Partisans

by Alistair MacLean

  Their relief was almost palpable when Petersen abruptly turned off the road into a narrow gully which suddenly – and to the two girls, miraculously – appeared in the vertical cliff-side to their right. The road was no road at all, just a convoluted, rutted track that offered only minimal traction for the almost constantly spinning rear wheels, but at least there was no way they could fall off it: high walls of rock pressed in closely on both sides. Perhaps five minutes after leaving the main road, Petersen stopped, cut the engine and dropped down.

  ‘This is as far as we go,’ he said. ‘As far as we can go in this truck, anyway. Stay here.’ He walked round to the back of the truck, parted the curtains, repeated his words and disappeared into the swirling snow.

  He was back within a few minutes, sitting beside the driver of a peculiar open vehicle which looked as if it might once have been a small truck that had had both its top and rear sliced off. The driver, clad in British warm – a thick, khaki, woollen overcoat – could have been of any nationality: with a fur cap pulled down to eyebrow level, a luxuriant black beard and moustache and a pair of hornrimmed sunglasses, there wasn’t a single distinguishable feature of his face to be seen except for a nose that could have belonged to anyone. Petersen stepped down as the vehicle came to a halt.

  ‘This is Dominic,’ he said. ‘He’s come to help us along a bit. That’s a four-wheel-drive vehicle he’s got there. It can go places where this truck can’t, but even then it can’t go very far, perhaps a couple of kilometres. Dominic will take the two young ladies, all our gear and all our blankets – I can assure you we’re going to need those tonight – as far as he can, then come back for the rest of us. We’ll start walking.’

  Sarina said: ‘You mean to tell us you expected this friend of yours to meet us here? And at just this time?’

  ‘Give or take a few minutes. I wouldn’t be much of a tour guide, would I, if I got all my connections wrong?’

  ‘This truck,’ Giacomo said. ‘You’re surely not going to leave it here?’

  ‘Why ever not?’

  ‘I thought it was your custom to park unwanted Italian trucks in the Neretva. I saw some lovely parking spots in the god-awful ravine we just came through.’

  ‘A sinful waste. Besides, we might even want it again. What matters, of course, is that our friend Major Cipriano already knows we have it.’

  ‘How would he know that?’

  ‘How would he not know it, you mean. Has it not occurred to you that the informer who tipped him off to our presence in the Hotel Eden would also have given him all the details of our trip from the torpedo boat, including those of this vehicle? Either by radio or before being apparently dragged from an hotel bedroom, it doesn’t matter. We passed through a check-point at Potoci about an hour ago and the guard didn’t even bother to slow us down. Odd, one might think, except that he had already been given details of our vehicle, recognized it at once and obeyed orders to let us through. Let’s get that stuff out quickly. It’s turned even colder than I thought it would be.’

  It had indeed. A south-east wind had sprung up, a wind from which they would have been sheltered in the Neretva valley, and was steadily strengthening. This would not normally have been a cold wind but this was a wind that paid no attention to meteorological norms: it could have been blowing straight from Siberia. The four-wheel-drive vehicle was loaded with passengers and gear and drove off in a remarkably short time: there could be no doubt that Dominic’s sunglasses were, in effect, snow-glasses.

  The five men set out on foot and were picked up some fifteen minutes later by the returning Dominic. The ride along an even more bumpy and deteriorating track was, because of the increase in snowdepth and incline, uncomfortable and haphazard to a degree, and only marginally better and faster than walking. None of the passengers was sorry when the truck pulled up at the track’s end outside a ramshackle wooden hut which proved to be its garage. Inside, the two girls were sheltering from the snow. They were not alone. There were three men – boys, rather – in vaguely paramilitary uniforms and five ponies.

  Sarina said: ‘Where on earth are we?’

  ‘Home, sweet home,’ Petersen said. ‘Well, an hour and a half’s gentle ride and we’ll be there. This is the mountain of Prenj, more of a massif, really. The Neretva river makes a big U-turn here and runs around three sides of it, which makes Prenj, in defensive terms, an ideal place to be. Only two bridges cross the river, one to the northwest at Jablanica, the other to the north-east at Konjik, and both of those are easily guarded and defended. It’s open to the south-east but no danger threatens from that direction.’

  ‘Gentle ride, you said. Do those horses canter or gallop? I don’t like horses.’

  ‘They’re ponies, not horses, and, no, they don’t canter or gallop. Not on this occasion anyway.

  They wouldn’t be stupid enough to try. It’s all uphill and pretty steeply uphill.’

  ‘I don’t think I’m going to enjoy this climb.’

  ‘You’ll enjoy the view.’

  It was half an hour later and she was enjoying neither the climb nor the view. The climb, though not impossibly steep, was a difficult enough one and the view, remarkable though it was, engendered in her only a feeling that lay halfway between fascinated horror and paralysed terror. The path, barely two metres in width and sometimes noticeably less, had been gouged out of the side of a slope so steep as to be virtually a cliff-side, and ascended it by a series, a seemingly endless series, of hairpin twists and turns. With every step the pony took, the floor of the narrow valley, when it could be seen at all through the driving snow, seemed more remotely and vertically distant. Only she and Lorraine had been mounted: the other three ponies carried all their securely strapped gear and blankets. Lorraine was on foot now, clutching Giacomo’s arm as if he was her last faint hope on earth.

  Petersen, walking beside Sarina’s pony, said: ‘I’m afraid you’re not enjoying this as much as I would like you to.’

  ‘Enjoying it!’ She shuddered uncontrollably, not with cold. ‘Back in the hotel I told you I wasn’t a great big coward. Well, I am, I am! I’m terrified. I keep on telling myself it’s silly, it’s stupid, but I can’t help it.’

  Petersen said matter-of-factly: ‘You’re not a coward. It’s been like this since you were a child.’

  ‘Like what? What do you mean?’

  ‘Vertigo is what I mean. Anyone can suffer from it. Some of the bravest men I know, some of the most fearsome fighters I’ve ever met, won’t climb a step-ladder or set foot in a plane.’

  ‘Yes, yes. Always. Do you know about it?’

  ‘I don’t get it, but I’ve seen it too often not to know about it. Dizziness, loss of equilibrium, an almost uncontrollable desire to throw yourself over the edge and, in the present case, a conviction on your part that your pony is about to jump out into space at any moment. That’s about it, isn’t it?’

  She nodded, dumbly. Petersen refrained from saying that if she’d known about her condition and the Yugoslav mountains, she should have stayed in Cairo. Instead he moved round the head of the horse and took her stirrup-leather in his hand.

  ‘These ponies are more sure-footed than we are and by a long way. Even if it should suffer from a bout of vertigo now, and ponies never do, I would be the first over the edge. And even if you felt like throwing yourself over, you can’t because I’m between you and the cliff edge and I’d stop you and catch you. And I’ll change sides at every corner. That way we’ll be sure to make it to the top. I won’t be so silly as to tell you to sit back and relax: all I can say is that you’ll be feeling a lot better in fifteen minutes or so.’

  ‘We’ll be away from this cliff by that time?’ The tremor was still in her voice.

  ‘We will, we will.’ They wouldn’t be, but by that time it would be so dark that she would be unable to see the valley below.

  It was quite some time after dark when they passed through the perimeter of what seemed to be a permanent camp of sorts. There
were a large number of huts and tents, all close together and nearly all illuminated: not brightly illuminated, for at that remote altitude there was no central power grid and the only small generator available was reserved for the headquarters area: for the rest, the great majority of the guerrilla soldiers and the inevitable camp-followers, there was only the light to be had from oil, tallow or coke braziers. Then there came a quite uninhabited and gently rising slope of perhaps three hundred metres before their small cavalcade fetched up at a large hut with a metal roof and two windows which gave out a surprising amount of light.

  ‘Well, here we are,’ Petersen said. ‘Home or what you’d better call home until you find a better word for it.’ He reached up his hands and swung the shivering girl to the ground. She clung to him as if she were trying to prevent herself from falling to the ground which was what she was indeed trying to do.

  ‘My legs feel all funny.’ Her voice was low and husky but at least the tremor had gone.

  ‘Sure they do. I’ll bet you’ve never been on a horse before.’

  ‘You’d win your bet but it’s not that. The way I hung on to that horse, clung to it –’ She tried to laugh but it was a poor enough attempt. ‘I’ll be surprised if that poor pony doesn’t have bruised ribs for days to come.’

  ‘You did very well.’

  ‘Very well! I’m ashamed of myself. I hope you won’t go around telling everyone that you’ve met up with the most cowardly radio operator in the Balkans.’

  ‘I won’t. I won’t because I don’t go around telling lies. I think you may be the bravest girl I ever met.’

  ‘After that performance!’

  ‘Especially after that performance.’

  She was still clinging to him, clearly still not trusting her balance, was silent for a few moments, then said: ‘I think you may be the kindest man I’ve ever met.’

  ‘Good God!’ He was genuinely astonished. ‘The strain has been too much. After all you’ve said about me!’

  ‘Especially after everything I said about you.’

  She was still holding him, although now only tentatively, when they heard the sound of a heavy fist banging on a wooden door and George’s booming voice saying: ‘Open up, in the name of the law or common humanity or whatever. We have crossed the burning sands and are dying of thirst.’

  The door opened almost immediately and a tall, thin figure appeared, framed in the rectangle of light. He came down the two steps and thrust out a hand.

  ‘It cannot be . . .’ He had an excruciatingly languid Oxbridge accent.

  ‘It is.’ George took his hand. ‘Enough of the formalities. At stake there is nothing less than the sacred name of British hospitality.’

  ‘Goodness gracious!’ The man screwed a monocle, an oddlyshaped oval one, into his right eye, advanced towards Lorraine, took her hand, swept it up in a gesture of exquisite gallantry and kissed it. ‘Goodness gracious me. Lorraine Chamberlain!’ He seemed about to embark upon a speech of some length, caught sight of Petersen and went to meet him. ‘Peter, my boy. Once again all those dreadful trials and tribulations lie behind you. My word, I can’t tell you how dull and depressing it’s been here during the two weeks you’ve been gone. Dreadful, I tell you. Utterly dreadful.’

  Petersen smiled. ‘Hello, Jamie. Good to see you again. Things should improve now. George, quite illicitly, of course, has brought you some presents – quite a lot of presents, they almost broke the back of one of the ponies coming up here. Presents that go clink.’ He turned to Sarina. ‘May I introduce Captain Harrison. Captain Harrison,’ he added with a straight face, ‘is English. Jamie, this is Sarina von Karajan.’

  Harrison shook her hand enthusiastically. ‘Delighted, delighted. If only you knew how we miss even the commonest amenities of civilization in these benighted parts. Not, of course,’ he added hastily, ‘that there’s anything common about you. My goodness, I should say not.’ He looked at Petersen. ‘The Harrisons’ ill luck runs true to form again. We were born under an evil and accursed star. Do you mean to tell me that you have had the great fortune, the honour, the pleasure of escorting those two lovely ladies all the way from Italy?’

  ‘Neither of them think there was any fortune, honour or pleasure about it. I didn’t know you had the pleasure of knowing Lorraine before.’ Giacomo had a sudden but very brief paroxysm of coughing which Petersen ignored.

  ‘Oh, my goodness, yes, indeed. Old friends, very old. Worked together once, don’t you know? Tell you some time. Your other new friends?’ Petersen introduced Giacomo and Michael whom Harrison welcomed in what was his clearly customary effusive fashion, then said: ‘Well, inside, inside. Can’t have you all freezing to death in this abominable weather. I’ll have your goods and chattels taken in. Inside, inside.’

  ‘Inside’ was surprisingly roomy, warm, well-lit and, by guerrilla standards, almost comfortable. There were three bunks running the length of each side of the room, some tall articles of furniture that could have been either cupboards or wardrobes, a deal table, half a dozen pine chairs, the unheard luxury of a couple of rather scruffy arm-chairs and even two strips of worn and faded carpet. At either end of the room were two doors that led, presumably, to further accommodation. Harrison closed the outside door behind him.

  ‘Have a seat, have a seat.’ The Captain was much given to repeating himself. ‘George, if I may suggest – ah, foolish of me, I might have known that any such suggestion was superfluous.’ George had, indeed, lost no time in doubling in his spare-time role of barman. Harrison looked around him with an air of proprietorial pride. ‘Not bad, although I say it myself, not bad at all. You won’t find many such havens in this strife-torn land. I regret to say that we live in accommodation such as this all too infrequently, but when we do we make the best of it. Electric light, if you please – you can’t hear it but we have the only generator in the base apart from the commander. Need it for our big radios.’ He pointed to two six-inch diameter pipes angling diagonally upwards along either wall to disappear through the roof. ‘Central heating, of course. Actually, they’re only the stovepipes from our coke and wood stove outside. Would have it inside but we’d all be asphyxiated in minutes. And what do we have here, George?’ He inspected the contents of a glass George had just handed him.

  George shrugged and said diffidently: ‘Nothing really. Highland malt whisky.’

  ‘Highland malt whisky.’ Harrison reverently surveyed the amber liquid, sipped it delicately and smiled in rapture. ‘Where on earth did you get this, George?’

  ‘Friend of mine in Rome.’

  ‘God bless your Roman friends.’ This time assuming his beatific expression in advance, Harrison sipped again. ‘Well, that’s about all the mod cons. That door to the left leads to my radio room. Some nice stuff in there but unfortunately we can’t take most of it with us when we travel which, again unfortunately, is most of the time. The other door leads to what I rather splendidly call my sleeping quarters. It’s about the size of a couple of telephone boxes but it does have two cots.’ Harrison took another sip from his glass and went on gallantly: ‘Those quarters, naturally, I will gladly vacate for the night for the two young ladies.’

  ‘You are very kind,’ Sarina said doubtfully. ‘But I – we – were supposed to report to the Colonel.’

  ‘Nonsense. Not to be thought of. You are exhausted by your travels, your sufferings, your privations. One has only to look at you. I am sure the Colonel will gladly wait until the morning. Is that not so, Peter?’

  ‘Tomorrow will be time enough.’

  ‘Of course. Well, we castaways marooned on a mountain top are always eager for news of the outside world. What of the past fortnight, my friend?’

  Petersen put down his untouched glass and rose. ‘George will tell you. He’s a much better raconteur than I am.’

  ‘Well, yes, you do rather lack his gift for dramatic embellishment. Duty calls?’ Petersen nodded.

  ‘Ah! The Colonel?’

  ‘Who else. I
won’t be long.’

  When Petersen returned, he was not alone. The two men accompanying him were, like himself, covered in a heavy coating of snow. While they were brushing this off, Harrison rose courteously and introduced them.

  ‘Good evening, gentlemen. We are honoured.’ He turned to the newcomers. ‘Let me introduce Major Rankovi, two of the Colonel’s senior commanders. You venture forth on a wild night, gentlemen.’

  ‘You mean, of course, why have we come?’ The speaker, Major Metrovi, was a man of medium height, dark, thickset and cheerful. ‘Curiosity, of course. Peter’s movements are always shrouded in mystery and heaven knows we see little enough of new faces from the outer world.’

  ‘Peter didn’t also mention that two of those new faces were young, female and – I speak as a detached observer, of course – rather extraordinarily good-looking?’

  ‘He may have done, he may have done.’ Metrovi smiled again. ‘You know how it is with my colleague and myself. Our minds are invariably preoccupied with military matters. Isn’t that so, Marino?’

  Marino – Major Rankovi – a tall, thin, dark-bearded and rather gloomy character, who looked as if he let Metrovi do all the smiling for both of them, didn’t say whether it was so or not. He seemed preoccupied and the source of his preoccupation was unquestionably Giacomo.

  ‘I asked them along,’ Petersen said. ‘I felt it was the least I could do to bring some relief into their cheerless lives.’