The Steel Fist

by Richard Townsend Bickers

  “Listen. I’m going to chuck two grenades. When they burst, everyone run like hell for fifty paces, then drop. Stay together. Each time they get close, we’ll throw a couple more grenades.”

  Waiting until the Germans could be seen twenty yards away, Taggart knelt on one knee, threw two Mills bombs, and ducked. Some fragments whirred overhead. The Commandos stood and ran, pounding for the shelter of a grassy hummock that would hide them all.

  The grenades had produced a fresh outburst of shouting, and cries from the wounded.

  Half a dozen enemy grenades burst belatedly. One of the Commandos staggered. Udall grabbed him.

  “Man hit, sir.”

  Taggart veered towards them, supported the bleeding Commando on one side, while Udall held him on the other, and completed his fifty paces.

  “Let them have it, Bren gunner, when they’re in range. We’ll save the grenades.”

  The enemy came carefully through the mounds of wind-heaped sand and coarse grass. The Bren gun and Taggart’s Tommy gun opened fire. A few enemy grenades whistled through the air and fell short.

  It abruptly became quiet. The sound of men trudging through the sand was overlaid by the whimpering and groans of two or three wounded.

  Taggart allowed five minutes, then gave the order to move.

  Fighting was still going on where it had first broken out, several hundred yards down the road. Taggart wondered if the H.S.L. was under attack also. He could see no gunfire where he thought it was. Perhaps there had been a fight that he had missed and the boat was already sunk or captured.

  Slowly the patrol retraced its steps.

  Taggart wondered if the enemy were gathering in strength along the road before making a search along the water’s edge. He began to hurry, burdened with the wounded man.

  When they saw the H.S.L. they saw also that there was a straggle of Commandos wading out to it. Presently they were up to their armpits in the sea, then clambering aboard.

  Lieutenant-Colonel Beauchamp-Ballantrae was leaning over the side, hauling men up to the rail. “You’re the last, Taggart.”

  “The others...?”

  “Both back. All accounted for.”

  Taggart handed up the wounded man and waited until last to leave the water.

  The H.S.L.’s engines came to life and she backed off the sand.

  From the roadway came a flurry of Spandau tracer. Bullets thudded into the hull. The three engines kicked together as the captain ordered full throttle. The wake creamed hugely.

  Men were laughing and talking, drinking rum and coffee, sprawling on the deck like pashas taking their ease. The only indulgence forbidden was to smoke. It was still dark and there might be lurking E-boats that would spot matches, glowing cigarettes and pipes.

  The Colonel sat below decks with his three officers.

  “Three dead, five wounded, nobody left behind; not even our dead. I think we can count it a success. Right, let me hear the details. You first, Hugh.”

  The sun was coming up. There was still twenty miles to go. A section of Hurricanes appeared overhead. No need to worry about enemy aircraft or E-boats if the R.A.F. was there. On deck, the Commandos were singing.

  Seven

  “We’ve got a lot to learn.”

  Beauchamp-Ballantrae’s habitually fierce look gave his assembled officers the feeling that he blamed each of them individually.

  “We did quite well; particularly considering the failure of two H.S.Ls and sixty of us to take part, the lack of really suitable landing craft, lack of specialised weapons and lack of specialised training. We have to learn to kill silently, to kill sentries without setting off an alarm, to kill cyclists and motor cyclists quietly, to stop lorries by other means than gunfire or mines in the road. We have to have a clear and simple means of identifying friend from enemy; we must have a close liaison with the other Services so that a farce like that business with the Hurricanes that delayed us isn’t repeated; and we must have absolutely reliable navigation equipment in the craft that carry us on a raid.”

  The Colonel had more to say; and, when his audience dispersed, Abberley had things to say to his two subalterns.

  “There must be tremendous opposition to the Commando idea at the War House and among battalion commanders. Their attitude will be that we’re trying to lure away their best people. They’ll argue that there’s nothing we could do that they couldn’t do as well or better, given the proper briefing and rehearsal. And there’s always inter-Service jealousy and politicking. The admirals and air marshals will be complaining about having to provide boats and air cover, just as vigorously as the generals will be opposing any new idea and especially one that they see as skimming the cream of the Army from every regiment in order to form an elite specialist force.”

  Gowland looked worried.

  “D’you think the whole idea will be squashed?”

  “No. Because it’s Churchill’s baby and in the end he’ll always win any argument. But I think it will take a hell of a lot longer to form ten five-hundred-man Commandos than even Churchill expected. There’s going to be too much argy-bargy for one thing. And, for another, defending this country against invasion is going to take priority over raiding enemy-occupied countries. Incidentally, Rodney, we’ve had applications from some of your old battalion: a chap called Dempster, a Sergeant Duff and a Corporal Something-Smith.”

  “I know George Dempster well; same company. Duff was my platoon sergeant. Fysshe-Smith was in my platoon, too. All good chaps.”

  “I’ll take the N.C.Os, then, if they get past the Colonel. Sorry I haven’t room for another officer.”

  Gowland asked “What’s being done about giving us the special training the Colonel says we need? I mean, we all know we’ve got a lot to learn; but talking about it won’t get us anywhere.”

  Abberley raised an eyebrow in the way that Taggart had come to know indicated amusement. Gowland’s aggressive bluntness and energy were the cause.

  “I don’t think you’ll be disappointed, Bill.”

  Gowland gave his troop commander an enquiring look, but Abberley would say no more.

  * * *

  “Cornwall? What’s this, then, a bloody holiday?”

  Gowland’s beefy face registered disbelief and indignation enough to draw a smile from Taggart.

  Abberley, at his most languid, remained bland and inscrutable.

  “Ever been to Cornwall?”

  “No. Why should I? We’ve got the best beaches and the best cliffs... and the best seaside places, Scarborough and Bridlington, in Yorkshire. Who needs to go outside Yorkshire for anything?”

  “The climate is perhaps a little kinder in the West Country.”

  “What’s that got to do with it?”

  “Dry weather means more hours available for outdoor training. By the time we’ve finished the Colonel’s programme on Bodmin Moor and the cliffs, I don’t think you’ll feel as though you’ve been on holiday, Bill. Other commandos are going up to Scotland. Considering the Colonel is a Scot, there must be a pretty powerful argument in favour of where he’s chosen to take us. As an exception, to save time, the whole unit is being taken by train; tonight.”

  Gowland looked sceptical.

  “We’d do better on the Yorkshire moors and the cliffs on Flamborough Head.”

  “Mention it to the Colonel,” Taggart suggested.

  Gowland gave him a dirty look, then grinned reluctantly and said “Bloody cider, eh? I don’t suppose there’s a decent beer brewed down there.”

  “Are there going to be enough billets?” Taggart asked.

  “We’re going to be under canvas.” Abberley looked at Gowland as though expecting a remark, but he appeared to be brooding. Probably, Taggart and Abberley thought, at the prospect of being exiled so far from his native county and beyond reach of its breweries.

  It was not until No 100 Commando paraded the next morning that he was seen to smile again.

  They had detrained at 3 A.M. and marched f
or an hour in the darkness and the faint glimmer of first light. They had arrived at an isolated little bay surrounded by high cliffs topped by coarse grass. They had erected their tents. Field kitchens had cooked their breakfast. They had washed, shaved and polished their boots. At 8 A.M. they fell in.

  Roll was called. The Colonel said “Training in unarmed combat is in the hands of Captain McQuade and Sergeant Gage.” He looked towards the tent lines on his left, then the gorse bushes on his right.

  Two bare-headed men in battledress and khaki gym shoes came sprinting towards him from opposite directions. One was over six feet tall and must have weighed sixteen stone. He reminded Taggart of a Matilda tank. The other was slight, about five feet nine inches and somewhere between nine and ten stone.

  They met on the uneven ground directly in front of the Colonel and between him and the front rank of the parade. They grappled. The big man flew through the air and landed on his back. The smaller man crouched, waiting for him to rise. He did so and rushed. This time it was the smaller man who was thrown through a backward somersault to fall prone. He was quickly on his feet and locked in a struggle with the other. And, again, it was the tall, heavy man who toppled.

  Both men stood facing the Colonel, at attention.

  “Thank you.” He addressed the parade as the two combatants turned smartly about to face it. He gestured to the big man. “Captain McQuade, as you see from his shoulder titles, is a Canadian. He has served in the Police and spent many years on frontier duty, apprehending bootleggers who were running illicit liquor into the United States. He has also spent a period with the Police in New York and Chicago, as well as having fought in France in the Great War.

  Looks as though you couldn’t dent him with a pickaxe and as if he wouldn’t bat an eyelid if a three-ton lorry ran over him, Taggart was thinking.

  “Sergeant Gage belongs to the P.T. Corps. He has lived in Japan and qualified in the highest possible grade in Judo. He is also a bayonet-fighting champion. Carry on, please, Captain McQuade.”

  “Sir. Stand at ease, stand easy and listen. Don’t miss anything the Sergeant or I show you or tell you. You haven’t the time for inattention. There’s a helluva lot you have to learn and time is short. As you’ve just seen, a man’s size is not necessarily the deciding factor in a hand-to-hand fight. You saw Sergeant Gage throw me twice out of three times. We’re going to teach you how to kill with your bare hands, with your feet, with your head and your elbows. How to garrotte and strangle and break a man’s neck. And a lot of other skills. And all silently. The only noise is if a guy you kill happens to grunt.” A slow smile spread across the captain’s huge, strangely pallid face. His enormous teeth shone yellow in the morning sun. Taggart expected him to slaver and was disappointed when he did not.

  “There is a new weapon for you: the Commando fighting knife.” His hand went to his hip and the sun glinted on the object lying on his vast open hand. “It has a seven-inch blade of carbon steel, seven-eighths of an inch wide. The cross-section is slightly diamond-shaped: that’s for the most effective penetration. The knurled grip and crossguard are made of brass. Every officer and man will also carry one of these.” He held up a length of cheese wire with a small wooden toggle tied at each end. “It’s for whipping round a guy’s neck.” He turned with lightning speed and looped the wire around Sergeant Gage’s thin neck. “Then all you have to do is give a quick tug on each end and you’ve got a corpse. Your third specialist weapon is a cosh. Coshes can be made in all sorts of ways. Here’s a simple one.” He pulled a thick woollen sock from a pocket. “The foot is half-filled with sand. Hit a guy in the right place with that and he ends up extremely defunct. Right; now, on the command, break ranks and form three sides of a square, so you can all see clearly. Sergeant Gage and I are going to demonstrate some of the things I’ve mentioned. And then you’ll practise until, six weeks from now, it will all come as naturally to you as sinking a pint of bitter. But before you do that, the Colonel has something more to tell you.”

  The Colonel said “You are going to be taught to camouflage yourselves so effectively that you will appear, even at close quarters, to be part of the terrain.” He spoke loudly.

  Behind him, a gorse bush and a clump of grass stirred and a man moved into sight from behind or beneath — it was impossible to say — each of them.

  “Finally, you have all looked over the edge of this sheer cliff behind me and you all know it seems unscalable.”

  The Colonel blew his whistle. A few seconds later the heads and torsos of six men in battledress appeared over the clifftop.

  “I think we’re all going to find these next six weeks rather unusually interesting.” Beauchamp-Ballantrae showed his men a momentary, rare, faint smile.

  * * *

  “You appear to have adapted to West Country beer rather well, Bill. A smooth transition, one might say.”

  Abberley drained his own tankard.

  “Not much choice. It’s this canary-piss or cider...”

  “And scrumpy is too strong for people who aren’t used to it. Quite.”

  “Too strong? Nothing’s too strong for a man suckled on Tetley’s and John Smith’s. I don’t like the taste of scrumpy.”

  Taggart ordered another round. The Seven Stars was a haven for which he was grateful. It was five miles from camp, far enough to ensure that they would find no reminders there of the Army; apart from the odd soldier, sailor or airman on leave: and, by the end of July and with England under siege, there were not many away from their units. Taggart supposed that he ought to have twinges of conscience about driving all this way two or three times a week in Abberley’s thirsty Alvis Speed Twenty-five, when petrol was so strictly rationed; but he had no twinges at all. Even the physical ones engendered by the early days of Commando training had passed off.

  He handed the brimming tankards to his two companions.

  “After four weeks, I feel as competent as any professional hired assassin. But when do we have a chance to do our stuff in earnest?”

  “I suspect something bubbling.” Abberley did not sound, however, as though he were particularly concerned. “it never does to be in a hurry, Rodney. You’re such an impatient chap.”

  Taggart’s Military Cross had been gazetted the previous day and he had been ordered by the Colonel to put the ribbon up at once. He would have left a decent interval, given the option: say, until he actually had to go to Buckingham Palace to receive the decoration. He felt self-conscious about the pristine violet and white adornment above his left breast pocket. He was also embarrassed by the persisting self-denigration that made him feel unworthy of being rewarded for conduct which he alone knew had been compounded partly of impetuosity and partly of sheer anger, with an infusion of stark terror that had sent him pelting headlong in retreat until he had cannoned into Sergeant Duff and been shocked into realisation of how close to the brink of both death and panic he had gone.

  Now, bearing the outward symbol of a publicly acknowledged gallantry, he felt that he had to justify it by fighting again as soon as possible; and, this time, keeping a cool head.

  Gowland’s eyes had wandered. He glanced back at his friends and smirked.

  “There’s something bubbling over yon.” He jerked his head towards the other side of the room.

  Taggart looked. Three girls in Land Army buff velveteen breeches and green jumpers were huddling over a small table and three glasses of cider. He glanced at their legs. The thick khaki knee stockings and heavy brown lace-ups were unexciting. But the girls were pretty and their figures well formed.

  “They were looking at us. And now they’re talking about us.” When Gowland was stirred, his “us” became “ooz”. He was plainly excited by the interest of the three young farmhands.

  So, Taggart realised to his surprise, was he. He looked at Abberley and read the signs in his eyes.

  “You look as though you’re ready to tackle a climb, Hugh.”

  “Funny you should say that. But nothing ve
ry high, you understand. I might just manage a climb onto a recumbent lady agriculturalist.”

  “I think we’re all thinking along the same lines. Do you notice a family resemblance among those three wise monkeys?”

  “Now you mention it...”

  A look of urgency appeared on Gowland’s face.

  “Hey oop! We’d better be quick.”

  The door of the saloon bar had opened to admit two R.A.F. pilots.

  “Why aren’t they down in Kent or Sussex?” Abberley pretended to be aggrieved.

  “Been in the thick of it, perhaps, and having a rest,” Taggart suggested.

  “In which case we’d better move swiftly.”

  Abberley stood up and a few long strides across the room took him to the girls’ table.

  Taggart and Gowland watched. So did the R.A.F. officers.

  The girls pretended to be surprised at Abberley’s arrival. They looked up and giggled. He rested his hands on the table and bent over them. Whatever he was saying seemed to touch some chord, for the girls began to blush and laugh. A moment later Abberley had scooped up all three of their glasses and was ushering them to the table where Gowland and Taggart were already beginning politely to rise to their feet.

  The R.A.F. officers grinned appreciatively.

  “May I introduce Molly, Polly and Dolly. My friends Rodney and Bill.”

  The girls sat down, alternating with the three young men.

  Taggart looked at the girl on his right. She had freckles, auburn hair, blue eyes and a mouth that seemed to begin at one ear and end at the other. The bosom of her jersey looked as though an air pump had inflated it to a good 100 lb per square inch pressure.

  “Are you sisters?”

  “Yes, m’dear.”

  “Local?”

  “We’re from near Bath.”

  “Fairly local, then.”

  “We’re a long way from home.”

  “And you’re Molly?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Wouldn’t you like something else to drink? A pretty girl like you deserves something more interesting than scrumpy.”