Invisible Foe

by Ronald Cove

  This time I held the gate firmly until Dave and myself were safely inside, then I gently closed it. And that’s when that snotty nose little bundle of joy came flying out of the house which stood opposite and yelled to his mates something almost undecipherable “Yere, yerry yup yelse we’ll be late” then without waiting for an answer was off legging it down the road. However, my supersonic brain had deciphered his message before dear old Danny had opened his front door. What the snotty nose bugger had said was ‘Here, hurry up or else we’ll be late’, so problem solved.

  Danny shook Selby’s hand and indicated that Dave should go on through into the front room where we had conducted our last interview. I too stepped through the front door and like Dave shook hands with dear old Danny, I also enquired after his health. He assured me there was no problem there. So I moved passed him and followed DI. Selby into Danny’s front room. Suddenly I sensed something was wrong, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up, I made to pull away from the open door, but what felt like a hand in the centre of my back propelled me uncontrollably forward through the door, and there laying on the floor was poor old Dave: my chief, my ex sergeant, my mentor, my friend, the one I’d looked up to all these years, well I had to really you see, the bugger had always been taller than me! Anyway, one thing I can vouch for, when someone bangs you over the head with a bloody sledgehammer, you really do see stars. I know this for a fact because the devious bastard who’d been hiding behind the door, had very nearly knocked my head off with one. Believe it or not, I actually stood for a moment and counted three bloody stars before sinking to my knees and letting my nose caress the floor.

  10:

  A VISIT TO LONDON

  Cpl: Fletcher now lying on the bed in his Warlingham lodging house, was trying to calculate how much damage he could cause by taking a trip into London, and perhaps placing a few booby traps around one or two small factories in and around the London area. After some consideration he considered it a good idea. All he had to do now he decided, was to sort out which factories would be worthy of his attention, and of course which would be the easiest factory to infiltrate, and hopefully cause the enemy a great deal of damage. After laying there for an hour or so longer, he decided he would first return to the Biggin Hill air base and put in for a weekend pass. That, he reasoned would give him two full days in which he could select suitable targets, in say places like Stratford or Bow, where he knew for instance the Bryant and May match factory stood, all be it, a cock stretch from Bow Road tube station and positioned in the Old Ford Road, presenting no problem at all. He therefore decided he would stay on at Biggin Hill and use it as his base for the time being. Having at this point made up his mind, Dick Fletcher removed himself from the bed and engaged in a quick shave and brush up. Knowing that Sally, his landlady, had just recently pressed his best uniform, he therefore thought it would be a good idea to slip into said uniform and present himself to the orderly room where he could request a weekend pass, after which he could return to his lodgings where he would then confirm one way or the other whether Sally his landlady was in fact a sympathiser. After all she had within the last couple of days given him every indication this was so. He further surmised that Himmler himself had connived for her to be on hand in case of emergency. That being the case, he silently praised the SS Furher for some good thinking.

  *

  I woke to the sound of a soothing voice cooing “Come on Sgt: Auger, wake up now, you’re alright, come on open your eyes” So just to be awkward I opened one eye to take a peek at whoever this was pestering me. What I saw with that one eye made me immediately open the other eye in double quick time, and when I say this nurse was beautiful, it’s a lie, coz she was absolutely gorgeous. “Why didn’t you wake me sooner?” I complained. “My dear Sergeant, I’ve been trying to wake you for about half an hour” she politely told me. “Right, well I’ll let you off this time, but do try harder next time” I returned. She simply stuck her nose in the air and walked away from me, with my eyes following her every move, while my mind jumped back remembering the time I’d woke up in a Belgium hospital, surrounded by so many beautiful young nurses and an exceedingly desirable sister, who I judged to be in her thirties and at the time much too old for me. What a naïve bloody idiot I must have been.

  My gorgeous nurse returned, this time however with a small trolley trailing along behind her. “I’ll just check make sure your brain is still functioning Sergeant, so just sit back and relax” she instructed. “Right” I replied. “Ok Sgt: Auger, follow my finger with your eyes side to side, up, now down, yes everything seems alright there” she announced, “now let me just take another peek at your wound” she next ventured. Of course, while this was going on I could do no more than admire a beautiful heart-shaped face, surrounded by a mop of shining fair hair which was, I hasten to add, half-concealed under a bloody tin hat! ‘wow’ I thought, it’s coming to something when Billy Auger starts chatting up nurses wearing a bloody tin hat, I just couldn’t believe it. Never mind, she still had a good pair of shapely legs, and besides I was really enjoying myself now with my face nestled into the hollow between her perky pair of breasts, while this lovely nurse examined the wound I had received on the back of my barnet. “How does that feel?” she asked. “Oh wonderful” I replied snuggling in a little closer. “Does it hurt there?” she next enquired while pressing with one finger down the back of my head. “Oh no, that’s great nurse” I assured her at the same time realising I was giving all the wrong answers. Anyway that’s when my old friend DI Selby put his head around the door and asked, “How is he nurse?” “I think he’s good for a year or two yet Inspector” she replied. She gently pushed my head away, gave me a wicked smile and a sly wink, which inferred there could be more to follow.

  DC Willis arrived and told us the car was ready and waiting outside. The silly sod never gave me a bleedin’ chance to ask my nurse her name, still I suppose I shouldn’t go on about that really, after all I am a married man, and my little nurse Florrie May is still as lovely as ever. Anyway, as we stepped through the Oldchurch hospital front door, it suddenly occurred to both Selby and myself that with each of us now wearing a nice clean white bandage around our barnets, and with a great deal of serious rain now pouring down, we would soon be looking like a couple of drowned rats. Nevertheless once again DC Willis saved the day when he produced two umbrellas, so now with each of us holding tightly to a brolly, we made a mad dash for the car, and tripped arse over tip down a bloody high curb in the process! Selby ended his excursion lying full length in the road, while yours truly brazenly kissed the back door of the highly polished car, and of course our brilliant dash for the car still left us looking like a couple of bloody drowned rats.

  However it wasn’t until we were approaching a place called Roneo Corner just outside Romford that DC Willis revealed that at the same time Selby and me had been nobbled, dear old Danny Ross had been murdered. “What!” Selby exclaimed, “do you mean while Sgt: Auger and me were lying there after being clobbered, the bastard then murdered that poor old bugger Ross!” Selby barked in an outrageous tone. “‘Ow’d the poor sod get it?” I quickly broke in. “Well whoever it was, used the same method he’d used when clobbering yous two, which must have been something like a cricket or baseball bat or something bloody similar, hard to tell really” Willis revealed hesitantly. Silence rained for a few moments. Then breaking the short pause he added “Anyway the forensic people think that’s how it was” he concluded. “Right, so the forensics are there now, I take it” Selby said quietly. “That’s right” Willis sung out. “And I take it the silly sods ‘ave removed the body?” Selby next asked. “I really couldn’t say” came a spontaneous reply. I could see our leader DI. Selby was now in deep thought, so I calmly tried in my most eloquent way to throw a lighter note on the subject. “Ah, don’t matter if they ‘ave Dave, they will ‘ave taken photos of the crime scene and you will see pictures of a dead body with a bloody gash in ‘is ‘ead” I stated. Dave gave m
e a long glance, then a smile broke out on his face. “There you are Willis, see ‘ow simple it is” he told the DC and quite suddenly burst into a fit of laughter. “See” I said with a smile. But suddenly Dave’s laughing ceased, and another question was bouncing around the car. It would seem this time Selby was now doing his best to put our skills of deduction to the ultimate test, his question was “Everyone keeps saying ‘he’ killed poor old Danny Ross, but ‘ow the bloody ‘ell do we know it was just the one?” The question was posed in such a way as though to offer a challenge. DC Willis at the wheel shrugged and gave Dave a quick glance. I offered what I thought to be a better scenario with “Perhaps there’s three or four of the buggers around Hornchurch Dave, then what?” I smiled. “Then What, Yer silly sod, then we’re in a bleedin’ lot of trouble, and that’s a fact!” Dave replied as we bumped along in the Wolseley.

  11:

  A MATCH TO BRIGHTEN THINGS UP

  Having finally established his landlady Sally was still a firm Nazi supporter, who had in fact gone to great lengths in order to persuade a tanker driver named Red to keep a watchful eye out for Cpl: Fletcher, and make sure he was on hand when the Corporal needed a lift out of Folkestone. Red had very cleverly conspired to fulfil this task, and practically delivered the Corporal on to Sally’s doorstep. So now with no more niggling little doubts about his landlady, Dick Fletcher boarded a district line train and arrived at Bow Road underground station at about mid-day on the Friday. Having previously arranged to stay at the Romford YMCA, he now thought it a good idea to spend the Friday afternoon just strolling around this part of London, making sure he knew exactly where to place any small gift he might feel inclined to leave for the night workers, just to make life a touch more exciting for them. He also thought that by surveying the Old Ford Road area in daylight, would be a sight better than fumbling about at night in these fruitless blackouts the British persisted on. It would for a start give him Friday night and all day Saturday to put one or two things together, which he hoped the workers in the Bryant and May match factory for instance, would appreciate.

  Cpl: Fletcher had already contacted the YMCA just outside Romford, and been assured they were holding a room for him for Friday and Saturday night. He in turn had promised to vacate the room by mid-day Sunday seeing as the long weekend pass he’d been granted, was due to expire at 10.00pm Sunday evening. He reasoned that this should give him plenty of time in which to place a few surprises around the Old Ford Road area. After all, from what he could see, the Luftwaffe hadn’t even touched this part of London so far. He therefore reasoned that by creating a little mischief in and around Bow Road itself and the Old Ford Road in particular, he would then be assured of causing a great deal of havoc plus putting a great deal more fear into the local inhabitants, which could no doubt deprive the night workers of their daytime sleep. This in itself may eventually cause one or two careless mistakes amongst the night workers, and could lead to certain individuals nipping out in the dark for a quick fag, in order to overcome their tiredness and calm their nerves, where they would through tiredness, inevitably forget to follow the blackout rules, by first striking a match in an open doorway where possibly a glass window adorned an adjoining door, and without knowing it, the reflection of the lit match would be seen for miles around. Then of course, the culprit would then go parading around the factory grounds puffing away on the cigarette, not realising that the light from just one quick fag could clearly be seen by any observant Luftwaffe pilot from near on 10,000ft above. This then was the result Cpl: Fletcher was hoping for as he made his way to Romford’s YMCA, where he was to enjoy a typical wartime meal, after which he had a quiet brandy and ginger with a Sergeant from the RA regiment, then after making his excuses retired for the night.

  Now alone in his room Cpl: Fletcher lay on his bed and began to work out the exact ingredients he would need to cause an explosion or perhaps a fire. After giving the matter some deep thought, he considered the best option would be to start a fire from whatever flammable material was on hand. ‘Yes’ he thought ‘that would be the wisest thing to do’. It was at that point Fletcher remembered how as kids, they were able to set fire to some old dried up leaves, by first placing two or three red top match heads in between two bolts which were then held together by a nut in the middle. Then it became a hit or miss exercise placed squarely in the laps of the Gods. It was just a matter of throwing this homemade contraption amongst the selected material and hope that when it struck the ground it would ignite. He decided this to be a far better option than trying to rack his brain in conjuring up some materials for a homemade bomb, after all this would without doubt mean he’d be obliged to visit one or two chemists for said materials and in all probability, having signed for them, would create an added danger of his face being remembered by the chemist. This then, he reasoned eliminated the bomb option for the time being. As quickly as he had discarded the bomb idea, another idea took its place.

  A smile slid across his face, and his fertile mind wandered back to the old fashion torch trick which is quite easy to put into action. All that is needed, a torch with good batteries, and in this case perhaps one house brick or a mound of earth, in fact anything to make the torch stand upright pointing towards the sky. It didn’t have to throw a particularly bright light, just enough to catch the eye of a Luftwaffe pilot, maybe even a Stuka dive bomber pilot as he goes into the attacking dive. Of course, the more he thought about it, the more he realised that one or even two torches would not suffice. No, what was needed, he surmised, must be at least half a dozen torches, and they must be placed in various concealed positions in a wide circle around the target to be bombed, also in such a way as not to attract the attention of one of those ARP men, who go around at night shouting “Put that bloody light out”. Although he thought, in this case an ARP man could very well be of some help, simply because while busy calling for people to put a light out in a house, these men were not looking for a small light, say in someone’s back garden, or maybe closer to a target. So this then was Cpl: Fletchers last thoughts before slipping between the sheets and drifting off for a full eight hours undisturbed sleep.

  By eight o’clock next morning, the Corporal was up, washed, shaved and halfway through breakfast, when for no reason in particular he took time out to glance around this immaculately laid out YMCA dining hall. On doing so his eyes took in several photos of famous people caressing the walls, such as Billy Bishop, the American 1st World War Ace fighter pilot, next one of Amy Johnson, then adorning the opposite wall a portrait of Winston Churchill. It was at that point the German saboteur became prey to a coughing spasm, which suddenly turned into a full-blown outburst of laughter that even prodded a nearby soldier into enquiring after the Corporals health.

  The whole episode was brought about, he realised, simply because on seeing the Churchill photo, his mind had quickly jumped back to Heir Himmlers office and the painting he’d seen there of Hitler. As it happened, at that very moment while the bogus RAF man had studied Churchill’s photo, he had suddenly become aware of the flaw in the Fuhrers painting. It exhibited the signature of a not too well known Jewish artist, who had changed his name from Saul Solomon to Karl Schmitt, which it would seem every German except the Fuhrer knew. After composing himself the Corporal offered his apologies to the other guests, then left the hall.

  *

  As we walked into the Hornchurch Police Station, a very smart uniformed police Sergeant held up his hand “Hang on a minute gents, are you Inspector Selby and party?” he enquired. “That’s right me ol’ cock” Selby answered. “Good, well we’ve just been informed by some Doctor from the Oldchurch Hospital, that you Sir and your Sergeant must rest for at least forty eight hours,” the sergeant said as though fulfilling a life’s ambition. “Yes, well that maybe so, my good sergeant, but then we’ve just been informed by the Super himself, that there’s no need for rest, work is the only answer for a quick recovery. So there you are my good sergeant, the Doctor must ‘ave it wron
g” Selby recited back to him with a smile. “Up to you Sir” the sergeant mumbled, then wandered off. Selby turned to me and was about to speak when quite suddenly we heard a raised voice slipping through the thin walls. “No, no, I’m saying you can’t do that” the first voice shouted. “Oh no, well you just stand there and bloody watch me mate” the second voice threw back aggressively. “It sounds as though we’re all in the same bloody room, what with these walls only being stuck together with plywood, I daresay every bugger in the station can ‘ear them,” I told Selby. However, it was dear old Dave himself who put into words what I was thinking. “That bloody voice sounds familiar Bill” he offered. I cocked my head to one side to listen further. “Yer know Dave, if I didn’t know any different, I’d say that was bleedin’”. At that point my summation was cut short by a long low rumbling fart, which seemed to bounce from wall to wall in the old wooden shack, then just fade away into silence. “That bloody well is ‘im Bill” Selby yelled as we both rushed for the door. “It can’t be” I sung out on grabbing the door handle and slinging the door wide open, which of course created a situation neither of us were prepared for. Kneeling on the floor in front of us, there appeared an old lady scrubbing the floor. Scrubbing brush and soap in her hand, bucket of water at her side. So in order to avoid this unexpected booby trap, Dave veered to the right, inadvertently catching his foot on the edge of the old lady’s bucket, which tilted him backwards, leaving him sitting on his arse drenched by the bucket of soapy water. I very cleverly swerved to the left in order to avoid the woman and bucket, but to my surprise found myself sailing through the air, having run straight onto a wet soapy floor. My airborne excursion came to a jolting end with me lying spread-eagled on my back, looking up at none other than dear old Plumpkin, my long lost army pal, who we’d thought we’d lost in Delville Wood in 1916.