Death or Glory I: The Last Commando: The Last Commando

by Michael Asher

  They were silent for a moment, then Copeland said, ‘You know, Tom, the chances of picking up Runefish are about 5 per cent. I reckon they've sent us on a snipe hunt.’

  Caine was about to agree, but stopped himself, clutching the door strop with his left hand, staring dead ahead. ‘Just think of that girl alone in the emptiness, lost, confused, powerless to do anything, surrounded by the whole bloody Panzer Army.’ He turned and stared at Cope. ‘Whatever bullshit story we've been fed, we can't leave her there, Harry. No. I'm going to get her out, if it's the last thing I ever do.’

  Caine's words cheered Copeland, and went a long way to dispel his misgivings. It was good to be with a leader who was committed.

  The stars were already fading, the eastern horizon edged in fire-washed ochre. A quarter of an hour later the sun burst through riffling dust-clouds, a gleaming fire-opal, painting bizarre shadow versions of the wagons in the sand before them. Caine waited until the sun was high enough to provide a clear shadow for the sun compass, then instructed Cope to give three short blasts on his horn – the prearranged signal for ‘general halt’.

  Caine found his prismatic compass and jumped out of the wagon. The desert lay featureless to every horizon – even Jaghbub oasis had been swallowed up by the vastness. The mission's projected ‘landfall’ was a point just over two hundred miles to the north-west, near the Italian post at Msus. Caine had already worked out the grid bearing with map and protractor – now he had to convert it to a magnetic bearing and transfer that to the sun-compass. Land navigation was a meticulous business, but one in which Caine had excelled from the beginning. He was good at it, yet he'd never become blasé, never lost the thrill of gratitude he'd experienced the first time he'd brought a convoy to within a stone's throw of a point in the middle of nowhere, merely through his own calculations. It had given him a satisfying illusion of mastery over the wilderness.

  What had been worrying Caine since they'd left Jaghbub, though, was the fact that he was the only qualified navigator on the op. If he went down, there would be no substitute. He'd decided to train up Copeland and Wallace, and when they'd grasped the basics, they could pass it on to the other lads.

  Calling his two mates to accompany him, he moved about ten yards from the scout-car. ‘You have to get far enough away from the wagon so that its metal doesn't affect the prismatic's magnetic field,’ he explained. ‘You can't use a prismatic in a vehicle because the constant gear-shifts and varying speeds are impossible to compensate for.’

  He fixed the bearing and held the compass out to them. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘all you have to do is manoeuvre the vehicle until the shadow of the sun-compass is aligned with this bearing, and drive in a straight line, keeping the shadow in the same place.’

  ‘Wait a sec,’ Cope protested, wearing his disdainful ‘clever-boy-of-the-class’ expression, ‘the sun doesn't stay in one place, so doesn't that mean we have to keep on shifting the vehicle?’

  Caine smiled. ‘Full marks, Harry,’ he said. ‘That would be the case, except that we have Bagnold sun-compasses with a calibration disc. Instead of constantly shifting the wagons about, we simply adjust the disk every thirty minutes, according to our azimuth tables. Apart from that, it's just a matter of logging the distance between each adjustment so you can calculate your position by dead-reckoning.’

  Wallace looked mystified at the mention of ‘azimuth tables’ and ‘dead-reckoning’, but Caine wasn't worried that he was out of his depth. Wallace was a practical soldier who needed to grasp things with his hands rather than his mind, but once he'd mastered the lesson, he would never forget it.

  When Cope had the White pointing in the right direction, Wallace took his post at the hatch and went on humming Vera Lynn. Caine resumed his seat beside the driver. As they set off into the open desert, he felt a surge of euphoria. The Sahara never failed to give him this thrill. Time was meaningless here – a year was the same as a thousand years. Once you were clear of ‘civilization’ it was as if you'd cut yourself loose in time and space, entered a freefall dimension whose hugeness reduced the war to a skirmish between colonies of ants. In the Blue, you broke free of normal human limits, engaged with nature's raw dynamics in a way you could never do in a city. Caine felt privileged to be here.

  His eyes worked constantly over the surface: sheets of flat, hard sand, crusts of shattered shale, hard gravel beaches, oval playas glittering with salt crystals. He picked out paths through the void, urging the driver left or right, balancing the compass-shadow against the wagon's speed, against the going. The drive was punctuated only by halts to adjust the sun-compass, but Caine was glad of these short pauses, as opportunities to feel the earth beneath his feet, taste the intensity of the almost ceaseless northerly breeze, feel the wax and wane of the sun's heat. Once he spotted a red admiral butterfly, coming from nowhere, going nowhere, and it seemed to him that the creature had been put there solely for his delight.

  On the good going the wagons sped along at forty miles an hour. Caine had instructed the drivers to fan out into ‘air formation’ – a rough arrowhead whose object was to present a more difficult target to marauding aircraft. On standard runs Caine would have taken a ‘jinks’ – a detour – every few miles, to throw off any spotters locked on their tracks, but time was short, and he decided to risk not taking one.

  By ten o'clock the desert was an inferno. The commandos doffed their outer layers, stripping down to shorts and socks and donning their special-issue footwear: Indian-style sandals known as chapplies.

  They had just halted for an azimuth adjustment when Caine heard the snarl of engines and the distinct grating of gears from beyond the horizon. He knew there was a convoy out there somewhere, but he couldn't see it. Caine had experienced this strange desert phenomenon of sound amplification before but had never been able to explain it. The curious thing, he'd observed, was that as soon as the convoy became visible, the engine noises would cease entirely until it was up close. Now, sweeping the landscape with his field glasses, he picked up a string of black beads on the edge of the world, apparently motionless among a glittering quicksilver mirage of pools and lakes. Caine got back into the wagon, pointed out the vehicles to Cope and told him to drive towards them. As his wagons approached, the convoy seemed to remain stationary – Caine spotted Union Jacks and formation-pennants that identified it as an Eighth Army column. Oddly, not until Caine's vehicles were within a couple of hundred yards of it did the column seem to unfreeze and explode into life – another optical illusion that Caine had become familiar with.

  Close up, it was a sorry sight – mixed-up British, Indian, New Zealand, South African and Free French wagons, driven by men with the hollow eyes of mummies, their faces gaunt and ghost-like under a film of chalky dust. There were limping trucks with shell-holes shot through their canvas covers, crippled AFVs being towed by mobile cranes, damaged field guns, broken-down Bren-gun carriers, trackless tanks and the skeletons of aircraft on transporters, wounded men crammed like sardines in the back of captured Axis lorries, who bounced on looking neither left nor right, like men possessed.

  ‘The face of defeat,’ Caine commented.

  Copeland stared after the disappearing column. ‘Jesus wept,’ he said.

  Just before noon, Wallace called Caine up to the observation hatch and pointed out another convoy approaching. It was perhaps two miles away, but even at this distance Wallace was certain it was the enemy. Caine watched it with his binos, marvelling at the acuity of Wallace's naked eyes. The convoy was a large one – a dozen big Italian Breda lorries, at least one of them carrying a 90mm self-propelled gun, and some Fiat Triple-Sixes. It was being led by an Italian A41 armoured car. ‘Ities, by the look of it,’ Caine said.

  ‘Let's scupper them,’ Wallace suggested. ‘They'll never know what hit 'em.’

  Caine was sorely tempted. These six-wheel Bredas were masterpieces of Italian craftsmanship, specially designed for difficult terrain. Beside them, British trucks were crude, mass-produ
ced jobs. A couple or three Bredas would be ideal for the Runefish mission. Sadly, he shook his head. ‘We can't afford to take prisoners,’ he said.

  ‘Who said anything about prisoners?’ Wallace smirked, patting the quilts on the Vickers ‘K’s.

  In commando training they'd been encouraged to go into action with what the instructors called the ‘killing face’. That was the expression on Wallace's countenance now. Caine saw it, and shook his head. ‘Listen,’ he said. ‘If those Ities surrender, I'll be faced with a choice of letting them go or shooting them down in cold blood. And that's a choice I wouldn't want to make – would you?’

  Wallace sniffed. ‘I suppose not,’ he said.

  Caine scoped the area around them. Fifteen miles to the south-west was a dune field, no more than a shimmer of varnished light on the skyline. It was too far away to reach quickly, and instead he picked out a low escarpment not more than a mile away, bristling with camel-thorn. ‘Head for that ridge,’ he directed Copeland. ‘Left – nine o'clock. There's enough shadow there to hide in, and we can sling the scrim nets.’

  Minutes later, from the shelter of a camouflaged scrim net, Caine watched the convoy with his field glasses as it rumbled past a quarter of a mile off. There were no flags or pennants this time, but he clocked Allied 3-tonners among the Italian trucks and noticed that some of the wagons were being driven by men wearing the insignia of the Royal Army Service Corps. He let out a slow breath. ‘It's one of ours,’ he said. ‘Captured vehicles.’ Wallace whistled, and Caine grinned at him. ‘It doesn't pay to be hasty, mate,’ he said.

  At high noon sun-compasses were ineffectual, so Caine made use of the halt to let the men brew up tea, to open tins of sardines and peaches in the shade of tarpaulins they'd rigged up under the scrim nets. At the previous night's briefing he had instructed drivers and co-drivers to check their engines and tyre pressure at every major stop and to top up with petrol and radiator water. He was pleased to see the two-man crews going about these tasks with practised ease.

  Caine realized that he hadn't had time to give Taffy Trubman a signals brief, and after posting two lookouts to watch the flanks, he walked over to the Dingo, where the signaller was erecting a rod aerial. ‘Don't get comms with Group,’ Caine said quietly. ‘Maintain complete wireless silence unless we hit an emergency.’ The Welshman considered him over his thick glasses: his puffy face took on a bemused expression. ‘That's not standard operating procedure, skipper,’ he said. ‘SOP is to get comms at every stop.’

  ‘You'll find a lot that's not SOP on this job – we have our own rules. There's too much risk of getting dee-effed, and we can't afford that.’ He handed Trubman a page from a message pad with numbers scrawled on it. ‘What I want you to do at each stop is to tune into this emergency frequency and listen for Runefish's SOS signal. She's got a biscuit-tin set, and if we pick up her transmission it'll solve the problem of locating her. Only, if you do pick up anything, whatever happens, don't acknowledge it. When you pack up the set, tune it back to zero, so there's nothing to betray the frequency if we get bagged.’

  ‘Right you are,’ Trubman sniffed. He adjusted his glasses and returned disconsolately to his aerial-building.

  Caine had Copeland call the rest of the boys over, intending to fill in the gaps in the briefing he'd delivered the previous night. He had only just begun, though, when one of the sentries, a clean-cut ex-Guardsman called Vic Bramwell, arrived back, out of breath. ‘There's a column coming directly towards us, skipper,’ he gasped. Caine glanced west, but Bramwell shook his head and pointed in the opposite direction. ‘No, it's coming up behind us,’ he said. ‘Looks as though they're following our tracks.’

  ‘Who the hell is that?’

  ‘It's not any of the ones that passed us this morning. I'd say it's British, though. Four 3-tonners, one towing a 25-pounder – maybe a Jock column?’

  Caine scratched his head. Jock columns were mobile units combining small packets of infantry and artillery. They'd been used extensively in the first year of the desert war, but he hadn't heard of them being deployed since. ‘What are they doing heading west?’ Copeland enquired.

  ‘Maybe we're not the only ones on a special mission,’ Caine said, but he felt doubtful. He was certain St Aubin would have warned him about a parallel operation – the CO had said that the only special-service troops available were the ME Commando. He pondered whether to stand the men to, but instead told them to stay alert in the cover of the nets and tarpaulins. He sent the sentry back to his post and told Flash Murray to man the Daimler's 20mm and cover the visitors. He called Wallace to join him in the open.

  The 3-tonners were on them within minutes, coming like strange lumbering animals out of the paste-white landscape, carrying veils of dust and sunlight reflected on their wind-screens like silver banners. Caine squared his wide torso towards the wagons, cradling his outsize Tommy-gun in the ready position. Wallace looped the sling of his Bren-gun round his neck. They stood their ground, though Caine was acutely aware that if there were any shooting, they'd go down in the first volley.

  The convoy halted a hundred yards from them, and a tall, sandy-haired officer dropped out of the leading wagon. Caine saw faces behind the windscreens and heads popping out of the observation hatches. The officer marched up to them as if he were on a parade ground. Close up, Caine saw that he was wearing captain's pips on his shoulder straps, a peaked service cap bearing the badge of the Scots Guards and khaki drills that seemed impossibly well pressed for desert service. He carried a .303 slung over his shoulder.

  The captain was obviously expecting a salute. Though they never saluted their own officers, Caine thought it best not to risk being identified as commandos. He threw one up, and the captain returned the gesture languidly. ‘Captain Broderick, 201st Guards Brigade,’ he said.

  Caine noted the ‘bar of Shepheard's’ drawl. ‘I thought your lot was at Knightsbridge, sir,’ he said.

  The captain grimaced. ‘Knightsbridge, alas, is no more. Jerry overran us yesterday. One hell of a scrap – never seen anything like it: men screaming, burning guns, wrecked lorries, tanks everywhere.’

  Caine's heart sank. He knew that Knightsbridge was the last defensive box on the Gazala Line, and that its fall meant that the Eighth Army's rearguard action had failed. ‘So Rommel will be going for Tobruk,’ he said, shaking his head.

  ‘Yes, one has to say the Desert Fox has done us up. All our brass-hats have demonstrated is that they're a bunch of incompetents.’ He chortled. ‘There's a rumour going round that Mr Hitler telephoned Mr Churchill the other day and offered to remove Rommel from his command. His only condition, he said, was that Churchill left all his generals in place.’

  Caine tittered politely, but was secretly surprised to hear this mutinous sentiment expressed by an officer of the socially elite Guards Brigade.

  ‘And you are…?’ the captain enquired, glancing at Caine's black tank-beret, searching in vain for a cap-badge.

  ‘Covering the withdrawal,’ Caine said, meeting the officer's eyes unflinchingly.

  A shadow passed across Broderick's clean-shaven face. ‘I see. Look here, you wouldn't have a medical orderly with you, would you? Only we have a chappie with a rather bad wound in the chest, and no one to do the works. Wouldn't trouble you, of course, but he's in a bad way.’

  Caine weighed it up. He didn't want to waste time doing other people's jobs for them, but he couldn't refuse to save a dying man.

  ‘How'd that happen, sir?’ Wallace demanded gruffly.

  The officer favoured the giant with a friendly smile. ‘Oh, bit of a shoot-out with Jerry. Almost nabbed us, you know.’

  Wallace pointed west with his massive, shrapnel-scarred, sphinx-tattooed arm. ‘Yeah, but Knightsbridge is in that direction, and you're coming from the other.’

  Broderick screwed up his face in an expression of mock imbecility. ‘Oh Christ,’ he said. ‘Don't tell me we're lost?’

  Caine and Wallace exchanged a brief glance, a
nd Caine was almost certain he heard the big man whisper ‘Woodentops’ under his breath.

  The captain didn't seem to have heard it. ‘About that orderly?’ he said.

  ‘Very good, sir,’ Caine said. ‘You can bring your man into the shade over there, and my orderly will have a look at him, but we can't take him with us. We're heading for the front. And sir, ask the rest of your men to stay in their wagons – only the stretcher party, please.’

  ‘I understand perfectly,’ Broderick cooed. Caine sent Wallace to fetch Maurice Pickney, while the captain bawled orders as shrill as parade-ground commands. A moment later four men dismounted from the back of the leading lorry, easing out a stretcher carrying what looked like a bundle of blood-smeared white rags. Taking a handle each they shuffled towards the little group, walking in step like a solemn funeral procession. The soldiers were tall and almost uniformly fair-haired, dressed like the captain in well-pressed khakis, and carrying Lee-Enfields slung from their shoulders. Even after they had laid the stretcher under the nearest awning, they remained po-faced and silent, accepting the cigarettes Wallace doled out but resisting his attempts to make conversation.

  While Broderick looked on, Caine and Pickney examined the wounded man. He was putty-faced, gasping for breath. Lifting his crudely applied dressings, Pickney saw bubbles of blood oozing from a gaping puncture in the chest. He shook his head. ‘It's a sucking pneumothorax,’ he said. ‘He needs surgery. All I can do is seal up the wound and leave a valve so that air can escape, but it'll only be a stop-gap. You'll have to get him to an aid-post right away.’