Lucilla--NaNoWriMo2014

Chapter Seven

Once they were sure that they were not followed, Mark and Lucilla returned to the nearest army base.

There Lucilla received a crash course in motion pictures. She paid little attention to the white movie screen in front of her as she sat down.  But then the lights went out and the projector began to flash moving pictures on the screen in front of her.  It was too overwhelming.  Lucy screamed for Mark to stop everything and turn on the lights.

She then rushed forward and looked behind the screen.

"Where did those little people go?"  She checked behind the screen.  "I saw small humans on the white sheet.  Were did you put them?"

"Lucy, you read Plato, didn't you?"

"Yes, but what does that have to do with anything?"

"Remember in Plato's Myth of the Cave what made the shadows that people saw when they were bound in the chairs?"

"Yes, there was a bright fire and images dangling in front of the fire.  The light from the fire-"  Lucilla thought for a moment.  "Oh, Mark, I think that I get it now.  You have a powerful light that passes through dangling images?"

"Something like that, Lucy."  He then had her to gaze at the images made by the motion picture film as it passed in front of the projector lens. Mark then opened a canister of one of the motion pictures reels.  He pulled out some film showing many images much alike.

Then Mark showed her a book in whici he had drawn images on several pages.  When he flipped the pages, Lucilla could see the images moving.  Mark explained that a camera recorded motion and a projector showe those motiions against a white background.

Then Mark showed Lucilla the movie Why We Fight narrated by Drew Pearson, a respected newspaper columnist with a magnificent speaking voice. The movie had been shown all over America in order to explain that the Germans, Italians, Japanese, and other allies had started a war of conquest all over the world.  That untold numbers of innocent people had already died.  Lucilla understood that the Germans, Japanese, and Italians were the primary aggressors in that war.

Lucilla was convinced of the need to defeat the Axis Powers in Europe.  That included El Duce or Benito Mussolini (an Italian just like Mark) and the barbaric German known as Adolph Hitler.

Although Mark could not come near exposing Lucilla to the vast number of movies already made, he could at least give Lucilla an idea of what they were like.

Among them were Gone with the Wind, The Jazz Singer, Mrs. Miniver, Stage Coach.

Next Mark set up a field telephone.  Mark then had an assistant sit by the phone while he went out.  A few minutes later, the phone rang, startling Lucilla.  The assistant then handed the phone to Lucilla.  He told her what to say into the phone.

Lucilla screamed when she heard Marks voice.  In fear she looked over at Marks assistant and said, "How did you get Mark's voice in that small device"

Mark then returned to the room with two tin cans with a string inserted in the middle.  He explained to Lucilla that the voice vibrates the speaker and the vibrations travel to the other phone.  At the other end the receiver vibrates and she would be able to hear a voice like his.

He then stretched out the two tin cans linked together with string.  He spoke into it while Lucilla held the can to her ear.  Sure enough, she heard Mark's voice int the tin can itself.

Then she was able to understand the principle of how vibrations were used to communicate.

That night Mark brought a wind-up record player with a speaker arm with a needle to their apartment.  He explained how the speaker was connected to a needle that picked up vibrations from the grooves in the record.  When Mark put a record on, she heard an orchestra and a singer.

"it's just like someone else is in our room here.  What a wonderful device."

"There is something else we can do besides listen to the music."

"What, Mark?"

"We can dance."  He then put on soft music with a steady beat and held out his arms for Lucilla.  She felt so warm and loved in his arms as he suggested that she follow the beat of the music and that their legs would move with the music.  So in a few nights Mark held Lucilla close as they enjoyed a number of songs on the record player.  Lucilla especially enjoyed being so close to Mark.

Here was a man that Lucilla respected, and she was beginning to have feelings for.

The next day she introduced Lucilla to radios.  There was a boadcast short wave radio bringing the British Broadcasting Company or BBC. There both music and radio fiction stories.

Then Mark showed Lucilla his transmitteer that he used in order to bring the plane down to take her and him to Algiers.

Lucilla caught on fast to the operation of a two-way radio.

But the Morse Code was harder.  Mark expained that sometimes the voice would not transmit because of atmospheric conditions would not allow it. In such case they would have use a code of long and short sounds known as Dots and Dashes.  The code had been used over wire for almost a hundred years and was still reliable when nothing else would work.

"One other task remains.  We must train you to observe things.  We will be traveling from the South of Italy toward Rome over a matter of months.  Our job will be to count or estimate the numbers of soldiers.  We must be able to describe the types of weapons, vehicles, planes in the sky, vehicles on the ground.  We cannot merely make notes in daily logs as we go along the countryside."

'What do we do then.  We memorize those figures.  If someone finds troop numbers witten down or anything else, the Germans or Italian military will shoot us as spies."

"Will we not be spies?"

"Yes, we will, Lucy."

"Then, Mark, you and I are going to have to rely on each other and trust each other to the fullest."

"Yes, now, Lucy,"  Mark said while showing Lucilla hundreds of cards showing Italian and German weapons and vehicles.  "We have some more work to do."

They practiced looking at them for hours until Lucilla was as competent as Mark.

As Lucilla's training drew to a close, they went to a fancy restaurant.  Even Lucilla thought it was as opulent as anything she had enjoyed in Rome.

There were tables with fringed table cloths, long candles on the tables, waiters in dinner jackets, and meals of several courses.  Lucilla found it almost equal to her most elaborate feasts in Rome. Nothing in her experience would rival that of Ancient Rome.  By this time Lucilla respected Mark too much to tell him that she often had far better entertainment and food.

Nevertheless, she enjoyed the slow dancing in which she learned to lean her head against Mark's shoulder.  Lucilla was used to lust often but not the romantic feelings she was having for Mark.

Mark must have felt it too.

When they got back to their apartment, Lucilla kissed Mark with extra passion.  Mark responded with equal affection.

Then something happend that Lucilla had not anticipated.  She never thought it would happen.

She and Mark then made passionate love for half the night.