The south was much more tricky, as however well the fortress of Gibraltar might be defended that alone could not stop Axis Forces by-passing it and crossing the narrow waters. But there was the Moroccan International Zone over which the Spanish had arbitrarily reassumed control, and one hoped that we might feel strong enough to send an Expeditionary Force there immediately the Nazis crossed the Pyrenees, which could contest the landing of Axis Forces in Africa.
Libya was the third possible, but more difficult, road for the Axis, but General Wavell’s magnificent sweep between December and February had carried the outposts of the Army of the Nile nearly six hundred miles further to the west, so all that territory would have to be re-won before Egypt was again threatened.
The fourth and only remaining way out of his cage for Hitler lay through Russia, and if he was desperate enough to take that, whether we liked the Bolsheviks or not, we would have every excuse for cheering our heads off. Any attempt to assess the rear fighting strength of the huge Soviet Army and Air Force could only be sheer guesswork, but it was as plain as the nose on one’s face that even Hitler could not take on 200 million new enemies without crippling himself so severely that it would shorten the war by years, and leave Germany at the mercy of our rapidly-growing Air Force.
In considering the prospect of our success in this Greek campaign one remembered that Hitler was said to have over 180 divisions at his disposal. That meant that if one wrote off 80 divisions for guarding the German eastern frontier against any surprise attack from Russia, and wrote off the whole of the Italian Army as good for nothing more than garrisoning conquered territories, Hitler still had 100 divisions of the finest and best-equipped troops in the world which, within a few weeks, he could concentrate upon any front on the Continent from the Baltic to the Mediterranean and from the Atlantic to the Black Sea.
How many divisions were we in a position to send against this armoured spearhead of the mightiest army that history has ever known? Six, eight, ten, twenty? As a serving officer of very junior rank I was in no position to know, but I was prepared to bet my bottom dollar that we couldn’t put more than a dozen divisions into Greece, and to do that would mean denuding Libya, Egypt and Palestine to a wickedly dangerous degree.
I was prepared to make another bet—that this crazy piece of gallantry was not being undertaken without opposition on the part of Generals Wavell and Wilson, who had proved themselves so brilliant in the Libyan campaign. My third bet was that Mr. Churchill did not like it either, because he is not only an idealist but also a trained strategist and a realist.
Perhaps the answer to this riddle lay in Mr. Churchill’s well-known loyalty to his colleagues. Certain of them were known from their past actions to be men of great ideals; but in Total War it must at least be questioned as to if idealists who have not proved themselves also to be realists make the wisest leaders. On grounds of principle alone it was clearly our duty to support those splendidly heroic Greeks. The idealists in or near the War Cabinet would naturally make a highly impassioned plea that we should do so; but had they paused to count the possible cost? Or was it that some of them had pledged us prematurely?
Looking at the map again it seemed so transparently clear what our strategy should be. To land another Expeditionary Force on the mainland of Europe before we had air superiority was to invite certain defeat. But if Hitler attempted to break out of his cage, either into Asia or Africa, we should fight like tigers with everything we had. If we could only keep him in the cage, the blockade would do its work and the R.A.F. would grow until by constant and terrific bombings we could destroy German morale, and cause the captive peoples to revolt. Then, and then only, should we be justified in again landing an army on the Continent, since it would have a decent prospect of waging a victorious campaign and speedily finishing the war.
Therefore, we ought to have said frankly and honestly to the Greeks: “If we send you six divisions, which is about all that we can possibly spare, there can be no hope whatsoever of this support being sufficient to enable you to hold any part of the Greek mainland against the main German Army.
“You have all our sympathy, but we are pitted against a remorseless enemy who for the moment is still more powerful than ourselves. You will recall that less than a year ago we lost all our first-line tanks and equipment by so rashly going to the aid of Belgium. We cannot possibly afford to lose a second mass of invaluable war material. The sole hope of restoring world freedom lies in us, therefore we dare not squander a single ’plane, tank, gun or man in any but a vital issue.
“In the main strategy of the world war the mainland of Greece has no significance. But Crete and the Greek islands of the Aegean which lie on the very doorstep of Asia are of real importance. Don’t ask us to sacrifice our tanks and men in Greece to no purpose, but let us put everything we can possibly spare into Crete and the other big islands, because by so doing, with our Navy to help us, we can bar the road to the East.”
Even for the sake of the Greeks themselves that was the policy that should have been urged; because if we lost our tanks and guns on the mainland, how could we hope to defend the islands successfully afterwards? With Crete, Mytilene, Lemnos, Samos, Khios and Samothrace in our keeping, the Greeks at least stood to retain some of their country, and could have evacuated their Government, and all of their Army and leading men that we could take off, to these bases. Whereas now, because of the irresponsible chivalry of some of our idealists, they looked in a fair way to lose everything they had.
This was no case of being wise after the event, and it required no special knowledge of military education to see the course which events were bound to take. All I could hope now was that the God who so very obviously watches over our interests would once again enable us to come out of this party better than we deserved; but I was heavy-hearted as I put away the maps and began to undress.
I had hardly got into bed when the telephone rang. It was Toby and he said: “We’re having a little supper-party tonight, old boy. There’ll be about a dozen of us and it’s frightfully short notice, but I was wondering if you could come along.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I’d love to.” And next minute I was out of bed again, pulling on my clothes as quickly as I could.
It was only a little after ten so I really had ample time, and having packed my things I went along to see the manager to pay my bill to date and tell him that I had been ordered away at short notice on special duties again. Then with my service kit I took a taxi down to the docks.
As the battalion had been standing by for several days it was a bit of real luck for me that embarkation orders should reach them on the very day of my leaving prison. It saved me any complications through having to report the following day at the prisoners-of-war camp and return to duty there, which might have proved a nasty snag if Toby had telephoned the Cecil urgently while I was at my job.
Down at the docks there was considerable activity. Tanks, Bren-gun carriers, lorries, A.A. batteries, searchlight units, and the mass of paraphernalia without which a modern army cannot function in the field were trundling slowly along the streets and through the dock-gates. Such embarkations have to be kept as hush-hush as possible, for which reason they are always carried out at night, when most of the inhabitants of the ports are asleep; but there was little chance of keeping this big-scale embarkation secret, particularly as the moon was only two days short of full and it was nearly as bright as day.
After considerable trouble I found the wharf from which the New Zealand brigade was to sail. One of the sister battalions of that to which I was attached was already engaged in loading their equipment. Soon after midnight the wharfside had been nearly cleared, and the advance parties of my battalion were able to place their markers for the approaching vehicles to drive up.
Within a few minutes I caught sight of ‘Long Willie’s’ tall figure as, accompanied by his adjutant and Toby, he arrived to supervise the embarkation. Leaving my baggage in the shadow of a shed, I walked s
traight up to him and saluted smartly.
“Why, hallo, Julian,” he said in his kind voice. “What are you doing here? Come to see us off and wish us luck on our travels?”
“I certainly wish you luck, sir,” I smiled. “But I’m happy to say that I’m going with you. I had to wangle things a bit, and I couldn’t get away until the last moment, but I now have the honour to report.”
“Do you speak Greek, then?” he asked.
“A certain amount, sir. Enough to get you most things that you’re likely to want. You may remember that my fiancée is a Greek.”
“Of course,” he nodded. “Well, I’m delighted to have you with us. It’ll be quite like old times, except that it may be a little more exciting. For the present you’d better just stand by in case the Arab dockers need a word of mild encouragement in their work.”
As I went back to collect my kit and park it near him, I felt a great relief. ‘Long Willie’ had taken the whole thing as perfectly natural and not asked a single question. But actually there was nothing very extraordinary in his old battalion interpreter reporting to him for duty without his receiving any official notification of it at such a busy time. Yet one never knew what unforeseen snags might arise in such a case, and I was heartily glad when, at about three o’clock in the morning, I went on board with ‘Long Willie’ and the rest of the Headquarter staff.
Toby and I managed to get a cabin together. I could no longer make myself useful by cursing or encouraging the Arab porters in their own tongue, so I went straight to bed, as I was anxious to be seen by as few people as possible before the ship sailed. When I awoke it was bright sunlight and we were already standing some distance out to sea. I had given Major Cozelli the slip.
Our ship was just a unit in a considerable convoy, and naturally the pace of a convoy is the pace of its slowest member, so although our large, rather old-fashioned liner could probably have done eighteen knots comfortably, she rarely made more than ten. In addition, from time to time the course of the whole convoy was altered on orders from its Naval escort, so although I fretted uselessly at the irritating slowness of our voyage on account of Daphnis, it was March the 15th and we had been three days at sea before we even sighted the Greek mainland.
Except for the fact that we had to sleep and practically live in our cork life-saving jackets, from fear of our striking a mine or being torpedoed without warning, and my personal worries, the voyage was rather a pleasant one, as it was a wonderful change to get these few days of winter cruise in the Mediterranean after all those many months of sand and dust and flies and heat in Egypt.
There was never a moment when destroyers were not to be seen making great circles round the convoy and the ’planes droned overhead; but the Navy and the Air Force took such splendid care of us that during the whole three days I saw only one incident. A single ’plane—Italian, presumably, although it was much too far off for us to identify from the deck—suddenly appeared out of a patch of cloud to northward. Instantly half a dozen of our airmen were swooping towards him, and before the enemy pilot could have even had a chance to press a wireless key his reconnaissance aircraft had been shot to smithereens.
As soon as we sighted the mainland my anxieties as to at which port we were to be landed increased. Naturally the plan for the coming campaign was a closed book to us. We had no idea at all if we should be expected to hold Thrace, so as to keep Turkey’s communications with Greece open in the event of an attack by the Germans through Bulgaria, or if we should be sent to some more central position up on the Yugoslav frontier.
In either case, Salonika seemed the most likely port of disembarkation, and I wondered how the devil I was going to manage to get down to Athens from there. It was most unlikely that I should be able to get leave; yet every hour was of importance, if I was to stop Daphnis jeopardising her life before she had been caught out by Mondragora. On the other hand, in general conversation the more experienced officers on board pointed out that when a modern army is shipped from one country to another the number of vehicles is so great that even the largest port cannot comfortably accommodate them all. Unless days are to be wasted every crane in every available port in the country concerned is needed to hoist the hundreds of tanks, Bren-gun carriers and lorries out of the holds, and that therefore whatever our final destination might be we might arrive at any port.
This comforted me a lot, as Piraeus, the port of Athens, has the finest harbour in Greece, so it would certainly take a large share of the traffic, and as it happened my luck was in; on the afternoon of March the 16th we docked there.
At least we anchored and lay off the port until sundown. The officers were then assembled and addressed by the Brigadier, who informed us that it was desired to maintain the greatest possible secrecy regarding the landing of Imperial Forces in Greece, as Greece was still officially at peace with Germany. Therefore the disembarkation would take place as usual at night, but in addition we were to be sent up-country in trains with drawn blinds, and in no circumstances was any officer or man to leave the dock or railway siding at Piraeus until their respective units were entrained.
For me this was a shattering blow, as Piraeus is only eight miles from Athens, and having got so near I was certainly not going to be carried away again without having seen Daphnis, and assured myself that she would immediately drop the dangerous game that she had been playing for my sake. There was only one thing for it. I must take a few hours’ French leave and risk any trouble which might come to me from my C.O. in consequence.
Having told my batman not to worry if he couldn’t find me on the train but to take good care of my baggage and try to get me a corner seat, directly we landed on the quay I slipped away from the rest of the Headquarter staff.
As I thought it likely that the guards on the dock-gates had orders not to let anyone through without a special pass, I made my way to the extremity of the enclosure and walked along the wall for some distance. The moon, which was just getting up, enabled me to see quite well, and I soon found a big coal-dump which had been stacked against the inside of the wall, by mounting which it was easy to slip over and lower myself into the street on the other side.
Walking back towards the dock-gates again I managed to pick up a taxi and half an hour later it set me down in the Kolokotroni, a broad thoroughfare in central Athens, where the offices of the Diamopholi company were situated.
It was now nearly eleven o’clock, so the offices were naturally closed, but after some little difficulty I got it out of the janitor, who was in charge of the big block, that Monsieur Nicholas Diamopholus had a suite at the Hotel Grande Bretagne.
Jumping back into the taxi, I ordered the man to drive me there. It was not far away, only just round the corner in Constitution Square. Having paid the man off, I marched into the hotel. Neither the taxi-man, the janitor, nor the hall-porter had shown any surprise at the sight of a British officer in uniform walking about their city; only charming smiles and an obvious desire to be of every assistance, and on entering the hallway of the Grande Bretagne I saw, as I had expected, that a number of British officers were in the Greek capital already.
Naturally many arrangements had to be made, and their presence was probably considered to be no more than that of an unusually large military mission, whereas had every shipload of soldiers which was arriving been allowed to roam about the cradle of modern civilisation at will, the cat would soon have been out of the bag. In any case, I felt that the presence of one additional officer like myself for the space of an hour or two at night would not do the British cause any material damage, and my own business was of the most deadly urgency.
Upon my inquiring at the desk for Nicholas Diamopholus, the frockcoated clerk told me that he was in the hotel, and rang through to his suite. A moment later a message came back to say that I was to be taken straight up.
A page led me past the great restaurant, on the oval floor of which many pretty girls and a number of officers, the great majority of whom were Greeks,
were dancing. As I went up in the lift my heart was high. Daphnis would almost certainly be living in the suite with her stepfather, even if she was working as a nurse during the daytime. The odds were a good three to one that within the next few minutes I would be holding her loveliness to me once again.
Upstairs the page led me down a long corridor. Old Nicholas was standing at the door of his suite waiting to greet me.
“Where’s Daphnis?” I asked. “I must see her and I’m terribly pressed for time.”
The old fellow regarded me sadly with his kind dark eyes. “She is not here,” he said. “She ran away from me two days after we landed.”
Chapter XIX
The Stage is Set
The disappointment was like a physical blow. “Oh God!” I muttered. “Haven’t you any idea where she is at all?”
He drew me inside. “I had a postcard from her three days ago. It only said that I was not to worry about her. It was posted in Sofia but it gave no address.”
I groaned. Sofia was now in the hands of the Germans, so even if I could have got leave there was no longer any possibility of my going there in search of her.
“Why should she run away?” the old man went on unhappily, as he led me into his sitting-room. “I cannot understand it, but when I heard you were here I thought that you might know.”
Evidently Daphnis’ stepfather could not help me, and there was no point in increasing his anxiety by telling him that she had run away in the hope of saving my neck and was now risking her own by spying for the Allies in the Bulgarian capital. He asked me a great many questions and was evidently under the impression, like his wife, that the original reason for Daphnis’ insisting upon coming to Greece as a nurse was because she had quarrelled with me. I assured him that was not so and that my own absence from Alexandria had been caused by a Service matter.
He wanted to give me supper, but I had to explain that I had come to Athens from the Piraeus without permission and must get back as soon as possible. He then insisted that I should at least drink a glass of wine, and gave me some lovely stuff, which, unfortunately, I was in no mood to appreciate. It was very rich and luscious, having something of the qualities of a heavy sherry, a Château Y’Quem and a Muscatel, all blended together. I happened to notice the label on the bottle, and it was called Daphni, so I asked if it was from some special vineyard of his own which he had called after his stepdaughter, but he told me that it came from a little village of that name just outside Athens, on the road to Eleusis.
The Sword of Fate Page 27