by Jack Higgins
The hate in her, the rage, was so strong now that, in a kind of panic, she dropped the cigarette in the sink, turned on the tap and bathed her face with cold water.
After a while, she felt better. The past was over and done with. She had buried her dead and that included her grandfather. Sicily and all that it stood for was a matter of total indifference to her now. She had her work, her daily routine, the hospital. There was no place for anything else. Luciano and Carter would have to understand that. She smoothed her robe, took a deep breath and went out.
The Refuge in what had been the old stables at the back of the convent wasn't much of a place, but the stone walls had been neatly whitewashed, there was a coke fire in the stove, benches and blankets for those who queued there each night.
They were a strangely assorted group. Whole families, mother, father, children, who had been bombed out, servicemen on leave or between trains and needing a bed. And then there were flotsam and jetsam to be found in any great city, the unwashed, the destitute, the drunks who could no longer cope.
Maria and two other nuns stood together behind a trestle table doling out bread and hot broth to the slowly moving line of people.
Two young soldiers in khaki battledress were arguing at the end of the line. There was a sudden cry, a flurry of blows. Maria went round the table like a strong wind and flung herself between them. The one she was nearest to, a young, red-headed Scot, bit out wildly, still trying to reach his opponent, and struck her in the face.
Suddenly Luciano was there, looking like the Devil himself. His right hand slapped across the boy's face very fast, his left seized him by the throat.
Maria had him by the arm now with both hands, exerting all her strength. ‘No, please. This isn't the way.’
And Luciano was smiling now and released his grip so that the boy fell to his knees. ‘Okay, pretty one. Whatever you say,’ he said in Sicilian.
There was a sudden buzz of conversation as the crowd came back to life. The soldier stood up and gingerly touched his throat.
‘I'm sorry, miss,’ he said to Maria. ‘I don't know how it happened.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘Get your soup and sit down,’ and she turned and went after Luciano.
‘It's been a long time,’ he said. ‘The summer of ’thirty-five. How old were you, sixteen?’
‘And you,’ she said. ‘You don't change.’
‘So you've kept up with what happened to me?’
‘Oh, yes, I know all about the great Lucky Luciano whose answer to everything is still violence. And where did it get you? Thirty years in prison.’
‘On a bum rap and I'm out now, aren't I?’
‘You were my hero that summer when you visited my grandfather, you know that? Robin Hood and Richard the Lionheart rolled into one. When we walked in Palermo and people stopped to kiss your hand, I thought it was a mark of respect. But I was wrong. It was only that they were afraid.’
‘What about Don Antonio. You ever hear from him?’
‘No.’
It seemed colder than ever in the chapel and Luciano leaned against the end of a pew as he looked down at her. ‘You still love him, don't you, and that tears you apart because you should hate him.’
‘Very clever,’ she said.
‘Listen, when I was in SingSing, a psychiatrist gave me all those fancy tests and told me I was below average intelligence. Wrote it on the report. Said I should learn a trade.’
She was unable to stop the slightest of smiles from touching her lips. ‘That's better,’ he said. ‘You laughed a lot that summer. That's what I remember best. Your smile.’
She shook her head. ‘Oh, Mr Luciano, what's to become
of you?’
‘Look,’ he said. ‘I'm not making any excuses. I could say Tenth Street was no place for any kid to grow up, but I won't. I made a conscious choice. When people talk to me about the war, I say what war? I've been at war all my life, but I engage in a combat that's nothing to do with civilians.’
‘Gangsters,’ she said. ‘Dope-peddlars, thieves, murderers.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘It sounds more like the Old Testament every minute.’
‘You don't need to tell me,’ she said. ‘The world can't be innocent with Man in it.’
‘And what the hell is that pearl of wisdom supposed to mean?’ he demanded. ‘What do you want me to do, drain the cup? All right, I'll tell you how it is.’
He walked to the altar rail and turned. ‘We're fundamentally alone. Nothing lasts.’
‘God,’ she said. ‘There is always God.’
‘Well, if he exists, your God, I wish to hell he'd make up his mind. He's big on how and when. Not so hot on why.’
‘Have you learned nothing?’ she said. ‘Has life taught you nothing?’
‘Oh, yes,’ he said. ‘I've learned to kill with a smile. I'll probably die with one. But those soldiers who are going to die in the Cammarata, will they be smiling, do you think?’
She stood staring at him for a long moment then turned and walked out.
Sister Katherine was at her desk in the office when there was a knock at the door. Maria entered. She stood there, hands folded, obviously deeply troubled.
‘Sit down, my child.’ Sister Katherine told her.
Maria said, ‘Sister, has Colonel Carter told you why he has come here?’
‘Yes,’ Sister Katherine said. ‘As much as he needed to.’
Maria went round the desk and dropped on her knees. ‘Sister, you know my story, you know why I came here.’
‘Of course,’ Katherine said. ‘You came seeking refuge. Instead you found God, is that not true?’
‘Sister, my bible tells me that we must love one another, but when I think of my grandfather, I know only hate.’ She gripped the older woman's hands tightly. ‘I am afraid of the violence I feel in myself. They would return me to everything I renounced, turned my back on. I will not do it,’ she added forcibly.
Sister Katherine smiled. ‘Such arrogance. You did not choose God, Maria. He chose you. For you, as his servant, there is no such thing as choice. You must do what is right. You may do no other.’
Maria stayed there for a long moment, head bowed, then she looked up. ‘Which means I must go to Sicily.’
Sister Katherine nodded. ‘Having no choice means there is no choice in the matter. A parodox, but true. What Colonel Carter has asked you to consider, this mission to Sicily, is one thing. The question of your hatred for your grandfather is another, hardly relevant to the greater issue. Is that not so?’
Maria took a deep, shuddering breath. ‘Help me, Sister.’
Sister Katherine's hands tightened on hers, they bowed their heads together in prayer.
It was very quiet in the chapel when Carter and Luciano went in. The door banged, echoed in the silence. She was at the altar rail on her knees, and they paused halfway down the aisle and waited. She knew they were there, of course, the head coming up slowly. She stayed like that for a long moment, then got to her feet and turned. Her face was pale, but quite calm.
‘Sister Katherine said you wanted to see me,’ Carter said. ‘You've made your choice. I presume?’
‘Did I ever really have one, Colonel?’
Carter, sudenly desperately sorry, said, ‘Put like that, I don't suppose you did.’
‘When do we leave?’
‘The morning would be fine.’ He hesitated and said, ‘Look, there's something we'd better get over with now. The only way we can get into Sicily at the moment is by parachute.’
‘That's all we need,’ Luciano said.
Carter ignored him. ‘I've known agents going into the field for the first time drop cold, as we call it. In other words, their jump over the target is the first jump they've ever made. I'm not too keen on that. I'd like you to think you had some idea of what you're doing.’
‘What would you suggest?’
‘We'll be staying at a house in Cheshire for a while not far from Manchester. There'
s a parachute school there. Most SOE agents pass through it. A six hour course of instruction and one jump is usually enough.’
‘With any luck, I could break a leg,’ Luciano said.
Maria seemed totally indifferent. ‘Fine, Colonel, whatever you say.’ She looked around her as if taking everything in for the last time, then put a hand on the altar rail. ‘I've been happy here. Truly and deeply content for the only time in my life. Perhaps that was wrong.’
Luciano said softly in Sicilian. ‘Now you go out into the world again. Maybe there are answers waiting.’
‘Yes, Mr Luciano,’ she said. ‘That could be true.’ She smiled slightly. ‘I will hang on to that thought, believe me. Till the morning then, gentlemen.’
She walked away along the aisle, the door closed behind her. Luciano said, ‘Well, Professor, you got what you wanted. Keep this up and maybe they'll give you another medal.’ He turned into the shadows, his footsteps echoing.
In Maison Blanche in Algeria just after dawn Harvey Grant walked across to the operations building. He was in a thoroughly bad temper. His mouth tasted like a sewer and his eyes were gritty from lack of sleep.
When he went into the Operations Room, he knew they were in trouble straight away, because it was deserted except for Joe Collinson, the squadron senior navigator who was night duty officer.
‘Anything?’ Grant asked him.
Collinson shook his head. ‘I'm sorry, sir, but I'm afraid they must have bought it. Way past their fuel time now. It's just not on.’
‘Four in a row,’ Grant said. ‘That's bad news, Joe.’
Collinson turned to the map of Sicily on the wall behind him. ‘Jerry knows something's building up over Sicily, sir. Too much traffic over the past few weeks. Those Junkers 88s are out hunting every night and they're good, sir. Too damned good for a Halifax.’
‘You don't have to tell me,’ Grant said. ‘I've seen the faces in the mess. It's reaching the stage that when you brief a crew for a Sicilian drop, you might as well give them their death certificates while you're at it.’
‘So what do we do, sir?’
‘What can we do except inform the AOC of the situation. If they say go, we go, you know that.’
He lit a cigarette and helped himself to coffee. Collinson said, ‘There's something for you, sir, just come in.’
He pushed the envelope across the map table and Grant ripped it open. He stood there for a moment, reading Harry Carter's signal.
‘Jesus,’ he whispered, and slumped down into a chair.
‘Is anything wrong, sir?’ Collinson asked, concerned.
‘Oh, yes, I think you could say that,’ Grant told him heavily and passed the signal across.
It was raining in Sicily that morning as the 21st Paratroop Battalion, or what was left of it, moved along a forest road towards the village of Vilalba. Max Koenig's 35 Fallschirmjäger fitted comfortably into three armoured troop carriers. He himself was at the rear of the column in a fieldcar with a driver and machine gunner. Rudi Brandt was riding point in another fieldcar way out in front.
There was a ragged volley of rifle fire, flattened by the rain, and Koenig nodded to his driver who pulled out to overtake the column. Koenig signalled them to halt.
Brandt's fieldcar had halted in pine trees on the ridge and the sergeant major stood beside it, a pair of Zeiss field-glasses raised, examining Vilalba below. It was a miserable place, typical of the mountain villages. A small church, a square, forty or fifty houses. There were two military trucks drawn up in the square and what seemed to be the entire population of the village watched as a firing squad went to work. There were already half a dozen bodies face down, or sprawled on their backs in the unnatural postures of death. Another half dozen were being hustled forward to take their place against the church wall.
Koenig got out of his fieldcar and Brandt handed him the glasses. ‘Einsatzgruppen, Obersturmbannführer.’
Einsatzgruppen were units of the SS which had been formed by Himmler prior to the invasion of Russia. They were extermination squads, recruited from the jails of Germany, officered by the SD and Gestapo. Occasionally soldiers of the Waffen SS, convicted of some serious crime, were transferred to them as a punishment and a number of Russian prisoners of war, mainly Ukrainians, were also employed by them.
Koenig handed Brandt his glasses back, his face grim. ‘All right, we'll go down. I'll lead.’
As his field car led the convoy into the square, the small crowd was already beginning to disperse, herded away by half a dozen SS armed with rifles. Fifteen or twenty women were crowded into one of the trucks, some of them very young girls, most of them sobbing bitterly.
Koenig got out of his fieldcar and walked forward to examine the dead. Three of them were teenage boys and there was another who could not have been more than ten years of age.
There was a cry behind him and someone called, ‘Signor Colonel, please!’
As Koenig turned, an old man ducked past the guards and ran before them. One of them raised his rifle and Koenig called, ‘Leave him.’
The man was very old with patched clothes and a heavy white moustache and there were tears in his eyes.
‘Please, Colonel, I am Angeli, the Mayor here, and you are a just man, everyone knows this.’
‘What happened here?’
‘They came an hour ago saying that a German sentry was murdered in the next valley yesterday. That someone from here was responsible. They took every fifth man for the firing squad and every fifth woman …’ He appealed to Koenig passionately now, hands raised. ‘In the name of God, Colonel. In the name of justice, tell your people not to do this thing.’
Koenig said calmly, ‘These are not my people.’
The old man was totally distraught now. He gestured towards the truck. ‘Colonel, please, my granddaughter. The Russian, he took her inside.’
Before Koenig could reply, Brandt approached, his face grave. ‘There is a difficulty here, I think, Colonel. These are Major Meyer's men.’
‘Indeed,’ Koenig said. ‘He's inside, presumably?’
‘No, he's not here personally, Colonel.’
The Fallschirmjäger waited for orders by their vehicles, weapons ready. Koenig looked them over, then adjusted his gloves.
‘Release the women, Sturmscharführer,’ he said clearly so that everyone could hear. ‘If anyone tries to stop you, shoot them.’
Brandt responded instantly. ‘Zu Befehl, Obersturmbannführer.’ He swung to face his men. ‘All right, you heard the Colonel.’
There was a burst of laughter and singing from the inn as Koenig approached. He paused at the bottom of the steps, selected a cigarette from an old leather case, lit it and passed inside.
There were half a dozen men drinking at the bar, rifles stacked. A burly Untersturmführer was seated at one end of a long table by the fire. He was more Eastern than European with narrow eyes and high cheekbones. The girl on his knee was small and dark, no more than fifteen, her face swollen from weeping.
There was a sudden silence as conversation died at the sight of Koenig standing there.
He said, ‘You are in charge here?’
The Untersturmführer pushed the girl and stood up.
‘That's right. Suslov.’
Koenig smiled down at the girl. ‘Go now, your grandfather is waiting for you outside.’
She stared up at him for one brief moment then, as she turned to run, Suslov grabbed at her. Koenig stepped in his path and behind him, the girl ran for the door.
Suslov said angrily, ‘Here, who in the hell might you be?’
‘Your superior officer,’ Koenig said calmly. ‘And from now on, you will speak only when I invite you to speak. You will also stand to attention in my presence.’
‘Sturmbannführer Meyer is my commanding officer, not you.’
Koenig raised his voice and called, ‘Sergeant-major!’
The rear door was kicked open and Brandt appeared, flanked by two paratroopers. All three
of them carried machine pistols and looked perfectly willing to use them.
Koenig said softly, ‘In future, when I give you an order, you get those heels together and shout, Zu Befehl, Obersturmbannführer. Do you understand me?’
There was murder in Suslov's eyes, but he did as he was told and stood to attention. ‘Jawohl, Obersturmbannführer.’
‘Good. Now answer some questions. The executed who were they?
‘Every fifth male.’
‘And the women?’
‘For the army brothel in Palermo. Every fifth female.’ He hesitated. ‘Sturmbannführer Meyer's orders.’
Koenig nodded. ‘You'll be interested to know that I've had them released. All that remains is for you and your men to remove yourselves. You have exactly two minutes in which to do that, otherwise I might be tempted to start operating in fifths myself.’
Suslov, by that stage, knew better than to argue. He turned to his men, gave a sudden command in Russian and made for the door and they followed.
Koenig selected another cigarette and Brandt offered him a light. ‘This could mean trouble, Colonel.’
‘Good,’ Koenig said, as engines roared into life outside.
He moved to the door and stood at the top of the steps as the trucks moved out of the village. At the same moment a Mercedes staff car came over the ridge. The leading truck stopped and Koenig saw Suslov get out and lean down to the Mercedes window. After a while, the Russian got back into the truck, it moved off and the Mercedes came down towards the village.
Koenig stood watching the villagers moving the bodies of the dead. The Mercedes pulled up and Meyer got out.
‘I was under the impression that I was in command here.’
‘Of this butcher's shop? You should be pleased.’
An old woman and two girls came by, pulling a handcart behind them containing the body of the tenyearold boy.
‘One of our men was murdered last night. I had good reason to believe the culprits came from this village.’
Koenig said, ‘Amongst the women selected on your orders, were twelve and thirteen-year-old girls. I've had them all released, by the way. I presume Suslov told you.’