The group was growing, with tentacles spreading into the police and tentative links with local communists. Madeline II was regularly delivering supplies and agents, as well as smuggling out the occasional refugee or downed airman. But more operatives meant more chance of being caught and more equipment meant more chance of the Germans finding it.
‘At some point things will go horribly wrong,’ Henderson warned. ‘But the key to the group’s survival is security, because nobody can tell the Gestapo what they don’t know.’
Eugene felt overawed as he began to grasp the complexities of his new job.
‘I feel like you’ve built me a tower of cards,’ Eugene told Henderson. ‘And my job is to stop them from getting blown away.’
The four diners laughed, as they finished their meal with bitter chocolate and small cups of espresso coffee.
Henderson took a glance at his watch. ‘And now it’s goodbye,’ he said, as he went around kissing everyone’s cheeks. ‘Alois, we didn’t get off to the best of starts what with you trying to kill me and all, but you’re a good man and we’d be nowhere without you and your brother’s work at the harbour. Madame Mercier, you are a true French heroine. Finally, Eugene, there’s no need to look so bloody scared because these two will look after you.’
Madame Mercier stood up and gave Henderson a hug. ‘Promise you’ll come back and see us all after we’ve won the war.’
Henderson laughed. ‘You want me back as soon as that?’
‘Nicolas will bring the cart with your equipment to Edith at the stables,’ Alois said.
The rugged old fisherman had tears in his eyes as Henderson headed out of the private room and left Mamba Noir for the last time. He crossed the street to his apartment. He’d already packed most of his things and left them aboard Madeline II that morning, but he had a final soapless shave and then packed his few remaining items in a leather bag.
His last act was to check the two rooms thoroughly for anything left behind. He didn’t bother pulling out the used handkerchief down the back of his bedside table, but he was surprised to find one of Marc’s undershirts trapped between his mattress and the rusty bed frame. It smelled vaguely of sweat, and Marc’s smell triggered a thousand memories.
Henderson looked around and saw Marc washing at the sink, Marc in bed, Marc pulling the curtains. He blamed himself for Marc’s death as he slammed the apartment door and bolted off down the stairs.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The U-boat crew bunker was at the heart of the huge construction site on the Keroman peninsula. Attacking it successfully meant carrying large quantities of weapons and explosives into the most secure part of the Lorient military zone. Henderson had planned meticulously, using information gathered by PT when he worked on the construction site, Edith’s local knowledge and, most valuably, information on the design and layout of the crew bunker which came from an exiled Spanish communist who was a friend of Antoine’s.
The guards on the main bridge going west out of Lorient knew Edith well and she had no trouble bringing the open-backed cart into town. After stopping to unload milk churns and fruit at a workmen’s canteen close to the docks, Edith turned the empty cart into the depopulated streets on the western side of the main U-boat dock.
She hadn’t been this way since the day she’d brought Marc over to take photographs of the bunkers. Organisation Todt was concentrating its manpower on completing the bunkers on the opposite side of the dock, so little had changed except for the demolition of a row of terraced houses, opening up a rubble path that would enable easy access for trucks bringing cranes and other large-scale equipment to the dockside.
‘Fleabag!’ a young lad shouted from the kerb. ‘Haven’t seen you for ages. What you up to?’
Jean-Paul was eleven, the youngest member of a little gang that Edith used to mess around with but had grown out of now she was almost thirteen and busy working for Madame Mercier.
‘Just came out to look around for old times’ sake,’ Edith said, stopping the cart out of politeness but hoping Jean-Paul would go away because she’d almost reached her destination. ‘Seen many Germans around?’
‘Not unless you go near the coal yards. No kid dares now. They got rid of Fat Adolf and the new guards bash your brains out if they catch you stealing coal. They got my brother one time. Mum had to come and fetch him and he was black and blue.’
‘Well it was nice seeing you,’ Edith said, as she gave the horse a tap. ‘I’d better go.’
‘You should come down and catch rats with us,’ Jean-Paul said, as he jogged alongside the cart. ‘We catch big massive ones with catapults and sell them to the butcher on Rue du Port. He pays us three francs per sack load.’
‘I’ll be sure to avoid his sausages in future,’ Edith said.
Then, much to her alarm, Jean-Paul jumped up on the cart.
‘Hey,’ she shouted. ‘This is Madame Mercier’s cart. Get off.’
‘Make me, Fleabag,’ Jean-Paul said, poking out his tongue.
Jean-Paul was a tough little lad. Edith might have been two years older, but she was skinny and knew she couldn’t make him do anything. Her only choice was to take him along and let Henderson deal with the situation.
Her destination was only a few hundred metres down the next street. Rosie and Henderson dashed out of a boarded-up shopfront as Jean-Paul sat up on the back of the cart.
‘What are you up to here?’ the boy asked suspiciously.
Edith didn’t want Jean-Paul running off and flapping his big mouth.
‘Come inside, if you want to see what we’re up to,’ she said.
Henderson wasn’t pleased to see that Edith had bought company.
‘He just jumped on the cart,’ she whispered. ‘He’s a total brat. There was nothing I could do.’
‘OK,’ Henderson said, giving Edith a wink before looking up at Jean-Paul. ‘I could do with an extra pair of hands actually. If I give you three francs, will you help me to unload the cart?’
Jean-Paul beamed like it was Christmas and his birthday in one, but then looked perplexed.
‘The cart’s empty.’
Rosie had already jumped into the back of the cart. After a quick glance to make sure that the street was deserted, she pushed a metal lever into a gap between the floor and side of the cart and pulled out a narrow plank. She then reached through the resulting slot and removed two wooden bolts. As Rosie jumped down, Edith stood behind the cart and slid the floor out revealing a large hidden compartment twenty centimetres deep.
Jean-Paul’s eyes bulged as he saw the array of grenades, pistols, machine guns, ropes, detonators, dinner-plate-sized cakes of explosive and black British army commando uniforms.
‘Start carrying,’ Henderson ordered.
Rosie reached over the side of the cart and gave Jean-Paul a wooden box filled with grenades. ‘Put it inside, quickly.’
They rushed back and forth, carrying the boxes of equipment into the house. Luc joined in, after apologising because he’d been out the back peeing. In two minutes the cart was empty and Rosie had the false floor bolted back into place. At this point Edith was supposed to have ridden off, but Jean-Paul had complicated matters.
‘Everyone inside,’ Henderson ordered, then pointed at Edith. ‘Tell me about your little friend.’
‘He’s just a kid,’ Edith said. ‘He’s always out on the street. His family’s rough and he’s got more siblings than toes.’
‘I can keep my mouth shut,’ Jean-Paul said. ‘I swear.’
‘He’s seen all our faces,’ Luc said, as he sneered at Jean-Paul. ‘Safest thing is to wring his neck.’
‘Luc, shut up,’ Rosie said, as Jean-Paul started to look scared.
Everyone was looking to Henderson for answers, but none were popping into his head.
‘We’ve got to kill him,’ Luc insisted. ‘We’re all leaving but Edith isn’t and that brat will know she brought the cart here.’
‘I’m not murdering a young boy, Luc,�
�� Henderson yelled, then looked at Jean-Paul, who backed nervously up to a crumbling wall. ‘Why do you stay out on the street so much?’
Jean-Paul shrugged. ‘Dunno, there’s never much to do.’
‘Their mum’s always drunk and the bloke she’s with knocks all the kids around,’ Edith said.
‘She’s not always drunk,’ Jean-Paul said defensively.
Jean-Paul flinched as Henderson moved closer and looked at finger-shaped bruises where someone had grabbed him around the neck, and scars down his arms where he’d been regularly thrashed with a branch or a length of wire. Trusting him was a risk, but Henderson thought a boy with a hard background would respond to kindness.
‘OK, here’s what you do,’ Henderson said. ‘Jean-Paul, are you listening?’
Jean-Paul nodded solemnly, as Henderson glanced at his watch.
‘Rosie is going to take you back to the stables with Edith and the cart. When you get there, she’ll give you two pills that will make you sleep until the morning. When you wake up tomorrow, Edith will give you ten francs. But if you ever mention what you just saw to anyone, I’ll send Luc after you.’
‘Ten francs!’ Jean-Paul grinned.
Edith eyeballed him. ‘Swear on your life, Jean-Paul.’
‘I swear on a stack of bibles,’ Jean-Paul said, still grinning at the thought of ten francs.
Henderson took Rosie to one side. ‘You’ve got plenty of time. Those pills react differently with different people, so tie the boy up just in case.’
‘Gotcha,’ Rosie said.
‘Take Jean-Paul out to the cart,’ Henderson told Rosie, ‘I need a private word with Edith.’
Edith expected a telling-off, but instead Henderson went down on one knee and put a hand on her shoulder.
‘I wish you’d accepted my offer to come back to Britain and train with us,’ he said, as he took his wallet out of his coat and passed over two ten-franc notes. ‘The other one’s for you.’
Edith shook her head determinedly. ‘I’d never leave my horses,’ she said. ‘Whoever took over would probably send old Dot off to the knackers’ yard within the week.’
Henderson smiled. ‘Have a word with Madame Mercier and tell her to find Jean-Paul a little job. I’d rather he was kept busy than out on the street tempted to tell his little friends tall stories.’
‘I think we’re OK,’ Edith said. ‘Jean-Paul is a bullshitter. Even if he does announce that he saw a cartload of guns nobody will believe him.’
*
‘I tied his wrists and ankles and laid him out on a couple of hay bales,’ Rosie said when she got back. ‘He’s sleeping like a baby and Edith’s going straight over to speak with Madame Mercier about fixing up a job.’
‘Still say we should have wrung his neck to be on the safe side,’ Luc teased.
‘I’ll wring your neck in a minute,’ Henderson said.
Joel had arrived ten minutes earlier after finishing work and meeting up with Antoine along the way. Henderson wanted Antoine to take part in the operation then travel back to Britain with them, where he could undergo full espionage training. If all went well, he’d return to Lorient in six to eight months’ time as a fully trained agent.
For now though nineteen-year-old Antoine had to be shown the basics. As Henderson and Luc checked, assembled and prepared all the equipment, Rosie took Antoine through aiming, firing and reloading an automatic pistol and throwing a hand grenade. Most important for tonight, she showed him how to insert an explosive fuse into plastic and explained the differences between the three kinds of fuses they’d use in the operation.
When this was done they took a break to eat dinner. Luc and Henderson wolfed down bread, tomatoes, salad potatoes and sausage. Joel, Rosie and Antoine felt varying degrees of nerves and didn’t have much appetite.
When they were done, Henderson got off the floorboards and looked at his watch for the two hundredth time that day. It was past eight, and just starting to get dark.
‘Have you all memorised your tasks?’ Henderson asked. ‘Including secondary tasks you need to perform if one of us is killed during the operation?’
‘What if more than one of us is killed?’ Antoine asked.
‘Cross your fingers and run like hell,’ Joel suggested cheekily.
Henderson laughed. ‘I always say the same thing: the only certainty in an undercover operation is that nothing will go as planned. But clear heads and common sense should get us through.’
‘Unless we all get shot,’ Rosie said cheerfully.
‘It’s time to say goodbye to our identities,’ Henderson said. ‘From this moment forwards, we’re an Anglo-French commando unit. I hope you’ve all memorised your new identities and background stories. Luc, where did you train?’
‘Gosport army barracks,’ Luc said.
‘What’s your rank and date of birth?’
‘Private second class, Jean-Marc Clemence, Free French Army, born 16 January 1924.’
Joel laughed. ‘You’ll never pass for seventeen. You haven’t even got pubes yet.’
Luc responded by pulling down the front of his trousers, showing the mass of frizzy hair around his crotch. Rosie pretended to retch.
Joel and Antoine laughed, but Henderson’s attempt at staying friendly with Luc hadn’t lasted and he smacked him hard around the back of the head.
‘Don’t be disgusting,’ Henderson said. ‘There are ladies present.’
‘You’ve seen my man meat before, haven’t you, Rosie pops?’ Luc said, as he leered at her.
Rosie smiled mischievously. ‘I had to squint pretty hard, but I believe there was a small worm-like object in there amidst the grime and lice.’
‘OK, stop pissing about and start preparing,’ Henderson said irritably. ‘I need your old documents, now.’
They threw the identity cards, ration papers, zone passes and all the other paraphernalia that enabled them to move through German checkpoints on to a metal tray which had previously held their dinner. Henderson tore the documents into small squares and splashed them with lighter fuel. As he was about to light them everyone dived away from the windows as three boys belted past the front of the house, running at top speed down the deserted street, pursued by a Kriegsmarine police officer.
After a pause, Henderson set the documents on fire, stirring them with the end of a pen to ensure every piece was thoroughly burned. While he did this, Rosie handed out waterproof pouches and there was some excitement because each one contained items of significant value.
First off there were papers, British military documents, sets of dog tags and French paperwork.
‘These papers are piss poor,’ Luc said, as he studied his new French identity document. ‘Why are we using this crap when there’s a stack of blank originals at the safe house?’
Henderson gave a wry smile. ‘Because we’re likely to be captured or killed with these documents on us and we don’t want the Germans to know that we have access to originals.’
‘But this won’t do us a lot of good if we get stranded and need to go through a checkpoint,’ Joel said.
Luc reacted with typical cynicism. ‘We’re five ordinary scumbags. If we pull this off they’ll probably pin a medal on us, but if we all get killed who’ll miss us?’
It was common for groups to turn on each other when they’re nervous and Henderson wanted it nipped in the bud.
‘That’s enough doom and gloom,’ he said firmly.
The other contents of the pouches were enough to raise spirits. Each one contained high-quality waterproof watches, waterproof lighters, several hundred francs and three gold ingots which could be used as bribes.
‘I synchronised my watch with Captain Warburton aboard Madeline II this morning,’ Henderson said. ‘It’s now 8.32 p.m. So wind your watches and set them now.’
The reminder of the time gave everyone a hurry-up, because the aim was to be out of the house by 8.50.
They swapped their French clothing for British army-issue under
wear and black commando uniform, then they had a few tense laughs as everyone blackened faces, hands and necks with camouflage make-up.
The final stage was tooling up. They each had an identical backpack full of ammunition, a set of civilian clothes, plus food, water, compass, maps and a basic first aid kit. They wore holsters with silenced 9mm pistols, plus Sten machine guns fitted with bayonets, shoulder belts ringed with grenades, a multi-tool and a jagged-edged hunting-knife.
Luc looked as happy as anyone had ever seen him. ‘I’m gonna kill!’ he said as he thumped his chest proudly. ‘Let me at those German sons of whores.’
He seemed slightly less enthusiastic when he realised that besides the weight of their personal equipment, they had two large equipment bags, each containing more than a hundred kilos of plastic explosives.
Their last act before leaving the house was to push a two-hour time pencil into a small slab of plastic and place it in the middle of the living room, with their clothes and everything else they’d left behind piled around it.
‘We’re two minutes behind,’ Henderson said, as he opened the front door and looked up and down the street. ‘Let’s move out.’
CHAPTER FORTY
They jogged down the street, with Henderson leading and the others running in pairs taking one handle of an equipment bag. It wouldn’t be completely dark for another forty minutes and they had little cover, but a nine o’clock shift change for the construction workers was the ideal opportunity to penetrate the bunker site.
They had no chance of getting through the strict security around the bunker complex on the eastern side of the dock, so the plan was to penetrate the lightly defended coal yards on the western side and then cross the fifty-metre-wide dock in one of the small motorboats used by harbour patrols.
They were dressed as soldiers now – although their youth and, in one case, sex stretched credibility a little. After months of sneaking around, Rosie felt weird brazenly approaching the security booth at the main entrance of the coal yard. She knocked on the door of a guard hut and tried sounding seductive as the door opened.
Henderson's Boys: Grey Wolves Page 25