by John Harris
“He’s OK. We got him just in time. He’s bad, but he’ll be all right. A couple of ribs, I think, and shock. The others are OK. A few cuts and a flesh wound.”
The sergeant stared at his tired young face, suddenly grey with fatigue, and the dried dark blood on his cheek. “How was it?” he asked.
“Grim,” Milliken said, experiencing as he spoke a feeling of vast superiority over the sergeant who had never been to sea. Fleetingly he wondered if it had really been as grim as he had thought, but he savoured the moment, nevertheless, getting the best out of it. “Grim,” he repeated. “Bloody grim.”
The sergeant patted his shoulder, as though to say he understood what Milliken had been through. To Milliken it was better than a medal. Then the doctor appeared in front of him and Milliken struggled to stand, but the doctor put a hand on his shoulder and held him down.
“Nice job you’ve done, Milliken,” he said. “Nice job in the circumstances. How do you feel?”
“I’m all right,” Milliken said.
“Better get into the ambulance and go up with the others.”
“No. Honest, sir, this is nothing. I’m all right.” Milliken had a moment of panic at the thought of the doctor’s face as he removed the bandages. “I only bled a bit. I’m hungry. I’ll come as soon as I’ve had something to eat.”
The doctor grinned. “Sure?”
“I’m all right, sir. Honest.”
“OK. Have it your own way. As soon as you’ve eaten, mind. You did a good job, son.”
As the doctor turned away with the sergeant Milliken’s proud heart was singing with pure joy. He had been to sea – and he knew suddenly he would be going again. He had been in action. He had fought the enemy. He had spoken sharply to an air commodore in the heat of battle. And, finally, he had been complimented for his part in it all. For all his youth, he was a man – now and forever.
The boat crew stood about the deck in their oilskins, coiling ropes with a slowness that spoke of fatigue, their hair hanging over their eyes, their bodies slack and weary. Skinner emerged from the engine-room, his best uniform ruined, his date gone, his eyes red with strain. “Thank Christ that’s over,” he murmured feelingly.
Then the boat began to empty. Ponsettia and Mackay appeared on deck, wrapped in blankets, helped by the station medical orderlies.
“Canada,” Mackay was saying as he hopped towards the iron ladder up the jetty, one arm in a sling, “I reckon you were right. They say the Skipper’s going to be OK. He’ll be buying his greengroceries from my shop after all.”
“Sure, he will, you soft clot. If I didn’t have so far to come from River Falls, I would, too.”
Ponsettia saw Milliken and slapped his shoulder as he passed. “S’long, doc,” he said warmly. “I thought the cow was going to turn over when she rolled that time as we turned away from the trawler. Jees-us, give me flying any day. I wouldn’t serve on these tubs for a fortune.”
Milliken smiled faintly and watched them as they were helped on to the jetty and towards the ambulance, incongruous among the uniforms in their survivors’ clothing. Then the Group Captain emerged with the other brass-hat and the Air Commodore from the dinghy who was looking more like a well-scrubbed tramp now, with the fatigue in his face and his civilian trousers and ill-fitting overcoat, his face dark with beard, and his hair awry in thin spikes on his head. He still clutched the water-blackened brief case in his hand.
“Anyway, thank God you’re safe,” Taudevin was saying. “Eve’s looking forward to seeing you. She’s waiting at home. We can send the brief case on, if you like, and you can get over it a bit before you need go.”
“I’m all right,” Waltby said. “I’ll be fine in a day or so. I’m glad Eve took it all right and didn’t knock herself up.”
Taudevin helped him up to the jetty, then turned towards Treherne and the crew of the boat, standing huddled together on the after-deck round the stretcher they’d lowered for Harding.
“Good show, gentlemen,” he said. “Thank you all very much.”
Then he waved and disappeared along the jetty.
Milliken sat on the Carley float, too tired to stand up, letting the sergeant and the doctor and the others superintend the lifting of Harding to the jetty. Treherne and Botterill followed them to the ambulance in a little cortège.
Then, as he heard the ambulance door shut and the gears grind, he saw Slingsby in front of him with Robb. Slingsby was staring after Treherne. “You know,” he said thought-fully, “it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if that Group Captain or the Air Commodore or somebody didn’t recommend the Lad for a gong. That’d shove Loxton’s nose out of joint with his lousy little Mention. Shore guns. Mast gone. Duff engines. Broken shoulder. No air cover. It was a good show, whichever way you look at it. It was worth a gong. Hell, what do they want for their money?”
Milliken was startled at the warmth in his tones. Then Slingsby turned round and seemed to see Milliken for the first time.
“Fag, Milliken?’ he asked abruptly, and Milliken became acutely conscious of the fact that he had known his name all the time.
“Thanks, Flight,” he said, quite forgetting he was a non-smoker. The offer made him one with the rest of the crew. It made him one with all those sly, wily, courageous men who were old in the Service. He had become a veteran.
“I hope you’re grateful to us all,” Slingsby went on in his harsh voice as he offered a match. “You’ve made a pick-up. You’re one of God’s chosen few.”
Robb laughed. “Enjoy the trip?” he asked.
Milliken coughed over his first drag at the cigarette. “I never thought we’d get back,” he said honestly.
“Get back?” Slingsby was once more the tough, vulgar little martinet with the taut frame and the iron voice, and Milliken jumped instinctively. “Get back? God, after a pick-up like that I’d have swum under the bastard, if necessary, and held her up all the way home.”
Milliken grinned. “I’ll bet you would, Flight,” he said, meaning every word.
Slingsby stared unsmilingly, weary for the first time. “All in a day’s work, son, all in a day’s work.”
His voice had lost its bark and Milliken felt no need to be humble before him any longer. Robb was grinning as they helped him up the iron ladder to the jetty, followed by the others. Tebbitt brought up the rear, in survivor’s clothing, his shoulders hunched, his face flabby and old looking, and Milliken wondered what he was going to do with his worries.
Milliken’s legs were aching with every heavy-footed step he took, and he walked along the hollow, echoing piles towards the land aware only of hunger and the desire for sleep, which lay on him, warm and cloying and comforting, making him indifferent to the cold rain that drifted into his face and the breeze that plucked at his hair.
Behind him, across the width of the river, the beat of the weather swept out to sea and across the Channel, where it harried the Continent and there died.
Milliken plodded on, weary but tremendously uplifted by triumph and the sensation he suddenly and joyously knew he’d cause among the WAAFS in the cookhouse. He wanted to sing, but then he remembered Slingsby’s words, “All in a day’s work, son, all in a day’s work.” He reached up, took off the neat blue side-hat he wore and, bashing it shapeless, shoved it cross-wise over his bandage and slouched after the others in a rolling piratical gait.
Synopses of John Harris Titles
Published by House of Stratus
Army of Shadows
It is the winter of 1944. France is under the iron fist of the Nazis. But liberation is just around the corner and a crew from a Lancaster bomber is part of the fight for Freedom. As they fly towards their European target, a Messerschmitt blazes through the sky in a fiery attack and of the nine-man crew aboard the bomber, only two men survive to parachute into Occupied France. They join an ever-growing army of shadows (the men and women of the French Resistance), to play a lethal game of cat and mouse.
China Seas
&nbs
p; In this action-packed adventure, Willie Sarth becomes a survivor. Forced to fight pirates on the East China Seas, wrestle for his life on the South China Seas and cross the Sea of Japan ravaged by typhus, Sarth is determined to come out alive. Dealing with human tragedy, war and revolution, Harris presents a novel which packs an awesome punch.
The Claws of Mercy
In Sierra Leone, a remote bush community crackles with racial tensions. Few white people live amongst the natives of Freetown and Authority seems distant. Everyday life in Freetown revolves around an opencast iron mine, and the man in charge dictates peace and prosperity for everyone. But, for the white population, his leadership is a matter of life or death where every decision is like being snatched by the claws of mercy.
Corporal Cotton’s Little War
Storming through Europe, the Nazis are sure to conquer Greece but for one man, Michael Anthony Cotton, a heroic marine who smuggles weapons of war and money to the Greek Resistance. Born Mihale Andoni Cotonou, Cotton gets mixed up in a lethal mission involving guns and high-speed chases. John Harris produces an unforgettable champion, persuasive and striking with a touch of mastery in this action-packed thriller set against the dazzle of the Aegean.
The Cross of Lazzaro
The Cross of Lazzaro is a gripping story filled with mystery and fraught with personal battles. This tense, unusual novel begins with the seemingly divine reappearance of a wooden cross once belonging to a sixth-century bishop. The vision emerges from the depths of an Italian lake, and a menacing local antagonism is subsequently stirred. But what can the cross mean?
Flawed Banner
John Harris’ spine-tingling adventure inhabits the shadowy world of cunning and espionage. As the Nazi hordes of Germany overrun France, devouring the free world with fascist fervour, a young intelligence officer, James Woodyatt, is shipped across the Channel to find a First World War hero…an old man who may have been a spy…who may be in possession of Nazi secrets.
The Fox From His Lair
A brilliant German agent lies in wait for the Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied France. While the Allies prepare a vast armed camp, no one is aware of the enemy within, and when a sudden, deadly E-boat attacks, the Fox strikes, stealing secret invasion plans in the ensuing panic. What follows is a deadly pursuit as the Fox tries to get the plans to Germany in time, hotly pursued by two officers with orders to stop him at all costs.
A Funny Place to Hold a War
Ginger Donnelly is on the trail of Nazi saboteurs in Sierra Leone. Whilst taking a midnight paddle with a willing woman in a canoe cajoled from a local fisherman, Donnelly sees an enormous seaplane thunder across the sky only to crash in a ball of brilliant flame. It seems like an accident…at least until a second plane explodes in a blistering shower along the same flight path.
Getaway
An Italian fisherman and his wife, Rosa, live in Sydney. Hard times are ahead. Their mortgaged boat may be lost and with it, their livelihood. But Rosa has a plan to reach the coast of America from the islands of the Pacific, sailing on a beleaguered little houseboat. The plan seems almost perfect, especially when Willie appears and has his own reasons for taking a long holiday to the land of opportunity.
Harkaway’s Sixth Column
An explosive action-packed war drama: four British soldiers are cut off behind enemy lines in British Somaliland and when they decide to utilise a secret arms dump in the Bur Yi hills and fight a rearguard action, an unlikely alliance is sought between two local warring tribes. What follows is an amazing mission led by the brilliant, elusive Harkaway, whose heart is stolen by a missionary when she becomes mixed up in the unorthodox band of warriors.
A Kind of Courage
At the heart of this story of courage and might, is Major Billy Pentecost, commander of a remote desert outpost near Hahdhdhah, deep among the bleak hills of Khalit. His orders are to prepare to move out along with a handful of British soldiers. Impatient tribesmen gather outside the fort, eager to reclaim the land of their blood and commanded by Abd el Aziz el Beidawi, a feared Arab warrior lord. A friendship forms between the two very different commanders but when Pentecost’s orders are reversed, a nightmarish tragedy ensues.
Live Free or Die
Charles Walter Scully, cut off from his unit and running on empty, is trapped. It’s 1944 and though the Allied invasion of France has finally begun, for Scully the war isn’t going well. That is, until he meets a French boy trying to get home to Paris. What begins is a hair-raising journey into the heart of France, an involvement with the French Liberation Front and one of the most monumental events of the war. Harris vividly portrays wartime France in a panorama of scenes that enthral the reader.
The Lonely Voyage
The Lonely Voyage is John Harris’ first novel - a graphic, moving tale of the sea. It charts the story of one boy, Jess Ferigo, who winds up on a charge of poaching along with Pat Fee and Old Boxer, the men who sail with him on his journey into manhood. As Jess leaves his boyhood behind, bitter years are followed by the Second World War, where Old Boxer and Jess make a poignant rescue on the sand dunes of Dunkirk. Finally, Jess Ferigo’s lonely voyage is over.
The Mercenaries
Ira Penaluna, First World War pilot, sees his airline go bankrupt in Africa and grabs at the chance to instruct pilots in China. But Ira hasn’t reckoned on the beat-up, burnt-out wrecks he is expected to teach his students in, or on the fact that his pupils speak no English. Though aided and abetted by an enthusiastic assistant, an irresponsible Fagan and his brooding American girlfriend Ellie, Ira finds himself playing a deadly game, becoming embroiled in China’s civil war. The four are forced to flee but the only way out is in a struggling pile of junk flown precariously towards safety. Will they make it?
North Strike
It is 1939. The Royal Navy urgently needs information about German raiders. There is only one place to get it…the port of Narvik and only one man capable – Magnusson. A story of the daring, outrageous exploits of a spy rescuing British prisoners from the Altmark and swept up in to the German battle for Norway.
The Old Trade of Killing
Harris’ exciting adventure is set against the backdrop of the Western Desert and scene of the Eighth Army battles. The men who fought together in the Second World War return twenty years later in search of treasure. But twenty years can change a man. Young ideals have been replaced by greed. Comradeship has vanished along with innocence. And treachery and murder make for a breathtaking read.
Picture of Defeat
It is 1943 and Naples has been looted by the Allies and Axis powers alike, its priceless art treasures coveted by some of the most corrupt criminal minds in Europe. But under the orders of Field Security, Tom Pugh must save the paintings of Detto Banti, no matter what the cost. In this tantalising read, one man stands against a tide of wilful destruction and greed, trying to save a past for the people of Naples’ future.
The Quick Boat Men
Edward Dante Bourdillon is a man whose fate is linked to the oceans. His parents perished on the waves and, brought up by his uncle who owns a boatyard, Edward leads a life in love with the sea. That is, until he sinks his uncle’s yacht. Soon our hero is bound for Cape Town on an old tramp steamer. From earthquakes to shipwreck, it seems his fortune is turning sour until forgiveness and World War One looms on the horizon.
Ride Out the Storm
The Allies, faced with a shameful defeat, are trapped between the onslaught of the mighty German army and the tumult of the ocean waves. Those that do not die face capture and surrender to the Nazis. But only nine days later more than a quarter of a million men have been rescued and placed safely on the shores of England, saved by an amazing assorted flotilla of barges, tugs, rowing boats and dinghies. This is the incredible story of a mass exodus across the Channel. John Harris tells the miraculous story of Dunkirk.
Right of Reply
Struggle, scandal and mutiny run riot in Right of Reply, set in the 1970s in a whirlwind of a p
olitical crisis. An invasion is planned by a convoy of British troop ships sighted off the coast of West Africa. A Khanzian base is at stake. The British claim sovereignty but sedition is in the air. Can the British government turn back before it’s too late? John Harris leaves us on tenterhooks.
Road to the Coast
It’s South America and a fugitive Englishman is caught in a military revolt against a tyrant. Harry Ash is a wanted man, fleeing the police and revolutionaries. After being bombed, he meets a beautiful woman, Grace Rodrigo, and steals a car to take her with him before realising they have a stow-away who could very well endanger their entire escape plan. John Harris pulls off a triumph of an action-packed narrative full of the kind of tension that will have you on the edge of your seat.
The Sea Shall Not Have Them
This is John Harris’ classic war novel of espionage in the most extreme of situations. An essential flight from France leaves the crew of RAF Hudson missing, and somewhere in the North Sea four men cling to a dinghy, praying for rescue before exposure kills them or the enemy finds them. One man is critically injured; another (a rocket expert) is carrying a briefcase stuffed with vital secrets. As time begins to run out each man yearns to evade capture. This story charts the daring and courage of these men, their rescuers and a breathtaking mission with the most awesome of consequences.
The Sleeping Mountain
The sleepy red-roofed Italian island of Anapoli, its lazy, leaning buildings pushed against the jagged harbour, dreams on peaceably by the sea. It is here that Tom Patch, an easy-going British artist, finds himself, discarding his mistress and in love with Cecilia. Even the Mayor of Anapoli basks in the sun, listening to goat bells and the rasp of mandolins. But above the unsuspecting residents hangs a malevolent volcano; a terrible destructive power seething below its crust. And the volcano is about to blow.
Smiling Willie and the Tiger
