Maybe there really was a Valhalla? In the meantime, take joy where you can, he thought. His eyes wandered again to Lisette's naked body.
The cigarette was nearly smoked down, and he was thinking about lighting another, when he heard another vehicle on the road. This one was moving more slowly, feeling its way along the dark country road almost with stealth. He moved to the window and glanced out, but saw no headlights. Was it a military vehicle, he wondered, or something else? It was just possible that it might be a farmer moving illegal produce along the road, taking a huge chance. The price of breaking the curfew was a bullet in the head.
A French farmer did not worry him. But if it was a squad of SS on patrol — or worse yet, members of the French Resistance — he did not want to be caught in the house. The SS might very well shoot him and be done with it. However, the French Machis would take their time cutting him into pieces with small, sharp knives, or perhaps torture him with hammers — he had heard rumors that this was their favorite implement to use on captured Germans. The thought made him shudder.
The French were nothing more than cowards, not real soldiers at all, but they were vicious all the same. With the advance of the Allies, and the Germans losing their grip on the countryside, the Resistance had grown bolder.
The vehicle was coming closer; he heard the engine slow as it approached the house. He didn't like the sound of that at all.
He moved away from the window and quickly tugged his clothes back on. His rifle was in a corner; he snatched it up before touching Lisette's shoulder. She only mumbled sleepily, so he shook her roughly until her eyes blinked awake.
On the road beyond the house, the vehicle came to a stop. The engine idled a moment, then switched off. He heard hushed male voices. They spoke French, which could only mean one thing.
"Machi ici," he said to Lisette, which was the best explanation he could give in French. He tried again in German, "The Resistance is here."
But Lisette had understood his broken French well enough. She sat bolt upright and pointed at her nightgown, flung on the back of a chair. Rohde grabbed it and tossed it at her.
Lisette peered out the window. “Mon frere,” she whispered.
Lisette had explained that the children were her brother's and that he was away. Away where? Rohde had wanted to know. She had been vague on that point. Now, Rohde thought that he had the answer. Her brother must be a member of the Resistance. In the dead of night, her brother must have returned to see Lisette and his children. Rohde was sure now that the Frenchmen were not after him. There was no way that they even knew he was at the house.
Rohde intended to keep it that way. He did not even think of staying to fight. He did not like the odds, taking on an unknown number of Resistance fighters on their own territory. Lisette would just have to deal with her brother on her own. For her sake, Rohde hoped that her brother didn’t figure out that Lisette had taken a German lover.
He straightened up from hurriedly tying his boots and gave Lisette a lopsided grin, then blew her a kiss. "Au revoir," he whispered, testing the limits of his French once more, then slipped out of the room, through the small farmhouse, past the useless old dog asleep in the farmhouse kitchen, and out the back door into the farmyard.
He was as silent as moonlight and shadow. Rohde hadn't survived as a sniper without possessing certain skills; by now, stealth was second nature.
He imagined his brother's ghost moving alongside him, keeping him company.
We make a good team, Carl. No one can hear us. We move like shadows in the night!
Moments later he was running across the farmyard. The humid night air was full of conflicting smells — honeysuckle, and the musky scent of some passing wild animal; the sweet scent of dewy grass being crushed under his boots, and then pungent manure.
He legged it across the next field toward the safety of the dark woods, the only sound coming from the long grass swishing against his legs. From the farmhouse, he finally heard the dog bark, then men's voices.
Rohde melted into the shadowy trees and was gone.
Chapter Nineteen
Back in the farmhouse, feeling her way in the gloom of night, Lisette pulled on her nightgown and then fluffed the pillow that still held the shape of the young German soldier's head. She smoothed out the tangled sheets. She hoped that it would enough to erase any signs that Dieter had been there. The last thing that she wanted was for her brother to find any clue that a German soldier had been in her bed.
She felt ambivalent toward the German. What was he to her? To answer truthfully, he was more than any single thing. He was a lover, which she had never had before. It was a delicious secret to have a lover. And yet, she felt no actual love toward him. The feel of his body next to hers at night was pleasant, and she was sure that the German enjoyed every bit of what he had taken from her. But she sensed nothing like love from him, either. In the end, she decided that it was simply a bargain that had been struck between them, without any particular sentiment.
And then there was the more practical matter that the German soldier brought them food. Tins of rations, including canned meat. Chocolate. Even bread from the Wehrmacht bakeries that somehow still managed to operate even as the war closed in around them. Without the arrival of the German that day at their water pump, Lisette and the children would have gone hungry.
Thanks to the German, she and the children had been eating like barons for the past two weeks.
Their old dog finally heard the voices approaching from the road and barked a warning.
Lisette rushed into the kitchen, which a moment later was filled with the bulky figures of men. Their body odor was pronounced in the summer heat, new sweat layered on top of old. In the country where so few houses had running water, sweat was usually the familiar smell of honest toil, but she thought that she detected a tang of fear under it all. At any moment, they might be found out by the SS. The French weren't the only ones who patrolled the roads at night.
Her brother pushed forward. Even in the dark she recognized him. He was not a particularly tall man, but years of farm toil had made him strong. He took her by the shoulders, but they did not hug.
"Henri," she said. "Thank God you are safe."
Her brother did not bother to acknowledge her concern. She had the sense that he was making a show of bravado for the men. And yet, something in his face seemed different. He looked older, somehow, as if the last few weeks of fighting with the Resistance had hardened him. He was more than the simple farmer he had been.
"These men are hungry and thirsty," he said gruffly. "We dodged the Germans on the road twice just now.”
“Mon Dieu,” she said, well aware of the consequences of encountering a well-armed German patrol.
“We were too smart for those Germans. These are good men.” Henri clapped a nearby man on the back and gave him a little push toward Lisette. “You remember Stefan from the village? He is with us."
Clearly, Henri wanted Lisette to notice Stefan. She found herself face to face with a vaguely familiar farm boy until he ducked away shyly.
“You must give these men something to eat,” Henri ordered.
"We do not have much," Lisette heard herself say. "There is barely enough as it is."
"See that you fix them something," Henri said sharply. "Where are my children?"
"Wide awake and frightened in their beds, I'm sure," she responded, sounding more annoyed than she meant to. "Go see them, now that you have woken them up."
"I will."