For a moment nothing happened.
‘Ease her a little on the left,’ said the leader. ‘You’re jamming her.’
Suddenly, with no perceptible jerk, smoothly as a hydraulic press, the whole of the concrete slab came up out of the floor, with the stove fixed to it. When it was about three feet up the leader gave the sign, ropes were fastened, and, as silently as they had come, the men departed.
The stove, despite its ascension, continued to bubble and hiss merrily.
Such was the entrance to the oldest of the existing undiscovered tunnels in a camp whose Commandant had boasted that no tunnel was possible.
One had only to see it in operation to realise why it had escaped all searches. Like the African elephant in its native jungle, it defied detection by its immensity. The Italian Security Police, as they probed and searched with ant-like zeal each night, running steel spikes between bricks and tapping on floors with leather hammers, were looking for something altogether different – something smaller and slighter. A trap-door which consisted of a single slab of concrete, six feet by six feet and over two feet deep; a
trap-door which weighed nearly half a ton and needed four men, assisted by double-pulleys; to lift it was something outside their ambit. It evaded search by being too big to see.
(It might as well be admitted that only a fluke had rendered its construction possible. The Italians had made the mistake of letting the prisoners into Camp 127 a fortnight before it was really ready – a fortnight during which construction work was still proceeding on the shower baths and the drainage. Despite all their precautions it had proved possible to get hold of cement and certain tools, and the escape committee had immediately ordered the construction of this monster trap. The original base of the stove, a lighter piece of work, was taken out, broken into pieces, and dropped into the water storage tank. The new base was cast in one piece and the lifting apparatus installed. Before the camp had even been completed, therefore, the foundation stone for a way out had been well and truly laid.)
Overstrand and Byfold were already dressed for work.
It was their job, every morning, to open up the tunnel, connect up the electric lighting system, see that the hand pump and airline were in order and that the trolley, which ran from the trap-door to the digging face, was working without hitch. With the tunnel now more than a hundred feet long, these details were becoming of increasing importance. When they gave the word that all was ready, the first shift of diggers would go down and the trap would be lowered on them. They would dig for four hours and would then be replaced by an afternoon shift.
Although they had dressed for tunnelling often enough not to feel self-conscious about it, both Overstrand and Byfold might have presented, to the unaccustomed eye, somewhat remarkable figures. From the waist downwards, they were clothed in that useful army garment known to the Quarter-master as ‘pants, woollen, long’, the ends tucked into the tops of their socks, of which they wore two pairs. Their top halves were covered by skin-tight association football jerseys. (Of no known club, they were part of an issue of sports kit by the Protecting Power, and were believed to be the colours of the Zermatt Wanderers.) Both wore balaclava helmets and were shoeless.
‘Where’s Cuckoo?’ said Overstrand.
‘He’s along there already,’ said Byfold. ‘Check the security, would you?’
Overstrand looked out of the window, and noted the position of various towels, shutters, refuse bins and deck-chair loungers.
‘Seems all right,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’
They made their way along the empty passage and into the kitchen. The stove hung suspended in the air.
A pair of steel spectacles gleamed from the darkness of the entrance shaft under it.
‘I thought you were never coming,’ said Goyles. ‘I’ve connected up the light. It looks all right from this end. There are twelve bags of sand waiting. We’ll have to get them out before digging starts.’
All three of them had climbed down the ladder and were standing in the bottom of the twenty-foot vertical entrance shaft. The tunnel itself, rather less than a yard square, ran away from the east side of this shaft. A slight bend hid the working face of the tunnel from a person standing in the shaft.
‘I’ll go up,’ said Overstrand. ‘Give me two minutes and then start checking the pump.’
He placed himself face downwards on a small flat trolley which ran on rails up the tunnel and propelled himself forward with his hands. Trolley and man rounded the bend and disappeared.
Goyles looked at his watch.
‘Ten to nine,’ he said. ‘The shift will be here in ten minutes. Let’s have these bags up and get the disposal squad busy.’
‘Why did God make sand so heavy?’ said Byfold. He had tied two sacks together, hung them over his shoulder, and was climbing up the ladder.
Goyles had nothing to say to this and had turned his attention to the pump. He looked at his watch again. Overstrand had said ‘two minutes’ and this was about the time it would take an experienced tunneller to reach the face. A novice would need five.
At eight minutes to nine, Goyles started operating the home-made pump. At three minutes to nine he stopped. Byfold had got most of the sacks of sand up and was starting his last trip.
One of the weaknesses of the system, thought Goyles, was that there was no means of communicating with the worker at the face. Even if you shouted, which would have been unwise, your voice, by some trick of accoustics, could not reach him. Something to do, no doubt, with the blanketing qualities of sand. A telephone from the shaft to the face would be a luxury, but might in the end save . . .
‘Still,’ said Tag, ‘one doesn’t exactly want to stand in their way.’
‘One wouldn’t want to do a Coutoules,’ he added.
‘Hello,’ said Byfold, ‘what’s happened to Alec? I’ve got all the bags clear. The shift’s about due.’
‘Nip up and tell them to wait,’ said Goyles. ‘We’ll give him a few more minutes. They trolley may have stuck.’
As Byfold’s stockinged feet disappeared out of the top of the shaft Goyles stared anxiously up the tunnel. If Overstrand really was stuck he would have to go after him and since there was only one trolley he would go on his elbows and knees. This was all right, of course. In fact, during the first fifty feet of the tunnel, before the rail had been laid, it had been the normal method of progress. But it meant an awful waste of time, and every minute that the trap stayed open could be dangerous.
He peered again up the tunnel.
Where there had been a faint glimmer of yellow, it was now completely dark. This did not necessarily mean that the light at the face had failed. Overstrand’s body and the trolley between them would blanket it effectively.
He became aware that Byfold was saying something.
‘—how long to wait?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Goyles. ‘I think I’ll have to go and see – no – hold it. Here he comes.’
Two feet appeared in the gloom of the tunnel and they heard the rumbling and creaking of the trolley on its home-made tram-lines.
‘How is everything?’ asked Goyles.
And then, even in the dim light of the shaft, he saw that Overstrand’s face was white.
‘What’s happened?’
Overstrand climbed off the trolley and stood up. He wiped his hands together, separating his fingers and rubbing them through each other as if to get the sand from between them.
‘Part of the roof’s fallen in at the top,’ he said, speaking slowly.
‘Has it—?’
‘No. It’s not right through. There’s no daylight showing. I think it’s held up by the foundations of the theatre. It’s difficult to see. You know we thought we were about under it.’
‘I see,’ said Goyles. It didn’t sound too alarming. ‘We’d better get the shoring-up started straight away. I’ll call off this shift and we’ll have a word with— ’
He was aware that Overstrand was star
ing at him.
‘It’s not just a collapse,’ he said. ‘There’s someone in it.’
‘What’s that?’
‘There’s someone in it. I could see his feet sticking out. I got some of the sand away. I think it’s Coutoules. He’s dead.’
‘You’re sure of that?’
‘Of course I’m sure,’ said Overstrand. He seemed to be trying to work up a little honest anger to counteract the effect of what he had seen. ‘You could tell that just from seeing his feet. I dug to his face to find out who it was. What are we going to do?’
It was noticeable that although both Overstrand and Byfold were regular soldiers, it was usually Goyles who assumed the command in any real crisis. He did so now.
He wasted no more time on Overstrand but climbed half-way up the ladder and said to Byfold:
‘Get this shift away, Roger. Tell them there’s a bit of the roof come down and there’ll be no more digging until we’ve got it shored up again. Then will you send someone for Doc. Simmonds and – ask Colonel Baird to step along?’
Byfold started to say something, took one look at Goyles’ face and changed his mind.
2
Colonel Baird was head of the Escape Committee. He was a New Zealander, had commanded an Infantry Battalion and had been acting commander of a Brigade at the time of his capture in the desert. He was a thick, grizzled, slow-speaking man: not a person you took liberties with.
He strolled into the kitchen three minutes later, slashing with his home-made flywhisk.
Both Overstrand and Goyles were up by this time, and standing beside the trap, and he listened to what they had to say.
‘It sounds to me like a two-man job,’ said the Colonel. ‘You found him, didn’t you, Overstrand? Well, that’s enough for a bit, I reckon. You go and change. You two – you’ll have to get that Greek out. It’s not going to be easy. I suggest you push the trolley ahead of you to the face. When you get there you’ll have to get either side of it and scrape the sand away with your hands until you can pull the body back on to the trolley. It won’t be exactly safe that bit. Do you think you can manage it?’
‘I expect so,’ said Goyles. ‘The lights still work. Overstrand says that the collapse is pretty well held up by the foundations of the theatre hut – we’re underneath that now.’
‘Stroke of luck,’ said Baird. ‘We might be able to save it yet. We don’t want to lose this one if we can help it. Down you go now. I’ll guarantee you ten minutes but don’t take longer if you can help it.’
Goyles couldn’t pretend that he enjoyed that crawl up the tunnel, but by the time he reached the face curiosity had the upper hand. He had never been in a tunnel fall before. The shift of the previous day had dug about six feet beyond the existing shoring; it would have been the first job for that morning’s shift to shore it up with the short lengths of wooden bed board, of which a stock was kept in the shaft. Sometime in the night, a large neat section had fallen out of the exposed roof. It had not quite filled the tunnel and over the top of it you could see the empty space it had fallen out of and the bricks and cement which were the foundations of the theatre hut. Underneath the fallen sand, somehow, incredibly was the body.
The actual operation of getting him out proved surprisingly easy, though far from pleasant, with every incautious movement bringing down a fresh trickle of sand from the cavity above.
Somebody – presumably Overstrand in his first effort to identify the body – had already scraped away a lot of sand on one side. Goyles, lying beside the truck, was able to dig, one-handed, into the pile on the other side. The difficulty was disposing of what he dug, but in the end he simply piled it on the trolley and Byfold, lying behind him, pulled the loaded trolley back and scattered the loose sand up and down the tunnel.
In the end, when the body was nearly clear – it was Coutoules all right – they edged the trolley in under his legs, retreated to the shored-up portion, and pulled. There was a further, alarming fall of sand, but the body came away with the trolley and the worst was over.
Five minutes later, they were back in the kitchen of Hut C.
Colonel Baird said: ‘If my hair’s white it’s you two who are responsible. Do you know you’ve been forty minutes?’
‘Time stood still, sir,’ said Goyles impenitently.
The body of Coutoules lay under a blanket in one corner of the room. Overstrand, who had changed and returned, lent them a hand and the four of them lowered the trap.
Up to that moment they had been too busy with the pressing necessities of the moment to give much thought to the problem which the figure under the blanket represented.
The awkward silence was broken by the arrival of the doctor.
‘He’s over there, Doc,’ said the Colonel. ‘It’s Coutoules.’
The doctor turned back the blanket, and then said: ‘I should like a little more light if I’m going to make a proper examination. Can he be moved?’
‘I was thinking the same thing, sir,’ said Goyles. ‘We’re rather a sitting chicken if anyone should come.’ The pulleys were still fastened to the stove and there was a good deal of bright, newly excavated sand on the floor, as well as four full bags which they had not yet had time to dispose of.
‘All right,’ said the Colonel. ‘But have you thought how you’re going to move him out of this hut?’
No one had.
‘Get him into the nearest bedroom for the moment – that’s yours, isn’t it, Goyles? Then clear up in here as quickly as you can. I’ll fix something to get him out. We’d better take him into Hut A. Meet us there, would you, Doctor?’
Goyles and Byfold picked up the body. Now that they were out of the tunnel they were beginning to feel glad of the blanket over it. They carried it in and laid it on the floor of their room.
‘Get hold of about twelve reliable types,’ said the Colonel. ‘People from this hut, if possible. We don’t want a lot of coming and going. Tell them to put on some sort of gym kit – and hurry.’
The power of Colonel Baird’s name was such that in less than five minutes a dozen puzzled, but willing, gymnasts had been assembled.
Colonel Baird gave them instructions.
Ten minutes later, the sentries on the walls were diverted at the sight of seven of their prisoners galloping from the end of Hut C with seven other prisoners mounted on their backs. The procession galloped past Hut B, down the alleyway between Hut B and Hut A, and from there out on to the Sports Ground, where a spirited tourney took place, each pair of riders trying to unseat the other. It did not surprise the sentries because nothing that the British did had power to surprise them. In the general excitement it may have escaped their attention, that whilst seven pairs had started out, only six had arrived at their destination.
The seventh rider was being dismounted from his perspiring horse in the dining room of Hut A.
‘I don’t want to do that again in a hurry,’ said Byfold. ‘I thought he was going to slip just as we got opposite the sentry platform – and the feel of those arms round my neck – ugh.’
‘All right,’ said Colonel Baird. ‘Put him down on the table, will you? You can do your stuff there all right, Doctor? Byfold, I don’t think we need you and Overstrand any more. Fewer people here the better, really. Warn the watchers that something is going on in this hut and we want the longest possible warning if any Italian heads in this direction. Oh, and you might see the Adjutant and ask the S.B.O. if he’ll step over here. Warn him not to hurry straight here – the sentries are very quick at picking up things like that – and I don’t know whether they’ve fallen for that bare-back circus act or not. Suggest that he might make his morning round in this direction in about ten minutes. You stop behind, Goyles. I want a word with you.’
The Colonel lowered himself on to one of the dining-room chairs – it had been built to Italian barrack specifications and was inadequate to his bulk – and Goyles sat down too, glad that he had his back to the things that were going on at the table
behind him.
‘Now, boy,’ said the Colonel, and he said it so kindly that Goyles felt suddenly guilty of nameless crimes, ‘tell me what happened.’
‘There’s not an awful lot to tell really,’ said Goyles. ‘We opened up the tunnel this morning, in the usual way, just after half-past eight. The drill is that three of us go down first.’
‘Yourself, Overstrand and Byfold.’
‘Well – not necessarily. Any three out of our room. We happen to be the only three of us there at the moment. The others are in the cooler.’
‘I see. And you get things ready.’
‘That’s it. We’ve all been in on this tunnel almost from the beginning and we know our way about it. We check the lighting and the pump and go up on the trolley to see that the shoring is holding up and there haven’t been any falls during the night, and we organise the disposal of any sacks of sand that the afternoon shift have left from the day before.’
‘I see. And this morning – by the way, do you open it yourselves?’
‘No. That wouldn’t work. It’s a four-man job to open or shut the trap, and it might have to be shut in a hurry. The same four chaps always do the opening – they live in the room next to ours – and they have to stand by the whole time the trap’s open in case there’s a panic.’
‘I’ll have a word with them in a moment,’ said the Colonel.
‘What next?’
‘I went down first and connected up the light. Then Overstrand and Byfold arrived. Overstrand went up the tunnel and – found Coutoules.’
‘Just like that,’ said the Colonel. ‘Quite simple, quite straightforward, and plain bloody impossible.’
‘I agree with you, sir,’ said Goyles stiffly, ‘but that’s what happened.’
‘I’m not disbelieving you, boy,’ said the Colonel. ‘How was he lying when you found him?’
‘I didn’t actually find him,’ said Goyles. ‘Overstrand did that. He says he tried to unearth him. He scraped the sand away far enough to see who it was, but I don’t think he moved the body. When Byfold and I went up to get him he was lying, half on his side, half on his face. His hands were in front of him, as if he was trying to scrape his way out. Enough sand had come down on him to pin him, though. He wouldn’t have had a chance. He must have died quite quickly.’
Death In Captivity Page 3