“Never figured you for the singing sort, Tommy,” Price said with a grin.
“Oh aye, after a pint or three and a couple drams of uisce beatha. I won myself many a twirl with some lovely young lasses those nights, so I did, and maybe a little more than a twirl if I was lucky.”
Price stifled a laugh. “Corporal Lynch, you’re a rogue of quite questionable character! Still and all, it doesn’t sound like a bad sort of evening.”
Lynch chuckled. “A bit more energetic than cigars and brandy in the parlour, I’m willing to wager.”
“As much as I enjoy the company of my brothers and cousins,” Price replied, “I think I’d prefer dancing with one of your bonny Irish lasses.”
Lynch grunted and his smile lost some of its strength. “No offence, Lieutenant, but given your pedigree, I wouldn’t advise stepping into a pub anywhere in Armagh. Might find a few of your teeth floating in someone’s pint.”
There was an awkward silence for a few seconds.
“Tommy,” Price finally said, “what Faust said this morning...”
“What that bastard said,” Lynch replied, “was a lot of fried bollocks. I joined the RIF freely, so I did, just like all the other lads, and we went on to fight for your King George and the rest of your bloody Empire. I might not like it, and to be sure, there are times it makes me a bit mad to think on it too much. But compared to bloody maniacs like Faust and his good friends Adolf and Heinrich, you lot seem like a bargain.”
Price raised the corner of his mouth in a smirk. “Well then, glad to know we English are a ‘bargain’ compared to Hitler. Very comforting.”
They looked at each other for a moment, and then simultaneously broke into grins.
“Ah, bugger it all,” Lynch said, shifting to get comfortable in his chair. “Count me off an hour, would you? I want a bit of a snore before we make our great escape.”
Price nodded. “Then you can do me the favor before the change of the guard.”
“I’d shake on it,” Lunch muttered, closing his eyes, “but me hands are tied.”
The two Commandos managed an hour’s fitful sleep apiece. Price was awoken by the sound of the deadbolt being drawn back, and he opened his eyes to see four German faces, two of them Klaus and Dieter, peering at them from the doorway, accompanied by a pair of gun muzzles. It was the changing of the guards, and after a short exchange between the four soldiers, the door was shut again, the bolt shot home. Footsteps could be heard faintly receding on the other side of the door, and soon all was quiet again.
Price turned and mouthed to Lynch ten minutes. Lynch nodded, and began to count to himself silently, listening to any change or unusual activity from the guards outside. When the ten minutes passed without any cause for alarm or concern, the two men nodded to each other, and Lynch carefully opened the clasp knife in his hand. Although the angle was awkward, the blade was sharp enough that only a little pressure was needed to slowly saw through the rope around his wrists. Within a minute, Lynch cut through the bindings and freed his hands.
Now, the clock began to tick loudly for both men. Lynch quickly cut through the ropes around his chest and legs. Standing and hobbling over to Price while his limbs protested, painful and tingling madly as normal circulation returned, in moments Lynch cut through Price’s bonds, and the two men were finally free.
“We need another weapon,” Lynch whispered in Price’s ear.
The lieutenant nodded, and the two men looked about the room. Lynch gestured at one of the chairs and mimicked pulling it apart, but Price shook his head and touched his finger to his earlobe. They paced the room, tugging on bricks that appeared loose, even examining the spigot to see if it could be twisted free. Price bent down and carefully removed the ladle from the bucket. It was made from two pieces of metal; the bowl that held water, and the handle, made from one long piece of metal curled at one end and welded to the bowl at the other.
Price might not have been as muscular as Lynch, but he was still a fighting man, and the Commandos underwent intense physical training, preparing them for extremes of endurance and surprising reserves of strength. Gripping the bowl in one hand and the base of the handle in the other, Price gave the ladle a hard twist and the handle snapped free, the weld broken, forming a sharp, jagged tip. Price carefully pressed the jagged end against the stone wall using the bowl of the ladle, and with pressure and some movement flattened and wore away some of the weld so that the end was acceptably even and sharp enough to pierce flesh if employed vigorously.
Each man sat back down in their chair and loosely wrapped their bonds around their legs and across their chests, holding the ropes behind themselves so they didn’t slip down and give away the ruse. Lynch clutched the open clasp knife, while Price held his makeshift stiletto at the ready.
“If this doesn’t work,” Price muttered, “we’ll probably be dead in a minute.”
Lynch simply shrugged. “There’s a war on. We could’ve all been killed on the beaches of Dunkirk.”
Price sighed. “You have a point, Tommy. Shall we?”
Lynch nodded and cleared his throat.
“You bloody English prick! You arrogant tyrant! I’ll bloody kill you bastard!” Lynch shouted at the top of his lungs.
“Shut your mouth you worthless Irish dog! If we ever get out of here, I’ll have you whipped for your insolence!” Price replied just as loudly.
The two men were rewarded with the sound of the door’s deadbolt being drawn back. Klaus and Dieter stormed in, machine pistols in hand. Price and Lynch continued to sling insults at each other at the top of their lungs, and the two Germans looked dumbfounded for a moment, before they made a joke and laughed, stepping forward with the intention of slapping their captives around a little bit until they calmed down.
Price drew first blood. With one swift motion, he stood up and clamped his hand across the receiver of Klaus’ Bergmann MP-28 machine pistol, while at the same time sinking his makeshift weapon into the guard’s left eye socket. He struck so quickly that even Lynch, who was anticipating Price making the first move, was taken by surprise. Price savagely twisted and churned his weapon around inside the Klaus’ eye socket, his victim shuddering and twitching, disturbingly silent, before he finally went slack and crumpled to the ground.
Dieter was so shocked and dumbfounded, he froze for a fateful second before bringing his MP-40 around. Lynch followed Price’s lead, grabbing the German’s machine pistol over the open bolt, while his other hand slashed across the guard’s throat with the sheep’s foot blade of the clasp knife. Despite the weapon’s small size, the razor-sharp blade sliced through the Dieter’s neck with shocking ease, and bright, hot blood fountained everywhere, slapping Lynch across the face and soaking his shirt in an instant. Dieter pulled the trigger of his weapon, and Lynch felt the bolt push forward, but the web of his hand between thumb and forefinger caught the bolt and kept the weapon from firing. The dying German clamped his free hand across his throat, mouth wide and gurgling, in a futile attempt to staunch the torrent of blood pouring from his wound, but within moments his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed to the ground, finally dropping face-first into a quickly-growing pool of blood.
“My god,” Price hissed at Lynch, “that actually worked!”
“Stop talking, and start grabbing their weapons. Sir!” Lynch hissed back.
Moving with the speed of hopeful desperation, the two Commandos unbuckled the German’s webbing and stole their ammunition pouches, knives and grenades. Lynch, soaked in his victim’s blood, put Klaus’ jacket and shirt, the garments hanging loose on him. Once dressed, they buckled on the German’s helmets, then checked their weapons and spare magazines, ensuring both were in perfect order.
“I dearly hope we can get out of these Jerry uniforms soon,” Price said, fussing with his helmet’s chinstrap. “It gives me the shivers to dress like a Hun. If I’m going to die, I want to do it in my proper uniform.”
“You have to admit, these SS bastar
ds are snappy dressers,” Lynch replied with a grin.
Price made a sour face. “Come on, Corporal. Let’s get moving.”
The two men exited the room, each taking a long last look at Pritchard’s corpse. There was nothing to do about it, and a brief search of his body revealed that Faust had taken anything of personal value. They couldn’t bring him, so they vowed to avenge him instead.
Price and Lynch quickly found themselves in a short hallway with a T-intersection at the end. Realizing they were in the basement of the hotel, the two men cautiously approached the intersection, but a careful reconnoiter showed they were alone. At one end of the hallway they saw the elevator shaft and a stairwell door. The other direction led to several other doors, no doubt storage and the boiler room.
“I think we need to give our hosts a little present this evening,” Lynch said.
“The boiler room?” Price asked.
“Oh aye. My thoughts exactly.”
They quickly broke into the room, and while Price stood watch in the doorway, Lynch looked over the room. A coal-fired furnace heated the boiler, which in turn heated the water tank, providing hot water for the hotel taps. Other piping also fed to the radiator system. Unsure how to actually cause the boiler to explode, Lynch opened the firebox door, flinching away from the intense heat. Lynch grabbed a nearby shovel and began scooping burning coals from the furnace and throwing them into the coal bin in the room. He did this a half dozen times, until it was clear that some of the bin coal was catching fire. Lynch shut the furnace door and began turning and closing every outgoing valve, attempting to trap as much steam pressure as he could within the furnace.
Lynch stepped out of the room and tapped Price on the shoulder. “All right, maybe that’ll work, maybe it won’t. Let’s leave the door open, maybe the smoke from the coal fire will give them a bit of a scare.”
“All right, but how do we get out of here?” Price asked.
Lynch thought for a moment, then looked back into the room. “Of course, the bloody coal chute! There’s just a locked grate over it.”
The went back into the room, tucking their faces into their sleeves as the smoke from the coal fire began to fill the room.
“Perhaps setting fire to the coal bin wasn’t the smartest idea, after all,” Price said wryly.
Lynch grabbed the shovel and began to dump the burning coals onto the floor. In a moment the way was clear. He grabbed an iron fire-pick and jammed the sharp end into the space between the grate’s lock plate and the wall.
“Lieutenant, if you could be so kind now, and lend some assistance?” Lynch asked.
The two men heaved on the fire-pick, and with a groan of old metal, the lock plate bent and burst, flinging open the grate. The two men wasted no time climbing up into the chute, working hard to gain purchase on the slick metal surface. Finally, Lynch made it to the top, and slowly raised the metal chute cover that led to the alleyway next to the hotel. Off to his left, he could make out the dim silhouette of four SS guards standing around the mouth of the alley, weapons in hand. In the other direction, the alley took a corner and connected with another street, no doubt also guarded by the SS. The Germans were taking no chances to allow a second attack on the hotel.
“Four Jerries at the end of the alley, and I bet the other end has someone around the corner,” he whispered to Price while suppressing a cough. The coal smoke was beginning to draft up the chute, and he knew the men in the alley would begin to smell it any second now.
“We can’t stay here forever,” Price whispered back. “We slip out and head for the other end of the alley. We’ll have to be fast and strike hard.”
Making every effort at silence, the two men slowly extricated themselves from the coal chute. Luck was with them, and none of the Germans detected their movements. The two Commandos stood and readied themselves, and Lynch remembered the grenade tucked into his belt. He pulled it free, holding it up to Price, and gestured with it towards the chute.
Price thought for a moment. “It would certainly lend veracity to our ‘boiler explosion’ ruse. Do it.”
While Price held the coal chute’s cover open, Lynch crouched down and peered into the boiler room. He could see the bin illuminated by the flickering firelight of the burning coal. He unscrewed the cap at the base of the grenade, grasped the ceramic ball that acted as the pull cord handle, and gave it a good hard tug. He heard a faint pop from within the grenade, and immediately flung it down the chute as hard as he could. The grenade sailed down the chute, struck the edge of the bin, and cartwheeled into the room.
Lynch turned to Price. “Time to run like hell.”
Chapter 19
The Ruins Of Calais
July 13th, 0001 Hours
Despite all the odds, McTeague had managed to get his men into Calais without being discovered. Against their strident protests, he’d ordered Hall and White to stay behind with Bouchard and the Soulieres. If they didn’t return in 24 hours, White was to make contact with England and arrange for extraction along the coast.
Hall had argued against being left behind. “If someone gets wounded, you’re going to need me. Bouchard is stable enough, he doesn’t need around the clock care, and White knows enough to be able to clean and dress wounds.”
“Orders are orders, lad.” McTeague had said. “I’m already going to be in for it with the colonel if we make it back alive. I cannae risk losing the one reason we came here. You have to make sure that Frenchie makes it back to Blighty, come what may. D’ye understand me?”
Hall didn’t look pleased, but he’d relented in the end, giving Thatcher some of his morphine and other supplies that might help if someone was wounded. No one pointed out that, if one of them was hit badly enough to require morphine, they probably weren’t making it out of Calais alive.
The other five Commandos, as well as Chenot and Édouard, departed the cave at 1900 hours and made their way to the hidden Blitz transport. They drove to their rendezvous point, using back roads, farm trails, and any other roundabout means of avoiding German patrols or roadblocks. The trip took over an hour, but the Commandos were rewarded when they hid their vehicle nearby and reached their meeting point undetected.
Marie had been waiting for them, hidden high up in the branches of a nearby tree. She explained to McTeague and the others what had happened the previous night, how the lorry had crashed and the three Commandos were captured. She also explained that Bowen and Johnson were still observing the hotel from their sniper’s hide, and she felt confident they could make it back into the city at night, if they were careful and more than a little bit lucky.
It took three hours to infiltrate Calais. The streets were almost entirely deserted after sundown, save for German patrols and a lone, distant figure, breaking curfew and hoping to avoid being spotted. The Commandos moved along alleyways and through ruins, staying low and moving slowly but steadily into the heart of the city. When they needed to cross streets, they did so one person at a time, a quick, low dash from one alleyway to another. Everyone was at their highest state of alertness, eyes and ears straining for the sounds of hobnailed boots on the street or the gleam of moonlight off of a coal-scuttle helmet.
The city was under blackout conditions, which actually aided the Commandos; there were no streetlamps to wash away the shadows they hid within, or headlights from passing vehicles to catch them out in the open. Twice they were passed by a German military vehicle, but they were never exposed by the weak illumination from the slitted headlights. The city was so hushed, so eerily silent, that a single German word or the clink of a rifle barrel against the rim of a helmet could be heard a block away. The Wehrmacht patrols made no attempt at stealth, while the Commandos had been trained in silent operations for nearly two years. They were invisible ghosts stalking through a city of the dead.
Eventually, Marie led them back to the ruined apartment building. Following some careful challenges and responses, Bowen and Johnson were reunited with their fellow Commandos. A
fter a few subdued pleasantries, Bowen turned to McTeague, his expression asking an unspoken question.
“Aye lad, we’ve come back for them,” the Scotsman said.
Bowen nodded. “I’d expect nothing less, Sergeant. Now, how are we going to do this?”
McTeague and Bowen filled each other in on their own activities over the last 24 hours, Bowen especially eager to know what had gone on in the hotel last night. During the conversation, the two men settled in and took turns using Johnson’s spotting scope. The Germans had put up a one-block radius of roadblocks around the hotel, preventing any unauthorized traffic to get near or pass by the building. Bowen informed McTeague that the Germans were turning away all foot traffic as well.
“We won’t be able to get within a hundred yards of the hotel without having to deal with sentries. They’re operating in groups and occupying exposed locations. We won’t have a chance to cut any throats in the dark,” Bowen said.
McTeague nodded. “I think we have no choice, save hit as hard and move as fast as we possibly can. If we strike in the wee hours, perhaps three in the morning, we can be in and out before they can form a response. But this time, Nelson has prepared a bonny great surprise for the Jerries; we’ll drop the bloody building down around them.”
“Well, it sounds like he rang the dinner bell last night,” Bowen said. “I suppose it’s only right he brings dessert.”
Nelson glowered at Bowen from the corner of the room. “Sod off, you bloody wanker. There was nothing I could do, the bastards were in my face before I knew it.”
Bowen put his hands up in mock surrender. “I’m sure you made every attempt at remaining unseen and unheard. Right up to the point where you start rattling away with your Thompson and tossing grenades everywhere.”
Commando- The Complete World War II Action Collection Volume I Page 26
