CHAPTER SONG: "If I Can't Love Her" by Terrence Mann (From Broadway's 'Beauty and the Beast')
"How did you find us, Captain?" Emmanuelle sat in the front of Capt. Jonathan Smith's cavalry truck, much to the dismay both the superior officer and her semi-assigned protector Lt. Joseph Blake, who sat beside her in the passenger seat while Smith drove, flanking her other side so she would be shielded should another sniper incident occur.
The young woman had a feeling it was intentional for both men to be on either side of her, although she had convinced herself that the enemy would not perceive her as an immediate threat being someone with no military training.
"We heard the shot and the honking horn from Lt. Blake's vehicle. Then, the headlights were used as a signal for us to follow to see if anyone survived." The kindly man glanced at her from the side only briefly to keep his eyes on the dawn-lit path in front of them. "It's a great relief to you alive Miss Hunterson."
A small smile graced his face before fading away into stoicism, but she could still view the shine of gladness.
Emmy couldn't help smiling herself.
"Emmanuelle is my name, Captain Smith. Miss Hunterson makes me feel old." She nudged his shoulder in a good-natured manner, hoping he wouldn't perceive the gesture as something offensive, forgetting for just a moment that she was in a different time where such behavior could be considered demeaning and especially unladylike.
She could feel Lt. Blake's eyes on her, spheres of blue vigilance glancing around from her to the grassy landscape painted with the darkened morning camouflage of sunlight. His hands shook upon his lap as he clasped them together, struggling to keep his breath leveled so as not to alarm the two other occupants of the cab beside him.
"Very well, if that pleases you, I'll refer to you as Emmanuelle." Smith chuckled deeply, looking to the side at Emmy again. "How does your Lance Corporal fare? The two of you seemed to be especially attached."
Emmy looked ahead through the truck's windshield, her eyes focusing on the horizon illuminating the indigo sky above them. The faint singing of some soldiers floated through her ears from the rear of the convoy, a sing she recognized from hearing in the museum back in modern day London...when she first held the book in her hands and had looked upon the images of Schofield and Lt. Blake for the first time.
"There is a lady sweet and kind,
Was never face so pleas'd my mind;
I did but see her passing by,
And yet I love her till I die"
Before she knew it, a tear made its journey down her cheek. Those lyrics made her think of Will, his arms around her as he sang another song in her ear, but they were just as resonant with romance and serenity.
And the poem he had recited in the basement beneath Ecoust. They had formed their own temporary paradise in that apocalyptic town, however delusional it may have appeared to behave in such a situation.
"We both barely made it alive to the second Devons. If it hadn't been for me, Will probably would've made it in time to save every one of those men, but there were still casualties that morning." She looked away from Capt. Smith to Joseph, seeing that the younger soldier's hands were trembling. Slowly, she reached over with her hands and held his shaking fingers in her grip. "He's risked a lot to keep me safe. He had to return to his battalion, but he'll find me again once he's granted leave."
"For the Corporal, it was more than a promise he made to protect you. He's infatuated with you, isn't he? I could sense it in the way he wouldn't leave your side back on that farm." Smith glanced once again at her, a wily glint in his eye as he spoke his deduction. "And I don't say that to mock you, my dear. He's a good man and I could sense a strength in you that compliments him."
"William Schofield is the man who saved me in every way a person can be saved. And the other soldier he was with, Corporal Thomas Blake..." She trailed off as she looked to Joseph, meeting his eyes and they continued to grip each other's hands, as though she were asking permission to speak about the lieutenant's departed brother.
Lt. Blake's lips lifted up slightly at the corners, unshed tears in his eyes that of which he rapidly blinked away, not daring to express weakness as a designated guard for this woman and as a decorated soldier in the presence of a superior. They locked eyes in silent communication, the rumble of the truck's engine the main instance of sound vibrating through the cab.
Joseph gave her a gentle nod, finding no words to give her, their hands still entangled together, his lips pulling up into a small smile for a signal to the woman wanting to tell the captain about his brother. Feeling bold, Lt. Blake lifted one of her fragile hands and placed a brief kiss upon her knuckles, one that had felt slightly longer than when he had done so back at the camp and in the ambulance.
She looked down at their entwined hands, fingers interlocked within her lap, then back up at her blue-eyed protector. The silent aura of guilt canvassing his face as he pulled his hands from her hold and turned away from her, not wanting to see a reaction of confusion and pity towards him...
He kept his focus on the landscape passing them, trying to pay more attention to the current calm of the French countryside graced by the full moon instead of the beauty sitting beside him, the woman he'd sworn to keep safe on another man's behalf. He brooded to himself as he tried to ignore her sweet voice as she talked to Smith.
Emmy was reminded of the way Will would kiss her, but before she could think of anything to ask Joseph, she chose to keep the subject focused on Thomas.
Now was not the time to figure out her dynamic with each soldier she was encountering.
She couldn't help but recall Tom's words to her about Will not being her only love. Was she bound to have her heart connected to somebody else besides her Lance Corporal? She needed to know who she would eventually be walking down the aisle towards in that picture of her in a wedding gown...
She found herself silent as she ended her speaking to Capt. Smith, just barely comprehending the words she had said to him, so preoccupied she was with her internal thoughts.
"We still have a ways to go, Miss Emmanuelle. Perhaps, you oughta sleep some. Lt. Blake and I will keep vigilance. No harm will come to you whilst you're in this vehicle with us." He looked at her with a near paternal gaze, as though he were encouraging her to rest and ensure her mental wellbeing. "That's a direct order, mademoiselle."
He gave her a semi-teasing wink of slyness as she smiled at his using the French term of courtesy toward her as a young woman.
A yawn escaped her mouth before she could think of a clever comeback. A dry cough tickled her throat from the parchedness in the air around them.
"Emmy, here's the rest of my water." Joseph was facing her again, undeniable concern on his face at the sound of her near choking. "It'll sooth your coughing; it may be an after-effect of your illness."
In his hands was his water canteen, his eyes meeting hers again in a soft pleading gaze, silently insisting she take what he was offering. Emmy stared up at the handsome lieutenant, her heart beating in a near erratic pace.
She didn't miss how his eyes glanced for a split second to her mouth and how his Adam's apple bobbed in a gulp of defeating temptation.
"For your Schofield. I'll get more when we arrive at the hospital. I promised him I'd look out for you. And a soldier's word is his bond." And that's all there is to this.
Lt. Blake's inner thoughts convinced him, keeping him from the deep end of overstepping himself.
Her shivering hands took the canteen from him, their fingers skimming one another with their tender touch. The younger soldier quickly withdrew his hand away from hers, as though the briefest contact with her made his skin burn.
"Something tells me its building into more than an agreement with William to keep me safe. It's as though I don't even have a say in what's happening to me here." She lifted the canteen to her cracked lips and took a swig of mild temperature water. "I heard what Private Seymour was saying to you back in the ambulance."
She failed to even care that they weren't alone while she was talking to him. With any minute they had ahead of them being another opportunity to be shot at, she had to explain to this man with whom she couldn't deny she was building a resemblance of affection for.
"If you're feeling anything for me, don't. It keeps things simpler. I love William Schofield, and he loves me. And I'm not a woman who's easy to place her trust in men, but I know that I don't have a choice but to do that here. I'm grateful to you for everything you've done and I cared for your brother in the brief time I knew him."
Her voice was a low whisper, their being close in proximity to one another. Her own breath trembled in spite of herself; her words were contradicting with her feelings and she hated herself for it. Any sane woman couldn't deny the allurement of Lt. Joseph Blake, yet she knew next to nothing about him. His voice in reply to her helped to drown out her heart pounding.
"I've no doubt that my brother was taken with you immediately, Emmanuelle. He was the sweet one in the family. Did he tell you about our dog Myrtle and our mum's cherry blossom orchard?" His tone lowered, trying to keep the atmosphere between them calm, the adrenaline from the last twenty-four hours simmering.
"Yes, he told me about the cherry blossoms..." She yawned again, her eyelids becoming heavy. Clutching the water canteen in her lap, she found herself leaning her head against the lieutenant's shoulder, the uniform fabric against her cheek reminding her again if when she'd been in the convoy truck with Schofield. "When I met him and Will, I immediately felt like I knew them all my life."
"Dare I ask...how you had ended up here? A beautiful American girl in wartime Flanders. Nobody can blame Corporal Schofield for falling for you. It's a miracle you've survived everything here; many grown man aren't able to say the same thing." His fingertips brushed away a piece of her brown hair off her forehead, feeling Smith's eyes upon them, ever watching.
"That's what I wanna know too." Her eyes closed as exhaustion began to possess her consciousness. "Joseph, if you want to truly keep your promise to Will, you need to promise me this: Do not fall in love with me. I don't need every man I meet here acting like I'm the only woman left on earth. Loving William is the result of him understanding me and going above and beyond for me when everyone else in my life has more or less left me behind."
A wave of intense sympathy waved through Joseph Blake as he looked down at the woman dozing against his arm, an extraordinary girl who wasn't afraid to speak her mind. Her breathing began to even out as she descended further into her dreams. How he ached to enfold his arm around her shoulders, to keep her warmth to him, but he clutched his hands together in restraint.
Whatever his heart was beginning to feel, he had to keep it concealed. Not for his own propriety, but for the sake of the woman and her paramour she had already pledged her love to and for his late beloved brother.
"I know you and Schofield deserve each other. I promised him I'd keep you safe and I shall." He whispered to her, his cheek skimming the top of her head as she slumbered on his shoulder. "But a promise to not have feelings for you may be harder to keep."
He closed his eyes momentarily to blink away the sleep from his eyes. For the briefest of flashes, two images assaulted his vision in the blackness behind his eyelids.
Tom in his crisp clean uniform on the day he first left for France, swaggering on the uncertain path to glory for king and country...
Then a woman, with a face eerily identical to one Emmanuelle Hunterson, adorned in a wedding dress of the wintertime season, pink petals speckling her gossamer veil, a bouquet of poppies in her dainty hands...
"Lieutenant Blake, are you alright?" Captain Smith's voice shattered the momentary illusion formed from the younger man's scattered mind. He spoke not too loudly to keep Emmy undisturbed.
"Fit as a fiddle, sir." Lt. Blake cleared his throat and leaned his head back against the seat, wondering how much further this damn hospital was, and unnerved by what he had just envisioned.
As he again tried to keep his focus on the landscape outside rather than on the woman resting on his shoulder, another thought crossed his mind.
Had Will yet written the letter he had said he'd write to his mother informing her of Tom?
A sob choked him and he swallowed it back, repressing his emotions yet desiring to sob and scream at the thought of not being there to comfort his mother when she'd eventually receive the unfortunate news...
It doesn't do to dwell on it...
Beyond the horizon, the shape of a building appeared in view.
Finally, they had arrived at the hospital, Hopital Temporaire d'Arc-en-Barrois...
"Captain Smith, sir? Is there a way we can get a message to the 8th Battalion of the Devonshires? I owe it to Corp. Schofield to tell him Miss Hunterson made it safely to the hospital?"
The captain looked to the lieutenant, looking to the younger man as he contemplated his request. He saw his hand clutching onto hers in a gentle grip, her head pillowed on his shoulder in a touching display of trusting him. The superior officer had to admire the fact that the two men were willing to trust each other in regards to the well-being of this woman...but he couldn't help but think of the ever clichéd phrase "All's fair in love and war".
The persistence in Lt. Blake's eyes caused Smith to push that thought to the back of his mind, and he gave him a smile of reassurance.
"Let me see what I can do, son. Best to awaken the lady, tell her we've at last arrived."
"Thank you very much, sir." Lt. Blake breathed a sigh of relief as the hospital came closer into view, and he took another look at the woman he was finding more difficult to not feel drawn towards.
Damn it all, maybe Private Seymour had been right all along...
.
.
Lance Corporal William Schofield at last finished the letter penned to his sister Molly telling her about Emmanuelle and how he planned to bring her to Surrey as soon as he was released on leave. He sat still against the shading tree, the very same one he had slept on a few days prior with Thomas Blake dozing a few feet away.
With everything he needed to say, he barely had enough room on the parchments available to him. Once he was sure the ink had dried, he carefully folded the letter before placing it with great care into an envelope.
On the front, he wrote the address of one Margaret Satterthwaite in Surrey before sealing it closed. He paired it together with the other letter addressed to Mrs. Blake, one half of his heart heavy with grief, the other aflame with elation.
Clutching both letters, he slid them into the same pocket in his uniform tunic while pulling out his tobacco tin to place Emmy's photograph back inside, trying to prevent it from being soiled in the outdoor elements.
The picture of her had been turned over to the back side of white with the delicate handwriting, only when he took another look at it, he read completely different words than what had previously been scribed. His heart pounded now with near panic and confusion...
December 24th, 1918
He turned it back over to the front, fearing for the woman he would've given anything to be holding again.
An image of her, the exact likeness of his love with her delicate features, the black and white quality failing to downplay her splendor; her dark flowing hair woven into a braid and her head crowned with a wedding veil snowed with the blossom petals Tom had described to him...
Emmanuelle Hunterson adorned in a wedding dress...
Beneath the date was a sentence that made a jolt of pain slither upward his spine.
Her future is the past.