There were a few helpers involved in this one too, but only to cover up the absence of two prisoners at roll call in the morning. The other two would be there to answer their names, but they were already listed for sick parade and they’d be coming straight here from the 7 am muster. Jack and Trolley had needed to be here in advance, on account of the German uniforms; there wouldn’t have been time to change into them, otherwise, and it would have been tricky to smuggle them down to this place in daylight.
Trolley murmured, “Thought we weren’t going to talk.”
“Can’t do much harm, if we keep it quiet. D’you think? It’s going to be a hellish long night.”
“OK. We’ll hear anyone coming, anyway.”
This was the out-patient department; there was no reason for anyone to be around at night, not inside the building. Outside there were guards, and dogs, and every twenty seconds the glare from circling perimeter searchlights flared across the latrine’s ceiling through those high, barred apertures.
Trolley, like Jack, had been caught at St Nazaire. He was a commando, and before the raid he’d helped to train Jack and his small naval team in commando methods. Jack remembered that in the training period, at Cardiff, he’d detested him, summed him up as a self-satisfied prig. Crazy … Old Frank was solid gold. But at that time he’d seemed to be like some young Cromwell. Super-fit, iron self-discipline, no drink, no smokes, no girls, blond hair like the bristles of a toothbrush and—worst of all—contemptuous disapproval of Jack’s weekends in London. Weekends with Fiona, of course.
All this effort wasn’t only for the sake of getting back to her. There was also the hatred of being cooped up, and with that the hatred of bloody Germans. For one’s own sake, let alone any duty aspect, you longed to get back where you could kill some.
“Know any word games?”
“No … What’s the betting on guards using this bog?”
“Walk up a flight of stairs, when they can piss on the wall outside?”
“Wouldn’t be difficult to sneak out and clobber one, while he was at it …” He changed the subject. “One thing that bothers me slightly, Frank, is if the goons notice my beard. I mean guards at the gate.”
“You’re going to keep your coat collar turned up, aren’t you?”
“It’s still a risk. There isn’t a single bearded postern in this camp.”
German guards were “posterns.”
The other prisoners who’d be joining them here after roll call were “Barmy” Morrison, a Rhodesian Air Force flight lieutenant, and a Greenjacket known as “Cockup” Cockrace. Those two were getting a sound night’s sleep in their own bunks, the lucky devils. There were dummies, rolled bundles, in Jack’s bunk and Trolley’s. Jack, hunched into his German greatcoat, pulled its collar up around his ears. He wore a beard not to hide the pink, burn-scarred areas of his face, but because in the early days shaving had been impossible, and he’d got used to it. He’d been very lucky, in fact; there were deep scars, real lacerations, elsewhere on his body, but the facial burns had been only skin-deep. The French doctor had said it would be because his clothes had been smouldering on him for some while before he went into the water. That Frenchman had done a marvellous job—on him and the others—in a hospital not far from St Nazaire, under German supervision, guards in the ward with automatic weapons trained on men semi-conscious in their beds.
Bloody idiots …
He wasn’t worried about Fiona’s reaction to his discoloured face. That was another thing he knew for sure about her. But she might like the beard, anyway. It was short, trimmed with scissors close to the outline of his jaw. The coat collar would hide it, all right.
“Frank.”
“Bitte?”
“When we get back—”
“Ah …”
“You sound like a Bisto Kid. Frank, seriously—I want to ask a favour.”
“Oh?”
“What you’re supposed to say is ‘Certainly, old boy, anything at all.’”
“All right. Certainly, old boy, within reason—my reason—anything at all.”
“Very generous … Look, all it is, is I’d like you to act as best man at my wedding.”
“Oh, crikey, I’d be delighted!”
“Hurray.”
“Really, I’m—well, honoured, flattered, whatever …”
“You’ll get as pissed as a skunk, is my guess. Bachelor party, I mean, night before, ancient tradition and so on. For the wedding itself I’ll make sure Fiona picks the prettiest bridesmaid in London. Pretty and willing?”
“Didn’t you tell me your girl was married before? Some old codger who snuffed it?”
“So what?”
“Well, I’m no master of etiquette, as you know, but I believe the second time round she’d have a matron of honour, not bridesmaids.”
“If she’s a smasher and not too bloody honourable, d’you care?”
“Not a hoot in hell, old boy … But seriously, I’d be as pleased as Punch to …”
“Let’s not get too serious about it. We have to get there, first. We ought to keep our thoughts on the minute-by-minute stuff, not daydreams. The wedding idea’s just something I’ve had in mind and meant to ask you about before.”
“We’ll get there, Jack. The whole Wehrmacht won’t keep me from that party … Hey—that’s the door downstairs!”
And boots now, stamping up the stairs …
Unmistakably German army boots. A guard too fastidious to spray the outside of the building?
Trolley whispered, “Don’t even breathe …”
The latrine was long and narrow with its entrance at the far end, pissoirs down its full length on one side with a few washbasins facing them, and these cubicles filling the whole width at the end. Boots getting louder as they climbed the stairs, getting near the top now. He might, of course, turn the other way—into the waiting room or the dispensary where he could park himself for a quiet smoke?
He turned this way.
Much louder, on the plank floor out there. A tired man’s heavy heel-dragging, echoey in the empty building. Searchlight sweeping by: by its brief light Jack saw his own clenched fists on the thick grey apron of the Wehrmacht coat over his knees. The light had gone again. The door at the end banged open, and the light-switch clicked: a bare bulb in a cobwebbed metal cage flared over this central cubicle in which Jack crouched. The knuckles of his fists were white.
A loud, long yawn: then a mutter in German. Talking to himself. Trolley might have understood it; it was because Frank spoke some German that he was playing the part of the NCO, in tomorrow morning’s charade. Also, he had blond hair, and with that bony face could easily pass for a Hun. He was the only one who’d need to open his mouth, tomorrow. The heavy boots, scraping along the latrine’s composite floor, were coming down towards this end.
Stop. Take a pee. Please?
Still coming, ignoring telepathic instructions. Jack resisting a natural inclination to gather himself into a position like a runner’s before a race, so as to be able to propel himself forward and grapple with the German as he pulled the door open. But to do it would mean shifting his feet, there’d be the risk of making some small sound. If the man was alert then he’d rush out, raise the alarm … Just—Jack told himself—be ready … The alternative might be to sit fast, glare up at the intruder, a fellow-German interrupted in the performance of a natural function?
In the dark? An unknown, bearded face, and clothing plainly intact? The only practical thing would be to hit him, hard and fast, while he was still off-guard, easy meat—as good as dead.
Better not kill him, though. That would justify the firing-squad.
The German had stopped. Muttering to himself again. Sounds of a coat being pulled open, buttons wrenched, heavy breathing … Perhaps after all he just preferred this end of the urinal: like a regular in a pub having his customary place at the bar … There was a rattle, then another semi-metallic sound. A thud—rifle-butt grounding. Leaning his gun again
st the wall? And now he’d begun to whistle between his teeth, a hissing with a vaguely familiar tune in it … Jack caught on to it suddenly—Harry Roy’s band, a year or two before the war: The Music Goes Round and Round …
And it comes out here … Here, the dénouement coming, boots clomping this way again. All right, you clown, I’m ready for you! The pacing had stopped again: there was a heavy flopping noise. Greatcoat being dumped on the floor: and it was not a leak this Bosch had come for, he was heading for the cubicles.
Tensed, and waiting: whichever door the bastard picked, this or Trolley’s, he or Trolley would go for him like a bull while the other one shot out and grabbed the rifle. Trolley would be on the same wavelength, just as ready for it …
The door of the cubicle on Jack’s right banged open, bounced against the wall. Jack frozen, motionless. The German had picked the empty cubicle, the only empty one, the one-in-three chance you hadn’t dared hope for!
The seat banged down. Boots scraped as he shuffled round. More movement of clothing: a belt-buckle or key-ring knocked against the partition, so close it was as startling as a shot. There was a heavy sigh as weight descended on the seat.
Then—if he’d dared move his hands, he’d have liked to have blocked his ears. And my God, not only noise … Ears and nose: you’d have needed two pairs of hands. And how long might it be before he leant far enough forward to see feet in the adjoining cubicle? The partition ended about nine inches above the floor: if Jack had turned his head in this crouched position he’d have seen Trolley’s boots. He wasn’t moving a muscle, though, not a finger, he wasn’t even blinking.
It would have been even nicer if he hadn’t needed to breathe.
What would the goon do, if he suddenly realised he had company?
Scream? Fall off the seat?
Screaming would have been preferable to the racket he was making. He must have been on guard-duty for the last week … Jack envied Trolley for being one booth further removed … But a new sound now: the scrape of a match. And a degree of silence, broken only sporadically, staccato-fashion while cigarette-smoke drifted up blue against the caged light, dissipating when it met the air-stream from the ventilators. Whistling again, and shifting round, grunting, then another burst of action. Jack thought, with his face screwed up and cramp in the muscles of his calves, He’s a one-man band …
A continuing lull now, though. Without any indications of departure or preparations for it. Just sitting: not even whistling, sitting as quietly and as still as Jack and Trolley.
Enjoying the end of his cigarette? Or listening?
One might have made some sound, without being aware of it. He shut his eyes, concentrated on not moving, on maintaining the total, universal silence.
Until Trolley sniffed.
The sound had been quite distinct. Nobody, Jack thought, could have doubted there was someone in that cubicle and that he’d sniffed. Except that to the German it might have sounded loud enough to have emanated from this nearer one.
Could have spotted his feet by now, under the partition? Might be sitting contemplating them, trying to work it out—why anyone should have been squatting here in the dark and had stayed quiet, or tried to … Trolley’s slip astonished him: if he hadn’t heard it, he wouldn’t have believed it could have happened. But as it had, and the German must have heard it, why hadn’t he spoken up, demanded to know who was there?
Suspecting the truth? This was, after all, a POW camp, and there’d been escapes and escape attempts before …
Years ago, Jack had developed a technique for soothing the soul while waiting to be beaten—at Dartmouth, the Royal Naval College. Beatings had been commonplace, mere routine: it was impossible not to be beaten, from time to time, and it was not at all unusual to have red weals, even broken skin, high on the right-hand ribs, more or less under the armpit. It was the way the tips of the flexible canes whipped round. If the cadet captain or house officer wielding the cane happened to be left-handed, you’d have the sores under your left arm. The habit Jack had developed involved the mental recitation of poetry to oneself. As he’d spent four years at Dartmouth he’d stored quite a lot of verse away, and much of it seemed to have scored itself indelibly into his brain. At random now he dredged up William Cowper’s The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk …
I am monarch of all I survey,
My right there is none to dispute;
From the centre all round to the sea
I am lord of the fowl and the brute …
From next door came a sound of paper being crumpled. He continued with his eyes shut …
O solitude, where are the charms
That sages have seen in thy face?
Better dwell—
The German was on his feet, dressing himself. The belt-buckle clinked. Jack’s eyes were open: he was reminding himself that this wasn’t necessarily the end of it, it could be that the man was putting himself into a state enabling him to take action of some sort. A few minutes ago, when Trolley had let out that sniff, obviously he hadn’t been in any such position. But now, as he suddenly thumped the door open, he began to sing in a low growling tone: Under the lamplight, by the barrack gate …
Jack murmured, a minute later when the door at the other end had slammed shut and the boots were crashing away towards the stairs, “Better dwell in the midst of alarms, than reign in this horrible place.”
“Come again?”
“Frank, you could have finished us off with that sniff!”
“Sniff? Me? I didn’t—”
“Christ Almighty, you did!” they could hear the boots clattering down the stairs now. “For all we know he’s gone to report there’s someone hiding here—get help, bring ’em back and—”
“Balls … But I say, didn’t he need that?”
“I’d say he needed a vet.”
Trolley sniggered. “What’s time? Three-thirty yet?”
“Getting towards four.”
Three hours to wait …
Then he was waking up—confused, and Trolley’s voice booming hollowly, like part of a dream he’d been having—“Awake, are you?” Jack was on the floor with his back against the lavatory bowl: he’d been there a long time—although he didn’t realise it immediately—and his back and neck were painful when he moved. Trolley’s voice again, sounding anxious: “You awake, Jack?”
“Of course I’m bloody well awake.”
Filthy taste in the mouth. Plus an ache in the skull …
“No ‘of course’ about it. And I’ve no watch, you know. How’s the time?”
“You asked me that about ten minutes ago, damn it.” Squinting at his wristwatch, which had suffered no harm from its immersion in the St Nazaire Basin a few months back. “Seven minutes past six.” He did a double-take. “Hell, it can’t be!”
“Last time I asked you it was four thirty-five. Hour and a half, you’ve been snoring and mumbling to yourself,”
“Haven’t you slept?”
“Maybe ten minutes … We’ve been darned lucky, you know, only that one customer.”
“Well.” Still getting his mind together. “Might be a rush soon, between now and roll call.”
Roll call was at 0700. The other two ought to get here by about ten past. They were already on the sick bay detail, so as soon as the parade was dismissed they’d hurry down here; if they were intercepted and questioned en route they’d say they wanted to be first in the queue for treatment.
They were both scatty, though. Each about as crazy as the other. A short-notice scheme like this would only attract loonies.
“Why should anyone use this place so early in the day?” Jack was easing himself up on the seat. He growled, “I’m not saying they will. It’s possible, that’s all. All I’m saying is we can’t afford to relax.”
“Listen who’s talking about relaxing … Actually, I was thinking it might be a very good idea to limber up a bit. Don’t know about you, but I’m as stiff as buggery. If we want to be fighting fit i
n an hour’s time …”
Exactly at seven, as always, the hooter sounded. Then you could hear distant yells. The prisoners would be tumbling out of their huts, staggering out still half asleep to fallin by platoons. Jack, listening to the distant sounds of a familiar routine, sang quietly, “Raus, raus, bleedin’ well raus . . .” He’d been trying to loosen up: toe-touching, arm-swinging, doubling on the spot. He stopped it now, and began to tidy up his uniform. Incredibly, the night had passed. Within minutes now, they’d be on the move.
“Think we could use the basins, freshen up?”
“You’re the Sonderführer. But I’d say wait a couple more minutes.” “OK … What if we do get visitors? I mean now, before the others—”
“Trust to luck, Frank, that’s what!”
You either planned every step along the way, or you played it off the cuff.
HM Submarine Ultra had surfaced one mile from the St Elmo lighthouse an hour after the Mediterranean dawn, and forty-five minutes later she’d slid her slim form alongside at Lazoretto, the Malta flotilla’s base on Manoel Island in Marsamxett Creek. Her Jolly Roger, the black skull-and-crossbones flag, was flying from the slightly-raised forward periscope with two new white bars sewn under a whole batch of others in the top-left corner; she’d sunk two ships out of a convoy of five bound from Italy to North Africa, and another boat of this flotilla, acting on her signal, had knocked down another of the surviving three before they’d reached Benghazi, which wasn’t bad—although quite recently the flotilla had destroyed one entire convoy and part of its escort as well. There were rumours of an impending offensive in the desert, so there couldn’t have been a better time for making holes in the Afrika Korps’ supplies.
Paul Everard commented—dodging out of the throng that was now milling through the submarine’s narrow gut—“Seems there’s a slight flap on, around these parts.”
Two boats were on the point of sailing, and one had been on her way out as Ultra had been entering the creek. For a lot of submarines to be pushed out all at the same time did suggest there might be something brewing. McClure, Ultra’s diminutive navigator, growled, “What’s the betting we won’t get more than one night in?”
The Torch Bearers: The Nicholas Everard World War II Saga Book 5 Page 15
