In the Light of Morning

by Tim Pears

  They reach adjoining mountain heights as day breaks. The rain eases off. Thick grey clouds lift from just above their shoulders, and become a thinner, paler grey. The timing is miraculous.

  ‘You see,’ Jovan tells a group of soldiers close by them, ‘when the people’s actions are right and just, even nature is on our side.’ The more simple-minded among the Partisans readily agree. He repeats what he said to Tom, for whom Jovan can claim ironic intention. Yet Jovan’s natural persuasiveness is such that even Tom feels a response to some deep longing for meaning; for supernatural agency working on their behalf; that the righteous have a destiny, for which they shall be spared.

  The sun comes out. They can feel the temperature rising from one moment to the next, as steam lifts from their clothing. They lie down and kip where they are, leaning against their rucksacks. In the afternoon food is passed around, slabs of cold meat and bread.

  Jack sits down with Tom. They have packed and repacked their rucksacks. Tom smokes.

  ‘When we came here, I don’t mind admitting,’ Farwell says, ‘I thought: You bastards, sidelining me in these endless bloody mountains, with these savages. But the odd thing is, Freedman, if we can knock out these railway lines, we might even have some impact on this war.’

  ‘You really think so?’ Tom asks.

  Jack peers at him, with his translucent blue eyes. ‘There’s no need to be so bloody earnest about it, man,’ he says. ‘It may not be a large impact. It may make no difference at all. Let us do what we must, and be damned.’

  Jack’s bluff confidence is oddly protective. He is able to take decisions and live with them unburdened by anxious thoughts of what alternative course he should have taken. He carries responsibility lightly. However different they are, Tom wonders if in time he might learn this gift of leadership from him.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Supplying Units Attacking Railway Tracks

  June 28

  AT NIGHTFALL THEY head west, part of a large body of Partisans. At intervals during the night a platoon of thirty soldiers, or a unit of half a dozen, peels off on one side or the other and melts into the forest.

  Tom watches them go and then, suddenly, he finds himself in a small group that Pero is leading south off the path. Tom does not understand. He runs back to the column and along it until he finds Jack Farwell, and tells him what is happening.

  ‘Yes, you need to go with them,’ Jack confirms. ‘Dixon, too. Change of plan. You’ll need to take on a bit more responsibility now.’

  ‘But what’s going on?’ Tom demands. ‘I’m supposed to be assisting you. I’m not supposed to make decisions.’

  The Partisans shuffle past them in the dark. The night is cool, and Tom can feel ice down his spine, though he is sweating.

  ‘Don’t worry, Freedman. You’re a liaison officer. All you need to do is get base to drop supplies where the Jugs ask you to. And once you receive a reply, tell the Jugs what time they’re due to arrive. It shouldn’t be difficult.’

  Tom is bewildered by this sudden turn of events. ‘But I’m only a lieutenant,’ he says.

  Jack laughs. ‘We’ll wangle a promotion, if that’s what you’re after.’

  ‘No, no,’ Tom tries to explain, but Jack is not listening.

  ‘Captain Freedman, yes, I can see that sounds better,’ he says.

  Tom tries to calm himself. ‘Is there nothing else I should know?’ he asks.

  Jack looks away. ‘Nothing for you to worry about,’ he says. ‘Do a good job.’ He turns and walks away. Tom trots back down the line, until he hears a voice.

  ‘Oi, sir. We’re down here.’

  Tom joins Sid, and Pero, and a small number of others. To Tom’s surprise, and relief, Jovan is among them. They stand on a slope below the main path and listen to the sounds of breathing, of boots on stones, rustling clothes and equipment, which fade to a whisper, and then are gone.

  Following Pero, they walk in single file. The night is cool. Tom does a head count: there are ten of them altogether. They have lost the protection of the large, headquarters contingent. He recalls the account of the Crna Roka, the Black Hand, and feels once more vulnerable.

  At daybreak they come to a farmhouse on its own in the hills. An old man with thick white hair is outside studying the clouded sky. They were not expected but he appears unsurprised, and ushers them inside. They crowd into the kitchen, where the old man’s daughter-in-law is already up. She sets about finding them food.

  It is still dim in the kitchen. The woman knows her way around in the murk but for the visitors’ benefit the old man lights lamps made from large, raw potatoes, hollowed out and filled with soft lard. The Partisans watch as the old man tries to light the wick he’d placed in the lard, using twigs flamed from the stove, burning his fingers, for the lard is barely flammable. But the old man perseveres, unflustered by the strangers’ eyes upon him, focused in his self-appointed task, until a smelly, flickering light illuminates the faces around the room. Then the old man leaves, with Jovan.

  The smell of burning lard joins those of fireplace smoke and body odour. Tom studies his companions who bunch up on trestles around the table. The six new Partisans sit in silence.

  ‘These people,’ Pero says to Tom, and Sid, ‘are your bodyguard.’ He introduces them. There are two women. One has a young peasant’s broad-boned, gentle features. ‘This is Francika.’ She blushes when she hears her name spoken, but keeps eye contact. She has freckles across the bridge of her nose and cheeks; and there is something odd about her eyes. Is she cross-eyed? Very slightly, perhaps, in one eye. The other woman – ‘Marija’ – is older, darker, sharper, more intent somehow; and even in her unkempt uniform, weary, unwashed, retains some faint air of sophistication.

  ‘Me veseli,’ she says, nodding formally to Tom and Sid in turn.

  There are two men, twenty or thirty years apart, both small, compact, with the same green eyes. ‘Franjo’, the older, turns shyly away; the younger, ‘Nikola’, nods to the Englishmen, beaming. They are surely father and son, but they look more like identical twins, one of whom has slipped out of chronological kilter with the other.

  There is a big silent bear of a man – ‘Stipe’ – and a rough-looking vagabond who peers around the simple room, it strikes Tom, as if searching for something worth stealing.

  Suddenly this man shoots a hand across to Tom, who takes it. ‘Marko Golob,’ the man whispers. ‘You may have heard of me.’

  Tom nods non-committally. The man still holds his hand, fixes him with his gaze. ‘I am a famous fighter,’ he says. ‘Ask anyone.’

  ‘Marko was one of the original Partisans,’ Pero agrees, ‘who took to the woods in the first days of the annexation.’

  ‘I was a shepherd. Now I am a soldier. Ask anyone,’ Marko advises the Englishmen. ‘They know who I am, I’ve fought with most of them. I just like to do things my own way, that’s all.’

  A great pot of stew is placed upon the table, and fresh brown bread from which they each tear a hunk. A miraculous meal, bread and stew the loaves and fishes that peasant women of this country produce, somehow.

  As they eat, Jovan returns with the old man and his wife. She carries a pail of fresh milk. The man speaks and Tom gathers that his son is far away – with the Partisans? Or in a labour camp? It isn’t clear. Children appear in the room. Twins the age of twelve or thirteen, Tom thinks; the girl goes over to help her mother, the boy stands in the doorway, head bowed shyly but watching what he can from the corner of his eye. Pero winks at him. A younger girl enters and within a short while is sitting on Francika’s lap.

  The woman gives them milk that has soured into yoghurt, served with a spoonful of honey. In this crowded, smelly kitchen it is another intimate miracle, remarkably delicious.

  Tom murmurs his appreciation.

  ‘Kislo mleko,’ the darker Partisan woman, Marija, tells him. ‘Enjoy it. I have been in the woods for almost one year. This is very unusual. And,’ she adds, nodding towards their hostes
s, ‘of rare quality. I never tasted better, even in Belgrade.’

  ‘Of course not,’ Marko says abruptly, as if admonishing her for some insult by omission. ‘Slovene women are the best cooks in Yugoslavia.’

  ‘Surely,’ says Francika, ‘you mean in all of Europe?’

  ‘In Europe?’ Marko counters. ‘My brother went to America to make his fortune, but he came home. You know why? He missed our mother’s food.’

  The young Partisan, Nikola, seated next to his father, asks, ‘Is that true?’ his green eyes widening.

  ‘Oh yes,’ Marko says with a definite, emphatic nod, thin lips tightening over rotten or missing teeth. ‘Yes, indeed.’

  ‘I believe it,’ Nikola says. ‘I believe it.’ Franjo pats his son on the back, and nods agreement.

  The boy in the doorway, meanwhile, has made his way over to Pero, and is studying his pistol in wonder.

  Jovan stands up. Everyone else stops talking and looks towards him. He thanks the woman for her food, the old man for his generosity, all the family for their hospitality. He explains that none of them can leave their house today. ‘And now, if you will allow us,’ he says, ‘we must sleep.’

  The boy leads them to a barn, which they share with two hugely pregnant cows. The Partisans lie down in the straw and sleep. The air they breathe is flavoured by the smell of the cows blowing off periodically through the day.

  June 29

  IN THE AFTERNOON they emerge from deep sleep, uncurling from the straw, and troop over to the house. The boy is trying to herd a pig that is somewhat larger than he is out of an enclosure. The big Partisan, Stipe, walks over. The sow runs hither and thither, avoiding the boy. The way her ears flap and her tail bobs makes it look as if she is playing a game. Perhaps she is; Tom knows little of such creatures. Stipe goes in, past the boy. He corners the sow and lifts her up, and carries her out of the enclosure. She must be about as heavy as Stipe is.

  Stipe’s physical presence is greatly reassuring. He is not tall, but massive. His neck is thick, his shoulders are very wide. He has a great barrel chest, and his legs are like tree trunks. It is as if his body has been squashed, so as to compress the physical power therein. He is not in fact that short, no smaller than Sid Dixon, yet he has the strength of some warrior troll or ogre. Tom is glad the man is on their side.

  Francika is already in the house, helping the mother. She urges them to sit. They eat bread with dripping.

  There is time this afternoon to regenerate their radio batteries. In Italy, a Briggs engine had been considered. But gasoline might not always be available, and even the midget engine was noisy. So what they have is a pedal dynamo. This particular model, Sid reckons, was captured from Germans in the Western Desert. It has a saddle and pedals, like a bicycle, and when ridden makes a noise like an enormous egg-whisk. Eight hours’ cycling are required to charge one battery. They take it in turns to pedal.

  The youngsters, Pero then Nikola, ride like sprinters in a race. ‘They could be in the Tour de France, sir,’ Sid says. ‘Riding for their country.’

  Once Sid and then Nikola’s father, Franjo, have had a go, Tom opts to take a turn. He can feel immediately the increased power of his legs, since he’d last ridden a bike, all those years ago in Oxford: he pedals furiously, sweating, gasping, until he is spent, and receives a loud round of applause.

  Those not cycling clean their weapons. Brown-haired Marija argues with Stipe over how to reassemble the MG34 light machine gun that he carries. Using a wood-handled spike borrowed from the farm, and a strip of leather, Marko repairs one of his boots as best he can, talking himself through the task. The son of the farm family helps them when he is allowed to, taking an eager turn on the dynamo.

  Tom offers Jovan a cigarette. He had hoped Jovan would offer him encouragement, or reassurance, but instead Jovan has been taciturn since they broke off from the headquarters staff. ‘May I offer you a word of advice from a Partisan officer?’ he says. ‘Avoid undignified spectacles, like this pedal machine.’ He gestures towards the dynamo with his chin. ‘You think the soldiers will like you for it. Perhaps you are right. But they will not respect you, and this is more important.’

  They smoke in silence for a minute or two. ‘You were not expecting this mission either,’ Tom ventures.

  ‘I should be with the command, of course!’ Jovan replies instantly. ‘I should be with your major, incidentally, to keep an eye on him. The Fourth Zone staff may be good soldiers, but they are naive.’ Jovan emits a bitter laugh that has no feel of humour in it. ‘Or perhaps the commissar is not so naive: he knows how to keep his job a little longer.’ He spits a strand of tobacco on the ground. ‘To hell with them,’ Jovan says, and suddenly, as if shrugging a cloak off his shoulders, his mood shifts. He smiles and puts an arm around Tom. ‘I am sorry, Tom, it is not your fault. Come, let us plan our campaign. Pero!’ he yells. ‘Bring the maps!’

  Jovan, Tom and Pero study waxed road maps laid out on the grass. The main railway line is on the eastern side of the Pohorje range, between Celje and Maribor; while on the western side, between Celje and Dravograd, is a winding, single-track line.

  ‘There are ten Partisan units scattered across these mountains,’ Jovan explains. ‘If we start at the top of the main line and work south, getting explosives to blow it every few miles, the Germans will catch us very quickly. Our passage must be unpredictable.’

  ‘I know many of these mountains,’ Pero says. ‘We will crisscross them.’ He sketches out a route, a zigzag path, from one unit to another.

  ‘How far apart are the railway lines?’ Tom asks.

  ‘Between thirty and eighty kilometres,’ Pero tells him.

  ‘As the crow flies,’ Tom says.

  ‘Yes,’ Jovan agrees. ‘And we are not crows. We have a lot of hard walking ahead of us.’

  ‘We are one day away from the first unit,’ Pero says. ‘What they have been able to do so far is very little. But with British explosives…’

  With the wireless batteries recharged, they listen to the news. US troops have liberated Cherbourg. Big, terrible bombs have been landing in England, from God knows where. With the map coordinates Pero gives him, Tom enciphers a message. Dixon radios for a drop. Tom watches him delicately tapping out the keys with his thick farm labourer’s fingers. Confirmation comes back: delivery in two nights’ time, at the appointed coordinates.

  Towards dusk they pack up and move off. The family gathers to watch them leave. The woman gives them bread and potatoes to take with them. The old man kisses each man among the soldiers. The boy walks beside Pero as far as the forest. The sky is pink. Tom can smell wild garlic. He turns back: only the two girls are still watching. The women and the old man have resumed their chores; have forgotten us, Tom surmises, have returned to the present moment they inhabit. The boy does not want to go back.

  ‘Soon you will be able to join up,’ Pero tells him. ‘Go home now. We will return.’

  ‘You are the British commanding officer now,’ Jovan tells Tom. ‘This is your mission.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Tom agrees. He nods, realising how much he wants Jovan to regard him as worthy of the role. ‘Yes, it is. I am ready.’

  Jovan takes his hand, and clasps it. ‘All for one and one for all.’

  Tom smiles. ‘You are adopting Dumas as an early Marxist?’

  ‘Why not?’ Jovan agrees. ‘I was always Aramis, when we played musketeers as children. You?’

  ‘D’Artagnan.’

  They tramp into the night. A pheasant is disturbed: its throttled cry as it rises, expression of its panic. Tom walks behind Jovan, who is first behind Pero the guide. Stipe lugs the light machine gun, Marija has a bandolier of ammunition slung over her shoulder. Father and son Franjo and Nikola stay close together, followed by Sid Dixon, and Francika. Marko the half-toothless, unshaven, rough fighter, whom Tom occasionally hears muttering to himself, brings up the rear.

  The First Unit

  June 30

  THEY BIVOUA
C IN the forest and fall asleep at dawn, exhausted. Tom wakes at noon to find himself resting against the trunk of a tree, alone. He staggers up, scans the wood, sees he has rolled twenty yards down the gentle slope they’d lain on. The Slovenes, accustomed to these slant conditions, have wedged themselves in place with rocks or broken branches.

  A dull, cloudy day. They boil the potatoes and eat them seasoned with wild garlic. In the afternoon they walk through the forest. At one point intermittent trees have a two-foot high white band around them, at knee height. Fifteen or twenty trees are so marked, as if a remote woodsman has daubed them with white paint, marking them out for felling. But as he passes close by one, Tom sees that the bark has been eaten away and resin bled – to poultice the wound? The resin turned white as it dried. Marko behind Tom must see him studying the trees. ‘A forest,’ he tells Tom, ‘is not a forest without deer.’

  They meet up with the first unit: a twenty-strong gang of fighters. Marko and Pero each know one of the men. Two planes are due. The drop point is a grazing pasture between hills. They build bonfires. A soft rain falls. Darkness comes early. They light the fires with difficulty. Jovan orders them into position. They hear the first plane arrive over the valley. Far above the mist and rain Tom can hear it circling. The mists thicken and thin like smoke. One moment they think the planes might get through, then it is so thick and raindrops are falling from the boughs around them and the leafy tops above seem lost in a veil of rain. The fighters keep dragging more damp wood to keep the fires burning, which smoke and hiss. For half an hour the planes circle in the moonlit sky above, while those on the ground can only watch the clouds and wonder.

  The longer they take the more chance there is of a German patrol hearing. Eight Partisans are posted out around the drop zone as lookouts. At any moment they may all have to cut and run.