The same man answered. “Why?”
“If a Gestapo man says he’s intelligent, he’s not honest. If he’s honest, he’s not intelligent, and if he’s honest and intelligent, he’s not in the Gestapo.”
All four soldiers laughed.
“I know I can get in trouble, but they’re only jokes.”
“Of course,” the soldier replied.
Franka was frozen, incredulous. John hadn’t given her any signal. Nothing.
“I have another joke, if you promise not to tell anyone else.”
“Of course,” the soldier sitting beside him said.
“All right, this is a good one,” he said. “What’s the difference between Christianity and National Socialism?”
“I don’t know,” one of the soldiers said.
He paused a few seconds. “In Christianity one man died for everybody. But in National Socialism everybody dies for one man.”
The men exploded in laughter.
John rose to his feet and pulled his pistols from his pockets. “Franka! Down!” he shouted as he stitched a line of bullets across the chests of the men sitting across from them. The last soldier rose, reaching for his rifle. John put two rounds into his face. The truck ground to a halt, almost knocking John off his feet. He took a second to regain his balance before emptying his weapons, sending bullets tearing through the tarpaulin and into the cabin. He reached down to her. She had the soldiers’ blood all over her face. “Are you shot? Are you hurt?”
“No, I’m fine.”
John took one of the dead soldiers’ pistols and jumped out of the truck. Franka followed him. The door to the vehicle’s cabin opened, and Vogel stumbled onto the road, an ugly wound staining his chest. He got off two shots before John put him down and sent his body collapsing onto the slush in an ungainly heap. John checked him, and the men in the front. All were dead. John was leaning against the side of the truck. Franka went to him.
“You came back. You could be across the border by now.”
“I told you I wasn’t going to leave you.”
She hugged him, but as she drew back she saw a red stain from where she’d pressed against his body.
“Oh no,” she said, ice running down her spine. “Show me.”
He lifted his arm to reveal a gunshot wound on the right side of his chest, level with his elbow.
“It’s not so bad,” she lied.
“I can make it, but we need to go now. More soldiers are coming.”
“Wait. I need to get something first.”
Franka ran to the cabin of the truck and opened the door. The Wehrmacht soldiers were slumped forward like rag dolls, their blood spattered all over the shattered windshield. The driver’s body collapsed onto the road in a formless mess. The medical kit was on the floor. John was sitting on the snow as she returned to him. She cut off some gauze and wrapped it around his chest in an attempt to stem the flow of blood. The top of his pants was already soaked red. He took off his Luftwaffe jacket and threw it on the snow.
“Hold this on here.” She handed him a thick bandage. “Keep as much pressure on it as you can.”
John nodded, but his face was china white. He reached into his rucksack for a civilian coat and just managed to slip his arms into it. It was wet with blood in seconds.
“We have to get out of here right now,” she said.
Franka took the map from his pocket. They had traveled several miles from where they’d planned to journey to the border. Once back there the cliff face awaited.
“I can make it,” he said. “Get the body out of the truck, and let’s drive back to where we were.”
Franka moved around to the passenger side of the truck, where she pulled out the other soldier’s body. She helped John to his feet, placed his arm over her shoulder, and led him to the truck, where he was able to pull himself up and in. The engine was still humming, the keys untouched in the ignition. She turned the truck around and sped down the road, the cold wind blowing in their faces, the carnage of the dead bodies they’d left on the road far behind now.
“You’re going to need a doctor, and soon.”
“Get me across the border, and we’ll figure the rest out later. You saved my life once. It looks like you’re going to have to repeat the trick.”
They drove for a few minutes before reaching a point where the cliff face seemed lower, the tree line closer. He put his arm over her shoulder as they abandoned the truck, not bothering to cover their tracks. The border. Freedom. She took his rucksack and dumped out as much as she could before taking its weight on her back. They moved together, him leaning on her, a trail of crimson in the snow behind them.
“I can make it,” he repeated.
Trees limped past on either side in the foot-deep snow. They came to the cliff face once more. It was twenty feet high.
“Get the rope. Anchor it around a tree, and lower me down.”
Franka reached into his pack for the rope and looped it around a sturdy tree. He wrapped it around his arms and gripped it with both hands as she lowered him inch by inch. John kept his feet on the rocks as he went. She knew how tired he was now but knew also what sleep would bring. Franka climbed down after him. He was sitting against a rock, barely able to keep his body upright, when she reached the bottom. She picked him up again.
“Let’s go, marine,” she said in English—just as he’d taught her.
She heard the soft rushing of the stream and pushed through the trees to find it. It was frozen at the edges, the flow of water free through the middle.
“This is it,” she said. “We can do this.”
“I can hack it,” he said, but his voice was weak, as if any step could be his last. He stumbled again, and she reached down to pick him up.
“Come on, John. We’re nearly there. Just a little farther now.” They kept moving along the stream bank, one more step, and then another. His feet began to cross, and he tripped again, bringing her down on top of him. He moaned as she tried to pick him up, but she ignored him, forcing his arm over her shoulder. His grip was slackening, but still they kept walking. Somehow.
“We’re so close. Don’t give up on me.”
Several minutes passed as they trudged forward, until his grip faded and he fell to the ground. The customs building appeared through the trees. It was only thirty yards away.
“We’ve made it!” she cried. “We’re in Switzerland. We’re free.”
“You’re free,” he whispered. “Thank you, Franka, for everything. Take the film.”
“No!” she shouted. “I won’t let you die, not while we’re so close. Now get up. Do you hear me? Get up. I’m not leaving you behind.”
She reached down, put her arm around him, and took his full weight onto her shoulders.
“We can make it. We are going make it. I am not letting you die,” she said over and over as she lumbered toward the small stone-gray customs building, the trees of the Black Forest so thick above her that she couldn’t see the sky.
Chapter 15
The countryside outside the city of Basel, Switzerland, October 1945
The setting sun dabbed the horizon red, orange, and purple. Franka stretched out the muscles in her back while she leaned on the garden hoe in her hand. In the distance the hills and trees of the Black Forest were discernable as dark shapes against the sky. The evenings were cooler now, the heat of summer dispelled by the coming of the autumn air. Neat green rows of potato plants covered the earth for several hundred yards in every direction, their uniformity broken only by the figures of the other farmhands returning from their day’s work. Franka bent to pick up the bucket of weeds she’d pulled and began to make her way back toward the barn. Rosa Goldstein was waiting for her by the tree they often had lunch below and greeted her with a smile.
“I didn’t think you’d still be here, Franka. I thought you were going home.”