by Leo Kessler
His Schmeisser at the ready, Greul doubled through the snow to his waiting C.O. ‘Sir?’
‘Come on, we’ll do a personal recce, Greul,’ Stuermer answered and set off at once. This time he knew he could not afford to waste a second, if his plan were to succeed. Steadily and in silence the two of them plodded up the mountain, their footsteps crunching over the snow, deadened by the heavy wet fog. Finally Colonel Stuermer said, ‘I think we’re far enough, Greul. We don’t want to alarm them too early, eh?’
‘No, Colonel.’
Together the two officers raised their binoculars and surveyed the House. Stuermer, for one, didn’t like what he saw. The long low building — it was perhaps three storeys high — was built of some heavy grey stone, covered by duraluminum, probably as protection against the mountain storms which raged almost constantly at that height in winter. On its flat roof, aerials whipped back and forth in the wind, and confirmed Intelligence’s guess that Elbrus House had been used as a weather station before the war. But it wasn’t only the strange house’s defensive features to which Stuermer objected: it was the rape of nature that had been carried out so high in the mountains. On the backs of hundreds of men and animals, the material to build Elbrus House had been borne up the mountain — there was even a great pile of coke outside, obviously for the place’s heating system. For him, Elbrus House signified the impertinence of Man in his persistent attempt to force Nature to her knees.
‘A difficult place to tackle,’ Greul cut into his thoughts.
‘Yes, a handful of determined men could hold that place against a whole battalion,’ Stuermer agreed, returning, to the immediate problem. ‘And by the look of that roof, the defenders might well be able to summon help or supplies by air. They could hold out there for ever and a day.’
‘Agreed, Colonel.’
‘And that’s why we are not going to attempt to take it, Greul,’ Stuermer said firmly, folding away his binoculars and looking squarely at the other officer.
‘What did you say, sir?’
‘You heard me, Greul. We are not going to attempt to attack it.’
‘But how can we move on to the peak, sir?’ Greul protested. ‘There is no other way—’
‘There is,’ Stuermer cut him short. ‘I made up my mind last night. There will be no more bloodshed on Mount Elbrus. Come on, I’ll explain what we’re going to do on the way back.’
Roswitha came out of the shower, completely naked as was her wont. Sitting at the table of the radio room, where she had been on radio watch during the night, Lydia’s eyes travelled up and down the other woman’s body with undisguised interest. ‘You are very beautiful, Comrade Captain,’ she said, her gaze falling on the delicate triangle of blonde down, which looked to her as smooth and sleek as the wing of some exotic bird.
She drew her gaze away by an effort of will and said, her brown doe-like eyes suddenly anxious, ‘Have I shocked you, Comrade Captain?’
Roswitha Mikhailovna hesitated before she answered, her body abruptly weak, as she was overcome by a sensation she had never experienced before. ‘No, Lydia,’ she answered, her voice strangely husky, ‘I take your words as a great compliment.’ With fingers that trembled slightly, she picked up the thick woollen Army combinations.
‘Must you dress already, Comrade Captain?’ Lydia asked, a note of pleading in her voice.
‘Why not?’ she answered, pausing, knowing as she did that she was treading on dangerous ground.
‘Perhaps you know.’ Lydia omitted the ‘comrade captain’ deliberately, lowering her gaze with mock modesty.
Roswitha stared at the girl’s pretty pale doll-like face, as if she were seeing her for the very first time. Suddenly she noticed that Lydia’s hair was hanging loose, forming a soft frame to her face. ‘No, I don’t know, Lydia.’
Lydia rose and came close to her. ‘You must!’ She reached out a hand, as if to touch Roswitha’s naked body, then thought better of it.
‘We must not indulge in emotionalism,’ Roswitha answered, feeling her heart racing in a manner that she had never experienced with a man before.
‘Why not?’
‘The war,’ Roswitha stammered. ‘Our mission…our duty to our Soviet Motherland…’
‘We have a duty to ourselves too, Roswitha,’ the girl said softly, persuasively, perhaps already guessing the strange turmoil in Roswitha’s brain. ‘It needs no more courage than the first plunge of the year into a cold-water swimming pool. Convention is easily overcome. And who would know? They are all asleep…. Why not, dear Roswitha?’
‘Because.’
‘Because what?’
‘Because…’ Roswitha Mikhailovna shuddered violently, as the other girl laid her cool hand on her right breast. She felt the nipple grow erect and the instant trembling of her knees, as if she might crumple and faint to the ground at any moment.
‘You know,’ Lydia said softly, insidiously, ‘you must have known that it would end like—’
‘Comrade Captain!’ a frightened, urgent voice called from outside. Lydia withdrew her hand, as if she had been stung.
Roswitha thrust the combination to the front of her naked body. ‘What is it?’
The sentry flung open the door of the radio room, her pale face flushed hectically at the cheeks, her bosom heaving with the effort of doubling down from her post on the roof. ‘Comrade Captain,’ she gasped. ‘I’ve just seen them through the fog.’
‘Seen who?’ Captain Mikhailovna snapped, businesslike and in complete control of herself again.
‘The Fritzes…they’ve arrived! They’re taking up positions all around the house...’
The fog was still thick, but through the binoculars she could see them well enough. They were mountain troopers all right. She recognized the typical peaked cap and its Edelweiss badge easily enough, and even without those two items she would have been able to identify them as trained mountaineers by the way they crossed the snowfield.
‘What are they going to do?’ Lydia asked, and added, ‘Comrade Captain’, swiftly.
‘I don’t know, comrade.’
Roswitha swept her binoculars from left to right and followed the Germans’ progress. It didn’t look as if they were preparing for a frontal attack on the House because they were extending their line on either side of the building, its points hooking round in a large, encircling half moon.
‘If they’re gong to attack, they are a long way off, Comrade Captain,’ Lydia said, expressing her own thoughts. ‘Our two machine-guns would soon make short work of them at that distance and with that amount of open ground to cover. Even I can see that.’
Roswitha nodded her agreement, her pretty face creased in a puzzled frown. Lydia was right. There were at least three hundred metres between the Fritzes’ positions and the House. In order to attack, they would have to cross a stretch of terrain which offered little cover save for the odd boulder. An attack in such circumstances would be a massacre. The Fritzes would have stood a much better chance if they had attacked undercover of darkness instead of advertising their presence as they were doing now. What the devil were they up to?
Stuermer blew his whistle shrilly. The men, stumbling and slipping off the snow slope, came to a halt gratefully. Stuermer cupped his bands around his mouth and yelled: ‘All right, start digging in now!’
The mountaineers unslung their packs, and removing their ice-axes and entrenching tools, they commenced the back breaking task of clearing the frozen snow to make shallow protective pits against the odd rifle bullet which was already winging its way towards the extended position.
Stuermer turned to Greul, who had been plodding through the snow behind him, his arrogant face set in a look of both depression and anger.
‘Well, Greul, we come to the parting of the ways,’ he announced, flipping back his glove and fumbling in his pocket.
‘I don’t like it, sir. Give me your permission and I’ll clear that pack of Red bitches out of the House within thirty minutes.’
‘But even if we carry out your plan, sir,’ Greul objected vehemently, as a slug threw up a wild flurry of snow only metres away, ‘we will still have them at our backs, forming a potential danger.’
‘Yes, but that is a calculated risk we must take,’ Stuermer said, finding what he had been seeking. He placed it on the palm of his hand.
Greul glared down at the little ten-pfennig piece, which in a moment would determine whether he would add Mount Elbrus to his list of ‘conquests’. ‘I don’t like it. I don’t like it one bit, sir. I must register an official protest.’
‘Duly registered, Greul!’ Stuermer answered, and balanced the little coin on his thumb and forefinger. ‘Ready?’
‘Ready,’ Greul said grumpily.
Stuermer spun the coin in the air, calling ‘Head, or eagle?’
‘Eagle!’
Neatly Stuermer caught the little coin and showed it to Greul ‘Head,’ he announced. ‘I go. You stay behind.’
‘Damn—’ Greul caught himself in time. He was not a man given to outbursts of emotion. A good National Socialist had to be as proud as a panzer and as hard as Krupp steel; one didn’t give way to one’s feelings. ‘Then you go, sir?’
‘Yes, and you take charge here.’
‘Will you take the flag?’ He indicated the crooked-cross flag that was flying from the nearest position. ‘The photo of your successful ascent will go around the world. Humanity must know that National Socialism has triumphed over Nature.’ Stuermer shook his head slowly, knowing as he did so that even if he managed the ascent successfully, there would be trouble — a great deal of trouble — at what he was going to do next. ‘No, not the swastika. But that.’ He pointed behind him. Greul swung round.
Sergeant-major Meier, who together with Jap, had been selected to accompany Colonel Stuermer on the ascent, if the latter won the toss, was standing there with the red and white Edelweiss flag of the Stormtroop over his shoulder. He grinned impudently at the major.
Flushed and angry, Major Greul swung round and stuck out his hand. ‘Colonel, may I wish you every success. Berg Heil!’1
‘Thank you, Greul. Berg Heil!’
Five minutes later the three of them, with Colonel Stuermer in the lead left the lines of Stormtroop Edelweiss and began the first leg of the ascent, while behind them on the roof of Elbrus House, Roswitha Mikhailovna fumed with impotent rage. Five more minutes and the tiny plodding figures disappeared into the thick milk-white fog. It was now nine o’clock, and it was one thousand and five hundred metres to the top of the western summit of Mount Elbrus.
Note
1. A mountaineer’s greeting.
SECTION FIVE:
THE FINAL ASCENT
ONE
She had no fear. She thought of nothing, but breaking through the Fritz positions. But Lydia, crouching behind her with the radio on her back, was obviously afraid. Roswitha could hear her breath coming fast and shallow, as if she had just run a race. Without turning round, she reached back and patted Lydia’s hand to comfort her. ‘Don’t worry, Lydia. Everything is under control. I can take care of them.’
‘I’m all right, Comrade Captain — thank you.’
Roswitha forgot her companion. Her eyes searched the terrain to her front, probing every dip and cranny for possible sources of danger, once she had broken through. Now the fog had begun to be burned away by the sun and here and there the snow glittered with a white crystalline glare. She knew she must act soon — before the fog had disappeared altogether; she needed its cover.
She took a deep breath and gripped her pistol more firmly. ‘All right, Lydia, stick close to me. Here we go!’
The first Fritz was a stocky dark-haired youth, who was working at digging a hole in the snow with whole-hearted, exclusive concentration.
She raised the pistol and fired. The slug hit him just below the rib cage. His eyes bulged and she could hear him grunt audibly as he sat down suddenly in the snow, clutching his stomach, his knuckles white.
His mate, twenty-five metres beyond, looked up, startled. He saw the woman and grabbed for his rifle which was lying on the snow next to his rucksack. She beat him to it. Her pistol cracked again. He doubled up and fell onto his knees, as if he were praying.
The third Fritz was quick. He fired instinctively. Roswitha ducked and the slug whined off the metal side of Elbrus House. Behind her, Lydia gave a little cry of fear. The pistol bucked in Roswitha’s hand. The rifle flew from the Fritz’s fingers. He looked down at it incredulously, as if he could not understand what it was doing there on the snow. She did not give him any time to consider the problem. Her pistol spoke again. The slug caught him in the chest. At that range the impact was so great that it knocked him clean off his feet. He hit the snow with a loud thump, and then they were springing over his writhing bloody body and running up the slope.
From behind there came the first noisy cries of alarm. Bullets started to stitch the snow at their flying heels. A slug ricocheted off the metal casing of Lydia’s radio. She stumbled and would have fallen, if Roswitha hadn’t caught her in time. ‘Keep going…keep going!’ she gasped.
To the enraged mountaineers, who had been taken completely by surprise by this sudden breakout, the two women were just flying blurs against the milk-white background, and accuracy in firing uphill is difficult at the best of times. All the same, their bullets were coming unpleasantly close. Bullets were kicking up white gouts of snow all around, and Roswitha knew they would be hit if they didn’t make cover soon. Then she saw it. A stretch of dead ground some twenty metres further on. ‘Faster,’ she urged…‘Faster!’
Fear lent speed to Lydia’s feet. She sped forward. She passed Roswitha, the heavy radio bouncing up and down on her back. Roswitha slipped and made a catlike recovery. Some thing slapped against her shoulder. It stung like the devil, but she knew instinctively the bullet hadn’t penetrated the thick wadding of her tunic.
Ten metres to go. The massed fire from below started to converge upon the two fugitives. Five metres. Lydia disappeared from sight. She had made it! Roswitha hesitated no longer. Summoning up the last of her energy, she dived forward into the shelter of the dead ground, landing on her stomach, all breath being knocked out of her lungs cruelly by the impact.
Fighting for breath, her lungs emptying and filling with explosive gasps, Roswitha flashed a glance at her wrist-watch. It was ten o’clock. It had taken her exactly sixty minutes to make her decision to break out and realize it. The Fritzes had an hour start.
A little groggily she struggled to her feet and offered Lydia her hand. ‘Come on, my little pigeon, on your toes. We must push on.’
Lydia could not speak; she was still fighting to recover her breath. But she got up willingly enough and slung the radio more comfortably on her thin shoulders. She looked up at the sky, swallowed hard in a final effort to control her panting, and croaked, ‘We might have snow, Comrade Captain, eh?’
Roswitha flashed a glance at the sky, which was again turning an ominous lead-colour. ‘Perhaps,’ she agreed. ‘If you still pray, Lydia, begin now. We need all the help we can get.’ She thrust her pistol back into its holster with a gesture of finality.
‘March, my little dove, we have an appointment on the mountain…’
TWO
The little group of Edelweiss men were making excellent progress. The rock face was broken and offered good holds and several convenient stances so that they were able to advance quickly. Stuermer was pleased but all the same, the rock obstructions and snow mounds made it impossible for him to prospect a direct route to the summit; they blocked the view upwards too often.
By mid-morning they had covered a good five hundred metres and were going very strong. Stuermer began to think that they would realize their aim of reaching the summit and starting on their way back to Elbrus House before it grew dark again.
‘Come on, the two of you,’ he yelled cheerfully, his breath fogging the air in a small grey cloud, ‘we’ll make climbers of you yet!’
He was to realize that his sudden euphoria was due to other causes than the sense of achievement; but that was later.
Just before one o’clock the three of them bumped into their first serious trouble of the ascent. They ran abruptly into an almost sheer rock wall, with, as far as Stuermer could see, neither holds nor stances. ‘All right,’ he ordered, his spirits still strangely buoyant in spite of the disappointing prospect in front of them, ‘take five. I’ll have a look at it.’
Gratefully, the other two slumped down on the frozen snow and with fingers that were stiff with cold, they began to eat the hard sausage they had brought with them, chewing it with relish as if they were really enjoying the rock-hard meat. They, too, seemed unaffected by the hindrance, chatting away with unusual animation, their bright-red faces very lively, their eyes gleaming.
Stuermer studied the slope. The traverse must have been one of the least attractive he had ever seen, the rock weathered, flaking and clearly unsound in many spots. Yet the realization did not seem to worry the lean colonel. Indeed, his face was wreathed in a bright smile, as if he really enjoyed the prospect of dicing with death on such a dangerous ascent.
‘Well,’ he announced cheerfully to the other two a couple of minutes later, ‘it’s not the best traverse I’ve ever seen. But I think it can be done.’
‘Of course, it can be done, sir!’ Meier snapped, throwing away the rest of his sausage carelessly. ‘But only if we get the lead out of our tails and get on with it.’ He giggled suddenly and surprisingly. Nobody seemed to notice his unusual behaviour, nor the strange unnatural gleam in his bloodshot eyes.
Stuermer took the lead. To the right the ice glittered evilly on the rock face and the wind shrieked about him, as he started the traverse, seeking with his finger tips for the slightest irregularity. Centimetre by centimetre he edged his way along, powdery snow cascading down at each step. But the fact that a foothold might give way and send him tumbling down the mountain to a certain death did not seem to worry him. Once the rock did give way and he only managed to save himself by a lightning switch of his weight to the other foot. Again he remained unaffected. He was not even annoyed by Meier’s fresh outburst of giggling.
