“I can’t see much of anything,” Derek complained. Actually a few stars had come out, and his eyes had gotten slightly more accustomed to the darkness. He had discovered that Mallory had better night vision than he had, and now he turned to her, whispering, “Can you see anything?”
“Yes. The sea’s right down there, and you can see the steep cliffs of the fjord.”
Mallory felt rather calm, which surprised her. She was more worried about what would happen to Derek when they got to England than she was of the actual mission itself.
“I wish we were on board that sub,” Derek said as they groped their way down the steep incline.
“We’ll be all right,” Mallory said. “We wait until the sub signals, and we give them a light. We take the small boat and row out. That’s all there is to it.”
“I suppose you’re right. I’m just jumpy.”
The three made their way down to a level spot, and Lorge said, “Here’s the boat. It’s not very big.”
“We don’t have to go far with it, Lorge. There are oars, aren’t there?”
“Yes. Maybe I should row out with you and bring the boat back.”
“We couldn’t chance that, Lorge,” Mallory said. She came closer and looked down at the small young man. “You’ve done enough already. Now you go back home.”
“When will you come back to us, sister?”
“As soon as I can. But you are the shepherd of the sheep now. When we get to England I’ll write to you in care of the Narvik General Store. Then you can write to me and tell me what’s happening with the church and with yourself.” She hesitated, then said, “We don’t know how long the war will be. You may be married with a family by the time I get back.”
“Pray God it won’t be that long.” He put his hands out, and Mallory took them with both of hers. “God go with you,” Lorge said. Then he turned and shook hands with Derek. “Take care of the Jesus woman, please.”
“I’ll do the best I can, Lorge, and thank you. I don’t know what we would have done without you.”
As soon as Lorge left, the two turned their eyes toward the sea. “What time is it, Derek?”
“Four minutes to go. We got here just in time.” He stared out at the sea and shook his head. Doubts filled him, but he did not want to speak of them to Mallory. They simply stood there with the cold wind biting them as it came off the sea.
“Look, a light,” Derek said suddenly. “It’s got to be the sub. Here, give me the flashlight.”
Derek took the flashlight and gave the signal. He received a confirmation and said, “Are you ready to go?”
“Yes, but—” Mallory didn’t finish her sentence, for they heard the sound of running footsteps. Frightened, they both whirled, but it was Lorge crying loudly, “There’s a boat filled with soldiers! They’re coming down the coastline!”
“What kind of a boat?”
“One with a motor!”
“We can’t outrun them,” Derek said. “Not if they have a motor.”
“We’ve got to try,” Mallory said. “Quick—maybe they’ll miss us in the darkness.”
Derek knew they had no choice, so the two scrambled into the boat and Lorge shoved them off. The sea was not rough, but still the waves tossed the small boat around as they rowed with all their strength. They had rowed for five minutes, one of them on each oar, when suddenly they received another light from the submarine. “There’s the second signal. We’ve only got a few minutes.”
Mallory pulled as hard as she could, rowing until her arms felt like lead.
Suddenly Derek said, “Listen.” But Mallory had already heard it. “They’re coming,” Derek said. “I don’t think we can make it, Mallory.”
“We’ve got to try.”
They could now make out the small German craft as it cleaved the water, headed toward them.
“They’ve seen us!” Mallory gasped.
“It’s too far to the sub—we’ll never make it!”
The small boat shot toward them, the roar of the engine getting louder. Derek pulled out his pistol and began to fire, but they kept coming. Throwing the pistol down, he pulled with all his might on his oar. “Pull, Mallory, pull,” he yelled.
Three soldiers in the other boat were standing up, their automatic weapons trained on Mallory and Derek. Mallory’s heart went dead within her. When the boat came closer, a German officer in the front ordered, “Stop your rowing!”
Both Derek and Mallory put down their oars. When the officer and a private leaped into their small craft, she immediately recognized Lieutenant Uldrich Stahl.
“Well, Miss Winslow and Major Grüber. You’ve given us quite a run, but it’s over now.” He waved his Luger. “We have some entertainment planned for the two of you, but I’m sure you knew that.”
Desperately Mallory tried to think of some way to escape, but the soldiers in the German boat were alert.
“You can just row us back to land. That submarine is due for a surprise in a few minutes. It’s quite a feat capturing an American female spy and a turncoat German officer and destroying a submarine. I think I will be a major before this is over, and I’ll be there for your hangings—both of you.”
Mallory turned away from the leering face of Stahl, and her eyes met Derek’s.
“Well, what is this? A love affair? That will make even a better story. All right. We’ll just wait here until your submarine is sunk. Then the destroyer will pick us up.”
****
Captain Bishop had excellent night vision, and he had been watching the pair row the small boat as it approached. They were no more than a hundred yards away when the rumble of the engine from the German boat reached them. “Something’s wrong,” he said to Moore.
“What is it, Captain?”
“I can’t be sure, but I’m afraid our people may have been captured by a German squad.” He watched as an officer leaped into the boat waving a pistol.
“What should we do, Captain?”
Captain David Bishop was a man noted for quick thinking and quick action. He saw his mission going down the drain and considered the fact that if the Germans knew about the escapees, they could also have a moored ship in the area. Still, he wasn’t afraid to take chances when he felt it might be worthwhile.
“You gunners, get ready to fire!” He looked up and yelled, “Put a light on those boats, Ensign.”
Instantly a bright searchlight stabbed out into the darkness, and all the men on deck saw the two boats. “That’s a German boat to the right. Blast it out of the water, Hartness!”
Almost before he had stopped speaking, a fifty-caliber machine gun broke the silence of the night with its raucous noise. Captain Bishop could see the slugs tearing into the side of the German boat, splintering it. Two of the men fell at once. The others opened fire with their automatic weapons, and Moore yelled, “Give it to them! Sink the dirty Krauts!”
The private standing over Derek lifted his weapon and began firing toward the searchlight. Derek, seeing his chance, sprang up and knocked the soldier into the water. He turned to pounce on Stahl, who was lifting his pistol, but before he had a chance, Mallory struck the man’s head with her oar and he fell limply to the bottom of the boat.
“Quick, we’ve got to get out of here!” Mallory exclaimed. “They might hit us by mistake.”
Derek returned to his seat and the two rowed as hard as they could. As they watched, the German attack boat, which was sinking fast, was riddled with bullets, leaving the rest of the crew dead. They heard the sergeant whom Derek had pushed into the water calling out for help, but in the frigid water he could not stay afloat long, and his cries dwindled, then were gone.
They reached the sub, and hands reached down and pulled them aboard.
“What about this German, sir?” one of the sailors asked. “Is he dead?”
“No, it looks like he’s coming around.”
“Bring him on board.”
At that instant a voice cried, “Captain, enemy vessel
approaching off port bow!”
Bishop turned and saw the destroyer coming directly at them. “There’s no time to dive,” he yelled. “We’ll fire all forward torpedoes and hope for a hit. And get that deck gun firing, Swanson!”
The deck crew was ready, and they began firing the gun at once. The fifty-caliber weapon rattled loudly, sending a stream of bullets toward the fast-approaching destroyer.
Captain Bishop had relayed his orders to the third lieutenant. The submarine rotated around by Bishop’s orders until it was squarely facing the oncoming destroyer. “Fire all forward torpedoes!” Bishop yelled.
A voice below echoed the order, and the submarine shuddered beneath Mallory’s feet as the tracks of the four torpedoes spread out. Derek put his arm around her, and they watched the destroyer, which obviously intended to ram them. The deck gun was firing rapidly, but there was no sign of any damage.
“Not much chance, Captain, firing blind like this head-on.”
“There’s always a chance, Charlie,” Bishop said tersely.
He had no sooner spoken than a torpedo hit the destroyer directly in the bow. The big ship swerved, and then suddenly an explosion ripped through the sky.
“We must have hit their munitions store!” Bishop yelled.
“Quick, let’s get out of here! Everyone below!”
Derek and Mallory knew nothing about submarines, but they were shepherded down below and waited until the hatch was closed.
“Dive—dive!” the captain ordered.
The submarine at once began to dive, and Derek and Mallory held on to the closest thing available to maintain their footing. It gave Mallory an eerie feeling to think they were going under the sea.
Captain Bishop commanded, “Periscope depth!” And then a few minutes later he was peering through the periscope. “She’s going down!” he said happily. “Here, take a look, Charlie.”
The second officer had his look, and then the other officers took their turns.
“You two were a lot of trouble,” the captain said to Derek and Mallory before he introduced himself.
“My name is Derek Grüber, and this is Miss Mallory Winslow.”
“And who is this?” Bishop asked as Lieutenant Stahl got to his feet. Blood was running down over his face, which was as pale as paper.
“Let me introduce you to Lieutenant Uldrich Stahl of the SS,” Mallory said.
“Well, I’m happy to know you under these circumstances, Lieutenant. I’m sure our people in London will want to talk with you.”
“How long will it take us to get to England?” Mallory asked.
“We’ll make a very quick trip. We’ll get out of here as soon as that ship is completely down.”
“Mason, guard the lieutenant well,” he said to his third lieutenant. “I think he might be of some use to our people.” Then turning to Mallory and Derek, he said, “It was close there for a while. I thought we were going to lose you.”
Mallory suddenly felt all the pressure that had built up inside of her leave. She took Derek’s arm and said, “Thank you for coming to get us, Captain. You look like an angel.”
“I’ve been called lots of things, but never an angel. Come along. We’ll have tea, and you can tell me your story.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
“We’ll Be Together”
The door to Colonel Ludwig Ritter’s office burst open, and Ritter looked up, a curse on his lips for whoever dared to interrupt him so rudely. The words died when a burly man wearing the uniform of a general seemed to fill the room. Ritter leaped to his feet and saluted, for he knew this man well.
“General Dengler! I-I wasn’t expecting you, sir.”
General Otto Dengler was a massive man with a broad, brutal face. He was feared and dreaded in the SS and known for his cruelty, not only to his enemies, but even to his own men on occasion.
“I’m sure you weren’t expecting me, but you should have been, Ritter!” Dengler’s voice was harsh, and he glared at the smaller man with disgust. A major dressed in the black uniform of the SS had entered with Dengler, and he shut the door firmly. He had a face like a shark, and there was a cruel smile on his thin lips as he studied Colonel Ritter.
“General, if I had known you were coming, I would have—”
“You would probably have tried to leave the country! What a dismal mess you have made of this business!”
“What business, sir?” Ritter squeaked, his voice almost leaving him. He hardly had the breath to speak, and the faces of the two officers told him all he needed to know. Ever since Lieutenant Stahl’s failure to capture the two fugitives, he had been dreading just such a moment. “I’m sure I can explain. It was all Lieutenant Stahl’s fault!”
“You were in command, I believe,” Dengler snarled. He advanced closer, and Ritter seemed to shrink before the bulk of the brutal form. “What idiocy possessed you to send a force of only six men on a mission like this? We had troops stationed on shore. You could have had a company surround the area!”
“Lieutenant Stahl felt it would be better—”
“Shut your mouth, Colonel Ritter! And, by the way, it’s not Colonel Ritter anymore. It is now Lieutenant Ritter, and you’re lucky we don’t plan to have you shot!”
“But, General Dengler, you can’t do that to me!”
“We’ll see whether I can or not! You’re incapable of running a desk, so we’ll see how you do in a combat outfit. We’re making you a first lieutenant in a crack company of the Fifth Army. I think he’ll like that, don’t you, Major?”
The major smiled and looked more than ever like a shark. “I believe the combat life of a lieutenant in that company is something just under three minutes, General.”
The former colonel had turned as pale as paste. His lips trembled, and he could not say a word.
“Get out of here! You’ll get your orders at once. Be ready for some action. I expect you’ll win the Iron Cross, a brave man like you. Now get out!”
As soon as Ritter had left, General Dengler said, “Watch him, Major! He may try to kill himself. On the other hand, if that’s what he wants, let him do it.”
The major smiled smoothly. “It will be his choice either to kill himself here or get himself killed for the glory of the Fatherland.”
****
Captain Bishop was saying his good-byes to Derek and Mallory. Their time had been short, for the journey to England had been quick. A flotilla of heavy ships had escorted them in, allowing them to travel on the surface. Now they had docked, and standing on the deck of the Tiger, the major said, “I wish you the best of luck, Major.”
“Not a major any longer, Captain.”
“I suppose that’s true.” Turning to Mallory, he said, “And you, Miss Winslow. Will you be going back to Africa now?”
“I think that will be up to the authorities. I would like very much to help with the work in Norway.”
“I expect you would get rather a warm welcome,” Bishop said wryly. “But I doubt very much if that will be possible.”
“Perhaps not.” Mallory lifted her chin defiantly. “But one day I’m going back. My heart is still with the Lapps.”
Captain Bishop was aware of the problems that faced the two, especially the German. He studied Derek’s face and shook his head. “Well, Grüber, I wish you the best of luck.”
“Thank you, Captain.”
“And now this is good-bye, Miss Winslow.” Bishop watched as they walked off the sub onto the dock. They were met by two uniformed guards and a civilian. “Strange pair,” he said. “A war produces some funny stories.”
As Derek and Mallory stepped onto the dock, a small man stepped forward and put out his hand. “My name is Hadley, James Hadley. You are Major Grüber, I take it.”
“Not major any longer. Just mister, I suppose.”
“Ah yes. Well, that’s true, I take it. And this is Miss Winslow?”
“How are you, Mr. Hadley?”
“Very well, thank you.” Hadley looked
rather frail, as a matter of fact, but there was a quickness about him that neither of the pair missed. “We will be seeing quite a bit of one another. I will be taking your stories.”
“Are you with the Secret Service, sir?” Derek asked directly.
“Something like that. You may consider yourselves guests of the British government.”
Derek glanced at the two heavily armed guards wearing large pistols in their belts and holding rifles in their hands. He smiled and nodded. “Of course.”
Hadley did not miss the sudden bit of humor and smiled also. “A necessary precaution. You are a very valuable man, sir. And, Miss Winslow, you will be wanting to speak with your parents—to contact your family, I’m sure.”
“Yes, I would, Mr. Hadley.”
“For the time being you will be housed at an estate just outside of London.”
“Mr. Hadley, what’s going to happen to Derek?”
“Why, my dear Miss Winslow, it’s far too early to say.” He knew more about this young woman than she supposed, having checked into her background thoroughly. He said nothing of this, however. “If you’ll follow me, we have a car waiting. I’m sure you’ll welcome a bath and a good meal after your adventures.”
****
“This is a beautiful place, isn’t it, Derek?”
“Yes, it is. And we’ve been treated most royally.”
The two were seated in a large room with high ceilings and beautiful paintings on the wall. The carpet was expensive, and a fire crackled in the huge fireplace built of native stone. They were drinking tea, and from time to time, one of them would glance at the man who sat a short distance away. He appeared to be ignoring them, but they were sure he was actually a guard keeping a close eye on them. He wore no uniform, but they had no doubt he had a concealed gun.
“It’s been an odd time. I feel like I’m in limbo,” Derek murmured.
“Do you suppose we’ll be interrogated again today?”
“I expect so, although I don’t know what else I can tell them.”
“Mr. Hadley knows more about us than he lets on. Why, he even knew about things that happened to me when I was young.”
“I don’t think you have any problem, Mallory, but they can’t make up their mind what to do about me, can they?”
The Unlikely Allies Page 26