The Black Baroness gs-4

by Dennis Wheatley

  'What the devil are you up to?' Gregory asked through chattering teeth.

  'Getting my coat off,' replied the airman. 'Come and give me a hand, then we'll lie down side by side and share it.'

  At first Gregory refused to accept the chivalrous offer, but von Ziegler was insistent. He pointed out that there was no question of there being any personal vendetta between them and that if Gregory had wished to carry the World War on to the little ledge he could easily have pushed his injured companion over hours ago. But such an act had obviously not even occurred to him; on the contrary he had done his best for his enemy and had fed him with his chocolate. Clearly then, von Ziegler argued, as long as they remained on the ledge the war had ceased to exist for them and until they were rescued or died there they ought to share the few assets they had.

  This reasoning so exactly embodied Gregory's own views that he gave way and they curled up together under the German's overcoat to get as much warmth as they could from each other's bodies.

  Gradually the long twilight gave place to darkness and the stars came out in the clear, cold heavens above. Von Ziegler slept little but tossed in feverish restlessness all through the night while Gregory only dozed for stretches of a few moments between long bouts of wakefulness. Morning found them hollow-eyed and miserable. The coming of the new day did not bring them new hope and as they munched the remainder of the chocolate they were both wondering how many hours of agony they would have to endure before they died.

  Soon after the sun was up they heard the flapping of wings and a big eagle soared by. The bird veered suddenly and came to rest upon a piece of rock about ten feet from where they were lying, eyeing them malevolently. The sight of it filled them with fresh dread. Eagles are carrion-eaters but they like fresh meat even better than a corpse. Both men were travelled and knew enough about the royal bird of prey to realise that if its nest was near by it might easily attack them and would almost certainly do so when they were too weak to resist. Such a feathered menace was capable of pouncing upon a full-grown sheep and with its talons buried in the poor brute's body lifting it for thousands of feet to its eyrie in the mountains. It would prove a redoubtable antagonist even to a strong, fit man armed with a thick club, as it could attack him from above, and, if it once got home, tear out its victim's eyes with two pecks of its great curved beak.

  Gregory did the only thing there was to do. It was better to risk a fight with the brute there and then than to wait until they were so weak that it would have them completely at its mercy and tear strips from their living flesh. Reaching out his hand he grabbed a large stone and flung it.

  The stone caught the eagle on the breast and it sailed into the air with an angry squawk. As he scrambled to his feet he grabbed up a larger stone and heaved that. It missed, but the great bird turned in its flight and drew off for the moment. Von Ziegler had struggled into a sitting position and threw another stone which brushed the eagle's tail feathers, while Gregory grabbed up two more. For a second the bird hovered, then in a beautiful curve, with its great wings at their full spread of six feet, sailed away.

  The brief episode filled them both with such horrible forebodings that they did not even discuss it; but both hoped that by their immediate attack they had ensured that the bird would leave them in peace and go in search of easier prey.

  The murmur of traffic was still coming from overhead so Gregory began to shout again, but after a time he gave up as it was quite obvious that nobody up there on the road could hear him. Fortunately the day was fine, and now that the sun was shining they began to feel slightly better as, even in that northern latitude, its rays warmed them a little. Von Ziegler's fever was no worse but his broken leg pained him badly, and Gregory's left shoulder hurt him every time he moved it; but they had had such a bad night that in spite of their aches and anxieties they decided to settle down again and try to get some sleep. For an hour or so they dozed, but both sat up with a start on hearing a sound that they had already come to dread—it was the flutter of great wings. The eagle's nest must be somewhere near and it resented their presence as it had come back to see how they were getting on.

  Grabbing pieces from the pile of loose shale they both went into action simultaneously. The eagle rose at once, then swooped towards their heads, but by a lucky shot Gregory struck it on the beak. With a loud squawk it swerved and flapped up into the air above their heads. Both of them sent more stones whizzing at it. The stones missed but made it swerve again. For a second it hovered, black and menacing, twenty feet above their upturned faces then, suddenly folding its wings, it dropped like a plummet straight on to them.

  They had no weapons with which to defend themselves and von Ziegler could not even stand up, but Gregory struck out with his fist at the bird's evil, rapacious face. Its razor-sharp beak came within a foot of his head but his fist landed on its muscular neck. One of the brute's talons ripped his coat from shoulder to elbow and he shuddered mentally as the brute's beady, red-rimmed eye stared into his own; but once more, its attack having failed, it swerved and the tip of its wing brushed his hair as it circled outwards away from the ledge to prepare for another swoop.

  Next second there was a loud report. The eagle croaked, twisted in the air and dropped from sight.

  Instantly Gregory turned up his face and began to bellow with all the force of his lungs. A moment later a head was thrust out over the edge of the cliff above and its owner shouted back in Norwegian. A hand was waved and the head withdrawn. Gregory sank down with a sigh. They had been found and now it was only a matter of waiting until help reached them.

  Twenty minutes drifted by, but they hardly noticed that in the immense relief at the thought that help was now definitely at hand; then several heads were thrust out over the edge above and a rope with a big slip-knot in it was lowered. Gregory fixed it securely under von Ziegler's armpits and, fending himself off from the wall of rock as well as he could, the airman was drawn up to safety. A few moments later the rope was lowered again and having attached it to himself Gregory was in turn hauled up to the cliff edge, where willing hands dragged him back on to the side of the road from which he had descended in such a terrifying manner some eighteen hours before.

  He then learnt through von Ziegler that it was the eagle which had been the means of saving their lives.

  Some refugees in a passing car had been watching the bird as it dived and swerved, when suddenly they had seen stones shoot past it, apparently hurled from the naked cliff-face. They had realised at once that the stones could only have been flung by human beings trapped on a ledge down there, but before they could set about their rescue they had had to wait until a car that had a rope in it came by. He also gathered that the attack on Lillehammer the previous evening had been defeated and that the survivors of the German force had retreated along the road to Hamar, the ruins of which, it was said, had been occupied on the previous day by a second detachment of parachute troops.

  Their elation at the prospect of rescue had temporarily renewed their strength and made them forget their hurts, but this burst of nervous energy soon wore off and it became obvious to their rescuers that they were chilled to the bone, injured and exhausted. A short discussion took place among the crowd of Norwegians, and a father and son who had no women with them very decently agreed to turn their car round and drive the two strangers back to Lillehammer, which boasted the ' only hospital within fifty miles. The back of their car was half-filled with trunks and suit-cases but some of these were shifted round so that the groaning von Ziegler could be propped up with his broken leg stretched out before him, and Gregory squeezed into the front seat between the two Norwegians.

  After being hauled up von Ziegler had still had his wits about him sufficiently to realise that his rescuers might become extremely hostile if they discovered that he was a German, so when he told Gregory how the eagle had led to their discovery he had used a few sentences of halting English. The pain that he was in had prevented his saying very much but the
Norwegians had taken it for granted that he was a Norwegian himself and that Gregory was an Englishman. It now transpired that the driver of the car could also speak a little English and he and his son were both curious to know how their passengers had become stranded on the ledge of rock thirty-odd feet below the level of the road.

  Gregory pulled his tired brain together in an effort to provide an adequate answer to this difficult conundrum without giving too much away. If he told the truth, von Ziegler would, he felt sure, be handed over to the military authorities at the first opportunity and shot either at once or as soon as his leg was mended; yet after the experience they had been through together he had a curious feeling that this would not somehow be quite fair to the man whom he himself had been ready and anxious to shoot the previous afternoon. Von Ziegler was no danger to anyone at the moment, and it seemed to Gregory that until he was in a better state to cheat death, if he could, a sporting chance ought to be given to him and that their personal armistice should continue.

  He therefore told the driver that their fall was the result of an accident. He said that they had got out of their car the previous evening but had neglected to put the brakes on before doing so. It had then suddenly run forward and as they had tried to prevent it going over the cliff his friend had been knocked down right at the edge of the precipice; the car had plunged into the abyss and his friend had rolled over the edge, where he had been left hanging by one hand. He had rushed to the rescue but had slipped and so, just as he had grasped his friend's wrist, they had both gone over, but by extraordinary good fortune they had landed on the ledge below.

  He knew that with the invasion crisis in full swing neither of the Norwegians would bother to check up the story about the missing car by wasting time looking for its wreckage; and they both accepted his account of the affair in good faith.

  Half an hour later they reached the Lillehammer hospital, a fair-sized building with low gabled roofs like those of a Swiss chalet. The place was already crowded with casualties from the affray on the previous day, but extra beds had been put up and Gregory and von Ziegler were accommodated in a small, bright room, facing south, that was normally used as a sitting-room for the nurses. The place was spotlessly clean and the medical attention of the highest quality. A doctor and nurses took charge of them. Von Ziegler's leg was broken and reset under an anaesthetic and Gregory's wrenched shoulder adjusted; then they were put to bed between fresh, clean sheets, with a rosy-cheeked, golden-haired nurse in attendance.

  The invasion had actually taken place in the small hours of Tuesday morning and it was now Thursday afternoon, yet to Gregory it seemed weeks since he had been in a comfortable bed without anxieties, so, although it was still early, after a bowl of excellent chicken-broth which satisfied his immediate hunger he dropped off to sleep in a relaxed and contented frame of mind.

  They both woke early the following morning and Gregory found that von Ziegler, while still in considerable pain, was well enough to talk, so he told him about the explanation that he had given on the previous day as to how they had become marooned on the ledge of rock and that he had refrained from disclosing the German's real identity.

  Von Ziegler expressed his gratitude and said that an occasion might later arise when he could repay Gregory's forbearance, in which case he would certainly do so. In the meantime, it was agreed that their armistice should continue at least until both of them were out of hospital, and to prevent complications the airman said that while he was there he intended to pose as a Swede, since he spoke Swedish fluently and the change of nationality would prevent the checking-up of any awkward questions that he might have to answer about his address and occupation.

  After breakfast they asked for news, and before going to fetch them a local paper—which was the only one available— their golden-haired nurse brought them up to date. On the Wednesday many German transports had been sunk in the Kattegat and Skagerrak, but in addition to Oslo, Bergen, Trond-heim and Narvik the Germans had managed to establish themselves at Kristiansand, Stavanger, Egersund and Vallo. There had been a number of air-raids and the industrial district of Porsgrund had been severely bombed. The British and German Fleets had been in action at various points along the Norwegian coast, but no details were yet available except that five British destroyers had steamed into Narvik Fjord against seven German destroyers. One British and one German had been sunk and two British and three German badly damaged, but the British had also succeeded in sinking seven German supply-ships and partially wrecking the quays.

  Gregory wondered why, when we had such immense naval superiority, five of our destroyers should be sent in against seven Germans, but even with the odds against them the British seemed to have put up a remarkably good show, as they had evidently gone in to destroy the supply-ships and had had to concentrate their fire upon them before becoming free to return that of the enemy destroyers.

  When it arrived the local paper gave further particulars of the events of the previous day. The headline was devoted to the reaffirmation of Norway's rejection of the German demand for a Quisling Government by M. Nygaardsvold, the Norwegian Premier, and the rest of the front page was devoted to King Haakon's escape, the attack on Lillehammer and Mr. Churchill's speech in the British Parliament.

  Von Ziegler gave Gregory a translation, and after hearing it he felt that although the British might declare that Hitler's attack on Scandinavia was a fatal strategic blunder the Nazis had carried out the job with amazing speed and efficiency.

  Reading between the lines he could make a pretty good guess at what had happened. With brilliant and impudent daring the Germans had sent a squadron, led by the Scharnhorst, right up the coast of Norway.

  Immediately the British had learnt of this they had dispatched their battle-fleet north in pursuit with the intention of cutting off the Germans when they turned and made for home. In the meantime, the rest of the German Fleet, in three squadrons, had convoyed their main landing-forces to Oslo, Bergen and Trondheim where they had forced the defences of these three ports and covered the landing operations with their guns.

  The British were probably somewhere about half-way up the coast when they received news of this and apparently they had detached a squadron led by the Repulse to follow the Scharnhorst, while their main fleet had turned south again, arriving too late to intercept the Germans there but in time to sink a number of their transports bringing up reinforcements on the following day. The Scharnhorst must have arrived off Narvik at about the time that the other German forces arrived off the more southerly Norwegian ports.

  She had sent her destroyer flotilla up the fjord to assist in the capture of the town but had herself continued with her escorting cruiser, the Hipper, on her northern course with a view to drawing the British away from Narvik and up into the Arctic.

  When the Repulse had come up it had appeared out of the question to let the Scharnhorst get away, so apparently the British Admiral had left his destroyers to bottle-up the German forces in Narvik while he continued with the chase. He had caught the Scharnhorst and severely damaged her, but by sheer bad luck she and her companion had managed to get away under cover of the mist and snow. Meanwhile, although his force was inferior to that of the Germans the commander of the destroyer flotilla had decided with a gallantry typical of the British Navy to go in to Narvik and destroy the supply-ships before the enemy could land any considerable quantity of munitions from them.

  That was about the size of it. The Germans had acted with such boldness that they had succeeded in pulling the wool over the Allies' eyes for the first few vital hours of this brilliantly-executed operation.

  Rough seas and bad visibility had probably greatly hampered the British and they had made the best out of a bad business when they had at last got to grips with such portions of the enemy as had not escaped them. But what Gregory could not understand was why the British Fleet had not been cruising off the Skagerrak all ready to intercept the Germans if they took up the challenge issued to them
by the mining of Norwegian waters on the Monday. Even less could he understand what had happened to the British Army. The Germans had made their landings early on Tuesday morning and it was now Friday, but apart from rumours which had been officially denied there was no news of a single British Tommy having as yet set foot on Norwegian soil.

  When the doctor came he said that Gregory had been worse, shaken by his fall than he had realised and that he must stay in bed for at least three days. As there seemed nothing that he could do for the moment which might give the Nazis a headache, he accepted the doctor's order quite cheerfully. He loved staying in bed reading, smoking and dozing when he had nothing better to do. Moreover, he knew that while he was there he would have less occasion to move his injured shoulder and that after the strain of the past few days the rest would do him a lot of good.

  During the night it had occurred to him that the Honourable Augustus Langdon-Forbes might possibly be in the hospital, so when the doctor—who spoke quite good English—had finished his examination Gregory made his inquiry. To his delight he learned that Gussy had been brought in on the Wednesday evening and he obtained permission to go along in a borrowed dressing-gown to see his friend, for ten minutes.

  He found the diplomat in one of the proper wards. Gussy had a nasty wound, as he had been hit by three bullets from the tommy-gun, but it had been cleaned up at once and was going on as well as could be expected. He had also been slightly concussed by the explosion of the hand-grenade, but he was already over the worst effects of that and his forty hours in bed with excellent medical attention had restored him to his normal philosophic calm.