So what he was about to do certainly didn't make any sense.
But it didn't matter: there still wasn't any choice.
He couldn't reach her quickly enough. Even before he was within arm's reach of her he opened his arms to her. Then she was in them again, and holding him tightly again, and sharing her fear and her need with him.
For a moment her hair was in his face, obscuring the view until he shifted one hand to press her head gently against his shoulder.
Nothing had changed outside. There was Wimpy, standing awkwardly on one-and-a-half feet, and there was the German officer; and beyond them there was the group of officers beside the staff car, still engrossed in their argument; and dummy4
behind them, on the roadway, the dust and the din rose together from moving vehicles and marching men in an endless single-file.
Nothing had changed. For an instant Bastable forgot everything else in the sickened realization that this was the enemy—this was the German Army—and that he was still a helpless spectator, a fugitive from a defeated army.
No! He tightened his grip on the child. No! It was impossible that it could happen like this. This was only one corner of the battlefield, and he wouldn't believe it—he must force himself not to believe it, never to believe it!
He could hear the guns in the distance, and his head ached, and he was bone-weary.
The German officer looked at him briefly, just one quick dismissive glance, and then turned back to Wimpy, raising his hand to the brim of his cap.
'M'sieur—je vous rr-mercy.'
He was turning away—
'M'sieur!' cried Wimpy suddenly. 'Siv-oo-play, M'sieur—
Capitaine!'
Please?
The German caught himself in mid-turn, and turned back.
'M'sieur?'
Was Wimpy mad? For Christ's sake—the German had been leaving them, and Wimpy had stopped him—for Christ's sake!
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Wimpy hopped forward towards him painfully. 'M'sieur—
Capitaine—'—and plunged into another stream of French, of which Bastable could only catch the pleading tone.
'Kommon?' The German frowned, following the words and the gestures doubtfully—Wimpy gesticulated to himself, and to his bandaged foot as he spoke, and to Bastable himself, and to the child, finally towards the road.
'Colembert,' concluded Wimpy.
Colembert?
'Kolombert?' repeated the German.
'Oui, m'sieur,' Wimpy nodded obsequiously, pointing again.
'Sate-oh-sood . . . oon-peteet-vee . . . va-kilomatre—Co-lem-bear . . .' He pronounced the name with appalling clarity.
'Pray de Belléme.'
The German consulated his map, still frowning. 'Ko-lem-bear . . . Ach-so! Kolembert! Oui!'
This time Wimpy really was mad—stark, staring, raving mad!
There was no other possible explanation. On the outside he still presented the nervous and voluble servility to be expected of a French civilian in his predicament. But on the inside . . .
The German officer looked up again from his map, pursing his lip as though he shared Bastable's doubts. 'Hmmm . . .'
The moment of doubt and uncertainty elongated, stretching Bastable's nerves with it until their tautness became a dummy4
physical sensation quivering down his back. With the child in his arms, he knew that it would be useless to try and run. But with his knees trembling like this he couldn't have run if he'd wanted to. And there was still nowhere to run, anyway.
The German stiffened suddenly. 'Zair-voll—' he gave Wimpy an abrupt nod, and reversed the map case '—votre nom, m'sieur?'
Wimpy swallowed. 'Ah—ahem!—Laval, m'sieur—Gaston Laval.'
The German had produced a stub of indelible penciclass="underline" he was writing on a piece of greyish paper — on a message pad clipped to the back of the map case.
He nodded towards Bastable. 'Ay votre fee?'
'Alys—Alys Dominique Marie Laval—'
'Alys... Laval...' The German looked at Bastable again.
'Bloch—Onri Bloch,' supplied Wimpy.
Onri?
Henri, damn it. Fool? Half-wit!
'Bloch . . .' The German continued to write, moistening the tip of the pencil from time to time on his tongue—an action which reduced him from a figure of terrifying menace to one of everyday ordinariness, who had the same problems with army-issue indelible pencils as Harry Bastable himself had experienced.
'Say sar,' The German signed the paper with a flourish.
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But. . . Gaston Laval, and Alys Laval—Alys! and Henri Bloch—
Onri Block-headed Bastable . . . what the blue-blazes had the German written?
And now he was handing the paper to Wimpy—and Wimpy was gabbling effusive gratitude, and bobbing and bowing over the scrap of paper in his hand, until the German finally cut him off with a curt 'M'sieur', half embarrassed and half contemptuous (or maybe simply scared, like any British officer in the same position, thought Bastable, that he was about to be embraced and kissed on both cheeks by an unshaven, garlic-breathed Froggie).
But whatever it was, it turned him away hastily, and marched him back down the pathway towards the group by the staff car at the roadside. Bastable watching him incredulously, aware that he had understood only a tenth of what he had seen with his own eyes, and that even that tenth was unbelievable.
'Quite a decent fellow, that,' murmured Wimpy. 'For a damn Jerry . . .'
'W—'
'Sssh, old boy!'
The German had reached his colleagues. He presented the map to the most formidable of them and pointed to something on it.
'Better not show too much interest in the proceedings.' said Wimpy softly, swivelling awkwardly towards Bastable, trying dummy4
to keep his weight off his bad ankle. 'Don't stare, old boy—
come on and get some of the things out of this damn cart, and help me into it—the sooner we remove ourselves from the scene, the better, I shouldn't wonder. Don't stare, Harry!"
Bastable started guiltily, aware that he had been watching the Germans pore over their map with a fascination unbecoming a French peasant.
'Put the child down—here, give her to me—' Wimpy held out his arms.
The limpet was again unwilling to leave Bastable's arms at first, and Bastable himself was almost as unhappy to surrender her; but with reassuring squeezes and comforting noises the thing was done again at last.
He started to unload the cart.
Leave me something soft to sit on.' murmured Wimpy at his elbow. 'And . . . that parcel there looks like the one in the kitchen—if it's food, we need it ... Is it?'
Bastable tore at the corner of the long package.
It's bread—leave it in,' hissed Wimpy. 'And those bottles of wine—leave them in too.'
Bastable grunted irritably at the unnecessary instructions.
The schoolmaster in Wimpy, which was never far below the surface, seemed to have assumed control of both of them.
'Hurry it up, old boy—hurry it up!'
Damn the man! thought Bastable hotly. There was a welter of dummy4
unanswered questions in his head, jostling each other furiously for precedence.
What had Wimpy said to the German?
What was written on that piece of paper?
And . . . Colembert—for Christ's sake—Colembert!
'That'll do. Now . . . help me in ... Not that way, you idiot—'