Assignment in Brittany Read Online Free Page A

explanations; or he could just speak French, and they’d still argue whether he was friend or foe. He decided to risk it.
    “You tackle too high,” he said in English to the big Yorkshireman. The weight on his back shifted.
    “Eh, what’s that?”
    “You tackle too high. And for Jesus’ sake, don’t raise that voice of yours. Do you want to bring a pack of Nazis down on us, you bloody fool?”
    The Yorkshireman dropped his voice again, but there was an angry vehemence in his whisper. “I never tackled high in my whole life.”
    “Well, that’s no reason to flatten me now, you blithering idiot.”
    “Sounds as if he might be English,” the boy remarked. He was feeling Hearne’s pockets gently. He removed the revolver and slipped it info his own pocket. “Get off, Sam,” he said then.
    “Not me,” said Sam, and settled his weight more squarely. “I’m fine as I am.”
    Hearne addressed himself to the thin-faced, anxious boy. “Go on, pick up his moosket for him, Wellington. Do you want us all to be caught?”
    “What’s your regiment?” the boy asked suddenly.
    “Liaison officer,” parried Hearne. “Ninth French Army. Sedan and points west, ever since.”
    “Where did you get these clothes?”
    “Where did you get yours?” Hearne grinned as he looked at their blue peasant blouses, ill-fitting jackets and ragged corduroy trousers. “Look here, I could talk much better with Sam off my back, and it’s about time we were moving on. I’m in a hurry, if you aren’t. And you might remember that I’d have used my revolver at once if I had been a Jerry.”
    “One wrong move from you, me lad, and I’ll flatten you proper,” Sam said placidly, and rose to his feet. He thrust one large red fist under Hearne’s nose for emphasis. “See?”
    “I see,” Hearne said with a smile. “And even if it was high, it was a damned good tackle.” Sam only grunted in reply, but an answering grin spread slowly over his large face. Strange couple, thought Hearne: the serious, fair-haired boy, thin and haggard, who spoke such precise clipped English, and the plain Yorkshireman with his broad back and vowels.
    “Which way are you heading?” the boy asked. He mighthave been twenty, but he looked more like seventeen.
    “North.”
    “Then we can go on together.” His tone was very definite. That would have been his answer if Hearne had said “South.”
    “I don’t want to lose that gun,” Hearne said.
    The boy smiled. “I’ll look after it very well.” He nodded to Sam, who took his place behind Hearne, and set off without another word.
    They covered the next three miles in Indian file, first the boy, then Hearne, with the Yorkshireman bringing up the rear. The pace was surprisingly good. They only had to slow down twice: once when they circumvented a village, once when they struck a broad stretch of completely open ground. Then the choice was either a wide detour up a hillside, or a ten-minute wait for the cotton-wool clouds to spread themselves over the hard, bright stars. The boy, to Hearne’s surprise, chose to wait. It amused Hearne to see how calmly the younger man had taken the command from the start; and he had taken it well. This was the first time that Hearne disagreed with him. And then he remembered that compared to these two men he was fresh and rested. He could only make a guess at how far they had travelled and under what conditions. Even then, like all guesses, his would be short: guesses didn’t tell the half of it. He noticed that the boy’s jacket was too thin: he was shuddering in spite of himself. Sam had noticed that shivering, too. He looked up at the sky and the slow clouds.
    “Blast you and blast you and blast you,” he muttered with surprising venom.
    Then the light dimmed at last, and they had a few minutes’ grace to cross the open ground. They ran silently with a grimdesperation. Ahead of them were some trees, beautiful trees, lovely, trees, gracious trees, noble trees.