by John Harris
‘Just because that bloody Pole wants to kill every German in the world, up to and including Hitler, is no reason why we should get involved.’
‘You bloody idiot,’ Magnusson snorted. ‘We are involved. We’ve killed two already – or at least the Pole has – and captured four. If we don’t get the rest, they’ll get us. If this lot don’t return, they’ll come looking for ’em. At the best it means a prison camp. At worst, they could shoot us for murdering their sailors.’
Campbell looked indignantly at Wolszcka, as if he felt their moves needed better planning than they were receiving. ‘The bastard’s forcing us into it,’ he growled.
‘Did we ever have any option really?’
What Magnusson said was right. They were totally committed. Wolszcka had committed them. Like Atwood, he had declared his own private war on the Germans and, though private, it seemed to include everybody else.
Atwood had listened carefully to the argument and now he put his own spoke in. ‘You’re right, of course, sir,’ he said to Magnusson. ‘You said it nigh-on as good as I could meself. There’s nothing else we can do. But after what they done to us, I’ll happily have a go and so will my lads.’
‘What you’re proposin’, boy,’ Willie John said, ‘needs the Black Watch, the Gordon Highlanders an’ the Brigade o’ Guards.’
Atwood sniffed. ‘You got the old 51st of Foot,’ he pointed out coldly. ‘My lot.’
‘You can’t go shooting all over the bloody place, man,’ Campbell argued, struggling with his aggressive naval spirit and the need for common sense. ‘One shot and the whole place will be alerted.’
‘Then we’ll ’ave to do it without shooting, won’t we, sir? Like we did ’ere.’
‘Hit ’em on the head and tie ’em up?’ Campbell’s scorn was withering. ‘They only do that in cowboy films.’
‘This isn’t a cowboy film,’ Magnusson pointed out coldly. ‘They’re killing British troops all over Norway as far as I can make out, to say nothing of Norwegians. It won’t worry me much to give ’em a bit back and I dare bet it won’t worry the Norwegians.’ He gestured. ‘And let’s, for Christ’s sake, be bloody quick about it, because if we don’t get on with it, they’ll start to wonder where this lot have got to.’ He swung round to Orjasaeter who was keeping well to the back in the shadows behind everyone. It struck Magnusson he was taking no chances of being identified if things went wrong and was probably even looking for a way to get ashore and hide himself.
Neither he nor Haldursen spoke.
Magnusson glared at them. ‘Listen,’ he snapped at Haldursen. ‘We can probably save your boat for you and get you some of that fuel that the Germans took! But we need your help. We need to know where the Germans are at Fjållbrakka. Exactly.’
The two Norwegians exchanged glances and Haldursen muttered something quietly. Orjasaeter nodded.
‘I will tell you,’ he said. ‘There are five in a machine-gun post on the road overlooking the fjord. And four more in a post on the jetty. There are eight in the house where the owner of the timberyard lived: the officers, the petty officers, a mess orderly and cook, a clerk and a driver for Jensen’s lorry. There are eight of them billeted in the timberyard, four on the fishing boat, Jakka, and at least fourteen living aboard Cuxhaven. There were more. But they were machine-gunners and engineers and they were left in Narvik in case of an attack there. They’re expected to return in a few days when the Germans come from Trondheim.’
‘How do you know all this?’
‘I was at Fjållbrakka when they arrived. They made me carry things. They even gave me coffee. They were boasting because they were getting what they wanted without fighting and without casualties. I saw them set up their posts and saw what went on in the house, because that’s where I went to get the coffee.’
Magnusson frowned. ‘Go on. What else do you know?’
Orjasaeter shrugged. ‘They made me show them round the house and I had to carry the officers’ kit ashore. They told me they were taking over the timberyard as a base but that it should go on working normally. They even brought me home at the end of the day in Jensen’s car when they came to take the fishing boats.’
‘Why didn’t they bring Cuxhaven alongside?’
Orjasaeter shrugged. ‘It’s only a timberyard at Fjållbrakka,’ he said. ‘The deep-water quay for loading is at Grude. You can get a big ship alongside there.’
‘Why didn’t they take over Grude then?’
‘There’s nowhere to live. Just sheds and the house that Jensen let the watchman have when he got married.’
‘And the timberyard at Fjållbrakka? Is it still working?’
‘The Germans telephoned Jensen. He’s in Oslo. He said we had to do as they ordered. Everybody in Marsjøen works there, so nobody argued.’
‘Tell me more about this machine-gun post on the road.’ Haldursen produced a chart of the shore line and Orjasaeter pointed out the road to Fjållbrakka and exactly where the machine-gun post was situated.
‘It’s a stone building,’ he said. ‘It was a farm but it was burned out years ago and this is all that’s left of it. Jensen used it for storing sawblades. There’s a yard at the front for lorries to turn.’
‘Right,’ Magnusson said. ‘That one first.’ His hand moved. ‘Then the one on the jetty. After that, we move along to the timberyard. By that time with a bit of luck we should have a few rifles and probably a few other items of hardware as well.’
Campbell was looking worried. ‘Forty-odd Germans is a lot of Germans,’ he said.
‘I thought you wished you were in Cossack when she boarded Altmark,’ Magnusson pointed out. ‘Well, this is your Altmark. They’re in small groups. With eighteen stuck on Jakka and Cuxhaven where they can’t help much. Has Jakka got a radio?’
‘Only for fishing,’ Haldursen said.
‘Right,’ Magnusson said. ‘Then we’ll take over Cuxhaven. She ought to be big enough to carry everyone who wants to leave.’
Three
There was a long pause. Then Campbell spoke slowly. ‘When do we do it?’
Magnusson turned to Orjasaeter who shrugged. ‘They relieve the post up the hill with the car.’ He pulled a heavy watch from his pocket. ‘They’ll be expecting them about now. Perhaps they’re the five who came here in the car even. They’ll be waiting for them.’
Magnusson frowned. ‘Then again we’ve no option,’ he said. ‘We do it now.’
‘We haven’t enough weapons.’ Campbell was being particularly stiff and naval.
‘We’ve got six more than when we started,’ Magnusson snapped. ‘We’ve also got Wolszcka. He’s as good as a couple of tanks.’
‘You’re being bloody optimistic! There are only eleven of us, for God’s sake!’
Magnusson’s temper broke. ‘Christ, man, there are another twenty-odd in the barn!’
‘Half of ’em with no weapons.’
‘What do you want, for God’s sake? The whole thing set up in naval fashion complete with headquarters and staff and a bloody flag lieutenant? The Germans have weapons. While our blasted politicians were farting about preaching peace, Goering was preaching guns before butter, wasn’t he? I’ll bet every German who was big enough to carry one had a gun of some sort somewhere. Weapons aren’t that important, anyway. It’s transport we need. We’ve got to get to Fjållbrakka fast.’
Haldursen indicated Orjasaeter. ‘My cousin has a van,’ he said. ‘He works the explosives for Jensen. Removing tree stumps. He also works for the quarry at Silvesborg and he uses it to travel about the country.’
Orjasaeter would clearly have preferred to keep the existence of his van quiet, but Haldursen gave him a defiant look. He wanted fuel for his boat from Fjållbrakka.
‘It’s in the shed behind my house,’ Orjasaeter admitted unwillingly. ‘When the Germans took Jensen’s car and lorry, I filled the space by the doors with hay and put the cow in. It looks like a stable.’
‘What about petrol?’
&
nbsp; ‘It’s full.’ The words came grudgingly. ‘Sometimes there are emergencies when the thaw comes – landslips that have to be cleared. I always keep petrol in cans.’
‘Get it,’ Magnusson said. ‘Six men in the car and six in the van. Twelve ought to be enough.’
‘Not tae get Cuxhaven, boy,’ Willie John pointed out quietly. ‘Ye seem tae ha’e forgotten somethin’. If ye’re goin’ tae capture a ship lyin’ in the middle o’ the fjord, ye’ll be needin’ boats. Unless ye’ve developed a gift for walkin’ on the water.’
Magnusson frowned. He had forgotten. ‘You can organise that,’ he said. He jerked a hand at the dinghies by the jetty. ‘When we leave, start this lot towards Fjållbrakka. We’d better also have another group under Marques set off along the road. It’s only about three miles and we might be glad of help.’
‘Suppose someone starts shooting?’ Campbell said.
‘It’s up to us to see they don’t,’ Atwood growled.
In his stiff pigheaded way, Campbell still seemed determined to find every flaw he could in the plan, bringing them out with a nagging persistence that exasperated Magnusson. He knew Campbell was right to think of them but he would much have preferred to brush them aside.
‘I don’t know one end of a machine-gun from the other,’ he admitted, ‘but I’ll bet Marques, Myers and the others do. We’ve got a petty officer and four men, all regulars, for God’s sake! They’ll surely know what to do.’
‘You’ve also got the 51st of Foot,’ Atwood reminded him tartly. ‘They certainly know what to do.’
Magnusson smiled. He had taken a liking to Atwood’s nononsense approach. In Atwood’s mind there was only one way to fight a war and that included cheating, kicking and biting. Atwood had become very conscious at Rora that war wasn’t a game of football where fouls were allowed.
‘We’ve also got the 51st of Foot,’ he agreed. ‘Together with assorted Norwegians all itching to get their own back. If we can’t do something with that lot, then we ought to be shot.’
Campbell sniffed. ‘We probably will be,’ he said.
When Orjasaeter arrived with his van, the hay still sticking to the joints round the mudguards, they crowded into the two vehicles and headed out of the village, leaving Willie John and Annie Egge with Haldursen and the Norwegian officer to guard the prisoners and prepare the dinghies. Marques was waiting for them at the barn and they picked their twelve men carefully.
‘We ought to have Wolszcka the Polszcka,’ Atwood said.
‘The mad bastard’ll balls it up.’
‘Not if I tell ’im not to, ’e won’t. And so far ’e’s polished off two of ’em, which is twice as many as the rest of us put together.’
They made their plans quickly, leaving Marques with instructions to follow them on foot as fast as possible, and stopping the car above Fjållbrakka, they crouched in the snow to study the fjord and the timberyard. The thin sliver of moon and stars in the frosty sky gave the place a curiously luminous look, as if it were lit by blue lamps; eerie, icy cold and ghostly at the same time.
Cuxhaven lay at anchor, in the middle of the fjord, her bows towards the sea. Snow covered her decks and clung to her masts and rigging, so that she looked like a ghost ship against the dark water. Alongside her lay the fishing boat, Jakka, a quarter of her length, a blunt, ugly little vessel with a dinghy trailing astern in the tide. There was no sign of a sentry.
Lights were on round the timberyard but there was no one moving about. A lorry stood near the gate.
‘The bastards have got a nerve,’ Magnusson said.
‘They will win the war with nerve,’ Orjasaeter said bitterly. ‘They take risks. The British are still outside Narvik, wondering what to do.’
Edging the car slowly down the road through the trees, they pinpointed the outpost.
‘You sure there are only five of them there?’ Magnusson asked.
‘Five,’ Orjasaeter insisted. ‘I’ve counted them.’
Magnusson studied the dark building. There was a single light coming from a window.
‘If we was to park the car right in front,’ Atwood suggested, ‘it’d mask their arc of fire. Then, if we was to rush it, we’d be on top of ’em before they could stop us.’
The others were quiet but nervous, all except Wolszcka, who was honing up his knife on the palm of his hand. Magnusson eyed him uncertainly. He wasn’t at all sure of the outcome, but he was glad to be doing something. As he stared at the yellow light among the trees he realised his feet were frozen, and suddenly it seemed almost more important that he should feel warm than that they should succeed in what they were about to attempt. As they had left Marsjøen, Annie had touched his hand.
‘I shall pray for you,’ she had said, and he reflected that it might need a great deal more than prayer. It might even need a lot more nerve than he possessed, and he was grateful for the few experts they had with them. When he’d been supervising the fitting out of Oulu he’d hardly expected anything of this nature, and had even, he remembered, thought how nice it would be to be stationed ashore well out of the way of the war, with no rationing, no shortage of booze or girls, and no blackout. Cockayne had soon disillusioned him on that score, and now he was even about to run a bloody battle. He hoped that God was keeping a sharp eye on him tonight at least.
Atwood was watching him and he got a grip on himself. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Let’s get on with it, Sergeant. Get your men in place. The signal will be a whistle, then we all go in together and, for Christ’s sake, since we’re coming from all sides at once, let’s try not to kill each other. Remember also, we don’t want any loud noises.’
‘We’ll use bayonets, sir.’
‘Is that what you usually do?’
‘We haven’t had the chance yet, sir. But we know how to.’
Magnusson nodded. ‘Okay, if that’s what you think best. Does everybody know there’s to be no shooting?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘What about Wolszcka the Polszcka?’
‘I think ’e understands, sir.
‘He’ll be your responsibility. Better have somebody keep an eye on him, and if the silly sod steps out of line, hit him with a rifle butt. We can’t take chances on him giving the game away just because he wants to murder Germans.’
‘Right, sir.’ Atwood was all efficiency. ‘If any of my lot does what ’e shouldn’t, ’e’ll ’ave to answer to me.’
To Atwood, that threat seemed far stronger than anything the Germans might have in mind.
They took up their positions, Magnusson to the north, the Koylis and the Norwegian soldiers facing the machine-gun in the belief that they’d know how best to handle it, Marques to the west, and the Norwegian sailors to the east. It seemed a good arrangement, but by this time Magnusson was numb with apprehension, and thankful that he had left placing the men to Atwood. Apart from anything else, Atwood, it seemed, had the gift of producing a piercing whistle between his fingers, something Magnusson had never mastered.
He waited, shivering and full of foreboding for the sergeant to return. From time to time the frost made the trees crack and little cascades of snow fell on them, so that he began to think not only how cold he was but also how hungry. He was still worrying about whether he’d be able to make his frozen limbs move when Atwood came back,
‘Right, sir,’ he said briskly. ‘Everybody in position. Now we drive up to the door. Bold as bloody brass.’
Magnusson swallowed and started up the car. Moving slowly to the brow of the hill, he allowed it to run down under its own weight towards the yard. As it did so, the door of the outpost opened and the light streamed out, catching the boles of the trees. Atwood, sitting alongside him, unfastened his door.
‘One of ’em coming to see why ’is relief’s so bloody late,’ he breathed. ‘Leave the sawny bastard to me, sir. ’E won’t know what ’it ’im. Just park away from the door in the shadows.’
He was gone from the car almost before Magnusson realised he was
going. Without him, Magnusson felt bereft.
It was too late to back out now, however. A figure had appeared in the doorway and was moving towards them even as he stopped the car and pulled on the brake.
‘Wieder spät am Tage,’ the German was saying bitterly. ‘Immer spät. Always late.’
As he approached, Magnusson’s heart was thumping. Then, behind the German, he saw a small dark shadow move and he guessed it was Atwood. The shadow merged abruptly with the dark shape of the German and there was a faint gasp and a cry, then Atwood’s piercing whistle almost made him jump out of his skin.
‘Come on!’
They scrambled from the car and began to run forward. At the entrance to the building, Magnusson crashed into a German petty officer who was on his way out and they fell to the ground together. Groping in the darkness for the German’s right hand to stop him reaching his pistol, Magnusson had just got a grip on the man’s sleeve when he collapsed in his arms, limp and silent. Looking up, he saw Atwood standing over them.
‘Thanks, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘What did you do it with?’
Atwood held out his hand and Magnusson saw a bayonet in his fist, red and shining with blood.
‘’E won’t argue no more,’ he said.
‘What about the others?’
‘Two dead–’ Atwood nodded at the petty officer sprawled on the floor ‘–including ’im. The Pole got the other. Slit his throat neat as you please before anybody could stop ’im. The poor bastard was trying to surrender, too. There’s also one with his ’ands in the air, one ’oo got a kick in the goolies, and one ’oo got a smack in the chops with a rifle butt. They won’t argue.’
Magnusson scrambled to his feet. ‘Thank you, Sergeant. You certainly seem to know how to move in the dark.’
Atwood grinned. ‘I was a poacher once, sir,’ he said. ‘Not professionally, you might say, but I lived near ’Arewood and ’Er Royal ’Ighness, the Princess Royal, and her husband, Lord ’Arewood, lost more than one of their pheasants to me. Not that I bore ’em any ill will, but it was usually a case of my need being greater than thine, if you see what I mean. The gamekeepers got so unpleasant about it, I decided it was wiser to leave for a bit and joined the army.’