A Broken Land rtw-2

by Jack Ludlow

  ‘I think you might need another stiff one, sir.’

  Cal held out his glass. ‘After what I faced in Hamburg, a jail sentence seems nothing to worry about.’

  There was no attempt at dodging the Navy, trying things like taking the Straits in darkness, but Captain Roland had his own method of making this go smoothly and that was the contents of his drinks cabinet once more. Ordered to heave-to off Gibraltar for a cargo inspection, the naval officer who came aboard was taken straight to the cabin and given a pink gin and it was the Navy’s own — Plymouth, and full strength.

  After four of those the visitor was finally handed the false manifest, which he waved about. ‘Damn it, old fellow, we’re all Englishmen here, what? I take it all is in order?’

  ‘Another gin?’

  ‘Don’t mind if I do.’

  If an Italian submarine spotted them in the Mediterranean, as they chugged past the southern tip of the Balearics, they had no knowledge of it. Besides, there were Royal Navy destroyers about to ensure that a ship heading for Piraeus under a British flag was not interfered with in any way; the change of course, all lights doused, and the increase in speed to sail west past Minorca were done in darkness, but it was daylight when the Barhill berthed in Barcelona.

  Indalecio Prieto came up from Valencia to inspect the now-landed cargo, which had lifted the spirits of more than just Barcelona — news had spread throughout Spain, though without his name being mentioned — given that those Italian submarines were taking a heavy toll of Soviet supply ships and severely choking off the provision of arms. He was happy to meet Cal Jardine’s request for something from the cargo in lieu of a cash payment, as well as providing very quickly a set of internal travel papers in his own name.

  That night, he went down to the docks, to where the smugglers hung out, and using his contacts there bought another forged set in a different name, as well as some morphine and a syringe. The hardest thing was not getting hold of a car — they were cheap and plentiful — but the fuel required to make use of it, and that involved a little dealing on the black market.

  Tank full and with a spare container in the boot, he loaded everything else he owned into it, leaving Barcelona for the last time and taking the road to Madrid.

  The city was now very much a place under siege and was even more tightly controlled with checkpoints than he recalled. He was asked for his papers and passport time after time, though any search of his car was perfunctory. Inside the city perimeter, Madrid was subject to the intermittent barrage of artillery shells from the Nationalist front lines just over the river, which, when one came close, forced him to pull over. While he was stopped he could hear the rattle of machine guns to the north, in the still-contested University district, as well as what he thought might be a trench mortar.

  Yet still people lived here, going about their daily lives, a lot of their clothing more rags than anything that could be called clothing, the faces pinched from lack of food, faces as grey as the stones in the piles of rubble which lay in every street and square, beside the deep craters which pitted the surfaces of both roads and pavements, ignoring the big signs which admonished them to get out of Madrid. Asked, they would no doubt have enquired where they were to go.

  The Hotel Florida seemed to be very close to the front line now, but it made no difference; those shells from the bigger cannon could reach right to the eastern suburbs, so nowhere was safe. Many of the buildings close by were seriously damaged, yet once through the doors there was the concierge to greet him, who seemed not at all fazed by the thick coating of dust which covered everything and filled the air, catching the back of Cal’s throat ever time he took a breath.

  Welcomed as what he was, a returning customer, once his luggage was carried in he was shown up to a room at the back of the hotel, safer, as was explained, from shellfire, though he passed some rooms with just a sheet of wood where there had once been a door; the place had suffered.

  An enquiry at the desk had informed him that the majority of the war correspondents still staying as guests were fully occupied trying to cover a Republican offensive at a place fifteen miles north of Madrid called Brunete. It was unlikely they would come back to their base overnight.

  The shelling started while he was washing and shaving, which had him holding his razor away from his face and listening to the whining of their flight, as well as the crump as they landed. It went on for about ten minutes and stopped, so he went back to his ablutions, now that he would not suddenly cut himself in reacting to a nearby explosion.

  The restaurant was still functioning, albeit with a severely diminished menu, but the food was wholesome if plain, and he sat there, sipping a beer, ignoring the occasional shelling, as darkness fell outside. Then he went upstairs and changed into the dark clothing he had bought before leaving Barcelona.

  If they wondered at the desk why he wanted more food sent up to his room, they did not ask; guests were always odd, it did not need a war on your doorstep to make them act strangely.

  Driving to his destination he was stopped twice and required to use the set of forged papers he had bought, which went with the press pass Peter Lanchester had provided him with; that was something he had learnt from his previous visit: no one moved around with greater ease than a foreign reporter — the Republicans saw anyone prepared to face their travails with them as friends.

  He had parked and walked to where he now stood on a street corner just off the Calle de Atocha, a long avenue that bisected the city, in shadow, watching the arched, ecclesiastical doorway of a building as dark as every other in a city that feared to be bombed. Had this church been a place of torment during the Inquisition? It was possible, given its age. If so, it had been given a new lease of life to inflict misery for a different faith.

  It was odd to think that a place where supposed enemies of the state were incarcerated, and very likely subjected to torture, had fixed hours of work, yet it just went to show how banal parts of what was happening in Spain could be. Guards worked in shifts and then went home, to wherever that was — in the case of the person he sought, an apartment he had taken over from a victim of one of his own purges, a short walk from the church.

  He observed the new shift drifting in one by one, with a resigned gait; those going off for the night were more of a crowd — black-uniformed men who had turned the arrest, beating and starving of prisoners into a set of norms. No doubt it was sometimes thrown into turmoil by a sudden burst of suspicion, but on a day-to-day basis it was like clocking on and off in an office or factory.

  The only person not doing that still had a fixed routine, and thanks to the rooting around of Tyler Alverson, Cal Jardine knew what that was. Somehow, being a creature of habit went with his personality, and right on cue, as the dial on Cal’s luminous watch slipped past eight, he emerged onto the steps of the church, taking a cigarette case from his pocket, extracting one, tapping it on the metal, then slipping it between his two middle fingers, before lighting up.

  Manfred Decker never went anywhere without two armed guards — was it necessary, or an affectation? Cal did not know, but judging by their lack of attention it seemed the latter. Most of those in Madrid who could be suspected of being class enemies had either already been shot, imprisoned, had fled, or were very circumspect when it came to dealing with authority. Thus, many months after the insurrection of the generals, life had settled for these non-combatants into monotony.

  Cal moved as Drecker moved, glad there was enough starlight to keep him in view without coming too close. If the Calle de Atocha was not busy, neither was it empty. The early hours of darkness tended to be less dangerous; even the Nationalist artillerymen stopped feeding their guns to feed themselves, so people were scurrying along, head bent into their shoulders in a way that had no doubt become habitual.

  There was arrogance in the communist’s gait; he saw no need to hunch, instead he cast his eyes imperiously at those who passed him, in the imagination of the man following seeking to look i
nto their souls for a hint of treachery. As people observed him getting close and took note of his garb — black leather coat, the pistol at the hip and that cap with the red star on his head — never mind the pair behind with slung rifles, they swayed away to avoid coming too close.

  The door of the apartment block was deeply recessed, creating an area of Stygian darkness. Drecker had his lighter out, snapping it on to locate the keyhole, his two escorts waiting for the door to open. The flame went out, the key turned, and as Drecker stepped inside the darkened hallway, they followed. It was their job to shut the door, and it was as one turned to carry out his duty that the shadowy figure stepped forward and put a bullet from his Walther PP right in the centre of his forehead.

  The phut of the silenced weapon barely registered; it was the door-closer being thrown backwards against his companion that made the second escort turn, what Cal could see of his face, really a pale blur, wondering what was going on. It was doubtful he had time to register it in his smashed brain.

  That was when Drecker, switching the hall light on, heard the door slam and turned to see his two guards slumped on the hall floor and the assassin standing, feet apart with the pistol, the long barrel of the silencer too, pointing at his own head.

  ‘On your knees, hands behind your head.’

  The overhead light obscured Cal’s face but Drecker’s eyes registered he had recognised the German-speaking voice. A hand went automatically to the flap of his holster, but the third bullet hit his forearm and broke it, driving his hand well away from the gun as the instruction was repeated. A shocked Drecker sank to his knees as Cal darted forward and took his pistol, before resuming his shooting stance.

  ‘I have come to make you pay for Florencia Gardiola.’ Drecker, who had been holding his wounded arm with his head bowed, looked up, trying to compose his face for an automatic denial. ‘As well as Juan Luis Laporta and, no doubt, hundreds of other innocents. You nearly had me killed too.’

  ‘I did not kill them — they died, and you were wounded, by an accidental discharge.’

  ‘No, you did not, but you gave the order, Drecker, to whoever fired that gun. Your mistake was to stay around in the shadows to ensure it was carried out. The first night after I met you, I saw you smoking a cigarette in the village square, and as you drew on it, the glow of the tip, because of the stupid way you hold it, lit up your cap badge. The night I was shot, I saw the same red star illuminated by a lit cigarette.’

  ‘You are wrong.’

  ‘No, Drecker, I am not. You waited to kill Laporta, and me too, marching up every night to keep his stupid attacks going and waiting till his own supporters were sick of it. Florencia was just a bystander, but what do you care?’

  ‘A victim — how many victims have there been on this front?’

  ‘Of their own side? You would know better than me. Now get on your feet.’

  ‘If I am going to die, I prefer to die here.’

  ‘You’re going to stand trial first, Drecker, I want the world to know you are guilty.’

  In pain as he undoubtedly was, Cal could see the flicker in the pale-blue eyes: hope, the prayer that his potential assassin might be stupid enough to seek judicial revenge in a city where it would not be him who would be the victim. Cal Jardine was holding his breath; he would kill him here if he had to, but give a man a chance of life and he should take it, even if it sounded crazy.

  ‘Turn around. I am going to tie your hands, which will be painful. Do not make a sound.’

  There was no gentility in what Cal did and he took pleasure in the whimpers of pain his actions caused, but the way Drecker did not cry out was promising; maybe he believed he was going to be handed over to a revolutionary court.

  ‘My car is outside and ten metres to the left of your front door. It is unlocked, go to it and open the back door. If you try anything I will put a bullet in the back of your skull.’

  The lit hallway, when the front door was open, was a risk, but it had to be taken and they were over the corpses and out in less than two seconds, now in the dark recess, with Cal’s muzzle pressed against Drecker’s neck.

  ‘Walk at normal pace.’

  That said, he dropped the weapon to run along his thigh, giving Drecker a slight shove to get him moving. The German did as he was asked, walked to the car, opened the back door and stood erect. With a quick glance to left and right to ensure no one was close, Cal hit him on the back of the head with the pistol butt, pushing him forward as he began to crumple, then leant down to heave in his legs. He had to close the door and go to the other side to drag him so he fell between the front and rear seats.

  The syringe, already loaded with morphine, went into his backside and was emptied; it was not enough to kill him, but he would not be groaning if he came round. The blanket to cover his inert body was taken from the front seat.

  Driving out of Madrid on the Valencia road proved easier than driving in from Barcelona. He was leaving the front line, and anyway, the checkpoints were less scrupulous in checking on a war correspondent, while the darkness concealed the comatose Drecker. Cal had to summon up all his reserves of calmness in a situation of real peril, but he had faced death enough times to smile a lot and trade pleasantries.

  To do what he wanted to do he had to get clear of Madrid, and the risk of going through checkpoints just had to be faced, but tired men on a dark night reduced the chances of discovery. It also kept them alive, given, as well as the Walther PP, he had a machine pistol on the floor by his feet with a magazine clipped in, and he was ready to use it. If it came to the crunch and he could not get clear, Drecker and he would die within seconds of each other.

  Out past those checkpoints he drove through Vaciamadrid and on in darkness to the next real junction at Villarejo de Salvanes, then took a left turn, heading for where, as far as he knew, lay the Nationalist front lines.

  In open country, once dawn came, he stopped, topped up the car with petrol, ate the food he had brought from the Hotel Florida, then, sure the road was empty, uncovered Drecker so he could get a gag on him before putting the blanket back on top. As soon as the local bus went past him — he waved to the passengers — he got back in and followed it.

  The front, away from the actual battle zones, was fluid and, with the limited resources on both sides, it was a case of roadside pickets rather than anything solid; there was no way they could afford the men to render it anything other than porous. The small town of Belmonte de Tajo was close by, and with his press credentials and less-than-perfect Spanish, he was taken for what he was, a foreign pressman in search of a background story.

  In asking people how they were coping with the privations of war, he found that the actual demarcation line was no more than a kilometre down the road going west, and if those to whom he had spoken were surprised that he headed that way instead of the way he had come, well that was his business. The road he ended up on was a track, but his compass told him it was going in the right direction and a muffled groan from the rear indicated his prisoner had begun to stir. Time to talk to him.

  ‘My first thought was just to put a bullet in your head.’ Looking up from the floor, Drecker’s eyes showed his confusion; Cal’s voice was utterly without passion. ‘But that would not have really given justice to Florencia, which is what you are going to pay for — her life, and my unhappiness at the loss. I have to tell you also, the notion of what I am about to do was inspired by a fellow countryman of yours.’

  From inside his jacket Cal produced a large envelope.

  ‘Inside here, in Spanish, is your name, rank and a description of your duties. I have taken your Communist Party membership card and wallet from your pocket. It also implies that you have information about the future plans of the Republican forces, which of course you do not. When they ask you for that information, you will deny that you have any and they will not believe you.’

  The look had changed as had Cal’s voice. ‘They will kill you eventually, Drecker, for they are no more g
entle than you have been to others, but not before they have done to you what you have inflicted on so many people, and when you are screaming in pain, I want you to think of this.’

  Cal took the photograph of Florencia out of his pocket and held it before the terrified German’s eyes. ‘There’s an expression we British use, it’s called “poetic justice”.’

  He had to get off the track into the fields; there would be a Republican outpost somewhere and it was pure luck as he drove that he saw the two men that manned the gimcrack blockhouse waving to him to stop, while not far from where they were based stood the Nationalist equivalent, in this case a not very high watchtower.

  Given they were defending the line, they were more proactive; whoever manned it loosed off a couple of shots at his car, more as a warning than an attempt to kill him. As soon as he was level with the watchtower he stopped, placed the things he needed as signs, got out and ducked behind the car, opening the back door.

  ‘Goodbye, Drecker, enjoy your visit to the other half of Spain.’

  Keeping the car between him and the Nationalists, he headed away, and sure he was beyond range, turned to regain the Republican area, coming round to the little blockhouse in a wide arc with fulsome apologies for being a stupid foreigner. He was with the two militiamen when the Nationalists finally and gingerly approached the abandoned car.

  What they saw first was what Cal had left on top of the dashboard: a black cap, with a very prominent red star facing right forward, and standing beside that a card, bearing the crest of the Partido Comunista de Espana.

  It was not long before one of them was running back to the watchtower, where there had to be a field telephone. Eventually one of them tried the engine, and when it fired it was driven well into the Nationalist zone. With many gestures that there was nothing they could do, the two Republican militiamen watched as the owner of the lost car, having accepted what had happened, began to walk back to the town, only using the finger to the finger-to-the-head gesture that he was mad when his back was to them.