Night of Flames: A Novel of World War II Read Online Free PDF

with geraniums. There were no lights and no signs of activity except the sound of a barking dog as they drove past.
    Anna glanced at Henryk and shook her head. The tiny, peaceful town was asleep, untouched by the violence of Warsaw. She wondered if they even knew their country was at war.
    As they drove on, Anna stared out the window, mesmerized by the steady rumble of the engine and the hum of the tires on the uneven road. Jan is out there . . . somewhere, she thought, closing her eyes, imagining that he was next to her, holding her hand. She smiled. They always held hands when they Night of Flames
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    walked. They had been married only two years yet she could barely remember what her life had been like before they met. At thirty-four years old, she had fi nally found love and happiness. But now, in the space of one unimaginable day, it could all be gone. Was this really happening? Or had she descended into some bizarre dream? Perhaps when she opened her eyes—
    Henryk cursed and hit the brakes, throwing Anna against the dashboard.
    Irene and Justyn tumbled off the backseat onto the fl oor as the car screeched to a halt. Anna sat up, gingerly fi ngering a welt on her forehead.
    A mule pulling a rickety cart, laden with tools and household goods, had lurched across the road right in their path. The man leading the mule stared wide-eyed at the car and waved apologetically as he struggled to pull the animal out of the way. A woman, holding the hands of two small boys, scrambled across the road. The man yelled something that Anna couldn’t make out, and she rolled down the window.
    “Stay out of Garwolin! It’s a mess!” the man shouted, jerking on the reins of the stubborn animal. “There are fi res everywhere . . . the main road is blocked.”
    He fi nally got the mule under control and off to the side of the road. “Where are you going?” he asked, breathlessly.
    “Krakow,” Anna said.
    The man was silent for a moment, then turned to the woman, who just shrugged. She seemed impatient to keep moving. The man looked back at Anna and said, “There’s a dirt road just ahead that goes off to the west. It will take you along the river, all the way to Deblin.”
    “Thank you,” Anna said and waved at the man as Henryk put the car in gear.
    They found the turnoff and headed down the dirt road, which soon degenerated into little more than wagon ruts as it meandered through farm fi elds and orchards. Eventually, they came to a crossroads, and Henryk pulled out the fl ashlight, aiming it at a battered wooden sign nailed to a tree. It said Deblin, with a faded arrow pointing south. The road improved to a relatively fl at, gravel path, but the moon had disappeared behind the clouds. It was pitch black and eerily quiet, as though they had been swallowed up by the night.
    When they arrived in Deblin, the town was just coming awake. They followed an ancient truck as it rumbled slowly along the main street, passing shop-keepers sweeping the walks in front of their stores. Two old men in work clothes 30
    Douglas W. Jacobson
    sat on a bench in front of the post offi ce. They returned Justyn’s wave as the car drove by.
    “They just seem to be going about their business like nothing is happening,” Anna said.
    Henryk glanced at her and shrugged. “What else would they do? It hasn’t affected them yet.”
    “They could be next,” Irene said from the backseat.
    Henryk nodded. “That’s true, but my guess is that until it happens most of them will just go on doing what they’ve always done.”
    Just past the center of the town they spotted a faded metal sign with the word Bensyna in peeling yellow paint. Henryk pulled the car up to a single fuel pump in front of a shabby brick building. A thin, middle-aged man wearing grease-stained coveralls pulled open a creaking, wooden door revealing an old tractor up on blocks inside the building. He kicked a couple of bricks in front of the door to keep it open and shuffl ed over to