by Alan Evans
The same procedure was followed when he reported again, just before Grundmann left a few hours ago. Smith said, “So the cargo is at Heimen?”
Pettersen confirmed through Woodman, “It is, sir, so far as he knows.”
And Grundmann had gone inland. To Heimen, inevitably, because the only road out of Bergsund led there. Had he found the cargo? It would be a miracle if he had not. Was he still there?
Smith kept his face expressionless as he asked, “Is there an Englishwoman at Heimen?”
Woodman blinked but fed the question to Pettersen, who shook his head and replied tersely. Woodman said, “He doesn’t know anything about Heimen. Says he was only there for a few minutes, just long enough to rout out the owner of the boat that brought him here.”
Smith nodded, still wooden-faced, and told the interpreter, “Thank the Lieutenant and bring him along. Tell him we’re going to look for his Major Vigeland and the cargo.” He swung on Ellis, “Leave one company here to hold the place. Embark the other three companies in Cassandra.” Leaving only one company was risky, as the commander of the sole German company left in Bergsund had found out, but Smith was going to need every man he could get. He sent Dobson running to tell Merrick to return to the ship with his marines as soon as the perimeter defences of the town were taken over by the holding company left by Ellis. Then he strode rapidly down to his boat where it lay by the quayside.
As Buckley laid the boat alongside Cassandra Smith ordered Appleby, “Get hold of Dobson when he comes back to the ship and keep your party aboard this boat.” Then he was climbing the ladder to the cruiser’s deck and on up to her bridge. There he brought Galloway up to date with the situation ashore then dictated to the Yeoman a signal to Admiralty that he had taken Bergsund, submitted that the port would be a useful base for further operations, but warned that he could not hope to hold it without reinforcement and particularly air support.
Galloway was bawling orders down to the deck below where the soldiers coming off from the shore were swarming aboard: “…And get ‘em below!” He turned and asked, doubting, “D’you think there’s a threat from the air, sir?”
Smith said grimly, “I saw what the Luftwaffe did in Spain and I know what they did in Poland. They will be in business in Norway and without air cover we’ll be sitting ducks.” But he saw Galloway still did not believe him.
He asked, “Chivers?”
“Back on board, sir, with his boarding-party and the soldiers he had with him. Miller has the Wilhelmina.”
Smith nodded, “Very good.” Miller and those other survivors from Hornet who were fit for duty now formed the prize crew of the captured troopship.
He called Ellis and his company commanders to the bridge and briefed them and his own officers again as the last of the troops came aboard and the swirling snow thickened around them. Galloway, startled and worried, asked, “You’re taking the ship up there, sir?” He did not believe this, either.
Smith grinned at him but mirthlessly, “I am.” Then he went down into Per Kosskull’s boat where Buckley waited at the helm. He took with him the grey-haired Olsen, young Lieutenant Pettersen and Woodman to join Appleby’s party. There were also a dozen marines and two seamen with a leadline.
Up on the bridge Harry Vincent peered down through the snow at Smith in the boat and muttered to Galloway, “This man is worrying me again. Where the hell are we going?”
Galloway said drily, “You’re the navigator.”
“Oh, bloody funny.” Harry flapped at the snow with a gloved hand, “But you can’t see a yard forrard of the bridge in this muck. And what the hell is waiting for us at Heimen? We know there’s a battalion and more gone up there and artillery. If we go aground then God help us. They’ll use us like bottles stuck up on a wall and shoot us into very small pieces.”
Galloway was of the same opinion but held his tongue. He had voiced his worries when Smith briefed his officers, and was worried still. As were all of them at the briefing. Only Smith had been confident. Galloway thought, He’d better be right, but —
He said, “I thought you’d changed your mind about him.”
“I thought everybody had — even Ben Kelso. But now he leads us on a stunt like this!” Harry shook his head despairingly.
Cassandra sailed at midnight, with soldiers still milling on her deck and being herded below, boats from the Ailsa Grange being taken in tow. With Smith in Per Kosskull’s boat leading the way she pushed into the blizzard that was raging now, sliding past the Wilhelmina. Miller, nursing his injured arm on the bridge of the captured transport, saw the cruiser as a grey ghost in a white world and said softly, “Good luck. You’re going to need it.”
Smith was still seeing the look of incredulity on Galloway’s face as he said, “You’re taking the ship up there, sir?” Smith had to. If he was to take Heimen in the teeth of Grundmann and his force then he would need Cassandra’s guns. But what if her gunners were blinded by the snow?
He was taking a calculated risk, backing his judgement of how Grundmann would act. He had to capture Heimen and the cargo of machine tools there, deny it to the enemy. That was his duty — though he had his suspicions about those “machine tools”.
Then there was Sarah but he dared not dwell on thoughts of his daughter.
And, a constant spectre in his thoughts now, where was Brandenburg?
11
Sarah woke and jerked upright in the narrow, lumpy bed as the door of her room was kicked open. She had locked it before going to bed, as always, but now the lock was ripped from its seating and the door crashed back against the wall. The light blazed down from overhead as Fritsch flicked the switch. He stood framed in the doorway. All the time they had been in Norway, after leaving the Altmark, he had worn civilian clothes. But now he was dressed in grey-green service breeches and shirt, boots that glittered in the light.
He shouted at her, “Get dressed and packed! You have five minutes!”
The girl pushed at her blonde hair with one hand, still dazed after the sudden awakening, blinked sleepily at him and asked, “Now? Why?” Then more strongly as her thoughts came together, “You can’t order me about like —”
But by then he had switched off the light and now grabbed a handful of the blonde hair. He dragged her out of bed and across to the window, snatched the curtains aside and thrust her face against the cold glass. He ordered, “Look!”
She saw the figures running in apparent confusion about the street, the sound of their boots muffled on the trodden snow. The first flakes of another fall drifted about them. Then she heard the hoarse, guttural shouting and realised these were soldiers responding to orders. Presumably they were the Norwegian troops who had arrived in four trucks the day before and were quartered in a house at the other end of the village…
No.
She stared, at first shocked and bewildered. Then she felt sick as she accepted the awful fact. These were German soldiers.
Fritsch said, “They’re here sooner than I thought. This place is now under German rule and so are you!” He threw her back towards the bed and barked, “Five minutes!” He drew the curtain, switched on the light again and strutted out of the room. He did not close the door. He had never had to.
Sarah closed it and sat on the bed as her knees gave under her. When she had met Fritsch again aboard the Altmark he had reminded her in that interview of her friend Frau Rösing and told her the young woman was in the concentration camp of Sachsenhausen. “She is guilty of crimes against the State.” Fritsch had smiled at Sarah, “But those charges could be set aside if you co-operated.”
Sarah did not trust him, but asked, “What do you mean by ‘co-operate’?”
“I will see to it that Frau Wising and her child are freed and allowed to go to a neutral country. All you will have to do in return is to make some broadcasts for us. You will be introduced as the daughter of an officer in the Royal Navy and you will name him: Captain David Smith. Then you will testify to the justice, humanity
and benevolence of our National Socialist State and our Führer. And you will give some interviews to foreign journalists, for example from the United States, repeating the same —”
Sarah broke in, “Lies!”
Fritsch still smiled and finished, “ — sentiments. And you will deny that you have been coerced; you will say you are acting of your own free will.”
Sarah had agreed but privately resolved to renege on that agreement as soon as Mai Wising and her baby were safe. She was sure Fritsch knew that but he had smilingly agreed and she knew why: He could not touch her while she was aboard Altmark but once ashore in Germany and in the Gestapo headquarters in the Prinz Albrecht Strasse she would be in his hands. She would honour the agreement then or take the consequences. She shrank from speculating on how much of the pain of those consequences she would be able to stand before she gave in and made the broadcasts.
And she had known all the time that he wanted more than the broadcasts, though he had not said so.
Now she dressed quickly with fumbling fingers, threw open her suitcase and began to pack. She had salvaged it from the Altmark the day after her boarding in the Jossingfjord. On the night of that boarding Fritsch had dragged her off the grounded ship and onto the ice as Cossack’s men freed the other prisoners in Altmark’s holds. He had told her, sneering, “That’s a British destroyer but you’re not going with them if you want Frau Wising and her baby out of that camp.”
So she had gone with him, climbing up the hillside from the fjord, and when she heard her father calling her name below she had obeyed Fritsch’s orders for Mai Rösing’s sake and shouted, “I’m staying with them! Leave me! I want to stay with them!”
But later when Altmark’s crew refloated her and sailed her back to Germany, Kurt Larsen going with them, Sarah had defied Fritsch: “I’m not leaving Norway until I see that girl and her baby!” To her surprise, Fritsch agreed, but she had to tell the British Embassy in Oslo that she did not want repatriation to England, wanted instead to stay in Norway with Fritsch. She also made that clear to the Norwegians. She and Fritsch stayed, but he insisted they leave Oslo and so they came to Heimen. He had driven her there in the Mercedes 170V given to him by the German Embassy in Oslo. In Heimen she had waited for news of Mai Wising and Fritsch had waited for — what? She had wondered, not trusting him to release Mai and her child, suspicious of his smug patience. Now she knew.
Yesterday the people of Heimen had heard on the radio that Hitler’s forces had invaded Norway. They had told Fritsch that he was under house arrest. When the Norwegian Major Vigeland arrived with his soldiers he posted a sentry on the house to enforce that arrest.
That made no difference to Sarah. Norway had been neutral but was now an ally of her country. Despite that Fritsch still had his hold on her. If she did not obey him then Mai Rösing and her child would remain — and die — in Sachsenhausen.
Fritsch had told her, smiling, “You’ll stay with me. And we’ll wait.”
Sarah fastened the suitcase, switched off the light and twitched back the curtains to peer out into the night. She saw the Norwegian sentry had gone from the front door, of course. There were the soldiers’ voices still but they were German voices, cheerful and interspersed with hoarse laughter. The men did not run but walked and their rifles were slung on their shoulders. Any fighting was over but she had not heard a shot.
The Wehrmacht controlled Heimen and Fritsch’s patience was explained: he had known the invasion of Norway was imminent. Now she could not turn to the Norwegians for help, was completely in his power.
And Sarah knew he did not want her just for the propaganda broadcasts. In that first interview aboard Altmark, Fritsch had said the member of the Berlin underground organisation captured by the Gestapo had told them a great deal. Sarah knew he was lying. The man had worked only on the fringe of the organisation, had known only her and the Rösing’s. And Mai Rösing could have told Fritsch little or nothing because her dead husband had been her only connection with the underground.
But Sarah had been an active member and knew a lot more. She could give names, point to faces and hideouts — if she broke under questioning. And Fritsch would try any means to break her.
As if reading her thoughts he threw open the door and said softly, “Now you’re in my hands. You will play the game by my rules. And in Berlin we will have a gathering of old friends.”
She followed him out into the snow.
12
On Brandenburg’s bridge Gustav Moehle grumbled, “This snow is a curse as well as a blessing!” He sat leaning forward in his captain’s chair to peer out into the blizzard. He was taking his ship into Narvik fjord to join the destroyers there. It was a long way past midnight and in the day just ended a British destroyer flotilla commanded by Captain Warburton-Lee had swept through the fjord, sunk two of the ten German destroyers in there and killed Bonte, the officer in overall command. Kommodore Bey now commanded the surviving destroyers.
Moehle said sombrely, “It’s a sad business losing Bonte. And a lot of other good men have died. Bey should get out of there as quick as he can or the Tommis will be at his throat.”
Kurt Larsen stood close by with Paul Brunner, the Executive Officer, both of them silent. They all knew a British naval force was cruising off Narvik fjord and strained their eyes now, looking for it. The snow was a blessing because it hid them, a curse because it also hid the enemy. Any sighting, any action, would be at point-blank range. The nerves of all of them on the bridge were strung taut by the tension.
Per Kosskull’s fishing boat shoved chugging into an endless curtain of white on a surface of dull, rippled silver that was the ice-cold water of the fjord. Pettersen with Appleby and Dobson were in the little cabin out of the way but all those in the well were coated in snow. Buckley stood at the wheel with Olsen and Woodman alongside him, Smith just behind. Most of the marines were in the well, rifles slung over their shoulders, with one of the seamen waiting to take his turn with the lead. The other stood in the bow, casting the lead and calling out the depth, steadily, monotonously: “By the mark seven…By the deep eight…” Two of the marines crouched beside him, a Bren gun resting on its bipod legs between them.
Cassandra’s dark bulk loomed close astern of the boat, following the light in the boat’s stern, seen from the cruiser’s bridge as no more than a red spark burning in the night. The tubby Williams sat in the sternsheets, clutching the signal lamp on his knees and ready to send any orders from Smith to Cassandra. Olsen pointed out the buoys marking the deep water channel, continually wiped snow from his eyes to peer ahead, and muttered hoarse instructions to Buckley at the wheel. They were translated by Woodman standing hunched against the bitter cold. In between giving steering orders Olsen hummed softly, some tune that Smith did not recognise, and seemed elated by this adventure.
Smith grinned sourly and reflected that Olsen was in a position to be relatively cheerful. But suppose he were responsible for the cruiser and all aboard her…That would be a different matter. If Cassandra ran aground or was crippled and sunk in this fjord by the enemy then Smith would face a court martial. And the lives lost would lie on his conscience. If he survived.
The night wore on as Cassandra crept up the fjord and Smith squinted at his watch again and again by the light of a torch. Time was slipping away and God alone knew what the sunrise would bring in terms of support for the enemy — or himself? But he dared not trust to the latter, had to assume he was, and would be, alone. And the light of day? None of them would see the sun in this filthy weather …
Until Olsen chattered eagerly at Smith, then Woodman, frozen-faced and the snow caked on him, translated, “The village is around the next bend, sir.”
Smith heaved a sigh of relief that they were there, then his breath quickened, though he did not realise it, at the thought of the action that was imminent. He was gambling and if he lost then these men, Cassandra’s crew and Ellis’s soldiers, would pay for it in blood. The snow had eased, not
much, but the circle of visibility had widened just enough for him to see the turning ahead, the line of the marker buoys curving to disappear between the steep walls of the fjord. Was that good news or bad? He said, “Thank Mr Olsen for his help.” Then to Williams crouched in the stern with his signal lamp, “Order the ship to stop.”
When the signal was brought to Brandenburg’s bridge it only heightened the tension. Moehle took the flimsy and read it silently then paraphrased aloud, “It’s from Grundmann’s holding force at Heimen: A British warship and transport have landed troops and retaken the port. Our troops have retired to consolidate their positions. In other words they’ve had to run like hell and they’re screaming for help.” He passed the signal to Brunner and ordered, “Tell the navigating officer I want a course for Bergsund.”
Paul Brunner turned to pass on the order but called Kurt Larsen, “Do you want to bet which ‘warship’ that might be? I’ll lay odds it’s that damned cruiser we keep running into!” Then he finished triumphantly, “But if we can catch her in Bergsund fjord then we’ve got her!”
Brandenburg turned and headed out to sea.
Cassandra slowed and came to rest in response to the blinking of Williams’ lamp while the boat circled with Buckley’s hands on the helm, to slide in against the cruiser’s starboard side. Smith climbed the ladder to her deck and thence to her bridge then gave his orders. The boats being towed were hauled in to cluster along the starboard side with Per Kosskull’s boat still holding Buckley and the others. The soldiers and marines from Cassandra went down into the boats and now the launches took them in tow.
The cruiser got under way and edged forward at a walking pace, turning slowly to round the bend in the fjord. Smith and Galloway had their glasses trained to port where lay the village, as yet unseen. There also lay the enemy. The boats, towed by the launches, bobbed along at Cassandra’s starboard side, protected by her from the fire of that enemy. The fjord opened ahead of them, a hillside lifting to starboard, grey and dimly seen through the falling snow, at the limit of their vision. And there to port was Heimen, also masked by the snow so the houses and other buildings showed only as furred black squares and rectangles against the soft-falling, drifting white, and surrounded by the ragged-edged silhouette of the forest.
