by Hall, Ian
Ivanhoe.
“What the hell?” I snapped. I looked around for Alice, but she had gone. “How did you get in?”
“Never mind that.” He looked stern. “You, lover boy, were supposed to meet me outside last night to discuss what happened when you met McIntyre.”
Oh boy, I had royally screwed up. The meeting to confirm we’d made contact with McIntyre had completely slipped my mind. “I’m sorry.”
“That’s okay, it’s no real problem.” He looked around the room, and seemed to smile. I followed his eyes. Clothes lay everywhere, and the room smelled of, well you-know-what. Sweaty bodies.
“We’re playing golf today just as planned. McIntyre said he’ll meet me on the tee.”
“Ten fifteen on the Portland course?”
“Aye,”
“Okay, we’ll be waiting.” He leaned over the end of the bed. “Listen up and listen good; this is important. When you hit your tee shot off the 6th, slice it right, towards the railway line. Can you manage that?”
A slight twist in my grip, a small opening of the club face. “Aye, I can manage a slice.”
“Good. Now, get the ball right into the heavy rough. Get McIntyre to help you look for it. We’ll be waiting in one of the hollows.”
“Okay.”
“Now that first encounter is most important, we need to both scare him with the news of his mole…”
“Charlie Peacock.”
Ivanhoe nodded. “But we’ve got to reassure him that we’re proper S.O.E., and have his best interests at heart.”
We exchanged serious nods, then he turned and left the room, closing the door firmly behind him.
It was the first time I’d been included in the S.O.E. term, and I felt proud; even though I lay bollock-naked under the covers, and my new girlfriend had seemingly disappeared.
I was pulling on my underpants when the door opened again. Alice this time, coat pulled around herself, looking in. “Has he gone?” I nodded, nervously clutching my hands to my privates. “And what’s wrong with you? Cat got your tongue?”
And whatever doubt lay in my mind of the immediate situation fled as she crossed to me and kissed me. “Much though I’d like to linger, the operation comes first.” She gave a little giggle at her unintentional double entendre. “We’d better get down to breakfast.”
Ten minutes later, the hour being eight thirty, we set ourselves back in our table, and waited on being served.
To no-one’s surprise, we ate every morsel from every plate, and still looked out for more. McIntyre and Sadie crept in around nine, red-eyed and very rough looking. I had a good look in the mirror before I left the room; I knew I didn’t look quite that bad.
With Alice hanging around the tee in case Sadie decided to come along with us, McIntyre and I gathered our gear. When he veered towards the Championship Course, used for the Open and such, I stopped, puzzled. “I thought we were playing the Portland?”
“Ha!” Despite his obvious hangover, McIntyre looked pleased with himself. “I’ve got some clout here, you know. I got our tee time switched to the Championship Course.”
And with no reason to possibly argue, I followed him to the tee area.
Luckily, Alice had heard, and to my surprise she laughed. “Ha, now you’re in for a real game.”
“How come?” McIntyre asked.
“He was studying every hole of the Portland Course on the train. This’ll test him.”
“Come with us, I could do with a pretty face to chat to.”
“No thanks, John. I’m going to see if I can get a hair-of-the-dog, maybe get Sadie to join me.”
McIntyre laughed. “You’ll be lucky, she’s gone back to our room to sleep it off.”
Waving, Alice walked back towards the hotel.
Wondering how it could go more wrong, we tee’d off, both straight drives down the centre of the fairway.
The first holes of the Championship Course set off right down the coast, with the sea on the right hand side. I tried to hang back, but of course, in golf there’s always a golfer behind you, pressing you for time. Considering the circumstances, I played reasonably well, a little better overall than my partner, although he regularly drove longer than I did.
There seemed nothing else I could do. On the sixth tee, after seeing McIntyre driving down the centre as usual, I opened the face of my driver slightly, and the ball went long, but sliced. After bouncing once on the fairway, it looped right, and into some rather hilly country.
“Ooh, into the rough, huh?” he sneered. “Want to hit a provisional?”
“Nah, I’ll have a good rake for it, and even if I can’t find it, I’ll take a drop.”
When we’d walked along the grassy path to the fairway, we both dropped our golf bags, and with one club over the shoulder, he veered off with me. I didn’t even have to ask him to help. Of course, I headed way right, into the hills, hoping he’d follow. “I don’t think it came this far.” McIntyre said, then he caught sight of Ivanhoe, standing ten yards away, pistol leveled. “What’s this? Robbery?”
“Not at all,” Ivanhoe motioned with his gun that we follow further from the fairway. I could see McIntyre gripping his club tighter, testing its properties as a weapon.
When we had become completely hidden from the fairway, Ivanhoe started with his spiel. “Mr. McIntyre, I’ll get to my point quickly, because I don’t have much time to convince you of my credentials. My name is Irving, and I work for the S.O.E. in Scotland. James is here because you know him, and he can vouch for me. I know you work for Military Intelligence, Scottish Section, or MI(S). We have a joint operation planned for next week, Operation Chrysalis, but I’m here to tell you that it’s going to be a disaster. You have a leak in your organization; a Charles Peacock. On the night of the raid, he will leak the intelligence to his German handler if he’s not dealt with.”
“How can I trust you?” McIntyre asked, he now leant on his club like a walking stick.
“You just have to.” Ivanhoe lowered his pistol. “You’ve got little choice.”
“So why has my organization not contacted me?”
“They can’t, the chance of blowing Peacock to the wind is too great.” He took a few steps nearer to McIntyre, who, to be honest, looked as bemused as I’d ever seen him. “Peacock’s your boss, he could blow your section wide open.”
“So how do you know all this?”
Ivanhoe looked at me, then back to McIntyre. “We have a common link, if you go far enough up the chain. And we’re both involved with Operation Chrysalis, well us and others too.”
“Okay,” McIntyre scratched his chin. “Let’s say I believe you. What happens next?”
Ivanhoe pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket. “We get this to Peacock. It’s complete bunkum, but it’s believable. It details operation Chrysalis; a raid on Ayr Harbour, on the German E-Boat flotilla. It’s planned for March 30th, next Sunday night.”
“Okay.”
“We let Peacock gift it to his handlers, then on Saturday night, we do two things, we bring troops ashore just south of here, and attack Prestwick Airport as planned. We need to cull some of the German long-range planes there.”
“And the second thing?”
“While the commandoes attack Prestwick, we also hit Peacock, his driver, his wife; every last one of them.”
“The buck might come back to me as the supplier of the intelligence.” McIntyre accepted the sheet of paper, and looked at it. “I could get burned.”
“Not if we’ve read Peacock accurately. He’s the kind of scum that would say he found the intelligence, not give a partner the credit.”
To my surprise McIntyre laughed. “Aye, you’ve described Charlie, right enough.”
“So you’re okay with this?”
“I don’t see where I have a choice. How do I get word to my people about the landings?”
“We’ll send the dates, times by courier.”
“It has to be someone I trust, how about Jame
s here?”
Ivanhoe looked at me then nodded. “I can arrange that. How about it, James, my boy, can you and Mrs. Dewar stand another trip away from home?”
Last night’s revelations came rushing back to me. “I dare say I could allow myself the luxury.”
“Bloody hell,” McIntyre burst out. “He’s actually blushing.”
And from there on in, the rest of the weekend was a walk in the park.
We finished our round of golf, said our goodbyes and met Alice back at the Hotel. That evening we had an early dinner, downed two bottles of wine, and repeated Friday night’s cavorting.
I swear I had gone to heaven.
On Sunday morning, we packed, and retraced our journey back home. To assuage mum’s suspicions, Alice went ahead alone, to arrive a good two hours earlier than I did.
When I opened the apartment door later that afternoon, I needed a bath, an ordinary meal, and a good night’s sleep. Thankfully mother was out at her friend’s and I slunk into bed around seven that night. I hadn’t got my dinner, but had managed to rustle up a sandwich or three.
Alice even stopped by the kitchen, and snuggled close, kissing me lightly, then stole one of my sandwiches.
“So are we a thing?” I asked, conscious that Frances was in her room, just a few steps away.
She gave me the most sexy of smiles. “I guess so.”
“We can’t show it, you know.” I looked back at the corridor. Faint sounds of music came from Frances’ room. “Not yet.”
“I know.”
That night I slept like a log.
Considering my new ‘condition’, I settled into work with a satisfied routine that surprised even me.
In the office, we kept our distance. Once outside, however, Alice and I held hands as we walked and practiced German, we canoodled in barroom corners; we reveled in being an item.
It came as no surprise when a young urchin arrived in my office on Wednesday morning; I’d almost been expecting him. What did shock me was the message content.
“HB Pencil. Outside now.”
I quizzed the accuracy of what the young lad had heard.
“Don’t look at me! That’s what ‘e said, honest!”
When I got to the street, Ivanhoe stood opposite. As soon as he seen me exit and recognize him, he walked away, up the Bridges, then down onto the Royal Mile. I followed , crossing the busy road. Following him was a pain. First through narrow closes, then down onto Jeffrey Street, then back onto the Mile, good grief he didn’t stop until he was down by St John’s Street and Moray House.
“We’ve got to get you on the eleven thirty train.”
I frowned. “It’s Wednesday!”
“Aye, it’s been pushed up a few days, Peacock needs dealt with quickly.” He handed me an envelope. “Money, like before. Look you’ll be travelling alone, this is too dangerous for Alice to disrupt you.”
“I beg your…”
“Shut-up. You’ll be operating what we call a ‘stagger’ formation.” He waved down my questions. “Basically it makes sense if you think of it as a line of four men. You’ll be the lead; you’re the contact with McIntyre. Behind you will be the courier; he’s got the papers. You do NOT take the papers from the courier until you have McIntyre in sight. If the courier is taken, you walk away; under no circumstances do you go to his aid. Under no circumstances, Okay?” I nodded. “The courier’s papers are the only dangerous part of the stagger. If it all goes wrong, whoever is caught with the papers on their person will be interrogated, possibly tortured, then shot.”
I tried hard to focus, to remember Ivanhoe’s words.
“Behind the courier is a guard. You will not know the identity of the guard, and the guard does not know you. The guard knows the courier. It is the guard’s job to protect the courier. If for any reason you get split up, or things go tits-up, you make your way to Troon, find McIntyre and warn him. Then you disappear. Find your way home. Do not stay at the hotel, it’s far too dangerous.”
“Okay.” I swallowed. This whole Biggles operation suddenly sounded a bit dicey. “You mentioned four men.”
“Three.”
“You said four men in the line.”
Ivanhoe shook his head. “You don’t want to know about the forth man.”
I let my protest go, but from my week in the country, I already knew. The four man stagger had been taught as the four man curling team. The fourth man was the broom. It was his job to sweep the rink clear. If the operation did indeed go horribly tits-up, the fourth man was the assassin who would kill the other three.
The operation was paramount. We were expendable.
And that didn’t feel good at all.
The Four Man Stagger
“Holy Boxcars, are we going in that thing?” The man beside me on the platform looked at the engine like it had come out of the Great War. Only on second thoughts did occur to me he’d given me my HB code. I glanced at him; just a perfectly ordinary young man. Then he patted his jacket pocket.
He was my courier.
I almost shuddered; the four man stagger had started.
I could feel myself getting more nervous by the second then, by mental processes, slowly brought myself back from the ledge. My hastily contrived story; I was simply going out of town to visit a friend, perhaps get in a game of golf. But of course I carried no luggage or golf clubs.
For most of the journey, I needn’t have bothered. I changed trains in Glasgow without a hitch, probably getting in the very same train we had the previous week; well, it sure looked the same.
At Irvine, as the train slowed to a stop, I noticed a large detachment of German troops on the platform, and my heart began to race again. My courier was one compartment in front of me; I’d noticed him take his seat when I had got on.
The guard’s whistle soon sounded, and the train moved off. I assumed the worse, that the Germans had got on board, and tapped my jacket pocket, the money, my own identity card.
I watched the now-familiar coastline pass by, and pretty soon we were slowing into Barassie Station, one stop before Troon. My exit from the impending search was now only a few minutes away.
And still no sign of Germans.
After a long wait, the train took off again, changing points to the right rapidly, heading for Troon.
I stood, walking to the door, headed out into the corridor, and found it already busy. Germans bustled to my left. I turned naturally away from them, but because of the crowd, I could not really move anywhere.
“Papeire,” Now a common phrase in Scotland, began to resound from behind me. “Papiere Bitte!”
“Halt!”
It couldn’t have been at me, surely. I turned to see my courier pushing past everyone, buffeting his way down the narrow corridor towards me. Germans behind him were clamoring for notice. Even in the crowded passageway, I could see lugers raised. I stood, my back flattened into the window. As he squeezed past, I felt his hand slip inside my jacket lapel. Damn if he hadn’t passed the poisoned pill to me.
I held my breath as the pursuing Germans swept past us with no regard of their guns, packs and other equipment buffeting passengers.
The train stopped in the Troon station, my stop, and the chase unfolded before us. Wailing German officers pushing past frightened civilians, shouts of warning. Then the melee spilled out onto the platform, and shots were fired. Then machine-guns.
The open door of the compartment lay before me. I made an instant decision, walked back inside, and sat down.
After a few minutes, the Germans on the platform, their chase obviously over, began checking papers as the passengers slowly got off the train. I had no idea what the next station was, but reasoned if our operation had been rumbled, there seemed more chance of evading capture outside Troon.
To my chagrin, after inspecting papers on the platform, the German contingent moved back onto the train. When the same officer from last Friday poked his head inside the compartment, I almost died. I had my real ID card wi
th me, I’d had no time to change it to Derek Dewar. As a German soldier squeezed past him into the compartment, the officer nodded to me. “Golf again this week, Herr Dewar?”
“Ya,” I nodded nervously in reply. As the soldier inspected the papers of the man opposite, my fellow passenger did nothing to hide his disgust in me, so obviously a collaborator. “But not today, Captain.”
I presented my ID card, but I needn’t have worried, the soldier had either not heard our exchange, or he had fallen asleep on the job; in any case, he paid the name on my card no attention whatsoever, and moved onwards.
I looked out the window at the empty platform. I don’t think I’d drawn a breath for minutes.
The train pulled away with a jerk, rocking me in my seat.
I racked my brain, searching for alternatives. Prestwick would be next station, but I had no idea how far it was down the coast. I looked out as the houses of the small town of Troon passed by, then we hit onto open countryside, and the golf course.
The golf course.
I looked out at the fairways and lavish greens; considering we’d just left the station, we were doing no more than ten miles per hour. I jumped to my feet, and ran into the corridor. The Germans had already moved on to the next carriage. The door to the outside world was closed, but I slid the window down, reached outside, and unlocked it. In one heartbeat I swung the door open and jumped out.
I landed awkwardly, tumbling on the hard stones of the railway line, then headlong onto grassy embankment. As I sat back, panting, I watched the rest of the train pass me.
As the train chugged into the distance, I gingerly stood up. No broken bones, no sprains, no twisted ankles.
I checked my pockets. I still had the wad of money, ID card and more importantly, the folded sheet of paper the courier had foisted on me. Now all I had to do was slip into the Golf Club, find McIntyre, and get back to Edinburgh before I got caught.
There’s nothing so out of place as a single man walking in the country, so I headed up the small embankment, climbed the barbed-wire fence and got onto the golf course. Feigning looking for lost balls, usually a profitable pastime, I slowly made my way to the clubhouse and Hotel. I washed up in the toilets of the clubhouse then, once I’d searched for McIntyre, went through to the hotel to ask there. The answer couldn’t have been more disheartening.
