Angela was unsatisfied. She scowled at the others clustered around the fire. “We cannot afford to feed useless mouths.”
Spiteful, stupid human! Bela wanted to shriek into Angela’s piglike eyes that Fairies were never useless. That they could do far more than humans, run faster, hide unnoticed, and move silently where mortals tramped and tripped.
She didn’t have to.
“Leave her be, Angela,” Rachel, the other woman in the group, said. “Rolf and Hans are coming back.”
Rolf was their leader and his support and acceptance of Bela and her twin rankled with Angela but she went quiet, seemingly contenting herself with scowling at the fire.
The fire that Fairy magic kept hidden from mortal eyes. Bela dreaded discovery even more than her mortal companions.
Both men came in, shaking the snow from their shoulders and depositing a large bundle on the floor.
“Turnips,” Hans said. “There’s not much else out there. We need to take Bela with us next time. She can always find something.”
Steal it, he meant, and yes, she could, sneaking into barns and villages unnoticed.
“We’re hungry and cold,” Rolf said, looking at the pot on the fire. “Stew?”
“Rabbit,” Angela replied.
“That Bela caught,” Rachel added and got a snarl for her pains.
The two men picked up enamel bowls and filled them from the pot resting on the campfire. Rolf sat beside Bela. “You and your sister speak English, don’t you?”
Bela nodded. “Among other languages.” French, Czech, German, and Romani, the language the Fairies shared with the gypsies. They, too, were being slaughtered by the Nazis.
“Who speaks it better, you or Gela?”
“English? Gela. My French is better than hers.”
“We’ll need both soon.”
“What’s going on?” Angela asked.
“We have two visitors headed our way. Coming from the group over by Tiefeswasser. They’ve been keeping them, now it’s our turn.”
“Visitors? Do we run a hotel now?” Angela asked.
“They’re escaped prisoners of war,” Rolf replied, almost snapping. “We’ll house them a few days then they move on. They can’t walk nonstop. They rest in safe places in between.”
“Heading for Switzerland?” Rachel asked. “They have a hard walk ahead of them in this weather.”
She was right. In summer the trip would have been long, but pleasant enough. This time of year it would be a very strong human who managed it on foot.
“So we’ve told them. They seem to think it would be easier to evade pursuit in this weather.”
“They are fools!” Angela muttered. “Idiots!”
“It’s worked for them so far,” Bela pointed out.
“Only with help from the partisans and underground.”
“How else would they escape?” Rachel asked. “We help them, they get home. After all, the British send us supplies.” She looked at Rolf. “Isn’t that how it works?”
Rolf nodded.
Angela let out a laugh. “We shall see. We do nothing but take in waifs who eat our food.” She looked across at Gela sleeping under a rug. “Look how much good taking in these two has done us.”
“Stop!” Rolf so rarely raised his voice that she went quiet. “Bela does more than her share, and now we need Gela.”
“To entertain visitors.”
Why did Rolf tolerate Angela? Bela wondered. Because they couldn’t afford to have her leave? She knew where they and other groups hid out in the mountains.
“Two escapees from a prisoner of war camp?” Bela asked.
Hans nodded. “I spoke to one of Klaus’s group. An Englishman and a Frenchman. The Frenchman is in a bad way. He’ll need to rest for a while when he gets here.”
Angela muttered something about the unit turning into a rest camp, but only Bela, with her heightened sense of hearing, caught it. She was wearied by the constant carping, and if it wore her down, how about Gela, who spent all day listening to the complaints and gripes?
“When will they get here?” Rachel asked. “We’ll need more food. Men eat a lot.” She gave Rolf a grin.
“Once we know they’re coming, I can set more traps,” Bela volunteered. Her traps seldom stayed empty for long. If they had noticed she never came back empty-handed, no one said anything. They were too glad for the meat.
“Let someone else take care of them,” Rolf said. “We’ll need you to come with us, once we get word.”
Chapter Six
Brytewood
Mary made it to three-thirty, but between arch comments from Mrs. Spriggly, who cleaned the school, good-natured teasing from the other teachers, and even Petey Cannock’s “Cor, Miss, never knew you could dance,” it had been a long day.
But playing unconcerned and casual, and answering comments with Yes, it was a lovely party, wasn’t it? she got through it. With a bit of luck in the next day or so, there’d be another German pilot bailout, or the buses would be cut because of petrol shortages, and the village would have far more interesting topics of gossip than her waltzing with Gryffyth Pendragon.
If only she could get over it as easily.
Just thinking about him sparked a memory deep in her body that was best forgotten, or at least totally ignored.
She’d made an exhibition of herself Saturday night but was not about to do that a second time. Ever.
Of course there was still Gloria to be faced, who’d been conspicuously absent until late Sunday evening, when Mary was on her way to bed. She’d cope. Gloria was a friend, not a village gossip.
Mary saw the last child out onto the playground, wrote the next day’s date on the blackboard, sorted papers for the morning, and left with a sheaf of essays under her arm.
It was her turn to stop by Whorleigh’s and get dinner, and she hoped he had something more than sausages left. They might be off the ration but they contained less and less meat each time she bought them. Speculation about the content of Mr. Whorleigh’s sausages stopped dead the instant she saw Gryffyth Pendragon leaning against the school gatepost.
Heaven help her! The man had come-hither oozing out of every pore of his body. He saw her and smiled and her throat went dry. Other parts didn’t. Quite the reverse in fact. This was nonsense. It was also disastrous. Just when she’d convinced herself speculation would soon die a natural death, here he was, all with his glorious self. And she had to curl her toes inside her sensible teacher shoes to stop herself racing across the playground and into his arms.
It was terrible.
Saturday, she’d half blamed it on the beer. This afternoon she had no such excuse and was only too aware that every flicker of an eyelid and every breath she took was being monitored by the mothers gossiping at the gate.
Shifting her bag on her shoulder, Mary fetched her bicycle, dumped her papers and bag into the basket and, grasping the handlebars with a grip that threatened to twist metal, wheeled it toward the school gate and Gryffyth Pendragon.
She had a good fifteen yards to compose herself.
Fifteen miles wouldn’t have been anywhere near enough.