child go hungry could drive one to do unthinkable things.
