We'll Meet Again (21 page)

He must be a great burden to them: feeding him could not be easy and his diet consisted mostly of fish and black bread. But they always appeared cheerful and talked all the while they were with him, waving their arms about, pointing higher up the mountain to the east, or down to the village and the sea. Perhaps they were telling him of their plans, explaining their intentions, but as he could not understand he had to trust them.

They were fishermen, as every man in the village was, and they had a two-masted wooden boat about fifty feet long, called the
Gabbi
. The Germans could hardly stop them fishing, it was their livelihood after all, and they were allowed diesel for their engines but they were not allowed outside a certain distance from land. It was a regulation they frequently broke if they wanted to find the fish. When the wind was in the right direction, they eked out the diesel by using the sails.

They had been outside the permitted zone when they had come across the debris from the sunken destroyer and spotted a couple of bodies on a piece of wood. One was dead but Chris was still alive, although only just. They had hauled him aboard their boat, stripped off his freezing wet garments and wrapped him in blankets. He had been unaware of was happening to him until he thawed out and understood from the gesticulations how they had rescued him. He was given hot soup which warmed his insides, all too conscious of how lucky he had been. The Arctic was no place to be cast adrift. He had tried to ask what had become of the other ships, other survivors. His answer was a shrug. He wasn’t sure if that meant he was the only one or not.

They had left him lying on one of the bunks while they finished fishing, then they made for their home village. It was on the mainland, close to the northern side of a deep fjord, sheltered from the Arctic storms by a host of small islands. It was still winter and
dark for most of the day. At midday there was a kind of twilight, but that was all. They had sailed in under this darkness, as sure of their way as cats on a roof, and dropped anchor.

He was too weak to walk and so they waited until night when the Germans were shut into the fug of their guardroom before carrying him ashore. He had been taken to Leif’s house where he was given food and drink and put to bed. The next day, they had put him on a sled and dragged him up to the hut. It was by no means a simple operation, even in daylight; in the dark it was hazardous. The side of the fjord rose steeply from the water and they had to take a zig-zag course, often manhandling the sled. By the time they arrived at the hut, they were all exhausted. After resting and trying unsuccessfully to make him understand their intentions, they had left him with several blankets, food and drink, but no fire and no weapon. The hut had become his home.

It was lonely up there. He passed the time watching the shore and village through the binoculars they had given him. There was a row of houses and a tiny church. A rough road stopped at a small quay and continued on the other side of the fjord. Travelling from one side to the other was done in their own boats or by the ferry. He spent hours watching it coming and going. He could see that everyone boarding it had to show papers of some sort, so any idea he might leave that way was out of the question. But it was the coming and going of the ferry that enabled him to count off the days. He would watch Gunner and Lief make ready for sea and chug away from the jetty, wishing he was going with them. They were usually gone two or three days and when they came back he felt a certain lifting of his spirits, knowing they would come up and see him before they left again.

An arctic fox came padding round one night in search of food
and he put scraps out for it, admiring its thick glossy coat that turned from white to grey and then a pale brown as winter gave way to summer. Several times he was awed by red and green lights that flickered across the northern sky.

There was also plenty of time to think and his thoughts turned to home, his mother and brothers and sisters. They must have been told he had perished. He imagined how they must have received the news, especially his mother who had wailed when he left and not hidden the fact that she didn’t expect to see him again. Had she told Sheila? Did Sheila think he was dead too? Did she care? After all, she had not answered his letters. He had really messed things up there.

She had been a feisty little thing at school, fiercely protective of her brothers and sisters and ready to scrap with anyone in their defence, including him if it came to a confrontation between his siblings and hers. She was bright, even in those days, and would have gone on to grammar school if her parents could have afforded the uniform and the bus fares to get her there. But she was still a cut above all the other children, always clean, well-spoken and polite.

The last time he had seen her she had been smartly dressed, her auburn hair rolled up over a scarf, her face lightly made up. And she spoke like a toff. Someone, and he supposed it was the people she worked with, had brought about the change and put ideas into her head. No, he told himself severely, that wasn’t fair, everyone had a right to try and better themselves. If he still wanted her, it was up to him to match it. Sitting in his snow-bound hut, he pondered the problem. He had worked in a garage before the war which was probably why he was put in the engine room of the destroyer. It had been sheer luck that he had been on deck when the torpedo struck. Luck also that he had been found when he
had: he could not have lasted another five minutes. There had to be a reason for that.

When summer came, there were a few more hours of daylight and a noticeable rise in temperature. The spruce and pine trees shed their burden of snow and lower down the slopes on the side of the fjord, alpine flowers grew in the crevices. He was fit and strong again and had been given a pair of skis and was teaching himself to use them. But he had to keep a sharp look out for other people, not just the Germans, but the locals too, some of whom, afraid for their lives, might very well report seeing him. He was impatient to be on his way and wondered how far it was to the Swedish border and how hazardous the journey would be.

He tried to find out from Gunnar when he came up one day, drawing a rough map in the snow. Gunnar put his hand on his arm and shook his head vehemently. Chris drew a calendar in the snow with numbered squares. ‘How long?’ he asked pointing, first at the calendar and then out over the fjord to the west. ‘How long?’

Gunnar shrugged and Chris gave up.

He didn’t see either Lief or Gunner after that for ten days and the food they had left him was all but gone. He began to wonder if they had been lost at sea, but dismissed that idea; they were too experienced, too good at handling their small craft for that to happen. Unless they had fallen foul of a German patrol. He was beginning to panic when Lief appeared with a newcomer who greeted Chris in English.

‘I am the school master from the other side of the fjord,’ he told him, shaking his hand. ‘Lief fetched me so that I might explain why you must wait here. I know you are anxious to leave, but it must be done with the least risk to the people of the village, you must understand that. The Germans can be brutal in their reprisals.’

‘I do understand, but I have been here some time and I must be a drain on the resources of the good people of the village who have been looking after me, not to mention a risk.’

‘Yes, that is one reason you must be patient. There is a big search going on and you must not be caught up in it.’

‘Are they searching for me?’

‘No, they know nothing of you. This is someone else. I cannot tell you more.’

‘I thought about trying to get to Sweden.’

‘You would never make it alone and none of the village men dare leave the village long enough to take you. Their absence would be noted.’ He smiled. ‘But do not despair. Plans are afoot to help you, but you must be patient until all the arrangements are in place. Whatever you do, you must not show yourself.’

Lief spoke to the schoolmaster who turned to Chris. ‘Lief asked me to tell you that no one will be able to visit you for a little while and he will leave extra food for you. There is a flask of hot soup and another of coffee but when that is gone, you must drink cold water. If you see a blue curtain on Lief’s washing line, you must leave the hut and hide in the forest. It will mean the Germans are searching everywhere and that might include this hut. For the sake of everyone in the village, you must not be found.’

‘I understand.’

The schoolmaster, whose name he never learnt, shook his hand again and left with Lief. He realised as never before just how much the Norwegians had risked, were still risking, to help him. He went back into the hut, to wait and keep watch. At the first sign of a German on the slopes below him, he would bury all the evidence he had been there in the deepest snow, and leave. Even if he died in the attempt, he would have to make his own way to Sweden.

With the spring and the arrival of the daffodils and tulips came a feeling of optimism and people in Britain began talking about ‘after the war’. The newspapers that Prue and Sheila read were full of plans for post-war reconstruction and a proposed welfare state covering health, unemployment and old age, when everyone in the country would be looked after ‘from the cradle to the grave’. It was going to be paid for with a national insurance scheme to which every adult would have to contribute. Before that could happen, the war had to be won. The signs were good. The tide was turning and Churchill and Roosevelt had met in Casablanca to plot their strategy for the remainder of the war. Hitler wasn’t going to make it easy.

‘Dilly’ Knox, one of the cleverest cryptographers at Bletchley, had died in February and that had been a real setback. He had been gifted, but highly strung and his tantrums were legendary. He had also been very protective of the girls working with him and they were miserable at his passing. His place was taken by Alan Turing, the one everyone called ‘the Prof’. He was busy designing a new machine, an advance on the bombes. If anyone apart from those working on it heard about it, they did not say so. They were all bound by the Official Secrets Act and there was no risk anyone outside BP would come to hear of it.

The German army and air force codes were being broken daily and those who could benefit from the knowledge were alerted, often as soon as, and sometimes before, the German commanders themselves received their orders. Prue was proud to be part of that and, as she became used to German military phraseology and abbreviations, found her work easier. Jews were being sent to Germany and their fate was unimaginable, so too were able-bodied Frenchmen shipped off to work in German industrial plants where they would be at the mercy of Allied
bombing. She worried about Gillie and wondered if Tim was as well-treated as he implied in his cryptic note, the only one she had received from him.

How could he tell Prue what it was like to be a prisoner of war? It was boring and frustrating. There were entertainments, games, lectures, all laid on by the men themselves, and there were frequent attempts to escape, almost all of which failed. Tunnels were begun and discovered before they could be put to use. Some made the attempt during an air raid, when the lights in the camp were extinguished, but the guards were wise to that and set the dogs loose in the compound to deter them. Those that did manage to get out of the compound were returned after a few days and locked in solitary confinement for a week as a punishment. Some were shot. When that happened, everyone went about with long faces until someone came up with another hare-brained scheme.

He was biding his time, observing and making mental notes, talking to the guards and building a picture of the terrain outside the camp. He was helped in this by the recaptured prisoners who were quizzed unmercifully when they were returned to the fold. His aim was to get back into the war but, more than that, he wanted to see Prue again. Receiving her letter had lifted his spirits even though she had not mentioned that last letter he had written trying to explain himself. Perhaps she had been embarrassed by it, or perhaps she had not received it. The post was notoriously unreliable. He couldn’t say it all again on a flimsy piece of airmail paper, not big enough for more than a couple of meaningless sentences.

In the meantime he studiously went to his German classes and practised on the guards, who seemed to think they were winning him round to believing Germany would triumph. He did nothing
to disabuse them of the idea. At night, when the camp was quiet, he lay on his bunk plotting. It was not enough to escape from the camp, he had to be able to stay out and move about without creating suspicion, to make his way to a neutral country. There was Sweden to the north, which meant finding a ship on the Baltic coast and possibly stowing away, Switzerland which was landlocked and surrounded by occupied countries where he might be stuck for the duration, or way down south to Spain or Portugal, which meant passing through France, fully occupied since a combined Allied expeditionary force had landed in North Africa and worried Hitler into thinking the south of France might be next. There was no longer a
zone libre
. The advantage of going that way was that he believed there were organised escape lines which might help him.

Setting his sights on England, home, his parents and Prue, gave him something to focus on, a goal to attain. What would he say to Prue? Would she let him explain how he felt? Could they go back to the cosy relationship they had had before that disastrous weekend in Huntingdon? He hoped so.

Everyone had been immeasurably cheered when they heard through the camp grape vine about the breeching of the German dams by RAF bombers in May.

‘It must have taken a helluva lot of guts to fly that low,’ Patrick said as they stood watching a cricket match on the compound which didn’t have a single blade of grass on it. ‘And in the dark too.’ He and Patrick Duffey, as flight lieutenants, had been separated from the rest of their crew who were in the other half of the camp.