A Parachute in the Lime Tree Read Online Free Page A

heart bleeds. And who might you be? Their nursemaid? You sound like you think you’re in a different league.’
    For a moment, he considered sharing his dilemma with her. He hadn’t felt proud of anything he’d done for a verylong time. He’d let himself be thwarted when it came to Elsa. Always caving in, letting them win. Jumping would be brave, he was sure of that. But was it honourable, or just insane? If the barmaid respected him for it – someone like her, who hated Germans no matter what they did – then maybe it was worthwhile. He ordered a small cognac and drank it down in one. He realised then that he’d made his decision without her. When he went back to the others, they had long since lost interest in his progress with the girl behind the bar. Joachim and Willy had just begun dancing a tango when Oskar left.

    The smell of planes seemed to linger at the Hotel Moderne. Perhaps that was why nobody seemed to want to drink there. The bar was a staging post between one sortie and the next; a place that never seemed to warm up. Even the crews only frequented it when they were back too late to find anywhere else. On those nights, anywhere would do: follow the beam, light the targets and leave.
    The others arrived back at the billet soon enough, with some of the girls from the Deux Pigeons. Joachim spread himself over three rickety chairs, smoking luxuriously, his yellow scarf knotted at his throat. When he spotted Madame, still at her accounts, he sprang to his feet and dragged Oskar with him into the foyer. He gave a little bow. When she continued to ignore him, he rang the brass bell on her desk.
    ‘One moment, please.’ She continued writing, licking the end of her pencil as she finished a fresh column of numbers. ‘Yes?’
    ‘The mural, Madame. That German paradise we’re going to paint for you.’
    Madame shrugged and went back to her sums.
    ‘Every airman this side of Quiberon will come here for a glimpse of home: mountains, pretty forests, houses from fairytales.’ He lent towards her in a stage whisper. ‘And not a swastika in sight.’
    She shook her head, still engrossed in the numbers on the page.
    ‘Oh come on, Madame. Oskar here will do the hard bits. I’ll stick to the sky. Consider it a fraternal gesture to the Hotel Moderne.’
    Madame Pouliquen waved her hand in the air. ‘Go ahead, if you must. But no mess.’
    He reached out to take her hand but she snatched it away.
    They began the mural the next day. Joachim knew someone in ordnance and had managed to get hold of some surplus paint: military green (dark green and black green), two shades of grey (ash and cinder), black, white, maroon and a little dribble of bright red.
    They were usually too exhausted after a mission to do anything much. Joachim used to sit at the window of their room with his feet up on the metal balcony, playing his clarinet until Madame Pouliquen arrived in her hairnet to hammer at their door. Now, Oskar and Joachim would go straight to work on the mural. By that time, dawn would be upon them and its thin light seemed to suit the colours they had at their disposal. No matter how tired, they got a second wind, daubing at the uneven surface of the wall. Joachim used to say it made him feel a little better, to have made something for a change.
    When they started, they didn’t have a plan for this paradise of theirs. Oskar wanted a lake and with a lake went mountains. Joachim described the hotel by the Bodensee where he had met Gisela, his girl back home, and Oskar painted that too. Then, he added his grandmother’s house in Schwetzingen and a small church on a hill. One night they came back to find that someone had painted a little party flag onto the filigree balcony that Oskar had spent the previous night perfecting. The red paint was still tacky. Joachim smeared it off with his thumb and wiped it on the leg of his flying suit, before using somecinder grey to cancel it out completely. Normally, they’d enjoy a