'It's not possible,' muttered Chevannes. 'Surely not.'
'They're getting a lead before they dive.'
Sure enough, the aircraft turned 180 degrees on to their backs and dived at about a ninety-degree angle. Sirens wailing, they screamed towards them, the valley resounding to their deafening drone.
'It's such a terrible sound!' Anna closed her eyes and placed her hands over her ears. Then, as the lead Stuka seemed about to plummet straight into them, it levelled out. From its undercarriage they watched as a dark cigar- shaped bomb detached itself from the belly and fell, shrieking its death whistle, seemingly hurtling straight for them. Tanner pushed his foot down harder on the accelerator and ducked. A split second later a deafening explosion behind them rocked the truck. Tanner gripped the steering-wheel and righted it as the second aircraft pulled out of its dive. Another bomb howled towards them, debris from the first raining and clattering across the tarpaulin and metal cab roof. Tanner ducked again, Anna screamed, and there was another explosion, this time ahead.
Tanner felt the brakes lock, and momentarily lost control of the front of the truck, then regained it and straightened the Morris. With a screech of burning rubber, it slid across the stony road and they ground to a halt as a swirling mass of cloud and smoke enveloped them.
'Are you mad?' yelled Chevannes. 'Now we are sitting ducks!'
'Not in this smoke. Anyway, they're not trying to kill us, sir,' Tanner shouted back. 'They're trying to stop us!' He wound up the window, coughing as dust, grit and cordite choked him. Debris - stone, earth, bits of metal - clattered down once more. 'They want Sandvold alive,' Tanner spluttered, eyelids stinging. 'As soon as this clears I'll try to get us going again, but we don't want to fall into any crater.'
As Tanner had suspected, the two Stuka dive-bombers had gone without strafing. It was the confirmation he needed that the capture of Sandvold alive was the enemy objective. Knowing this made no difference to their goal of reaching the Allies, but it meant the Germans had to be careful about how they attacked them. That, he knew, was a useful advantage.
As the clouds of dust dispersed they could see the crater just ahead: a large hole spread across more than three-quarters of the road. The bank on the left, overlooking the lake, had collapsed, while boulders and other rocky debris were scattered twenty yards around it.
'Bollocks,' said Tanner, stepping out of the cab and hurrying to the crater's edge. Chevannes had followed him, and now, from the back of the truck, came Sykes and Lieutenant Larsen.
'Can't help but admire it, can you?' said Sykes, as they stood there regarding the damage.
'Bloody fine marksmanship,' agreed Tanner.
'We'll never get the truck past,' said Larsen.
'Damn you, Tanner,' said Chevannes. 'I knew we should have waited until this evening when we would have been out of sight of the Luftwaffe. Now we're stuck, unless you have any more bright ideas.'
'Well, sir,' he winked at Sykes, then turned back to Chevannes, 'if you'd take your men and keep a good watch out for any trouble, the corporal and I will get us moving again.'
Sykes delved into his bag and produced two cartridges of Polar dynamite. 'See, sir?' Sykes beamed at Chevannes.
'You wish to make another crater?' The Frenchman was clearly appalled.
'No, sir. We're going to blast away a bit of the bank. Then we drive round the crater.'
Tanner hurried back to the truck where Sandvold and the other men were waiting anxiously. Grabbing his pack, he said, 'Get ready with your shovels.
We're going to have to do a bit of clearing in a minute.'
'What the bloody hell's going on, Sarge?' asked Erwood.
'Bomb crater in the road. And we need to get past it, pronto.' He hurried back and took out his tin of safety fuse, which Sykes tied round the dynamite and placed in a small hole in the bank that he had already dug.
'How far back, Stan?' said Tanner. 'I've only got about forty foot left here.'
'Forty foot! Blimey, Sarge, we don't need anything like that! A foot or so should be fine. This stuff burns at two foot per minute, so just give me time to get out of the way. You might want to take the truck back a bit, though.'
Tanner nodded, cut the fuse and ran back to the truck. After he had reversed thirty yards, he saw Sykes signal, then put a match to the fuse and run down the road towards him. He turned to Anna, still waiting patiently in the truck. 'Might want to duck your head,' he told her. He kept an eye on his watch, following the seconds ticking by. A breathless Sykes reached him. 'Any moment now, Sarge.'
An ear-splitting crack rent the silence of the valley, the report echoing across the lake, while another cloud of dust briefly obscured the road. Once the rain of rock, stone and grit had settled, Tanner and Sykes hurried back to the crater to see the result of their efforts.
Hallelujah. A six-foot wide chunk of the bank had been blown, most of which appeared to have slumped into the existing crater. The road was a mess of rock, stone and earth, but it would soon be passable once more.
'Stan,' said Tanner, patting his corporal on the back. 'You're a genius.'
'I bloody am an' all.' He grinned.
Tanner returned to the truck, brought it forward, then ordered his men to get out and start clearing. Less than ten minutes later, the road was ready, and with the men standing and watching, Tanner began to inch forward. A scrape of metal as the offside wing ground against the bank. Tanner could feel the resistance of the rock. 'Sorry, Mr Sulheim,' he said to himself, then pressed his foot on the throttle. A painful screech of metal, and the truck lurched forward. A moment later, it was safely on the other side.
'Quick! Vite!' shouted Chevannes. The men got back into the truck, Chevannes rejoined Tanner and Anna in the cab and they set off once more. Tanner looked at his watch again: a little over twenty minutes from the start of the attack. A glance at the map, open once more on Chevannes' lap. He wondered how long it would take the Stuka crews to return to their base and warn the ground troops of their position. With the road blocked behind them, he guessed the enemy would be coming from the Gudbrandsdal valley, joining the road at Vinstra. It was a good distance to Vinstra from Tretten, but who was to say whether the troops would come from Tretten or further north up the valley? It was impossible to know. He wiped a hand across his brow. Really, he thought, they might meet Germans at any moment. Perhaps Chevannes had been right, after all. Perhaps they should have waited. No, he told himself. We need to make ground while we can.
'Are you all right, Sergeant?' asked Anna.
'Yes - thank you, Miss.' Then he said to Chevannes,
'Sir, we need to watch the road ahead like hawks.'
'Yes, thank you, Sergeant, but all I can see at the moment is the end of the lake,' said Chevannes, 'so at present there is little I can do.'
'In a couple of kilometres, the road climbs again,' said Anna. 'It follows the lip of the mountain plateau. You can see a long way from up there.'
'What about snow?'
'There will be snow on the mountains but the road will be clear by now. I'm certain of that. There are quite a few farms along it - they will make sure the road can be used.'
'Good,' said Tanner, then took his German binoculars from round his neck and passed them to Anna. 'Here,' he said. 'Do me a favour, will you? Keep a dekko with these.'
'A what, Sergeant?'
Tanner smiled. 'Sorry, Miss. Soldier slang. It means, could you keep a sharp lookout?'
'Of course.' She returned the smile, and Tanner was pleased to see irritation on Chevannes' face.
A mile, then two. Suddenly the end of the lake reappeared and the climb began. Tanner dropped down a gear, the Morris grinding sluggishly forward. The road was winding, too, so their forward view was never more than a hundred yards at most. Tanner felt a heaviness in his stomach. He tapped his fingers on the steering- wheel, bounced up and down in his seat again, then eventually took out his last remaining packet of German cigarettes, offered one to Chevannes and Ann
a - who both declined - then fumbled for his matches. The effort of getting at them from under his jerkin, then delving into the right-hand breast pocket on his battle blouse caused him to drive over a pothole and briefly lose control of the wheel.
'Concentrate, Sergeant,' snapped Chevannes. 'We haven't come this far just for you to drive us off the road.'
Tanner ignored him, and as he clutched the steering- wheel, matches now in one hand, Anna said, 'Would you like me to light it for you?'
'Thanks, Miss,' said Tanner, and passed her both matches and cigarette. Having lit it, she carefully placed the cigarette between his lips.
'Thanks,' said Tanner again, inhaling deeply.
'Don't forget to keep watching the road ahead, Anna,' said Chevannes.
'No, of course - sorry,' she said, hastily bringing the binoculars back to her eyes. Tanner smiled to himself - as if they'd be any use on this winding stretch of road. He opened the window and the smoke dissolved through the narrow gap. It felt cooler already, and Tanner felt a shiver run down his back. Christ! Any moment, just round this corner ... But then he turned and the road was still empty. He felt a momentary flutter of relief.
'We're nearly there,' said Anna, as they drove round a sharp hairpin. Beneath them, away to their right, there was a deep ravine, dark, forbidding and densely covered with thick forest, but as they crested the brow the road levelled at last. To the left, they saw the snow-covered mountain plateau, to their right the ravine and in front, the long, straight road that hugged the lip for some fifteen miles, almost all the way to Vinstra. 'How far can you see now?' Tanner asked Anna.
'Three or four kilometres at least. It's empty.'
Patches of thin mud-brown snow covered the road, but its surface was clear enough for Tanner to push down hard on the throttle and build up speed. 'See anything at the back?' Tanner yelled.
'Nothing,' came the muffled reply.
Where were they? Tanner wondered. He drummed his fingers, felt the pistol at his hip; his trusted Enfield was wedged between his seat and the door.
Another two miles, and the road veered to the left, round a subsidiary valley to the main ravine, then curved back and straightened once more. As Anna had told them, there were a number of farms along this high mountain route, but not a soul stirred. The road was empty - not a cart, person or animal. Tanner realized he had barely even seen a bird. The place seemed lifeless; it was almost impossible to think a war could be going on. Tanner strained his eyes. One of the eyelids flickered. Fatigue was getting the better of him.
A glint in the distance snapped him out of his reverie. 'There!' he said. 'What was that?'
Both Chevannes and Anna had their binoculars trained. Another glint. 'There it was again!' said Tanner.
'It's them,' said Chevannes. 'A convoy of four trucks.'
Tanner's heart was drumming in his chest, his tiredness forgotten. 'How far?'
'Seven kilometres, maybe eight.'
'What are we going to do?' asked Anna, fear in her voice.
'Stop and head into the mountains,' said Chevannes.
'Here?' said Tanner. 'Where? There's no cover at all.' He glanced at the map. 'Where are we? What's this valley here?' With half an eye on the map, he pointed to a dogleg in the road.
'It's not far,' said Anna. 'Look, the road turns just ahead.'
'Good. Another valley to skirt round, then we'll be out of view. Ten to one it'll be wooded. We can ditch the truck there and take cover in the trees.'
To his relief, as they turned the corner and lost sight of the enemy, Tanner saw that the landscape was covered with dense forest. To their right a mountain stream was tumbling and cascading down to the ravine. At the corner of the dog-leg, the road crossed the stream and it was here that Tanner stopped.
'Everyone out! Quick!' shouted Chevannes.
Tanner hurried to the back of the truck and grabbed his pack, slinging it on to his shoulders, his mind whirling. 'Five miles at twenty miles an hour,' he mumbled, 'take away five. Ten minutes.' He looked at his watch. Nearly half past ten. Ten minutes to get Sandvold and Anna away and come up with a plan to delay the Germans. Think, man, think.
Chevannes was already urging the others to head into the trees. 'Come on!' he shouted. 'Quickly! Get moving!'
'Sir, wait!' Tanner called out. He ran up to him. 'Sir, if you and your men take the professor and Miss Rostad, my men and I will try to hold them off for a while.'
Chevannes paused then said, 'Very well.'
'Miss - Anna,' said Tanner. 'Where will you head for?'
'Here,' she told him. Her finger was shaking as she pointed on the map. 'Skjedalen. There are several mountain seters where we can shelter.' She swallowed, her eyes searching Tanner's face for reassurance. 'There are two peaks above us over to the right of where we are now - the Olasfjellet and the Silikampan. Keep those on your right and head almost due north.'
'All right,' he said. 'Now go. Wait for us there.'
Wide-eyed, frightened, she turned and ran.
'Lads, quick,' he said, calling his men to him. 'We need to halt these Jerry bastards. There are four trucks, and by my reckoning that's around seventy men.' The men's faces were ashen. 'Stan, the time has come for us to use up a bit more of our explosive. Can you start rigging the truck? You've got about five minutes. Dan, head up stream a bit, then cut into the trees on the right- hand side. Look for a good view down here, where you can see the road both sides of the bridge. The rest, follow Dan and be ready with your magazines. Find some good cover. The corp and I will join you in a minute. Now get going. Iggery, all right?'
Erwood and the other five hurried off and Sykes was already rigging together four cartons of Nobel's gelignite.
'What have you got, Sarge?' he asked, quick fingers deftly tying a length of fuse round them.
'Five more packets of Nobel's and about ten sticks of Polar. Oh, and half a dozen grenades. Where you going to put them?'
'Round the fuel tank, I thought. And why don't you put one of your cartons of Nobel's in the engine bay?'
'All right. What size bang is this going to make?'
'A big one.' Sykes grinned.
'Good. It needs to be. We've got to blow up as many of those trucks and as many Jerries as possible. How are we going to trigger it?'
'Grenade on the door?'
'Sounds good.' He lifted one side of the bonnet, and placed the carton of gelignite beside the coil.
'Seems a shame to blow her up,' said Sykes, as he opened the driver's side of the cab and leant in to set the booby trap on the passenger door. 'She's a good little runner, this one, and only a year or two old.'
'All for the greater good, Stan.'
'I s'pose. Even so.'
He handed the fuse back to Tanner then said, 'I see Mr Chevannes has buggered off.'
'I told him to. Someone's got to look after the professor and Miss Rostad.'
'He didn't need much persuading.'
'No, the sod. I could read his mind like a bloody book. He was thinking, This might seem a bit cowardly, but there's every chance I'll get rid of that bastard Tanner.' He chuckled. 'Christ, he's a pain in the arse.'
'Well, it's just us now, Sarge.'
'Yes,' said Tanner, 'and I feel happier already. Right. All done?'
Sykes nodded.
'Good. Let's get the hell away from here.' They scrambled off the road and up the side of the stream. 'You in position, Dan?' Tanner called to Erwood.
'Yes, Sarge,' Erwood shouted back, as Tanner and Sykes continued climbing up and away from the road.
'Good cover?'
'Yes, Sarge!'
'Have you sorted out your escape route?'
A pause. 'Think so, Sarge.'
Tanner slipped, cursed, then looked back to see the leading enemy truck turn the last shallow curve in the road a couple of hundred yards behind them. His heart was thumping again. 'Here they come!' Tanner called, and scrambled up through the snow and into the trees, short of breath, chest tight, blood pu
mping. Good, he thought. Erwood, with Hepworth beside him, lay behind a rocky outcrop, a clear field of fire on the road below and the stream beneath them. The other riflemen were nearby, most behind trees but making good use of the undulations on the steep slope rising from the stream. They were learning, thought Tanner. Behind him, he saw the others' tracks disappearing into the trees. The forested slopes, he knew, would be a great help; as the mountain climbed away from them, the dense pines seemed to draw towards one another, so that within about seventy yards from where he now stood he could no longer see any snow-covered ground at all, only the trees. The pines would protect them as they fell back.
'Stan, you stick back on the lip of the ravine,' he told his corporal. He wanted Sykes to be able to make an easy get-away, should it be necessary. 'And here,' he said, taking off his pack and gas-mask bag, 'keep these by your feet, or put them somewhere out of the way.' He now realized how foolhardy he had been in keeping so much high explosive about him during the firefight at the seter; he'd been fortunate then, but he didn't want to chance his luck a second time. He grabbed two sticks of Polar dynamite and three grenades, then stuffed them into his haversack, which still hung from his hip, and ran over to Erwood and Hepworth.
'Hep, grab your rifle and move back. I'm going to man the Bren with Dan.'
'Where to, Sarge?' asked Hepworth.
'Up the hill a bit. Where you can get some good shots in and get away quickly. Go! Get a bloody move on!'
Along the road ahead the trucks were drawing near. With shaking hands, Tanner undid the fastenings on his magazine pouches, felt in his haversack for his grenades and .303 ammunition clips, then pulled his rifle into his shoulder. 'Got a couple of tracer rounds, Dan?'
Erwood handed him two. Tanner fed them into an ammunition clip and slotted it into his rifle's magazine.
'Ready?' he asked.
'Sarge.'
'Don't fire until I say.' He took a bead on the truck. The pack of Nobel's strapped to the fuel tank was out of sight, but he had a clear view of the bonnet. His body was tense, heart hammering, as the first enemy truck drew alongside the Morris-Commercial, then slowly pushed on across the bridge. Damn, he thought, then saw that the two trucks following had halted alongside Sulheim's wagon. Orders were being barked and troops, most now wearing helmets rather than field caps, were jumping from the back of the lorries. Tanner watched with bated breath as two men approached the Morris. Then, to his annoyance, they stepped round to the far side and opened the door. 'Sod it,' whispered Tanner.
The Odin Mission sjt-1 Page 24