Aubrielle's Call (27 page)

CHAPTER 36

They were mistaken.

The long shallow beach prohibited even the smallest boat from coming ashore.

John carried Aubrielle to the large
château
that faced the water then lowered her legs to the ground. “See the small boats beyond the beach? Even the flat-bottomed rowboats will hang on those sandbars at high tide.”

“How will we reach them then? Swim?”

More displaced civilians ran down toward the beach toward the uniformed Frenchmen at the waterline watching the boats.

John ran his hand along the back of his neck and looked back toward Dunkirk. A large ship appeared anchored near the long stone jetty. It would be evacuating soldiers.

Have I made a mistake and bypassed her best chance to escape?

“John, look.” Aubrielle pointed at a woman following the group of civilians.

In late pregnancy, the woman struggled to keep up with the group as they crossed the sand.

“I see her.” He squeezed Aubrielle’s shoulders. “I’ll be right back.” He crossed the beach with his long strides to the pregnant woman.

“Let me help you,” John said as he reached her.

She had fallen to her knees in the sand but looked up at him and nodded.

He pointed to Aubrielle beside the
château
. “My fiancée is there.” He gripped her arm and helped her to her feet. “There’s more cover near the building until we decide what we’ll do next.”

She latched onto his arm with a firm grip and a grateful smile.

Several servicemen ran past them shouting plans to bring automobiles down to the beach.

“That might work.” John watched the men as they ran around the side of the building toward the sea road.

“What might work?” Aubrielle helped the woman into the shade beside the building.

“Those men.” He pointed as four more ran past. “They plan to drive vehicles into the channel far enough to form a pier and reach the small boats.”

“Is that possible?” the pregnant woman asked.

Aubrielle shared a long look with John. “We’re fine. Go. Help them. If we stay on this beach, it will be certain death for all of us.”

John hugged her. “Stay close to the building.” He released her and ran after the last group of soldiers. Their plan was desperate, but they were out of options.

This has to work.

* * *

“I’m Aubrielle.” They settled against the building and sat on Aubrielle’s blanket from Arras. “When are you due?” she asked.

The dark-haired woman gave a sharp laugh. “My name is Lucie, and I was due last week.” A protective hand caressed her round stomach. “I give thanks each day that he or she has decided to make me wait. I pray the baby will hold on a few days more.”

The first car rounded the
château
scoring deep tracks in the soft sand. The driver passed the first sandbar before the tires slipped sideways and spun in place.

Soldiers watching near the water line ran to assist. They pushed the car into the water. With each incoming wave, the front of the car lifted and tried to wash backward.

“They’ve stopped,” Lucie commented.

After a quick discussion over the top of the half submerged auto, the men dove beneath the waves.

“What are they doing?”

Aubrielle shook her head. “I’ve no idea.”

Another vehicle rounded the
château
. Four men, including John, ran beside it. Each time the car stuck in the sand the men forced it forward. When it stalled, they pushed the vehicle into the surf behind the first.

“When’s high tide?” Aubrielle asked the small group that had gathered near the edge of the
château
.

“After dark,” a hollowed-eyed elderly man said from across the gathering. “Not long. It’s almost sunset now. There will be another before noon tomorrow.”

Had John carried her that long? The day had muddled in her head.

I must have slept as he carried me.

“How do you know this?” challenged a stout woman with dried blood on her neck.

The man pointed at the building behind them. “The wife and I were the caretakers here. We came up from Lille every summer.” His chin quivered, and he wiped his nose.

A third car careened around the building and onto the beach, and then another. With the first pier completed, the men began another a hundred yards to the west.

The old man had been right. The sun hung low, a strange red ball coloring the sky through orange striped smoke-clouds.

The big ship had sailed from Dunkirk and been replaced by another.
At least some are getting out.

John returned to the
château
when it became too dark to work. Wet, chilled and exhausted, he leaned against the building and shivered.

Aubrielle sat beside him. “Lie down and rest.”

“We’ll need to go out to the boats when the tide comes in.” He pillowed his head on her lap.

She covered him with their blanket and rubbed his arm. “You’ll wake when it’s time.”

In the dark, she listened to the waves as they crashed closer. The tide had risen, and the water swept near.

As though the Germans knew their plans, planes returned with the tide. They dropped flares attached to small parachutes. The lights hung suspended, like a hundred tiny moons, and extended from Bray-Dunes to Dunkirk, lighting the waterline.

Several dozen men ran to the improvised piers. They made their way to the end, which was well beneath the water now. Waist-deep, they waited for the small boats to pick them up.

“This is going to work,” John said. He gripped her hand and they crossed the beach.

The old man and Lucie followed behind.

Aubrielle’s heel stung as the raw flesh pulled away from the shoe, but she tried not to limp. John would pick her up again, and exhaustion etched his face.

I can walk.

As the salt water washed over her shoes and licked against the opened blisters on her heel, she caught her breath at the pain.

John climbed on top of the nearest vehicle and held his hand out for her.

The sharp whine of a dive-bomber echoed from the darkness overhead accompanied by shouts from the beach. Explosions lit Dunkirk, back-lighting the large vessel at the jetty.

John clenched his teeth. “Damn them.” He slipped into the water and lifted her above the surf. His long legs fought against each receding wave, and as they passed from the water’s edge, an explosion rocked the beach.

Aubrielle landed on her back in the wet sand. The breath knocked from her lungs. Above her hung a thousand tiny lanterns floating in the sky. Then John was there, sheltering her with his body. She couldn’t hear his voice, but the rat-tat-tat of machine-gun fire pierced her muffled hearing.

John pressed her into the sand, curling around her until he covered her completely.

She was suffocating.

One ear buried in the sand, the other to John’s chest. The glow of a single flare floating above the waves became her focal point, the only thing she could see, and then her lungs released and she inhaled.

Time slowed to a standstill while death swept the beach.

After a long while, John rose onto his hands and knees.

She turned her head and said his name into a vacuum that stole sound.

He frowned at her. The line between his brows was back. His lips moved, but he had no voice.

Then her ears popped, and a piercing whistle slowly faded. Sound returned.

“Aubrielle?” John gripped her shoulders and pulled her upright. His hands ran through her hair checking for injury. “Are you hurt?”

“No.” She placed her hands on both sides of his face until his eyes locked on hers. “I’m all right, John.”

Behind him, the second vehicle-jetty had completely dissolved. Not even flames remained.

He pulled her to her feet, and they ran to the relative safety of the building. One by one the hanging flares failed. In the end, only the burning ship in the channel outside of Dunkirk glowed in the night. Even the stars were gone, blanketed by smoke.

When the sun rose, the men pulled the dead up the beach away from the high tide line. Some they pulled away from the water had been killed last night. Other corpses, bloated and grotesque, had washed ashore with the tide and remained.

The second pier built from vehicles had taken a direct hit. Both the boats and the bodies that had been in front of Aubrielle and John were gone. Blasted into the channel.

Like the sun, the water slowly rose again.

While they waited for the tide, Aubrielle sat with Lucie

The pregnant woman curled herself over her stomach and cried until the tears stopped, then she rocked herself, her stomach wrapped in her arms.

John walked through the waiting men, talking with soldiers. When the water reached its high point, he returned where Aubrielle waited with Lucie.

“I’ve spoken with most of the men near the water. We’re going to get the women off the beach and into the boats first.”

Aubrielle counted six including herself and Lucie. “Now?” She observed the water. The choppy waves in the channel had calmed.

“Yes.” He helped Lucie to her feet and escorted them toward the water. Three French officers flanked the other women and John made a path to the makeshift pier.

Like they had attempted last night, John climbed onto the roof of the second submerged vehicle, then lifted Aubrielle to the hood. “Are you steady?”

Aubrielle nodded and looked into the channel. Three small boats had turned and headed toward them.

Behind her, John helped Lucie onto the vehicle.

“John!”

John looked to the beach, then out at the boats. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

Aubrielle made her way to the end of the pier and held Lucie as the rest of the women walked toward her.

The men in the boat used their oars to halt their progress at the end of the vehicles. They wore unfamiliar uniforms wet from the choppy waves in the channel.

The younger man in the back of the vessel called to John, a huge grin on his face. “You make a big target up there, John. They can see you from Dover.”

“What the hell are you doing here, Bosun Sweeney?” John smiled, the first time in days. “Where’s the
Giselle-Marie
?”

“Master Keats awaits us in the channel.” A white-haired man with a matching beard offered his hand to Lucie. “Churchill put out a call to all civilian vessels requesting assistance. Keats answered the call to evacuate Dunkirk.” He passed Lucie to the man behind him, then reached for the next woman. “I never dreamed we’d find you here.”

The women filled the small boat.

Last to board the small vessel, Aubrielle held John’s hand, refusing to let go. “Get in with me, please.”

“I can’t, love. My weight will swamp the rig.” He looked at the white-haired man. “Take care of her, Mister Rice.”

“I will, John.”

Her wet hand slipped from John’s. “No. Let me stay with John.”

“Easy, miss. You’ll need to sit, or you’ll tip us over.” He gently pressed her down onto a cross-board seat. “We’ll come back for John.”

“Promise me.” She gripped his jacket. “Promise you’ll come right back here and get him.”

“On my word,” the old sailor replied. He lifted the oar and nodded to his partner. “My name is Kenneth Rice.”

“Aubrielle Cohen.”

The small boat rocked as they stroked away from the pier. Overhead, the sound of aircraft clenched her stomach. This time, they were above the clouds, their guns firing in the air. “What’s happening?”

The bearded sailor looked up. “The Royal Air Force is keeping the Luftwaffe busy.”

Aubrielle couldn’t tear her sight away from John.

He remained on the makeshift pier helping other men climb into small boats. He was easily the tallest man on the man-made dock. Then clouds blew between them and the beach, and he was lost from view.

“Fog?” Sweeney asked.

“Or smoke. We’ll take either,” Mr. Rice replied.

Through the mist, a solid hull rose, and the men turned the boat. “Ladies, this is the hardest part. You’ll need to climb that ladder to the deck.”

The small boat bobbed beside a rope ladder with rounded wooden rungs for footholds.

“
Merde!”
one of the women whispered.

A tall blonde-haired girl rose and gripped the ladder. “This is nothing.” She stepped onto the board and climbed. At the top people waited and helped her onto the deck.

“The quicker we unload you, the faster we can go back for your men.”

Aubrielle gripped Lucie’s hand. “What about her?” She looked to Ken Rice.