Read Online Fireshadow by Anthony Eaton - Free Book Online Page B

ranger here about half an hour ago, checking up on the place, making sure we’re doing the right thing.’
    â€˜Huh?’
    â€˜He wanted to know about you, and I told him that you were just a bloke camping. Nothing unusual.’
    Something in the way she spoke, the way she chose the words, managed to penetrate the haze of embarrassment.
    â€˜Unusual?’
    â€˜Yeah.’ For the first time the girl looked askance, not meeting his eyes. ‘He was pretty interested in whether I’d had a close look at you. If you had any . . . distinguishing features.’
    Vinnie lifted a hand to his face, unconsiously.
    â€˜I told him I hadn’t seen you close up, but that you seemed fine to me.’
    She was looking directly at him now. Her hair glinted a reddish hue in the sun, her head tilted slightly to one side and a small wrinkle of concern creasing between her eyebrows.
    â€˜I did the right thing, didn’t I, Vinnie? I mean, you’re not on the run from prison or anything like that, are you?’
    â€˜No. I . . .’ Words abandoned him.
    â€˜Didn’t think so. You look like you just need some time away from the world. That’s right, isn’t it?’
    â€˜I gotta go . . .’
    He pushed past, stepping off the path to get by her, and his shoulder and upper arm, still moist with sweat, brushed lightly against hers. The echo of contact coursed along his nervous system; his toes and fingers tingled with brief adrenalin. Then he was clear, walking, stumbling, almost running back to his tent, to the safe, tenuous privacy of those flimsy canvas walls.
    September 1943
    In summer, before the madness of war, his family would picnic in the nearby forest. Father, Mother, Mathilde and himself. Mother would pack food and they’d carry it deep into the woods, sometimes near a lake, and spend the afternoon there.
    Erich studied the gnarled, reddish trunks that surrounded the camp. The forest was so different. Here, trees grew twisted and misshapen, prowling through undergrowth so thick and spiny that to venture into it without protective leggings was madness. Plants here would leap at you, snagging your clothes and hair, opening seams already ragged with wear. And the animals – the birds – it was as though they were laughing at you the whole while, screaming from the green shadows, mocking these strangers in all their alien hopelessness. Sitting on the hospital steps and looking out through the fence line, Erich longed for those warm summer afternoons in the forest, for trees that shed their leaves with the onset of cold, for the moist crackle of leaf litter below his feet.
    â€˜How’s the reading?’
    Alice emerged from inside and gestured at the book which lay, ignored, on his lap.
    â€˜Fine, thank you.’
    She sat on the step beside him.
    â€˜Grandfather says that Günter is getting much better now.’
    â€˜Good.’
    â€˜You should be proud of yourself.’
    Erich shrugged. ‘I did what was necessary.’
    Laughter echoed across the compound from the guardhouse by the gate. The girl’s constant presence and chatter were irritating. It was as though she didn’t realise the gap between them – that they were enemies.
    â€˜Are you all right?’
    â€˜Excuse me?’
    â€˜You. Are you all right? You’ve hardly spoken to anyone since the night we’ – she hesitated – ‘since the night of Günter’s operation.’
    â€˜I am not the talking to people type.’
    The girl stifled a small giggle and Erich threw her a sharp look.
    â€˜I’m sorry. You sound so formal sometimes.’
    â€˜I am sorry my English is not so good.’
    â€˜No, it’s not that at all. You speak beautifully. I just wish you’d relax a little. It would make everyone so much more comfortable.’
    â€˜There is a war on. Comfort is not important.’
    She was still smiling. ‘It’s silly,