Hellfire (2011)

by James Holland

  The answers to these questions, which she had asked herself over and over again, were no clearer to her. She closed her eyes, clenched her hair in her hands and felt tears prick her eyes. There was only one thing about which she was certain: that she no longer wanted to be a spy – not for Germany, not for anybody. I can’t do it any more. She wanted to work for the Polish Red Cross, help her countrymen, and begin a love affair with Alex – not because Orca had told her to, but because she wanted to be with him. A good, decent man, who made her laugh and who would make her feel safe. I can’t mourn for ever.

  She shuddered. ‘Be strong, Tanja,’ Tomas had told her. ‘Never give up.’ She wiped her face, stood up and went to the small leather box on her chest of drawers – she had had it since childhood and had carried it with her all the way from Poland. Opening it, she took out the single gold ring and clutched it. Then she took out the photograph. A young man, laughing, sitting beneath a tree, a lake beyond. Four years ago, almost to the day, she realized. August 1938.

  She looked at it for several moments, then put it, with the ring, back in the box, went into the living room, poured herself a brandy and lit a cigarette. She sat at the table, thinking hard and forcing herself to clear her mind. Smoke swirled into the still air. Brandy seared her throat.

  Then, at last, resolution of sorts. What happened in the desert or at sea was now out of her hands. She would respond to messages from Orca with her normal swiftness; she would appear to Artus as committed as ever. She now had something on Orca, but to get out of this mess, she needed to know more – much more. From now on, Alex and his colleagues would not be the only ones trying to unravel the spy circuit. She would try to find out who Orca and Artus were.

  Friday, 14 August, around six a.m. Tanner was just completing his morning shave when there was a bang on the door of Lucie’s flat. Quickly wiping his face, he hurried to the door and opened it. One of the Field Security men was standing there.

  ‘Morning, sir,’ he said, slightly breathless. ‘Sergeant Ellis. Sorry to call so early, but Major Vaughan and Captain Astley sent me to get you.’

  ‘Give me a moment, will you?’

  A minute later, his shirt on, belt and pistol fastened around his waist and cap hastily shoved on his head, he was shutting the door behind him.

  ‘Did he say what it’s about?’ asked Tanner, as they hurried down the stairs.

  ‘No, sir. Captain Astley just told me to get you and take you to Old Cairo.’

  ‘Old Cairo? Bloody hell.’

  They left the apartment block. Parked outside was a black Austin 10. ‘That’s ours, sir,’ said the sergeant.

  Tanner got in beside Ellis and they set off down past the university and turned south on Kasr El Aini. There was already traffic about: trams jangling up and down, and carts laden with fruit and other produce heading into the city. The car rattled and spluttered, jerking both men in their seats.

  ‘Sorry about the car, sir,’ said Ellis. ‘We’ve been promised some jeeps, but the priority’s the desert.’

  ‘Doesn’t bother me. Just so long as it gets us there.’

  ‘It’s not far. A couple of miles at most.’

  The city briefly gave way to mud-coloured shacks and small fields of maize and sugar cane. Tanner glanced to his right and saw the Island of Roda, with its dense groves of date palms, hazy in the early-morning light. He watched the tramline turn over the bridge across the Nile that led to Giza and Mena Camp. Tomorrow he would be taking a tram along that line himself, on his way back to the battalion. But first this.

  Ellis took the road down to the harbour. Warehouses lined the quayside, which was already busy with boats, newly docked and already unloading rice and grain from Upper Egypt. Ellis wove through carts and trucks right up to the edge of the quay, where they saw Captain Astley, who waved.

  ‘Morning, Jack,’ said Astley, as Ellis brought the car to a stop.

  ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘Jump out and I’ll show you.’

  Tanner thanked Ellis, and got out. The quayside was alive with the shouts of merchants and dockworkers.

  ‘This way,’ said Astley. ‘We’re right down by the river.’

  He led Tanner down a broad flight of some forty or so steps to the water’s edge, where Vaughan stood, with several FS men and Egyptian police gathered around him.

  Vaughan turned as he approached. ‘Hello, Jack. Guess who washed up in the river this morning?’

  ‘I’ve got a pretty good idea.’

  An FS man stood back to let him through, and Tanner peered down at the dead man stretched out on the stone. The corpse was pale, with a swollen gash across his throat, his shirt covered with blood.

  It was the tailor, Gyasi Moussa.

  THE WESTERN DESERT

  August and September 1942

  10

  Tuesday, 18 August 1942. The column trundled slowly north-westwards, a stream of some hundred sand-coloured vehicles into which the entire 2nd Battalion was crammed: a combination of Bedford 30- and 15-hundredweight trucks and at least thirty universal carriers, all rumbling along at a steady twenty-five miles an hour. The road, an unmetalled track, hugged the edge of the Nile delta, so that although the view ahead was mostly of the dust kicked up by the vehicle in front, at either side they could see the endless desolation of the desert to the left, and the lushness of the delta to the right.

  It was still quite early, a little after eight, and they had been driving for more than an hour. The air was still fresh. Tanner sat up front, next to Private David Brown, who was driving. The truck was a Bedford 15-hundredweight, an MWD, six-cylinder, 72-horsepower, and around two tons unloaded. It was basic as hell, all glass and doors stripped off, with just a single roll-bar between the cab and the body. Although the engine sometimes played up, the radiator was sturdy and reliable even in the extreme heat of the desert, and the gearbox was as strong as an ox. With five men in the back, rifles, a Bren, ammunition, rations, water and fuel cans, plus all their individual kit bundled up and strapped to the sides, the MWD was home to the seven and would remain so throughout their time in the desert.

  The truck hit a pot-hole, causing groans behind, and knocking Tanner in his seat.

  ‘Jesus, Browner!’ cursed Tanner. ‘Watch where you’re bloody going.’

  ‘Sorry, sir,’ said Brown. ‘My goggles must be a bit dusted up.’

  ‘Well, give them here, then.’

  Brown took them off and passed them to Tanner, who poured a small amount of water from his bottle over the lenses. Once the grit was washed away, he dried them on his shirt and passed them back.

  ‘Cheers, sir,’ said Brown, putting them back on. ‘Ah, yes, that’s much better.’

  Tanner cuffed him gently on the back of his head. ‘Bloody hell, Browner. Next time just ask, all right?’

  Despite being jerked and bounced in his seat, Tanner was in a good mood. Things were back to normal. Browner was beside him, his old mate, Stan Sykes, was behind with Hepworth and Smailes, with whom he had served for more than two years, then Mudge and Phyllis, two new lads. It no longer mattered that he was now Lieutenant Tanner rather than CSM: the differences in rank could more easily melt away out in the desert.

  The same could not be said of camp life. For the past three days, Tanner had found it difficult to adjust to his new status. He did not feel he belonged in the mess. Officers swore, but not in the same way that he used such language. Table manners were different too. His father had taught him how to behave, but during dinner at Mena House with Peploe and the colonel, he had been at sea with the array of knives and forks, unsure which to use and when. He had also struggled with some of the conversation. It often seemed to be about people they all knew but he did not. And there was also his sense of social inferiority: he did not feel a lesser man, but was keenly aware of the huge gulf between him and his fellow officers – all but Tanner and one other in C Company had been to public school. Lieutenant Marsden was a grammar-school boy; Tanner had ba
rely been to school at all. Strangely, he had felt less conspicuous when he’d been with SIME. Maunsell’s relaxed ship, the eclectic group of operatives and the fact that he had barely been out and about socially had shielded him.

  Most of his fellow officers had been friendly and accepting towards him; only one or two, including a couple of young subalterns in B Company, seemed to be steering clear. He was aware that the problem was mainly of his own making, and recognized that it was up to him to come to terms with his new status, but it was not something he could resolve in a few days. It would take time.

  What he had found even harder was feeling like an outsider among the men. He could no longer share his meals with Stan and the other lads, or enter the sergeants’ mess for a beer. An invisible barrier had been drawn up. Even Stan had initially seemed a little wary, as though not wanting to appear overly familiar now that Tanner was an officer. Eventually Tanner had told him to cut it out and, armed with several bottles of Stella, they had walked up to the Pyramids and had the kind of easy chat that had done so much to sustain them both during the past two and a half years.

  That had helped, because after three days back, Tanner had been feeling quite deflated. It had reminded him of when he’d first joined the regiment, ten years before, as a boy soldier. He, a Wiltshireman with a West Country burr, had been surrounded by Yorkshiremen, mostly from the industrial cities of Bradford and Leeds. He’d felt like an outsider then too.

  Now those feelings had melted away. This was the life he had known since they had become fully mechanized the previous autumn. Their role was to roam the desert, to patrol and cajole the enemy, not hold any static position or the dreaded ‘boxes’ that had done for Eighth Army back at Gazala in May. Each company worked as a team, and each six- or seven-man section lived, slept and fought together.

  Captain Peploe was in the lead truck with six men from Company Headquarters, followed by Tanner with six men. Then came six more trucks per platoon, except for 2 Platoon, who were in carriers. Tanner leaned out and gazed back at the long column as it trundled forward along a wide curve in the road. It reminded him of a goods train. He breathed in the smell of dust, oil and metal, and smiled to himself.

  ‘This is more like it, isn’t it, sir?’ said Sykes, behind him.

  ‘Too bloody right, Stan.’ Tanner grinned. It was good to be back on track with Sykes – they’d been through so much together. Sykes was from Deptford, in south London. When they’d first met, back in early 1940, Tanner had sensed a kindred spirit immediately, not least because Sykes had been another outsider among the mass of Yorkshiremen. After nearly three years of war, the battalion was not quite so full of home-grown soldiers as it had once been – Mudge, for example, was from Suffolk – but the early ties that had drawn the two together remained. Men came and went in any company and battalion – whether killed, wounded, promoted or posted – and Tanner knew that, at some point, the chances were that he and Sykes would be separated. It was something he chose not to dwell upon. They would be serving together in the battle to come; for the time being that was good enough. Never look too far ahead. It was a mantra Tanner had always lived by.

  Sykes had also proved his worth as a friend: after Tanner had been wounded he had saved both his rifle, with its special fittings for a scope, and his German sub-machine gun, the latter taken the previous year on Crete. He had presented these weapons back to him as though they were long-lost family heirlooms on his arrival back with the battalion. Tanner had been very grateful, allowing himself more effusive thanks than he would normally have demonstrated, for he valued both weapons and had assumed they had long since become casualties of war. The rifle he had had since returning to England early in the war. Most were now the Number 4 Short Magazine Lee Enfields, but his was the earlier Number 1 Mark III, which not only had fittings for the old 17-inch sword bayonet, which Tanner preferred, but also had special pads and mounts attached for fixing a telescopic sight, which he had had fitted on the quiet before heading to Norway. He still had the Aldis scope – most of his personal belongings had thankfully made it with him on the long journey back to Cairo. It had been his father’s in the last war and was one of his most treasured items, partly for sentimental reasons, but principally because it had repeatedly proved itself a life-saver. That scope had helped him get out of more scrapes than he cared to remember.

  The sub-machine gun was an MP40, taken from an enemy para-trooper on Crete. Beautifully balanced and superbly made, Tanner preferred it to the Thompsons that were now staples of the British Army and thought it a far superior weapon to the smaller, lighter Sten, which, although easy to carry about, lacked the velocity of either the MP40 or the Thompson. Nor was getting ammunition for the MP40 a problem: it shared the same 9mm-calibre rounds as the Sten. He had put several boxes of it in the truck.

  Some thirty yards ahead, Peploe’s truck swerved to avoid a donkey and cart, kicking up a bigger swirl of dust. Tanner squinted behind his sunglasses and ducked his head as the cloud rolled over them.

  ‘Just ease back a bit, will you, Browner?’ he said. ‘Don’t want everyone to choke to death before we get up to the blue.’

  ‘Sorry, boss,’ said Brown.

  The road now climbed on to an embankment and Tanner looked out over the sprawl of delta. Away to his right he could see the Nile, the sails of feluccas clearly visible between the date palms and banana plantations. There were fields, too, small dark-green rectangles. A farmer was ploughing with an ox, the blade turning furrows of rich, chocolate-coloured earth. The sun beat down, but unlike in Cairo, where the taxis were mostly dark, enclosed vehicles that drew the heat, the open Bedfords, travelling at twenty-five miles per hour, provided a warm breeze that shielded them from the scorching sun.

  Cairo had been left far behind. Glancing back, he saw the city as a grey smudge in the distance. He would miss Lucie and he had been sorry to leave her, but he’d vowed he would be back. The thought of returning to her was something he could relish. He had also been sorry to say goodbye to Vaughan. As they had shaken hands, and wished each other luck, he had seen the envy, regret, even, in his friend’s face. He wondered whether the general would take up his coastal raiding party idea. He hoped so – it seemed a good one to him, particularly now when Rommel’s LOCs were so much longer than their own. If the raiders could sabotage supplies coming into Tobruk and Mersa, the enemy’s closest ports, they might make a big difference.

  The convoy rumbled on towards Alexandria. His thoughts turned to the mole and whether they would ever catch him. Moussa had been cut from ear to ear – such an unnecessary way to kill someone. Quiet, yes, but all that blood: it would have been a messy business. Paul Rolo had suggested that an Islamist had killed him – cutting the throat was an Islamic way of delivering death. Perhaps. But if there had ever been any doubt about the circuit, the murder had clinched it. Even George Kirk had conceded that.

  Ah, well. It was out of his hands now, and already the importance of catching the spies had receded. Ohio had made it, limping into Malta’s Grand Harbour, despite having been hit innumerable times. Two destroyers had strapped themselves to her sides, and a third had led. A miracle. Four other merchantmen had got there too – five out of the fourteen that had begun, but Malta was saved. There was now apparently enough fuel for the island to launch offensive operations once more. It meant that bombers could fly from Malta, attack a convoy, fly on to Egypt and vice versa.

  Maunsell had been so jubilant he had sent one of the secretaries to buy several bottles of champagne from the Semiramis Hotel and they had all toasted the success of the convoy and gallant Ohio. ‘In the battle to come,’ Maunsell told them, with uncharacteristic gravity, ‘this really could make all the difference.’

  The convoy had succeeded, despite the enemy spy circuit operating from Cairo. GHQ had started moving to Mena, which might well narrow the field of suspects, should another signal be picked up. New clampdowns were in place, making top-secret information even more need-to-know. One o
f the circuit – or an associate – was dead, and continued efforts were being made to track down the elusive Eslem Mustafa. Maunsell had repeatedly said they must tighten the noose around the spies to make it far more difficult for them to obtain intelligence of real value. After all, any spying operation was only as good as the information it passed on.

  Tanner thought of the eccentricities of Maunsell’s organization: only a few, like Maunsell and Maddox, were proper intelligence men. It had struck him as odd that Vaughan, or even he, could be drafted in with little or no prior grasp of counter-intelligence work. And yet, as Maunsell had said, so much of it was about common sense. He supposed he had been able to bring a bit of that to it. He chuckled to himself. A strange experience.

  The road led them further into the lush vegetation, and after a couple of hours the desert to their left had vanished. By half past ten Hepworth, especially, was restless.

  ‘Surely it’s time to brew up, sir. We’ve been going nearly four hours already.’

  ‘What do you want me to do about it, Hep?’ said Tanner. ‘I’m sure the colonel’ll give us a halt in a while.’

  Hepworth was quiet for a bit, but as another ten minutes passed, even Sykes was beginning to grumble. ‘I really thought Old Man Vigar understood the importance of char,’ he said. ‘I’m bloody gasping.’

  ‘I’m hungry too,’ said Phyllis.

  ‘You’re always bloody hungry, Siff,’ said Sykes. ‘Is there ever a time when you don’t think about scoff?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Phyllis. ‘Course.’

  ‘When’s that, then?’

  ‘When I’m thinking about that Egyptian bint I had last week.’

  ‘We all know about that one, Siff,’ said Sykes. ‘An absolute beauty once you got past the moustache.’