Codeword Golden Fleece (45 page)

Having paid for the tall Polish airman’s dinner as well as his own Rex wished him good-night and went out into the street. Turning south, he set off between the two lines of dismal buildings towards the camp. The place boasted no pavement of any kind, and there were no street lamps. The only light came from guttering candles set in bottles which could be seen glimmering through some of the grimy windows that he passed.

After he had covered a couple of hundred yards he suddenly
got the impression that he was being followed. There were very few people about, so once on the
qui vive
he was soon able to identify his shadow by the simple process of alternately quickening and slowing his pace. It was the Polish officer with whom he had been feeding, and there was no doubt that the fellow was following him, as each time Rex paused to light a cigarette or peer into one of the ill-lighted windows the tall airman stopped too.

Rex had always been so confident in his own strength that, forgetting about his injured arm, he was not the least perturbed, and when he reached the end of the town walked briskly on into the darkness of the open country. He had covered another quarter of a mile when he caught the soft footfalls of his shadow, who was now evidently hurrying as quickly but as quietly as he could to catch up with him.

Even then Rex only wondered vaguely what he wanted, and surmised that perhaps the poor fellow was going to ask him for a small loan, having been ashamed to do so in the public room at the inn.

When the footsteps were only a few yards behind him Rex turned and said: ‘Hello!
Que voulez-vous?
’

To his amazement, instead of replying, the man crossed the remaining space between them in two swift bounds, whipped out a black-jack and slashed with it at his head.

Taken by surprise, he jumped aside only just in time. But his assailant struck again, and the second blow caught him on the side of the head above the ear.

It was only as he reeled back half blinded by pain that he remembered his injured arm, and strove in vain to jerk it out of its sling.

His foot caught in something, and he lost his balance. With silent ferocity the man leapt upon him and bore him to the ground.

Next moment, with not the faintest conception as to why he had been attacked, Rex found himself fighting for his life.

As Rex went over he fell backwards on to the grassy verge at the roadside. The Polish airman came down on top of him, driving the breath out of his body; he had thrust out his left hand to get a grip on Rex’s throat, and his right, in which he still grasped the black-jack, was raised for another blow.

Gathering his great strength, Rex suddenly hunched up his knees and lifted his shoulders, throwing his antagonist off. But the man came at him again like lightning and forced him back on to the grass before he could even struggle to his knees.

Rex knew that normally there were few men, apart from professional boxers and wrestlers, who could have bested him in a physical combat, but his injured arm robbed him of a great part of his powers, and the Pole was not only as tall as himself but extremely muscular and fit. He could not for the life of him imagine why the fellow had attacked him, yet he cursed himself for having been caught unawares. He had known for a good ten minutes that the man was following him, and on a lonely road at night in an area given over to a defeated army he should have realised that there might be desperate characters about, and at least have had the sense to pull out his gun as the man came up with him.

He thought now as he lay on his back writhing under his assailant that if he could only get at his gun he might yet put a swift end to the combat in his own favour. But he had only one free hand, and he needed that to protect his head.

As the Pole swung the black-jack up again Rex caught his wrist and gave it a savage twist. With a grunt of pain the Pole let the weapon go, but it fell only to dangle from his arm by a leather thong. Next second he had smashed his left fist down into Rex’s face.

Rex flinched under the blow, but hung on to his opponent’s wrist. Jerking it towards him, he gave it another violent wrench, at the same time heaving himself over sideways. To save his arm from being broken the Pole let his body follow through and
was flung right over Rex’s head. As his shoulders and back descended heavily on Rex’s wounded arm, Rex let out a yell, but for the moment he had freed himself.

With an effort he jerked himself up into a sitting position and reached for his gun, but the Pole was up too, on his knees, and hit him a stunning blow with his clenched fist on the side of the head.

Rex heeled over under the impact. He was being attacked now on his crippled side and was thus almost defenceless The Pole slogged at him again, and before he could grasp the butt of his gun he was forced to snatch his hand from his pocket to protect his head.

The Pole, seeing his advantage, struck with both fists alternately, raining a hail of blows at him. As the only way of avoiding them Rex flung himself backwards again on to the grass, and once more thrust his hand down to his pocket in an attempt to pull out his pistol.

Suddenly the Pole jumped to his feet and delivered a terrific kick at Rex’s body. It got him under the ribs. The pain, was excruciating, and the breath was driven out of his lungs. Gasping for air, he rolled over in the hope of getting away; but his attacker ran at him and kicked him with all his force again. This time the man’s heavy boot landed on Rex’s head.

Stars, circles and flashes flickered and gyrated in the intense blackness that abruptly veiled his eyes. His head was singing like a kettle, he was still fighting for breath, an agonising pain was tearing at his ribs, his skull seemed to be opening and shutting, there was the salt taste of his own blood in his mouth. New pains stabbed at him as he lay, now inert and helpless, and ne knew subconsciously that the Pole was ruthlessly kicking him into unconsciousness. Then the pain eased and he passed right out.

When he came to he lay quite still for a time, staring at the starlit sky above his head and wondering what had happened to him. Then memory trickled back. The Duke riddled with bullets, Simon arrested, himself left as the sole hope of getting the Golden Fleece safely through to London, his journey to Cernauti, the tall, blue-eyed Polish airman and the bitter, uneven struggle.

There was a dull ache in his side, and his head hurt intolerably. Suddenly he shivered and realised that he was very cold. Next moment the reason seeped into his still bemused and pain-dulled
mind. He was lying there on the grass in his pants and vest. While he was unconscious he had been stripped of all his outer clothes.

As he struggled into a sitting position pain stabbed at him in a dozen places; his chin dropped heavily on his chest, and he moaned. Then the thought of the Golden Fleece came into his mind again. If that had been taken with his clothes it was the end, as he had not the faintest idea who his attacker was or any means of tracing him.

With bruised and aching hands he fumbled at his waist. His wounded arm had been pulled from its sling when the Pole undressed him. As he moved it he felt a sharp twinge of pain above the elbow, but it seemed now the least of his hurts.

Suddenly he let out a sigh of relief, and relaxed. The money-belt was still there, and he could feel the flat wad of the option in it. Fooled, beaten up and robbed as he had been, the worst had not happened. He had the bulk of his money in the belt, too, so once his pains eased a little he could buy other clothes and be able to carry on the big game, which was the only thing that really mattered.

He did not think that he had been unconscious for very long, as the moon was only just rising above the flat horizon. Lifting himself painfully to his feet, he shivered again. Then as he looked round his eye lit on a tumbled heap of stuff a few yards away from him. Something on the top of the heap shimmered dully in the faint moonlight. Walking over, he saw that it was a button, and that the heap consisted of the Polish officer’s clothes.

Turning them over, he found that the whole outfit was there; uniform greatcoat, cap, tunic and breeches, belt, shirt, collar, tie and even the black boots. The man had been his own height, so the clothes should fit him. Shivering again, he began to put them on.

As he did so he formed an idea of the probable reason why he had been attacked. Many of the Poles were, he knew, splendidly stout fellows and had already expressed their determination to fight on, although their country had been overrun. Perhaps this chap had intensely resented the idea of beeing cooped up in an internment camp and made up his mind to get to France or Britain in order to join in the fight against the Nazis again as speedily as possible. He had spoken a little of both French and English, so the difficulties of the journey should not prove insurmountable if he could once get away from the area where his
compatriots were interned. To do that his most urgent need would be a suit of civilian clothes. Meeting Rex, who was the same height as himself, and very vulnerable to attack through having one arm in a sling, must have proved too much of a temptation for him, and he had decided to knock him out and strip him as the most certain way of getting what he wanted.

The uniform proved a little tight across the shoulders, but to Rex’s relief the boots were big enough; the cap, however, was a hopeless misfit, being at least three sizes too small.

As he pushed it on the back of his head it suddenly came to him that his recent ill luck might in reality prove a blessing in disguise. Here he had been all the afternoon and evening battling his wits for a way to get into the camp, and a Polish officer’s uniform had now been thrust upon him.

Regretfully now he thought how stupid it had been for the Pole and himself to fight it out when, had one of them only disclosed his desires to the other, they might have simply swapped clothes and parted the best of friends.

The idea made him laugh, but directly he did so his mirth was checked by a dozen pains stabbing him. This caused him to make a careful examination of his hurts. His head was very sore, and the blood had congealed on top of two nasty cuts, but his thick, curly hair had saved his skull from being cracked. His side now throbbed dully, but he did not think any of his ribs were broken as the pain was well below them. The wound in his arm had opened and bled a little, but he knew that it would soon heal again if he refrained from using it. All things considered, he had come off far better than might have been expected. He knew that for some hours to come he would continue to feel sick and giddy, but he had sustained no serious damage that time and rest would not put right.

He next debated whether to make his attempt to get into the camp that night, but quickly decided against it. For such an undertaking he needed all his wits about him, and, even if he pretended to be tight, so that it might be assumed that he had been mixed up in a drunken brawl, to arrive at one of the gates with blood all over his face was a sure way to invite questions from the guard, and, as he could not speak Polish, that was the one thing he must avoid. Still badly shaken and half-bemused as he was, it would have been madness to risk ruining the whole business through some stupid slip that he would not normally make when rested and more or less recovered from his beating
up. Besides, there was no great urgency about getting hold of a plane, as only four days were gone out of the thirty for which the option was valid.

In consequence, he began to wonder how he could best get himself cleaned up and where to pass the night. He could walk back to the town and claim his bed at the inn; but the odds were that by this time it would be shut and to get into it he would have to knock up the evil-smelling travesty of Shylock who ran the place. Even if it were still open, its single room giving on to the street, which served as hall, lounge, dining-room and bar, was much too small for there to be any chance of his slipping through it and up the rickety staircase at its far end unnoticed. Shylock’s visitors were not so many or his eyes so slow that he would fail to remark that Rex, having gone out dressed like a fairly prosperous mechanic, had returned clad in the uniform of a Polish officer, and his instinct for keeping on the right side of the authorities would probably send him creeping hurriedly round to the police station to lay an information about the strange metamorphosis of his visitor.

Rex could have gone to one of the other inns but he thought it a hundred to one that wherever he showed himself his state would attract attention, so he dismissed the idea and decided to spend the night in the open. He remembered that, about halfway between the town and the camp, the road ran over a low stone bridge that spanned a sluggish stream. There, at least, there would be water to wash in and, with luck, under the arch he might find shelter from the possibility of rain and wind.

The moonlight was now brighter, and before leaving the place of his fierce encounter he looked carefully round to see if either he or the Pole had dropped anything during their struggle. But he could find nothing. All his clothes had disappeared, and with them his gun, his torch and the wallet in which he had kept all his notes of low denomination.

The bridge was only ten minutes’ walk away, and on reaching it he found that it would serve his purpose admirably. Under it, on the north side, there was a bank between it and the stream amply wide enough for him to stretch himself out without any risk of his rolling into the water. Stooping his head, he got down below the ancient blocks of stone and spread out the Pole’s greatcoat on the ground. The night was moderately warm here out of the wind, and, having stretched himself at full length, while
he was still worrying about his throbbing hurts, he fell asleep.

In the morning he woke to find that his head and side were still sore, but he felt considerably better. Partially undressing, he knelt down by the stream and bathed his hurts in the cool water. As he was about to pull on the tunic again he felt something crinkle in the left breast pocket. On looking inside, he found a square piece of flimsy paper. It had some words in ink neatly written on it in a language he took to be Polish; below them was an indecipherable signature scrawled in pencil, and imposed upon it a circular rubber stamp in the centre of which the figures 24.9.39 stood out clearly.