Partisans

by Alistair MacLean

  Sarina said, ‘And come Monday morning? When the search starts?’

  ‘Come Monday morning this truck will probably have joined the old one. Whatever happens, we’ll be a long way away from it by then.’

  ‘You are devious.’

  ‘You’re being silly again. This is what you call forward planning. Get inside.’

  The new truck was rather more comfortable and much quieter than the old one. As they drove off, Sarina said: ‘I’m not carping or criticizing but – well, you do have rather a cavalier attitude towards the property of your allies.’

  Petersen glanced at her then returned his attention to the road. ‘Our allies.’

  ‘What? Oh! Yes, of course. Our allies.’

  Petersen kept looking ahead. He could have become suddenly thoughtful but it was impossible to tell. Petersen’s expression did what he told it to do. He said: ‘That mountain inn yesterday. Lunchtime. Remember what George said?’

  ‘Remember – how could I? He says so much – all the time. Said about what?’

  ‘Our allies.’

  ‘Vaguely.’

  ‘Vaguely.’ He clucked his tongue in disapproval. ‘This augurs ill. A radio operator – any operative – should remember everything that is said. Our alliance is simply a temporary measure of convenience and expediency. We are fighting with the Italians – George said “Germans” but it’s the same thing – not for them. We are fighting for ourselves. When they have served their purpose it will be time for them to be gone. In the meantime, a conflict of interests has arisen between the Italians and the Germans on the one hand and us on the other. Our interests come first. Pity about the trucks but the loss of one or two isn’t going to win or lose the war.’

  There was a short silence then Lorraine said: ‘Who is going to win this dreadful war, Major Petersen?’

  ‘We are. I’d rather you’d just call me Peter. As long as you’re other wise civil, that is.’

  The two girls exchanged glances. If Petersen saw the exchange he gave no signs.

  In apljina, in the deepening dusk, they were halted at an army roadblock. A young officer approached, shone his torch at a piece of paper in his hand, switched it to the truck’s plates, then played it across the windscreen. Petersen leaned out of the window.

  ‘Don’t shine that damned light in our eyes!’ he shouted angrily. The light beam dipped immediately.

  ‘Sorry, sir. Routine check. Wrong truck.’ He stepped back, saluted and waved them on. Petersen drove off.

  ‘I didn’t like that,’ Sarina said. ‘What happens when your luck runs out? And why did he let us through so easily?’

  ‘A young man with taste, sensibility and discretion,’ Petersen said. ‘Who is he, he said to himself, to interfere with an army officer carrying on a torrid affair with two beautiful young ladies. The hunt, however, is on. The paper he held had the number of the old truck. Then he checked driver and passengers, a most unusual thing. He had been warned to look out for three desperadoes. Anyone can see that I’m perfectly respectable and neither of you could be confused with a fat and thin desperado.’

  ‘But they must know we’re with you.’

  ‘No “must” about it. They will, soon enough, but not yet. The only two people who knew that you were aboard the ship were the two who are still tied up in the hut back there.’

  ‘Somebody may have asked questions at the Colombo.’

  ‘Possibly. I doubt it. Even if they had, no member of the crew would divulge anything without Carlos’ okay. He has that kind of relationship with them.’

  Sarina said doubtfully: ‘Carlos might tell them.’

  ‘Carlos wouldn’t volunteer anything. He might have a struggle with his conscience but it would be a brief one and duty would lose out: he’s not going to sell his old girlfriend down the river, especially, as is like enough, there would be shooting.’

  Lorraine leaned forward and looked at him. ‘Who’s supposed to be the girlfriend? Me?’

  ‘A flight of fancy. You know how I ramble on.’

  Twice more they were stopped at roadblocks, both times without incident. Some minutes after the last check, Petersen pulled into a lay-by.

  ‘I’d like you to get in the back, now, please. It’s colder there but my fisherman friend did give me some blankets.’

  Sarina said: ‘Why?’

  ‘Because from now on you might be recognized. I don’t think it likely but let’s cater for the unlikely. Your descriptions will be out any minute now.’

  ‘How can they be out until Major Massamo – ’ She broke off and looked at her watch. ‘You said you’d phone the army post at apljina in an hour. That was an hour and twenty minutes ago. Those men will freeze. Why did you lie –’

  ‘If you can’t think, and you obviously can’t, at least shut up. Just a little, white, necessary lie. What would have happened if I phoned now or had done in the past twenty minutes?’

  ‘They’d have sent out a rescue party.’

  ‘That all?’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘Heaven help Yugoslavia. They’d have traced the call and know roughly where I am. The call was sent on the hour by my friend. From Gruda, on the apljina – Imotski road away to the northwest of here. What more natural than we should be making for Imotski – an Italian division is headquartered there. So they’ll concentrate their search on the Imotski area. There’s an awful lot of places – buildings, store-houses, trucks – where a person can hide in a divisional headquarters, and as the Italians like the Germans about as much as they like the Yugoslavs – and the order for my detention comes from the German HQ in Rome – I don’t suppose they’ll conduct the search with any great enthusiasm. They may have doubleguessed – I don’t think they’d even bother trying – but go in the back anyway.’

  Petersen descended, saw them safely hoisted aboard the rear of the track, returned to the cab and drove off.

  He passed two more roadblocks – in both cases he was waved on without stopping – before arriving at the town of Mostar. He drove into the middle of the town, crossed the river, turned right by the Hotel Bristol and two minutes later pulled up and stopped the engine. He went round to the back of the track.

  ‘Please remain inside,’ he said. ‘I should be back in fifteen minutes.’

  Giacomo said: ‘Are we permitted to know where we are?’

  ‘Certainly. In a public car park in Mostar.’

  ‘Isn’t that rather a public place?’ It was, inevitably, Sarina.

  ‘The more public the better. If you really want to hide, there’s no place like hiding in the open.’

  George said: ‘You won’t forget to tell Josip that I’ve had nothing to eat or drink for days?’

  ‘I don’t have to tell him. He’s always known that.’

  When Petersen returned it was in a small fourteen-seater Fiat bus which had seen its heyday in the middle twenties. The driver was a small, lean man with a swarthy complexion, a ferocious black moustache, glittering eyes and a seemingly boundless source of energy.

  ‘This is Josip,’ Petersen said. Josip greeted George and Alex with great enthusiasm, they were obviously acquaintances of old standing. Petersen didn’t bother to introduce him to the others. ‘Get your stuff into the bus. We’re using the bus because Josip doesn’t care too much to have an Italian army lorry parked outside the front door of his hotel.’

  ‘Hotel?’ Sarina said. ‘We’re going to stay in a hotel?’

  ‘When you travel with us,’ George said expansively, ‘you may expect nothing but the best.’

  The hotel, when they arrived there, didn’t look like the best. The approach to it could not have been more uninviting. Josip parked the bus in a garage and led the way along a narrow winding lane that was not even wide enough to accommodate a car, fetching up at a heavy wooden door.

  ‘Back entrance,’ Petersen said. ‘Josip runs a perfectly respectable hotel but he doesn’t care to attract too much attention by bringing so many people in at on
ce.’

  They passed through a short passage into the reception area, small but bright and clean.

  ‘Now then.’ Josip rubbed his hands briskly, he was that kind of man. ‘If you’ll just bring your luggage, I’ll show you to your rooms. Wash and brush up, then dinner.’ He spread his hands. ‘No Ritz, but at least you won’t go to bed hungry.’

  ‘I can’t face the stairs, yet,’ George said. He nodded towards an archway. ‘I think I’ll just go and rest quietly in there.’

  ‘Barman’s off tonight, Professor. You’ll have to help yourself.’

  ‘I can take the rough with the smooth.’

  ‘This way, ladies.’

  In the corridor upstairs Sarina turned to Petersen and said in a low voice: ‘Why did your friend call George “Professor”?’

  ‘Lots of people call him that. A nickname. You can see why. He’s always pontificating.’

  Dinner was rather more than Josip had promised it would be but, then, Bosnian innkeepers are renowned for their inventiveness and resourcefulness, not to mention acquisitiveness. Considering the ravaged and war-stricken state of the country, the meal was a near miracle: Dalmatian ham, grey mullet with an excellent Pošip white wine and, astonishingly, venison accompanied by one of the renowned Neretva red wines. George, after remarking, darkly, that one never knew what the uncertain future held for them, there after remained silent for an unprecedented fifteen minutes: no mean trencherman at the best of times, his current exercise in gastronomy bordered on the awesome.

  Apart from George, his two companions and their host, Marija, Josip’s wife, was also at the table. Small, dark and energetic like her husband, she was in other ways in marked contrast to him: he was intense, she was vivacious: he was taciturn, she was talkative to the point of garrulity. She looked at Michael and Sarina, seated some distance away at one small table, and at Giacomo and Lorraine, seated about the same distance away, at another, and lowered her voice.

  ‘Your friends are very quiet.’

  George swallowed some venison. ‘It’s the food.’

  ‘They’re talking, all right,’ Petersen said. ‘You just can’t hear them over the champing noise George is making. But you’re right, they are talking very softly.’

  Josip said: ‘Why? Why do they have to murmur or whisper? There’s nothing to be afraid of here. Nobody can hear them except us.’

  ‘You heard what George said. They don’t know what the future holds for them. This is a whole new experience for them – not, of course, for Giacomo, but for the other three. They’re apprehensive and from their point of view they have every right to be. For all they know, tomorrow may be their last day on earth.’

  ‘It could be yours, too,’ Josip said. ‘The word in the marketplace – we hoteliers spend a lot of time in the market-place – is that groups of Partisans have by-passed the Italian garrison at Prozor, moved down the Rama valley and are in the hills overlooking the road between here and Jablanica. They may even be astride the road: they’re crazy enough for anything. What are your plans for tomorrow? If, I may add hastily, one may ask.’

  ‘Why ever not? We’ll have to take to the mountains by and by of course, but those three young people don’t look much like mountain goats to me so we’ll stick as long as possible to the truck and the road. The road to Jablanica, that is.’

  ‘And if you run into the Partisans?’

  ‘Tomorrow can look after itself.’

  At the end of the meal, Giacomo and Lorraine rose and crossed to the main table. Lorraine said: ‘I tried to have a walk, stretch my legs, this afternoon, but you stopped me. I’d like to have one now. Do you mind?’

  ‘Yes. I mean, I do mind. At the moment, this is very much a frontier town. You’re young, beautiful and the streets, as the saying goes, are full of licentious soldiery. Even if a patrol stops you, you don’t speak a word of the language. Besides, it’s bitterly cold.’

  ‘Since when did you begin to worry about my health?’ She was back to being her imperious self again. ‘Giacomo will look after me. What you mean is, you still don’t trust me.’

  ‘Well, yes, there’s that to it also.’

  ‘What do you expect me to do? Run away? Report you to – to the authorities? What authorities? There is nothing I can do.’

  ‘I know that. I’m concerned solely with your own welfare.’

  Beautiful girls are not much given to snorting in disbelief but she came close. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I’ll come along with you.’

  ‘No, thank you. I don’t want you.’

  ‘You see,’ George said, ‘she doesn’t even like you.’ He pushed back his chair. ‘But everyone likes George. Big, cheerful, likeable George. I’ll come along with you.’

  ‘I don’t want you either.’

  Petersen coughed. Josip said: ‘The Major is right, you know, young lady. This is a dangerous town after dark. Your Giacomo looks perfectly capable of protecting anyone, but there are streets in this town where even the army police patrols won’t venture. I know where it’s safe to go and where it isn’t.’

  She smiled. ‘You are very kind.’

  Sarina said: ‘Mind if we come, too?’

  ‘Of course not.’

  All five, Michael included, buttoned up in their heavy coats and went out, leaving Petersen and his two companions behind. George shrugged his shoulders and sighed.

  ‘To think I used to be the most popular person in Yugoslavia. That was before I met you, of course. Shall we retire?’

  ‘So soon?’

  ‘Through the archway, I meant.’ George led the way and ensconced himself behind the bar counter. ‘Strange young lady. Lorraine, that is. I muse aloud. Why did she sally forth into the dark and dangerous night. She hardly strikes one as a fresh-air fiend or fitness fanatic.’

  ‘Neither does Sarina. Two strange young ladies.’

  George reached for a bottle of red wine. ‘Let us concede that the vagaries of womankind, especially young womankind, are beyond us and concentrate more profitably on this vintage ’38.’

  Alex said suddenly: ‘I don’t think they’re all that strange.’

  Petersen and George gave him their attention. Alex spoke so seldom, far less ventured an opinion, that he was invariably listened to when he did speak.

  George said: ‘Can it be, Alex, that you have observed something that has escaped our attention?’

  ‘Yes. You see, I don’t talk as much as you do.’ The words sounded offensive but weren’t meant to be, they were simply by way of explanation. ‘When you’re talking I look and listen and learn, while you’re listening to yourselves talking. The two young ladies seem to have become very friendly. I think they’ve become too friendly too quickly. Maybe they really like each other, I don’t know. What I do know is that they don’t trust each other. I am sure that Lorraine went out to learn something. I don’t know what. I think Sarina thought the same thing and wanted to find out, so she’s gone to watch.’

  George nodded a judicious head. ‘A closely reasoned argument. What do you think they both went out to learn?’

  ‘How should I know?’ Alex sounded mildly irritable. ‘I just watch. You’re the ones who are supposed to think.’

  The two girls and their escorts were back even before the three men had finished their bottle of wine, which meant that they had returned in very short order indeed. The two girls and Michael were already slightly bluish with cold and Lorraine’s teeth were positively chattering.

  ‘Pleasant stroll?’ Petersen said politely.

  ‘Very pleasant,’ Lorraine said. Clearly, she hadn’t forgiven him for whatever sin he was supposed to have committed. ‘I’ve just come to say goodnight. What time do we leave in the morning?’

  ‘Six o’clock.’

  ‘Six o’clock!’

  ‘If that’s too late –’

  She ignored him and turned to Sarina. ‘Coming?’

  ‘In a moment.’

  Lorraine left and George said, ‘For a
nightcap, Sarina, I can recommend this Maraschino from Zadar. After a lifetime –’

  She ignored him as Lorraine had ignored Petersen, to whom she now turned and said: ‘You lied to me.’

  ‘Dear me. What a thing to say.’

  ‘George here. His “nickname”. The Professor. Because, you said, he was loquacious –’

  ‘I did not. “Pontificated” was the word I used.’

  ‘Don’t quibble! Nickname! Dean of the Faculty of Languages and Professor of Occidental Languages at Belgrade University!’

  ‘My word!’ Petersen said admiringly. ‘You are clever. How did you find out?’

  She smiled. ‘I just asked Josip.’

  ‘Well done for you. Must have come as a shock. I mean, you had him down as the janitor, didn’t you?’

  She stopped smiling and a faint colour touched her cheeks. ‘I did not. And why did you lie?’

  ‘No lie, really. It’s quite unimportant. It’s just that George doesn’t like to boast of his modest academic qualifications. He’s never reached the dizzying heights of a degree in economics and politics in Cairo University.’

  She coloured again, more deeply, then smiled, a faint smile, but a smile. ‘I didn’t even qualify. I didn’t deserve that.’

  ‘That’s true. Sorry.’

  She turned to George. ‘But what are you doing – I mean, a common soldier –’ Behind the bar, George drew himself up with dignity. ‘I’m a very uncommon soldier.’

  ‘Yes. But I mean – a dean, a professor –’ George shook his head sadly. ‘Hurling pluperfect subjunctives at the enemy trenches never won a battle yet.’

  Sarina stared at him then turned to Petersen. ‘What on earth does he mean?’

  ‘He’s back in the groves of academe.’

  ‘Wherever we’re going,’ she said with conviction, ‘I don’t think we’re going to get there. You’re mad. Both of you. Quite mad.’

  FIVE

  It was three-thirty in the morning when Petersen woke. His watch said so. He should not have been able to see his watch because he had switched the light off before going to sleep. It was no longer off but it wasn’t the light that had wakened him, it was something cold and hard pressed against his right cheek-bone. Careful not to move his head. Petersen swivelled his eyes to take in the man who held the gun and was sitting on a chair beside the bed. Dressed in a wellcut grey suit, he was in his early thirties, had a neatly trimmed black moustache of the type made famous by Ronald Colman before the war, a smooth clear complexion, an engaging smile and very pale blue, very cold eyes. Petersen reached across a slow hand and gently deflected the barrel of the pistol.