by Alan Evans
Geoffrey prodded the turf with his stick, thinking. Ward pushed him, “So there you are! Now, d’you think you can do it?”
Geoffrey hesitated, “Well—maybe I can…” He paused, frowning.
Ward heaved an inward sigh of relief. That was good enough. He said, “Well, you’ll bloody well have to—my movements are likely to be pretty erratic from now on. I suppose I’ll have to remain titular head, chairman of the board or whatever, but I’ll give you all the authority you need.”
“And advice?”
“If you want it.”
Geoffrey muttered, “I think I will. One thing, to start with: Willcox sent me a letter by hand, all mysterious, saying the government wants us to set up a whole new factory, not for wireless but R.D.F.”
“So?”
“I don’t know what it is yet, for God’s sake!”
Ward did and another word for it was radar. He grinned, “They’ll explain. Take the contract because we need that stuff. Anything else?”
“Not at the moment.” Geoffrey looked thoughtfully at Ward. “The old boy always said you were good at taking a decision.”
Ward thought that was rubbish; in this he just happened to know the Navy would need radar.
Geoffrey went on: “He also said you were a throw-back to old Captain Matthew.”
That startled Ward. “Bloody cheek! He was a pirate.”
That was probably untrue. No one had ever openly accused Great-Great-Grandfather Matthew Ward of piracy. He came home after the American Civil War with a lot of money and there were rumours he had run contraband to the southern states, but Matthew never said how he made the money. He used some of it to set up a marine engineering works with his son in charge and two engineers from Clydeside. He called it the Perseus Engine Works after the ship in which he made his stake. Inside of a year the business was making money and Matthew was sick of it. He went out to Singapore and never returned, was lost at sea ten years later. His widow and son prospered, first of a line of hardworking, astute business people. The interests of Perseus now ranged from heavy engineering to radio, to hotels and a Scottish estate.
Ward thought he might have inherited Matthew’s itch to go to sea but that was all they had in common, except that Matthew had been a very tall man with black hair and eyes with a hard look as they stared at you out of the old photograph. Anyway, nobody knew much about Matthew. The family weren’t secretive about him, but he was rarely discussed.
Ward stirred in his seat beside Driver Gibb. They had been on the road for twenty minutes. Now they turned off the empty country lane winding between dusty hedges and entered the drive of the hospital. The roof of the building showed above trees and they followed the drive that curled around the trees and ended in a circle of gravel. Farther on, past the end of the building, was another copse and a cart track disappeared into it. Gibb turned the Commer on the gravel and braked it at the foot of the steps leading up to the open doors.
Ward got down from the Commer and passed through the doors, his men at his heels, their boots clumping on the polished wooden floor of the hall within. They halted and stood still, suddenly hushed. Nuns glided along the quiet, sun-striped corridors. An elderly woman that Ward took to be the Mother Superior came from an office into the hall and Ward explained his errand in halting French. Neither she nor her nuns showed any surprise at their presence and Ward decided they must have become used to armed men in heavy boots. There was no delay. He was shown to the wounded and his men started carrying them out on stretchers, lifting them into the Commer and making them as comfortable as possible. There were four: three soldiers and a seaman, all of them pale and ill but all eager to go.
In the Mother Superior’s office she handed Williams, the S.B.A., four sets of written notes, one for each case. Williams scratched his head over them, the Mother Superior explained and Ward tried to translate. It was some minutes before Williams said, “Right, sir, I think I’ve got the hang of them.”
Meanwhile at the front of the building, the loading done, Tracey looked towards the hospital and asked, “What’s the French for urinal?”
“Never you mind. I’m not having you getting lost in there. The place is like a rabbit warren.” Jenkins jerked a thumb at the trees filling the curve of the drive. “Nip in there.” And as Tracey trotted away, “Get well in and out o’ sight! This place is full o’ nuns and we don’t want your John Thomas causing an international incident!”
Driver Gibb asked, “Where’s your big feller?”
“The old girl is briefing him and the S.B.A.”
“Hope he doesn’t take too long over it.”
“He won’t. He’s as keen to get back to the ship as the rest of us.” Jenkins swung up into the rear of the truck and said to the men inside, “Won’t be long now, mates.”
Gibb climbed into the cab as Ward appeared with Williams in the doorway of the hospital, a flock of nuns behind them. He and the S.B.A. came quickly down the steps, putting on their caps, and at the foot of them Ward turned and saluted, then walked around the rear of the truck. “All aboard?”
Jenkins leaned out over the tailboard and hauled Williams inside. “Only Tracey to come, sir. He’s gone to relieve himself.” He opened his mouth to bellow for the rating then said, “Here he comes.” He gave a snort of laughter. “He must ha’ thought we were going without him. Never seen him move so fast!”
Tracey ran across the yellow, sun-seared grass from the trees, head back and legs pumping furiously. Ward started towards the cab then halted as Gibb started the engine. Tracey was waving. He was close and gravel spurted from under his boots now; Ward could see his gaping mouth and wide eyes. Tracey came up and panted, “I couldn’t shout in case they heard me, sir! There’s Jerries down at the gate, I think!”
There was a moment of stunned silence then Jenkins broke it, “You think! What d’ye mean, you bloody think?”
Tracey explained simply, “I’ve never seen one before, not really, just in pictures.”
Ward stared down the drive to where it curled away around the trees. The Germans were supposed to be thirty miles away. Tracey must be mistaken, but—“Are they coming up here?”
“No, sir. Stopped on the road.”
“How many?”
“A lot. A dozen. Maybe more. I didn’t count them. I’d just—finished and then they drove up.”
Ward said, “Show me.” He told Jenkins, “The rest of you wait here.”
He ran to the trees with Tracey. It was cool in their shade and they ran in that coolness for some thirty yards, then Tracey flapped a hand. Ward was already slowing and edging aside to take cover behind a tree. They were not at the edge of the wood yet, still in its shelter, but he could see the drive where it ran down to the gateway and through to the road. A truck was stopped on the road, its cab and open body just showing above the low wall. The body was filled with seated troops in green-grey uniforms, their carbines standing between their knees. There looked to be a score of them and one manned a light machine-gun mounted on the roof of the cab.
At the gate, ahead of the truck, stood a big, open Mercedes touring car, its dark, bluish-grey paintwork showing through the film of dust that coated it. Two soldiers with carbines sat in the back, another at the wheel. Like those in the truck their tunics were open at the neck, they wore forage-caps and on the right breast of each was a spread-winged eagle in silver. A fourth man was stepping down from the front of the car and stretching. He looked as tall as Ward, who saw the officer’ silver piping on this man’s forage-cap.
Tracey whispered, “Are they Jerries, sir?”
Ward nodded. They outnumbered his little party by five or six to one. Then there was their machine-gun. And their car was parked across the gateway like a cork in a bottle, with Ward and his men inside it.
*
Leutnant Franz Engel stretched his long frame and looked around. In the distance smoke hung over St. Nazaire; they had seen the Heinkels make their bombing runs. Here there was only an em
pty road and fields basking under the sun. A drive ran up from the gateway to curve around a belt of trees and behind them rose the roof of the hospital. Nothing could be more peaceful.
Engel, twenty-three years old, lean and bronzed, grinned down at the driver of the Mercedes. Pianka was a much older man, a veteran of the first war. He sat squarely and patiently behind the wheel. Engel teased him: “I don’t see any resistance, any Tommies.”
Pianka shrugged, “I still say we are too far ahead, Herr Leutnant. It is against orders.”
“Against the letter, maybe, but not the spirit. Reconnaissance is a part of Intelligence.” He and Pianka were Abwehr, Military Intelligence. “If you want to learn then you go and look.” He leaned forward to slap Pianka’s shoulder affectionately. “Don’t worry, old soldier. The Tommies have gone back to England, the war is over and soon we will be home.” Pianka shook his head and Engel prodded him with a long finger. “You don’t agree? Spit it out.”
“The French have asked for an armistice but the Tommies haven’t.”
“They will. They can’t fight on alone. It doesn’t make sense.
“They don’t work things out like that.”
“So?”
“Remember when we were in Spain two years ago?” That had been with the Abwehr, too. “Remember the bull-fights? The Spaniards said the bull was most dangerous when he was in his querencia, his own chosen place in the ring, and you had to get him out of there to kill him. Now the Tommies have gone to their querencia and there are thirty kilometres of sea to cross to get to it.”
Engel took off his forage cap and ran fingers through his hair. He looked down thoughtfully at Pianka then grinned and shook his head. He climbed back into the car and settled the Walther P38 comfortably on his hip. “Back up. We’ll pay a visit to the hospital and see if they have any interesting patients. As for the war and the Tommies—we will see.”
Pianka nodded, unsmiling. “That’s right.”
*
Ward had run back to the Commer, Tracey scurrying at his heels. He pulled himself into the cab and heard Jenkins call, “All aboard,” as he yanked Tracey into the back of the truck. Ward panted at Gibb, “Turn her round…” And as the Commer lumbered in a circle he pointed: “Follow that lane!”
It was no more than a track, winding away between the trees at the side of the hospital. As the Commer swerved into it Ward said, “They’re Jerries all right and they’re coming up here.”
The Jerries had in fact arrived. Jenkins, crouched by the tail-board of the Commer with the two seamen, rifles at the ready, saw the Mercedes appear around the curve in the drive. A second later a bend in the lane hid the Commer but not before Engel had seen it. He yelled and pointed: “Tommies!”
The hunt was up.
The Commer bounced and slewed over ruts. Ward’s cap slipped forward over his eyes and he shoved it on to the back of his head. In the rear of the truck they clung on to the tail-board until the stretchers began sliding when Williams sprawled flat on the floor with his boots against the tail-board and his hands on the nearest stretcher, so steadying all of them, tight-packed as they were.
The Commer burst out of the wood and now the lane ran between high hedges. Gibb kept his foot down, swinging the Commer round the snaking curves, then for a hundred yards the lane ran straight. They flashed past a turning on the right and ahead was a yard and a house. Gibb tramped on the brake, Ward saved himself with a hand braced on the dash. Gibb jammed the Commer into reverse and Ward jumped out as the truck rolled backward, Gibb hanging out of his open door to see behind, steering with one hand. Ward sprinted back along the side of the Commer and on to the turning. It was clear enough now that the lane swung to the right here. He stood in the middle of the lane where Gibb could see him, waving the driver on but with one eye looking back in the direction of the hospital. Dust still hung in the air, kicked up by the Commer’s wheels and it clung to the sweat on his face. The anger at being hunted was building in him, so when the Mercedes car swung around the bend a hundred yards away he found that, unthinking, he had drawn his .38 Webley from his belt and cocked it. He pointed it, aimed and fired as he had been trained on the firing range: squeeze, cock, aim, squeeze, cock, aim—
Engel saw the tall Englishman and the pistol, the reversing truck with rifle-barrels trained over its tail-board. Then pistol and rifles fired and the windscreen of the Mercedes starred. There was a rapid clanging as if the car was beaten with a hammer, it swerved across the lane and smashed into the hedge. Engel sprawled across the broken windscreen, petrol stinking beneath him. He pushed himself up with hands splayed flat on the hot metal and fell back into his seat. His ribs and stomach hurt and his nose bled, the salt of it in his mouth. Pianka lay collapsed and loose over the wheel. The two soldiers in the rear had been thrown out and were now crawling dazedly away from the car. It would burn and the tank was nearly full.
Engel shoved out of the car and ran unsteadily around the back of it. He had to get Pianka out. He grabbed the driver by the shoulders and started to drag him from the car then heard an engine revving. He looked over his shoulder. Ten yards away stood the tall Englishman. He was about Engel’s age and he wore the uniform cap of the Royal Navy. His pistol pointed at Engel and they stared for a long moment at each other across the narrow stretch of rutted, dusty track. Then the pistol lifted, its barrel pointed at the sky, and the tall man swung away. He trotted long-striding after the truck, climbed into the cab, and it pulled away into the side turning and was lost to sight.
Engel lifted Pianka in his arms and carried him up the lane away from the car. His own truck came rocking down the lane, halted and the troops spilled out of it. Engel bellowed, “Give a hand here! Medic!” The orderly came running with his satchel and dropped to his knees by Pianka. Engel muttered, “Take good care of him.” He straightened and looked back at the Mercedes. He could still see the face of the British naval officer; he had read his death in it and he would never forget it. He took a deep breath of life.
*
Gibb asked, “Are they still after us?” He shot Ward an anxious glance.
“No.” They would have to drag that car clear to allow anything bigger than a bicycle to pass.
Gibb blew out his lips in relief. “That scared the whatsit out of me!”
Ward had not been afraid and he thought that probably that was because it had all happened so quickly. That German officer had not been afraid either: he had glared defiance into the muzzle of the pistol when Ward had been ready to shoot him. Why hadn’t he? Because the German was unarmed and helping an injured man? He had not thought it through at the time, had instinctively turned away, but he was glad now.
The lane ran into a road ahead. A car flashed across the opening as the Commer rolled up to the junction and the two of them in the cab caught a quick glimpse of a girl sitting in its back seat. Gibb said, “They’re in a hurry.” He turned into the road in the wake of the car as it fled away from them.
Catherine Guillard was in a hurry. The Germans were coming and she wanted to be in her own place in St. Nazaire. She had been visiting her aunt in Paris and had returned as far as she could by rail but there were no trains running after Nantes. A taxi-driver had agreed to take her to St. Nazaire but reluctantly and only for a large fare, paid in advance. Her smile may have helped. Her mouth was too wide for classic beauty but it turned up at the corners and she had green eyes, fair hair carefully curled, and make-up carefully applied. She was tall for a girl, long-legged and still gawky; she was just nineteen and a little too serious.
Her father, once a senior official in the port, had died a year ago. Her mother had died back in the twenties. Catherine worked in the port office as secretary to a head of a department. Her services were prized because she learned a great deal from her father and so was knowledgeable besides being quick and efficient.
They passed several abandoned army trucks and the taxi-driver said bitterly, “The English have run home and deserted us!”
Catherine kept silent. She knew that the French government was asking for peace terms and that the driver was right. Two nights ago, however, General Charles de Gaulle had broadcast from London, calling for French volunteers to carry on the fight: “The flame of French resistance must not be extinguished.” Catherine thought he was right too but there was nothing she could do.
Then she leaned forward. “Isn’t that a soldier?”
He was a British soldier in khaki and he staggered as he walked. In the car they did not hear the German aircraft until it boomed overhead then swept up, climbing and turning. Its single bomb burst on the road some thirty yards ahead, between them and the soldier. The driver braked, swerved and swore, Catherine braced herself with arms and legs against the back of the seat in front of her and the car skidded past the small crater in the road but then slid sideways into the ditch.
They crawled out, gasping and shaken. The aircraft had gone and the road was empty except for the soldier lying twenty metres or so past the crater, dust and smoke from the explosion drifting over him.
Catherine said, “The soldier is hurt.”
The driver was working his way around the car, inspecting it. He did not turn his head, only grumbled, “He’ll be dead. If not now, then soon.”
Catherine swung away angrily. At school she had shown a facility at languages. Her German was correct but her English much better because she had travelled to England several times with her father on his business trips. During one protracted tour she went to school there for six months and learned to speak the language well. She also made British friends.
So now she ran down the road to the soldier. He sprawled face down, covered in dust, his rifle still looped by its sling around his arm. He had neither steel helmet nor cap. Catherine put down her bag, carefully disengaged the rifle and then turned the man on to his side. He was of middle height, sturdy, and heavy to move. She supported his head with one hand while she snatched the cardigan from her shoulders and wrapped it around her bag to make a pillow. She put it under his head and that was, she thought, all she could do; she knew nothing of nursing. But she tried to clean the blood from his head and face with her handkerchief. She looked up when she heard the truck, surprised to see it since she thought the British had all gone. The driver of the truck changed down, steered it past the crater in the road and halted beside her.