By the end of a quarter of an hour the fire had so far died away that what little light remained was unimportant. Gimlet called Cub to him, and having told him to keep handy in case he needed the grenades, passed the order to advance.
"What do you think they're doing in there?" Cub asked him.
"I should say they're trying to make out how many there are of us here before they decide whether to bolt or fight it out," answered Gimlet. 'They must know they've lost the aircraft. Whether or not they have any other mechanical transport remains to be seen."
"Hello—what's happening now?" asked Cub suddenly, as smoke, increasing in volume, appeared from the lower part of the mill to drift away before the breeze. "Can they have set the place on fire?"
"More likely they're burning secret documents or something of the sort," replied Gimlet.
"Unless . . . unless they're putting up a smoke screen to cover a get-away," he added quickly. He called urgently to Copper and ordered him to move nearer to the smoke and open fire if he saw a movement.
They waited for Copper to crawl forward to his new position; and hardly was he in place when through a thin film of smoke Cub saw a car, or a vehicle of some sort, back away from an outbuilding, turn, and then move off, travelling down the line of smoke. He shouted a warning to Copper, but he needn't have bothered. Apparently Copper had seen what Cub had seen, for he made a dash forward to a fresh position from which he could enfilade the smoke trail. The moment he stopped, his Sten gun began its vicious chatter, firing short bursts, the tracer bullets with which it was loaded cutting a white line from the muzzle into the smoke. He made another dash forward and fired again. This time the effect was apparent. A car, swaying drunkenly, appeared from the smoke, and running off the old track which it had been following, sank axle deep into the soft ground of the marsh. Copper gave it another burst, raking it from front to rear, although there was no sign of life in it. At any rate, no one attempted to get out.
"That's the green car!" called Cub, recognising the vehicle by the shape of the body.
'Aye, and I reckon I've scratched a bit more of the paint off it, returned Copper.
Gimlet spoke to them. "Start moving towards the mill. Keep low. Fire at anything you see moving."
The attack advanced slowly, converging on the objective. Once Copper's gun stuttered a brisk burst. There was a tinkle of splintering glass. "You keep your 'cad inside, chum," he advised some person unseen by Cub.
At a distance of about forty yards Gimlet stopped again. Cub wondered what he would do. He also wondered what the people in the mill were doing; he felt they ought to be doing something, although the difficulties of defence were evident. The attackers could see their objective owing to its bulk, but those inside the mill could not see the attacking force in the darkness. Therefore, any shooting that they did would be guess work. It may be that they thought they could hold the building until daylight, when, of course, the advantage would swing round to their side, for they would then be under cover while the attacking force would find itself in the open, in full view.
Gimlet started crawling forward again and Cub kept near him. An occasional shot was now being fired from the windmill, but Gimlet gave orders that the fire was not to be returned because the flash of weapons would reveal their positions. What disturbed Cub more than the reports of gunshots was the occasional whoof of a gas pistol. But either these weapons were non-effective at long range or else they were entirely local in their effect, for no results could be observed.
"Pass me the bombs, Cub," ordered Gimlet. "I'm getting chilly. We'll make an end of this business."
Taking the bag containing the bombs Gimlet selected two grenades—one a 'sixty-nine'
concussion bomb, and the other an incendiary. "You stay where you are, but cover me if anything starts," he told the others. Then, cupping his hands round his mouth, he shouted:
"Hi! You, in the mill! I'll give you five minutes to come out with your hands on your heads!"
There was no answer—unless a single shot fired blindly from the upper part of the mill could be called an answer.
Gimlet waited five minutes by his watch—a weird, uneasy period. At least, so thought Cub, to whom the whole thing still wore an atmosphere of unreality.
"Time's up!" shouted Gimlet. "You've had your chance!"
Before he could move, a door in the windmill was flung open, leaving a bright rectangle of yellow light. Against it a man could be seen running, crouching as he ran. One man at least had had enough, thought Cub. However, he did not get far. Several shots were fired from the mill in quick succession and the deserter fell. He did not get up.
When Cub looked back for Gimlet he was no longer there. Again came a period of waiting, of suspense, of brooding, sinister silence. A few minutes passed. Then the hush was broken by a crash of glass, followed an instant later by an explosion, muffled, but violent.
"That was Gimlet tossing in a pineapple," Copper told Cub dispassionately.
A few seconds passed; then came another explosion, this time not so loud. A white incandescent glare lit up the inside of tile mill, showing unsuspected cracks in the woodwork. It grew brighter and brighter as the incendiary bomb flared up. It took on a yellow tinge, the yellow turned to orange, and then to dull red. A mighty cloud of smoke began to drift away from the mill.
Copper crawled closer to Cub. "Looks like 'e's done it," he observed without emotion. "
She's on fire. That old wood'll burn like straw. I'd say the Wolves 'ave 'ad it. Any that didn't get knocked out by the concussion of that sixty-nine will look like kippers in about five minutes—unless they bolt. You can't stay in the smoke of a phosphorous bomb and stay alive. Don't I know it!"
A man dashed out of the building, bending low, his figure cast into bold relief by the brightly illuminated smoke. A revolver crashed a single shot.
The man fell.
"That's one for Trapper," said Copper evenly. "Well, they asked for it, the skunks. Who did they reckon they were, comin' over 'ere knocking our fellers blocks off? Let's get a bit nearer. Ah! No you don't." Copper's final remark was addressed to two more figures that sought safety in flight. His gun stammered its dreadful message. The figures spun, fell, and lay still.
The windmill was now well and truly alight, a terrible spectacle with the flames leaping skyward and the woodwork crackling like dry kindling. It turned night into day. A man jumped from one of the top windows and landed on the outbuildings with a fearful crash.
"I reckon 'e won't need no doctor," remarked Copper.
"Don't be so callous," chided Cub, who, now that the battle was won, could not help feeling a passing qualm for the losers.
"Callous!" cried Copper indignantly. like that. You 'eard what Gimlet said? What's the use of strokin' a mad wolf?"
Cub could see Gimlet kneeling on the grass not far away so he went on and joined him.
Trapper was a little to the right, crouching low so that he could see under the cloud of slowly drifting smoke in case a Wolf should attempt to use it for cover. The constable was a short distance to the left, rifle at the ready.
From a distance of thirty yards they stood and watched the end. It would not have been safe to go nearer, for explosions occurred from time to time inside the doomed building, throwing clouds of burning splinters high into the air.
"They must 'ave 'ad a fair store of bombs and ammunition in there," remarked Copper. "
There can't be anybody left alive."
"I fancy my first bomb must have knocked out anybody on the ground floor," opined Gimlet.
Together they stood and watched the end. As Gimlet said, there was nothing else to do.
After about five minutes Copper let out a shout and pointed down the track. Looking in that direction the others saw a strange procession approaching.
"What on earth's all this!" exclaimed Gimlet wonderingly.
"Looks like the N.F.S.," answered Copper. "Trust the fire brigade to turn up. What a hope they've got.
Someone must have spotted the fire from the village."
They walked over to the new arrivals. Gimlet did not interfere when the firemen ran a hose down to the lake.
"They'll be able to get in a bit of practice, anyway," observed Copper cheerfully. "What do we do next, sir?"
Gimlet pocketed his revolver. "I think we might as well go home and let the General know what has happened," he replied. "There's nothing more we can do here, and I'm beginning to feel as if I could do with a few hours in bed. The constable can take charge of things until the General arrives to clear everything up. I imagine he'll come along as soon as he hears about it. Well, there is this. Quite a lot of fellows with death warrants in their pockets will be able to breathe more freely now."
Gimlet called the constable and thanked him for his support; he told him to say nothing about what he had seen, and invited him to take charge until the security police arrived from London.
This the constable promised to do.
Leaving him standing there, a lone guardian of the law, they walked slowly back to the car. Little was said. There was not, after all, very much to say.
* * *
The destruction by fire of the Grimston mill, and the extermination of the enemy fanatics that occupied it, was the end of the Werewolf attempt to create a reign of terror in Britain, as had been done elsewhere in Europe. Not a word of the story appeared in the newspapers, the authorities deciding that it was better to leave the promoters of the organization in Germany to guess the fate of their accomplices.
As far as is known there were no survivors. From certain remains found, and documents in the portfolio which Gimlet had picked up in the boathouse, it seemed that the General'
s early remarks about the identity of the big Nazis behind the conspiracy were nearer to the truth than he may have supposed at the time. No fewer than four of the men who died in the boathouse, or in the mill, were on the list of Nazi war criminals. Apparently they thought that they were safer in Britain than in their own country, where the search for them was being prosecuted with greater diligence. One of these was Wenson, or, to give him his proper name, the notorious Hugo Stresser. The man in the fur coat was another of those mentioned by the General. This was Karl von Runtz, and it was to him that the portfolio belonged. There was reason to suppose that he was the head man of the movement, or as Copper would say, the King Wolf. From papers found in the portfolio it seemed probable that he had come over to straighten things out following the confusion caused by the raid on the London headquarters. If this was so, then he had reached Britain just in time to be caught in the round-up, in much the same way that Wenson had fled from London, only to perish in the flames of the old Norfolk mill.
That is as much as Gimlet and his comrades were told at the time, beyond the fact that the contents of the portfolio enabled the police of certain liberated countries to do a little cleaning up on their own account, rumours of which trickled through from time to time to Lorrington Hall, where the comrades were enjoying a well-earned rest, made all the more pleasant by a useful cheque received from the Home Office for "services rendered.
"Just what do you reckon they mean by services rendered?" inquired Copper, as he carefully folded his share and put it in his wallet. "I don't remember rendering anything. I did the job I was asked to do and a cove can't do more than that. Am I right, Trapper?"
"Tch! Every time," agreed Trapper.
"That's probably what they mean," said Cub smiling.
THE END
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04 Gimlet Mops Up Page 15
