by Glenn Meade
Salter laughed, pulled hard. The nail sheared from the finger. The Arab stiffened, beads of sweat rising on his face, its expression twisted in pain, but he didn’t scream.
“Changed your mind yet?”
Hassan gritted his teeth, blood dripping from his injured finger, clenched his eyes shut against the agony.
“No? Then let’s try another.” As Salter moved to grip the next nail, there was a burst of machine-gun fire from somewhere outside. “What the bloody—?” He jumped to his feet as one of his men stormed into the room.
“We got trouble on the way, boss. Lots of it.”
64
* * *
00:50 A.M.
When Weaver arrived at the Shabramant crossroads, the headlights caught the unmistakable lattice of tire tracks in the dust. He was filled with dread, slammed his fist into the dashboard with frustration. “Damn! It looks like Sanson got his reinforcements, and he’s been and gone.”
“What now?”
“Put your foot down, hard as you can.”
SHABRAMANT
1:00 A.M.
Sanson and his men had crawled towards the sand dunes opposite the gates, everything going smoothly until the last few minutes before the assault. He could make out the sentry boxes in the wash of silver moonlight, the outlines of a half-dozen barrack huts, lights on in several of the windows. But apart from the two guards, smoking and chatting as they leaned against one of the boxes, he noticed no other activity in the camp.
He gestured to the two scouts, their faces still blackened, and they slipped forward on their bellies, vanishing into the shadows like ghosts. They reappeared across the road minutes later and overpowered the two guards, but one of the sentries managed to let out a muffled scream before a hand cut off his cry.
“Let’s pray no one’s heard the noise,” Sanson fumed. He turned to the major.
“Get those gates open and see if you can find out from the sentries where Salter is, then bring me the bullhorn.”
“Yes, sir.”
Sanson led the way towards the gates, and when they were opened, he instructed the men to spread out and move forward. “Don’t open fire unless I give the order.”
They had hardly moved a dozen paces when the door of the nearest hut opened, fifty meters away, and a couple of men stepped out cautiously, looking as if they’d decided to investigate the disturbance.
“Get down!” Sanson ordered, and everyone threw themselves to the ground, but it was too late. The two men wore British army uniforms and were armed with Sten guns, and when they saw the intruders they opened up, firing wildly, before vanishing back inside the hut and dousing the lights.
The major darted up beside Sanson, dropped himself flat on the ground. “Bloody bad luck—we almost had them by surprise.”
“Give me the bullhorn.” The major handed it over, and Sanson shouted into the mouthpiece. “This is Lieutenant Colonel Sanson, military intelligence. We have the airfield surrounded. Put down your weapons and come out with your hands up.”
Glass shattered in one of the windows, a Sten gun was poked through, and a chatter of fire whistled above Sanson’s head as he ducked for cover.
“If that’s their answer, so be it. Bring up the armored car. And get some men round the back of the huts to cover the rear, in case anyone’s stupid enough to make a break for it.”
The major spoke on the field radio, and within a minute the armored car had roared in through the gates, followed by the troop carrier. They drove forward and swung right, covering the troops as they crouched behind the vehicles. Sanson tapped on the car’s armor plate with his revolver, a metal flap opened in the door, and the face of the machine gunner appeared.
“Rake the huts with fire, one by one,” Sanson ordered. “We’re going to flush them out.”
• • •
Salter had doused the office lights the instant he’d heard the first rattle of gunfire. He fumbled his way to the window, where one of his men was hunched down with a Sten gun. They heard the metallic voice from the bullhorn, followed by a second burst of fire. “It’s the army, boss. And it sounds like they mean business.”
An armored car and a troop carrier with a heavy machine gun started to hammer one of the huts with a deadly salvo of fire, and less than a hundred yards away Salter noticed shadowy figures move in the darkness. He was confused, seething with anger. “How did the bloody sods know we were here?”
“It beats me. But we’re in the deep end, no two ways about it.”
A stray burst of fire shattered the window, and the man went to raise the Sten gun in reply, but Salter stopped him. “Don’t be bloody daft, you’ll give our position away.” He turned to the four of his men still in the hut. “One of you stay here, the rest try and get to the others, out the back way. Tell them we’re breaking out, pronto. It’s everyone for himself.”
Three of the men moved towards the rear of the hut, and Salter crouched with the remaining man beside the window, saw more shadows moving closer in the darkness. In the other buildings, the rest of his gang were putting up stiff resistance by the sound of it, answering the attack with chattering machine-gun fire. “How many do you reckon there are?”
“Too many from the looks of it. And it won’t be long before they have us covered, every which way.”
Salter fumed in anger as one of his trucks parked outside a neighboring hut had its tires shredded by deliberate gunfire. “The sods are making sure we can’t escape. Well, we’ll see about that. Get out to the nearest hangar at the back. See if you can find us any kind of transport. I’ll be right behind you, soon as I take care of the wog.”
“Right, boss.” The man crawled across the floor towards the rear corridor. Salter crouched over Hassan, still tied to the chair, and pointed the tip of the Sten gun barrel in his face. “Looks like it’s just you and me, sweetheart. It’s time to talk or die. Where’s Deacon and his friends? Tell me, and you live to fight another day. Don’t, and your head’s going to look like a pulped melon.”
Another shower of stray fire exploded into the room, breaking glass, rounds stitching the wall and riddling the field radio’s metal chassis. Salter wiped perspiration from his face, tightened his finger on the trigger, pressed the barrel into the Arab’s forehead. “I don’t mean to rush you, matey, but if you don’t answer soon you mightn’t have a bleeding choice. This is it. Last chance. Where are they?”
Sweat glistened on Hassan’s face. “On the Nile bank. A villa called Maison Fleuve.”
“Exactly where on the Nile bank?”
Hassan told him, and Salter grinned in the shadows. “You wouldn’t be lying to me, would you?”
“It’s the truth. Take me with you. I show you.”
“Oh, don’t you worry, mate, you definitely will if we get out of this alive. Your friends have a few questions to answer.” Salter loosened the ropes, pointed towards the corridor with the gun, as more stray fire ripped into the hut, sending splinters of wood flying. “Outside, the back way. Fast. And keep your head down.”
Hassan struggled from the chair. As he stumbled in the darkness, he knocked the table. Salter prodded him with the machine gun. “Move it! Or they’ll be on top of us.” Hassan noticed his knife, still planted in the desk. He stumbled again, deliberately this time, grabbed the hilt, yanked it from the wood, and slipped the blade unseen into his sleeve. “I said move it!” Salter roared.
• • •
At the back door of the hut, Salter began to panic. The gunfire was getting closer. He saw his man hurry towards them in a sweat, wheeling a battered-looking motorcycle, a green-painted Moto Guzzi, the engine already running. “What’s that?”
“There was nothing in the hangar, boss, except a couple of push-bikes and this bloody ancient motorcycle.”
“I don’t care how old it is, is it working?”
“Seems to be, and there’s fuel in the tank.” He frowned at Hassan. “We can’t take the wog. There’s only room for two.”
&n
bsp; “You’re right.” Salter coldly brought up the Sten and squeezed the trigger, sending the stunned man reeling back, dancing in a chatter of fire.
“Get on the bike. You’re driving.” He pushed Hassan forward. The Arab swung round, the blade in his hand. Salter’s eyes were beacons of horror as he tried desperately to raise the Sten. The knife slashed at his throat, a deep gash opened in his neck, and his head went back, spouting blood. Hassan moved in for the kill, planted the blade deep in his chest.
Salter screamed, and as he staggered back Hassan snarled, “Go keep the Devil company, Englishman.”
Salter collapsed, his tunic drenched in blood, and Hassan retrieved his knife, picked up the Sten, hung the weapon by its sling from his shoulder. He climbed unsteadily onto the Moto Guzzi, his jaw still on fire, just as a Jeep skidded around the corner, three soldiers on board. He raised the Sten, let go with a long chattering burst, and the vehicle reversed wildly.
• • •
Sanson led the men towards the barrack office, taking cover behind the troop carrier. It was the last building to be stormed; the others had already been taken, Salter’s gang putting up heavy resistance until they realized that the odds were overwhelming. A group of confused and shaken Egyptian air force men had been led out from one of the huts, their hands tied behind their backs, several injured from flying glass, but neither Halder nor Salter was among the dead or captured, and with only one building remaining, Sanson was getting anxious. “Give them a warning to surrender.”
The major raised the bullhorn. “Lay down your weapons and come out with your hands in the air. Fail to obey the order, and we open fire.”
There was no reply, and Sanson said, “Give me a couple of grenades.”
The major handed over the grenades and Sanson lobbed one through a shattered window, then another. Two flashes and two explosions followed, then he ordered the machine gunner on top of the carrier to rake the front of the building. The Bren gun stitched a hail of fire across the veranda. Wood splinters erupted, the remaining windows shattered, and the door was shot off its hinges.
When the firing died, Sanson moved forward, his pistol at the ready. “Right, let’s see what we’ve got.”
• • •
Someone switched on the lights and Sanson saw the bullet-riddled field radio and Doring’s tortured corpse sprawled in a corner. “Fetch one of the prisoners. Find out what’s been happening here.”
When a burly-looking prisoner with a broken nose was ushered in, his hands cuffed behind his back, Sanson went up to him. “Where’s Salter?” he promptly demanded.
When the man hesitated, Sanson struck him a blow on the jaw. He reeled back, and Sanson cocked his revolver, a murderous look on his face. “If I have to ask again, you’ll be minus an eye.”
The man massaged his jaw. “He—he was in here last time I saw him, honest.”
Sanson pointed to the body. “Who’s that?”
“One—one of Deacon’s mates, a Jerry name of Doring. Reggie had words with him, and the Arab—”
“You’d better tell me everything that went on here. Fast. And I want to know exactly who was present when you raided the airfield, descriptions included.”
Sanson listened as Salter’s man talked, then said urgently to a couple of the troops, “See if you can find the Arab and Salter, or if anyone’s spotted them. They have to be still on the airfield. And be careful how you go, they’re both wily scum, and dangerous.” He knelt over Doring’s body. “What did he tell your boss?”
“Nothing. Kept his mouth shut to the end, the poor sod.”
Sanson stood. “Deacon’s friend you mentioned—the one dressed as an officer. I’ve reason to believe he’s a wanted German agent named Halder. I need to find him. Where is he?”
Salter’s man looked totally confused. “Bloody heck! That’s news to me. You mind me asking what’s going on?”
“Just answer the bloody question.”
“He was with us when we took the airfield, but left with one of his men. Only the wog and Doring stayed behind. Reggie said they’d be back before the aircraft landed.”
Sanson sighed bitterly with frustration, examined the shattered radio. “Did anyone contact Doring and his friends before or after we arrived?”
“Not that I know of.”
“What time are the aircraft due to land?”
“The boss wasn’t sure exactly, not until Deacon’s mates returned.”
There was a noise behind him, as one of the men Sanson had dispatched came into the room. “The Arab’s been spotted, sir. It seems our lads drove round the back a few minutes ago and saw him escape on a motorcycle. They went after him.”
“What about Salter?”
“I think we found him. He’s in a bad way.”
• • •
They carried Salter in and laid him on the desk. His breath came in labored gasps, his throat a crimson gash.
“We’ve got a medic coming. Try to hold on,” Sanson told him, but knew it was useless. Salter was bleeding to death from a horrible chest wound. Lying there on the desk, he looked like a corpse already, chalk-white, his hands clutching his chest. Sanson leaned over. “Listen to me, Salter. Deacon’s friends, they’re German infiltrators. I’ve got to find them. Do you understand me?”
Salter coughed up blood, stared up at the ceiling, eyes wide. For a few moments it seemed as if he had regained his senses. He managed to claw Sanson’s tunic, raw anger in his eyes, his voice a hoarse rattle. “The—sodding Arab—he did for me—”
Sanson could barely control his impatience. “If you know where they are, tell me, man!”
Salter gurgled, relaxed his grip, his breath coming in tortured gasps.
“Hang in there. The medic’s on his way,” Sanson urged.
“No—no good. Won’t help me—”
“Where are they, Salter? If you know, then tell me!”
• • •
Weaver saw the flashes of light two hundred yards from the airfield. Gunfire crackle and grenade explosions filled the night air, and his heart sank. He told Helen Kane to pull up and he climbed out of the car. “We’re too late. It’s already started.”
She got out of the driver’s seat and came up beside him. Weaver looked towards the airfield, his face grim, watching the flashes of light from the welter of small-arms fire. She put a hand on his arm. “There’s nothing you could have done, Harry. I hate to say it, but it’s over for your friends. Now let’s get out of here, before we both get shot.”
He took the pistol from the car, made to move off into the darkness. “If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, get out of here and back to Cairo.”
“Harry, please—by now it’s pointless.”
“I need to know what’s happened.”
65
* * *
Hassan revved the Moto Guzzi as he sped along the edge of the runway.
A burst of machine-gun fire ripped into the ground to his right, and he glanced over his shoulder. A Jeep raced after him in the darkness, three soldiers on board, clouds of dust pluming in its wake. Hassan revved the throttle harder, tried to widen the gap, but he was barely able to control the motorcycle, his hand ablaze with pain as he gripped the handlebars.
The runway came to an abrupt end and he veered left onto open ground. He was on hard-packed sand that rolled beneath the wheels in rough waves, bouncing the front absorber struts madly, sending agonizing shock waves through his body. He peered ahead into the moonlit darkness but saw only more rolling scrubland all the way to the barbed-wire perimeter. He was trapped. Gunfire raked the soil ahead of him and he glanced back again. The Jeep bounced over the rough ground, gaining on him fast.
He drove on, zigzagging, frantically searching for a sharp rise somewhere near the perimeter, until he saw a long, rising mound no more than fifty yards to his left, near the edge of the wire. Another burst of fire riddled the ground dangerously close on his left, and he swung right, then veered left again in a narrow arc,
straightened the front wheel, and headed directly towards the mound, revving hard.
The Moto Guzzi accelerated sharply, eating up the final twenty yards at full power, until it looked certain he was about to crash into the mound. At the last moment, he jerked up the handlebars and opened the throttle full. The engine screamed, the back wheels hit the rise at ferocious speed, and he sailed through the air. The motorcycle rose for a few terrifying seconds, he felt something claw savagely at his leg as he cleared the wire, and then he started to sink fast. The front wheel hit the ground forcefully, the Moto Guzzi bucked, and he came off and landed hard, grunting, the breath knocked out of him.
Dazed, he looked back to see the driver slam on his brakes to avoid hitting the mound. Too late, he skidded, and the Jeep kicked up a cloud of dust and rolled over on its side. One of the soldiers was thrown free, his body hurtling through the air. The Jeep rolled again, landed on top of the wire, and Hassan heard the muffled screams of the other two men as they were crushed beneath the vehicle.
He staggered painfully to his feet and checked the Moto Guzzi. The engine was still running, and he climbed back on and pushed the machine forward to assess the damage. The front wheel had been slightly warped. It still spun, but grated against the forks and would slow him down. The Sten gun had bruised his side when he’d fallen, the barbed wire had cut a jagged gash down his right calf, and his jaw had started to bleed again.
He heard the roar of an aircraft as a Spitfire came in low, its engines snarling, then another on its tail, the landing lights of both ablaze as they flew over the airfield, before they screamed up into the night. As he revved the motorcycle, he saw the soldier who had been thrown clear stagger to his feet, clutching his shoulder. He brought up the Sten, squeezed off a burst and, as the dazed man dropped for cover, sped away.
• • •
Weaver was halfway along the airfield perimeter road, moving fast, when he heard a motorcycle engine somewhere behind him and looked back.
