of the tarpaulin, peering out. She tries to button her blouse, fingers fumbling.
"Shite," Colin breathes, but the lights and the footsteps are already receding and she slumps against the wall, her heart hammering. The thought of being discovered, the near miss, makes her stomach clench. Her throat feels raw. She looks back at Colin, wanting to share their escape, but he's scrambling up the ladder, and a second later, he's gone.
A clean pair of heels, she thinks; the English phrase so suddenly vivid it's blinding.
She's soaking, she realises: blouse stuck to her back, hair plastered against her neck, a sliding wetness dragging down her legs. Her body feels heavy, waterlogged, her arms shaky, too weak to pull her up the metal ladder, and she clings to the cold rail as if she might drown. It's a few moments before she can climb out of the pool. There are shouts at the other side of the camp, where the barracks have been built, but she hurries the other way, back over the playground, the tarpaulin ruffling behind her. The seesaw and roundabout are still, the swings rocking gently in the breeze. She finds the bike where he left it, propped behind a chalet, and climbs on, noticing as she hitches up her skirt that the seam of her slip is torn. Catch- stitched, just as her mother taught her. It will take five minutes to mend with a needle and thread, but she suddenly feels like weeping.
She pushes off, pedalling hard, although she finds it makes her wince to ride. She doesn't care that she's stealing his bike. She'll throw it into the hedge outside the village. He'll never ask about it, and if he does, she decides, staring at her pale knuckles on the handlebars where his fingers have curled, she'll pretend she's forgotten her English.
Three
I
t's dusk, the summer sky still light, but the sand at their feet in shadow. It slides away as they descend the dune, and ahead of him Karsten sees old man Schiller stumble, struggling to keep his balance with his hands up.
They'd been squatting in the lee of the sea wall, hands on heads, for what seemed like hours before Karsten felt the stiff tap of a muzzle on his shoulder. He'd looked up, opening the arms pressed to his ears, and realised the bombardment had stopped.
No, not stopped--he could still make out the sizzle of shells high overhead--but the targets were more distant. Retreating , he thought. Nearer, there came the thin chatter of small-arms fire, then nothing. He heard his knees crack as he stood.
"Think they mean to shoot us?" Schiller had hissed as they moved out, and young Heino muttered, "We deserve it." Karsten had told them to shut up.
Now, as they round the bluff and see the makeshift stockade before them, he notices their pace pick up, Heino's bandaged right hand glowing like a lantern held up before them.
From a distance, the stockade looks as if it's built of driftwood, the barbed wire wrapped around it like seaweed, but close up Karsten recognises the fence posts as the blackened stumps of their own shore defences, shattered in the bombardment. Inside, he slowly lowers his arms, feeling the tight ache in them, the unaccustomed strain.
It feels like freedom just to put his hands down.
He stays close to the wire, walking the perimeter until he's at the eastern end of the enclosure, nearest the sea. Between the hulks of beached landing craft, he watches the white lines of surf advancing one after another, listens to the gravelly draw of the tide on the sand.
His father's trawler had been lost at sea twelve years earlier, the body never found, and his mother had moved them as far inland as she could, but Karsten never stopped missing the water. His father had been a submariner during the Great War, and Karsten had joined the Kriegsmarine hoping to follow in his footsteps, only to be told he was too tall for a U- boat. He'd had to settle for the field-grey uniform of the naval infantry and a life overlooking the Channel from shore defences.
The squad had swum
"Shite," Colin breathes, but the lights and the footsteps are already receding and she slumps against the wall, her heart hammering. The thought of being discovered, the near miss, makes her stomach clench. Her throat feels raw. She looks back at Colin, wanting to share their escape, but he's scrambling up the ladder, and a second later, he's gone.
A clean pair of heels, she thinks; the English phrase so suddenly vivid it's blinding.
She's soaking, she realises: blouse stuck to her back, hair plastered against her neck, a sliding wetness dragging down her legs. Her body feels heavy, waterlogged, her arms shaky, too weak to pull her up the metal ladder, and she clings to the cold rail as if she might drown. It's a few moments before she can climb out of the pool. There are shouts at the other side of the camp, where the barracks have been built, but she hurries the other way, back over the playground, the tarpaulin ruffling behind her. The seesaw and roundabout are still, the swings rocking gently in the breeze. She finds the bike where he left it, propped behind a chalet, and climbs on, noticing as she hitches up her skirt that the seam of her slip is torn. Catch- stitched, just as her mother taught her. It will take five minutes to mend with a needle and thread, but she suddenly feels like weeping.
She pushes off, pedalling hard, although she finds it makes her wince to ride. She doesn't care that she's stealing his bike. She'll throw it into the hedge outside the village. He'll never ask about it, and if he does, she decides, staring at her pale knuckles on the handlebars where his fingers have curled, she'll pretend she's forgotten her English.
Three
I
t's dusk, the summer sky still light, but the sand at their feet in shadow. It slides away as they descend the dune, and ahead of him Karsten sees old man Schiller stumble, struggling to keep his balance with his hands up.
They'd been squatting in the lee of the sea wall, hands on heads, for what seemed like hours before Karsten felt the stiff tap of a muzzle on his shoulder. He'd looked up, opening the arms pressed to his ears, and realised the bombardment had stopped.
No, not stopped--he could still make out the sizzle of shells high overhead--but the targets were more distant. Retreating , he thought. Nearer, there came the thin chatter of small-arms fire, then nothing. He heard his knees crack as he stood.
"Think they mean to shoot us?" Schiller had hissed as they moved out, and young Heino muttered, "We deserve it." Karsten had told them to shut up.
Now, as they round the bluff and see the makeshift stockade before them, he notices their pace pick up, Heino's bandaged right hand glowing like a lantern held up before them.
From a distance, the stockade looks as if it's built of driftwood, the barbed wire wrapped around it like seaweed, but close up Karsten recognises the fence posts as the blackened stumps of their own shore defences, shattered in the bombardment. Inside, he slowly lowers his arms, feeling the tight ache in them, the unaccustomed strain.
It feels like freedom just to put his hands down.
He stays close to the wire, walking the perimeter until he's at the eastern end of the enclosure, nearest the sea. Between the hulks of beached landing craft, he watches the white lines of surf advancing one after another, listens to the gravelly draw of the tide on the sand.
His father's trawler had been lost at sea twelve years earlier, the body never found, and his mother had moved them as far inland as she could, but Karsten never stopped missing the water. His father had been a submariner during the Great War, and Karsten had joined the Kriegsmarine hoping to follow in his footsteps, only to be told he was too tall for a U- boat. He'd had to settle for the field-grey uniform of the naval infantry and a life overlooking the Channel from shore defences.
The squad had swum
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