She drifted in and out of... sleep? consciousness?...for what felt like an eternity. And then, finally, she heard, “Go ahead to a compartment,monsieur. You’ll be warmer.”
Warmer. That was a nice thought. She felt as though she’d been carved from ice.
“Oh no, that’s quite all right. I’ll stay with the car for the duration. It isn’t a long trip, once we get underway.”
“I’m afraid I can’t allow that,monsieur. It is far too dangerous for a passenger to be on the flatbed. The tunnel has such sharp curves, and at the speeds we must go, there is always the risk thatthe ropes mooring your auto will snap. You’d be hurled against the tunnel wall—it’s happened before.”
A prayer from her school days filled her mind, the words translating from Latin to French as she went.Hear us, O holy Lord, Almighty Father, eternal God: and deign to send your holy angel from heaven, to guard, cherish, protect, visit, and defend all who dwell in this house. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
Well, not a house, but she didn’t know the Latin word for “automobile on a train car that could well try to splatter itself against a tunnel wall.”Housewould have to do.
She heard Henri leave, knowing he had no choice.
But the exchange meant they’d be moving soon. She clung to that. And as she heard brakes releasing, engines chuffing, and finally felt the world move under her, another tear trickled out. Part relief. Part fear. Part prayer.
Without sight, she had only her ears to tell her when they entered the tunnel. How many sharp curves were there? When they barreled around the first one, the bags shifted against her, and a whimper slipped out.
At least there was no one to hear her.
Then another, the other direction, and she feared she was about to slide off the seat.Hear us, O holy Lord, Almighty Father...The words clattered over and over through her head like the wheels across the tracks.
She was going to die here. In a mailbag, in the back of her own auto, somewhere in the Pyrenees. What did they do with the cars that flew off, into the tunnel wall? Did someone come and drag them out, or would Henri have to hike through the tunnel to try to find her body?
Her children would think she’d abandoned them. Marcel would mourn her. Alliance would crumble—no one else had all the pieces, to put it together again.
Faith.Again, the word echoed through her mind in Marcel’s voice. What would he say, if he was here?
That while she was important, she was not God. While she ought to do what he called her to do, she should never be so arrogant as to think he couldn’t achieve his will without her.
That if she wanted to be a part of his plan, she had to cry to him, not only when all hope seemed lost, butalways.
Was the whole world rocking? Was she falling? Dizziness swamped her, and she couldn’t get enough air. What would happen to her when she died? Hell? Purgatory? Heaven?
Maybe thiswaspurgatory. It seemed as horrifying as Dante’s version, anyway. Endless pain, endless labor until she’d finally worked off her sin.
No.Now it was Sister Ursule’s voice.You are not working off your sin. You are working through it. Working it out of your soul. You have to let go of the sin, ma petite, for the Father to take it from you.
She’d never much liked Dante, and she hadn’t liked her teacher’s answer to her objection to it, either.
A sudden noise jerked her back to awareness. The car door. Opening, then closing. And then Henri’s voice, there and straining to sound good-humored. “I’m back. If the car falls off, at least we’ll be together.”
She managed a muffled sound to assure him she was alive.
He chatted, but she had no idea what he was saying. The world was rocking again, swinging. She was a child like Elise, on that swing in the yard, soaring up to heaven, back down. Up, down. Up, down.
“We’re almost there. Stick it out for a few more minutes, Zelie. Courage!”
Faith.Marcel again, smiling at her with those emerald eyes.You need faith.
Clangs, clatters, more swinging—side to side instead of upand down. Beams of light. Heaven? Hell’s flames? No—flashlights. Flashlights, sweeping over her bag.
“These are diplomatic bags,” Henri said. “Top secret information—for the marshal, you know. I need to get to Madrid as quickly as possible, I have time-sensitive correspondence in here. Move it along, if you can.”
Another eternity, and then came the cries of,“Adios. Vaya usted con Dios.”
The words probably had some idiomatic meaning, but her mind would parse only the literal:Go with God.
Was he here with her, in this cramped bag, feeling her pain? Was he in this car, running from the Nazis too? Was he with her mother in jail?
