Operation XD

by James Barrington as Max Adams

  What they couldn’t afford to do was to have the fuel run out, because then they would be absolutely at the mercy of the wind and the waves, and at some point the launch would almost certainly be swamped and possibly capsize, with the consequent loss of everyone on board. And that, as Michaels said to Barber as they stood side by side in the tiny wheelhouse, would be a hell of a shame for all concerned, especially after the undeniable success of the unit’s mission to Holland.

  Barber stared around them at the empty sea: behind at the receding coastline; then looked ahead at where the sun was sinking, with unpleasant rapidity, through a distant layer of scattered cloud towards the western horizon. In an open boat full of soldiers with no sailing experience, limited fuel, virtually no supplies, no charts and only a compass to steer by, night falling and a journey of well over 100 miles in front of them, assuming they could follow a direct track, which they couldn’t, they were in an invidious position and all of them knew it.

  ‘What happened about the radio?’ he asked. ‘Did the commander make a call to any navy ships in the area?’

  ‘He’s done rather better than that,’ Michaels replied. ‘He’s promised to get one of his men to make regular calls on whatever radio set he has access to at IJmuiden before he shuts up shop and sets off for Dunkirk. And he’s also managed to find a radio for us.’

  Bracing himself against the movement of the launch, Michaels picked up the larger of the two canvas bags he’d carried onto the boat, placed it on the small table next to the wheel and throttle, and opened it up. From it he took a dark green painted object, the shape of a tin of food, but about ten times bigger and clearly quite heavy. It was strapped to a wooden board by a metal band that run around its circumference, and there were what appeared to be three electrical terminals at one end and a further two on the top of the cylinder at the other end.

  ‘That doesn’t look like a radio to me,’ Barber pointed out.

  ‘That’s because it isn’t,’ Michaels replied. ‘This is the power source, a thing called a dynamotor.’

  He opened the other bag, the one he’d been carrying over his shoulder, and removed another dark green painted piece of equipment, this one oblong and with a selection of dials and controls set into a brown panel in its centre.

  ‘This bit is the radio,’ Michaels clarified.

  ‘That looks a lot more familiar,’ Barber said, dividing his attention between the view through the wheelhouse windows at the darkening sky and the constant motion of the sea, and what Michaels was doing beside him.

  ‘I don’t know much about it, but according to the commander this was made in Czechoslovakia in about 1935, and it was originally intended for use as a covert radio, the sort of thing a spy could use to send a message to his controller. There should be three bits altogether, the dynamotor, receiver and transmitter, but for some reason he only had the transmitter and power source. He was also somewhat evasive about how he obtained it in the first place, and I didn’t want to push him about it.’

  Assisted by Rochester, Michaels set about connecting the various leads linking the two parts of the set, following a set of written notes Commander Slater-Jones had given him, and then connected another lead to the launch’s power supply, a generator being driven by the engine.

  With everything connected correctly, as far as he knew, Michaels activated the transmitter by turning one of the switches on the control panel. Immediately, the dial at the top of the transmitter sprang to life, showing that the unit was powered up and ready for use.

  ‘If there’s no receiver,’ Rochester said, ‘how are we going to know if our message has been received or not?’

  ‘The short answer is that we’re not,’ Michaels replied. ‘If our message does get through, hopefully we’ll see a warship of some description heading towards us.’

  Rochester pointed at the Morse key attached to the transmitter.

  ‘So we have to use that and just transmit blind. What about the message? What are we supposed to say? And do you know the right frequency to use?’

  Michaels nodded.

  ‘The commander will be broadcasting, as I said, and he’s given us the simplest possible message to use in our transmissions. We just repeatedly send the letters KFRE in Morse code, not all the time, because that will swamp any sets that are receiving it, but about once every five minutes.’

  ‘And do you know Morse code?’ Barber asked. ‘If not, I do.’

  ‘I do, actually. It’s very simple. KFRE in Morse is dash dot dash, dot dot dash dot, dot dash dot and a final dot, so it’s not difficult to remember, and in any case I’ve written it down. The frequency the commander has told us to use is 2410 kilocycles per second. This isn’t my field, obviously, but apparently that’s the standard Royal Navy radiotelephone and voice communications frequency, so it’s monitored all the time, and that’s the important bit.’

  ‘So we just broadcast that every five minutes or so and hope for the best?’ Rochester said. ‘It seems a bit hit and miss to me.’

  ‘It is a bit hit and miss, but it’s all we’ve got, so that’s what we’re going to do,’ Michaels replied, somewhat sharply. ‘And tell the men out on the deck to keep their eyes peeled for the first sign of an approaching ship. In this boat, we’re a fairly small target, and it would really piss me off if a British destroyer turned up and steamed straight past us because nobody on board had seen us, so make sure they look sharp.’

  As Rochester nodded and stepped out of the wheelhouse, Michaels leaned forward, seized the Morse key in his right hand and rapidly tapped out the four-digit message that was intended to both identify them and alert any British warships, in the vicinity, to their presence. Commander Slater-Jones had told Michaels that Royal Navy destroyers and some other warships were fitted with basic direction-finding equipment, so as soon as any vessel was sighted they should increase the frequency of their transmissions to once a minute, and he had been intending to include that piece of information in his own broadcast from the shore.

  Then it would be a matter of the people on the two vessels spotting each other visually and then getting close enough together to make the transfer. It was a plan – if such a vague collection of what ifs and maybes could be dignified by that description – that was so full of uncertainties that Michaels frankly doubted that it was going to work. But as he had said to Rochester, it was all they had.

  Minutes later the sun disappeared completely below the horizon and a kind of grey twilight surrounded them, increasing their sense of isolation and making it even more difficult for Barber to steer the best – or at least the safest – course through the waves.

  And then, even over the rhythmic throbbing of the boat’s small diesel engine, the sound of an aircraft engine suddenly became audible. Not the distant steady drone of a multi-engine bomber, the noise they’d got very used to while they’d been in Holland, and especially in Amsterdam, but the higher-pitched roar of a single-engine fighter aircraft. And it was somewhere close to them.

  ‘Aircraft!’ Rochester yelled. ‘Load your weapons.’

  The chances of it being an Allied aircraft so close to the Dutch coast was almost nil. And that could only mean one thing.

  The engine sound faded briefly, then grew louder again. But they couldn’t see the aircraft, although they knew it had to be somewhere above them, possibly above the lowest of the numerous cloud layers.

  The sound was moving, but almost constant in volume, and suddenly Dawson, who was standing right beside the wheelhouse with his MP40 cocked and ready – though he knew that such a small-calibre weapon would be almost completely ineffective against an attacking aircraft – realized what the pilot was most probably doing.

  ‘I think he’s circling,’ he said, ‘maybe looking for a break in the clouds.’

  Then the sound of the aircraft engine gradually receded towards the east.

  ‘He’s buggering off,’ somebody said.

  ‘I wouldn’t put any money on that,’ Dawson retorted.


  Seconds later, a menacing grey shape appeared to the north of the boat, seemingly just feet above the wave tops, and heading straight towards them.

  ‘Go to starboard,’ Michaels instructed.

  ‘But the waves—’ Barber started; the captain didn’t let him finish.

  ‘Sod the waves,’ he said. ‘We’re broadside on to that fighter. We have to turn towards it. Make the turn.’

  Barber swung the wheel clockwise to start the boat swinging to starboard, and at the same time increased the throttle opening, judging the speed of the launch against the movement of the surface of the sea, so as to change direction as the bow approached the crest of a wave rather than in the trough between waves, when the danger of being swamped or capsized was much greater. The launch lurched sideways, over to the left, and then corkscrewed to the right before straightening up.

  As it did so, the pilot of the German fighter – in the half-light of dusk it looked to Dawson like another Messerschmitt – opened fire, the thumping of its wing-mounted machine guns clearly audible just seconds after they saw the flashes of the weapons firing. In the confusion of the broken water around the launch, they had no idea where the bullets had hit, but none of them damaged the boat.

  Half a dozen of the KFRE soldiers had not only managed to get to their feet on the pitching and rolling deck of the launch, but they’d also managed to load and aim their Lee-Enfield rifles at the oncoming fighter, and as the aircraft got closer they let loose a ragged volley of shots. They all knew they were wasting ammunition; that they had almost no chance of hitting the aircraft because of the erratic motion of the boat and the speed at which their target was flying, but at least firing at it made them feel better. And even if by some miracle one of their shots had hit the aircraft, it was extremely unlikely that it would do any serious damage, unless they somehow managed to hit the pilot himself.

  The aircraft howled overhead, banking away from the boat in a climbing turn, another handful of shots following it, to no obvious effect.

  ‘He’ll be coming back to try again,’ Rochester predicted. ‘Start firing as soon as you see the aircraft.’

  The sound of the Messerschmitt engine died away, but then the aircraft reappeared about a quarter of a mile away, diving down almost to sea level to begin another strafing run.

  ‘What have we done to piss him off?’ Dawson asked, of nobody in particular. ‘There must be more important targets around here than a big rowing boat full of knackered British soldiers.’

  Their shots again did not apparently damage the aircraft, or seem to dissuade the pilot, who continued towards the launch in a straight line, firing short bursts from his cannon as he approached. This time his aim was better, and a couple of the shells hit the back of the launch, both passing harmlessly through the roof of the wheelhouse.

  But the boat was clearly a difficult target because it was moving about so erratically. The waves that had forced them to track down towards the south-west were now beginning to help them, tossing the launch around so much that the fighter pilot was being prevented from getting a clear shot at the vessel.

  On the other hand, the violent motion was doing nothing for the men on the open deck, about half of whom had either already thrown up or were clearly going to do so in the very near future. Some had managed to make it as far as the gunwale, but several had not, their vomit adding an unpleasant and smelly topping to the shallow pool of sea water that covered the open deck and sloshed from side to side with the motion of the launch.

  The Messerschmitt pulled up again as it passed over the boat and disappeared into the clouds.

  Barber steered the boat to port again, trying to make ground towards the west and reduce the worst of the pitching and rolling motion. Around them, the darkness was intensifying and Michaels knew that within a matter of minutes the pilot of the attacking fighter would be unable to see them clearly, if at all.

  He also realized something else.

  The launch was fitted with navigation lights, as was required by law, a red light on the port side of the wheelhouse and a green light to starboard, but Barber had quite correctly not switched them on. They were, after all, trying to keep a low profile and trying to make a covert escape from Holland. Displaying lights with enemy fighters in the air was pretty much an open invitation to be attacked.

  But there were other sources of illumination. The very basic compass inside the wheelhouse was fitted with a light so that the markings could be seen, and even that was casting a dim glow that illuminated the faces of the three officers crowded into the tiny structure.

  Michaels reached across Barber and snapped off the light, then turned to Rochester.

  ‘If that bloody Messerschmitt comes back towards us, tell the men not to shoot at it. The flashes from the muzzles of their rifles could be giving him an aiming point. And I don’t think anybody is, but just tell them not to smoke until we’re sure he’s gone for good.’

  Rochester nodded in the darkness and opened the wheelhouse door. As he did so, he heard the sound of the aircraft’s engine growing steadily louder somewhere above them.

  ‘Don’t shoot at it,’ he ordered urgently, raising his voice over the hammering of the waves against the hull and the noise of the boat’s engine. ‘The pilot might be aiming at your muzzle flashes. And nobody lights up a cigarette until he’s buggered off.’

  They all knew that the fighter was close to the boat, and probably circling around as the pilot looked for a target, but there was no third strafing run, and after about three or four minutes the noise of the engine started to diminish as the Messerschmitt obviously turned away and headed back towards the coast of Holland. Against a featureless black sea, the boat must have been completely invisible, but any light at all would have made it instantly identifiable.

  Michaels waited until the sound of the engine had died away completely, and then waited for another five minutes, just to be sure, before he turned on the dim light inside the compass binnacle. The lack of illumination hadn’t proved to be too much of a problem for Barber, his experience in small boat sailing and navigation giving him an instinctive feel for the state of the sea, and the launch had been maintaining the more or less westerly track they needed to follow, albeit still being forced somewhat down to the south by the direction of the waves.

  What they still didn’t know was where they were, except in the broadest possible terms, and without a sextant and a chart they had no way of finding out. Not that a sextant would have helped, as the cloud cover had by then increased to such an extent that not even the moon was visible, far less the stars. It was going to be a very black night, but hopefully only as far as the weather was concerned.

  ‘How are we doing for fuel?’ Michaels asked, tapping out the Morse message once again.

  Barber squinted at the small gauge located just to the left of the compass.

  ‘According to this,’ he replied, ‘we’ve still got about three quarters of a tank, maybe a little more, but I’ve no idea how accurate this gauge actually is. Or how big the tank is, come to that.’

  He tapped the glass a couple of times, but the needle inside didn’t move, which might – or might not – have been a good thing. It could mean the gauge was giving an accurate reading, or alternatively that the needle was stuck.

  Michaels did a quick mental calculation, then glanced at Barber.

  ‘I know this isn’t much better than a guess, but I reckon we’ve come no more than about 20 miles from IJmuiden,’ he said. ‘So I hope that gauge is really pessimistic, because if it’s accurate we’ve got no chance of making it to England. A quarter of a tank to cover 20 miles would give us a range of about 80 miles – say one hundred to be really optimistic about it – and that would mean we’d run out of fuel with the coast of East Anglia in sight but a few miles in front of us, and with no way of reaching it unless we swam for it.’

  ‘I know, but I can’t really slow down much,’ Barber said. ‘We have to keep up a certain speed just to
cope with these bloody waves, and we don’t even know what cruising speed this boat should maintain for maximum range. Maybe we should be going faster, not slower. And even if we did alter our speed, it probably wouldn’t help much because of the conditions.’

  ‘I know,’ Michaels replied, ‘so don’t sweat it. Just keep going as close to due west as you can and we’ll keep transmitting as the commander ordered. I’ll just nip out onto the foredeck and see how the men are coping. It’s not much fun here in the wheelhouse, where it’s sheltered, but it must be a bloody sight worse out there on the open deck exposed to the elements.’

  To Michaels’ surprise, apart from the few who were still seasick, most of the previous sufferers having now got more accustomed to the motion, the mood of his men was quite buoyant. He put this down to the fact that they were finally heading for home, even if there was no guarantee that they would actually make it. They all knew that at least they were heading in the right direction.

  ‘You can smoke now, lads,’ he said. ‘Just make sure you cup your hands around the match when you light up, and if you hear aircraft engines stub out the cigarettes immediately. And don’t forget to keep your eyes open for any ships. If you do see anything, tell us straight away.’

  For over three hours, the small launch tracked broadly west, tossed and buffeted by the waves. All around the fragile vessel, the night was impenetrably black, without even the faintest glimmer of light showing in any direction to indicate the presence of either a ship or land. Not that they were expecting to see land – any part of England – for at least ten hours after their departure from the Dutch coast, and even then it would only be if their fuel lasted. Round about ten that evening, the moon became dimly visible as a faint crescent through the scattered but quite heavy layers of cloud, and that provided a tiny amount of light that was welcome, if only to relieve the all-enveloping blackness.