Awareness slowly returned, and with it a sense of acknowledgement. Like acceptance. He had been tried, and found wanting; now it was over. When he properly awoke, cold, stiff and empty, the sun was already high. And the town was silent. He left his crevice and walked along the cliff until rooftops appeared; then the whole town spread out below him, with its church spires, sandy beach-front and little harbour bobbing with fishing boats. Smoke drifted from bombed-out buildings, wrecked vehicles lay everywhere, and a white flag flew over the town hall. He approached closer, and a low murmur rose to him like plainsong, as men in uniform, thousands and thousands both grey and khaki together, packed the roads and streets surrounding the harbour. In their midst stood a single German tank.
He found steps in the cliff and descended to the town. Everywhere Highlanders stood, sat or lay, weaponless, smoking, talking in low voices or sleeping. Here and there Germans corralled them into lines. There was no shouting, no shooting, and little animosity, only the weary resignation of the vanquished and the bustling efficiency of their captors. Somewhere a regimental piper played a haunting lament. Slowly he made his way to the harbour, and to where the tank sat. A pennant fluttering from its antenna bore the Roman numeral VII. The men around it were not lower ranks, they were officers, aides, adjutants and senior NCOs of both armies. At their centre, standing apart and conferring quietly, stood two men he recognized: Major General Victor Fortune and Generalmajor Erwin Rommel. Fortune’s face was fatigued and downcast. Rommel’s demeanour was business-like. As Theo approached, both glanced up, but then continued as before.
‘What happened?’ he asked a nearby aide.
‘What happened? Where the hell have you been? We surrendered an hour ago.’
‘To him?’ He nodded at Rommel.
‘To him.’
He turned to go, then a German voice stopped him.
‘Junge, halt!’
The narrowed eyes, the chiselled jaw, the cleft chin. Unchanged in the four years since they’d met at the Hitlerjugend games.
‘Come here please.’
Theo approached. Others looked on curiously. The conquering general and the nobody private. Nearby, an aide snapped photographs of the harbour scene.
Rommel plucked gloves from his fingers. ‘So we meet again,’ he said in German.
‘Ja, Herr General.’
‘I see you made your decision.’
‘Sir?’
‘About who you are.’ He looked around the crowded harbour. ‘A Scottish man apparently. I’m not sure you chose wisely, for they are all going into captivity.’
‘I’m not Scottish.’
‘No. Then what? Italian, perhaps?’
‘Italian? No, um, well, half—’
‘Because Italy just entered the war. On Germany’s side.’
‘What?’
‘Yesterday, evidently. Although I must doubt the wisdom of this liaison. Reasonable soldiers, terrible officers, in my experience, the Italians.’ He took out a silver cigarette case; the aide with the camera leaped forward with a lighter. ‘Anyway, this puts you in an even more difficult position, wouldn’t you say?’
Theo could only shake his head.
‘Because in war, it’s vital each of us knows which side we’re on. And I’m not sure you do.’
‘No, sir.’
‘No. But you don’t belong here, that’s for sure. Tell me, do you still run fast?’
‘Run? I don’t…’
‘There’s a little village, five kilometres up the coast, that way.’ Rommel gestured. ‘It’s called Veules-les-Roses. Rather charming.’
‘Herr General.’
‘A British patrol boat is there, five hundred metres offshore, picking up anyone who manages to swim out to it. A few have, I gather.’
‘I don’t see…’
‘I have just instructed two tanks to drive to the cliffs above the village and open fire upon this ship. I expect it will then leave, rather quickly, don’t you?’
‘Yes, Herr General.’
Rommel checked his watch. ‘You have thirty minutes before they get there.’
CHAPTER 9
Cliff Poutney’s tragic death on the Apeldoorn hospital train casts a pall over every man on board: sick and injured, doctors and orderlies, guards and escorts, friend and foe alike. After the appalling carnage of Arnhem, losing yet another man to a bullet, just for some madcap escape attempt, seems wretched and pointless, and I can only shake my head in agreement with the German major when he points to Cliff’s blanket-covered body and asks, ‘Was this worth it?’
Grateful to be needed elsewhere, I go forward with Bowyer to deal with Theo. He’s in a carriage for the most seriously wounded near the front and it takes some time to reach it. When we do, I find he is indeed in extremis. Rocking gently to the motion of the train, he lies completely comatose on his stretcher, and upon examination exhibits a sky-high fever, low blood pressure, breathing fast and shallow, and pupils alarmingly fixed and dilated. Even as I examine him, his body convulses in a seizure and I have to break off until he goes limp again. Then I unwind the bandage on his head, there to find the ominous signs of swelling I’ve been dreading, and can only conclude, weighing up his symptoms, that he’s suffering a lethal build-up of cranial pressure caused by bleeding. In simple terms, a brain haemorrhage.
‘Don’t look too good, do it, Doc,’ Jack Bowyer mutters.
‘Not terribly.’
‘Double dose of morphia?’
Suddenly this is the last straw. ‘NO, God damn it!’ And in a fit of frustration I let fly at Jack. ‘I am sick to bloody death of you and everyone telling me to end this boy’s life, Bowyer. You may think it inconvenient he’s still alive, but that’s his choice. Our job is to help him until he decides otherwise. Is that understood!’
‘Totally. So what you going to do?’
‘I have no idea!’ And with that I stalk outside to the carriage platform where of course, fumbling with cigarettes and overwrought emotions, I immediately regret the outburst. Before I know it tears are starting. Not just for Cliff, whose death upsets me greatly, nor for Theo or the thousands of other Market Garden victims we’ve had no time to grieve for, but mostly, I’m ashamed to say, for poor old Dan Garland and all that brought him to this pretty pass. I never wanted this, I tell myself, I’m ill prepared, ill suited and hopelessly out of my depth. An unwilling amateur thrown among hardened professionals, who despise me. An imposter in other words, and an affront to the beret on my head.
I smoke and sniff and wallow in self-pity for a while; then fortunately Jack arrives to put a stop to it.
‘I’m going down back with the others,’ he grunts moodily.
‘No. Listen, wait.’
He pauses.
‘Sergeant, look, I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.’
He shrugs. ‘Only trying to save him unnecessary suffering.’
‘Yes, and God knows, it may yet come to that.’
‘We all feel it, you know. The dying and maiming and that, it’s not just you.’
‘No.’
‘And Doc Poutney, he was a good man, a good doc: we all feel bad he’s dead.’
‘Yes. Yes, we do.’ I fumble for cigarettes and offer him one; automatically he tucks it behind an ear. ‘It’s just, well, that boy in there, he’s fought damn hard to keep going, and I’m not ready to give up on him yet.’
‘Fine. So like I said, what are you going to do?’
Trepanning, unbelievably, is what I’m going to do. Cut a hole in his skull to relieve the pressure. Right there on the train. It’s extreme, and fraught with risk, but the only thing left. I brief Jack, whose eyes widen incredulously, send him off with a shopping list; then I go in search of Colonel Alford and the German major. Ten minutes later Theo’s being manhandled into the train’s operating theatre which, though cramped, is clean, well lit and surprisingly well equipped. We strap him to the table and set up blood and plasma drips. Anaesthetic won’t be needed as he’s already uncon
scious, but considerable care is devoted to disinfecting him, me, and a growing array of instruments and equipment. Soon Jack appears bearing the final items: a workman’s hand-drill, an assortment of drill bits, and a drinking straw.
‘What’s this?’
‘Sorry, no rubber tubing anywhere. It’s the best I can do.’
‘Oh. Well, at least you found a drill.’
‘It’s a Heller – German, you know. Came from the guard’s van.’
‘Good quality then, hopefully. Put the drill bits in the Lysol and then scrub up.’
‘Me?’
‘Yes, you. There’s only room for two of us.’
‘But—’
‘You’ll only have to hold his head, you won’t even have to watch.’ Still he hesitates. ‘Look, Sergeant. Jack. We may not always, you know, see eye to eye. But you’re still my orderly, I hope, and as far as I’m concerned, the best there is. I really do want you here.’
Colonel Alford arrives with the German major. ‘Are you quite sure about this, Garland?’ he asks.
‘No, sir, but if the pressure’s not released he’ll die within the hour.’
‘Very well. What’s the procedure?’
I take a breath. ‘Open a flap of scalp two inches square. Retract the periosteum layer to expose the cranium. Drill a burr hole in the bone using the half-inch drill bit, but only down as far as the dura mater. If the haematoma’s extradural we should see blood escaping straight away.’
‘And if it’s subdural?’
‘Then I tent the dura up through the burr hole using this hook, and make a cross-shaped incision to allow the matter beneath to release. I then suture this, er, tube to the incised dura to act as a drain.’
‘A drinking straw.’
‘Yes, sir. It should serve until we get him to a proper hospital.’ I glance at the German major, standing purse-lipped at the entrance to the carriage. ‘If that might be arranged, er, Herr Major?’
‘Perhaps.’ He nods. ‘And this operation can be concluded within ten minutes?’
‘Yes.’
‘Because I cannot stop the train for one minute longer.’
‘I understand.’
And that’s what happens. He barks an order and a minute later the train grinds to a halt. Suddenly all is pin-drop silent and everyone’s waiting, so I nod to Jack who cradles Theo’s head to one side, and set to work with scalpel and drill bit. The drilling noise is disconcerting, as is the smell of hot bone. Alford and the German exchange glances, and Jack pales somewhat, but I press on until a half-inch-diameter crater is created, then fractionally further until I feel the drill penetrating. The haemorrhage does turn out to be subdural, and there’s a flurry of panic when the drinking straw is inserted but gets blocked by a blood clot which I have to suck out by mouth. Then there’s a gout of blood and cerebrospinal fluid, the pressure is released and all that remains is to secure the straw and close the flap of skin.
And pray like fury.
*
The following afternoon the hospital train finally reaches its destination. ‘Fallingbostel’ the station sign reads, in Lower Saxony, Colonel Alford says, some thirty miles north of Hanover. Deep in the heart of Germany, in other words, and a world away from any advancing allies or grand notions of liberation. And our mood reflects this sense of isolation as we medics assemble along the platform, the orderlies distribute themselves among the stretchers and the walking wounded shuffle painfully into line. Battledresses filthy and threadbare, accessories dangling on bits of string, possessions slung in tied bundles on sticks: frankly we look more like a procession of tinkers than a column of Paras. Nor, as we tramp listlessly along the town’s cobbled streets, do the local inhabitants give us a second glance; apparently the whole area is a patchwork of prison and labour camps, so another gaggle of foreigners wandering by is of no interest to anyone. Soon we’re ascending out of town and into a forest of brooding pines. Rain starts to fall; conversation, already desultory, fizzles to silence. Even our guards seem subdued. I return to the head of the column following a visit to Theo, who is being carried at the rear.
‘How’s he doing?’ Alford asks.
‘Still with us. Just.’
‘Infection’s your greatest threat now. You need to get him on penicillin, quickly.’
‘There should be some at this new place. They say it’s well equipped.’
Wrong. For as we are soon to discover, ‘they’, who were the Germans at Apeldoorn, either had no idea or were simply lying. Another twenty minutes and the trees suddenly clear to our right and a wire fence appears, twelve feet high topped with coiled barbed wire. Then a watchtower heaves into view complete with guards, machine guns and searchlight. We round a bend, the fence stretches on and then a cluster of wooden huts appears. It’s ominous, reminding me of newspaper photos of a camp in Poland where fifty RAF officers were recently massacred following a break-out. This one looks identical: barbed wire, watchtowers, guns, huts, the lot. We reach imposing wooden gates manned by guards struggling with snarling dogs. On the gate is mounted a sign: ‘Stammlager XIB’.
‘This is no hospital,’ Alford growls.
He’s right. It’s a prison camp and a grim one. After another hour being processed through the gate we’re escorted to the ‘lazaret’, which is a separate compound serving as a makeshift infirmary. As we draw near a British army padre hurries out to greet us, his expression anxious.
‘Hello, Colonel, hello, chaps, we’ve been expecting you.’
‘And you are?’ Alford asks.
‘Pettifer, camp padre and interpreter. Got bagged in Italy. Been here a year.’
‘What is this place? We were told to expect a hospital camp.’
‘Ah, well, it’s a POW camp, sir, obviously, of sorts. A Korrekturlager in fact.’
‘A what?’
‘Correction camp. It’s one of Hitler’s latest edicts, you see, sir. He regards you airborne chaps as, well, sort of terrorists. Gangsters, is the word he uses. He says once captured you should be treated as such.’
Some of us smile at the notion of being gangsters. But not Bill Alford. ‘That’s a bloody outrage! I demand to see the camp commandant immediately!’
‘You will sir, I’m sure, and soon,’ Pettifer soothes, ‘but I must advise caution in your dealings with Major Möglich. He can be very, well, unpredictable.’
‘Unpredictable be buggered! I insist on a meeting, Padre. Please see to it right away. Meanwhile, the rest of you, let’s get everyone housed and settled.’
The lazaret huts are damp, cold and cramped. Four have been allocated to us, each divided into rooms barely ten feet by twelve, and crammed with double-tiered bunks such that twenty wounded men are expected to be housed in each room – that’s over a hundred to a hut. There are no washing or toilet facilities in the rooms, just bedpans and one small latrine area per hut, few signs of medical equipment or supplies, nowhere to treat the wounded, make examinations or operate, and no fuel for heating. Alford’s right, it is an outrage, completely contrary to accepted conventions of war. As we work, settling the patients as best we can, we learn that the camp houses mostly Russian and French POWs, some of whom have been in captivity for years. There’re also Dutch, Belgian and a few non-airborne Brits. The Russians are in the majority but in a particularly parlous state; their compound is fenced off from the rest and their treatment much harsher. The French rule the roost therefore; most have been in captivity since the fall of France and as a result have the ‘system’ fine-tuned to their advantage. They run the bath house, cook house and stores, their people liaise and negotiate with the Germans, they’ve cornered the market in tradable goods such as Red Cross chocolate and cigarettes, they even control the coal stocks for the stoves. ‘How’s your French?’ someone mutters at one point. ‘Because we’re going to need it.’
At around six the ‘evening meal’ is served: buckets of watery cabbage soup and unpeeled boiled potatoes. No meat, no protein, insufficient to nourish a mouse.
To their infinite credit, our injured make few complaints but gratefully swallow whatever we pour in their mess tins, if they’re fit enough to swallow; for those with facial or abdominal injuries who can’t manage solids, we mash their food into a gruel. The gravely ill, like Theo, get nothing.
We officers eat after everyone else, retreating to one room we’ve set aside as an office-cum-surgery. Though we try to put a brave face on it, our mood is gloomy and our spirits low, the prospect of permanent incarceration here almost unbearable. As we drain our tins of cold cabbage water, a stamping of boots is heard outside, the door crashes open and a delegation marches in: four German soldiers and the aforementioned commandant, Möglich, plus Padre Pettifer following behind.
‘Colonel Alford,’ he begins, ‘may I introduce the commandant, Major Möglich.’
‘Yes you certainly may! Now listen to me, Möglich—’
But Möglich holds up a hand, as though stopping traffic. Short by comparison to his escort, bald and paunchy but smartly turned out, he surveys us with a disdainful downturn of the mouth and then addresses Pettifer in German.
‘The, er, major expresses some surprise at your, ah, appearance, sir.’
‘He what?’
‘To be exact’ – Pettifer winces – ‘he says he’s astonished to find that the so-called elite British red devil stormtroopers look so, er, schlampig.’
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