Eagle Has Landed

by Jack Higgins

  ‘Yours or your mother’s?’ She threw a stick at him and he ducked. ‘It’ll have to wait. I’ve got to go out tonight. Put it in the oven for me and I’ll heat it up when I get in.’

  ‘Can I go with you?’

  ‘Not a chance. Too far. And besides, it’s business.’ He slapped her behind. ‘A cup of tea is what I crave, woman of the house, or maybe two, so off with you and put the kettle on.’

  He reached for her again, she dodged him, grabbed her basket and ran for the cottage. Devlin let her go. She went into the living room and put the basket on the table. The Gladstone bag was at the other end and as she turned to go to the stove, she caught it with her left arm, knocking it to the floor. It fell open disgorging packets of banknotes and the Sten gun parts.

  She knelt there, stunned for the moment, suddenly icy cold, as if aware by some kind of precognition that nothing ever would be the same again.

  There was a step in the doorway and Devlin said quietly, ‘Would you put them back, now, like a good girl?’

  She looked up, white-faced, but her voice was fierce. ‘What is it? What does it mean?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he said, ‘for little girls.’

  ‘But all this money.’

  She held up a packet of fivers. Devlin took the bag from her, stuffed the money and the weapons back inside and replaced the bottom. Then he opened the cupboard under the window, took out a large envelope and tossed it to her.

  ‘Size ten. Was I right?’

  She opened the envelope, peered inside and there was an immediate look of awe on her face. ‘Silk stockings. Real silk and two pairs. Where on earth did you get these?’

  ‘Oh, a man I met in a pub in Fakenham. You can get anything you want if you know where to look.’

  ‘The black market,’ she said. ‘That’s what you’re mixed up in, isn’t it?’

  There was a certain amount of relief in her eyes and he grinned. ‘The right colour for me. Now would you kindly get the tea on and hurry? I want to be away by six and I’ve still got work to do on the bike.’

  She hesitated, clutching the stockings and moved close. ‘Liam, it’s all right, isn’t it?’

  ‘And why wouldn’t it be?’ He kissed her briefly, turned and went out, cursing his own stupidity.

  And yet as he walked towards the barn, he knew in his heart that there was more to it than that. For the first time he had been brought face to face with what he was doing to this girl. Within little more than a week, her entire world was going to be turned upside down. That was absolutely inevitable and nothing he could do about it except leave her, as he must, to bear the hurt of it alone.

  Suddenly, he felt physically sick and kicked out at a packing case savagely. ‘Oh, you bastard,’ he said. ‘You dirty bastard, Liam.’

  Reuben Garvald opened the judas in the main gate of the workshop of Fogarty’s garage and peered outside. Rain swept across the cracked concrete of the forecourt where the two rusting petrol pumps stood forlornly. He closed the judas hurriedly and stepped back inside.

  The workshop had once been a barn and was surprisingly spacious. A flight of wooden steps led up to a loft, but in spite of a wrecked saloon car in one corner, there was still plenty of room for the three-ton Bedford truck and the van in which Garvald and his brother had travelled from Birmingham. Ben Garvald himself walked up and down impatiently, occasionally beating his arms together. In spite of the heavy overcoat and scarf he wore, he was bitterly cold.

  ‘Christ what a dump,’ he said. ‘Isn’t there any sign of that little Irish sod?’

  ‘It’s only a quarter to nine, Ben,’ Reuben told him.

  ‘I don’t care what bleeding time it is.’ Garvald turned on a large, hefty young man in a sheepskin flying jacket who leaned against the truck reading a newspaper. ‘You get me some heat in here tomorrow night, Sammy boy, or I’ll have your balls. Understand?’

  Sammy, who had long dark sideburns and a cold, rather dangerous-looking face seemed completely unperturbed. ‘Okay, Mr Garvald. I’ll see to it.’

  ‘You’d better, sweetheart, or I’ll send you back to the Army.’ Garvald patted his face. ‘And you wouldn’t like that, would you?’

  He took out a packet of Gold Flake, selected one and Sammy gave him a light with a fixed smile. ‘You’re a card, Mr Garvald. A real card.’

  Reuben called urgently from the door. ‘He’s just turned on to the forecourt.’

  Garvald tugged at Sammy’s arm. ‘Get the door open and let’s have the bastard in.’

  Devlin entered in a flurry of rain and wind. He wore oilskin leggings with his trenchcoat, an old leather flying helmet and goggles which he’d bought in a secondhand shop in Fakenham. His face was filthy and when he switched off and pushed up his goggles, there were great white circles round his eyes.

  ‘A dirty night for it, Mr Garvald,’ he said as he shoved the BSA on its stand.

  ‘It always is, son,’ Garvald replied cheerfully. ‘Nice to see you.’ He shook hands warmly. ‘Reuben you know and this is Sammy Jackson, one of my lads. He drove the Bedford over for you.’

  There was an implication that Jackson had somehow done him a great personal favour and Devlin responded in kind, putting on the Irish as usual. ‘Sure and I appreciate that. It was damn good of you,’ he said, wringing Sammy’s hand.

  Jackson looked him over contemptuously but managed a smile and Garvald said, ‘All right then, I’ve got business elsewhere and I don’t expect you want to hang around. Here’s your truck. What do you think?’

  The Bedford had definitely seen better days, the paintwork badly fading and chipped, but the tyres weren’t too bad and the canvas tilt was almost new. Devlin heaved himself over the tailboard and noted the Army jerrycans, the compressor and the drum of paint he’d asked for.

  ‘It’s all there, just like you said.’ Garvald offered him a cigarette. ‘Check the petrol if you want.’

  ‘No need, I’ll take your word for it.’

  Garvald wouldn’t have tried any nonsense with the petrol, he was sure of that. After all, he wanted him to return on the following evening. He went round to the front and lifted the bonnet. The engine seemed sound enough.

  ‘Try it,’ Garvald invited.

  He switched on and tapped the accelerator, and the engine broke into a healthy enough roar as he had expected. Garvald would be much too interested in finding out exactly what he was up to to spoil things by trying to push second-class goods at this stage.

  Devlin jumped down and looked at the truck again, noting the military registration. ‘All right?’ Garvald asked.

  ‘I suppose so.’ Devlin nodded slowly. ‘From the state of it, it looks as if it’s been having a hard time in Tobruk or somewhere.’

  ‘Very probably, old son,’ Garvald kicked a wheel. ‘But these things are built to take it.’

  ‘Have you got the delivery licence I asked for?’

  ‘Sure thing,’ Garvald snapped a finger. ‘Let’s have that form, Reuben.’

  Reuben produced it from his wallet and said sullenly, ‘When do we see the colour of his money?’

  ‘Don’t be like that, Reuben. Mr Murphy here is as sound as a bell.’

  ‘No, he’s right enough, a fair exchange.’ Devlin took a fat manilla envelope from his breast pocket and passed it to Reuben. ‘You’ll find seven hundred and fifty in there in fivers, as agreed.’

  He pocketed the form Reuben had given him after glancing at it briefly and Ben Garvald said, ‘Aren’t you going to fill that thing in?’

  Devlin tapped his nose and tried to assume an expression of low cunning. ‘And let you see where I’m going? Not bloody likely, Mr Garvald.’

  Garvald laughed delightedly. He put an arm about Devlin’s shoulder. The Irishman said, ‘If someone could give me a hand to put my bike in the back, I’ll be off.’

  Garvald nodded to Jackson who dropped the tailboard of the Bedford and found an old plank. He and Devlin ran the BSA up and laid it on its side. Devlin clipped the ta
ilboard in place and turned to Garvald. ‘That’s it then, Mr Garvald, same time tomorrow.’

  ‘Pleasure to do business with you, old son,’ Garvald told him, wringing his hand again. ‘Get the door open, Sammy.’

  Devlin climbed behind the wheel and started the engine. He leaned out of the window. ‘One thing, Mr Garvald. I’m not likely to find the military police on my tail, now am I?’

  ‘Would I do that to you, son?’ Garvald beamed. ‘I ask you.’ He banged the side of the truck with the flat of his hand. ‘See you tomorrow night. Repeat performance. Same time, same place and I’ll bring you another bottle of Bushmills.’

  Devlin drove out into the night and Sammy Jackson and Reuben got the doors closed. Garvald’s smile disappeared. ‘It’s up to Freddy now.’

  ‘What if he loses him?’ Reuben asked.

  ‘Then there’s tomorrow night, isn’t there.’ Garvald patted him on the face. ‘Where’s that half of brandy you brought?’

  ‘Lose him?’ Jackson said. ‘That little squirt?’ He laughed harshly. ‘Christ, he couldn’t even find the way to the men’s room unless you showed him.’

  Devlin, a quarter of a mile down the road, was aware of the dim lights behind him indicating the vehicle which had pulled out of a lay-by a minute or so earlier as he passed, exactly as he expected.

  An old ruined windmill loomed out of the night on his left and a flat stretch of cleared ground in front of it. He switched off all his lights suddenly, swung the wheel and drove into the cleared area blind, and braked. The other vehicle carried straight on, increasing its speed and Devlin jumped to the ground, went to the back of the Bedford and removed the bulb from the rear light. Then he got back behind the wheel, turned the truck in a circle on to the road and only switched on his lights when he was driving back towards Norman Cross.

  A quarter of a mile this side of Fogarty’s he turned right into a side road, the B660, driving through Holme, stopping fifteen minutes later outside Doddington to replace the bulb. When he returned to the cab, he got out the delivery licence form and filled it in in the light of a torch. There was the official stamp of a Service Corps unit near Birmingham at the bottom and the signature of the commanding officer, a Major Thrush. Garvald had thought of everything. Well, not quite everything. Devlin grinned and filled in his destination as the RAF radar station at Sheringham ten miles further along the coast road from Hobs End.

  He got back behind the wheel and drove away again. Swaffham first, then Fakenham. He’d worked it all out very carefully on the map and he sat back and took it steadily because the blackout visors on his headlamps didn’t give him a great deal of light to work by. Not that it mattered. He’d all the time in the world. He lit a cigarette and wondered how Garvald was getting on.

  It was just after midnight when he turned into the yard outside the cottage at Hobs End. The journey had proved to be completely uneventful and in spite of the fact that he had boldly used the main roads for most of the way, he had passed no more than a handful of vehicles during the entire trip. He coasted round to the old barn on the very edge of the marsh, jumped out into the heavy rain and unlocked the padlock. He got the doors open and drove inside.

  There were only a couple of round loft windows and it had been easy enough to black those out. He primed two Tilley lamps, pumped them until he had plenty of light, went outside to check that nothing showed, then he went back in and got his coat off.

  Within half an hour, he had the truck unloaded, running the BSA out on an old plank and sliding the compressor to the ground the same way. The jerrycans, he stacked in a corner, covering them with an old tarpaulin. Then he washed down the truck. When he was satisfied that it was as clean as he was going to get it he brought newspapers and tape which he had laid by earlier and proceeded to mask the windows. He did this very methodically, concentrating all the time and when he was finished went across to the cottage and had some of Molly’s shepherd’s pie and a glass of milk.

  It was still raining very hard when he ran back to the barn, hissing angrily into the waters of the marsh, filling the night with sound. Conditions were really quite perfect. He filled the compressor, primed the pump and turned its motor over, then he put the spraying equipment together and mixed some paint. He started on the tailboard first, taking his time, but it really worked very well indeed and within five minutes he had covered it with a glistening new coat of khaki green.

  ‘God save us,’ he said to himself softly. ‘It’s a good thing I haven’t a criminal turn of mind for I could be making a living at this sort of thing and that’s a fact.’

  He moved round to the left and started on the side panels.

  After lunch on Friday, he was touching up the numbers on the truck with white paint when he heard a car drive up. He wiped his hands and let himself out of the barn quickly, but when he went round the corner of the cottage it was only Joanna Grey. She was trying the front door, a trim and surprisingly youthful figure in the green WVS uniform.

  ‘You always look your best in that outfit,’ he said. ‘I bet it has old Sir Henry crawling up the wall.’

  She smiled. ‘You’re on form, anyway. Things must have gone well.’

  ‘See for yourself?’

  He opened the barn door and led her in. The Bedford, in its fresh coat of khaki green paint really looked very well indeed. ‘As my information has it, Special Force vehicles don’t usually carry divisional flashes or insignia. Is that so?’

  ‘That’s true,’ she said. ‘The stuff I’ve seen operating out of Meltham House in the past have never advertised who they are.’ She was obviously very impressed. ‘This is really good, Liam. Did you have any trouble?’

  ‘He had someone try to follow me, but I soon shook him off. The big confrontation should be tonight.’

  ‘Can you handle it?’

  ‘This can.’ He picked up a cloth bundle lying on the packing case beside his brushes and tins of paint, unwrapped it and took out a Mauser with a rather strange bulbous barrel. ‘Ever seen one of these before?’

  ‘I can’t say I have.’ She weighed it in her left hand with professional interest and took aim.

  ‘Some of the SS security people use them,’ he said, ‘but there just aren’t enough to go round. Only really efficient silenced handgun I’ve ever come across.’

  She said dubiously, ‘You’ll be on your own.’

  ‘I’ve been on my own before.’ He wrapped the Mauser in the cloth again and went to the door with her. ‘If everything goes according to plan I should be back with the jeep around midnight. I’ll check with you first thing in the morning.’

  ‘I don’t think I can wait that long.’

  Her face was tense and anxious. She put out her hand impulsively and he held it tight for a moment. ‘Don’t worry. It’ll work. I have the sight, or so my old grannie used to say. I know about these things.’

  ‘You rogue,’ she said and leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek in genuine affection. ‘I sometimes wonder how you’ve survived so long.’

  ‘That’s easy,’ he said. ‘Because I’ve never particularly cared whether I do or not.’

  ‘You say that as if you mean it?’

  ‘Tomorrow.’ He smiled gently. ‘I’ll be round first thing. You’ll see.’

  He watched her drive away, then kicked the door of the barn shut behind him and stuck a cigarette in his mouth. ‘You can come out now,’ he called.

  There was a moment’s delay and then Molly emerged from the rushes on the far side of the yard. Too far to have heard anything which was why he had let it go. He padlocked the door, then walked towards her. He stopped a yard away, hands pushed into his pockets. ‘Molly, my own sweet girl,’ he said gently. ‘I love you dearly, but any more games like this and I’ll give you the thrashing of your young life.’

  She flung her arms about his neck. ‘Is that a promise?’

  ‘You’re entirely shameless.’

  She looked up at him, hanging on. ‘Can I come over tonight?�
��

  ‘You can’t,’ he said, ‘because I won’t be here,’ and he added a half-truth. ‘I’m going to Peterborough on private business and I won’t be back until the small hours.’ He tapped the end of her nose with a finger. ‘And that’s between us. No advertising.’

  ‘More silk stockings?’ she said. ‘Or is it Scotch whisky this time.’

  ‘Five quid a bottle the Yanks will pay, so they tell me.’

  ‘I wish you wouldn’t.’ Her face was troubled. ‘Why can’t you be nice and normal like everyone else?’

  ‘Would you have me in my grave so early?’ He turned her round.

  ‘Go and put the kettle on the stove and if you’re a good girl, I’ll let you make my dinner—or something.’

  She smiled briefly over her shoulder, looking suddenly quite enchanting, than ran across to the cottage. Devlin put the cigarette back into his mouth, but didn’t bother to light it. Thunder rumbled far out on the horizon, heralding more rain. Another wet ride. He sighed and went after her across the yard.

  In the workshop at Fogarty’s garage it was even colder than it had been on the previous night, in spite of Sammy Jackson’s attempts to warm things up by punching holes in an old oil drum and lighting a coke fire. The fumes it gave off were quite something.

  Ben Garvald, standing beside it, a half-bottle of brandy in one hand, a plastic cup in the other, retreated hastily. ‘What in the hell are you trying to do, poison me?’

  Jackson, who was sitting on a packing case on the opposite side of the fire nursing a sawn-off, double-barrelled shotgun across his knees, put it down and stood up. ‘Sorry, Mr Garvald. It’s the coke—that’s the trouble. Too bloody wet.’

  Reuben, at the judas, called suddenly, ‘Here, I think he’s coming.’

  ‘Get that thing out of the way,’ Garvald said quickly, ‘and remember you don’t make your move till I tell you.’ He poured some more brandy into the plastic cup and grinned. ‘I want to enjoy this, Sammy boy. See that I do.’

  Sammy put the shotgun under a piece of sacking beside him on the packing case and hurriedly lit a cigarette. They waited as the sound of the approaching engine grew louder, then moved past and died away into the night.