Water Song Part 15

Then she disappeared from sight, completely vanished!

"Emma!" he yelled as panic swept over him. She'd dropped into a mud-drenched bog and it had swallowed her whole.

He could no longer afford to search for rocks. He leaped into the mud, sinking instantly up to his knees. Pus.h.i.+ng forward with all his strength, he waded through the thick sludge.

As he came closer he heard screaming, and new hope surged in him. She wasn't completely under! Her two arms flailed. "Hold still, Em," he called to her. "The more you struggle, the faster you'll sink."

Pulling his s.h.i.+rt over his head, he twirled it quickly into a line. Then he dropped to his stomach, inching forward on his elbows. When he thought he was close enough, he swung the s.h.i.+rt to her, holding tight to his end.

She grabbed it on the first throw.

He wrapped his end of the s.h.i.+rt tightly in his clenched fist. "Okay now, sug. Whatever happens, I've got my end and I won't let go no matter what. You don't let go either, hear me?"

He pulled on the s.h.i.+rt but he couldn't bring her straight up. Every time she rose a little, the mud sucked her back down.

Maybe this was similar to a riptide, he considered. When a riptide swept a person out to sea, it was best to swim from side to side instead of trying to head directly into sh.o.r.e. "Listen, Em, we're goin' to move sideways, just like crabs do. Stay cool and don't drop that line. We'll get you out."

She nodded as he began crawling to the side still clutching the s.h.i.+rt. He could see her neck, and soon her shoulders began to appear. "Hey, we're makin' progress," he cheered. "Ya, you right, it's workin'!"

The direction they were headed in was taking them closer to the road, but he didn't dare veer off. The bog she had sunken into was rising, and he couldn't risk taking her off its upward path.

Then she stopped moving. As much as he tugged, she was stuck.

"My skirt snagged!" she shouted.

"Can you slip it off?"

She shook her head. "I can't move my arms."

"Don't let go of the s.h.i.+rt," he said as he slipped into the mud beside her. "I'll unsnag you."

"Don't go!" she cried in a panic-filled voice.

"I'm a frog, remember? I love mud."

He filled his lungs until they felt full to bursting and then ducked his head under into the black world of ooze. He used her body as his guide, working his way down until he reached the end of her skirt. It was wrapped on a branch of some kind.

Moving in the mud was maddeningly slow. It closed in around him, seeping into his ears, his nose, pus.h.i.+ng its way into his mouth. His breath was running out. What if he couldn't make his way up in time?

Her fingers began to clutch at him. Was she sinking? With a tug, the branch broke, setting her skirt free.

But how could he fight his way up without pulling her down?

He found footing on a ledge of stone beneath him and pushed against it. Grabbing her around the waist, he pushed up, hoping to keep her head above the muddy surface.

The rocky ledge continued, and he was able to keep on it and bring his nose and then his mouth above the mud.

With a whoosh, he breathed out and then sucked in fresh air.

He continued to hold her as they trudged out of the bog, heading for the road. He was shoulder high in mud, with Emma in his arms, when a brilliant light swept out of the darkness, blinding him.

He had no choice but to keep going toward it.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE.

The Treasure

When Emma's eyes opened, she was no longer out in the dark night. Instead, she lay on a cot in a dimly lit hut. Her skin had become unnaturally tight and she could feel something gritty in her mouth.

Holding up her arm to the light, she saw it was completely caked with dried mud. Her entire body, from her hair to her boots, was covered in muck! She felt for her locket and discovered that it was, amazingly, still around her neck, though even it was also encrusted in the dry, flaking earth.

And then she remembered everything.

The fire. Her escape. Feeling overjoyed to see Jack in the fire's glow, moving out there on the field just when she'd given up on ever seeing him again. Feeling such a great need to get to him that she'd run out despite all she knew about the muddiness of the fields, all she'd come to warn him of; thinking that if he was standing, it must be safe.

Then the terrifying moment the mud sucked her down; the earth itself seemed to have become a hideous monster determined to consume her whole.

And then there he was beside her.

When everyone else had let her down, had gone away, had not come to get her, when the world itself had lost its mind-there he was.

He had gone down to the bottom of the muddy bog with only one purpose: to push her up.

What an idiot she'd been not to have seen him more clearly right away; how much he loved her, what a brave, large spirit he had. He'd never stopped trying to help the Allies, through his pain, his isolation, his capture; he'd never stopped trying. And all along he'd hidden these things from her; hidden them to keep her safe.

Truthfully, she knew she had seen it, but she'd fought against it. He seemed too strange to her, not the picture she had in mind of the person she would love.

A rueful laugh escaped her lips. Lloyd had been her image of the suitor she should have: status-minded, sn.o.bbish, two-faced Lloyd. So cla.s.sically handsome and socially acceptable! How could she have been so wrong?

But where was Jack now?

Sitting up, she looked around the room. It was a simply furnished field office of some kind, with maps on the white walls-and a picture of Kaiser Wilhelm the Second. She recognized the German leader instantly from his photos in the newspapers.

Where was Jack?

Scrambling from the cot, she went to the window. There he was, outside, standing in front of a German soldier who was holding a pistol on him.

The soldier was going to shoot him!

Emma yanked the door open and ran to him, throwing her arms around his neck. Holding him tight, she kissed his mud-smeared lips with her own.

"Halt!" the soldier cried. "Stop that!"

"I love you," she whispered.

"I love you too, Em," he answered quietly.

"Stop or I will shoot you both right now!" the soldier insisted angrily.

Emma turned to him. As she did, she saw that her locket had slipped from her neck and fallen at her feet, its two halves sprung open. The locked compartment was finally open! Picking it up, she looked inside. Two deep red rubies lay nestled in the golden half sphere.

She stepped toward the soldier and thrust them at him. "Take these. They're very valuable. In exchange, just turn your back a moment and let us escape."

He laughed. "I don't need to bargain. I'll shoot you and then take them."

In a flash, she had them out of the locket and in her mouth. "I'll swallow them first." Slowly she walked backward to Jack. "Turn around and I'll leave them on this tree stump behind me," she said.

The soldier studied them with narrowed, suspicious eyes. "Put them down now."

Jack reached out for her hand and she took it. Together they backed up to the tree stump. Emma took the rubies from her mouth and set them down, keeping her hand on them until the soldier turned.

Together they raced down the hillside. The moon had come out, and they could see a river at the bottom of the hill; it was rus.h.i.+ng fast, its wild current glistening silver.

Gunshots fired from on top of the hill. The soldier had come after them. A bullet rushed past Emma's face.

"Stay low. Keep running," Jack said, gripping her hand even tighter as they continued down the hill.

Another bullet whistled past.

Then, from atop the hill, came the clatter of machine gun fire.

Emma screamed just as they came to the riverbank. Something had hit her arm. Blood poured out. The searing pain was awful.

Guided by her scream, the next bullet grazed her forehead.

"Breathe deep," Jack said. Grabbing her beneath her armpit, he threw them both into the river.

CHAPTER THIRTY.

Water Song

Jack swam in a river of silver ribbons that carried him along on their flowing strands, singing to him all along. The breezes skirting the s.h.i.+mmering whitecaps carried music to his ears.

You belong to the river. You are prince of the water. You have won the heart of the one you love. Prince of the river. Prince of the water. Swim on. Swim on. Until you carry your love ash.o.r.e. Swim on.

Obstructions filled the water, branches and clumps of matted leaves that had risen off the riverbank because the water was so high. It didn't matter to him. He pushed them aside easily. He felt light and strong, able to swim for miles, if he needed to.

Gripping Emma firmly across her chest and beneath her one arm, he kept her head above the water as he pulled with one arm and snapped his legs together in powerful scissor-kicks going forward. The bullet that had grazed her head had knocked her unconscious. If he lost his grip on her, she would drown. But nothing would ever force him to let her go now.

She loved him. She had said it. She'd kissed him.

With one kiss she had turned him into a prince among men. Nothing else mattered now-not the Waifs' Home, not the hard days working on the docks, not the blistering afternoons mopping a deck, not the rat-infested trenches, not the burning gas in his eyes. None of it mattered anymore.

Her love had released him.

More than a kiss, she'd given him her tears. By trusting him, she'd made him realize how worthy of trust he had always been.

More than the kiss, she'd given him her vision of him. By seeing him clearly, she revealed all that he was inside-revealed it to him as well as to her. Her view of him became his view of himself, and he realized that the man she now saw was the one who had been there all along.

More than the kiss, her sacrifice made him see the essential beauty of her, the depth below the surface s.h.i.+ne. When the locket split, it was as though her heart had opened to him.

But the kiss had been the magic token, the gesture of love, the mixing of energies that sealed the bond.

He was suddenly full of optimism about the future-their future together.

She loved him. She had said it. She'd kissed him.

The ribbons of silver that were sweeping him along slowly turned into strands of gold. Was he in Allied territory yet? It would be important to know, because the sun was rising and they would be easy to see, there in the water.

The golden, sun-flecked water began to sing him a new song. Be gone from the river. Be gone, you prince of the water. The one you love needs magic from the land. Prince of the river. Prince of the water. Be gone. Be gone. Now carry your love ash.o.r.e. Be gone.

He knew this song was right. Emma needed to be out of the cold water. He had to see how bad her wounds were, how much blood she'd lost.

Just ahead, they came to a swirling eddy in the river. A tree had fallen into the water. Reaching out, he was able to grab hold of it to keep from moving with the rus.h.i.+ng current.

Still holding tight to Emma, he dragged them both along the tree until he was able to sit in the shallow water. He pulled her up so that she was half on land and half in the shallow, watery banks because right then it was the best he could do; he needed a moment to recover.

He s.h.i.+vered in the cool morning air. Untying his shoes, he emptied the water from them, tied the laces together, and slung them around his neck. Pulling off his unders.h.i.+rt, he rang out the water from it before putting it back on. As much as he longed to collapse there awhile, he couldn't leave Emma in the bracingly cold river water.

He lifted her, carrying her to a dry patch of long gra.s.s and carefully laying her on it. Her blouse was torn and blood-soaked, exposing the place where the bullet had gashed her arm. He hoped it wasn't lodged inside the skin. He didn't think it was.