The Paul & Jenny Stories Pt. 15g: Another June Wedding Part 7
A Paul and Jenny story.
(Copyright 2001 by Paul. All rights reserved).
All events and characters are fictitious.
* * * * *
Spain 1937.
Roland Wagstaffe.
Roddrego could hardly stand let alone walk by the time we slid down the opposite side of the hill. I couldn't tell whether his ankle was sprained or broken. It mattered little, as he certainly wasn't going far unaided.
What were we going to do?
It was about three miles to the convent over some pretty rough terrain. I looked at my wristwatch. It was nearly three in the afternoon. It would be full darkness by six-thirty. Over three hours. We could make it. I just hoped that we were not going to be followed.
The Convent was fairly isolated from what I recalled from when we had visited it once with Roddrego's father on a previous stay. Then there had been about thirty Nuns and an equal number of girl students in its school. We could never take sixty in the truck. With Roddrego's father and staff that would mean nearer seventy. Three trips. Perhaps their parents had collected all of the students by now? It would still leave forty people. Two trips. At least some if not all of the Nuns would want to stay. That would leave just the former President and his staff. One trip. Always assuming Miguel got there all right.
"Come on, Roddrego." I said, standing up from where we'd rested for a few minutes at the foot of the slope. "We'd best get on."
"Leave me here, my friend."
"No. Of course I'd leave you if it only affected you." Appeal to his sense of duty before he became stubborn. We didn't have the time for a protracted debate. "You know your mother and father wouldn't leave if they knew you were out here."
His father might but not his mother. A formidable lady.
"You are right." He struggled to his feet using his rifle as a support.
I felt the relief in him that I had given him a face saving reason for my not accepting his offer to stay behind.
We started with my trying to support him on one side but the narrow track down which we walked meant that one of us was always stumbling over the rocks and bushes to the side. In the end I found a narrow slab of rock sticking up from the ground and perched him against it. I look back down the track. We had only covered a few hundred yards. I looked at my watch. Nearly half an hour had passed. If they had been following the must have caught us in this time.
I returned to Roddrego and turned with my back towards him after handing him my rifle.
"Sling them over your back then place your arms around my neck." I instructed.
I thought he was going to argue at first but he thought better of it and I felt him move close. I reached behind and picked him up by the thighs while he took some of his weight on my shoulders with his arms. I could have cried out loud as I felt the skin across my back tear open and something warm ran down inside my shirt.
I stumbled on along the bottom of the steep sided valley we were in. The sun was behind Roddrego's back and I concentrated on our shadows on the ground before us. They seemed to lengthen with each steep I took then they were overtaken by the shadows of the hills around us.
We stopped frequently. Whenever I could find somewhere to rest Roddrego against. I didn't want him lying on the ground, I knew I would never have the strength to get him back up on his feet alone. And all the time my thirst grew.
It was nearly dark when we stumbled across the well-used dirt track that Roddrego assured me led to the Convent. "Ten minutes, my friend." He said by way of encouragement. "No more."
Again we walked and hopped side by side with my trying to support as much of his weight as I could. I could see a light ahead. A single lantern hung above a doorway as a sign of invitation to weary travellers. And we were nothing if weary.
There was a metal bell pull fitted to one side of the doors, I pulled it and heard a clinking sound from inside the building. A small wooden slide in the door was moved and a white face peered at us from behind three metal bars.
"Yes?" The woman asked. "Can we help you?"
"My friend and I are injured." I replied, never had I been so grateful for the two years we had spent in South America after the Great War and the knowledge of Spanish it had given me. "We seek his father and mother. They are here."
The panel slid back into place and I could hear the mumbling of voices behind the door then one half opened and two heads peered through the crack at us.
"It is Senor Roddrego." One of the heads exclaimed.
I could see now that they both wore the Habits of Nuns.
"Si Sister." Roddrego replied, holding onto the wall for support.
"But, you are hurt." The second said and the opened wide the door and lent their support on either side of him.
I carried the two rifles as the sisters helped Roddrego inside and closed and bolted the doors behind us.
