There was a shriek in the air, getting louder by the moment. The Frenchman knocked her down and lay flat on top of her. She started to scream. Then more explosions shook Marianske Lazne, and she realized he hadn’t gone mad and wasn’t trying to assault her right out in the middle of the street.

“Artillery!” he bawled in her ear. “When you hear that sound, for God’s sake get down!”

Peggy did scream then, but on a note different from the one she might have used a moment earlier. Through the shell bursts she heard more shrieks, men’s and women’s and Lord only knew whose. Something warm and wet and sticky splashed her hand. She looked at it. It was blood-not hers, or she didn’t think so. With a little disgusted cry, she wiped it off her robe. No, not hers: no more welled out.

More and more shells landed on and around Marianske Lazne. How many guns did the Germans have, anyway? “Make it stop!” she yelled to the Frenchman. “Jesus, make it stop!”

“I wish I could, Mademoiselle,” he replied.

Peggy heard guns going off, too, in the woods around the spas. The Czechs were making a fight of it, anyhow, or trying to. But Marianske Lazne was within artillery range of the border, as she knew much, much too well. How long could this little country hold off Hitler’s armored legions?

After what seemed forever, the bombardment eased. Peggy raised her head and looked around. She wished she hadn’t. Her husband had fought in the Great War. He’d never talked much about what he’d done and what he’d seen. If it was anything like this…Peggy understood why not. She would spend the rest of her life wishing she could forget what artillery did to the civilians in Marianske Lazne. She remembered one thing Herb had said, talking to someone else who’d seen the elephant: “Artillery-that’s the killer.” Jesus, he wasn’t kidding.