Prologue
OccupiedBelgium• August1917
Finn dragged himself another yard in the mud as agony shot through his mangled leg. He needed to hide. The pilot who shot him down had probably already landed at the German airfield two miles away, and it wouldn’t be long before a search party was sent to capture him. Finn’s airplane had burst into flames moments after he crashed, and now it billowed sooty clouds of smoke that acted as a signal to the Germans. And Germans sometimes shot downed pilots rather than take them prisoner.
A village was only a few acres away, but Finn’s chances of getting there with a busted-up leg weren’t good. He clenched his teeth and elbowed another few feet through the sludge, struggling to keep his head up so he wouldn’t suffocate.
He couldn’t die now. Delia hadn’t forgiven him yet. She was the best, purest part of him, the shining inspiration that fueled his dreams ever since he was a kid. Hehadto survive, if only to get home and win her forgiveness. He crawled through the mud with renewed determination.
“Monsieur,laissez-moi vous aider.”
The urgent whisper startled him, and he lifted his eyes to see a woman hunkered beside him. Frizzy copper hair surrounded a face filled with fear, for the Germans would shoot her too if they caught her helping him.
She repeated herself, and his pain-addled brain struggled to make sense of the French words. She was offering to help him. A boy stood behind her, who looked barely old enough to shave.
“Run,” he gasped. “They’ll be here soon.Run.”
The woman ignored him and crouched down, slipping an arm beneath his shoulder. “Pieter,aidez-moi.”
Pieter rushed to his side, looping Finn’s other arm over his own shoulders. Together they hauled him upright. Pain jolted through his body, and he nearly screamed. Instead, he gritted his teeth and forced his good leg to move while his right leg trailed uselessly behind.
The rumble of an automobile sounded in the distance. It was the Germans. Only Germans had gasoline rations, and they’d be here soon.
Waves of agony rolled through him as he focused on the timber-framed cottage straight ahead. A little girl held the front door open. The woman started issuing orders to other children inside.
“Vite,remonte les planches.”
Quick,pull up the floorboards, she had ordered. Finn understood the words but couldn’t make his brain work well enough to reply in French.
“Don’t risk your life for me,” he said. She had children. They’d be orphaned if the Germans found them.
The floorboards had been pulled up, revealing bundled newspapers and tins of beef hidden below. In short order the mother emptied it, and Finn rolled into the shallow hiding place. His spine slammed against the foundation stone, shooting another wave of pain down his leg.
He got a look at her panicked face as she prepared to cover him with the boards. “Madam, thank you. I owe you my life.”
Darkness descended as she replaced the boards and dragged furniture over them. Lying there in total darkness, he started praying. The Germans were coming, and his odds of surviving the next few minutes weren’t good. If by God’s grace he managed to get home, he would find a way to thank this good woman, and then he would fight to win Delia’s forgiveness.
1
NewYorkCity• September1917
Today wasn’t the first time Delia Byrne had to scrub congealed egg yolks from the front of the building, but it was the worst. In addition to the eggs spattered on the stately old law office, the vandals had scrawled slurs in red paint across the plate-glass window.Kraut lover. Pacifist cowards. Traiter.
“They misspelledtraitor,” Delia said with a nod to the word that obliterated the elegant gold stenciling of the Chandler Law office.
“I suppose we’ve been called worse,” Reginald said as he surveyed the damage. As always, she and Reginald were the first to arrive at the office this morning. Wesley Chandler, the owner of the firm, usually arrived a few hours later. As a widowed father with a teenaged daughter who was running amok, Wesley made a point of having breakfast and dinner with his wayward daughter every day.
“Let’s try to get this cleaned up before Wesley gets here,” she said. They were due in court at eleven o’clock for the Baumeister case, and she didn’t want Wesley distracted by this latest attackof vandalism. If they didn’t get the egg off soon, the heat would bake it onto the bricks.
The law firm kept wire brushes, scrapers, soap, and buckets for precisely this sort of vandalism, which was becoming depressingly frequent ever since America entered the pointless European war. Defending the city’s immigrants from anti-German hysteria carried a cost, and it was likely to get worse unless decent people stood up to the bullies.
Once armed with soapy water and a wire brush, Delia attacked the dried egg yolk with gusto. She hated this war. Actually, she hatedallwars, but this one seemed especially tragic. It provoked knee-jerk hatred toward anything German, even though few people even understood why America had joined the war.
“And how much is the Baumeister case going to cost the firm?” Reginald asked as he watched her scrub. Reginald managed the finances for Chandler Law and cared too much for his manicure to help with the scrubbing. With his ruthlessly groomed Van Dyke beard and piercing black eyes, he reminded Delia of a hawk on the lookout for anything that could endanger the firm’s bottom line.
“Wesley is donating his time, so it won’t cost us anything.”
“Wrong,” Reginald said. “It’s cost us the Darlington Hotel contract. Yesterday, Mr. Darlington notified us that he no longer wants Wesley to represent his hotel and has demanded a refund of his retainer fees.”
