Russian Front (14)
The noise of the shooting died down. Hugh squirmed around on his back and put the mirror in its leather pouch. The he carefully replaced the leather sockets on the sniper scope of his rifle and set about cleaning it. Tania began to do the same. They heard joyous shouts of victory from the floors below. The artillery spotters had gone below to congratulate the victors, no doubt expecting a share in a celebratory swig of vodka. ‘What I can’t understand is,’ said Hugh quietly, ‘why the Jerries don’t just pound this place flat with an air strike and some artillery. That’s what Rommel would have done.’ ‘That’s a good question.’ Tania agreed matter-of-factly. ‘This is a key position. We are only two or three hundred meters from the Volga,’ ‘So what’s the answer?’ ‘They don’t like this kind of war. Static, bogged down in ruins. They like sweeping across open country, sitting proudly on top of their panzers. Another point: the first thing they did when they approached Stalingrad was to bomb it to pieces from the air. They thought that this would destroy our will to fight. All it did was create a thousand fortresses, like this one. Attack from the air has had the opposite of the desired effect, as far as they are concerned. Perhaps that is why they don’t send in their Stukas. I don’t really know.’ She thought for a moment. ‘Their psychology is also important. They still don’t respect us as fighters. You should never underestimate your enemy.’ The artillery spotters ascended the all-but-shattered stairs. Their faces were ruddy and they had wide grins. Tania looked at them. ‘Stay close to me, if you would, Hugh.’ She murmured. ‘One of those boys is bound to try his luck, if you know what I mean.’ One of the soldiers was indeed looking over at Tania with a look of unambiguous longing. ‘You have your rifle,’ he said thoughtlessly. ‘Exactly,’ she grimaced. ‘I wouldn’t want to be court-martialled for shooting a fellow Russian. I don’t mind facing the Fascists, but to be shot for killing a Russian trying to rape me would be rather absurd, don’t you agree?’ There wasn’t any arguing with that. He stayed close to her as they discussed their plan for the night’s sortie, then ate some bread and soup and dozed as the sun went down. When you’re in action you never miss a chance to eat or sleep. The randy artillery spotter began to snore loudly. He had obviously managed to obtain sufficient vodka to become reasonably drunk. Night fell and it became very cold under the stars, which Hugh could see through the holes in the roof. A soft wind moaned in the eves. About midnight they made their way to the ground floor. The interrogator was waiting for them. Tania briefed Pavlov on their intentions. Hugh couldn’t understand what she was saying, but he knew that she would be telling the heroic sergeant that they were going out and would be back some time before dawn. Then the three of them slipped out of the house and crawled slowly and carefully the few hundred yards across the center of the square to the workmen’s hut beside the railway tracks. This was effectively No Man’s Land, but it was safer than trying to work their way around the buildings at the sides of the square, where they could bump into a German patrol. Here, out in the open under the moonless but starry sky, they were lost in a desert of rubble and shell-holes. It took them two hours to make it to the hut. The door was hanging open at a crazy angle and they slipped in with knives drawn, but there was no one inside. Tania crept out again and cut the telephone wire that ran roughly north to south beside the hut. After a quarter of an hour they could see, through the smashed window of the hut, a German soldier walking along the wire, looking for the break. Tania shot him and tapped Hugh on the shoulder. He crawled out through the door. When he got to the corpse he took off the steel helmet and overcoat, then stood and waited. After twenty minutes or so another German soldier appeared, just visible in the starlight. He nearly bumped into Hugh before he saw him. Hugh whipped out a pistol and hissed: ‘Hande hoch.’ Tania materialized like a ghost, her knife at the newcomer’s throat, and they led their prisoner, his shaking hands raised obediently, into the hut, where they bound his hands behind his back. The German-speaking intelligence officer questioned the man in a low voice for what seemed like a long time, but was probably only ten minutes or so. Hugh had picked up a few words of German but couldn’t follow what was being said. The prisoner seemed very frightened and completely co-operative. He was a sapper sent out to repair the line as Tania had anticipated. When the interrogation was over the intelligence officer tapped Tania on the shoulder. The captured soldier gave a low groan of despair, clearly believing that the time his treachery had bought him was at an end. Tania and the intelligence officer whispered together. Then they took the prisoner outside. Hugh could see all three of them through the window. He could just make out the intelligence officer speaking a few very low words and pointing to the German lines. Tania unsheathed her knife and cut the man’s bonds. Then they just let him walk away. Hugh could hardly believe his eyes, but he was relieved that he didn’t have to watch an unarmed prisoner being summarily executed. Just before the soldier disappeared into the darkness, he turned, raised his arm and said: ‘Danke, kamerad.’ Then he was gone. After they had made their long and exhausting way back to Pavlov’s House – the defenders of which had foiled repeated attempts to infiltrate the place while they were away – they crawled through the narrow tunnel and trudged back to the headquarters bunker. ‘Why did you let our friend go?’ asked Hugh, pulling off his boots in his room in the bunker, which seemed ineffably cozy after the strain of the night’s activities in No-Man’s Land. ‘Our friend? You mean that fascist we captured,’ replied Tania. ‘Yes. I felt sure that you were either going to bring him back here or shoot him.’ Tania sighed deeply as she slumped on to Sergei’s bunk. They hadn’t seen Sergei since their arrival in Stalingrad. ‘This bloody war, you, I mean Hugh. Hatred is exhausting. I still hate the Germans, but I’ve killed enough of them.’ She looked at him. ‘Why are they here? Why are they doing this to our homeland? Why are they making us kill them? What makes them so … so convinced that they have a right to just walk in and take over?’ ‘Hitler. The Nazis,’ he said simply. ‘No,’ she shook her head slowly. ‘I mean yes, you’re right, but also I think there is something more. I honestly believe that there is some kind of national, erm, psychosis, a darkness in the German soul. Look at the last war. Wasn’t that terrible enough for them? And look around you,’ she continued with weary, bitter sadness, ‘this beautiful city reduced to ashes. How long will it take to rebuild it? I know in my heart that we will drive the fascists back to Germany, but how many more of our people must die?’ He couldn’t think of a single word to say that would help her. ‘So why did you let our friend off the hook?’ ‘It was Sergei’s idea. He describes it as tactical altruism. The man had betrayed his country. He knew that, he wasn’t stupid. If he revealed that he had been captured by us - the enemy - and then released, his superiors would know that he had co-operated with us. He would have found himself in front of a firing squad. But he was infinitely grateful for being released. So, according to Sergei, we have created a pacifist in their ranks.’ She looked at him. ‘And I didn’t want to shoot him, Hugh, I really didn’t. The more he spoke the more human he seemed. I could picture him being kind to his children.’ She sighed. ‘Perhaps I am finished as a soldier.’ The blanket at the door was pulled back and Sergei appeared, looking annoyed. He took a swig of vodka from a silver hip flask. ‘Fuck!’ he exploded. ‘Fuckety fuck and bollocks!’ I say old man, there is a lady present, Hugh thought to himself but didn’t say so. Sergei looked at them. ‘If the other side find out that you’re an impostor … well, it will make us look desperate. And the trouble is, we are desperate. That moving ice in the Volga has made our supply situation impossible. Until it freezes over completely, we’re buggered. I’m going to talk to Chuikov this evening and recommend taking you back to Moscow. We can’t risk being made fools of.’ ‘Why should the fascists find out?’ asked Tania. ‘Hugh has convinced everybody so far.’ ‘I’ve had word from our people in London,’ Sergei replied flatly. ‘There is at least one German spy looking all over England for Hugh. My masters in Moscow believe that his cover is about to be blown.’ Chapter Eleven LONDON Sally and Eichmann had both been brought back to London several days earlier. It was three o’clock in the morning of the nineteenth of November and neither could sleep. Sally was comfortable in another Mews flat. After the soldiers and police had broken into the Swaynes’ home, she and Hugh’s mother had been given cups of tea in separate rooms while they told their stories to Special Branch detectives. After the talking and note-taking, Sally had just time to say goodbye to Helen Swayne in the winter twilight. Both of them had been seriously shaken by their encounter with Eichmann, the older woman saying that she had wondered from the first whether or not he was a psychopath. Sally didn’t know what this meant and she didn’t have time to ask. A car was waiting and detectives were anxious to get her back to London. The two women kissed each other and promised to write. Fighting men weren’t the only ones for whom shared danger could form quick, strong bonds. ‘I’m so sorry I can’t explain what’s going on,’ said Sally. ‘I don’t even know myself. Hugh and I were brought here from …’ ‘Remember “Need to Know”, Miss,’ said a Special Branch man who had insisted on standing by them as they said goodbye. ‘It’s alright,’ said Helen Swayne. ‘Just promise to come back when you can. The war can’t go on for ever, and it looks as if the tide is turning at last.’ The car had been driven at what seemed to Sally like breakneck speed through the evening to Fortune’s headquarters in blacked-out Regent Street. The circumstances were almost exactly the same as when she and Hugh had been deposited on the pavement after landing at Croydon Aerodrome. That seemed like a very long time ago. The sergeant-major-in-mufti type with the prize-fighter’s build smiled kindly at her in the lobby as he switched on the light. ‘Just up the stairs, Miss. Lesley will meet you.’ She wasn’t particularly looking forward to meeting Lesley. She mounted the stairs and the steel door opened and there was Lesley, a definite amused twinkle in her eye. ‘So I can’t get lifts anywhere, can’t I?’ she demanded in that brisk voice. ‘I didn’t mean to be rude,’ said Sally in her let’s-be-friends voice. Lesley gave her a long look with rather knowing eyes. All of a sudden Sally wondered if Lesley might be a lesbian. Lesley guided her in to the large, bustling room. It was nearly ten o’clock at night but the place was still busy. A woman was holding a curtain over a large notice board, waiting for Sally to go by. Top Secret, obviously, Sally said to herself. Fortune was waiting in his office, a bottle of sherry standing on the blotter. He was his usual avuncular self. ‘Come in, come in, welcome back to the relative safety of the Metropolis! I gather your few days in the country turned out to be not quite as restful as you had hoped? You will have a sherry, won’t you, my dear? Lesley, will you do the honors in return for a glass?’ Three glasses of sherry were poured. There was a sipping silence. A clock ticked. Sally looked at Fortune and then around at Lesley who was sitting to one side and behind her. ‘So, how did you find out where I was. Things were getting a bit dicey with that … spy, I suppose he was.’ Fortune nodded at Lesley, who looked down into her glass before speaking. ‘We were a bit stumped for a couple of minutes when the line went dead. Then I called our switchboard girl. It’s standard procedure around here to log the number as well as the time of any calls put through by operators out of London. I knew from the files that Hugh’s next-of-kin lived in Hawkstone.’ ‘We then got on to the Special Branch to order the village sealed off,’ continued Fortune. ‘The police at Dulverton went straight to the Hawkstone post office, since we knew that was the source of your call. The post mistress was very anxious to help, if somewhat garrulous, by all accounts. The whole operation was co-ordinated by the Special Branch in Exeter. They and the Army train for this kind of thing, and there are always lots of Army units on Exmoor. We think Eichmann …’ ‘Eichmann!’ Sally burst out. ‘I’ve heard of him.’ ‘Not the Eichmann; an Eichmann,’ explained Fortune. ‘It’s a common name in Germany, like Smith or Jones. Anyway, that’s his name, not Ryan. He wouldn’t tell Special Branch anything, of course, but we received a lot of information about him from …well, let’s just say a very surprising source. This, ah, person couldn’t tell us exactly where Eichmann was, but he – I don’t think I’m giving anything away by revealing his gender – did tell us all about Herr Eichmann and so we knew we were dealing with a very nasty piece of work. Rather an arrogant type, to boot. Seems as if he’s been boasting to MI5 that he knows all about Hugh’s mission.’ ‘What about Montague? Did you catch him?’ ‘Not yet. He got wind of the fact that we were after him, Lord knows how, and disappeared into the desert with a stolen truck full of petrol, water and food. He could be almost anywhere. Apparently he’s a sort of Lawrence of Arabia character. Speaks fluent Arabic, knows the desert like the back of his hand, confirmed bachelor, that kind of thing. He might be almost anywhere, but we can’t afford to chase him. He’ll be nabbed when he turns up.’ Fortune looked at her. He seemed to have forgotten his sherry. ‘I expect you are wondering how Hugh is getting on. Well, all I can tell you that as of a few hours ago he was alive and well.’ Sally felt tired and hungry. ‘What happens now? To me, I mean?’ ‘Young Lesley,’ he said as he rubbed his forehead, ‘will take you to supper at a small place I know in Soho that stays open agreeably late.’
Go to part: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19
Copyright © 1998 Aidan Steer |