Chapter 9 - Nobody Leaves Carter
The drainage ditch carried them west through waist-high weeds.
Every hundred yards Eli expected gunfire.
Every hundred yards they found only silence.
That was not comforting.
Hale could barely walk.
Turner drifted in and out of consciousness.
Jack carried him until his legs shook.
When Frank offered to take over, Jack refused.
“I got him.”
“You’re bleeding.”
Jack looked down.
A bullet had torn through the fabric over his upper arm.
“Scratch.”
“That’s not a scratch.”
“Then it’s an angry scratch.”
Tommy whispered, “He’s becoming funny. He must be dying.”
Even Hale smiled.
For half a mile, they were soldiers again instead of trapped animals.
Then Eli stopped.
Ahead, the ditch ended near a dirt road.
Beyond it stood a barn.
No movement.
No vehicles.
No birds.
Again.
Too quiet.
Jack crouched.
“You see something?”
“No.”
“Then why stop?”
“Because I don’t.”
Jack nodded as if that made perfect sense now.
Eli crawled forward alone.
He studied the road.
Fresh tire tracks.
Boot prints.
A cigarette butt crushed into mud.
Still smoking.
He backed away.
“Patrol nearby.”
Hale whispered, “Can we go around?”
“East loops back toward the village. South is open field.”
“North?”
Eli pointed toward the barn.
“Through there.”
They moved carefully.
Frank opened the barn door.
Inside were abandoned tools, hay bales, and two terrified French civilians—a woman and a boy no older than twelve.
The woman raised both hands.
“Américains?”
Eli lowered his rifle.
“Yes.”
She began crying.
The boy stared at the wounded men.
Hale knew a little French.
He spoke with her.
Her name was Claire Laurent. The boy was her son, Mathieu.
German soldiers had searched the farm less than an hour earlier.
They were looking for Americans.
“How many?” Eli asked.
Hale translated.
Claire held up both hands twice.
Twenty.
Jack muttered, “Wonderful.”
Then Claire said something else.
Hale frowned.
“What?”
“She says there’s another German group moving west. They expect to meet near the bridge.”
“That’s our route,” Frank said.
Eli looked at the map.
The bridge crossed a narrow stream three miles away.
Beyond it lay American lines.
The Germans had anticipated that too.
Jack stared at Eli.
“This still feel like a normal ambush?”
“No.”
“Somebody knew our route.”
Hale heard them.
“Careful.”
“You think we have a traitor?” Tommy asked.
Nobody answered.
The word itself felt dangerous.
Eli looked at the civilians.
“Can they leave?”
Hale asked.
Claire shook her head violently.
The Germans had taken her husband two days earlier for helping wounded Allied soldiers.
She did not know if he was alive.
Mathieu reached into his shirt and removed a small American dog tag.
Eli froze.
The boy handed it to Hale.
Hale read the name.
“Thomas Avery.”
Frank whispered, “I know that name.”
Avery had served in another company.
Missing since D-Day.
Claire led them behind the barn.
Three small graves lay beneath an apple tree.
Each had a crude wooden cross.
On one hung an American dog tag.
On another, a British identification disk.
The third had no name.
Claire had buried them herself.
Eli removed his helmet.
One by one, the others did the same.
Even Jack.
Hale translated as Claire spoke.
“She says they came wounded. One American, one British, one she thinks Canadian. Her husband tried to hide them. They died before the Germans came.”
Mathieu pointed at the nameless grave.
“He never spoke,” Hale said. “They don’t know who he was.”
Eli knelt beside the earth.
He thought of the unknown marker they had passed days earlier.
A soldier without a name was still somebody’s son.
Somebody’s brother.
Somebody’s friend.
Jack stood behind him.
“We should go.”
Eli looked up sharply.
Jack added, quieter, “But we should remember where this is.”
Eli’s anger softened.
“Yes.”
They moved on.
Claire showed them a cattle path through the orchard that avoided the road.
Before leaving, Eli gave Mathieu half his chocolate ration.
The boy broke it in two and handed half back.
“For soldats,” Claire translated.
Eli almost refused.
Then he accepted.
“Tell him thank you.”
As they left, Claire caught Eli’s sleeve.
She pointed to his German rifle.
Then to the road.
“Sniper,” she said in broken English.
Eli nodded.
“Yes.”
She looked at him intensely.
“Good sniper?”
Jack answered before Eli could.
“The best.”
Eli glanced at him.
Jack shrugged.
“It’s true.”
They reached the stream near dusk.
The bridge was guarded.
At least fifteen German soldiers.
A truck.
A light machine gun.
Hale studied the position.
“We cannot fight through that.”
Eli pointed downstream.
“Can Turner swim?”
Turner opened one eye.
“Hell no.”
Jack said, “You’re from Minnesota.”
“I said I can’t swim with my leg looking like a broken chair.”
Tommy found a narrow section hidden by trees.
They built a crude litter using jackets and branches.
One by one they crossed.
Eli stayed on the east bank.
Again.
Jack noticed.
Again.
“Not this time.”
“Jack.”
“No.”
Eli’s patience snapped.
“You think standing next to me makes up for what you did?”
Jack flinched.
The others went quiet.
“No.”
“You beat me because you were embarrassed.”
“I know.”
“You put your boot on my fingers.”
“I know.”
“You made every day in England worse because hurting someone smaller made you feel bigger.”
Jack’s jaw tightened.
“I know.”
“Then stop trying to pay for it in one afternoon.”
Jack looked at the ground.
“I can’t.”
Eli stared.
Jack’s voice dropped.
“My younger brother was small.”
Nobody had heard this before.
“Name was Charlie. Kid got sick when we were little. I used to fight anybody who touched him.”
Eli said nothing.
“He died at fourteen.”
Jack swallowed.
“After that, every weak thing I saw made me angry.”
“Why?”
“Because I couldn’t save him.”
Eli understood more than he wanted to.
Jack looked up.
“I thought if I hated weakness, I’d never feel helpless again.”
Eli’s voice softened but did not forgive.
“So you made other people helpless.”
“Yes.”
The answer was immediate.
No excuse.
Jack crossed the stream first.
Then turned.
“I’m not asking you to forgive me.”
Eli handed him the German rifle while he climbed down.
“What are you asking?”
Jack offered his hand.
“Let me be better than I was.”
Eli looked at the hand.
Then took it.
Not forgiveness.
May you like
Not yet.
But something had begun.
