“Who’s been promoted to take his place?”
“Major Mason has been given temporary command. There simply isn’t enough time to brief someone else on our Invasion mission. Anyway, I doubt that Blackshirt Lieutenant-Colonels grow on trees.”
“When do you leave?” Greg asked.
“Tomorrow.” Baldwin took another sip of his beer.
“Well, be careful up there. The Battling Brits won’t know that you’re one of them. They’ll take one look at your Blackshirt uniform and treat you as a dirty stinking Fascist traitor. If you’re captured and you’re lucky, you’ll be shot as a traitor immediately; if you’re unlucky you’ll be tortured beforehand and then strung up by your balls from the nearest lamp post.”
“I am aware of the risks, but thank you for pointing them out so graphically,” Baldwin said dryly.
“You’re welcome,” Greg smiled sarcastically.
“Anyway, I don’t intend to get captured. I intend to sabotage the invasion from within and then return to the Occupied South as a Fascist war hero as per orders.”
“Well, good luck, compadre.” Greg wiped his lips with his hand and stood up to leave. “I’ll see you when you return, God willing. May the Holy Virgin look over you and guard and protect you, my friend.” Greg kissed the talisman that he wore around his neck.
“Thank you, my friend. Adios, Ramón.”
“Adios, El Bonito.”
Mendoza saw the Militia officer standing outside his house and he felt an ice cold hand grip his heart. He willed himself to keep walking.
“Colonel Mendoza?” the young officer asked. “My name is Second-Lieutenant Ball of the 1st B.U.F. Militia. We have rescued your daughter, sir. Aurora and Alice are both alive.”
Mendoza’s legs buckled and he would have fallen to the ground if Astray had not caught him. “Where - where is she?”
“Inside, sir. My men are guarding her,” Ball answered.
Mendoza rushed into his house. “Aurora!” he shouted.
“Papa!” Aurora leapt out of her seat and ran towards her father. When she reached him she launched herself off the ground into his arms. Mendoza caught her and gave her a gigantic bear hug, lifting her off the floor.
There wasn’t a dry eye in the house as the half a dozen militiamen guarding the two girls wept unashamedly at the sight of the emotional reunion between father and daughter.
“You’re… you’re all right?” Mendoza asked with tear filled eyes as he stroked his daughter’s dirty matted hair.
“I’m alive, Papa,” Aurora answered resolutely.
Mendoza nodded his head with understanding. He could imagine what the SS kidnappers had probably done to the girls when they had been captives. “And your finger?”
“I’ll live. I have nine spare,” Aurora said stoically.
“Spoken like a true Spartan.” Mendoza tenderly kissed her on her dirt encrusted forehead. “Alice!” Mendoza held out his arms and Alice tumbled into them. He held her closely as Alice hung on like a limpet. “I’ll let Sam know immediately. Now, what do you girls want to do? Do you want to wash? Eat? Sleep?”
“A long hot bath, a change of clothes and a hot meal would be the first step, Papa.”
Alice nodded.
“All right,” Mendoza answered. “We’ll talk when you feel that you’re ready.”
“Yes, Papa.” Aurora kissed her father on the cheek and Alice followed her example. Both girls disappeared upstairs.
Mendoza waited until both of the girls had left the living room. “Major Astray?”
“Yes, Colonel?” Astray answered from a position of attention.
“Please could you organise a round-the-clock guard of platoon strength for myself and my daughter. I want a squad of Legiónaries guarding my daughter and myself at any one time. This is the second time that we’ve survived an SS attack; I don’t think that we’ll survive a third.”
“Yes, Colonel.” Astray saluted and went to the study to phone the barracks.
Mendoza turned to face Ball. “Second-Lieutenant Ball, I am indebted to you, sir, for finding and freeing my daughter.” Mendoza bowed gracefully.
Ball bowed in turn. “It was my pleasure, sir. Any human being would have done the same.”
“How did you find her?”
“We were carrying out a Fighting in a Built up Area exercise in Frampton -”
“The sight of the infamous massacre?” Mendoza interrupted.
“The very same.” Ball nodded his head. “When one of our lorries ran over a land mine.”
“Madre Dios!” Mendoza exclaimed.
“Yes, sir. Approximately sixty of my men were either killed or wounded in the ensuing ambush.”
“My God!”
“But we found and freed the girls, sir, and that’s all that matters,” Ball said grimly.
“Well as I said, Second-Lieutenant Ball, I am forever in your debt. Did you manage to kill any of the kidnappers?”
“No, sir. But they were definitely SS. Both of the girls told us this and they left equipment lying all over the place. They must have abandoned their gear in their attempt to escape.” Ball paused before he asked the next question. “If you don’t mind me asking, sir, do you know why the SS kidnapped your daughter?”
“I don’t mind you asking at all. After all that you and your men have suffered you have the right to know,” Mendoza said, matter-of-factly. “The SS and the XVII Bandera of the Spanish Foreign Legión have been conducting a blood feud which started three years ago during the Civil War. We are pursuing a vendetta against them.”
Ball straightened up before he replied. “The SS killed and wounded sixty of my men, Colonel. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. The 1st Battalion of the B.U.F. Militia is also declaring a vendetta against the SS.”
“May I count on your help and assistance against the SS when the opportunity arises?” Mendoza asked.
“You can count on it, Colonel.”
The two men shook hands.
Chapter Twenty
Obersturmbannführer Ulrich looked at his watch for the tenth time in as many minutes. Five minutes to midnight. Five minutes until Operation Thor commenced. Ulrich shook his head in disbelief at the events of the last seventy-two hours. The Führer was in a critical condition in hospital, and it was widely whispered that it was fifty-fifty whether he would make it or not. He had only escaped certain death because he had been in a ground floor toilet when the mortar attack had taken place. The other members of his entourage had not been as lucky. Generaloberst Rommel, Brigadeführer Herold and General-Major von Schnakenberg had all been killed, as had their second in commands. The commanding officers of the Potsdam Grenadier Regiment, the Oberschutzen Jaeger Regiment and the 4th and 5th SS Infantry Regiments had also been killed, along with their second-in-commands. What had Monat said little more than two months ago? Yes, Ulrich smiled as he clicked his fingers, Monat did not think that Ulrich was fit to command the Triple S Brigade and he had been rather put out when Ulrich had agreed with him. But Monat was dead and he was still alive. And yet again he was the most senior officer in the Brigade, and the de facto commanding officer of the Triple S. Ulrich smiled. Every cloud did indeed have a silver lining.
“Five minutes, sir,” the glider pilot announced over his shoulder.
“Five minutes, lads,” Ulrich repeated to his seven stormtroopers. He was in command of one hundred and eighty men consisting of one hundred and fifty SS paratroopers and thirty SS engineers. The (DFS) 230A glider only carried eight troops and after the colossal losses that the Luftwaffe had suffered during the Battle for Crete, the air force had been forced to search high and low throughout their bases in Europe in order to find twenty-five gliders to transport Ulrich’s strike force.
Ulrich thought about the last orders that Brigadeführer Herold had given him before he was killed: “Obersturmbannführer Ulrich, your mission is to seize the Beattie and Auchterlonie Bridges and the village of Robinson and hold until relieved.” The man
tra repeated itself in Ulrich’s mind: hold until relieved…hold until relieved.
A sudden jolt abruptly interrupted Ulrich’s daydream. “What was that, Captain?” he asked anxiously.
“Flak, sir,” the glider pilot answered nonchalantly. He pointed ahead of the glider, where there was a sudden bright flash and a puff of smoke. The glider shook as the shock waves from the explosion reached them. “I used to be a bomber pilot, sir, before I was transferred to the Glider Squadron. The Tommies probably think that we’re a group of bombers heading for Edinburgh. They often open fire on us as we cross over the border, but they rarely hit anything. Flak should be random and light, sir. Absolutely nothing to worry about,” the pilot said confidently.
“I’m happy to hear that, Captain,” Ulrich replied with relief.
The glider rocked from side to side as a flash and a puff of smoke appeared to the left of the glider, and then another flash and puff of smoke appeared to the right. Ulrich watched, open-mouthed with horror, as the next flak shell scored a direct hit on the glider to the left. The aeroplane instantly disintegrated into a thousand pieces and Ulrich’s glider rocked and rolled violently from the vibrations from the blast, as the fuselage was hit by a shower of shrapnel that consisted of pieces of plane and paratrooper. A body landed on the cockpit window with a massive thud and then slid off to fall away to the ground below. The window was splintered like a spider’s web and looked as if someone had thrown a bucket of blood over it.
“This flak isn’t random and light!” the pilot shouted.
A flak shell suddenly tore a massive hole in the left wing of the Junkers Ju 52 towing Ulrich’s glider.
“Casting off!” the pilot shouted immediately, and released the towing cable without a second’s hesitation. He had been on enough bombing raids to know when an aeroplane was going to crash and burn and he didn’t want his glider to be dragged down with it.
The Ju 52’s entire left wing tore off and the transport plane started to fall away, cartwheeling through the sky as it plummeted towards the ground. Ulrich breathed a sigh of relief as three parachutes billowed out from the Ju52 as the stricken aeroplane’s crew bailed out.
“Making our approach!” the glider pilot shouted.
His co-pilot didn’t reply. He sat with his head slumped forwards onto his chest as a thin trickle of blood dripped from his lifeless fingertips.
“Link arms!” Ulrich ordered. The paratroopers did as they were told and also raised their feet off the ground.
The glider dropped like a stone through a shower of flak and brightly-coloured tracer rounds, hit the ground, bounced once and skidded along the ground at one hundred and fifty kilometres per hour until it came to an abrupt stop.
Ulrich patted the pilot’s shoulder. “Thank you, Captain. That was a fantastic piece of flying.” But the Captain did not answer. He would not be answering anyone’s questions ever again. The metal skid that ran along the bottom length of the glider had snapped on impact and had ricocheted through the cockpit window. The pilot was impaled through the chest to his chair, and stared with sightless eyes into the darkened distance in front of him.
“Everybody out!” Ulrich ordered.
The two paratroopers nearest to the door kicked it open, jumped out, and were immediately cut down by a fusillade of machine gun fire.
“Gott in himmel!” Ulrich fired a burst of bullets through the cockpit window and then knocked out the shattered pieces of glass with the barrel of his Schmessier. He crawled through the gap and jumped to the ground, where he took up a firing position. “Follow me!” he ordered. Ulrich fired short, sharp controlled bursts of rounds in the general direction of the British machine gun, as his men followed him out of the cockpit window and lay down around him like the hands of a clock in a position of all round defence.
Ulrich tried to get his bearings as his eyes gradually regained their night vision. It was difficult to see in the darkness through the haze of smoke that hovered over the battlefield. Brightly coloured British tracer rounds swept the ground as the machine gunners searched for German targets. There was the constant cacophony of grenades exploding, the yelling and screaming of men in pain, the bark of men bellowing orders and the runaway train crashing noise of gliders landing either under the control of their pilots or as they smashed out of the sky, burning to the ground.
Ulrich searched for a familiar landmark. “Mein Gott! I don’t believe it!”
“What is it, sir?” one of his officers asked.
“Look!” Ulrich pointed.
“Mein Gott, sir! Beattie Bridge!”
“Yes! Despite the flak the pilot landed us right where he was supposed to!” Ulrich shouted above the noise of the raging battle. “Listen in, men! We’re about one hundred metres from Beattie Bridge. We’re going to carry out a squad attack on the enemy pillbox guarding the left hand side of the bridge! Stumpff: you, Kesselring and Brauchitsch will form Delta fire team and you will provide covering fire whilst myself, Halder and Blucher form Charlie fire team and assault the position. When we take cover we will provide covering fire whilst you assault the position and so on. Clear?”
“Clear, sir!” the stormtroopers replied.
“Sir?”
“Yes, Stumpff, what is it?” Ulrich asked, as he checked that he had a full magazine of rounds and a couple of hand grenades close at hand.
“Sir, is it wise to assault the enemy position? After all, we only have six men,” Stumpff asked with a lowered voice.
“With six men or with sixty men, the numbers don’t matter, Stumpff. Everyone else might well be dead for all we know. We attack with what we’ve got, as always. What counts here is not numbers, but surprise and daring!” Ulrich looked at his men. “Besides, do you want to live for ever?”
“No, sir!” his paratroopers answered with the light of battle burning fiercely in their eyes.
“Does that answer your question, Hauptsturmführer Stumpff?”
“Yes, sir!”
“Then let’s go! Halder and Blucher, follow me!”
Hauptsturmführer von Stein steadied himself as the Ju 52 veered to the side again. A massive explosion lit up the sky as the transport plane immediately in front blew up. “Look out!” von Stein warned, as a stick of paratroopers floated into view in front of von Stein’s aeroplane.
“Up! Up! Up!” the pilot ordered, as he and his co-pilot used all of their strength to pull back on their controls. The Ju 52 responded slowly and started to climb steeply upwards. Von Stein held his breath as the aeroplane just missed clipping the parachute of the last soldier.
“What the hell is going on, pilot?” Von Stein demanded after the near miss.
“We’re all supposed to fly at the same height, sir, to make sure that we don’t hit any of our paratroopers. However, our barometric pressure altimeters aren’t as accurate as we’d like them to be so it’s difficult for everyone to fly at exactly the same height. Mein Gott!”
A burning Ju 52 suddenly appeared in front with its right wing on fire heading towards von Stein’s plane on a collision course. “We’re going to collide! Get out!” The pilot flicked the switch, signalling the green light to jump.
“Everybody out!” Von Stein ordered, and threw himself out of the aeroplane. As his parachute opened he looked behind him and watched open mouthed in horror as the two Ju52s collided. The aeroplanes exploded, sending burning pieces of wreckage hurtling through the sky. A piece of wing tore through a paratrooper and ripped him in half as if he was made of paper. Another piece of burning fuselage set a parachute on fire and sent the soldier screaming and hurtling to his death. Von Stein watched as a paratrooper floated helplessly towards a burning building. The soldier disappeared into the inferno with a last desperate cry for help before he exploded. He must have been carrying anti-tank grenades. Von Stein looked above him. He was alone. No one else had jumped out of his aeroplane.
Ulrich wiped the sweat from his dirty brow with a filthy hand, and raised himself slightly to look
over the body of the dead paratrooper that he was using to provide cover from fire. The entire distance between himself and the pillbox was covered in a carpet of German bodies. He could have used the bodies of his fallen comrades as stepping stones to reach the bunker without touching the ground. Ulrich cursed. He had not realised that the innocent looking house to the right of the bridge had been transformed into a pillbox. The real house must have been demolished and replaced with a bunker that was disguised and camouflaged to look like the house that it had replaced. That rather significant development had not been noted and included in the briefing plan. Stumpff, Kesselring and Brauchitsch had paid for that intelligence oversight with their lives. They had been cut down as they made their first attack.
“What now, sir?” Halder asked desperately. “The Tommies are killing us!”
Ulrich spotted exactly what he was looking for amongst a pile of dead paratroopers. He turned to speak to his two surviving men. “I’m going to crawl towards the flamethrower and then I’m going to crawl towards the pillbox and burn those bastards alive. Then I’m going to fry the Tommies in the house next door. You two provide covering fire if the Tommies spot me. Understood?”
“Understood, sir. Good luck!” Halder wished. Ulrich nodded grimly. He stripped off his webbing and back pack to help him crawl easier. He checked that his Luger pistol had a full magazine and left behind his Schmessier, which was awkward to carry when crawling. Ulrich stuffed a couple of hand grenades into each of his jacket pockets. When he was ready he kissed the crucifix that hung around his neck and peered over the top of the dead paratrooper again. He needed to be definite about the direction in which he was going to crawl.
Ulrich started crawling slowly towards the pillbox in short bursts. He would crawl until there was a bright flash of light as an aeroplane blew up in the sky, or if an artillery or mortar round exploded on the ground. Ulrich would then stop crawling so that the Tommies would think that he was just another dead German. Eventually, he reached the flamethrower. He swore as he realised that the straps were hopelessly entangled and he wouldn’t be able to physically separate the flamethrower from the body of the dead operator. Ulrich reached for the hilt of his SS dagger. Shit, it wasn’t there. It must have fallen out somewhere. He looked around. There. He spotted a bayonet on a dead paratrooper’s webbing belt. He slowly drew it out and started to saw the straps.
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