Henderson's Boys: Eagle Day

by Robert Muchamore

  He’d always thought of the German Army as a mighty force packed with muscle-bound brutes, but stripped of boots and guns they reminded him of a school gym lesson. Confident bodies threw themselves at the waves, while big men with flabby arms looked embarrassed and skinny ones who didn’t like walking on the pebbles hobbled.

  Paul drew men quickly, in a few rapid strokes, trying to capture expressions and postures of the sea-front drama. A non-swimmer was dragged out yelling and screaming as his mates on the shore jeered. They yelled phrases that Paul didn’t understand; their bullying tone matched that of boys who’d pushed him around at school in Paris.

  Paul found it depressing to think that when he finally escaped from education, he was sure to be conscripted into the military and would have to put up with the same bullying crap all over again. As Paul wallowed in this train of thought he failed to hear the German officer clambering over the white rocks in the blind spot on his left.

  The first he knew was when a boot crunched a few metres from his face, sending chalkstone clattering down the shallow cliff-face. The officer was a good-looking man, with a square jaw and spindly fingers.

  Fearing a slap or kick, Paul dropped his pad and covered his head.

  ‘Don’t be scared.’ The officer smiled, speaking in decent French, ‘I see you have the sling off your arm today.’

  Paul was shocked. He thought he’d been invisible, but the German had clearly seen him before.

  ‘Max— Er, my mother took the splints off last night,’ Paul explained warily, as he held out a lower arm with a distinct kink in it. ‘It hasn’t set straight, but luckily I draw with my left hand.’

  ‘Like me,’ the German said, still smiling. ‘I’m left-handed, but every time I took the pen with my left at school the teacher would rap me on the knuckles.’

  ‘Same with me.’ Paul nodded, feeling more comfortable now it was clear that he wasn’t in trouble. ‘It’s really stupid. What difference does it make if you write with your left hand?’

  ‘Beats me.’ The officer shrugged. ‘So what do you think of today’s swimmers?’

  Paul sat up on the rocks as he answered. ‘They’re not as good as the ones you had here last week.’

  ‘That’s an understatement,’ the officer laughed. ‘They’re a mountain battalion. Half of them can’t swim and most have never seen the sea before.’

  Paul couldn’t think what to say in reply and there was a brief silence before the officer bent over and took Paul’s pad. He burst into laughter as he saw the sketches of men struggling in the water and doing their exercises.

  ‘These are really good,’ the officer said. ‘You really capture their … I don’t know the French word. The in their body.’sense

  Paul enjoyed the compliment. ‘Their emotions,’ he smiled.

  ‘Yes,’ the officer said, nodding as he began flicking through the pad. ‘Emotions. It’s clever how you convey so much with just a few lines. And I see that you work well in other styles too.’very

  Paul cringed as the German turned the spiral-bound pages. He hated people looking at his drawings because he sometimes liked to draw really dark stuff like dead bodies or people being eaten by giant bugs. But the German held the pad open at a pastel drawing of Rosie, depicted with a hammer in her hand as she helped PT to repair the cottage roof.

  ‘Is that your girlfriend?’ the officer asked teasingly.

  Paul shook his head. ‘My sister.’

  ‘You draw beautifully,’ the officer said as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small bar of chocolate. ‘Here. I have plenty.’

  Paul had a sweet tooth and was a huge fan of chocolate. This was the first he’d seen since leaving Paris a month earlier, so he snatched it keenly. ‘Thank you much, sir.’so

  ‘I’ve seen you up here several times,’ the officer said, as he passed back the pad and took his wallet from inside his coat, ‘but I had no idea that I was in the presence of such a talent. Have you ever tried drawing from a photograph?’

  Paul nodded. ‘It’s not as good as real life, but I used to do it all the time. When I was little I used to draw cars and aeroplanes from pictures in magazines, but I mostly draw people and animals now. They’re more interesting for some reason.’

  The German took a photograph from his wallet. ‘My wife, daughter and I. If I gave you this could you make a small drawing of it?’

  Paul liked being free to draw whatever he fancied, but he was intimidated by the tall officer and grateful for the chocolate.

  ‘You don’t look sure,’ the officer said. ‘But you do like chocolate, yes?’

  ‘The only thing better than chocolate is bread and jam.’

  ‘OK,’ the officer said, laughing. ‘In our storeroom we have boxes of good Belgian chocolate. Twenty-four bars in each box. If I gave you one of those would you draw my family from this photograph?’

  ‘We’re almost out of jam,’ Paul said. ‘Do you have jars of jam?’

  The officer held his hands about thirty centimetres apart. ‘The army gets it in cans about this size. Mixed berry or apricot.’

  ‘I’ll draw your picture for a can of mixed berry,’ Paul said, smiling.

  ‘Deal,’ the German said, as he passed over the photograph. ‘It’s my only picture of them, so be sure you don’t lose it.’

  *

  Henderson was in decent shape but the Germans seldom let him off work much before seven and the thirteen-kilometre ride home along the coast road was no fun when he was tired. Waves crashed and occasional gusts sent his bike wavering dangerously close to military vehicles. The German drivers ignored speed limits and knew they’d face little more than a rebuke if they squished a French cyclist.

  Halfway between Calais and home, the Germans had set up a snap checkpoint. These cropped up at random locations throughout the region and comprised two cars or two trucks parked on opposite sides of the road and anywhere between three and six soldiers.

  This was the third checkpoint Henderson had encountered in the six days since they’d arrived in the north. French traffic queued, while Germans were waved through. The wait varied, depending upon the level of traffic and how methodical the soldiers were, but even a ten-minute delay was irritating at the end of a ten-hour shift.

  The Germans had forbidden the sale of petrol to Frenchmen, effectively banning private vehicles in the process. The queue comprised a single farm tractor, eight bicycles and a similar number on foot. The soldier inspecting documents spoke less than a dozen words of French, but took great pains over each piece of paper and held it up to the sun, presumably to check for some mysterious sign that it was a forgery.

  Although the Germans were on the lookout for spies, their everyday targets were French soldiers who’d escaped from the weakly guarded prisons. As a result, men got a harder time than women and men of military age such as Henderson could expect a thorough grilling.

  After a fifteen-minute wait, during which less than half the queue in front of Henderson disappeared, a Mercedes limousine with a Nazi flag at the end of its long bonnet drew up alongside. Henderson got the horrible feeling that he was being called back to translate at some ghastly late-night meeting, but instead the back door was thrown open revealing Oberst

  9 Ohlsen, the Deputy Commander of the Pas-de-Calais region.

  ‘Mr Boyle,’ the Oberst said warmly. ‘Perhaps I can offer you a short cut?’

  Henderson nodded as he recognised the balding Oberst. He’d met him the previous Friday whilst translating at a meeting with a director of the French railways.

  The Oberst thumped on the glass panel that separated the passenger compartment and ordered his driver to strap Henderson’s bike to the rear of the car. Henderson walked around to help the driver, but the Oberst ordered him brusquely inside the car.

  The vehicle’s interior was panelled in walnut, with two comfortable chairs at the back and two pull-down seats facing the other way. Henderson settled in next to the Oberst, separated by a leather arm rest whi
ch flipped open to reveal two crystal decanters and a row of tumblers.

  ‘Drink?’ the Oberst asked.

  Henderson was thirsty after a six-kilometre bike ride and needed cold water more than whisky or wine, but an opportunity to socialise with such a senior officer was a rarity so Henderson accepted a glass of red.

  ‘Heading home, Mr Boyle?’ the Oberst asked.

  Henderson nodded. ‘A long day,’ he said. ‘At least my wife will have a meal ready.’

  The driver pulled away and the engine of the huge limousine was so remote from the back seats that they could hear the click of German heels as the soldiers on the checkpoint saluted their deputy commander.

  ‘I envy you home cooking,’ the Oberst said. ‘It’s four months since I saw my wife.’

  This comment made Henderson feel guilty. It had been more than four months since he’d seen his real wife back in England, and Maxine wasn’t the first woman he’d slept with during the interlude.

  ‘This beats the bike.’ Henderson smiled, spreading himself over the padded leather as the German raised his glass and made a toast.

  ‘Cooperation,’ the German said, and Henderson copied him.

  ‘It is actually a pleasant surprise to bump into you, Mr Boyle,’ the Oberst said. ‘Your translation at the meeting on Friday was immaculate and I’ve found that a good translator can make my life a lot easier.’

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ Henderson said.

  ‘I’ve received orders from General Rufus today. He’s put me in charge of the overall planning for Operation Sea-lion.’

  Henderson had nosed around and picked up details from documents he shouldn’t have seen, but he pretended to be mystified. ‘Sea-lion, Herr Oberst?’

  ‘The operation to invade England,’ Ohlsen explained. ‘The logistics are fearsome: eleven battalions, twenty thousand horses, eighteen thousand tanks, artillery pieces and god knows how many vehicles have to be transported across the English Channel on barges. The battle between the Luftwaffe and the Royal Air Force is going in our favour and Berlin demands that we’re ready to invade as soon as we control the skies.’

  ‘A task you can really sink your teeth into,’ Henderson said, as he wondered whether to ask a bold question. ‘Is there a target date set for the invasion?’

  The Oberst smiled. ‘There’s no firm date, but once the destruction of the Royal Air Force is complete, the die will be cast.’

  ‘Before winter, I assume,’ Henderson said.

  ‘Of course.’ The Oberst nodded. ‘You need daylight and good weather for this kind of operation. It has to be before the end of September. Otherwise we’ll have to wait until next spring and who knows what fortifications the British will have built by then?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ Henderson agreed, as he drained the last of his wine.

  ‘Another?’ the German asked, but Henderson shook his head and the Oberst continued. ‘Anyhow, Mr Boyle, getting back to your excellent translation services. I actually dictated a memo to the translation department earlier today, requesting that you be permanently assigned to my office. Operation Sea-lion has absolute priority, which means that I’ll need a highly capable translator, rather than whatever incompetent the translation department decides to assign me.’

  ‘Well, Herr Oberst,’ Henderson smiled, ‘I’m flattered.’

  *

  Henderson kissed Maxine as he waltzed into the kitchen whistling the hymn All Things Bright and Beautiful.

  ‘You’re late,’ Maxine said. ‘So – why the good mood?’

  ‘Oh, you won’t believe.’ Henderson smiled, as he nodded to Paul and Rosie who sat at the table. ‘Short of a direct order from the Führer’s office in Berlin, putting me in personal command of the German invasion of Britain, I couldn’t be in a better position to steal information.’

  ‘How did that happen?’ Maxine asked, as she opened the oven and took out the remains of a sausage casserole.

  ‘You’re now looking at the personal translator to Oberst Günter Ohlsen, who is in overall command of the invasion planning for the entire Pas-de-Calais region.’

  Rosie looked at her brother. ‘That sounds even better than Paul scoring the big tin of jam from that Boche on the beach.’

  Henderson sat at the head of the table and was so excited by his stroke of luck that he barely thought as he scooped a huge mouthful of sausage and potato into his mouth.

  ‘Hot!’ he yelled, as he spat the food back into the bowl. ‘Holy Mary mother of god! Maxine, get me some water!’

  ‘Fool,’ Maxine laughed, handing Henderson a cup of cold water as Paul and Rosie killed themselves laughing. ‘You watched me pull it out of the oven half a minute ago. Were you expecting it to be cold?’

  Once he’d guzzled water and taken a couple more cautious mouthfuls of casserole, Rosie spoke seriously.

  ‘It’s quarter to eight,’ she explained. ‘Tonight’s transmission window is eight-fifteen to eight-thirty, so if you’ve got a message for McAfferty I’d better start encoding now.’

  Henderson slid a small document pouch across the table. ‘It’s not much,’ he said. ‘At least not compared to the kind of information I’ll get when I start working for the Oberst’s office. It’s information on barge movements and more delays getting the railway lines into the docks at Boulogne repaired.’

  Rosie had developed a knack for encoding. To minimise the risk of their radio signal being detected, she had to pack all the information Henderson gathered into the shortest message possible and then convert it into the code using Henderson’s key phrase.

  ‘I practised my Morse code again this afternoon,’ Rosie said proudly, as she scanned the documents and began making notes with a pencil. ‘I’m up to twenty-two words a minute.’

  ‘Excellent,’ Henderson said. ‘Just remember that accuracy is the most important thing when you’re transmitting in code. You only have to miss one letter and the poor soul unravelling the message will have the devil’s own job setting things straight.’

  ‘I know.’ Rosie nodded. ‘I was thinking, actually. Seeing as you’re always tired and you have to get up halfway through the night to listen out during the reply window, maybe you could take a rest after your meal tonight. Paul and I can easily handle the transmission.’

  Henderson considered this over a mouthful of potato. Paul knew more about the workings of the radio than he did and Rosie was better at sending Morse code, plus he tired after his long day working in Calais.was

  ‘I’d be grateful for that,’ Henderson said. ‘I could do with an early night. But remember what I taught you. Transmission is the riskiest part of this operation. We’ve got no clue if the Germans have radio-detection teams working in this area, or how good they are at their jobs if they do. One of you has to sit outside and keep lookout during transmission and if you’re even suspicious you abandon the receiver and run. Is that understood?’slightly

  ‘Absolutely.’ Rosie nodded.

  Paul nodded too, but he felt uneasy because he’d be the lookout and he recalled how effortlessly the German officer had managed to sneak up on him at the beach earlier in the day.

  ‘I’d be even happier if Marc or PT went with you,’ Henderson said. ‘Two sets of eyes are better than one.’

  But Maxine shook her head. ‘They went out after dinner with Luc’s son Dumont.’

  ‘Really,’ Henderson said suspiciously. ‘What are they up to?’

  ‘Hunting rabbits with a catapult,’ Paul explained. ‘They brought two back with them this afternoon and Dumont showed us how to skin them.’

  Maxine shuddered. ‘It was horrible,’ she said. ‘I felt queasy when I saw the blood on the floor of the barn.’

  Henderson laughed. ‘Well sweetheart, if you want to eat an animal you’ve got to kill it.’ But his tone got more serious as he looked out the window, ‘Mind you, I can’t see how they’re hunting rabbits in this light. You can barely see out there.’

  ‘It’s going to rain,’ Maxine added. ‘I just
hope they muster the sense to get indoors before it starts to pour.’

  * * *

  9Oberst – a high-ranking German officer.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Dumont was a chunky sixteen year old. He was light in the brains department, but PT and Marc thought he was a laugh and he knew a lot about hunting and fishing.

  With so many people unable to re-enter the military zone the boys had free run over hundreds of abandoned farms. The former tenants were poor, but Dumont claimed to have broken in and stolen all kinds of valuables they’d left behind.

  But Dumont claimed all kinds of things, and the only houses he took Marc and PT into contained nothing more valuable than tools and bottles of wine. When they got bored of hunting and burgling they threw stones through windows and Dumont got annoyed because Marc was a much better shot.

  PT enjoyed learning about the countryside, but he’d survived on his own wits for more than two years and found Dumont’s bragging and destructive appetites childish. Marc had less reservation. After growing up in the regulated environment of an orphanage he prized nothing more than freedom.

  Whilst Marc’s conscience told him that some day people would come home to find busted doors and wine bottles smashed against their walls, he loved the sense of power you got roaming around the empty buildings doing whatever the hell you liked.

  It was turning dark as the trio sat on a low wall in the heart of the village. There was a duck pond set in a square, but two shops and a post office were boarded up and the grass on the lawn around the pond was up to knee height. Apart from the wind, the only noise came from a small but lively crew of German soldiers sitting outside a bar across the square.

  They were young intellectuals, ranging from late teens to early twenties and from grenadiers to junior officers. They drank wine and smoked cigarettes while they discussed arts and politics and teased each other about their love lives. The bar served good food and they enjoyed the fact that they’d found a secluded spot, away from boorish colleagues who preferred to down half a dozen beers and start throwing punches.