‘Friendly bastards, aren’t they?’ Branting grinned as he waved back.
‘Let’s hope that they are not overly friendly and request us to stop and visit with them,’ replied Sweeny dryly.
The river was beginning to sweep round in a sharp curve towards the north now, turning around a sort of headland and broadening considerably. The current was stronger here and Sweeny had to increase the power — but not too much because the Kelvin started to make belligerent noises.
‘If we get beyond the reach of the town it should be a clear run up beyond Glamstad,’ Branting grunted in satisfaction.
Sweeny was just beginning to relax when a low grey hull suddenly shot out of a small rivulet a few hundred yards ahead. It was a speedboat which turned its razor-sharp bow towards them. On its for’ard casing was mounted a heavy Spandau machine-gun with two men in naval uniforms and steel helmets crouching behind it. There were uniformed figures in the wheelhouse and two sailors at the rear carrying Schmeisser machine-pistols. From the stern a red, white and black Swastika fluttered. The frothing bow wave indicated the speed of the vessel.
Sweeny ceased to feel tense. He moved coldly and deliberately.
‘No half measures, Branting,’ he muttered. ‘We can’t survive an inspection. It’s us or them. Let Woods know!’
Branting moved with studied casualness out of the wheelhouse and went to the hatchway which led down into the crew’s cabins.
‘German patrol boat coming at us,’ he called softly to Woods. ‘Either they go under or we do. Right?’
He turned back without waiting to hear Woods’s reaction.
Three metres away the motorbarkasse had slowed, the roar of its heavy diesel engine muted to a soft purring. It began to ease alongside. The gunner behind the vicious-looking Spandau on the foredeck was professional. The muzzle of his machine gun made a lateral sweep extending fore and aft of the barge. Sweeny could see that the two sailors at the rear held their Schmeissers at the ready. They were expecting trouble. There were three men in the wheelhouse. A rating at the wheel, a petty officer and a lieutenant. They were all regular German navy. Seven men in all. Sweeny eased back the throttle.
The officer, a young, fair-haired youth, came out of the wheel-house.
‘Stop your vessel at once. I wish to come aboard.’
His Norwegian was perfect and idiomatic.
Sweeny glanced at Branting. ‘Stand by!’ he hissed.
The diesel engine of the motorbarkasse increased in volume as the helmsman eased the wheel to bring the patrol vessel rubbing alongside the old barge. The two sailors jumped from the stern of their ship and went forward, taking up positions with levelled machine pistols. Sweeny found he had time to admire their professionalism and precision.
‘Spandau first, Schmeissers next,’ Sweeny said, knowing that against the automatics they did not stand a chance.
The young lieutenant was beginning his leap for the deck of the barge.
‘Now!’ yelled Sweeny. He brought his Webley up through the open wheelhouse and fired. His first bullet smashed into the head of the gunner. It was a lucky shot and sent the man spinning from his position behind the machine-gun. He cannoned into his companion, who was waiting to feed the ammunition belt. The man recovered in an instant and dived towards the handgrips.
Branting’s shot caught the man in the chest.
The young lieutenant, halfway between the two vessels, was doomed. Sweeny wheeled round and fired twice more. The shots dropped him into the water in the gap separating the two vessels. If there had been any chance of him surviving the bullets, a sudden surge of water, which brought the motorbarkasse smashing into the side of the barge, finished him.
Even then, those on the barge did not really stand much of a chance. One of the men with the Schmeisser machine pistols had opened up, sending a stream of bullets into the wheelhouse and causing both Sweeny and Branting to hit the deck as glass smashed and wood splintered above them.
Then one of the sailors seemed to throw up his machine pistol into the air and pivot, arms above his head, before falling to the deck. There was a moment in which the man’s companion stood bewildered. Even as he turned to bring his gun back into action, Sweeny was up and fired again, sending the man crashing to the deck. Beyond him, Woods emerged from the for’ard hatch, his face curiously white, his Webley in his hand.
Sweeny was scrambling out of the wheelhouse now, hearing the increasing roar of the motorbarkasse diesels.
‘Don’t let the bastards get away!’ he cried, fumbling in his pocket. He brought out the second of the two grenades which Branting had given him. The German vessel was drawing away now, the petty officer shouting instructions at the rating, who was hunched over his wheel. Sweeny ran down the length of the deck to where the German sailors lay and threw the grenade in an arc towards the motorbarkasse. Even before it reached the apex, Sweeny had grabbed one of the dead sailors’ Schmeisser machine-pistols and was sending a spray of bullets towards the stern of the craft. There was a brief moment and then the patrol vessel erupted in a roar of flames and smoke and flying debris. It sounded like a tremendous thunderclap whose echoes reverberated over the river.
Sweeny was knocked back by the blast from the explosion but recovered swiftly. The German vessel was sinking very fast, what little was left to sink. The grenade had simply torn her apart like matchwood. Her timbers and plywood hull, tinder dry and resinous, burnt immediately. There came a second explosion from the fuel tanks and then only a whirlpool of creamy, yellow foam, with oil bubbling in it, marked the spot where the motorbarkasse had been.
He turned around slowly. Branting was already heaving the bodies of the two German sailors over the side. Woods had come up on deck, still white-faced and trembling slightly.
‘Welcome to the club,’ said Sweeny grimly, with a smile that seemed strangely fixed. ‘You have learnt just in time how to fire a gun with accuracy.’
From the direction of the fortress on the hill they could hear the whine of an alarm, sounding like a ship’s klaxon.
Sweeny began to move for the wheelhouse.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ he yelled.
‘Where?’ demanded Branting. ‘We’re done if we stick to the river now. They must have another patrol boat, or they can send a fighter plane to shoot us up.’
‘Who’s sticking to the river?’ demanded Sweeny, swinging the wheel and opening up the throttles of the old Kelvin again.
‘Where can we go?’ Woods asked, joining them.
‘Around the next bend. As soon as we’re out of sight of the castle, I intend to beach her. It will be dark in less than an hour and we can take to the hills. There’s still a good chance we can elude the Germans and get through those mountains to Sweden. I’m not giving up now.’
CHAPTER FIVE
They sheltered in a thicket, watching the German scout plane as it circled overhead, swooping close to the old barge which had dug her bow into the soft mud of the embankment about fifty feet below them. They had abandoned the vessel and scrambled up the banks toward the lower slopes of the hills, which were covered in thick forest. The pine woodland, interspersed with birches, alders and elms, carpeted the hills and valleys for miles in every direction from Kongsvinger, which was one of the centres of Norwegian forestry. They kept low as the aircraft moved aimlessly around obviously searching for them.
Sweeny and Branting now carried the Schmeisser machine-pistols which they had recovered from the dead sailors. Woods, more confident now of his ability to use his Webley, was covering Hersleb.
‘We’d better start moving, because they’ll soon have troops here,’ Branting advised as Sweeny stared up at the aircraft.
‘You know this area, Branting,’ Sweeny nodded. ‘What route do you suggest?’
Branting thought a moment before replying. ‘It’s best to head due east over the hills, but night will fall in an hour or so and it wouldn’t be wise to be out on the hills in these clothes. We’ll suffer exposure.
’
‘Is there an alternative?’
Branting made an affirmative gesture.
‘I remember a small village, maybe five miles away. There’s an hotel there. It’ll probably be shut now, but it was a tourist centre for winter sports, climbing, skiing and mountain trekking. When I was there about a year ago they kept supplies of equipment for their guests. If we could equip ourselves there, we could head up into the high mountains and be across the border within twenty-four hours.’
‘All right,’ Sweeny nodded. ‘It seems like the only game in town. We’ll try it.’
*
Feldwebel Weiss stood respectfully silent while Hauptmann Eschig took the telephone call from the officer in charge of the Geheime Feld Polizei in Kongsvinger. Weiss watched his superior’s face pale and his mouth tighten.
‘Are you telling me that seven men and a patrol vessel were simply wiped out, almost under the guns of the fortress of Kongsvinger?’ Eschig said slowly.
Weiss frowned, trying to understand the message by reading Eschig’s features.
‘I see. I see.’ Eschig was nodding. ‘They ran the barge aground exactly where? How about your search aircraft? What direction? Glambergel … what’s that? Ah, through the mountain passes.’ He listened for a few moments, then nodded again, vigorously. ‘Das is sehr gut! The Wurttembergische Gebirgsbataillon? First rate mountain troops. Good. Yes, I’ll be coming up to direct operations personally.’
Eschig replaced the receiver, picked it up again and jangled the rest impatiently.
‘Put me through to the field commander of the Kongsvinger area,’ he demanded. Then, with a hand over the receiver, he glanced up at the impassive Weiss. ‘Sweeny is quite a man. He’s just written off a motorbarkasse and seven men at Kongsvinger and still managed to get his party away into the mountains. Get me a large-scale map of the Glambergel region, just east of Kongsvinger.’
Weiss turned to a file, found the map and spread it in front of Eschig, who drummed his fingers as he waited for his call to go through.
A moment later the Abwehr captain straightened in his seat.
‘Good evening, Herr Generalmajor. Yes, I have been informed. Herr General von Falkenhorst has placed me in charge of the matter. I understand that you have several companies of the Wurttembergische Gebirgsbataillon in your command area. May I suggest, Herr Generalmajor, that you send two companies of these troops into the mountains to head off these people before they get to the Swedish frontier? The Wurttembergers are the best equipped mountain troops we have and they should be able to cut them off without difficulty.’
Eschig listened to the brief reply with his head to one side.
‘I appreciate this, Herr Generalmajor. How soon can they leave? Within half an hour? That is good. I shall be flying up to Kongsvinger in the morning. Thank you, Herr Generalmajor.’
*
It was dark by the time Sweeny’s party reached the outskirts of the village. It had taken them nearly three hours of hard walking and some climbing to reach the valley in which the picture-postcard buildings stood, half sheltered by the forest and surrounding a small lakelet. Dominating the buildings was a large wooden construction looking like an overgrown Swiss chalet. It had a wooden veranda on its lower floor and balconies running all round the building on the first and second floor level.
‘That’s it,’ Branting sighed. ‘The Hotel Vinger.’
They halted on the edge of the pine forest while Sweeny examined the terrain.
‘There doesn’t seem to be anyone about,’ he mused. ‘Everything is in darkness.’
‘Who would come for a holiday in the mountains now?’ Branting asked. ‘The hotel was probably shut up as soon as the news of the invasion came.’
Sweeny and Branting went forward, leaving the others waiting silently among the trees. They scrambled onto the veranda and walked carefully round, peering into the windows, most of which were shuttered so that the interior was inaccessible to prying eyes. Sweeny found a side window which yielded to a few expert twists of his knife.
‘I’ll go and open the main doors, Branting. You bring the others up.’
He slipped over the sill and found himself in the gloom of the grand foyer. The atmosphere was still and slightly musty. He made his way to the main doors and withdrew the bolts. Branting had brought everyone up and they stumbled in, exhausted and cold, as soon as he opened the doors.
‘Well,’ said Woods, smiling round in the gloom, ‘it looks as if we have this place to ourselves. Who’s for a drink?’
He turned to the deserted bar just as a voice snapped: ‘Who are you?’
They froze. Sweeny recovered first, turning slowly in the direction of the voice and cursing himself for not spotting the obvious. The main doors had been bolted from the inside and no lock had been turned from the outside. Any simpleton should have realized that whoever had closed the doors would still be within the hotel.
On the far side of the foyer a door had been thrown open and an elderly man stood there. He was clad in an old-fashioned dressing gown and he carried a stick. Just behind him an old woman was peering in consternation over his shoulder.
‘The hotel is closed,’ said the man slowly, the nervousness in his voice becoming obvious. ‘How did you get in? What do you want?’
It was Inge who broke the tension by stepping forward, hands outstretched as if pleading.
‘My friends, I believe I am speaking to loyal Norwegians. We badly need your help. We are in trouble with the Germans for we, too, are loyal Norwegians.’
The old man’s face was stony in the semi-gloom. He made no reply.
‘We need to rest for the night. We need food and something warm to drink. And we need clothes and skis in order to cross the mountains.’
‘Anna, get a light,’ said the old man slowly, not moving, the stick still in his hand. They could have easily overpowered him but Sweeny decided it was best to do things by persuasion rather than force. The old woman disappeared behind the bar and emerged a moment later with an old kerosene lamp which she lit, spreading a warm glow through the foyer.
‘I am the janitor here,’ the old man said grimly, as he examined each of them in the light. ‘It is my job to protect this hotel and its possessions until the owner returns.’ He thrust out his chin defiantly. ‘You are all strangers here. We do not know you.’
Arne Branting took a step forwards.
‘I have stayed at this hotel many times while I have skied and climbed in these mountains, my friend. Strangers? No, we are Norwegians. If it is strangers that you want to see then you will soon see Germans. They will be coming here soon to take this hotel, and they will not leave when you ask them to.’
The old man frowned. ‘I have a duty to the owner,’ he said stubbornly.
Inge reached out a hand to him.
‘But if you are a loyal subject of our King then you must help us.’
The old man pulled himself up, looking at her indignantly.
‘I’m as loyal a subject as any,’ he retorted. ‘But I know my duty.’
‘There is no duty greater than the protection of His Majesty’s subjects against the invaders,’ replied Inge.
The old man’s shoulders suddenly slumped in resignation.
‘What can I do against so many?’ he mumbled, half to himself.
It seemed that he had somehow given his permission, for his wife moved forward, smiling nervously.
‘Come,’ she said, her glance encompassing them all. ‘I will show you to rooms where you may rest. There is food if someone assists me.’
Inge took her arm and smiled warmly.
‘You are very kind.’
The old woman shrugged and gestured towards her husband, who was standing with bowed head.
‘Take no notice of Ottar. It is hard for him to adjust to these troubled times. But we must all do what we can to save our country, is this not so?’
While the old woman led the others up to the rooms, with Woods making sure
that Hersleb was locked in a small room by himself, Sweeny and Branting prevailed on the old man, Ottar, to show them to the hotel’s storerooms in the basement. They were a veritable Aladdin’s Cave of clothing and sports equipment which the hotel maintained for the use of its guests. There was all manner of warm clothing and ski-ing equipment. There was even a pair of field-glasses. Branting, who had some expertise here, was set to the task of sorting out suitable materials for the morning’s trek.
After supper, Sweeny gathered Inge, Woods and Branting together and spread a map of the district, taken from the hotel stocks, on the table before them.
‘It’s up to you, Branting, to suggest a route,’ he said.
Branting grimaced. ‘We could be in Sweden on Sunday if we follow these passes through the fjells. That way we could avoid any German search.’
Sweeny bent forward, frowning over the map as Branting traced a line on it with his finger.
‘That’s fairly high up,’ he observed. ‘Surely it would mean retracing our steps almost back to the river and coming up through this valley near the main road? The Germans would certainly have patrols in this area.’
Branting shook his head.
‘There is an alternative route which I’ve climbed on two occasions. Up this kliev.’
Woods pursed his lips.
‘Climb a rock face?’
‘Yes,’ Branting acknowledged. ‘But it would put twenty-four hours onto the journey if we went down through the valleys.’
‘But there are eleven of us, including a reluctant man, and what about Trina Lanstrad’s ankle? Didn’t she sprain it in the cemetery?’ Inge asked.
‘I checked her ankle,’ Woods intervened. ‘It’s perfectly OK now. She must have wrenched it on a root or something but she didn’t sprain it.’
‘There we are then,’ Branting smiled. ‘Most of us have done some climbing and skiing before. I’ve asked the others. The kliev will bring us to a path on the mountain which leads onto a small plateau. We cross that and then its fairly straightforward until we come to the glacier …’
The Valkyrie Directive Page 19
