Devils with Wings: Silk Drop (22 page)

“Look down there sir.”

Paul surveyed the ground in front of him that fell away beyond the crest as an undulating slope. Directly to his front the terrain was a mix of crumbling, light coloured rocks on reddish brown earth, interspersed with green grasses and scrub, splattered with the occasional flower. Low lying herbs filling in some of the gaps. One lone Olive tree acting as sentry. Looking to the far right, at the top of the perpendicular slope was a stepped terrace of what looked like olive trees in symmetrical lines marching down the hillside, directly beneath them a section of gully joining that slope to the one directly beneath Paul.

The gully probably started somewhere beneath the village, a kilometre to their east. A good place to descend, thought Paul. Beyond, towards the coast, he could see the glistening town of Hania, the steadily rising sun reflecting off the numerous windows. Above could be seen flights of Junkers still depositing their loads and Stuka dive bombers hovering like vultures waiting to swoop down and deliver death and destruction on demand.

The air felt fresh and tasted sweet, clearing his throat and lungs of the taste and smell of burning aviation fuel and oil, his face now blackened with more than just burnt cork. He looked at Leeb to his left, his keen eyes scanning the foreground, seeking out any potential threats. Paul pulled out his binoculars and scanned the mid-ground intently, it was quiet, no signs of movement. In the distance he could hear the crack of rifles and the faster chatter of machine guns, anti-aircraft fire adding to the discord as Junkers continued to fly over the island disgorging their loads.

He turned round to look behind him, the flat, level ground, also strewn with various rocks and scrub, slowly rising in the distance, beyond the mountains with their snow capped peaks. West of him was the start of a shallow escarpment, currently protected by Leeb’s men. To the east, the direction of their target, the small village of Pagantha.

In the centre, the rest of his company were going about their business, checking drop canisters for weapons, ammunition or supplies, stragglers joining their platoons, Nadel still wishing hopefully for the arrival of his missing men. Once the contents were either consolidated or dispersed amongst the company, the wheels and handles would be attached and those would be used as transports and dragged to Paul’s current location. He could see Unterfeld Richter loading some of his mortar bombs on to his men, the rest would remain in the containers and dragged wherever they went.

He saw a bulky figure running towards him in a low crouch, who he immediately recognised as Max returning to report to him on the status of the company. Max lay prone, next to Paul, peering over the crest, JU 87s in the distance, their inverted, gull shaped wings distinctive. The pilots locating their targets through the bomb sight windows in the floor of the cockpit. Three in a line, they rolled one hundred and eighty degrees, one after the other, the aircraft nosing into a dive.

Paul turned to see what had transfixed Max’s attention. The three Stuka’s nose dived, close to sixty degrees, hitting a speed of over five hundred kilometres an hour, the Jericho Trumpet, the wailing siren, heard even this far away from the scene of its target somewhere between Hania and Rethymnon. At fifteen hundred metres the bombs were released, the four, fifty kilogram bombs under the wings and the two hundred and fifty kilogram bomb held centrally, hurtled towards the target, engulfing it in a hot blast of shrapnel as the pilot pulled up from the dive, fighting the effects of nearly five g’s of force, his vision fogging as he finally levelled the plane and headed for home, a base on the mainland of Greece.

“Christ I’m glad I’m not on the receiving end of that lot,” exclaimed Max

“If we don’t get our marker flags out we may well be,” said Paul turning to Leeb giving him instructions to do just that.

“Well Max?”

Max pulled a small pocket book from his tunic and read the scribbled lines on it.

“It looks like we’ve lost two troop from Leutnant Nadel’s platoon sir.”

“Damn, what a waste,” cursed Paul. “I knew them all. They fought well in Corinth. To be killed before you have even left the plane.”

“The company newsletter says that you and your stick were also lucky to get out sir,” said Max looking at his commander’s blackened face.

“Very lucky Max. The rest of the company?”

“The rest of the company are present, except for Scherer, who was killed on your flight sir and Forster, who has broken his leg on this God forsaken surface.”

“Yes, Scherer was his by an AA round, straight through the chest. I don’t think he even knew he’d been hit. Who to replace Forster?” mused Paul. He turned to Leeb.

“Fessman?”

“That would be my choice sir.”

“Max?”

“He’s more than ready for the opportunity sir.”

“Do you want to give him the news Ernst?”

“It would be better coming from you.”

“Ok, send him over will you Max?”

Max got up from the ground, reddish soil clinging to his smock, and went in search of Fessman who was on the western edge of the piece of ground they currently held.

Paul heard rustling behind him and turned to see five figures running towards him. The first he recognised as Leutnant Roth, the second, his six foot athletic frame and short blonde hair, helmet strapped to his belt, could only be his friend Erich, his close friend, followed by his three scouts.

Paul stood up and they came to a halt in front of him.

“Sir, this is... “ Roth started to say, but Erich strode passed him and gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder.

“I lay marker flags out for you and you still can’t bloody well hit the target,” he said laughing.

They forgot all those around them as they wrapped their arms around each other, slapping each other’s back, like two long lost brothers who had found each other again through such adversity. Realising they had an audience, they parted, but were still laughing, their joy at seeing each other again was clear for all to see.

“God it’s good to see you Erich. We thought we’d lost you to the high and mighty life of Regimental HQ.”

“I needed to be where the real work’s done,” he responded.

At that moment Max joined the group, bringing Fessman with him.

“Feldwebel Grun, you don’t look any different from when I last saw you, apart from the makeup.”

“You seem to have put on a bit of weight since you’ve been with the hierarchy sir.”

They both looked at each other, not a flicker on their faces, Erich’s scouts looked on in amazement. Then Erich thrust out his hand, shaking Max’s, their grip firm, their faces breaking out into a grin.

“You’ve not tamed our ex-Hamburg Docker yet then Paul?”

“Did you ever think I could? Erich, I need a couple of minutes, then we can get an update from you, ok?”

“Sure, Feldwebel Grun can update me.”

Paul turned towards Fessman, his brown, hawk like eyes looking out from his slightly pinched face, the arched eyebrows questioning his sudden appearance in front of his Company Commander.

“You’ve heard about Unteroffizier Forster I assume?”

“Yes sir, an unlucky break, if you pardon the pun.” Fessman, ever the company comedian.

“Could you caretake the troop in his absence?”

“What, you mean run the troop sir?”

“That’s exactly what I mean, command it.”

“But... “

“There are no buts Fessman, can you do it or not?”

“Yes sir,” he responded bringing his feet together sharply and his arms straight by his sides.”

“Good. Well then Uffz Fessman, you had better get your troop sorted, we’ll be moving out soon. And your first challenge is to rig a stretcher for Uffz Forster.”

“Will do sir. And sir, thank you for the opportunity, you’ll not be disappointed.”

“I know, now off with you.”

Fessman left to join his troop and Paul returned to Erich. The reunion over, they needed to get down to business.

“Max, can you pull in the platoon commanders and platoon NCO’s in?”

“Considerate done sir.”

“Erich, will you run through what you know about the area?”

Multiple explosions could be heard to the north west towards the coast and Maleme airfield.

“Maleme is getting hit pretty hard, have you put marker flags out Paul? The Luftwaffe boys will soon be hunting further afield for tasty targets like this. Sorry about Christa,” he added, needing to say something to his friend about it.

“I only met her twice, but it was enough to know what a special person she was.”

Paul looked down, the pain racing through his body, like an electric current twisting his nerve endings, gripping his heart like a vice, his stomach churning, nausea threatening to overwhelm him. Erich gripped his shoulder.

“Are you ok Paul? I’m sorry, I know it’s still fresh, but I had to share with you my condolences, you’re my friend.”

Paul straightened up.

“It’s ok Erich,” he said placing his hand on top of his friend’s hand.

“Sometimes it’s so fresh, even out here, that the pain can be unbearable. There was so much hope for the two of us.”

Before they could continue their personal exchange, they were interrupted by the three platoon commanders, three platoon NCO’s, Unterfeld Richter, the radio operator and Max.

“Any joy on contacting HQ?”

“No sir, still no response,” replied Bergmann.

“Keep trying.” The frustration in Paul’s voice obvious.

“We’ve had problems as well Paul,” added Erich. “But you will get through eventually.”

“Right gather round. For those of you who haven’t met him, this is Oberleutnant Fleck. He landed earlier in the morning because he thought we might get lost.”

They all laughed, dissipating some of the tension.

“All yours Erich.”

Erich cleared a patch of ground, kicking away some of the low lying herbs and small stones until he had a reasonable half square metre of cleared space to play with. He drew a square in the dirt with a stick he had picked up earlier, for this sole purpose.

“To the north, we have the crest next to us here, which drops away in stages to the coast and eventually Hania. To the south, it is similar ground to what we are on now, but slowly climbs up into the mountains you can see behind me. The western edge drops away as well, similar terrain to what we’re on now until it hits the coast, some seventy five kilometres away. The important part, the region we’ll be heading into, east, about a klick from here is the village of Pagantha, where at least a platoon of British soldiers are held up. It is a route they could use to ferry soldiers to outflank our main attack below. I will leave the rest of that to your Oberleutnant to cover. But back to the village, I’ll hand you over to Unterfeld Gerste, he can give you the low down on the village.”

A grizzled veteran, who should have been a full sergeant by now, but had been up and down the ranks many times for various misdemeanours, stepped forward and in a gravelly voice explained the layout to the assembled men.

“The village is about four hundred metres long.”

He scraped a deep rut running from south to north from one end of the square to the other, with a small bend in the middle.

“This road runs right through the centre of the village with a raised embankment, about fifty metres wide, running alongside it, east, for its full length. Starting from the south. The road leaving the village slopes gradually away to the south, then east, with an escarpment on its left and the embankment to its right. The top of the escarpment has a very thin line of trees and opposite on the embankment is a cream coloured, two storey building with a terracotta roof. Beyond that the ground gradually slopes away, where there is a second two storey building of a similar style.”

He placed some herbs he’d picked up and sprinkled them west of the road to represent the trees and two small white stones or rocks to represent the two buildings.

“To the north, the road coming out of the village also slopes away. The road through the village is fairly flat with a slight curve in the middle. Above the road, on the embankment again, is a similar house to the other two. Opposite, on the other side of the road there is a flat stretch for about fifty metres, before the ground gradually climbs upwards, not as steep as the escarpment at the other end, and interspersed with trees until you hit the flat of the plain were on now.”

He again sprinkled some herbs to support his description and placed another one of the small white rocks. But he then placed two small sticks just below the house, pointing northwest, getting wider apart the further away they were.

“This is the start of a gully, running pretty much down to the lower land below. That describes the two ends of the village. As you move south along the road, about one hundred and fifty metres in, you have a curve in the road, about fifty metres long, which straightens out almost immediately. Just before this bend on the right of the road.” He placed a rock in position. “You have a one storey building, this one is white in colour. Immediately just before the bend.” He traced the route with his stick. “On the left, on the raised piece of ground that runs parallel with the road you have another building. This one is more of a pale tangerine colour with a terracotta roof, but this one is quite long, maybe twenty or more metres, possibly two houses back to back. We’ve nicknamed this the Mandarin.”