Russian Front (6)
‘Let me take you out to supper tomorr-, when we get to London. I can explain everything, at least, as much as I know.’ He smiled in her eyes. ‘I’m sorry I was so offensive to you back in the villa. It was unforgivable.’ (Hark at Sir Galahad! shrieked music-hall-demon.) She looked searchingly into his eyes. ‘Yes, well, I can understand that you had your reasons,’ she said with more coolness. Careful, don’t over do it, she’s not a fool, Swayne told himself. But she didn’t understand him. She had made herself into his prey. * * * * * * As the plane droned north-west towards England, Montague entered his quarters in a small apartment in Tobruk. He had been walking for hours, trying to decide what to do, and he was tired and depressed. He sat on the bed for half an hour while the sun went down, not moving. Eventually, in the last of the light, he seemed to come to a decision and moved off the bed and took two clean shirts out of a drawer. He then went out on to the tiny balcony and hung both shirts over the railing, as if to dry them. At ten o’clock the next morning an Arab man in a white suit walked past the apartment in the narrow street. He gazed up at the two white shirts briefly, then hurried around the corner. At exactly two o’clock that afternoon Montague sat down at a table in a café in a small square. The table was occupied by a man who Montague understood worked for SMERSH, the Russian secret service. Montague, speaking in low anxious tones, told the man as much as he knew and some that he guessed about Swayne’s mission. The man nodded, listening intently and then thanked him quietly but profusely for the information. No money changed hands. Montague was spilling the beans because he felt that it was the right thing to do. The man he talked to, who called him Comrade and promised that his masters in Moscow would only use the information as background knowledge, to ‘even things up’, as he put it, was actually an agent of the Abwehr, or German military intelligence. Two hours later he was tapping out cipher groups on a transmitter hidden in a suitcase to German military headquarters across the Libyan sea in Heraklion, Crete. Montague’s troubled thoughts were there encrypted by an encoding machine known as Enigma, believed by the Germans to be impenetrable, for onward dispatch to Abwehr headquarters in Berlin. The information that a British sniper from the elite Long Range Desert Group was on his way to Russia for some secret purpose connected with his specialized skill, together with Montague’s suppositions on the nature of that mission, was on the desk of Admiral Canaris, head of German military intelligence, first thing the next morning. But Canaris was unaware that the Enigma cipher groups had been picked up and recorded by British Army listening posts on the North African coast and then relayed via Gibraltar to the top secret decoding complex located at Bletchley Park, deep in the Buckinghamshire countryside. Here were housed machines that could – most of the time, given the time – ‘unbutton’ or decode the Enigma messages. In one of the many huts in the grounds of the house, highly trusted WRENS fed the captured cipher groups into the electro-mechanical machines known as Bombes. These devices, as strange to look at as anything dreamed up by Heath Robinson, began to hum like sewing machines as they searched through many thousands of possible combinations for the mathematical key that would unlock the coded message. This work went on twenty-four hours a day, all-year round and sometimes the messages would be unbuttoned quickly enough for them to be read by British intelligence, almost before they had reached their intended German recipients. But Montague’s message proved a bit more difficult. The machines hummed on in the frosty evening of the last day of October, watched over by their female attendants. Chapter Five SOHO TO MOSCOW The plane landed at Croydon aerodrome in the darkening drizzle of late afternoon after a long and bumpy flight skirting the German-occupied Channel Islands. Peering out the window at the gloaming of Southeast England it amazed Swayne that the pilot could find London, never mind Croydon. The weather had become progressively worse as they neared England and Swayne began to miss the Lisbon sunshine almost immediately. The prospect of England in autumn had seemed intensely nostalgic when he was in the desert and being shot at. He had longed for smoky red sunsets, soft rain, dripping hedgerows. Once inside the Nissen hut set-aside for arrivals he began to see the changes that three grim years of war had made. The lights seemed fewer and dimmer and the air of shabbiness and strain was almost palpable. Most of the furniture and fittings seemed dusty and in need of repair. The good news was that they would not have to struggle into London through the blackout on a bus or a train. A Humber staff car was waiting to meet them both, and they were recognized and quickly nodded through the formalities. Swayne carried their bags to the car and they set off for some as yet unknown destination. To his relief he was told that he could take off his bandages. By this time it was fully dark, but the drizzle had cleared and the moon came out allowing Swayne and Sally, in the back of the Humber, to see blacked-out South London passing by. Every so often they would see one or more bomb-damaged houses and rubbly sites where houses had been pulled down. The ATS driver must have very good night sight, Swayne thought, or drove this route regularly, for the light from the slitted headlamps seemed very faint. They crossed the Thames over Westminster Bridge, with moonlight rippling on the water. There was very little traffic as they circled Parliament Square and turned into Whitehall. Swayne guessed that they would be dropped here, somewhere around the Empire-within-an-Empire of the War Office, but the car proceeded smoothly to Regent Street via Trafalgar Square. Nelson’s monument was stark against the moon glowing behind thin, high cloud. At the lower end of Regent Street the driver, who hadn’t spoken a word to them, pulled the car into the curb, and, leaving the motor running, moved swiftly around the car to open the door for them. Then she smiled, got back into the car and drove away. Swayne and Sally, in their false uniforms with no identity papers or English money, were left on the pavement. The moon chose that moment to sail behind thicker clouds and the street became almost pitch-dark. Buses and taxis rumbled past, their headlights shielded and dim. The air tasted sooty and damp. Somebody bumped into them and muttered an insincere apology. Swayne began to notice the cold, although it was what the weather forecasters would have described as a mild night for the beginning of November. ‘I don’t know what we’re supposed to do,’ Sally hissed. It seemed appropriate to whisper in the circumstances. They waited a few moments longer and Swayne was about to suggest finding the Officers’ club for a drink when a big man wearing civilian clothing and what looked in the gloom to be a bowler hat appeared at their side. ‘Squadron Leader Swayne and Staff Nurse Knott?’ He had the voice of a Sergeant Major, but he spoke quietly. ‘This way, please, it’s on the first floor,’ He led them into a doorway between shop fronts and closed the door carefully before switching on the light. A single bulb illuminated a flight of stairs. The hairs on the back of Swayne’s neck began to prickle, and he looked at the Sergeant-Major-in-mufti type. He really was a huge man with a great barrel chest, wearing a pinstriped dark blue suit, which was not new but carefully looked after. His shoes sparkled, even in the poor light from the small bulb. He was in fact wearing a bowler hat planted very straight on his head. He noticed Swayne’s assessment and said pleasantly, ‘Just up the stairs, sir. The Colonel’s waiting to see you.’ Sally had gone pale but Swayne thought, what the hell, this is the middle of London and a bona-fide staff car met us. And what about getting through passport control and customs without a single question or having to show any documents? They must be among friends, surely. He smiled at Sally. ‘Come on, let’s find out what this is all about.’ The CSM, as Swayne had come to call him in his mind, looked as if he was going to say something and then stopped himself. ‘Just up the stairs, sir – and you miss, that’s right.’ They began to mount the stairs. As they neared the top of the first flight, they realized that CSM was not following them. Swayne turned around to see him waiting at the bottom with his hand on the light switch. ‘Just wait on the first floor, sir,’ he called. Swayne and Sally turned the corner at the landing and continued up the stairs to the first floor. They came to a large steel door opposite a smaller one with some frosted glass that said ‘Ladies’. A peephole opened in the steel door, then closed. Then the door itself opened and a man and a woman in their late twenties in civilian clothes, came out chatting easily and smiling. The woman looked Sally up and down in a brisk kind of way, saying, ‘Hello, Sally, I’m Lesley. We’ve been waiting for you both. I expect you’d like to freshen up wouldn’t you? Come on, I’ll show you the facilities and we can have a chat.’ All this while gently but firmly propelling Sally into the Ladies. As this was happening, the man, also smiling in a kindly sort of way, opened the large door wider and politely waved Swayne inside. ‘Inside’ was a bit of a shock. The steel door was evidently soundproofed, for there was a racket of conversation, typewriters clacking, telephones being dialed and all the hum and movement of a large, busy office. With the lights on and the blackout curtains drawn tight, it suggested the newsroom of a daily newspaper shortly before deadline. Very few uniforms were to be seen. Against the near wall, opposite the windows, there was evidently a large noticeboard. This was currently covered with a curtain, which a secretary was holding, ready to pull back when Swayne – the stranger – had passed by. She smiled at him. Why was everybody so pleasant, all of a sudden, Swayne asked himself, was it like this all over London? In the desert, headquarters staff had been under enormous strain, and it showed, trying to deal with Rommel and his Afrika Korps. He supposed it was just because ‘here’ was so far from the front. At the end of the room, past cubicles containing a number of young men and women engaged in what looked like graphic design – Swayne glimpsed a poster with a figure of a soldier on it and some inspirational headline in a language he didn’t recognize - the youngish man knocked on a door and waited with what seemed to Swayne a definite touch of deference for the muffled ‘come in’. On entering the room, which turned out to be a large, comfortable-looking, wood-paneled office, Swayne took in the information that there were two men present as the door closed softly behind him. One of the men was sitting on the edge of a large desk with a green-shaded lamp. He looked about forty and decidedly unmilitary although he was wearing the uniform of a full Colonel. He moved forward smiling to greet Swayne. Swayne snapped to attention, feeling a bit of a fool for doing so in a bogus uniform, but he had long ago learned that, in the class-ridden British Army, it was wisest to err on the side of caution when it came to military courtesy. As he did so he looked at the other man present. He was a thickset, shortish man of around fifty wearing a good gray suit and terribly mismatched shirt and tie. He had a tough, jovial, wide face and thick black hair. He was smiling at Swayne with a definite twinkle in his eye. There was a bottle of vodka on the desk whose label showed only Cyrillic lettering. The colonel had returned Swayne’s salute rather messily and was guiding him to a chair. ‘Here you are, old chap, sit down, sit down. I expect you’d like a drink and a smoke after such a long flight, wouldn’t you? Yes, of course you would.’ The colonel poured a stiff measure of vodka into a glass and handed it to Swayne, then pushed a silver cigarette case at him as he went behind the desk. The other man hadn’t been introduced, he just continued to smile at Swayne with that undimmed sparkle in his eyes. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I haven’t introduced us, have I? I’m Colonel Fortune and this gentleman, who would rather you just knew him as Sasha, is attached to the Russian Embassy.’ The avuncular colonel then looked down at his hands, evidently about to explain something while choosing his words carefully. Swayne took a careful sip of his vodka and found it to be flavored slightly, although he couldn’t say with what. The drink on his empty stomach made him roaringly hungry all of a sudden – lunch on the plane had been sandwiches, and it was now at least nine o’clock – and he immediately pictured himself, with definite longing, sitting opposite Sally in one of those jolly little Italian places in Soho where one could get such a decent meal for half a crown. But the colonel was evidently about to speak, so Swayne looked at him with polite attentiveness. Hopefully some kind of explanation was forthcoming. ‘Pepper.’ Said Sasha suddenly. Swayne raised his glass and looked at it. ‘Flavored with pepper? That’s interesting.’ He took another sip. He decided he liked the taste, it took away the harshness of the spirit without making you long for some ice cubes. ‘It’s very nice.’ ‘I am glad you enjoy this. Russian vodka is best vodka in world, as is Russian Champagne,’ said Sasha in good if heavily accented English. It was news to Swayne that vodka was made in any other country besides Russia, and it was certainly a revelation too him that they made Champagne as well. With one part of his mind he wondered what a Frenchman would have made of Sasha’s assertion. The colonel didn’t seem to mind being interrupted, he appeared pleased that Swayne had made a good first impression. ‘I don’t doubt, Lieutenant Swayne,’ the colonel began, ‘that you are very curious to know why you were whisked – well, practically whisked - from your unit in North Africa via our cloak-and-dagger friends in Lisbon all the way to London.’ He waited for Swayne to reply, but Swayne couldn’t think of anything to say. The vodka was making his blood sing and his empty stomach gurgle. ‘This operation,’ Fortune continued, with an encompassing sweep of one hand that took in the whole of the building, ‘busies itself with what you might describe as acts of deception. We’re not spies or saboteurs or commandos or that kind of thing. Tricking the enemy into believing what we want him to believe is our business. ‘Now this deception can take many forms. You’ve been in the desert for more than a year, so I wouldn’t be giving away any secrets if I told you that General Montgomery had arranged, for example, to dress tanks up in wood and canvas to look like lorries so that German aerial reconnaissance couldn’t detect them. Or, more exactly, would simply detect a lorry park instead of a tank brigade. And you may have noticed that these ‘lorries’ carry a kind of brush-type arrangement behind them to cover the tank tracks. Once you engage upon this kind of thing you have to look after the small details. ‘And of course it doesn’t stop there. If we wish the Germans to believe that an armored assault is being prepared in another part of the line, in order to deceive them into switching their reserves from where the real attack is about to take place, we have trailers that can simulate tank tracks and equipment, together with loudspeakers that will broadcast the characteristic clanking sounds and other noise of tanks moving into position. All this you know, since you’ve seen it happening. Trickery of this kind is as old as war itself and has been used by all the great generals. Think of the Trojan Horse. ‘I wish I could tell you some of the other things we get up to. Suffice to say that we have the most curious range of specialist skills in this department. Special effects men from Denham Studios, commercial artists, playwrights, and even a magician. Actors, too. Which is, I suppose, where you come in.’ He looked at Swayne with blue, penetrating eyes. Suddenly he seemed less affable and much more like a real soldier. Sasha stirred. ‘The forces of the Soviet Union are, as you are aware Lieutenant Swayne, engaged in a titanic struggle with the fascist beasts in the once-beautiful city of Stalingrad on the Volga. You, and I mean you personally, Lieutenant Swayne, have certain specialist skills and, erm, …’ here Sasha paused, making the chewing sound that Russians make when they are choosing their words, ‘qualities which will be of use to us in our struggle against the fascists.’ Swayne was surprised at this. The only specialist skill he had, apart from a good standard of fitness, was his skill with weapons, particularly rifles. Things were beginning to slot into place however. It explained his luxurious sea voyage. But why the Badger job, as Lucas had called it? He had now effectively disappeared off the face of the Earth. The thought chilled him. And where was Sally? Why hadn’t she reappeared? ‘Sergeant Knott’, Fortune continued with a fond smile, giving Swayne the impression that mind reading was one of his deception skills, ‘will be our guest in a comfortable flat in town for a while. She is already being well looked after. In due course she will be returned to her unit, and everybody will believe that she received some relatively kind punishment for her supposed, ah, indiscretion in Lisbon.’ Fortune then looked down at his hands again and his manner became rather more grave. ‘You have been brought back to London for a special mission. That is why we arranged for you to disappear for a while. This mission is not, or at least it shouldn’t be, especially dangerous and so you will not be able to choose whether or not to undertake the job, which will involve you travelling to Stalingrad, and …’ Fortune hesitated. ‘Showing the flag, Sir?’ Swayne hazarded. ‘In a sense, yes. But not the Union flag. The red banner.’ Sasha leaned forward and put his elbows on his knees. ‘The battle at Stalingrad is on a knife edge. Stalingrad, Stalin’s city. Think for one moment and you can see the significance of the name. It has become apparent that Hitler is utterly unwilling to cede a single square meter of the city that he believes he has all but conquered. It also will take little imagination to realize how important it is to Comrade Stalin to hold on to what we still possess. But forget the personalities. The peoples of the Soviet Union have already had to bear terrible sacrifices, the like of which make the bombing of London seem trivial, believe me.’ This was a provocative remark and Sasha immediately sensed the change in atmosphere. He raised his hands, ‘I say this with great respect for your people, particularly the working classes of your East End who have suffered the worst, believe me. Remember, I am stationed here, I have felt the bombs also.’ ‘Go on, Sasha,’ Fortune said quietly. ‘You will have heard the propaganda which we produce about the heroism and determination of the Russian soldiers, and in many cases it is true. But the battles in Russia are vast and trying, and morale has been a serious problem. Even now, when we are bleeding the Fascist Sixth Army white at Stalingrad, our soldiers frequently desert, surrender,’ he gestured with his arms, ‘shoot themselves in the hand, and so on. To be honest, they are not, generally speaking, well trained or supplied. Please keep that to yourselves. ‘The one development that has stiffened our resolve and given the soldiers back some of their confidence is the success of street-fighting in Stalingrad. In particular, our snipers are both hated and feared by all the Germans. You, Lieutenant Swayne, are a sharpshooter and you know how much damage one man with a rifle, telescopic sight, some fieldcraft and a good brain can do.
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Copyright © 1998 Aidan Steer |