by Paul Gait
He put on his headset again. ‘I’m sorry about that, but I’m back now,’ he announced. ‘I just had to get a bit more information…You OK?’ he forced himself to ask, suppressing any malevolence in the question.
‘No, I’ve had it now…you got to get me out before I go mad,’ Frank pleaded pathetically.
‘Ok, but insanity is not permitted,’ William advised him flippantly. ‘So here’s the plan of campaign.’
William disconnected his link back to control. This was going to be between the two of them, and he didn’t want his conversation added to the recording of the defusing of the bomb.
‘Ok…but just get on with it.’
‘This woman…’
‘What bleedin’ woman?’ Frank queried, puzzled.
‘The one you want me to get a message to…’
‘Liz, yeah. Is that where you went? Cos my boss was going to do it earlier.’
‘No, I didn’t go to play cupid. Quite the contrary actually.’
‘So what’s she got to do with getting me out of here?’
‘Everything.’
‘What you on about?’ Frank demanded, suspicious at the direction of the conversation. ‘Are you going to send her down here to take my mind of things? ‘he added flippantly.
‘No. Listen and listen good.’ William’s voice had now taken on a threatening tone. ‘DON’T INTERRUPT UNTIL I’VE FINISHED, ALRIGHT?’
‘Ok you don’t need to shout. I can hear you.’
‘Right…if I…when I get you out of there…you don’t see her again…do you understand?’
‘What! Are you mad? I’m sat on a friggin’ bomb and you want to talk to me about who I’m dating!’
‘Listen…the sooner you agree to what I’m saying, the sooner we’ll have you out of there. Do you understand?’
‘Yes, OK…ok…go on then…but hurry up.’
‘The woman you’re seeing is…my wife.’
‘What?’
‘Liz is my wife.’
‘Oh shit, that’s all I need,’ Frank said helplessly. ‘A jealous husband with his finger on the trigger. I…I thought you’d …you’d split up with her,’ he lied.
‘No. I’ve been in Afghanistan risking my life. Not going around bedding other people’s wives like you. You lowlife scum. Now listen and listen good. Your life depends on your answer.’
‘Ok…OK. I’m listening,’ Frank said fearfully.
‘Promise me you’ll never see her again…’
‘YES. Anything you say,’ Frank interrupted.’
‘Otherwise I’ll break every bone in your effing body.’
‘Yes OK. I understand. I promise, alright? Now please just get on with it…’
‘I mean what I say. If you continue seeing her you’ll wish you’d died. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?’ William said malevolently. There was no doubt as to the genuine intent of the threat behind it.
‘Yes. I’m sorry it won’t happen again,’ Frank said fearfully. ‘In any case, I’ve never dated her before tonight,’ he started to explain, hoping to placate William. ‘We were only going to…’
‘Pal, I don’t want to know what you had in your lecherous mind…in fact, I don’t even know why I’m giving you this chance. I should just blow the bloody thing up right now with you down here.’
‘Come on. Hey…I promised…that’s what you wanted wasn’t it?’
‘People like you make me sick. Why should I believe you? I bet as soon as you get out of that hole…you’ll forget about all this and be getting in to her knickers.’
‘No I won’t. I’ve already promised you,’ Frank grovelled.
‘No. Forget it. Why should I give you the chance?’ William hissed.
‘Look. I don’t know what I’ve got to do to convince you…but…I’ll do anything alright?’
‘How can I be sure? If you don’t have any scruples about shagging other people’s wives. Why should I believe the word of a scumbag?’
‘Believe me…because…because just at the moment I could quite willingly sign anything to get out of here.’
‘Yes I know and that’s what I…’
“Look…please…please get me out of here. I’ll do anything.’ Frank was becoming desperate. Looking to find something to force the issue he said illogically. ‘What if I shook the bomb and then we’d both be history.’
‘Yes of course, you could do that,’ the other answered non-plussed. ‘It helps to be a good runner in my business and I could be away from here. Perhaps even get out of the blast area. Whereas you’d be scattered all over the site.’
William’s mind instantly went back to Pete’s death and what he’d said about the insurgents. He knew he couldn’t lower himself to their level and deliberately kill this man.
Frank had in the meantime inadvertently rested his arm on the bomb.
‘Oh shit, I’ve nudged the bomb…and it’s ticking again,’ he informed William.
Instantly, the officer’s demeanour changed. Gone was the jealous husband. The consummate professional returned. ‘Alright, stay calm…tell me when it stops.’
‘No it’s still going.’
‘Don’t move a muscle.’
‘Oh God…Ok…ok. It’s stopped again.’
‘Right. This is what we’re going to do…’
Smithy suddenly arrived by William’s side.
‘Sorry Boss, but I think we’ve got a comms problem. I’ve been calling you…’
‘Ok, let me check my connections…woops I must have pulled out the cable accidentally.’ William admitted, re-plugging himself back into the line.
‘OK, I’ll check.’
The soldier jogged back to his position and did a Comms check.
‘You receiving now, over?’ William asked quietly.
‘Yes. I can hear you OK,’ came the reply.
‘Just for your information. The bomb has just been ticking again…probably for two seconds,’ the officer informed him unemotionally.
‘Bloody hell Boss. By my reckoning that’s about 6 seconds of the 10 seconds gone that we know about…let alone the time we haven’t recorded. You ought to be pulling back.’
‘Yes, I hear what you say but…’
‘Come on. Nobody will blame you if…’
‘No Smithy…we’ve got to…’
‘Christ don’t try and be a hero, you said yourself…’
‘No, we’ve got a man’s life on the line. Now, have you got any more info for me?’
‘Yeah, your baby is probably a mark 12. It was developed towards the later part of the war.’
‘Ok, tell me more.’
‘It’s got a reed relay arrangement in the detonation circuit. So you can neutralise the bomb without having to get your screw driver out. All you need to stop it is a magnet.’
‘Great, where do I position the magnet?’
‘There are two positions and we’re just checking with our source which is which.’
Frank had been listening to the interchange. ‘Two positions?’
‘Yes, that’s right. I expect Fritz was getting a bit fed up with our ability to defuse the UXBs…so he probably added a little challenge for us.
‘What do you mean a little challenge?’
‘Well, I suppose you could say a gamble really…they called it the ‘Russian Roulette- Schalter’…’
‘Russian roulette switch,’ Frank said, translating. ‘I know the German, but what does that mean?’ he asked apprehensively.
‘Defusing it is a gamble.’ William said calmly.
‘I don’t understand. Surely they just dropped the bomb and when it hit the ground it blew up?’
‘Not that simple. They all had different explosion settings. Some exploded on impact as you say, but others exploded just above the ground. Others were ‘sleepers’, designed at delaying attendance at a bombed site.
‘All this talk of explosions isn’t helping me. Can’t you hurry up?’
‘You might like to know that some were also aimed at k
illing rescuers and UXB people,’ William said deliberately adding to Frank’s mental anguish.
‘Then there were mechanisms to make sure that they didn’t go off prematurely when they were being loaded or if the plane experienced turbulence,’ he continued. ‘Enough of the history lesson. Please, I implore you. Get me out,’ Frank grovelled.
‘Imagine some of the manoeuvres they had to do to evade fighters and flak.’
William ignored Frank’s pleas and continued.
‘Your friend down there, we believe, has a final stage detonation circuitry which was controlled by the bomb loader.’
‘So what you waiting for? Your mate said all you need is a magnet. Send it down to me and I’ll stick it on the bomb,’ Frank volunteered quickly.
‘It’s not that simple,’ William warned. ‘The person arming it could change the configuration of the switch to be either safe or booby trapped at the last moment. That way, even if we got hold of the circuit drawings, or somebody had figured out how to defuse it…they introduced this element of uncertainty…during the war a lot of our guys found this out…the hard way.’
CHAPTER 34
‘Boss, they want to do an interview with you,’ Smithy informed William.
‘Who is they? I’m in the middle of dealing with Frank here.’
‘The TV people. All the major international news stations by the look of it.’
‘You can do it,’ William suggested.
‘It’ll look better if it was done by an officer. Besides, you’re good at ‘batting’ the awkward questions these reporters are likely to ask.’
As an intensely private man, William did not like being in the limelight or attracting public attention. But in his role as an EOD officer he had often been put in front of the cameras to satisfy the voracious appetite of news hungry international TV stations looking for an exclusive.
‘Perhaps it might ‘ring somebodies bell’ about this type of bomb if I do talk to them. And, as we need more information about the anti-tamper mechanism, I suppose it might help,’ he considered.
Frank was also privy to the conversation and pleaded with William ‘Please don’t leave me. Come on, I agreed to your terms. That was the deal.’
Smithy was puzzled. ‘Terms?’ he wondered.
‘Tell you later,’ William said softly. ‘Frank. While I’m gone Smithy will continue getting some of this mud off you so we can get you out as soon as the bomb’s made safe,’ William added.
William was pleased to make the love cheat ‘sweat’ even more in his incarceration.
The Officer made his way to the scrum of TV reporters gathered around an encampment of cameras beyond the exclusion zone.
Microphones were thrust at him from all angles and an avalanche of questions were directed at him. Everybody was speaking at once. Unphased, he looked around the myriad labelled microphones and positioned himself in front of the ZDF news reporter. William knew that the German broadcaster Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen would offer him the best chance of getting to anyone associated with the bomb. If they were still alive.
Coincidentally, from his armchair in Göttingen Germany, a man called Franz Schmidt, was idly channel flicking and came across the ‘breaking story’ just in time to hear the newsreader say…’Experts say that the bomb is probably a 1000 pound one dropped during the later stages of world war 2 by the Luftwaffe to disrupt the development of the jet powered Gloucester Meteor.
‘That name is familiar…where do I know it from?’ the old man said repeating the name, ‘Gloucester! Gloucester!’
‘We visited there on holiday once. Remember? When we stayed at Heinz’s place near Cheltenham,’ his wife suggested. ‘And you flew a secret mission over there didn’t you?
‘Oh, did I tell you about that mission?’
‘Yes. Only about a hundred times. Remember while we were there we went looking for bomb craters and old deserted airfields or some other such nonsense in the Cotswolds.’
‘Yes, that’s right,’ he recalled. ‘The jet engine of course…We did a raid on the Gloucester Aircraft Company factory.’
‘Oh so you remember now?’ his wife said, going back to her newspaper.
‘It was the later part of the war…we needed a propaganda victory to show the world we were still powerful. I remember. We reached deep into England and dealt a blow to their secret development of the jet engine.’
In the meantime, the television reporter continued, ‘The 23 year old digging operative, who has yet to be named, has been trapped for over six hours now with the bomb. A bomb disposal expert is with him. I’m told we can go live to the scene.’
‘Hello, Trudi.’ The screen changed to show a uniformed William standing by a young female reporter holding a microphone.
‘Yes, hello. I am here with Captain Witherton, the Explosive Ordnance Disposal officer. We understand that there is some delay in getting the young man out. Why is that?’
‘Yes, that’s correct. We have to stabilise the bomb first. Every time he moves, the mechanism starts ticking.’
‘Tell me more about the bomb,’ the interviewer demanded.
‘We have yet to uncover it. But he tells me it is about a metre and a half tall, seventy five centimetres round. It is black with a bulbous belly. It has a plate on it which says ‘Happy Birthday…’
‘Frank. I hope you like the little surprise.’ William and Franz chorused.
‘Mein Gott.’ said Franz, expressing his surprise.
‘How did you know that?’ his wife queried, looking up from her paper.
‘I commissioned the plate…because I dropped…the bomb.’
‘What? No! This is too much of coincidence!’
Helga put down the newspaper and became interested in the coverage, shocked by Franz’s revelation.
‘That is most unusual,’ the reporter said. ‘Do all bombs have messages on them?’
‘Very few. That’s why we think we might be able to find out who dropped this one. It’s obviously quite unique. Certainly in my experience, ‘William added.
‘So what are your plans?’ the TV reporter continued.
‘Well, we need to stop the firing mechanism somehow.’
‘Is this an easy job?’
‘No. The particular bomb we are dealing with is a special one. It’s a sleeper.’
‘A sleeper!’
‘Yes. It is designed to explode after a period of time once on the ground. This is to cause casualties to rescue workers.…very few have been successfully defused.’
‘Why is it so difficult?’
‘The designers introduced a special anti-tamper device to prevent defusing of these bombs.’
‘If that’s the case what are you going to do to get the young man out?’
‘We’re researching archives to establish how the mechanism can be made safe. Can I make an appeal?’
‘Yes of course, carry on.’
William ended the interview looking directly into the camera and said, ‘Do you know anything about this bomb or anybody who can help with information about it? If so, please contact your local police and they will contact our control.’
‘Thank you Captain Witherton. I’ll let you get back to your vital mission.’
The screen switched back to the studio.
As William made his way back to the trapped Frank he ignored the other questions demanded of him by the other frustrated reporters.
‘Oh. So my bombs didn’t all explode after all,’ Franz said reflectively.
‘You must tell them that you know something,’ Helga directed.
‘I…can’t. I can’t remember the details. It was something to do with magnets.’
‘Please try to remember…’
CHAPTER 35
‘Sir, we’ve managed to track down the name of the German pilot who actually dropped it.’ The soldier who had delivered the earlier note advised William on his return.
‘Great news. That’s a start at least,’ William said, encouraged that thin
gs were progressing.
‘Apparently the records of the last flight of the captured Halifax were never destroyed. They didn’t have time before the French resistance raided the place.’
‘So we’ve got the answer?’ William quizzed.
‘No, not yet. But you’ll never guess who the pilot was?’
‘Adolf Hitler?’ The officer volunteered flippantly.
‘Not even close! It is definitely a Franz Schmidt. So it could be matey boy’s Grandad.’
‘What’s the chances of that?’ William said in amazement.
‘Wouldn’t it be spooky, if it was?’
‘I’d say so…when do we get the detail?’ William queried.
‘They’re trying to get his contact details now. But I wouldn’t depend on it too much,’ the soldier cautioned. ‘There must be thousands of Franz Schmidts in Germany.’
‘In any case he must be in his nineties. That is, if he’s still alive,’ William observed.
‘Yes, he is boss,’ Smithy interrupted. ‘I’ve just checked with Frank. But if it is his Grammpy, we might be on to a loser. Apparently the old man does have memory problems.’
‘You mean dementia?’ Williams heart sank.
‘No, I’m not sure if it’s that or just old age. But he is pretty ancient.’ Smithy advised.
How many decades ago if he did drop the bomb?’
‘Christ, I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast let alone what would have happened those many years ago.’ Smithy replied.
‘We have a dilemma then. Can we rely on what he says anyway?’ William said cautiously.
The soldier handed Smithy a note.
‘According to the latest information, there were several combinations they could use on the bomb.’
‘Now we’re getting somewhere,’ William smiled.
‘The crews developed a ditty to help remember the appropriate combination so they didn’t accidentally blow themselves up,’ Smithy relayed.
‘So do we have that combination yet?’ William quizzed.
‘Not yet. But they’re going through archive material to try and find it.’