Life moves on. This chapter has taken a while due to mundane life interrupting writing time. My dear partner once again helped with various aspects and I appreciate his help. I am thankful to all the historians and the availability of information on the Internet. Otherwise, this chapter and others would have taken months instead of weeks. Hope you enjoy this next slice of life. Please vote and comment! I enjoy hearing from my readers.
*
Spring had brought heavy wet snow and the inevitable mud. Quintus and George had hauled rocks and gravel up from the riverbeds to make paths between the cabins. Between loads of rock from the river, they were digging graves as the ground thawed. So far, they had dug nine. Over the years the cemetery had been expanded. In the newer section was a place for soldiers. Rather than take up land for bodies that weren't there, there was simply a large slab of marble that had space for names as deaths were reported.
Natalie was exhausted. She sat in the rocker beside the fire, holding Bertie and wondering if there were any more deaths to come. First had been Betty. She had grown weaker and weaker as January turned into February. One morning Quintus had gone to see why Bertie was crying and found Betty had died in the night. It was so cold that they wrapped Betty's body up, placed it in a coffin and then put it out in the back of the barn.
Then city folk came onto their land hunting for deer and elk. Instead, they shot what they thought were four wolves. Kent had found the hunters, killed them and brought the 'wolves' back for burial. They too ended up wrapped and waiting in the barn.
Natalie knew that her mother Celia was ill, but then again, she swore the woman was fueled by hatred. Celia hated the war, the war brides, non-shifters, and just about anything to do with this century. In her 80's, she had grown smaller in stature and bitter. Natalie had foxglove tincture to take to her mother's but simply could not bring herself to get up out of the rocker. It didn't hurt that Bertie was asleep. She dozed in the chair.
*
"Maman," George said softly. He barely tapped Natalie and she woke up. George took the sleeping baby from her arms.
"What is it George?" asked Natalie.
"Quintus. He find Bizzet," her son said softly pointing to Quintus holding a frail naked old man in his arms.
"Merde!" hissed Natalie under her breath. She stood up and walked over to Quintus who had tears rolling down his cheeks. She touched Bizzet and found a weak thready pulse. He looked like he hadn't eaten in a week and smelled worse. "Where?" she asked.
"On the high meadow. I went hunting and smelled him. Went to look and found him like this. I bring him home," said Quintus.
"Take him to my bed. We make him comfortable. Not much else to do," said Natalie. They washed Bizzet as best they could and then Natalie sat with him while Quintus ran for Marie and Tilly. Marie took care of the children and got dinner while Tilly brewed up willow and mint tea for Bizzet. Tilly had turned out to be a good nurse and herbalist. She helped Natalie run the clinic.
Natalie spooned the tea into Bizzet's mouth. It was a slow process as she waited for it to go down. He finally began to swallow and she was able to give him sips instead. Tilly braced him upright for Natalie.
"Bizzet, you hear me?" Natalie asked when he finally made eye contact.
"Aye. Who bring me here?" he asked in a voice no louder than a whisper.
"Your boy, Quintus," said Natalie. "He find you."
"Good boy. Best my lot," whispered Bizzet. "I go, you put me next to Wild Girl, that meadow."
Natalie nodded. She knew the place. He slept on top of her grave for so long there was a dent in the earth. Tears began to gather and she wiped her eyes. She held his hand as he drifted off to sleep.
"Natalie, you gonna eat?" asked Tilly.
"Non. I stay with Bizzet," said Natalie.
"I'll be back in a minute and bring you a sandwich and a cup of tea. It's been hours since you ate and we can't lose you," said Tilly.
Natalie just nodded. Tilly was a force of nature, and right now, Natalie needed her and the strength she provided.
Bizzet passed at dawn. Natalie had fallen asleep in the chair when his wheezing woke her. He'd said his goodbyes between gasps and faded away. Outside, George, Quintus and Kent howled their grief to the dawn sky. Quintus had wanted to bury Bizzet in his uniform, but Kent and Natalie said no, knowing how much Bizzet had hated the military after the Great War. Instead, they wrapped him in an old quilt that Natalie knew had been his mother's. It was the quilt that he'd wrapped Quintus in all those years ago.
The boys buried Bizzet next to his beloved Wild Girl. They took time to bring stones up to cover both graves. Then it was time to fill the graves in the cemetery. By the end of the day, no one wanted to do anything. Natalie went to bed and left Tilly, Marie and Alice in charge. She gave orders to not be woken unless it was for Celia. She slept for nearly thirty hours.
*
Piedimonte, Italy. May, 1944.
"British to the left of us, Poles to the right and us in the damn middle!" hollered Jacques trying to be heard over the bombardment of the guns.
"Aye, and that damn reporter for the CBC is still blathering away back in that farmhouse," said Henry.
"What he say that Stursberg?" asked Jacques.
"He reporting the battle. Say we been given the shit job again. Thickest part to go through. Concrete, steel, and barbed wire. Meby 20 feet deep. Oh, and don' forget them 700-800 guns shooting at them damn Germans," said Henry. He flinched as yet another barrage landed nearby.
The men had been moving forward as best they could, but it was as rough here as it had been twenty times before. Monte Cassino had been a nightmare. Instead of fighting from house to house, it had been from bush to boulder. 'Buster' had done more for the Canadian troops by sniffing out booby traps, land mines and pockets of soldiers than most of the dog and handler teams. The New Zealand Corp and the Gurkas who'd been trapped on Hangman's Hill wanted to adopt Buster, but Henry refused. Soon after that was when Brian had been wounded.
Brian returned to duty just in time for the final assault on Monte Cassino. This time it was better organized. The British took a river the Americans had failed to cross on a previous attempt and the Poles linked up with the British and Canadian corps to provide the added strength to pinch off the German supply lines up the Liri Valley. When Monte Cassino fell, the remainder of the Canadians melded with other surviving units and headed with the British and II Polish Corp to the battlefield outside of Piedimonte. It was here that in a concentrated effort, the Germans were being smashed.
Brian came up behind Henry. "You seen Henri?" he asked.
"Non. He was down that way," Henry pointed. "Why?"
"I got this bad feeling," said Brian. He left the ammo he'd been carting and headed off towards the direction Henry pointed. At each entrenchment, Brian checked on the men and left supplies if he could.
"Sir, I look for my son-in-law, Henri Desjardin. Have you seen him?" Brian asked of one of the officers directing men at a headquarters station.
The officer looked on a roster and then a second sheet. "Ah yes. Thought I recognized that name. Hit and wounded. Down at the field hospital," he said. He pointed towards a dusty tent with a Red Cross emblem on it. Brian thanked the man and ran for the tent.
Once there, he found a nurse and asked again for Henri. Men were pouring into the triage area. The smell of blood, guts and death was thick in the air. Brian gagged and tried to not throw up when he felt a hand on his arm.
"Sargent Davy!" hollered Dr. Abrams. "Are you hurt?"
"Non! I look for my son-in-law, Henri," said Brian.
"He's over there," said Abrams. "Just a bullet wound in the calf. He's groggy, but alright."
Brian nodded and headed across the tent to the far side where men were sitting and awaiting transport. He crouched down next to Henri. "You okay?"
"Aye. I get to go to soggy England. Maybe home," said Henri. His leg was bandaged and seeping ever so slightly. "I dive for cover, but my leg... it is too slow," he tried to joke.
"You going to be okay. That Dr. Abrams, he look after you. I go back now, take care of that idiot Major and the rest of the boys. You go home, you kiss all of the family for me," Brian said. He hugged Henri and then after checking for dispatches, headed back up the hill.
*
"You find Henri?" asked Jacques hours later as they sat in the back of a truck rolling along the roads towards Rome. The line had broken and the Allies had poured through the German defenses like water.
"Aye. He go back that England base. Maybe go all the way home. Us, we head to Rome. Then only the Army know where," said Brian. He was tired. Tired of the heat, the guns, fighting and most of all, Italy. The soggy cold of Aldershot was looking better and better. Brian also missed his family. No letters. Nothing.
The Canadian Corp rolled through Rome at 3am and headed North. As the Germans retreated, the battles became a series of lines. Trasimene Line in June. Florence in July. The Gothic line in August, and the Rimini Line in September. Rimini was as bad as Monte Cassino. Mountains, rocks and no place to hide. The Greeks and New Zealand troops fought alongside the Canadian troops. Once again, Henry and Buster made their presence known and gave men hope when they thought all was lost.
Wolf ran. He smelled that sour scent of the enemy. Crouching low, he belly crawled up to the pit the men hid in. There were three. Swiftly, he dropped the first one. By the time the second one saw him, his throat was gone. Last was the gunner. He never heard his friends die over the noise. Nor did he hear Wolf. He just died. Wolf ran back to his two-legged pack mate and earned his rest. Soon it would be time to find the next pit.
Wolf felt better working. He could smell the enemy that the two-legged soldiers could not. The two-legged soldiers were happy when he killed the sour enemy. Soon it would be dark and time to hunt.
"Are you sure you won't give up that dog mate?" asked an NZ soldier. "He's a real help. Cleared those ditches and houses with hardly a loss."
"Aye, but it'd be like giving away my brother or my pa" said Henry. That made the soldiers laugh as they headed for the trucks transporting them to the next battle.
*
Henri figured he could run faster than the truck was moving. Granted, his leg was still painful. A splinter had worked out while on the boat trip from England to Canada. He hadn't been able to shift since that field hospital in Italy where Dr. Abrams had helped him. Now almost eight months later, he was less than fifty miles from home and the driver was creeping along.
"Hey, you think you could drive faster?" Henri shouted.
"Non!" yelled back the old man. He was squinting at the road trying to see by the blackout lights still in use.
"Then let me drive!" said Henri. The old man pulled over and Henri moved into the drivers seat. He winced as the clutch was stiff and hurt his leg. He shifted his eyes slightly and headed down the road at nearly sixty miles per hour. The old man next to him hooted with laughter as they drove.
