Chapter 42

By about four o'clock that afternoon, Lauren was exhausted. She shuffled off the side of the road and flopped down in the dirt. Jamie and Emma followed, glad to sit for a moment. Beads of sweat clung to their faces, ready to trace their features, clean paths through the dust and grime. Lauren hated the feeling of dirt, the heat compounding her distaste and causing her to wonder if staying in San Falino would have been the right decision. Switzerland would never have had such an exodus of people. Disagreements were always settled by a national referendum.

She lashed out at a fly buzzing round her face, cursing at the tiny insect as it slipped from her fingers. They watched cars and trucks lumber by in both directions, loaded with cargo of arms and soldiers to the north and with refugees to the south. She reached into her grip and pulled out a can of lemonade, pulled the ring and drank, eyeing the line of people all the time, ready to protect the drink should anyone attempt to steal it from her. Sharing it with Emma and Jamie, she mentally took stock of their situation. To her relief, the children had obeyed her to the letter since they left home, and she was pleased that they had managed to get so far without injury or any problem. But the stifling heat, the dry dusty road and the smell of people, sweat and fear all took their toll, adding to her imagination and fueling her concern for their safety.

"Lori, where can we stay tonight?" asked Emma, throwing the empty can away.

Lauren frowned at her lack of thoughtfulness. "I don't know" she replied, more sternly than she had intended. Accommodation was indeed a problem, and the thought of camping by the roadside did not appeal. A convoy of army trucks roared past them, young soldiers watching silently from the rear.

"We'll be warm out here. There'll be loads of people, don't worry!" said Jamie. He seemed stronger than Lauren would have thought, and certainly had made the mental adjustment to their fortunes. "Come on, we should keep going for a while!" he said, standing. Lauren followed, pulling Emma up. They rejoined the main crowd and settled into the slow column of refugees heading south.

She turned slowly at the sound of shouting. "Hey!" A soldier had jumped from a truck parked at right angles to the road and was beckoning in their direction. Lauren turned away, trying to determine if it was she or someone else that the soldier summoned. "Hey!" he shouted again, advancing towards her. Her stomach heaved and she felt her sphincter tighten as blood rushed from her head.

"M... Me?" she asked, pointing to herself as he adjusted the rifle slung over his shoulder.

"You. You and you. You come. You foreigners. Come now!" He approached, the crowd parting and avoiding eye contact, pleased that it was someone else being stopped. "You special, not San Falino. Come" Lauren was dazed, panicked into making a decision of either accepting what could be a generous offer of protection for foreign nationals or continuing on the dusty road. She glanced at Jamie and Emma, reading their body language. She turned back to the soldier and smiled.

"Thanks!" she said, indicating to the others that they should follow. The soldier helped them up into the truck with their meager belongings and the truck drove off, north. "Oh! Where are we going?"

"Where you live?"

"Just north of Boquette" replied Jamie in the soldiers language.

"Ah, very good. Then we take you back. Guard house. No Nationalists there. We look after you at house."

Lauren decided not to argue. Three or four other soldiers sat further down in the truck, occasionally leering at her and Emma. She leaned forward in the seat, weathering the potholed road and the wild swings of the vehicle as it lumbered back the way they had come. She glanced at Jamie who frowned back at her.

"What?"

"Just seems a bit weird, that's all. Better to get us non-immigrants out of the country rather than disperse us again." He stared back again at his feet. Lauren could offer no consolation or advice and watched helplessly as the familiar streets of Boquette passed them by. Within ten minutes the truck pulled up outside the house, and they lead the way through the front door. Lauren dumped her bag in the hallway and headed for the kitchen, pulling down the note from the fridge door.

"Cold drink?" she asked as the officer followed her. She assumed he was the senior soldier there, given his two stripes. She remembered the lesson at school and the colorful book that he listed all the ranks of soldiers, sailors and airmen. Even so, she could only guess that he was a Sargeant or Corporal. His face was creased from either laughter or squinting, his black mop of hair untidily falling over his ears. Several days' beard growth gave him a black mask that she felt she disliked. He was perhaps three inches taller than her, but many pounds heavier. Forty would be a good guess of his age, she thought, younger than her father.

"Yes, beer. My men search house. Just in case." Lauren nodded, pouring lemonade from the bottle into three glasses and then pulling a pack of beer from the fridge. Suddenly, a scream resounded down the hallway. Her initial terror subsided as she realised that the sound didn't belong to Jamie or Emma. "Ha!" he said delightedly. The scuffles grew louder until a soldier rounded the corner into the kitchen, pulling one of the cleaners with him. She was dressed in tatty blue knickers and a black bra only. The soldiers conversed in Spanish, amusement in their faces. The cleaner stared at the ground, obviously ashamed of being caught. To Lauren's horror, the officer reached out and felt her breast, squeezing the nipple until she screamed. The soldiers laughed as they dismissed her with a push out into the garden. "She asleep in bed. Common bitch!" He took the beer and made his way to the lounge. Lauren followed, anxious to both keep the soldiers away from Emma and Jamie and claim her bedroom. Emma and Jamie were in the lounge already, talking to two of the soldiers.

"Come on, let's get washed!" said Lauren, encouraging them out of the room as quickly as possible. At seven o'clock, Lauren made a meal for everyone, raiding their store of canned food in the spare room. The soldiers continued to drink, finishing the beer at just after eight o'clock and then starting on the wine. They seemed to have no care whether it was red or white, sweet or dry and laughed like common criminals when Lauren tried to recommend a good after-dinner port.

At nine, Lauren ushered Emma and Jamie off to bed, saying to the officer that it had been a long day. She watched as his eyes followed Emma's buttocks, his beer bottle poised between his lips as she disappeared off down the hallway. Shortly afterwards Lauren herself went to bed, anxious about the night and the five soldiers who now seemed to be living with them.

She showered, dressed in bra and knickers, pulled a T-Shirt over her head and crept across the hallway into Emma's room. She slept, soundly, also dressed for perhaps only the second time in Lauren's knowledge in a T-Shirt. Jamie was also asleep, albeit fitful as he tossed and turned on the pillow. She returned, shuddered involuntarily and tucked herself into bed. Distant laughter filled the night, punctuated by the seemingly endless sounds of the toilet flushing and doors slamming. As her muscles relaxed and dull aches set in, she sobbed quietly, reflecting on her fortune, the scenes of poverty on the road and the dirty, ill-mannered guards that had become part of her life. She slept heavily, dreamlessly as the party continued.

Lauren sat bolt upright as though someone had flicked a switch on. She surveyed her room, noting it was almost four in the morning. The curtains were drawn but she knew it was still dark. Then she heard the footsteps that she knew had woken her, coming down the hallway. They stopped outside her door. A knock.

"Hey!" said a voice.

The officer, she thought. Panic set in, her heart beating loudly as her breathing became shallow. "What?" she replied weakly.

"Need wine. Where wine?"

A sigh of relief escaped her lips as she swung out of bed and put the light on. She smoothed down her T-Shirt and gazed in the mirror. "Coming, just a minute!" She checked the clock again. Four o'clock and still drinking. She opened the door to see the officer making his way back down the hallway. The house stank of cigarette smoke and she could see a haze hovering halfway between the floor and ceiling of the lounge. The soldiers had made makeshift beds in the hallway, their backpacks arranged as pillows, blankets stretched out uninvitingly.

Lauren followed a safe distance behind into the kitchen and through into the utility room. She reached down into a cupboard and pulled out a dusty bottle of Graves. It looked expensive and was quickly exchanged for a bottle of Neirsteiner that she knew was less than ten dollars. Grabbing a corkscrew, she returned to the lounge. The floor was strewn with the tools of their trade. Small arms, rags, boxes of ammunition. She thought she recognised an automatic rifle of the type she had seen in the newspaper. The smell of oil, smoke, drink and urine sickened her. The soldiers were sprawled across the sofa, one on the floor, and one gazing out of the window. The officer beckoned her across to his armchair, stubbing out a fat cigar on the Wedgwood dining plate that served as an ashtray.

"Open. You open"

Lauren sighed, determining that it was best to get them their wine then get out as soon as possible. With the amount of drink they must have consumed she wondered if there would be an opportunity in the morning to decide whether to stay or make a run for it when they eventually slept. She turned the corkscrew slowly into the neck of the bottle, taking care, as her father had always said, to make sure that the screw went all the way through the cork. She tugged, but it wouldn't come free. Her arms ached and turning away from them, she gripped the bottle between her legs and pulled hard. The cork flew out, bringing the soldiers on the floor out of the doze. The officer stood, bringing six glasses to her.

"You fill." As she finished the third glass she realised that the sixth one was spare and moved it to one side. "No, this you!"