One member of the Avenue rump, who did play an active part in the landings was Ted Hartnell, ship’s gunner, but it was by no means as active a part as he would have wished and he was bitterly disappointed when the Luftwaffe failed to show up in great numbers. Night fell off the littered beach without him having been able to train his sights on a single enemy aircraft.
He was so cast down by the scarcity of enemy aircraft that he complained bitterly to the cook, when he went below for his cocoa.
“It’s enough to drive a man back to Civvy Street,” he grunted, as though the cook had the ordering of Luftwaffe sorties in the west. “Where do you suppose they’ve got to? There were always plenty of the bastards around on the Malta runs, weren’t there? And they came low enough when we were slopping about in life-jackets, didn’t they? Here we are, right on their bloody doorstep, and not one of ’em’s got the guts to take a crack at us! I tell you chum, it’s enough to make a man go to the skipper and ask for his ticket!”
His chagrin at being so cheated was not counterfeit, for Ted Hartnell was an implacable Nazi-hater, and was here off the beaches from choice, having gone to considerable trouble to get himself transferred to a vessel earmarked for D-Day service.
Now he felt badly let down, like a huntsman who has been promised a cracking day with a famous pack, and has gone on to draw coverts from dawn to dusk without a whiff of scent.
The cook, an elderly seaman, with most of his troubles behind him, did not share Ted’s disappointment.
“You don’t know when you’re well off, mate!” he growled. “All I c’n say is, thank Gawd they did stay away! And for why? Because I don’t go for the kind o’ visiting cards they use and that’s straight!”
Ted finished his cocoa and went on deck again, taking up his position in the bows, and searching the expanse of sea between anchorage and shore. He had completed his tour of duty and had only to summon his relief, but he was reluctant to call it a day. He had all manner of scores to settle with the Luftwaffe and there would never be another chance like this, not if he lived to be a hundred.
Ted was well over forty now, and until 1939 he had never harboured a spiteful thought for anyone. His transition, from amiable jazz-drummer to fire-eating ship’s gunner, had begun long before the Nazis had fired a shot in his direction, and his sea service in the Atlantic and Mediterranean, had confirmed him in the belief that killing Nazis was the only worthwhile job for a man who called himself a man.
The Nazis, on their part, had done their best to reciprocate his animosity. They had torpedoed him in the South Atlantic, and set him adrift for the better part of a fortnight, on a spoonful of water a day. They had then machine-gunned him all the way from Gibraltar to Malta and back, and they had fired long bursts at him when he was clinging to an overturned lifeboat in the Bay of Biscay. Finally, as though despairing on killing him, they had turned their guns on his property in the Avenue, cracked all his windows, and brought the ceilings down. Despite all this he was still here, searching the sea and sky for a target and finding none.
It was, as he said, enough to drive a man back to Civvy Street.
Two honorary members of the Avenue community did find targets on that day.
Orrie and Mitch, boy-friends of the younger Carver twins, Fetch and Carry, were ashore on Omaha beach at first light, and manoeuvred their vehicles through the intricate network of underwater obstructions that had already accounted for most of their section.
By eight a.m. Omaha Beach was a shambles. Dead men had piled up in the shallows, and wrecked vehicles were almost wheel to wheel along the tide line.
It was not part of the official duty of Orrie and Mitch to assault German strong-points, but in the kind of mix-up that ensued on Omaha beach that morning anything could happen, and they soon found themselves being used as infantry.
The two Americans did not share Ted Hartnell’s crusading fervour for Democracy, but they were extremely interested in personal survival, and at that particular time and place the elimination of certain strong-points seemed the only way to ensure such survival.
With Rangers, and other assault troops, they blasted their way into the sandhills and shot Germans at close range, after which they gave a hand with the wounded and then helped in the buildup of ammunition on the hard-won beach-head.
They did their duty, with something to spare, but they did not pretend to themselves, or to each other, that it had been the kind of day they would look back upon with pleasure.
“I’d sure like to git to hell outa this,” admitted Orrie, after darkness had fallen, and they lay in a slit trench trying to sleep above the roar of a naval barrage.
“Me, too,” confessed Mitch, “I don’t aim to be no hero, Bud, never did and never will! Them dolls back home ain’t gonna believe about this, Orrie!”
“No,” said Orrie, glumly, “but I sure ain’t gonner waste no time convincing ’em, just so I get back in one piece! I’m gonna have other things on my mind right then, I guess!”
Presently the stream of naval shells overhead ceased. An officer looked into the trench and told them that word had come through from other sectors further east that British and Canadian units had made good their landings, and were advancing rapidly inland.
“We don’t really belong with this outfit,” Mitch told him, hopefully, “we’re transport drivers, and we sorter got lost early on.”
“Is that so?” said the officer, reflectively. “Well, I’m kinder lost myself, boys, but who the hell isn’t?”
He moved on and when it was darker and quieter the two friends fell to discussing the twins again. Their situation increased their intimacy and they spoke more freely than they had ever spoken in the past.
“You aim to marry that doll o’ yours, Mitch?” asked Orrie, presently.
“Yeah, I guess so, we have kinder talked it over,” admitted Mitch. Then: “How about you and Carry?”
“Aw, we’ll get around to it, mebbe,” said Orrie, laconically, “and when we do, what-say we make it a double?”
“Could be,” said Mitch, adding thoughtfully, “if we get into that trucking business, like we figured, we could set up house together. Then, maybe, we could swop dolls whenever we felt like it, for so help me, Orrie, I can’t never tell one from the other, can you?”
Orrie was thoughtful for a spell. Finally, he said: “Mitch, here’s sumphin I ain’t never told you before! You remember that night at the Searchlight Battery dance, when I climbed in the wrong truck? Well, fact is it was dark, and I got to necking your dame by mistake!”
He expected Mitch to exclaim but instead the other received the confession with a gruff laugh.
“You think that kinda funny, Mitch?” demanded Orrie, indignantly.
“I sure do,” said Mitch, “because it so happens that I made the same mistake the same night, and your dame didn’t so much as squawk, so I reckon them two was ribbing us, Orrie!”
There was a silence for a moment, then Orrie said:
“How’d you make out with mine, Mitch? Honest, now!”
“How’d you?”
“I’m asking you, Mitch!”
“Okay! Pretty fair, I’d say! And you, Orrie?”
“Fair to middlin’,” admitted Orrie.
There was another pause, broken by Mitch, who said:
“You figger we’d better let on we know ’bout it, Orrie?”
Orrie considered. “No, I guess not,” he said at length. “Dames are funny that way. They don’t mind kickin’ over the traces now an’ again, just so they c’n still let on to ’emselves they ain’t. I figger we’ll keep this one up our sleeves and make other mistakes, mebbe!”
“I’m easy,” said Mitch and then, dismissing the women; “Jeese! I dunno what I’d give for a smoke, Orrie!”
“Me, too,” said Orrie, “but I guess that’d be sticking our necks out, Bud!”
Presently the shelling ceased altogether and they slept.
Far away to the south-east, some hundreds o
f miles from Omaha beach, a man who had not been seen in the Avenue for almost two years was celebrating D-Day in his own way. He was sitting in the latrine of a prison camp barrack block, absorbed in putting his final touches to a curious piece of handiwork.
The task was being performed in the uncertain light of a home-made dip, constructed of a tin of meat fat and a twisted pyjama cord. The light was very bad and the materials inadequate, but he seemed, nonetheless, to be making good progress, for presently he laid his work aside, rose, took a metal skewer from his pocket, and began to address himself to the padlock on the wash-house door.
When he had picked the lock he whistled and looked over his shoulder at another man, who had been standing in the shadows behind him. This man was now examining what appeared to be a large oval picture frame.
“That’s first-rate, Boxer,” said the other man. “Are we ready to hang it now?”
“Just about, Whitey,” said Boxer, and opened the door a crack in order to look across the wide yard towards the garrison wire.
The beam of a searchlight swung slowly across the big compound, paused for a moment on the big canteen building, then passed on, leaving the prisoners’ barracks in darkness.
“Now,” said Boxer, and dived into the open, with Whitey close on his heels.
Their excursion was a direct result of the D-Day landings, news of which had come through on ‘Anna’, the illicit camp radio, within two hours of the invasion.
The prisoners were jubilant and their guards had been correspondingly nervous all day.
Apart from a good deal of skylarking, however, the day seemed to have passed quietly enough, far too quietly for Boxer, who began to feel restless towards evening and drifted over to see his friend, Corporal White, who lived across the compound.
“Seems tame, not to do nothing to show ’em!” he told Whitey. “Damn it, we’ve always celebrated good news in some way, haven’t we, and this is the biggest news we’ve ever had, isn’t it?”
“Sarnt-Major said to take it easy, Boxer,” said Whitey despondently. “He says old Jerry’s sure to be trigger-happy for a week or so!”
“Aw, what the hell,” grumbled Boxer, “I don’t mean nothing like that! I mean just a bit of a lark! Listen, Whitey, I got a little pepper-upper, that’s a hundred per cent safe, and will only take the two of us! We don’t need to say nothing to the others, not ’till it’s in the bag!”
Corporal White had had a wide experience of Boxer’s ‘pepper-uppers’ in the past year or so, and although curious he was nevertheless guarded in his reply.
“What is it?” he asked, “you tell me, and let me judge for myself.”
Boxer told him and Whitey chuckled, appreciatively.
“Cor! No harm in that,” he admitted, “no harm at all! You say you can get hold of a picture of Adolf?”
“Easy,” said Boxer, “and we can take our pick of frames, can’t we?”
“I’m on,” said Corporal White, “only let it be a surprise, to all the others. We can fix it in the canteen, high up above the service hatch, so don’t say nothing ’till it’s all fixed!”
They perfected and planted their ‘pepper-upper’ and were back in their own huts within twenty minutes of leaving the barrack. It was not until after roll-call the following morning that their handiwork was appreciated by the prisoners as a whole.
The duty officer heard howls of laughter issuing from the canteen, as he made his final check of numbers, preparatory to handing in the parade states into the guardroom.
He was curious to discover the cause of the merriment. It did not sound the kind of disturbance that called for disciplinary action, but more like a display of high spirits that needed prompt investigation before it overreached itself and got out of hand.
He called a corporal and two elderly reservists, and marched them in to the canteen, where the prisoners were awaiting their meal.
His arrival was the signal for renewed laughter. Howls of delight greeted the squad’s arrival, and the men made way for him, respectfully, as he walked down the long building towards the serving hatches at the far end. It was here that the most of the kriegies were gathered, and the laughter was loudest and most persistent.
Then he stopped, ten yards short of the hatch, as his gaze rose slowly above the level of the aperture, and came to rest on an astonishing addition to canteen furniture.
High above his head, so high that it could only be reached by a ladder, hung a large coloured print of the Fuehrer. It was one of the portraits sent out to the camps in batches by one of the Berlin illustrated papers, and it showed the Fuehrer in pensive mood, staring down into the hall with that look of brooding sadness so typical of his recent portraits. It was framed, neatly enough, in a lavatory seat, and underneath it, in large, paint-scrawled letters, was the legend: Have this one on me, chaps!
Boxer heard the duty officer’s squeal of rage and at once clutched Whitey for support. Together, and in the midst of a shouting, laughing throng, they reeled against the deal table. Tears rilled Boxer’s eyes as he stamped his large feet in a paroxysm of mirth. He laughed openly and shamelessly, for Boxer had always enjoyed his own jokes as much as anyone else.
CHAPTER XXXIV
‘Crossbow’
IN THE EARLY hours of June 14th, 1944, Jim Carver was returning empty from a delivery in the West Midlands, when he passed what appeared to be the scene of a routine bomb-incident.
He stopped because he was curious. The scene had a familiar air, uniformed men standing beside their parked lorries, a vast heap of rubble, a tangle of fire hoses on the pavement, and a fire-tender parked alongside the wide gap in the terrace.
He thought: ‘My word, but that must have been a big one! I didn’t know there had been a raid last night,’ and he climbed out of his cabin, and touched a tin-hatted warden on the arm.
“What was it? A blockbuster?”
“We’re not sure,” said the warden, “I think it was jettisoned. Somebody didn’t want to fly all the way home with it, I suppose, but whatever it was it was a nasty packet, one of the worst we’ve had!”
“Damn it, I thought we’d finished with this sort of thing,” said Jim.
“So did everybody,” said the man, shortly and moved away to help a group of men in battledress demolish a tottering chimney-stack.
Jim went back to his lorry and drove slowly into the West End, via the Bayswater Road. The traffic was light and there seemed to be few people about, although it was now approaching the first rush hour. He was tired and longed for bed. “I’m getting too long in the tooth for these all-night jobs,” he told himself. “Thank God it all seems to be finishing, and we shall be able to take things a little easier. What a hell of a time it’s lasted, already nearly five years!”
He reached home, turned in, and slept until Harold came home at six. Harold called up from the hall:
“You about, Jim?”
“I soon will be! Put the kettle on, Harold!”
He came downstairs in his pyjamas, unshaved and with his grey hair sticking up on end.
“I’ve slept the clock round! I was all in when I got back, soon after you left this morning. I passed a nasty incident on the way. Did you get anything over this side?”
“I heard them banging away at something,” said Harold, “but it didn’t sound much like a raid, more like a single aircraft, out of control. As a matter of fact there’s a rumour in the City that it was the first of them.”
“First of what?” asked Jim, “what rubbish are they talking in your office now?”
“Secret-weapon talk,” said Harold, “Hitler’s last fling. They say this one was a pilotless ’plane, called the ‘V.1’.”
He was surprised when Jim failed to pooh-pooh the idea.
“I suppose it’s possible,” he said, remembering the size of the gap in the row of houses he had passed early in the day. “I wonder if our people are on to it?”
They were, as he had ample opportunity to discover during the latter p
art of the week, when delivering to Eastbourne and Hythe. By that time the run from Lambeth to the East Sussex coast, had become known as ‘Doodlebug Alley’, and a succession of strange, speeding missiles, looking like crossbows, and sounding like a two-stroke motor-cycle being driven across the sky, were streaming in from the Pas de Calais coast, each heading in the general direction of the capital.
At first, Jim did not take them very seriously. He fell back on his old method of personal reassurance, the line that he had taken throughout the blitz. London was a big place, and if one’s chances of being hit during an attack by two hundred bombers was small, then how much better were they of dodging a single warhead, without a human brain to guide it?
He pulled in on the way through Norwood one morning and watched a V.1. pass directly overhead, honking its way north-east, and suddenly cutting out as it dived silently to earth.
It fell short of the main target, somewhere in the direction of New Cross, but he distinctly felt the vibration, and saw the vast plume of yellowish smoke mushroom into the sky.
He watched the street come to life again, shoppers emerging slowly from doorways into which they had crouched when the V.1’s engine had cut, and its dive had begun. Then he looked more closely at a middle-aged woman’s face, as she straightened herself beside his lorry. There was fear in her face, fear and infinite strain, but when she saw him looking at her, her mouth twitched into a nervous smile.
“That’s another that missed us, anyway,” she said but the tremor in her voice belied the flippancy of the remark.
“They don’t seem to be having much effect,” said Jim. “Of all the things that little maniac has tried so far this is certainly the daftest!”
“I don’t know about that,” said the woman, grimly, “they kill people, don’t they? I passed a place yesterday in Beckenham, where they say one of ’em wiped out about fifty. Hit a chain store, so they said, and made a rare mess of it, I can tell you!”
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