Beneath Gray Skies

by Hugh Ashton

  “Good old British pounds sterling it shall be. But I don’t have the money with me. I’m going to have to get it from my hotel for you, if you’re prepared to wait.”

  Pete led Dowling through the narrow alleys of the dockside. As they came out from between two buildings, he pointed at a ship berthed at the quay. “That’s her, the Bobby Lee, but she’s in heavy disguise like I said,” he said. Sure enough, a Panamanian flag was flying from her jack staff, and the name on her stern read John Hancock. “Bet if you scraped that Yankee moniker off, you’d find the good old Southern name underneath,” said Pete.

  “I’m not taking that bet,” said Dowling.

  “And this here’s the warehouse they all went into,” said Pete. He stopped and listened outside the door. “Funny, it’s real quiet.” He moved forward. “And the doors are open.” He pushed open the small judas gate in the main door and entered. Dowling followed. “Got a light?” asked Pete. Dowling was in the habit of carrying a small battery flashlight with him. Shielding the main beam with his hand, he switched it on, removing his hand as it became apparent that they were alone in the warehouse. There were rows of German Army cots, Army-issue field kitchens at one end of the warehouse and …

  “A whole row of bloody field latrines,” exclaimed Dowling in wonder. “But where are the people?” He counted the rows and columns of cots. “I make that about a couple of thousand people, all vanished.”

  “There’s something here,” called out Pete. He was standing at a table. “Don’t know if this is important or not.” He held up a scrap of paper.

  “Bahnhof - Freitag 23:13,” read out Dowling. He looked at his watch. If they’re meant to be at the station at 13 minutes past 11 on Friday evening, which is this evening, they can’t have been gone long. How many stations are there in this town? I only know the central station.”

  “I figure,” said Pete, “that these two thousand guys is meant to be kept kinda hidden.” Dowling nodded. “So they’re not going to go through the middle of the town. These guys will go from one of the dockyard freight depots. The nearest is a couple of blocks away. Comin’ along?”

  “Of course.” Dowling cursed silently. So close, but his watch now read half past eleven. There was little chance that the train was still there. And that meant there was no way that he would be able to talk to Finch-Malloy in Bremen. If he had gone on to Berlin with the rest of the group from the Confederacy, Dowling had to follow him there. He followed Pete out of the warehouse to the depot, which was really only a freight loading platform and an office.

  -o-

  A sleepy railroad official was turning off the lights in the office and locking up.

  “Working late?” asked Dowling.

  “A special train tonight,” grumbled the other.

  “What sort of train? What was it carrying?”

  “I’m usually off duty at least two hours before this. I like my quiet evenings at home at my time of life.”

  “But you get paid for overtime?” suggested Dowling.

  “Not nearly enough to answer foolish questions late at night,” complained the official, snapping the door shut and locking it behind him.

  “So how about some over-overtime?” suggested Dowling, waving a few large German bills in the general direction of the man’s pocket, where they swiftly disappeared.

  “A train made up of cattle trucks. Going to Berlin. Carrying men. Lots of them, dressed in each other’s clothes, by the look of it. Speaking some foreign language, like English, but not English English, I’m sure. And a lot of those National Socialists standing around shouting.”

  “And the train was going to Berlin, you say?”

  “Yes, due to arrive there tomorrow afternoon. That’s if the signals aren’t broken. Which they usually are,” he added with the air of a man who enjoys bad news. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I will bid you gentlemen goodnight.”

  “Well, what is that lot worth to you?” asked Pete when they were alone together again.

  “More than you might think. Can you wait until tomorrow morning and come round to my hotel to collect it? No, come to think of it, I shall probably have left the hotel by early tomorrow morning. Come with me to the hotel now.”

  “So you’re off to Berlin, too?” suggested Pete.

  “It sounds like quite a story,” replied Dowling. “Wouldn’t you like to see it all in the papers?”

  “Sure I would, so I’m goin’ to wish you all the best of luck in getting it printed. So where’s your hotel? Will you put my name in the papers?” He kept up a constant stream of chatter all the way back to the hotel, but Dowling thought that the chatter, and the substantial sum in British pounds that he pressed into Pete’s hands, were a fair price for knowing what he now knew.

  Chapter 11: Berlin, Germany

  Goering strutted up to come almost toe to toe with Brian. “I am giving the orders here.”

  David had never before been in such a big city, where so many people were all moving so fast, and he saw more automobiles in a few minutes than he had previously seen in the whole of his life. The brief glimpse he had seen of Berlin as the 3rd Alabama moved swiftly and as inconspicuously as possible from the depot to the warehouse a mile or so away, where they were to be quartered, had scared him. Brian had seemed quite at home, even greeting the few Berliners that they encountered with some friendly words in German.

  “How many languages do you speak?” asked David.

  “A few,” replied Brian, in a gruffer tone than he had just used to the surprised Berlin worker. “Not enough.” There were days when trying to get Brian to talk was like getting a mule to sing, thought David.

  They stayed in the warehouse for a few days. It was arranged in the same way as the one in Bremen, with latrines at one end and field kitchens at the other, and cots arranged in rows between them. The roof leaked in many places, though, and it seemed to be continually raining outside, so a lot of time was spent moving cots around, out of the constant drips.

  David wanted to play chess, but Brian said he was bored with losing all the time. He pulled a book out of his knapsack, though, and explained to David the way to understand and play the chess problems in the book. After that, when he wasn’t working with the Captain and the Colonel, David spent most of the time puzzling his way through the problems in the book, trying to see the board from both sides.

  “Ah, that’s always the problem, what?” said Brian when David mentioned the difficulty of the problems. “Seeing things from more than one side. Nothing harder in chess or in life, is there?”

  There was no answer that David could give to that, so he ignored it. Sometimes he thought he saw the not-quite-a-Major Goering who’d asked him to write out the poem in Bremen, but it was always at the other end of the warehouse, or when the light was bad (the electric lights in the warehouse weren’t working and the Germans hadn’t provided any other form of light), and he couldn’t be sure.

  There were more and more different Germans coming to see the officers each day, all with their red, white and black armbands. Some of them didn’t seem to speak much English, and spent their time pointing at maps of Berlin while the English-speaking Germans explained things in low voices. Sometimes David saw his Captain shaking his head and talking with a worried face to the Colonel after the Germans had gone, but he could never hear what they were talking about.

  On the third day, David was called to the Colonel.

  “More of your beautiful writing, young man. But not poetry this time. Look.” He pointed to a pile of handwritten papers, covered with lines and scribbles. “You should be able to read my writing by now. I want these maps and orders copied out neatly. There’s one for every company in our regiment, and because your writing’s so good, you’re going to be doing the same for every company in the other regiments as well. There’s a list of times and places with each map. Write that out underneath the map, on the same side. Do this one first, and I’ll have a look at it.”

  “Yes, sir.” O
bviously his feelings had showed in his voice. The Colonel put a hand on his shoulder.

  “You’re a soldier, son, and soldiers don’t complain.”

  “I wasn’t complaining, sir.”

  “And they don’t answer back, either. I know it’s a lot of work, but over three thousand men are going to be depending on you. And I can assure you personally that if everything goes well, you’ll be remembered.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “That’s better. Now get that first map drawn and let me see it when you’re done.”

  David was now a master at sorting out the Colonel’s spidery writing, and he had always found maps fun, when he had a chance to look at them.

  “Excellent!” said the Colonel, looking at the finished product. “Just one thing. On all the rest, make the company name a little bigger. No need to do this one again, though.”

  “One thing, sir?”

  “Yes?”

  “The light’s not so good at this end of the room, sir, at this time of the day. Permission to work at my company billet, sir?”

  “Sure, why not? Get a couple of men from your company to help you with that table and chair. Take the papers yourself. And Corporal…?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Don’t you dare lose them.” The usually genial voice was as fierce as David had ever heard it. “We all are in deadly trouble if those papers get into the wrong hands. And one of us in particular will be in more trouble than the rest. Know who that one person will be, Corporal?”

  “Me, sir?”

  “Quite right, son. So keep those papers safe, and nothing will happen to any of us.”

  David was soon seated at his table, working hard, and trying to ignore the stares, when he felt the presence of someone close behind him.

  “Go away, will you? Or do something useful like steppin’ up and gettin’ me a cup of water. I’m thirstin’ for a drink, and there ain’t no Coca-Cola.” The presence at his back didn’t go away.

  “I’m tellin’ you, Private!” said David angrily. Having someone literally breathing down his neck while he was concentrating irritated him, and though he hardly ever used his corporal’s rank to make others do his bidding, he felt now was the time to assert a little authority.

  “Sorry, old man,” said Brian. “Just having a bit of a look-see, what?”

  “Don’t do it again,” snapped David.

  “Don’t worry, I won’t,” replied Brian. “I’ll get you that water, now, shall I?” He went off leaving David wondering just what had been going on. Something was obviously very strange, but he didn’t think it was his place to try and find out too much. After all, Brian was his friend, and there was no better soldier in the unit than Brian. So what was the harm in his friend seeing what they were all going to be doing the next day? None, he told himself, but it wasn’t right, all the same. But it was better for the officers to worry about that sort of thing, all the same.

  “Sorry,” repeated Brian, turning up again with the water and handing it to David. “Just got up to stretch the old legs, and saw you hard at work, so I stopped to admire your skill. Damn’ good map, you know,” pointing to a map of the working-class Wedding district of Berlin. “What lucky beggars are going in there, then?” squinting at the paper.

  “I’m not rightly sure you should be looking at these, Brian,” a little angrily. He had been told not to lose the papers, after all, so they must be important, and probably not to be looked at by everyone.

  “Why, sorry. Are they secret?” but not moving away.

  “Can’t tell you for certain if they are, but they’re certainly important and no-one else is meant to be seeing them right now. Even you,” he added half-apologetically to his friend.

  “All right, Davy, I’m not going to poke my nose in where it’s not wanted.” The light was fading, and David was only halfway done. Feeling rather disappointed that he hadn’t been able to do more in the time, and more than a little concerned about Brian’s behavior, he gathered up the Colonel’s original maps and his copies, and carried them back to the company office area. On the way, he debated with himself whether to tell the Colonel about his suspicions concerning Brian, but, as he told himself, he had no definite proof of anything that Brian had done wrong. And if he was mistaken in his suspicions, he’d lose the best friend he had. Come to that, he reflected, he’d lose his best friend if he was right. He kept his mouth shut as he handed the papers back.

  “Well done, Davy,” said the Colonel. “These are real good, I want you to know that. I wasn’t expecting you to finish them tonight anyway. Tomorrow morning is fine, as long as you’re all done by twelve o’clock, since there’s a lot of folks stopping by tomorrow afternoon. Make an early start on them.”

  -o-

  The next afternoon was taken up with an officers’ conference, with all the officers and a group of about twenty visiting Germans sitting at one end of the warehouse, looking at a blackboard, and reading David’s maps. David could recognize Major Goering, sitting in the front row, next to a smaller dark-haired man with a mustache.

  David reckoned the meeting lasted about two hours. When it had ended, the Lieutenant came over to David’s platoon, and explained how they were all to leave the warehouse at five o’clock the next morning, and walk over to another area of Berlin. There, they would be met by a truck which would be carrying their rifles and ammunition. Picking up their rifles from the truck, they were then to stand around a ministry building and arrest anyone attempting to enter or leave. Other trucks would then carry away the arrested people.

  “And,” he added. “You’re all to be wearing one of these, so we know who’s on our side.” He opened a bag, and pulled out a swastika armband. “Y’all take one now, y’hear, and put it on when you pick up your guns and ammo tomorrow. Not before, y’hear now?”

  They filed past and each took an armband. Brian held his as though he’d just pulled it out of the latrine, thought David.

  -o-

  Five o’clock came, and David’s company hungrily filed through the streets in the morning half-light. “Sure wish we’d had some coffee,” whispered David to Tom.

  “Sure wish I was back at home,” replied Tom. “I kinda got this feeling someone’s going to get hurt today. Don’t want it to be none of us that gets it.”

  “Quiet, you two,” came the hissed order from the sergeant, and the company walked on in silence.

  At the point where David had drawn a cross and a number “1” on the map, a gray covered truck was waiting. As the company approached, the driver climbed out of his cab, and let the tailgate fall.

  “OK, fellas. Get your own rifle, and the ammo’s in the box in there,” said the sergeant. “Ten rounds each. Keep the chamber empty. Don’t want anything going off by accident. And get those armbands on. Right arm, Hiverton. You know which arm your right arm is? Jeezus…”

  They walked the last few hundred yards to the ministry and took up positions round the entrances. “You’re not to shoot,” the Lieutenant reminded them. “Not unless they start shooting at you, and they won’t, because they’re civilians. Understood?”

  “Sir? What if the cops come by and try to stop us, sir?” asked Tom.

  “We’ve been told they won’t, but if they do, just stop them. But shoot only if you’re being shot at, understand?”

  The first worker at the ministry came along a few minutes before seven o’clock. He was carrying a large broom and a bag full of what turned out to be coal, and he didn’t look like David’s idea of someone working in a government ministry. The sight of so many rifles pointed in his direction did not seem to worry him unduly, and he went quietly to the spot in the nearby grassy park where the Confederate soldiers indicated he should stand.

  Another five minutes went by, and a large black automobile drew up. Major Goering stepped out of it, wearing his military helmet and leather coat, complete with swastika armband, and David heard a sharp hissing sound from Brian beside him.

  “He lo
oks like a caretaker,” said Goering in English to the Lieutenant, jerking his thumb at the prisoner. “Janitor, cleaning man, whatever you say. Send him to his home, he’s useless to us.” He said a few words in German to the man, who picked up his broom and bag of coal, and trudged off in the direction he had come from. Goering dismissed the car, and it sped off.

  After another ten minutes, a man in a suit which had once been smart, but now looked shabby, approached the building. “That one,” said Goering, pointing. Surrounded by a squad of Confederate soldiers, who understood not a word of the German protests the man was shouting at them, he was marched to the area the Lieutenant had designated for prisoners.

  After a short while, he was joined in the holding area by several more similarly dressed men, who had been seized and held by the Confederates. All of them started shouting at their captors—David didn’t need to understand German to work out that they were protesting their treatment, but Goering came over to them and shouted a few words in German, and they fell silent.