Page 76 of Love in the Shadows

Fabienne handed over the documents, her heart racing.

“You work at the dairy. That’s in the other direction,” he said without looking up.

She rested her arm on the window frame. “Yes, Herr Obersturmführer. We have a—”

“I am Kommandant Neumann’s wife.” Johanna leaned across Fabienne and held out her papers.

He took them, shone a torch at them, and handed them back. “Get out of the van.”

Fabienne did as he instructed.

“I said, I am Frau Neumann, the kommandant’s—”

“Yes, Frau Neumann.” He clicked his heels. “We still need to do our job. If you would also kindly step out of the vehicle, please?”

There were four guards in total, and no obvious signs of another patrol lurking. Still, that was too many men for Fabienne to challenge without risking their lives. But if Johanna couldn’t pull any weight with them, she might not have any other option but to engage.

“Open the back?”

The pallets had shifted on the uneven track roads, and part of the trap door was visible if someone had a keen-enough eye. She scratched her palm and saw the same recognition in Johanna’s eyes.

“I will inform my husband of this,” Johanna said.

He looked at her, unphased by the threat, and smiled. “Be my guest, Frau Neumann. My instructions come from higher up than your husband.”

Putain, putain! Fabienne stood still as he flashed the light around the empty van, working out the sequence in which she could take the guards down without getting either her or Johanna shot.

“What’s in the churns?” It was always the same question.

She put her hands in her pockets, casually, located the cold steel shaft of her pistol, and rocked on her heels. “They are empty. They will be filled as soon as I get to the dairy.”

He shone the light into her eyes, and she turned away. “You are going in the wrong direction for the dairy.”

“My daughter is sick,” Johanna said. She stepped between the officer and the back of the van. “That’s why we’re heading this way.”

“Why didn’t you take the main road into town?”

Fabienne remained silent. The officer looked from her to Johanna and back again.

“Where are the child’s papers?”

“I forgot them. I was in a hurry. She has a fever. I fear she has tuberculosis.”

He indicated to the soldier with the rifle directed at Fabienne. “Keep an eye on them.” He went to the passenger side door and peered in.

Fabienne slowly took hold of the gun, her finger poised on the trigger. Any attack she made would have to be swift and accurate.

The officer returned to the back of the van. He called the other two soldiers forward.

“Move the pallets.”

The two soldiers climbed into the van.

“Wait,” Johanna said.

All four men looked towards her. The man with the rifle lost his focus on Fabienne, shifting his aim to nowhere in particular.

It was a split-second distraction, but long enough for Fabienne to shoot him square in the chest, and then the lieutenant. The children beneath the hatch screamed, distracting the soldiers inside the van. The men grappled to align their rifles, which had been slung over their backs while shifting the pallets. They were not fast enough. Fabienne fired another two bullets, and they fell to the floor with a heavy thud.

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