‘No, sir,’ Marc said.
‘No, God,’ Troy said.
God grabbed Marc’s muddy foot and twisted his big toe. ‘What do you call me?’
‘God,’ Marc said, gasping.
‘OK, boy. You’re going to admit that yellow is your favourite colour.’
‘Am I bollocks,’ Marc said.
‘Give him something to drink,’ God ordered.
Two men grabbed Marc. As one ripped his head back by pulling his hair, the other forced a rubber hose into his mouth and turned a wall-mounted tap, firing a powerful jet of water down his throat. The water triggered his gag reflex, but the vomit shooting up his throat was blocked by the water flooding his mouth and nose. He was drowning and vomiting at the same time. As he fought to break loose he could feel water splashing down his chest and a sense of dread, worse than anything he’d ever felt before.
The voice of God counted out the seconds, each one feeling like a month. ‘Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty.’
The hose was ripped out and Marc crashed forwards. He spat the water and thrashed about, coughing up chunks of vomit lodged in the back of his mouth.
‘What’s your favourite colour?’ God demanded.
Marc remembered what Henderson had taught them: if you’re being tortured, do everything you can to slow the process down. Cough for twice as long as you need to. Clear your throat three times. Look as if you want to speak, but make rasping noises and beg for a drink.
‘I know what you’re doing,’ God shouted. ‘Tell me that your favourite colour is yellow, or the pipe goes back in, this time for a full minute.’
Marc tried not to think about it. Once the pipe went in, you couldn’t move or speak. He’d have to take the full minute. But he didn’t want to look weak. What kind of sign was he giving if he gave in after one attempt?
Marc was hauled up off the dirt floor.
‘Well?’ God asked. ‘Is yellow your favourite colour?’
Marc gritted his teeth. ‘Always preferred red.’
‘Right,’ God shouted.
The other two grabbed Marc and tipped his head back. This time his fear made him fight much harder, refusing to open his mouth even when they pinched his nose. But Marc realised he’d only made it worse for himself, because he was already short of breath when the pipe went in. He managed to push his tongue back to stop the jet making him vomit, but the water seemed colder this time and after the struggle his neck was bent back painfully.
‘Twenty-three … twenty-four …’
Marc tried telling himself that this was part of his training, they weren’t really going to let him die, but that wasn’t how he felt as the water choked him.
‘Fifty-seven … fifty-eight …’
The tube came out and he slumped on to his chest, sobbing with pain and gasping for air.
‘No delaying tactics,’ God told him, as he placed his boot on Marc’s back. ‘Tell me in three seconds or the tube goes down for a minute and a half.’
‘Yellow,’ Marc sobbed. ‘I love yellow.’
Troy yelped as one of the other Canadians delivered his electric shock.
‘OK, Troy,’ God said, as the other men positioned Marc back on his knees with the headlamp blazing in his eyes. ‘You once owned a pet rabbit called Fluffles.’
One of the Canadians clipped a wire linked to the shock apparatus to the waist of Marc’s sodden pyjamas, and another to the bottom of the leg.
Troy had watched Marc’s suffering. He fought as the men pulled his head back, but chickened out when he saw the pipe, which still had chunks of Marc’s puke stuck to it.
‘I once owned a rabbit called Fluffles,’ Troy shouted.
Marc went into spasm as the electric shock fizzed through his wet pyjamas. It wasn’t too painful, but he turned angrily towards Troy. ‘You can’t even hold out for one little squirt?’ he shouted. ‘You useless wimp!’
‘That’s what they want you to say,’ Troy shouted back. ‘They’re trying to set us against each other.’
‘Don’t give me that,’ Marc shouted.
‘Well isn’t this fun?’ God said. ‘This time it’ll just be electric shocks, but we’ll up the current from fifty amps to four hundred. Marc, tell me that your favourite actress is Vivien Leigh.’
‘Yeah she is,’ Marc said, pointing at Troy. ‘I love her. Adore her. She’s my favourite, now zap him.’
There was a fizz of electricity and the much more powerful shock made Troy howl with pain. The Canadians had backed off so that they didn’t catch the shock and Troy – who also remembered what he’d been taught about delaying the interrogation process – jumped up and made a run for it.
He only got about three steps before one of the Canadians got him around the neck, swept his legs away and slammed him to the floor.
God was distracted and Marc saw his opportunity, standing up and jumping on to the bonnet of the car. He slid over the polished metal and jumped down beside the passenger door. The headlights were on, so Marc figured that the key was in the ignition. He went to get in the driver’s seat, planning a daring charge through the wooden doors, but was gutted to see piles of bricks where the front wheels were supposed to be.
Instead he turned to the apparatus used for giving electric shocks. The device was on wheels and had been adapted from a rack used for charging car batteries. As a Canadian who’d run around the back of the car closed in, Marc gave it an almighty shove.
The apparatus toppled forwards, making the lead that was connecting it to the mains electricity pull tight, before lashing forwards with such force that the plug ripped the socket out of the wall. The bulbs on the ceiling flickered, then went out, plunging the barn into darkness, apart from the two narrow headlight beams which were powered by the car battery.
‘That’s the main fuse,’ someone shouted.
Marc’s path to the exit was blocked by God, but there was nowhere else to go so he made a run for it. Within three steps, he was sandwiched between God and the man who’d run behind the car. Marc’s backward kick didn’t connect, and he was soon flat on his chest with a knee pressed against his back and Troy’s face close enough for the boys to feel each other’s breath.
‘Little shits,’ God shouted, as he leaned over the shock apparatus. ‘This is wrecked. You two are dead, you hear me, dead?’
‘I’m not scared of you,’ Marc shouted. ‘Do your worst, I reckon you’ve got eight minutes left before you have to let me go, and you can’t zap us because I broke your toy.’
‘What do you want me to do, sir?’ the man pinning Troy to the floor asked.
Troy whispered to Marc. ‘Sorry I wimped out.’
‘You bloody should be,’ Marc replied bitterly.
‘We’ve still got the hose and the ice bath, sir,’ said the man holding Marc down. ‘Or we could cuff ’em and hang ’em on the wall by their wrists.’
Marc saw someone new come through the door, and recognised his voice.
‘And what exactly will that prove?’ Brigadier Ouellet asked. ‘You’re not here to torture them. You’re here to see whether these boys have got what it takes to stand up to an interrogator, and I think they’ve made their case, don’t you? Give ’em both a kick up the arse and send them back to bed.’
*
Henderson decided to let his team lie in until nine. When they came along to the house for breakfast, he sat at a long dining table, dipping bread soldiers into a soft-boiled egg and enjoying the act rather more than anyone older than ten was supposed to.
‘Sleep well?’ Henderson asked, stifling a smile.
‘What do you think?’ Marc said bitterly. ‘You could have warned us.’
‘Where would the fun have been in that?’ Henderson asked.
The room filled with the sound of grating chairs as the kids took their places. The cook brought over two bowls of eggs and a steaming pot of tea.
‘Soft-boiled, hard-boiled,’ she explained. ‘Go easy on the milk, we’re almost out.’
&n
bsp; ‘Where’s Boo?’ Rosie asked. ‘She seemed shaken up by it all.’
Marc hadn’t realised Boo had been dragged out of bed with the kids, though she was less experienced at undercover work than he was, so it made sense.
‘I think she withstood the unpleasantness as well as can be expected,’ Henderson said. ‘But she’s mortified that the ice bath ruined her hairdo.’
‘Of course, some of us didn’t let ourselves get captured in the first place,’ Paul said.
‘You’re so smug,’ Rosie howled. ‘You only got out because your bed was right next to the window.’
‘And nobody except a skinny beanpole like you could have got through that gap,’ Joel added.
Henderson spoke gravely. ‘Actually, Paul, you’ve got to report to barn C after breakfast for a twenty-minute interrogation session with the Canadians.’
Paul looked aghast and dropped the egg off his teaspoon. A weak, ‘Oh …’ was all he could manage.
‘Gotcha!’ Henderson said.
Paul gasped with relief as the others cracked up laughing.
‘Paul, you looked like you were gonna lay a brick in your pants,’ Marc said.
‘In complete seriousness, I’d steer clear of the chap you kicked in the mouth,’ Henderson said. ‘He got driven off to see an emergency dentist in Falmouth, so I don’t think he’s your biggest fan.’
Rosie leaned across and gave Paul a peck on the cheek. ‘My baby brother,’ she said proudly. ‘I never knew he had it in him.’
‘Morning,’ Brigadier Ouellet said brightly, as he came in from the hallway. Boo was directly behind, and everyone looked shocked because her hair was combed flat, she was bare-legged and she wore a short summer dress instead of her smart Wren’s uniform.
‘I’m drooling,’ Joel whispered to PT, who nodded in agreement once he was sure that Rosie wasn’t looking his way.
‘Your lot put up a jolly good fight last night,’ the Brigadier told Henderson, before glancing at his watch. ‘Remember to keep in character at all times. Our tailors are getting ready down in the garden, you need to be ready in the lounge with everything you’re planning to take over to France.’
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Marc and Troy left the house by the back door and walked the length of the garden with their suitcases. They were heading to a Nissen hut in a field several hundred metres from the house, but were struck by their own bare footprints in the mud leading towards the barns.
‘I’m really sorry about last night,’ Troy said. ‘I should have stuck it out with the hose. I want you to even the score.’
Marc looked curious. ‘How exactly?’
Troy put his case on the grass and stood still with his arms behind his back. ‘Take a free shot at me.’
Marc shrugged. ‘Just forget it.’
‘I feel really bad,’ Troy said.
Marc shook his head and grinned. ‘You really want me to thump you?’
Troy pushed out his stomach. Marc was pissed off that he’d suffered so badly from the hose, but he liked Troy and didn’t blame him. Nobody is really in control of themselves when faced with that level of fear.
‘I’m stronger than you,’ Marc said, as he bunched his fist. ‘You’d better not run back to the house bawling.’
‘I won’t,’ Troy said. ‘Hit me.’
Marc threw his first, but as Troy flinched Marc pulled his punch and went for Troy’s nipple, giving it an almighty twist. This was painful, but there was no risk of causing an injury serious enough to jeopardise the mission.
‘Bugger me!’ Troy howled, as he stumbled backwards clutching his chest.
Marc tripped Troy up, but grabbed his arm so that he didn’t hit the ground hard. Then he gave him a two-fingered jab in the ribs.
‘You half killed me, you little bastard,’ Troy said, in pain but laughing too.
‘Good,’ Marc said, as he picked his case back up. ‘Now we’re even.’
As Troy and Marc headed towards the hut in good spirits, PT and Paul started walking the other way with their luggage.
‘Everything OK?’ Troy asked.
‘It’s so bad,’ Paul said gravely.
‘Yeah,’ PT said. ‘Especially the bit where you have to bend over and they shove a red-hot poker up your bum.’
Marc tutted. ‘Yeah, I’m really falling for that. Are you gonna tell us or what?’
‘What,’ Paul said, as PT made a whiplash sound followed by a scream.
All Nissen huts were made from curved metal sections, but this one comprised twelve sections, making it twice as long as the one they’d slept in. Just inside the door were two large tables, designed for cutting fabric, with a pedal-powered sewing machine at the end of each one. Beyond this area was storage: rails of old clothes and shoes, shelves stacked with suitcases and boxes of personal items such as toothpaste, cigarettes and shaving foam. All were French brands in French packaging.
There were two Jewish Frenchwomen inside. One was elderly with shrunken mole-like eyes; she took Troy’s case while a younger lady with witchlike tangles of black hair and a tape measure around her neck grabbed Marc.
‘My name is Lael,’ she began. ‘Are you Hortefeux or Jarre?’
‘Hortefeux,’ Marc said.
‘You’re a handsome boy,’ Lael said, then shouted across to her colleague. ‘Yetta, look at this beautiful thing.’
Yetta laughed as she put Troy’s suitcase on her tabletop. ‘I think mine is more handsome,’ she laughed.
‘Now I need you to strip,’ Lael said, as she opened Marc’s case and threw everything out. ‘Have you got everything here that you’re taking to France? Not a pyjama top still in your bedroom, or a picture of your mother on your bedside table?’
Marc shook his head as he unbuttoned his shirt.
‘No point being modest,’ Lael said, as Marc slowly unbuttoned his shirt. ‘I’ve got to check every single piece of clothing, and this suitcase is no good for a start, it’s got Made in Derby printed inside the lid.’
Lael and Yetta were mirror images, taking the boys’ clothes and belongings and carefully inspecting the seams and labels. Very few passed muster.
‘What are you looking for?’ Marc asked.
Lael seemed happy to answer as she held up one of Marc’s shirts. ‘This came from France. You can tell by the soft collar and the feel of the fabric. But this one is different. The collar is stiffer, the cuffs are square rather than rounded and it’s a fine Indian cotton that you wouldn’t often see in mainland Europe. Even though it has no label, I can tell that it was made in Britain. And if I can tell that almost all of your clothes are British, the Gestapo can tell too.’
Marc was impressed as Lael accurately selected the few items in his wardrobe that came from France, and rejected the much greater number that he’d picked up after arriving in Britain. She let him keep his British army boots after he explained where he’d got them.
‘Give me your undershorts,’ she said finally. ‘Unless you want me to stick your hand down the back and inspect them in situ.’
Marc reluctantly stepped out of his boxers, then to his horror saw that the back was completely brown.
‘They made me walk through the field barefoot last night,’ Marc explained, as Lael inspected them with a look of complete disgust. ‘Then they made me kneel and the mud on my heels must have soaked into the back.’
Troy laughed. ‘Don’t believe him, miss, he’s shat himself.’
‘Such language,’ Yetta said, reaching across her tabletop and giving Troy a hard slap across the face.
‘Jesus,’ Troy moaned, as Marc laughed at his expense.
Lael looked disgusted as she pinched Marc’s shorts between thumb and forefinger, lifted the lid on a metal dustbin and shuddered as she dropped them in. ‘Right, let’s sort you out,’ she said.
Marc and Troy glanced at each other as the two women disappeared into the storage area. They’d emerge periodically with armfuls of clothes to try on. An all-new wardrobe would be suspi
cious, so most were either second-hand garments sourced from refugees or new items made in the French style and then bashed about to look worn.
Items that fitted were packed in genuine French suitcases. Others were marked up with chalk for alterations. Toothbrushes and toothpaste were added, along with French comic books, a few basic first aid items such as iodine and gauze, and French-made alarm clocks. To finish off each boy also got a few packets of cigarettes and chocolate bars.
‘Save the treats for bribes and winning favour,’ Lael said. ‘Don’t scoff them.’
‘You took my soap,’ Troy said. ‘Do I get a French one to replace it?’
‘Our agents report that there is no soap available in France,’ Yetta replied. ‘If you’re caught with soap, it’s highly suspicious.’
Lael scowled at Marc, ‘Not that you’ll miss it much, will you?’
‘I just had a shower three days ago,’ Marc said. ‘It’s not our fault we got dragged across a muddy field in the middle of the night.’
‘Special items,’ Lael explained, as she reached into a shelf under her table and took out a long velvet-lined box, divided into dozens of individual compartments.
The first thing she pulled out was a tatty-looking belt. She held the buckle up to Marc’s face. ‘It’s tarnished to look like brass, but it’s twenty-two-carat gold. If you find yourself on the run you can sell the metal, or give it to someone as a bribe. You can tell it’s genuine by the weight.’
Next she pulled out a large button. ‘This pops apart like so, and you can hide a standard L tablet inside. I’ll sew one on to all your trousers.’
‘Which one’s the L tablet?’ Troy asked.
‘A is air-sickness,’ Marc said. ‘B Benzedrine to keep you awake, E knocks you out for thirty minutes if you need to buy time, K is the sleeping draught, though enough of it will kill you, L is the suicide pill.’
Troy shook his head. ‘I’m not taking a suicide pill with me. Those things are creepy.’
‘Finally there’s a pencil for each of you,’ Lael said, as she pulled out two stubby, chewed-up pencils. ‘Twist and pull.’
Henderson's Boys: Grey Wolves Page 9