D-Notice by Bill Walker (books to read for self improvement txt) 📕

place and then pushed the loose 7.65mm round back into the magazine and slid it back into the butt. She pointedly put the pistol on safety and laid it carefully onto the pile of clothing and accoutrements piled next to the footlocker. A few minutes later, the footlocker was empty.

“That’s it, then,” Erika said, resigned.

“I’m sorry.

Erika grabbed his hand. “Don’t be. You did your best. And I am forever grateful.”

Michael’s heart thudded against his rib cage and his ears filled with a buzzing sound, as if his head had become a hive of bees. He wanted to kiss those lips, drown in the oceans of her eyes, taste the essence of her.

Without thinking, he leaned forward, excited to see her moving to meet him. Good Christ, it was really happening! He could feel her breath lightly dusting his mouth. And then—

“Michael?” Lillian called from the bottom of the attic steps. “Are you two all right up there? I was beginning to worry.”

“I feel like I’m back in school,” Michael whispered.

Erika leaned back, stifling a giggle.

Cocking his head toward the steps, Michael said: “We’re just fine, Mother!”

“Anything turn up?”

“No, nothing.

He felt Erika grab his wrist, her grip surprisingly strong. “Michael!”

The urgency in her voice made him snap his head around, prepared to see some rodent the size of a cat sitting on its haunches regarding them with hostile black eyes. Instead, he followed her gaze to the footlocker, noticing that a corner of the patterned paper lining the trunk had come loose on the inside of the lid. Leaning forward, he spotted the corner of a yellowed envelope poking out from underneath.

Ripping the paper aside, Michael yanked out the envelope, his eyes eagerly devouring the four words written on the front in a faded cursive script: TO MY UNBORN CHILD.

“Open it, Michael!” she said, when after a long moment he’d failed to do anything.

He looked up at her, his eyes flaring. “No. There’s someone else who should have that honor.”

He stood then and clattered down the attic steps. Erika followed him down into the parlor and watched while he threw the envelope into his mother’s lap. Lillian looked up at him, a startled look on her kindly face.

“Something turned up, after all, Mother,” he said, his voice smooth and controlled. “Open it.”

“But it says—”

“I know what it bloody says. Open it!”

“Michael!”

He whirled to face Erika who looked at him with a look of outrage.

“Please...don’t,” she said.

Michael sighed, nodding once, then fell into a nearby chair, a look of exhaustion spreading across his face. “I want you to read it, Mother. I don’t know if I can.”

He watched as she gently tore the aged envelope and pulled out a sheaf of equally yellowed pages covered on both sides with the same flowing script. Then, with a pleading look that spoke volumes, Lillian Thorley looked down at the pages in her trembling hands and began to read.

THE FATHER: 1941

Chapter Sixteen

The Heinkel hit rough weather over the Baltic and Thorley spent most of the harrowing flight strapped into his seat, trying to hold back the contents of his stomach. As the plane pitched and yawed, buffeted by the high winds and lashed by icy rain, he tried his best not to think of the events in Russia.

But this was impossible.

The images and sounds came unbidden: the explosions of the artillery shells as they ripped up the camp, the decomposing bodies and the god-awful stench that clung to everything, permeating to the soul where it festered like a disease. The thoughts piled on top of one another, wave after wave, until his stomach let loose with a torrent that felt as if his entire insides were coming up through his throat. Gasping, for breath, he unsnapped his restraints and tried his best to vomit where it would be the least offensive, but this did little good. The entire cabin now reeked of bile.

Wiping his mouth on the sleeve of the Wehrmacht uniform he leaned back in the seat and closed his eyes, feeling his head throbbing with a dull ache that somehow made the feeling in his guts less noticeable. A trade-off. One pain for another. Too bad it didn’t expiate the deeper one.

What am I going to tell them?

What indeed? That a British regiment was massacred in a country where they should not have even been in the first place? These were the facts, but they still didn’t add up. Why had they been there? Were they there to help the Finns or the Russians? And did the Germans really kill them and plan this whole charade as a ruse?

Why were they there?

The more he asked himself that question, the more the question itself sounded like a string of nonsense syllables, like a Hindu mantra spoken over and over again to focus the mind inward toward enlightenment, the words themselves meaningless.

The door to the Heinkel’s cockpit banged opened and the Major stepped out. His face twisted into a grimace as he caught a whiff of vomit. He disappeared back inside and a minute later reemerged with a hip flask. Caught by a vicious downdraft, the plane dropped like a stone. The Major snarled and grabbed for one of the struts, as the pilot fought to pull up the Heinkel’s nose. The Jumo engines howled, and something heavy broke loose behind where Thorley sat and began banging against the bulkhead. Lightning flashed outside the plane, casting ominous shadows throughout the cabin, and the resultant thunder answered almost instantaneously. They were now in the heart of the storm and Thorley felt a knot of fear in his already beleaguered gut. The plane finally righted itself and began to climb, a moment of calm ensued, allowing the Major to reach