Henry took Sandrine’s hand and led her from the doorway of the house. She had dressed, finding herself a pair of blue grey pantaloons and shirt, over which she wore a shawl. Henry had changed into clean fatigues. A new shirt and trousers. They smelt of lanolin and polish. He left his old clothes in a heap on the floor. His abandonment of order thrilled him.
They looked set for a journey back to civilisation. Henry watched Sandrine gather together the few things she wanted to take back with her, including the dress she had carefully folded and put to one side when Pewter had come upon her. He adored her, even though he still understood so little. The fact that she was willing to share her secrets with him was not lost on Henry. She had opened her heart to him. There was no question he would give his heart to her.
As he sat in the silence of the house whilst she was changing, so much more began to make sense to him, her strength of mind and body, her determination, her passion and her drive. He could never imagine meeting another like her. She was bewitchingly unique. They said nothing as they walked from the house down the street, their heads bowed, as if in silent procession to church. Sandrine didn’t even turn to bid her home goodbye. She had long ago left her childhood home, in every way.
Henry’s mind was still a mass of questions and fears, but there was no time to consider them now. Fampoux was lost. Soon the Germans would learn the news of the British defeat, or their disappearance from the village, and they would come upon it with their strengthened units. Henry and Sandrine had to be away – better to travel lightly and quickly and be assured of their escape rather than weighed down with unnecessary items from the past. For all that history and violence and terror was behind them now. He would mourn his men for the rest of his life but only the future lay before them. Its unpredictability was enticing.
All Henry had brought with him from the house was the unit’s diary, tucked under his right arm as he walked. Whilst Sandrine had been changing he had written up his final entry. He’d left nothing out. He’d not been sparse with his details. The wolves, the method of their creation by the Church, the devastation, the fall of Fampoux. He breathed deeply and contentedly as he closed the cover of the book, his last act as an officer in the British Expeditionary Force. His gun, his packs, his iron rations, all his standard issue, he left behind at the house, the only trace of his ever having been in the village.
“There is nothing for me here now,” Sandrine announced, as they stepped away with urgent strides.
They reached the junction where the street turned onto the main road. Away to their left they could see the desolation of the trench, quiet as the grave. Beyond No Man’s Land, along the line of trees and built up earth, which marked the line of the German trench, figures like ants in the distance could be seen gathering and preparing for an assault with urgency.
To their right, climbing the slight incline to the apex of the sweeping hill, was the vast network of the British support trenches, ominous, silent and grey black.
“We’ll never get through them,” Henry warned, shaking his head. “Not that way.”
All his optimism now drained out of him, all his hope had come to nought in that moment, in the realisation that there was nowhere they could go. To the east, they would come upon the Germans. Henry would be taken as a prisoner of war, perhaps even shot and discarded in an unmarked grave. Sandrine, he wished not to think what might happen to her in German hands, whether she allowed the rage to come upon her or not. To the west, they would arrive in the support trenches, be processed and interrogated. Henry would be posted to another unit, if lucky, more likely shot for desertion, for leaving his post, suspicions being raised as to how he could have survived, to have been the last one out of there alive. To the north and south they would be caught up within the warring fronts of both sides, their fates no different, no better than going east or west. “It’s desperate, my darling,” he said, shaking his head.
She turned and stroked her fingers through his hair and kissed him gently. “Nothing’s truly desperate. Not after you’ve lived as long as my kind have,” she replied. “Come on!”
They hurried back into the tangled depths of the ruined village.
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see!” Sandrine called, tugging him by the hand.
But at the next turning, they shuddered to a dead halt.
Up ahead stood Sister Isabella, her legs astride the middle of the grey white road, her hands extended around a silver coloured revolver pointed directly at the pair of them.
“It’s you!” Sandrine hissed, letting go of Henry’s hand and dropping back onto her haunches like an animal about to spring.
“It’s me,” replied Isabella hollowly. The revolver trembled in her hands.
“How did you find me?”
“Does it matter?” Isabella asked, gently unclamping and clamping her fingers on the grip.
Henry raised a weary hand. “Please!” he said, stepping forward with both his hands raised. “Please! Let us go!”
“Be quiet, Henry!” Sandrine hissed, her eyes firm on the Sister. “Are you going to try and take me?”
The revolver wavered in Isabella’s hand. Her finger whitened against the trigger. She closed an eye, focusing on Sandrine’s heart. She felt the pressure of the trigger. One more little pull.
“No,” Isabella then said, and let the gun drop to her side.
“Why?” Sandrine asked, standing again and facing down her opponent.
“Just tell me,” Isabella asked, raising her hands and the gun lifelessly in front of her and then dropping them to her side. “Did you kill them?
“Them?”
“The Fathers?”
Sandrine hesitated, as if confused by the question. “No.”
“Then who did?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s true. I don’t know who killed Father Andreas or the others.”
“Then tell me, Sandrine, tell me why?”
“I only know why I did what I did, no matter how small my role.”
“That will suffice.”
Sandrine chuckled. “Peace,” she said, and then her tone darkened. “And revenge.”
“Peace and revenge?” the Sister scoffed. “By the killing of two Priests?”
“Like I said, I do not know who killed them, or expected them to be murdered,” replied Sandrine, turning to Henry who watched her closely.
“But you still think the killing of two Fathers, two peaceful and kindly Fathers, will grant you the revenge you so sought and in doing so bring you peace?! I should shoot you now and put you out of your ignorant misery.”
“You think this is about the killing of two Catholic Fathers?”
“But you said –”
“I said peace and revenge. I did not tell you the means or indeed when such a thing shall be achieved.”
“So, the deaths of the Fathers –”
“Enough of the Fathers!” cried Sandrine. “Sister, if you were provided with the opportunity to both achieve peace on earth and salvation for your people, would you not grasp such an opportunity, no matter what the cost?”
“Every life is sacred.”
“Yes, but what is the deaths of two when set against the salvation of millions? An everlasting peace? What better goal can there be for mankind?” Isabella shook her head, but there was the hint of admiration in her eyes at Sandrine’s vision. “You really believe you can achieve what you say?”
But Sandrine was no longer looking at her. Instead she was staring at Henry, whose manner had changed to surprise at what he had heard. “Yes,” she said finally, “I want to end these terrible wars, both of mankind and against my people.” And finally she turned to look at Isabella. “Don’t you think there’s been enough killing?” Something caught Isabella’s attention. Sandrine and Henry followed her gaze to the horizon. Germans, a vast band of grey and black massing in the distance, coming towards Fampoux.
“The war,” said Isabella. “What’s this got to do with it? With you? With the Fathers? I have to know.”
“You will see, Sister. You will see.”
“I must know.”
“Be prepared for disappointment. Your Church will need to learn to cope with disappointment from now on.”
Sandrine raised an eyebrow indicating that the Sister would have to wait. That only time would tell.
And now Isabella suddenly chuckled and looked away. She shook her head, peering about the ruins and rubble. “I wish you luck,” she said, striding forward and past the pair of them.
“Luck?”
“If it is peace you seek, then may all luck go with you. And you should go yourselves,” she warned, “the Germans will be here any minute.”
“Tell me,” Sandrine called after the Sister. “Why didn’t you kill me? Just now?”
Isabella stopped and looked back. “Like you say, it seems to me there’s been enough killing.”