The Triumph

by Christopher Nicole

  The alternative was to go down to Broad Acres himself...and do what? He had taken the girl in and given her a home. No one else. Lee had been aghast from the moment he had told her what he felt he must do, but with her unvarying loyalty she had accepted his decision. He had virtually adopted the girl, and he had personally killed her father, after watching her mother die. To throw her out, send her to an internment camp, would be a betrayal of every chivalrous instinct in his body.

  So, go down to Broad Acres and put her across his knee, and wallop her? He had a suspicion she might enjoy that. Far more to the point, he had a suspicion that he might enjoy that as well — far too much.

  How he wished he could go out to Egypt and join the troops there. He wouldn’t care if he wasn’t in command. Just to get into a tank and see the enemy through the slit. He was a fighting soldier. He had always been a fighting soldier. Always in the past the uncertainties of personal problems had been resolved in the glorious certainty of physical action, win or lose, kill or be killed. Riding into battle with an utterly fearless unconcern for personal safety, he had always won. Now he sent other men and women into battle, and watched them from afar, and could share neither their triumph nor their tragedies.

  *

  ‘The mountains are called Maglio and Durmitor,’ Murdoch explained, pointing to the map. ‘They’re each about seven thousand feet high, but there is a valley between. Still high, but fertile country, well wooded, with plenty of concealment. Where that long, narrow lake is.’ He grinned. ‘We’ll endeavour not to drop you in the water.’

  ‘Rather close to Sarajevo, isn’t it?’ Brigadier Durden asked.

  ‘Fifty-odd miles,’ Murdoch told him. ‘But the Germans only control the towns and the main roads. Fifty miles is a long way in that situation. For a German.’

  ‘Yes,’ Durden agreed. ‘And General von Reger is in Sarajevo.’

  ‘That is his command headquarters, according to our latest reports. You understand that he should be approached with the utmost caution. We don’t know if he will be receptive.’

  Durden nodded. ‘But you feel it will be worthwhile, sir.’

  ‘Yes,’ Murdoch said. ‘I met the General, when I was in Germany before the war. He struck me as being a very sensible fellow.’ He had not of course told Durden that Paul was his son.

  ‘Right-ho,’ the Brigadier said. ‘Well, I think that about ties it up. When do I go?’

  ‘On Thursday, you fly out to Cairo via Gibraltar. Thence to Cyprus. The actual flight is from Cyprus.’

  ‘Will do.’ Durden grinned. ‘Four days.’

  ‘Stay sober,’ Murdoch recommended. ‘Now, I’d like to meet your team.’

  Durden raised his eyebrows.

  ‘A weakness of mine,’ Murdoch said.

  ‘Quite, sir. I haven’t told them what the op is, of course.’ ‘I wouldn’t have expected you to. What have you told them?’

  ‘That we are undertaking a mission into enemy-held territory, and that we may be away some time. Nothing more than that.’

  ‘And they are all volunteers?’

  ‘Oh, indeed, sir.’

  ‘Good. Then I would like to meet them. Bring them along tomorrow.’

  *

  Brigadier Durden appeared rather like a ringmaster, as he stood in the doorway to Murdoch’s office. He was, in fact, showing unwelcome signs of strain this last week. Well, Murdoch thought, he was being almost literally launched into the blue. He was the ideal man for the job, on paper: he was a logistics expert, he had known Yugoslavia before the war, he spoke Croat, and his hobby was mountaineering. He had fought in Norway and received the Military Cross; no one could question his courage. Murdoch had picked him from several volunteers for this mission, and he had no doubt at all that when the mission actually began Durden would be as cool as necessary.

  He was more concerned with the possible reactions of the three men accompanying the Brigadier, who as yet did not know their fate. Three men? Murdoch’s jaw dropped as he surveyed the two men and the woman standing before his desk. All wore battledress, but...he looked at Durden.

  ‘Captain Percy Markham, sir.’

  Murdoch shook hands.

  ‘Sergeant Ronald Evans, sir.’

  Another firm handclasp.

  ‘Private Mary Edmunds, sir.’

  ‘Private.’ Murdoch gazed at her. She was a tall, somewhat raw-boned young woman, pleasant-faced and with curly fair hair peeping out from beneath her forage cap. She looked tough and fit enough, but...‘I’m pleased to make your acquaintance,’ Murdoch said. ‘I am sure you will all be a credit to the service. Good luck, and thank you.’

  They saluted and filed out.

  ‘A word, if you will, Brigadier,’ Murdoch said.

  Durden closed the door.

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ Murdoch inquired.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘My dear fellow, you can’t take a woman parachuting into the Serbian mountains.’

  ‘Why not, sir? She volunteered.’

  ‘For a mission. Not a mission like this. And with three men...’

  ‘Private Edmunds speaks Croatian and German, sir. Amongst other languages. She is a highly skilled linguist. I picked her for her qualifications over several men.’

  Murdoch gazed at him.

  ‘And you use women, sir,’ Durden reminded him. ‘Only after I have personally supervised their training.

  And I don’t like doing it. I don’t like this one at all.’ ‘She won’t let us down, sir.’

  ‘I was considering the other side of the coin, Brigadier.’

  ‘I can assure you, sir...’

  ‘Simmer down,’ Murdoch told him. ‘I wasn’t thinking of you or your men. But she is going to have to live rough with a lot of Serbs.’

  ‘With whom we shall be fighting, shoulder to shoulder. I will make Edmunds’s well-being my personal concern, sir.’

  Murdoch knew he wasn’t trying to be funny; a sense of humour was something the Brigadier entirely lacked. ‘Very good, Durden,’ he said. ‘I was just taken aback. Carry on.’

  The Brigadier saluted.

  *

  ‘I’m not sure it isn’t indecent,’ Murdoch grumbled to Methuen.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ the Commander agreed. ‘But she did volunteer, and she knows she’s going to be with a lot of men. It’s the thought of if she were to be captured by the Gestapo that worries me.’

  ‘Yes,’ Murdoch said. ‘It worries me, too. I worry about all of them.’

  ‘I know that, sir,’ Methuen said. ‘That’s wh ...’ he gave a kind of gulp.

  Murdoch raised his head. ‘Say it.’

  ‘I think Deschards has gone.’

  ‘What? What makes you say that?’

  ‘There has been no report this week. So I contacted Pleinhomme, and asked him to check. He has just come back to me. Her rooming house was raided, nine days ago. Gestapo. The neighbours heard shots, and then they saw people being removed.’

  ‘Dead people?’

  ‘Live people. But not in very good shape. One of them was certainly a woman.’ Methuen watched his superior’s fingers curling into fists. ‘I’m sure she will never betray us, sir, or her contacts.’

  ‘Yes,’ Murdoch said. ‘Deschards will never betray us.’ But she will die cursing us, he thought. Me, at the least. He got up. ‘I’m going to the Cavalry Club.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Methuen said unhappily.

  Murdoch didn’t even feel like getting drunk. He lay on his bed and stared at the ceiling, remembered Monique jogging round and round the cellar, so confidently, so powerfully. And then blowing that target to bits. Shooting accurately after extreme exertion is difficult, Mrs Bryant had said. Had Monique undergone extreme exertion before having to shoot for her life? Either way, she hadn’t succeeded.

  And now Durden, setting off into the blue, with his three volunteers...while he lay on his bed and sweated. God damn, he thought, to have a command...the telephone jangled.

  Murdoc
h lifted the receiver. ‘Yes?’

  ‘I have a call for you, General,’ said the hall porter. It’s Commander Methuen.’

  ‘Put him through.’ Murdoch’s heart began to pound. It had to be news of Monique. Perhaps she had evaded the Gestapo after all, in which case he’d bring her back out, right away. ‘Commander?’

  ‘Sorry to disturb you, General,’ Methuen said. ‘But we have just received a top-secret communication for you from the PM.’

  ‘I’ll be right down,’ Murdoch said, and dragged on his uniform.

  Churchill had wired, in code, to General Sir Alan Brooke, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, copied to Lieutenant General Sir Murdoch Mackinder, on special assignment to his Majesty’s Government: GOTT KILLED IN AIR CRASH THIS MORNING HOURS AFTER ACCEPTING COMMAND EIGHTH ARMY STOP FATE HANGS HEAVY AT TIMES STOP SUGGEST VERY SERIOUSLY MONTGOMERY FOR VACANT POSITION STOP ALEXANDER CONCURS STOP IF YOU AGREE AMERICANS WILL HAVE TO BE SQUARED STOP SUGGEST CIGS CONTACT EISENHOWER AND MACKINDER PUT POSITION TO MONTGOMERY STOP MOST URGENT DECISION TAKEN AND IMPLEMENTED IMMEDIATELY STOP HOT STOP CHURCHILL.

  Murdoch picked up the phone and called the War Office. He had known Alan Brooke for many years, as he had known his predecessor, Sir John Dill, whom Brooke had only replaced as CIGS the previous December, owing to Dill’s ill health. ‘Yes,’ Brooke said. It’s an odd world. Poor old Strafer. Anyway, we don’t have any choice but to go along with Winston’s idea. I wouldn’t wish Montgomery on anyone, much less an army suffering from low morale, but there is no one else. You go along and see him, Murdoch. And the best of luck.’

  *

  Murdoch left next morning, driving down to the south of England where Montgomery was presently in command. He had of course known Montgomery as long as he had known most of the other generals in the British Army, without ever coming into close working contact with him; Montgomery was six years the younger man. Murdoch knew him for a painstaking soldier who had a reputation for holding, and expressing often enough, the opinion that few of his contemporaries really understood the art of modern warfare. Which probably accounted for the fact that he had had the least opportunity of all the senior British commanders to distinguish himself, although he had commanded an army corps in France before Dunkirk; no one really wanted either to command him or work with him, and that Alexander had agreed with Churchill over giving him the Eighth Army spoke volumes for the new GOC Middle East’s confidence.

  Murdoch therefore approached the meeting with some caution. But his fighting record as well as his seniority was an asset. He was greeted most courteously and entertained to a decidedly simple lunch, at which no wine was offered. ‘I assume you’ve come to see how my troops are getting on?’ Montgomery asked when the meal was finished and they retired to the General’s office to drink coffee in private.

  ‘As a matter of fact, no,’ Murdoch told him. ‘I was asked to come and see you by the PM. With the agreement of Brooke, of course.’

  Montgomery, a sharp-featured little man with a small military moustache, raised his eyebrows. ‘An emissary from the corridors of power,’ he remarked. ‘Have the Yanks objected to me?’

  ‘Not so far as I am aware,’ Murdoch said. ‘But it has been decided that they can’t have you.’

  ‘Is that so? Why not?’

  ‘We want you to take the Eighth Army.’

  Montgomery turned his head to frown at him.

  ‘As you probably know,’ Murdoch said, ‘it’s in pretty bad shape. Not only did it take a shellacking from Rommel, but it has the idea that the man cannot be beat, that his tanks and guns are superior to ours.’

  ‘The reports I’ve read indicate that they are,’ Montgomery observed.

  ‘That may be, although steps are being taken to remedy this. The point is, the army has to be restored to its full fighting capacity, and Rommel has got to be beaten. Otherwise Malta is going to fall, and then probably Egypt.’ He didn’t add that in such an eventuality Torch would probably have to be abandoned, and perhaps the whole of North Africa, and ultimate victory would have receded by another year at least, even with American aid.

  ‘Oh, I can see that,’ Montgomery agreed.

  ‘Well, will you take the command?’

  Montgomery stared in front of himself for several seconds. Then he said, ‘Has it ever struck you, Murdoch, just how whimsical Fate can be when she decides to play tricks? She takes a professional soldier, who has devoted his life to his country and his career, who has fought in the Great War and obtained some little distinction, who has progressed through the various grades of seniority until he arrives at the rank of lieutenant general, and is given command of an army. It could be said that he has arrived at the pinnacle of his ambition, of his career. And then, with a snap of her fingers, the fickle jade takes it all away.’

  ‘My dear fellow,’ Murdoch protested. ‘I am sure it isn’t going to be anything like as bad as that. The Eighth Army is restorable. My own regiment is with them, and my son. They are just looking to be led. As for that supposed inferiority in weapons, I can tell you in confidence that President Roosevelt has authorized the immediate transfer of three hundred Sherman tanks to Egypt. They are the very latest American machines, and are superior to anything possessed by the Afrika Korps. I really see no reason for you to be that despondent.’

  Montgomery had turned his head, and was frowning again. ‘Despondent? I am not in the least despondent.’

  ‘But what you just said ...’

  ‘Good Lord!’ Montgomery gave a sudden grin. ‘I wasn’t speaking of myself, Murdoch. I was speaking of poor old Rommel.’

  *

  It occurred to Murdoch, as he drove back to London that afternoon, that Montgomery might indeed be the one man who could beat Rommel. More than ever he wished he could be there, to see and hear for himself, rather than have to wait for Fergus’s letters.

  But when he regained his office, he forgot all about the Eighth Army. ‘I’m afraid it just isn’t our day, sir,’ Methuen said. His voice was tense.

  ‘What’s happened now?’

  ‘Brigadier Durden has had a heart attack.’

  Murdoch sat up straight. ‘A what?’

  ‘A heart attack, sir.’

  ‘But he was passed as absolutely fit.’

  ‘I know, sir. I suppose he must have been under a greater strain than we realized.’

  ‘Yes,’ Murdoch said. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘The Middlesex Hospital.’

  ‘I suppose I’d better get down there. Let them know I’m coming, will you. Is he conscious?’

  ‘Ah...’ Methuen hesitated. ‘When I meant the hospital, I actually meant the morgue, sir.’

  ‘Good God! Just like that?’

  ‘I’m afraid so, sir. The mission is due to depart on Thursday. Shall I cancel it? I’m afraid there isn’t time to brief a replacement in time. Even if we can find one.’

  Murdoch stared at him.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Leave it with me for a few hours,’ Murdoch said. ‘It doesn’t have to be cancelled yet.’

  *

  He called for his car and drove into Buckinghamshire, found Mrs Bryant in her office. ‘Deschards,’ Mrs Bryant said. ‘Now that is a shame, General. But she was careless, letting herself be taken alive. I gave her a full supply of cyanide tablets.’

  ‘We don’t know she was taken alive,’ Murdoch said. ‘But supposing she was, what will they do to her?’

  ‘Do you really want to know?’

  ‘Yes,’ Murdoch said. ‘I do.’

  Mrs Bryant’s shoulders rose and fell. ‘A body search. Very unpleasant. A flogging. The Gestapo are fond of flogging women. Electric shocks. This is their latest toy. They attach them to various sensitive parts of the body.’ She gazed at Murdoch. ‘There are a lot of those. Then a cell. And then a firing squad. Or just a bullet through the inspection hatch. It’s all very unpleasant. Far better to bite the cyanide capsule.’

  ‘Yes,’ Murdoch said. ‘Take me downstai
rs, will you, Mrs Bryant.’

  She got up without comment, led him down the stairs. Mr Hunt had his usual four girls in the cellar. ‘Give the young ladies a ten-minute break,’ Murdoch requested.

  ‘Dismissed for ten minutes,’ Mrs Bryant said.

  The girls gave Murdoch anxious glances — he had of course met them before sending them here — and filed out. Murdoch removed his uniform, stripping to his underwear. ‘Test me, Mr Hunt,’ he said.

  Hunt looked at Mrs Bryant, and received a quick nod. ‘Very good, General. You’ll find a pair of plimsolls over there. Will you put them on and start running?’

  Murdoch obeyed. He quickly began to sweat. But he kept himself fit by playing squash at least three times a week and did not find the jogging unduly hard. Indeed he soon began to enjoy it, lost count of the number of times he circled the room, was surprised when Hunt said, Now, General.’

  He stopped at the table, picked up the revolver, used his left hand as it slipped on his sweat-wet palm, turned to face the target as it came into light, and squeezed the trigger six times. Cardboard flew in every direction.

  ‘Nice shooting!’ Hunt exclaimed.

  ‘Indeed,’ Mrs Bryant said. ‘I wish some of my girls could have seen that. I mean, at sixty...’

  ‘Don’t say it,’ Murdoch suggested. ‘But you think I’d pass your tests?’

  ‘That one,’ Mrs Bryant told him. ‘There are others.’

  *

  ‘I really feel we should do something about that aircraft, sir,’ Methuen said. ‘And the three staffers. They don’t know about Durden’s death yet. But it’s hardly fair to cancel at the very last minute, and they’re due out tomorrow.’