by Ian Blake
He tucked his pipe into his pocket and both men left the room. When the outer door had closed and the typist had resumed her typing, Tasler got up and closed the inner door.
‘We’re in slight confusion,’ he said when he had returned to his desk. ‘Supremo decided to drop in unannounced. Bloody typical. I thought he was in Delhi and he suddenly turns up here demanding to know what’s happening about the Special Operations Group he wants formed. Been in meetings all morning.’
‘I saw him,’ said Tiller. ‘He seemed in a hurry,’ though not, he nearly added, in such a hurry that he did not have time to greet an old shipmate.
‘He’s always in a hurry,’ said Tasler with a laugh. ‘There are a lot of people around this building who want things done yesterday. Mountbatten always wanted them done the day before yesterday.’
Tasler lit a cigarette, offered one to Tiller, who refused, and waved the sergeant to a seat. ‘First things first. I expect you were wondering who those two bods were?’
‘Part of your new set-up, sir?’
Tasler shook his head. ‘Commander Grant is NID.’
‘NID?’
‘Naval Intelligence Division. He wanted to have a look at you. This Special Operations Group Mountbatten is keen to form in South-East Asia might be required to do some clandestine work as well as special operations.’
‘And the civilian?’
Tasler ran a hand through thinning blond hair. ‘Yes, well, let’s just say he’s a civil servant. Part of the Ministry of Economic Warfare.’
‘I’ve heard of that, sir.’
Tasler looked at him sharply. ‘You have? Where?’
‘In Scotland. I was told Kingairloch House was part of the Ministry’s set-up. They had hush-hush groups training there in demolitions. It seemed more like uneconomic warfare to me, as they were blowing things up at all times of the day and night. I thought plastic explosive was meant to be in short supply.’
Tasler laughed. ‘Uneconomic warfare. I like that, Tiger. Anyway, this gentleman you met here, he’s in the same racket. Everyone’s beginning to get interested in the Far East, in anticipation that we can shift more of our resources to fight the Japs if Jerry collapses when we invade Europe. Also, the Yanks are beginning to weigh in with a lot more matériel. So actually PE isn’t in short supply any more. What is in short supply is the right people to use it. You get my drift?’
Tiller nodded. ‘You mean we won’t have to use 808 any more?’
Nobel 808 was the subject of a joke that Tiller and Tasler shared. It was an earlier form of plastic explosive which came in rubbery brown sticks wrapped in waterproof paper. Tiller couldn’t abide the stuff. Its smell – of bitter almonds – still lingered nauseously in his memory, as did the blinding headache it had invariably given him.
‘It was quite effective against that railway track,’ said Tasler. ‘Remember?’
‘Do I ever, sir.’
It was a very powerful explosive. Provided a sawing motion was not employed, it could be cut and the flat surface was then taped directly on to the target.
Tasler chuckled. ‘I’ll not forget you trying to soften the 808 before we laid it.’
Nor had Tiller. Unlike PE, 808 had to be softened first if it was to be moulded around its target. The instruction pamphlet recommended this be done by holding it under the armpit for at least a quarter of an hour or by placing it in boiling water. Tiller had never found boiling water available on the occasions he and 808 had found themselves together behind enemy lines and he had discovered from that raid with Tasler that the suggested alternative had been equally impracticable. He had not found it easy to move quickly and silently to avoid an alert sentry while holding a lump of 808 in his armpit. It wouldn’t have helped the accuracy of his shooting with his silenced pistol either. Luckily, he had not had to use the weapon, as the major had disposed of the sentry.
‘Well, no time to reminisce now,’ Tasler said with a tinge of regret. He took a last deep puff from his cigarette, stubbed it out in an ashtray already filled with dog-ends, and pulled a brown folder in front of him. ‘Let’s get down to business.’
He opened the folder and Tiller said: ‘Do you really want me as an instructor, sir?’
Tasler grinned at him. ‘What do you think, Tiger?’
‘I was hoping for something more . . . active.’
‘Well, you heard what our civil servant friend said. ‘Don’t you believe him?’
Tiller didn’t, but he didn’t like to say so. He waited.
‘Strictly between ourselves, Tiger, and not to be mentioned outside this room, I can promise you action. All right?’
Tiller smiled in relief. ‘All right, sir. Where, sir?’
Tasler looked surprised. ‘Burma, of course. Where else? As I told you, Lord Louis is very keen to form a Special Operations Group within South-East Asia Command. For a start, it will have a number of Combined Operations Pilotage Parties.’
Tiller nodded, and felt the adrenalin begin to pump. Wherever there were COPP teams major Allied landings were being planned, for they were the boys who reconnoitred likely beaches, checking on gradients and the consistency of the ground.
‘It’s also going to include a new force of Royal Marines – Detachment 385 – who are going to need training up. They’ll be employed in deception raids but will sometimes work with cockles or inflatable craft launched from flying boats. And it’s planned to have four Sea Reconnaissance Units, too.’
‘What are they, sir?’
‘God knows. They do something exotic with paddleboards apparently.’
‘Paddleboards, sir?’
Tasler looked at the paper in front of him. ‘That’s what it says. Supremo is all for innovation, and fighting in Burma is not like fighting anywhere else on earth. It’s going to need a new set of ground rules and we’re going to need a new way of thinking.’
‘We, sir?’
‘Yes, Tiger, we. I’ve been appointed second in command of SOG.’
‘And where do I fit in, sir?’
‘The last element of this new outfit are three SBS groups which worked in the Med until the Eyeties threw their hand in. One’s already out in Burma, and in action. It’s one of Major Pountney’s units, so it’s basically army-controlled, but there are a number of Marines in it. Initially, I just want one of my own men on the ground, as it were, who will get a quick grasp of what the group is doing and can report to me when I arrive in Ceylon. As you know, Major Pountney isn’t exactly a fan of the Corps, but he’s heard of your exploits with the SBS and is quite willing – well, he grudgingly consented – to you joining the group in Burma.’
Tiller smiled. He had heard of the legendary Roger Pountney, of course, the man who had started the SBS back in the grim, dark days of 1941. He had heard, too, of the major’s belief that the Marines had been constipated with tradition ever since the Battle of Trafalgar.
‘What’s the SBS doing in Burma, sir?’
Tasler got up and walked over to a wall map of South-East Asia. Tiller followed him.
‘The Fourteenth Army have been trying to recapture Burma ever since we were driven out of the country in 1942 and it’s had to try and do it all on its own. Small wonder it’s come to be called the "Forgotten Army". Well now, at last, it looks as if the Japs are in retreat throughout Burma and are being pushed southwards. But in this area of western Burma here, known as the Arakan, they keep managing to supply their troops up these rivers here: the Kaladan and so on. As you can see, these rivers run north–south and are all connected by a maze of smaller rivers. It’s a hide-and-seek kind of war as the Japs use native boats to take their supplies up river and our patrols find them very elusive. Fifteenth Corps, which is part of the Fourteenth Army, is pushing the Japs back in the Arakan. This is where A Group, SBS, is working, helping to sever the Jap supply lines, among other tasks.’
Tiller looked puzzled. ‘But how are COPP, and these blokes with the paddleboards, going to help?’
‘
The British and Indian Divisions are all west of the Irrawaddy,’ said Tasler, indicating the area. ‘They’re going to have to cross it – and the River Chindwin – to get at the Japs in eastern Burma. The Irrawaddy’s almost a mile wide in some places, so they’ll need all the help they can get to cross it.’
Tasler went back to his desk, and Tiller said: ‘And where do the Welman’s come in, sir?’
Usually Tiller could read Tasler’s face like a book. But now it suddenly became quite expressionless.
‘That I can’t tell you, Tiger. Not yet. But you’re officially on the roll of HQ South-East Asia Command as a Welman instructor at Hyatt’s Ferry, Ceylon, as of 15 April. Hyatt’s Ferry is where the Group is being based. You may actually have to help train some of Detachment 385 in their use. But, to be honest, I don’t think you’d make a good instructor, would you, Tiger?’
Tiller grinned. ‘No, sir.’
Tasler glanced down at the dosier in front of him, and then back at Tiller.
‘What are they like, Tiger?’
‘What, sir?’
‘The Welmans, of course.’
A tug hooted on the Thames below them.
‘Death-traps, sir.’
Tasler laughed. ‘That’s what I heard too. Well, here are your travel documents. Air to Calcutta, then a train to Chittagong for the usual introductory course on Japanese firearms and jungle warfare, then on to Cox’s Bazar, on the Indian side of the border with Burma. That’s where A Group is based. You report to a Major Jim Danforth.’
4
Like everything else in Burma the deck of His Majesty’s Motor Launch No. 586 was damp and sticky with heat. Tiller pressed his face against it as he felt the craft surge forward.
Already his clothes were soaked with sweat, for with the onset of monsoon weather the air had become humid and oppressive. He wanted to raise his head but they had strict orders to stay prone until past the grassy point on the starboard side that guarded the entrance to the River Mayu. The skipper, a South African RNVR lieutenant called Mick Wright, had said there should not have been any Japs within miles of it, but, he had added, the Japs were never where you thought they would be. Indeed, they always popped up where you least expected them. So keep your heads down, he’d said. And your arses, too. Someone had been shot through both buttocks a couple of months back.
Directly overhead the night sky was crystal clear, but on the horizon astern of the ML Tiller had seen the towering cumulonimbus that had begun to build. These clouds were an early precursor to the monsoon, one of the crew had told him. They looked as if some monster genie had been released in a gigantic puff of smoke which rolled and swirled 30–40,000 feet into the air. Get into a cloud pattern like that in an aircraft, the crewman had said casually, and its wings would be torn off by the storms that raged within it. Such accidents were common, he had added; aircraft simply disappeared without trace.
One of the crew walked half crouched among the prone bodies on the ML’s deck to pass on the word that they were past the point and were in the river. Tiller sat up, propped himself against the mounting of the vessel’s three-pounder, and placed his M2 automatic carbine across his lap. The three-pounder, which had just been cranked round by its two-man crew so that it was now trained straight ahead instead of on the point, smelt of oil and stale sweat. Silently, one of the figures on the deck got up, moved across to Tiller and sat next to him.
‘It’s certainly a different sort of war,’ said Sergeant Dave Welsh quietly.
‘You can say that again, Taffy,’ Tiller answered.
‘I thought you Marines were as at home at sea as you were on land? That’s your motto, isn’t it?’
‘Yeah, that’s right. Per Mare Per Terram. But it depends on the sea, doesn’t it?’ Tiller said sourly. ‘And it depends what’s happening on it. Fuck all on this one, from what I can tell.’
‘A routine patrol is a routine patrol is a routine patrol,’ said Taffy. ‘Don’t worry, you’ll see more action than you want by the time we’ve finished. Mick has a nose for trouble.’
Taffy was a small, wiry character, and very reserved. He came from Devon – he was nicknamed Taffy because of his surname – and never talked much, not to anyone. Just didn’t feel the need to. He found Tiller rather the same, which was why they got on. Taffy had long ago learnt that the chatterers of this world did just that and not much else. For the umpteenth time he slid out the curved thirty-round magazine from under his carbine to check that it was correctly loaded, and then clipped it back on. Automatic weapons of any kind were lethally efficient – so long as they didn’t jam.
‘You used one of these?’ he asked.
Tiller shook his head. ‘A Sten’s always done me.’
‘They’ve got a faster rate of fire than a Sten,’ said Taffy. ‘And they’re a lot more accurate at a longer range. You’ve got to give it to the Yanks: they make some first-rate equipment. Mind you, their ammunition doesn’t seem to have the stopping power of ours. If anyone gets hit with a .303 bullet they stay hit.’
Tiller grunted. He hadn’t had the opportunity to use the carbine in anger yet. He wondered if he ever would. He had been with the SBS patrol two weeks now and the nightly excursions had all drawn a blank. It wasn’t his idea of action.
The two men sat in companionable silence for the next half-hour, automatically scanning the bank as it unwound on the ML’s port side, though it was much too dark to see anything except the tops of the trees silhouetted against the night sky. Tiller was just thinking that it was going to be another blank night when he heard Mick Wright on the bridge a few feet away snap: ‘Starboard thirty, full speed ahead.’
The ML swung away from the left bank of the river and the swell of the diesel engines thrummed in their ears.
‘Just a drifting log, I expect,’ said Taffy. ‘In the dark they look exactly like native canoes. No, I’m wrong. Native canoes are logs. Dug-out ones.’
Although Taffy didn’t say all that much, he made sure that anything he did say was correct.
The two men stood up and peered into the darkness. Behind them the sky was quite light, despite the huge, ominous clouds on the horizon, but ahead the river and its jungle banks merged into an impenetrable black gloom. It was only when they strained their eyes at a long, low object on the starboard bow, pointed out to them by one of the gun crew, that they understood the reason for the ML deviating from its course.
‘Bigger than a native canoe,’ Taffy murmured. ‘A lot bigger. And higher in the water than a sampan.’
‘Stand by to board,’ Wright called over his windscreen at the two sergeants. ‘Taffy, don’t let your men bunch together too much. I don’t trust any of these bastards.’
‘What is it, skip?’ Taffy asked.
‘It’s got two masts. Could be a tavoy coaster. Or possibly a mergui. Whatever it is, I don’t like it. Slow ahead now.’
The ML lurched back into the water as its speed was reduced. The native craft could be seen more clearly now. It was still making way upstream, with both its lateen bamboo sails set, but it was impossible to tell whether it was ghosting with the breeze and tide, or was under power. It maintained its course as the ML approached and then ran parallel with it. Two figures were crouched in the stern, holding on to the long, curved tiller. They were looking straight ahead as if pretending they had not seen or heard the ML. Then the Arakanese interpreter the ML always carried aboard hailed the crew through a loudspeaker and received an acknowledging wave. Slowly, the craft began to swing away from the bank towards the middle of the river.
The skipper called down the voice pipe for the engines to be put in neutral, and the freed clutch set up an eerie rhythmical whine. Wright watched the craft carefully as it swung broadside on to the ML. The ML was still moving forward.
‘Slow astern.’
A pulse of sound came from the ML’s funnel and white smoke belched from it for a moment. Then the ML dropped back as the craft crossed its bows. The muzzle of the three-pounder f
ollowed the craft’s progress foot by foot.
The clutch whined as Wright ordered the engines into neutral again.
Tiller could see that one of the figures on the craft was running forward, and one after another the sails came down as the craft swung round until its bows were pointing downstream. For a moment it kept creeping forward before its progress was stemmed by the incoming tide. As it hung motionless in the water an anchor dropped with a splash.
‘That’s not a tavoy or a mergui,’ said Sandy Brightman, an Australian corporal who was one of the ML’s SBS patrol. ‘Look where its foremast is stepped. Right in its bows.’
The interpreter had come down from the open bridge to join them; he always went along with the boarding party. ‘Kattu,’ he said pointing at the craft. ‘Kattu.’
‘He says it’s a sandoway,’ Taffy pronounced.
‘Does it matter?’ Tiller asked.
‘You bet your sweet Jesus it does,’ said the fourth member of the SBS team, Dopey Douglas. ‘Get a laung-zat up this way, for instance, and you’ll know it’s almost sure to be on Jap business. Normally, you only get them on the Irrawaddy or the Chindwin.’
Tiller shrugged. Aircraft spotting was one thing – he’d been through a course on that – but Burmese boat spotting seemed a trifle obscure. Yet the SBS team were all equally knowledgeable on the subject.
‘I thought the locals were on our side,’ he said. ‘Isn’t Burma a British colony?’
‘So was my country at one time, mate,’ said Sandy. ‘That doesn’t make us any fonder of you Poms. Rather the contrary as a matter of fact.’
‘Oh, belt up, you bloody kangaroo,’ Taffy said good-naturedly. ‘The Burmese are on their own side, that’s the truth of it.’
‘The sandoway is a local rice-carrying craft, so it could be genuine,’ Dopey remarked. ‘Not that genuine is a word you could use about the Burmese,’ he added wryly. Dopey was one of those Englishmen who thought everything south of Dover was nasty and foreign.
‘Let’s go and look anyway,’ said Taffy. He called up to the bridge: ‘Are you going alongside, skip?’