Hearts of Stone (22 page)

Andreas shook his head. ‘Your philosophy is not for me. I have plenty I want to live for.’

‘You have a girl waiting for you, is that why you want to survive?’ Moss’s eyes twinkled and he clicked his fingers. ‘I knew it. Poor fellow. That will be quite a burden for you.’

‘I don’t think so,’ Andreas responded firmly.

‘Be realistic, my dear chap. War is a dangerous enterprise at the best of times. But what we are engaged in is the most dangerous of all duties. Why, there are myriad ways in which we can die. Even if we leave the enemy out we could be killed in training, during infiltration, from sickness, or untreated wounds. And if we survive that lot the other side will be doing their best to shoot us. If we are taken prisoner the only thing we can expect is to be tortured and then put up against a wall and shot. If we’re lucky we might get a chance to put a bullet in our heads, or take poison, before we are captured. So, you’ll pardon me if I don’t share your expectation that we will survive the war. That girl of yours? I’d forget her. Forget she ever existed. Otherwise she’ll only be a distraction and get between you and your duty.’ As the mess steward refilled his glass, Moss leaned forward and clapped Andreas on the shoulder. ‘So, eat, drink and be merry, as the saying goes! Especially when you see what’s coming in a couple of days. Parachute training. If ever there was a test of a chap’s nerve, it has to be hurling himself out of an aircraft with a bloody silk sheet and handful of ropes standing between him and eternity. Cheers!’

Chapter Twenty

T
he interior of the Wellington shook and lurched as it clawed its way into the night sky over Palestine. The sound of the straining engines was a constant roar in the ears of the men sitting on the benches either side of the fuselage, close enough for their knees to touch every time the bomber shuddered. Aside from the parachute instructor and a dispatcher, the other eight men were all agents in training, dressed in padded jumpsuits and strapped into their parachute harnesses. Each man had a small kitbag on the bench beside him, containing essential equipment for the escape and evasion exercise. A pale blue light barely illuminated those around Andreas and he was grateful that they could make out as little of his expression as he could of theirs.

He was terrified at the prospect of what was to come. Even though the parachute course was rushed, he had not felt much trepidation at leaping off the twelve-foot-high stage to learn how to roll on landing. Nor stepping off the training tower in the craned harness to simulate the last sixty feet of a drop. The first real jump, from a tethered balloon at a thousand feet, had been an almost serene experience. The basket had lifted gently off the ground and risen steadily into the sky before the tethered cable eased it to a stop. When his turn had come, Andreas had stepped up to the exit and let himself fall out as soon as the instructor had given him the command to jump. There was a brief sensation of uncontrolled speed before the static line pulled the parachute open and he felt a powerful jerk as the canopy rippled out above him. As he looked down at the landscape spread out below him, and the tiny upturned faces of those watching from the training field, he could not help laughing for joy at the thrill of the experience. The moment passed briefly enough as the ground came rushing up towards him and he just remembered to bend his knees in time to take the force of the impact. It drove the wind from his lungs and he lay gasping until an instructor rushed over and bellowed at him to get on his feet and bundle his parachute.

There had been two daylight jumps from planes before this final exercise, which was intended to be as close as possible to the experience of a real drop into enemy-held territory. They had been briefed in the afternoon that they were to be dropped somewhere within a thirty-mile radius of the school and had to find their way back inside the grounds without being picked up by any of the patrols that had been sent out to search for them. They had until the following night to return. After that they would be deemed to have failed and would have to repeat the exercise. The idea of jumping into the night, over unfamiliar terrain, had played on Andreas’s nerves over the intervening hours as he prepared his kit and was driven out to the airfield to wait for the order to board the Wellington.

Opposite him sat Bill Moss, arms folded across his chest as he whistled to himself. For a moment Andreas stared at him, jealous of his languid air, then he smiled as he realised the Englishman would never be able to hear the tune he was whistling above the roar of the engines and that it was simply a facade, an attempt to look unconcerned by the imminent danger they all faced. Glancing round, Andreas could see that the others were either looking intently serious or feigning calm as well. For some reason it made him feel more confident.

The note of the engine began to ease as the bomber reached its cruising height and continued on a level course for another half-hour before the pilot eased the throttles back and the red light blinked on inside the fuselage, bathing the passengers in a lurid glow. The dispatcher bent over the hatch in the floor, unfastened it and lowered it towards the rear of the plane. The slipstream roared beneath the opening and Andreas gave an involuntary tremor as he saw the dark void beyond.

‘UP!’ the instructor yelled, gesturing clearly with his hand.

The recruits struggled to their feet and shuffled into line, carrying their equipment bags in their left hands and their static lines in their right.

‘HOOK UP!’ The instructor reached his hand up to the steel cable running along the roof of the fuselage and curled his fingers. Andreas attached the metal clip to the cable and tugged it to make sure it was secure. There was only one man ahead of him and Moss directly behind. The line edged forwards and then the first man lowered himself so that he was sitting on the edge of the hatch, legs dangling through the hole where they were buffeted by the air roaring past. There was a brief delay and then the red light went out, to be replaced by a green glow from the lamp on the bulkead.

‘GO!’ barked the instructor.

The first agent released his equipment bag and heaved himself forward, instantly disappearing. His static line went taut an instant later. Andreas dropped down and lowered his legs, flinching at the cold blast of air. He released his bag and folded his arms across his chest as he fell into the night. It had happened so quickly he was not aware of it, and had no time to exalt at his newfound courage before the harness jolted him severely as if he had been shaken in the fist of a giant. The air whistled through the cords of the parachute and the roar of the bomber’s engines quickly diminished as it flew on. Below, to the right, Andreas could make out the dull hemisphere of the first parachutist, drifting towards the dark ground. There was a crescent moon providing just enough illumination to pick out the details of the landscape below. Remembering his training, Andreas looked for recognisable features that he could relate to the map of the drop zone the agents had been shown during the briefing. But by moonlight it bore little resemblance to the map and Andreas knew he had little time to get his bearings. Frantically he looked round at the hills surrounding the drop zone. Then he caught the silvery glint of water off to the left and felt relief surge through his heart as he recognised it as the reservoir supplying a large kibbutz.

The ground was coming up fast now and he could see where he was to land and muttered a curse as he saw a small cluster of trees directly beneath. Below, his kitbag swung lazily and then crashed through the topmost branches. Gritting his teeth and bending his knees, Andreas followed it in, feeling twigs and small branches splintering under him as he crashed through the tree. Then he hit a more solid branch, twisted to one side and fell through towards the ground. He braced himself for the impact but his harness brought him up sharply as the cords and parachute collapsed over the tree.

He hung there for an instant gasping for breath and scared witless. Then he remembered his training and fumbled for the harness release and let himself drop to the ground. The kitbag had fallen the other side of a branch and Andreas unclipped it and let it hit the ground before he stepped out from under the tree and looked round. The last four of his comrades were still descending but would land hundreds of metres away. Closer to, he saw a figure who had landed in the open hurriedly bundling his chute up before scurrying to a nearby outcrop of rocks to conceal it. Andreas hissed a curse as he looked up. He grasped a fold of his chute and pulled. It shifted a short distance before snagging and he swore again under his breath before he took out his knife to start cutting it free.

‘Oh dear,’ a voice called out softly. ‘You seem to have got yourself in a bit of a pickle, my dear chap.’

He turned as he recognised Moss’s voice and saw his companion with his chute and kitbag bundled in his arms. He dropped them by the tree trunk and drew his knife to help Andreas.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Helping you out, old boy.’

Andreas shook his head. ‘That’s not the way it works, my friend. We’re supposed to make our own way to the school. You remember what they said. It’s easier to avoid attention and capture if we act alone.’

Moss chuckled. ‘Of course. That’s what they told us. And having told us that you can be sure the patrols will be looking for men on their own.’ He tapped his jump helmet. ‘Using my loaf. Come on, let’s get this mess sorted out.’

Andreas turned his attention back to the silk and cords festooned over the tree and they worked quickly until most of it had been cut away. Then, burying the chutes, their suits and helmets in a shallow pit, they paused to take their rations, compass and revolvers from their kitbags. The weapons were unloaded but issued to the agents to add to the versimilitude of the exercise. Underneath the jumpsuits they wore plain civilian clothes and while Andreas stood some chance of being taken for a local, Moss did not, and had to wear a cap over his cropped fair hair. With the location of the reservoir he had seen earlier, together with the compass, Andreas had the direction they would need to travel and they set off, across the open ground towards a hill a few kilometres off that Andreas had chosen as their first waypoint. They walked in silence for a while, striding quickly across the dark landscape to get away from the landing site. There was to be an hour’s grace before the search for them began. It would commence from where they had landed and sweep in the general direction of the school and towards a second cordon of patrols lying across the path of the agents.

They steered clear of settlements and roads and used tracks that could not easily be traversed by vehicles. A few times they encountered flocks of sheep and warily worked their way round. Once they were not so successful and the animals rose to their feet and their bleating roused a shepherd who shouted angrily into the night as Andreas and Moss ran off. Reaching the crest of the hill just as the first smudge of light crept along the eastern horizon, Andreas paused to scrutinise the lay of the land ahead. Trees blanketed the slope in front of them before giving out on to more farmland and pasture. A small town lay some five kilometres off and a minaret rose up, dark and slender, against a fainter shade of darkness beyond.

‘Look there,’ Moss said quietly and Andreas turned to see his companion pointing back the way they had come. The beams of headlights crept across the ground where they had landed over an hour before. There were more vehicles abroad, picking their way steadily along the rutted country lanes.

‘They didn’t waste much time. And they’re starting to head in our direction. We’re in for some sport. Now I know how the fox feels.’

‘Fox?’

‘Hunting, old boy. Surely you know. Horses, hounds and a wily fox to run to ground.’

‘Not on Lefkas.’

‘Really? Poor show.’

Andreas regarded him with concern. ‘Perhaps it would be better if we did not regard this as a game.’

‘But it is a game. All a game. The difference is the stakes are much higher. When a man is playing for his life against the lives of others, he is engaged in the absolute acme of sporting pursuits and there is nothing finer, more noble or more downright enjoyable.’

‘You may think so. But I am only interested in liberating my country from tyranny. That is all. It is not a game for me. It is a sacred purpose.’

Moss frowned at him. ‘A different perspective, to be sure, but no more than that. As long as we dish the Hun, that’s all that matters.’

Andreas drew a deep breath to calm his irritation, and again wondered if Moss truly felt this way, or whether it was a manner he affected to carry him through the terrible dangers he faced serving in the SOE. If so, it seemed to be a common trait of the British officers he had met and he wondered if he would ever truly understand them. But this was not the time to speculate.

‘We should keep moving. We could be in that town by dawn and have a better chance of hiding in a crowd.’

Moss considered the notion and nodded. ‘How far from there to the school?’

‘If that’s Al Qatah, then another eighteen or twenty kilometres at the outside. We can cover that before the deadline.’

‘It’s not the distance that’s an issue. They’re bound to have the approaches to the school covered. That’ll be the real challenge.’

Andreas nodded. ‘We’ll work out a solution when we get closer. Let’s go.’

Scrambling down from the crest they entered the treeline and picked their way through the trees. On the far side, they kept close to the walls and drainage ditches dividing the farms and worked their way towards the town as the dawn crept into the sky and the landscape resolved itself into more detail and pastel shades of colour. Once, as they made to cross a road, they had to take cover as they heard a vehicle approaching and an open-topped car with two red-capped military policemen rumbled past, leaving a wake of swirling dust. Andreas and Moss stayed pressed to the ground in the ditch beside the road and only emerged after the sound of the vehicle had faded away. Thereafter they approached any roads and tracks cautiously, until they reached the more humble dwellings at the edge of Al Qatah. Some of the inhabitants had already risen and exchanged curious greetings with the two strangers striding purposefully into the town.

‘I think we’re provoking a little attention,’ Moss muttered.

‘We’re not local people, and we aren’t dressed to pass as locals,’ Andreas said. ‘We should change. The patrols probably know what we look like. It’s the sort of thing the instructors at the school would tell them to make it more of a challenge.’

Moss nodded.

A short while later they were in the heart of the town, in the market square where some of the stallholders were already setting out their wares. Andreas used some of the currency from the equipment bags and bought a pair of
keffiyehs
, baggy trousers, sandles and dark jackets for them to wear and they changed in a side street, abandoning their former clothes and boots in a heap of refuse that had been swept into a space between two buildings.

By the time they left the town there were plenty of other people, animals and vehicles on the road and they walked steadily along the verge, trying not to look conspicuous by walking too fast or too slow. Late in the morning another military police patrol cruised along the road towards them, the occupants scrutinising those they passed by. Andreas felt his pulse quicken as they approached, fearing that their true identities would be obvious amongst the more markedly Middle Eastern features of those around them. As the car came closer, Moss stepped off the edge of the road into a field and pulled down his trousers and squatted. Andreas silently cursed him, but then the car was alongside, the driver glanced at Moss with a quick look of disgust and eased the accelerator down to pass by more quickly. When he had gone a safe distance Moss pulled up his trousers and hurried back to Andreas’s side with a wide grin.