War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 494 Preparations for Reinforcement
In the stinky bear cave, when Wei Ran woke up, the wind outside the cave had stopped, the snow had dropped a lot, and even the faint aurora could be seen in the night sky far away.

In the corner of the wall on one side of the cave entrance, Kang Tan was still guarding the slowly burning bonfire. Looking at the other side, Gail, who was huddled in his sleeping bag, was muttering something, but Dorian was sleeping soundly.

Stretching out his hand to touch Dorian's forehead, Wei Ran heaved a sigh of relief. Fortunately, his body temperature seemed to have returned to normal.

"Uncle Kang Tan, how long have I been asleep?" Wei Ran asked in a low voice.

Hearing this, Kang Tan glanced at the watch he snatched from his wrist, and responded in a low voice, "It's less than eight hours."

"Let me help you check the wound, and then you can take a rest." Wei Ran took out a first aid kit from his pocket while speaking.

"I'm sorry to trouble you." While speaking, Kang Tan carefully moved his body and sat next to Wei Ran, then took out the flashlight and turned it on.

Undoing the bandage on Kang Tan's leg, Wei Ran took a look at the wound, and was somewhat relieved when he saw that there was no sign of inflammation.

After changing the dressing and gauze, Wei Ran collected the changed gauze into the first aid box, picked up some branches, broke them and threw them into the helmet, "Uncle Kang Tan, go to sleep for a while."

"I'm not sleepy yet"

Kang Tan shook his head, put his lower body back into the sleeping bag, hesitated for a moment and said, "We need to reinforce this place as soon as possible."

"What's wrong?" Wei Ran immediately realized something.

Kang Tan didn't say anything, he just turned on the flashlight again, and pointed to a cracked charred wooden beam not far away with the beam of light.

Seeing this, Wei Ran immediately got up and drilled out of the bear cave, and later found that although the wind outside was a little less, the snow had accumulated more than half a meter deep. The brown bear whose head was buried by him, even the drag buckets on both sides of the cave entrance were almost buried.

Looking up at the snowflakes that were still falling, Wei Ran got into the hole again, "This is a big project, just the few of us"

"We have plenty of time, don't we?"

Kang Tan was full of confidence, "Wait until Gail wakes up, and then we'll set up the tent and live in it temporarily, before the next blizzard comes, we'll reinforce it as soon as possible."

Hearing this, Wei Ran nodded, helping to build this shelter was one of his return missions, so he naturally had no objections.

"I don't know what happened to Quentin." Kang Tan shook his head, "I still owe him a pair of leather shoes."

"Leather shoes?" Wei Ran looked at him puzzled.

"I am a shoemaker"

Kang Tan said with nostalgia, "I used to run a leather shoe store in Paris, and even General Charles de Gaulle asked me to order leather shoes."

"It seems that your craftsmanship is good." Wei Ran asked after a pause, "Kang Tan, how did you get here?"

"Maybe it's because I made leather shoes for General de Gaulle." Kang Tan spread his hands with a smile, "Who knows what those Germans are thinking, we have already surrendered."

"It's true that no one knows what's going on in their minds." Wei Ran smiled and asked along the lines, "So Quentin is also your client?"

"That was a month ago"

Kang Tan said with a smile, "I lost my shoes at the time, and Quentin got me a pair. It is said that they were taken off the feet of a dead prisoner. I promised to make him the best pair of leather shoes in the future. "

"I believe Quentin will definitely come back to ask you for leather shoes." Wei Ran slightly increased his voice.

"Quentin is back? Whoops!" Gail sat up suddenly in his sleep, but accidentally knocked his forehead against the scorched wooden beam.

"Unfortunately, he hasn't come back yet, but I believe he will definitely come to us."

Kang Tan spread his hands, "Since Gail is awake, we should start working."

"What job?" Gail asked, rubbing his forehead.

Kang Tan joked with a smile, "Reinforce this place so that it won't be knocked down by your forehead next time."

"You don't need to rest a little longer?"

Wei Ran frowned and asked, saying that he was pretty good, but the physical condition of these three people is not very good, what they need more now is to have a good rest and eat more.

Kang Tan waved his hand, "No, we have enough food and drink now, and the most important thing is that there are no Germans urging us with guns."

"I'm not tired either!"

Gail sniffled and said, "I just dreamed that those Germans pressed my face into bear dung. The smell is really disgusting."

"I don't need to talk about such a disgusting dream in the future, but the taste here is really not very good."

Kang Tan thought for a while and continued, "In this way, let's set up the tent first, and after we move in, we can think about how to strengthen the place next."

"You take care of the bonfire." Gail said before Wei Ran, "it only depends on me and Victor to set up the tent."

"The bonfire is really important," Wei Ran continued, "at least you don't have to worry about making Dorian smell like meat before we set up the tent."

Kang Tan touched the wound on his leg, and finally nodded in agreement with Wei Ran and Gail's suggestion.

After comforting Kang Tan, Wei Ran and Gail drilled out of the hole and found the canvas roll buried in the snow.They found a few nearby pine trees around, and after some research, the two unrolled the canvas and successfully built it by the light of the flashlight.

As Dorian said before, this tent may really be used to keep the armored vehicle warm.In other words, the space in the tent is also scary, big enough to park an armored vehicle.

However, the oily smoke and soup stains accumulated in one area also hinted that this tent may have been embezzled and turned into a battlefield kitchen.

The surrounding area of ​​the tent was buried with snow, and Gail followed Wei Ran into the tent, stepping on the snow inside and saying, "Or we can just live in this tent."

“This is not good advice”

Wei Ran poked the shovel into the snow at his feet, straightened his waist and said, "Let's not talk about whether the tent will be blown away in the next snowstorm, that layer of canvas can't stop the low temperature, let alone the flames of the campfire. "

"makes sense."

Gail sighed, resigned to his fate, and took a rabbit-footed step, stepping on the snow under his feet while saying, "My feet are almost frozen."

"Why didn't you get a pair of boots from the German?" Wei Ran asked, looking at the pants wrapped around his feet.

"My feet are swollen from the cold, and I can't fit in German boots at all." Gail quickened his pace while speaking.

"I can get two bearskin bags later, they will definitely be warm." Wei Ran thought for a while, then continued, "And Kang Tan said he is a shoemaker, maybe he can make a pair of shoes for you."

"Why didn't I think of that! I'm going to get two bear skins now!" Gail had already run out of the tent before he finished speaking.

Not long after, Kantan and Dorian walked into the tent dragging the bear skin, followed by Gail walking in with a sled trailer full of supplies.

Looking at the two pieces of bear skin covering Gail's feet, Wei Ran shook his head, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, the two pieces of bear skin were completely stripped from the hind legs of the brown bear, Gail just turned them over, Then tie one end with a rope and put it on the foot.If you ignore the remaining blood and fat on the bearskin, it looks like he is wearing a pair of real leather socks.

"Leave the work in the tent to me and Dorian"

Kang Tan pointed to the bear cave, "Victor, and Gail, you need to clean up the snow around the bear cave first, and then we will study together how to strengthen him."

"How are you feeling now, Dorian?"

While Wei Ran was speaking, he also glanced at the pair of marching boots on the opponent's feet that were the same style as his own. He clearly remembered that those boots were worn on Kang Tan's feet before.On the other hand, Kang Tan's feet, like Gail's, were also covered with the bear skin peeled off from the front legs of the brown bear.

"It's much better," Dorian said, sniffling. "Although my head still hurts, it's much better."

"Then don't waste time," Gail finished, and was the first to run out of the tent.

Walking out of the tent with Dorian, Wei Ran picked up the shovel poked at the door and carried it on his shoulder and asked, "Dorian, I heard you are from Lille?"

"A small town in the countryside" Dorian replied with a big snot, "a small place called Cuva Town in the Roubaix district, how about you?"

"Dunkirk" Wei Ran once again gave an address that was almost as famous in France as Paris after 1940.

"I've heard of it, but I don't know where," Dorian wiped his nose with his sleeve as he spoke.

"Dorian, how did you get caught by the Germans?" Wei Ran walked to the edge of the bear cave, and started to clear the snow along the edge of the stone wall with Gail.

"My father is a guerrilla." Dorian gave the answer indifferently, picked up a piece of gravel and threw it into the sled drawer near the entrance of the cave.

"French guerrillas." Wei Ran grinned, and really didn't know what kind of evaluation to give, after all, their combat effectiveness was really pitifully low.

"What about you?"

Dorian threw the second fastest stone into the sled and asked, "Why were you sent here?"

"Maybe it's because when the British retreated from Dunkirk, I picked up an unwanted rifle nearby." Wei Ran made up an excuse in a joking tone.

"Didn't you pick up the shoes and underwear that the British lost?" Gail asked with a playful smile.

"I ran too fast, I didn't catch up." Wei Ran spread his hands solemnly, and immediately after that, the three of them laughed out loud.

During the chatting of the three young people, Dorian sent three carts of excavated stones to the tent, and Wei Ran and Gail had already cleared the foundation.

The foundation of this collapsed house was not that big, it was basically a rectangle with a side length of four meters by five meters.

But after clearing this circle, the stone wall, which was originally less than one meter high, is now as high as the chest.Even the rest of the positions are nearly half a meter high.

"Go back to the tent and rest first"

Gail said out of breath, the job of clearing the snow is not easy.The most important thing is that his physical condition is not much better than that of Dorian or Kantan, which can be seen just by looking at Gail's sunken cheeks due to long-term malnutrition.

“Really take a break”

Wei Ran agreed, poked the shovel on the snowdrift casually, and walked back with the help of Gail, whose footsteps were flimsy.

At this time, Kantan and Dorian had already built a simple stove with the stones they picked up. The bonfire that was burning released a heat that could not be ignored, and there were even two steaming lunch boxes on it.

On the edge of the fireplace, Kantan, who was sitting on the bearskin, had chopped a small pile of firewood with an axe, while Dorian was carrying down the dead branches from the trailer.

"Drink some hot water." Kang Tan pointed to the lunch box on the stove, "I put some pine needles in it."

Hearing this, Wei Ran and Gail were not polite, each picked up a cup that matched the kettle, poured some scalding pine needle water from the lunch box and held them in their hands.

Speaking of which, the water is not delicious, especially the unique taste of pine resin makes Wei Ran not willing to swallow it at all.

In contrast, Gail looked satisfied.Obviously, even a cup of hot water was not so easy to get in the life of the former captives.

"I also cooked some bear meat," Kang Tan continued, "Although it may not be as delicious as Gail's, it must be cooked.

"This is already very good," Gail said contentedly, "there is salty meat, hot water, and it is warm enough."

"Don't be too optimistic"

Kang Tan put down the ax in his hand, panted and said, "We have to speed up a bit, and we have to change to a place that is strong enough and where we can set up a bonfire unscrupulously before the next snowstorm."

(End of this chapter)