The Night Before Morning

by Alistair Moffat

  ‘You two,’ said the soldier in charge, pointing at Levinson and Peter Green, another old neighbour from Glasgow, ‘take the body away. We will show you where to dispose of it.’

  *

  ‘Will we see people wearing kilts, perhaps? Hear bagpipes?’

  The little professor’s jaunty response amazed me.

  Robert MacDonald had described to me what he thought might be a blind spot in the southern perimeter around St Andrews. The Germans had built a timber palisade across a bridge over the Kinnessburn, but had not noticed that there was a narrow shelf at the foot of the piers. With care, it was possible to pass under the bridge and the perimeter without being seen. Griffith-Smith had passed a message to Feldman and we met at the mouth of Crail’s Lane in the warren of alleyways that link the streets of the older, eastern end of the town. We agreed to walk up and down these and avoid being seen on the wide main streets.

  ‘What option do we have?’ said the professor, before going on to point out the obvious difficulties of getting more than twenty people out of St Andrews unseen and unheard. ‘Professor MacDonald is correct. We’ll become expendable. I conclude that our only hope of survival is to get out of here now, as soon as possible, taking with us all the calculations we have made and all of the supporting data. We’ll buy time. Perhaps others are working to build atom bombs. Probably the Russians. But that will take time – time when something, anything, might happen to frustrate the Germans. I know that an expression of what may be described as faith might sound strange coming from a scientist. But it’s all I have, and these are most certainly strange times.’

  *

  ‘I know this is dangerous for you, and I am sorry. But I think we don’t have much time.’

  When Alan Grant opened the front door of the MacDonalds’ house at the top of Hepburn Gardens, he invited in not only an apologetic Jamie Griffith-Smith but also his wife, Miriam, and their children. Moments later I found myself listening to Miriam’s account of what she had discovered about the disappearance of her parents. Obviously deeply distraught, wide-eyed with desperation and in the company of people she did not know, I felt sorry for her, and Jenny sat close on the sofa, taking her hand. From her husband, Miriam knew of the Eichmann memoranda, but the only scrap of information she had on the whereabouts of her parents was the phrase ‘resettlement in Perthshire’.

  ‘I think I might, just might, know where the Germans have taken them,’ I said, in as measured a way as I could muster. ‘When Jewish communities in Hungary were rounded up and deported, they were taken to labour camps. In Perthshire, there’s only one large camp and, given the fact that it isn’t even three months since the surrender, there’s been no time for them to have a new one built. I think the Germans might have taken your parents to the Black Camp at Comrie.’

  After a little rummaging in a hall cupboard, Robert MacDonald found a leather-bound copy of Newnes Motorists’ Touring Map of Britain and he pointed out Comrie to Miriam, deep in Highland Perthshire.

  ‘Why so far away, so remote?’ she asked.

  Alan Grant and I looked at each other. ‘I suspect they chose that site because it will be difficult for anyone to escape, especially in the winter.’ And because the Germans do not want what they are doing to become well known or observed in any way – that was the other reason, I thought, but Mrs Griffith-Smith was distressed enough as it was.

  After listening to others speak, saying little himself and comforting his wife, it seemed to me that Griffith-Smith had become galvanised, anxious to act, to take risks. Gone was the languid, public schoolboy manner of our first meeting at Crail harbour. Around the MacDonalds’ kitchen table we discussed what was possible, what were necessary risks and came up with a plan. Full of assumptions and needing an outrageous amount of luck, I thought our chances of success were no better than fifty-fifty.

  Better odds than we had ever had.

  3 January 1945

  After morning roll-call and another hour standing stock still in the bitter Highland weather, the Levinsons and their neighbours were ordered to form up and follow the soldier in charge. From a store, they were given shovels, picks and two barrows. Beyond the perimeter of the camp, a stream ran through a deep declivity fringed with willows and hawthorns. Close to its edge, the group was ordered to stop.

  ‘From here,’ shouted the German, ‘for forty metres in that direction, you will dig a pit two metres in depth.’

  This was the kind of manual work that none of the prisoners had done for many years, or indeed ever. The ground was frozen hard and snow had drifted against the treeline by the stream.

  ‘Begin!’ shouted the soldier. ‘The harder you work, the warmer you will be.’

  Rafael Levinson swung his pick and the tine bounced off the rock-hard earth. He tried again and this time moved a solid clod of frozen earth, like breaking a piece off a rock cake.

  The others took his lead and in that flat, fertile field surrounded by the sheltering mountains of the Grampian massif, a group of old friends began digging their grave.

  *

  As darkness fell, Colonel Kritzinger read and re-read his revised orders. Sitting in his office at College Gate, at a desk opposite the windows and their view up and down North Street, he blew out his cheeks and shook his head slowly. Berlin was insisting on an acceleration of the timetable and the imposition of a new and much more severe regime with the American scientists. If progress was not made more quickly, then action needed to be taken against their families. Examples should be made, and his superiors left that to Kritzinger’s discretion. But would punishment beatings, or worse, really be effective? Would constant anxiety hinder the scientists’ work?

  When the colonel looked up from the pool of light on his desk to weigh that consideration, a thunderous blast roared in the street outside. The panes of his office windows were shattered, and shards of glass flew like shrapnel, cutting Kritzinger’s face and tearing a huge rent in the sleeve of his uniform.

  *

  ‘Small bombs we can make quickly,’ said Professor Feldman to Griffith-Smith. At a meeting that morning at the Bute, the scientists had all listened carefully to what was proposed, knowing that the young man in the Vigilante uniform who spoke to them was taking an enormous risk. Who was to say that one amongst their number might be prepared to talk to the Germans, perhaps forced to by circumstances the others knew nothing about. Blackmail? Perhaps a hostage held elsewhere? But after a few questions about their destination, there was unanimous agreement from the team. They would leave, gather up their families, such possessions as could easily be carried, and flee, run for their lives. Several had watched John Campbell die – and his body was still hanging from St Salvator’s Tower – and that image, one of them said, would go with him to his grave.

  After a little more discussion, the scientists split into two teams and, with materials already at hand, they made eight explosive devices all fitted with a timer. Each was set to go off five minutes after the other and Griffith-Smith distributed the small packages widely at key points in the town. Designed to be noisy and bright but not spray shrapnel, they were hidden in dustbins, post boxes and one behind an evergreen hedge in St Salvator’s quadrangle. Only the bomb placed opposite Kritzinger’s office was powerful.

  Within moments, whistles blew and a squad of patrolling soldiers came running down North Street. Minutes later, another device detonated in South Street and soldiers were being pulled off patrol along the perimeter and into the centre of the town to repel whatever or whoever seemed to be attacking St Andrews.

  When Robert MacDonald heard the first explosion, he checked his watch and, with Jenny and Eileen in the back and Alan next to him, pushed the ignition button of his old Humber, nosed it out of the driveway and turned it west, towards the mountains and the Atlantic shore. Taking back roads through Fife and Perthshire, he reckoned they would reach Darroch House in four or five hours.

  At the same time, Jamie Griffith-Smith cut the engine of the truck he ha
d driven up from the depot on the Largo road. Having parked out of sight on the track behind the football ground, leaving Miriam and the children in the cab, he walked quickly to the bridge over the Kinnessburn. Only one sentry had been left and while Jamie asked him, in halting German, what the commotion was in the town, Isaac Feldman led his wife, his colleagues and their families under the bridge. At any moment, the sentry could have walked to the other parapet and seen them, and if he did, Griffith-Smith had thumbed off the safety catch on his Webley revolver. Following instructions, they waited in the shadow of riverbank trees until all were through and then walked in a group to the nearby football ground and the truck. Miriam helped them into the back and waited what seemed like an age for her husband to return.

  Bombs were still going off but they needed to move quickly.

  *

  Walking through the early dark, with enough light in the western sky to give the landscape definition, brought back memories for Katie and me. As we made our way across the playing fields of University Park and though the screen of trees at the far end of the rugby pitch, the dark sheen of the Eden estuary opened up before us. Beyond it was the mouth of the Firth of Tay and the Angus coast. To the north-west, the lights of Broughty Ferry, Monifieth and Carnoustie twinkled. Below us we could see the low, sandy headland that had made St Andrews world-famous, the site of the Old Course, the best-known golf course on the planet.

  Most of the academic year took place in the winter months and we often ended the day by walking along the West Sands, below the golf course, taking our time, enjoying the salt air, the call of the gulls and the eye-blearing wind off the sea.

  But that night, there was no time to dawdle and pick up shells. We each carried a rucksack and a gun slip. Even though we had only one box of cartridges for our shotguns, the lead shot was heavier than I remembered. Once we reached the main road, we crossed and found the railway line. It skirted the Eden estuary and would take us directly and unobtrusively to where we needed to be. Although the line ran across open country and there were no cuttings to hide us, there were no patrols either. The Germans seemed to have concentrated such manpower as they had in St Andrews, and the countryside around the town was only very lightly policed.

  After half an hour, Guardbridge station came into view, its buildings visible against the western sky. We checked the time, looked down the track towards St Andrews, gratefully unshouldered our heavy rucksacks and I changed my clothes.

  *

  Once everyone was safely aboard and the back tarpaulin secured, Griffith-Smith guided the lorry out of the lane by the football ground. As he turned south, the last of the little bombs detonated and Miriam reached across to squeeze his arm. They had a chance now, a plan, and they had to make it work. Once on the Largo road, Griffith-Smith had decided to cut across country to Strathkinness, and from there strike north towards the Eden estuary. They had a long journey ahead and complete concentration was essential.

  ‘Darling,’ said Miriam, ‘if David is right about the camp at Comrie, in the Highlands, how will we get there?’

  He turned and with a rare smile, replied, ‘We’re going to take the train.’

  *

  In St Andrews, the serial detonations had caused chaos. While Colonel Kritzinger was receiving first aid for the cuts on his face and a shard of window glass was being removed from his bicep, soldiers were knocking on doors, rousing residents, searching for answers.

  When a patrol turned down North Castle Street and door-banging produced no responses, despite the fact that the lights were on in all the houses and, in one kitchen, the radio was playing, one of the sergeants began to suspect something. In frustration, soldiers broke into Kilrymond Lodge, the corner house occupied by Professor and Mrs Feldman, but there was no one to be found. A cheerful fire was burning in the grate. A runner sent to the Bute Building returned to report that no one was working in the laboratories.

  ‘None?’ asked Kritzinger. ‘Are you sure? None of them are to be found anywhere. They must be hiding somewhere. They cannot have simply disappeared. Find Griffith-Smith for me. He knows the town better than we do.’

  *

  ‘You will do precisely what we tell you to do. When the train from St Andrews arrives, follow our instructions. Do you understand? Yes or no?’

  In heavily German-accented English, wearing Griffith-Smith’s dress uniform stripped of its insignia under a black overcoat and a regimental hat he had doctored, I shouted at the stationmaster.

  ‘Now you will telephone the main signal box at Leuchars Junction and instruct them to clear a path for us through to Perth, and then beyond to Crieff and Comrie. Do you understand?’ I bellowed again. ‘And remember, I understand English. Perfectly.’ Perhaps I was overdoing it a little when I added, ‘This is an emergency! Business of the Reich, of highest importance.’

  Griffith-Smith stood beside me, making sure the stationmaster could see his pistol.

  The train from St Andrews to Dundee was due in ten minutes. Only two carriages, it shuttled back and forth between the town and Leuchars Junction, where passengers had to change trains. And this was the last train of the day. Katie had assembled all of the Americans and their families on the platform.

  When the stationmaster had finished his call, Griffith-Smith tore the flex out of the wall and I shouted, ‘This is a secret mission that must remain secret.’ And with that, we tied the poor man’s hands with his telephone flex and locked him in his own lavatory. When he started shouting, no one would hear him until the morning.

  Once back out on the platform, we heard the train coming from St Andrews before we saw it. Scarcely waiting for it to stop, Jamie and I boarded. ‘On behalf of the Department of Public Safety, this train is now commandeered for military use.’ Griffith-Smith walked down the corridors of its two carriages, ejecting puzzled passengers to wait on the platform. ‘There will be another train along soon,’ he could not resist adding.

  Meanwhile, with a pistol in my pocket, I spoke to the engine driver and his stoker, explaining what was happening and that they were required to comply with my instructions – immediately and without question.

  Once Katie and Griffith-Smith had made sure that all the Americans were on board and that Miriam and her children had found a compartment where they could sleep, the locomotive clanked forward, crossed the River Eden to begin the long journey into the mountains.

  XII

  ‘MacCaig?’ Robert MacDonald pushed some coins into the slot on the telephone box by the side of the road. ‘Are you still able to meet us in Arisaig? I’m in Fort William and should be with you in an hour.’ The line crackled but MacDonald heard the old man agree to meet him later at his shop.

  On the quayside, where moored boats bobbed on the tide and the clutter of creels, fishing gear and nets were piled against the gable end, Donald MacCaig’s establishment was no mere shop but an emporium. A post office, a purveyor of foodstuffs (mostly tinned), a retailer of hardware from lamp wicks to paraffin, a lending library, a specialist in oilskins and waterproof clothing, and, when Mrs MacCaig was in the mood, an excellent bakery, it was the hub of the village, and indeed all of South Morar.

  Before he began driving west, Robert MacDonald had explained that, having decided to spend some of the New Year holiday at Darroch House, he had invited so many guests that he would need food, especially Mrs MacCaig’s pies, scones and bannocks, and of course plenty to drink. The old man had a key to the house: would he mind delivering and MacDonald would call in later that evening to pay? Famously, Donald MacCaig ran a cash business and was particular about prompt payment. And did he have any second-hand shotguns and cartridges in store, by any chance? Would it be possible to hire them? Some of the New Year guests might want to go out for a little rough shooting over the holiday.

  When they at last reached the ocean at Loch nan Uamh, where Prince Charles Edward Stuart had made landfall in July 1745, and where he boarded a French ship a year later after the failure of the rebellion, a br
illiant half-moon had risen in a clear winter sky. For a mile or two the road hugged the Atlantic shore, the dark heads of the mountains of Moidart rising to the south, beyond the pale shimmer of the sea loch. It was a sight that salved the soul. For Robert MacDonald, it was a return to his native place, the heartland of the great Lordship of the Isles, where MacDonald chiefs had been hailed as kings, rulers of a vast Atlantic principality that stretched from the Isle of Lewis to the Isle of Man. As he travelled further and further into the west, history seemed to fold him into its heart, leaving the chaos and manifest evil that afflicted the world behind him.

  ‘You all right to drive all the way?’ asked Alan Grant, snapping MacDonald back to the present. ‘I hear the sound of regular breathing in the back seat. Do you want a nap?’

  Robert shook his head, saying he was fine. It was not far now. He turned down the sharp bend under the railway viaduct and plunged the car into the shadows of Druimindarroch, the ridge of the oak trees.

  *

  Belching plumes of steam, the night train rattled through the Fife farmland, its rhythms lulling most of its exhausted passengers into deep sleep. Katie and Griffith-Smith patrolled the corridor running beside the compartments, reassuring, talking quietly to those still awake, still fearful.

  Trying to stay out of the way but grateful for the furnace-like heat from the boiler as the stoker shovelled in coal, I had decided to remain in the cab of the engine. Even though the driver and his mate seemed afraid, even cowed, neither meeting my eye when I spoke to them, I had no reason to trust them. And they knew a great deal more about trains and the railway than I did.