Attack Alarm (20 page)

“Hanson! Waaf outside wants to see you.”

I looked up. Fuller, who was acting as air sentry, was standing in the door. “Eh?” I said stupidly as my mind tried to grasp what I had heard quite clearly.

“Waaf wants to speak to you. She’s over by the pit.”

A sudden flood of new energy coursed through my body. “All right,” I said, and dropped the blanket I had just picked up and went outside.

It was Marion all right. But when I came up to her I could think of nothing to say except, “Have you found out when her birthday was to have been?”

I was horribly conscious of the fact that I had spoken very abruptly to hide my nervousness.

“Yes,” she said. It may have been my imagination, but it seemed to me that she gave me a rather puzzled look. “It was on Sunday.”

“You mean to-morrow?”

She nodded.

The imminence of what I was expecting steadied me. I did not say anything. To-morrow meant to-morrow morning, surely. To immobilise the fighter ’dromes must mean a landing from the air and that would almost certainly be carried out at dawn. There was so little time—less than twelve hours.

“What’s the matter?” Marion asked.

“Nothing,” I said. “Just that there isn’t much time if I’m to do anything, and I don’t know what to do.”

“No, I don’t mean that. I knew that would worry you. But you seemed so strange when you came out.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. I felt suddenly scared of losing my one ally. Almost unnoticed an intimacy, deeper than just the words we spoke to each other, had grown up between us. It seemed so easy to break the thread that made that intimacy—it was so indefinable, so slight. “It’s just that I’m tired and worried.”

“Hadn’t you better tell Winton or someone in authority all you know?” she pleaded.

“Yes, but what do I know? Nothing. I’ve told John Nightingale. He didn’t laugh at me, thank God! That’s the best I can do. The rest is up to me.”

“But what can you possibly do?”

“I don’t know. I shall have to get to this Cold Harbour Farm to-night.”

“But how? You won’t be able to get leave, will you?”

“No. I’ll just have to take a chance on breaking camp,”

“But you can’t possibly do that.” The anxiety in her voice gave me a perverted thrill. “You might get shot.”

I laughed a little wildly. “That wouldn’t be anything new,” I declared. “They’ve already had two attempts at shooting me.”

“Barry!” Her hand gripped my arm. “You don’t mean that. You’re not serious, surely.”

I told her about the bullet that had hit the back of my tin hat during the previous day’s raid and about the burst of tracers that had streamed past me from the dispersal point that morning.

“But why don’t you tell your officer?”

“Because I can’t prove anything,” I said, exasperated.

“Oh, if you want to be obstinate, be obstinate,” she said, her eyes wide and two angry spots of colour showing in her cheeks.

“But don’t you understand,” I said, “in each case they might easily have been accidents? Ogilvie would just think the raid had upset me and I should be sent off to Battery for a rest. It’s no good. I’ve just got to get to Cold Harbour Farm to-night. That reminds me,” I added suddenly. “John Nightingale promised to get me Ordnance Survey maps for south-east England. But he can’t. He bailed out in a dog-fight this afternoon. God knows where he is. And I must have those maps, otherwise I can’t tell where the wretched place is. Have you got any in Ops.?”

“Yes, but I can’t take them away.”

“No, but you could search through them. It would take some time, I know, but——”

“I certainly will not,” she cut in. “I’ll do nothing to help you embark on this crazy expedition.”

My troubles seemed suddenly to roll away as I gazed down at her defiant, anxious little face. “That’s sweet of you, Marion. But please—you must help
me. It’s just as dangerous if I stay here. And if I didn’t go and what I am afraid of happened, you’d never forgive yourself, I know.”

She hesitated.

“Please,” I said. “It’s the only chance.”

“But you can’t be certain that what I heard Elaine say in her sleep had any deep significance.”

“Yes, but what about the injured workman?”

“I can understand your regarding the coincidence of their both speaking of Cold Harbour Farm as significant, but Elaine’s birthday probably has no bearing on the business.”

“Three more fighter ’dromes were attacked to-day,” I said. “During the last three or four days practically every fighter station of any size in south-east England has had a bad pasting. It just happens that the date of her birthday is about the time I think they will strike if they’re going to. Your arguments are just the sort of arguments that I know would be raised by the authorities if I went to them. I’ve made up my mind that I’m on the right track. The only question now is, will you help me or not, Marion?”

She didn’t say anything, and for a moment I thought she was going to refuse.

“Well?” I asked, and I spoke abruptly, for I was afraid that I had lost her as an ally.

“Of course I will,” she said simply. But she spoke slowly, as though considering something. Then suddenly she became businesslike, almost brusque. “I’ll go and look through those maps right away. I’ll come back and tell you the result of my labours as soon as possible.”

“You’ll find it somewhere in the centre of a ring drawn round the fighter ’dromes, I expect,” I said as she turned to go.

“I understand,” she said.

I watched her walk briskly away, thinking how
strange it was that people should have different sides to their personalities. I had just seen Marion for the first time as the efficient secretary. My God! I thought, and she would be efficient too. What a wife for a journalist! The thought was in my mind before I realised it. And suddenly I knew that she was the one girl for me. And then I kicked myself mentally as I realised that I had been thinking only of the things she could give me, and had not given a thought to what I could give her. And what could I give her? “Hell!” I said aloud. And then went back into the hut as I saw Fuller looking at me curiously.

The next few hours dragged terribly. I was not afraid, thank Heavens! I had something concrete to do now and there was no room in my thoughts for fear. But as the evening wore slowly on I experienced the sinking sensation that one gets just before a big match. I passed part of the time reconnoitring my line of escape. The barbed wire, I knew, would not be difficult to negotiate. It was dannet, that coiled wire which is stretched so that it stand in hoops. By parting two of the hoops it was fairly easy to step through it. It was the sentries I was worried about. I went over and had a chat with the Guards’ corporal at the neighbouring pill-box. By fairly persistent, but not too obvious questioning, I discovered that there was roughly one sentry to each five hundred yards of wire. There were also some sentries in the wood along the valley. But they were very few—one at each end. They were supposed to meet in the middle once every hour. There was a path running through the middle of the wood. These shouldn’t worry me, but because they were the unknown factor they worried me a good deal more than the sentries along the wire.

Marion did not turn up until nearly ten. I was on stand-to then. I went out of the pit to meet her. “I think I’ve got it,” she said as I reached her. “I found
two. One down in Romney Marshes. That isn’t any good, is it?”

“No,” I said. “Nightingale told me of that one.”

“The other isn’t quite in the centre of the southeastern fighter area, but it’s not far off. It’s just off the Eastbourne road in Ashdown Forest.”

“That sounds hopeful,” I said. “There were no others?”

She shook her head. “I don’t think so. I went very methodically through the maps for Kent and Sussex. I don’t think I missed anything.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “It must have been a frightful job.”

“No, it was rather fun in a way—all the peculiar place-names one had never heard of before, and some that one had. You know the Eastbourne road, don’t you? You go through East Grinstead and Forest Row and up to Wych Cross, where the Lewes road forks off. You keep left here on the Eastbourne road and about half a mile farther on there are one or two cottages on the left. Another half-mile and there is a lane turning off to the right. Take this, fork right along what appears to be a track, and you’ll come to Cold Harbour Farm.”

“Marvellous,” I said.

“When do you start?”

“As soon as it’s dark—about eleven. The moon doesn’t rise till late now. My detachment doesn’t go on until one, so I shall have two hours before they miss me.”

“Do you think you can get out all right, though?”

“Unless I have bad luck, it should be easy.”

“Well, good luck, then,” she said, and squeezed my hand. “I must get back. Your boys are already beginning to talk about us.”

She had half turned to go when she stopped. “By
the way, Vayle went off in his car just before eight this evening. He won’t be back to-night.”

“How do you know?” I asked.

“A boy I know in Ops. told me. He’s studying to become a navigator. He saw Vayle getting into his car and asked him whether he could come and have a word with him later in the evening about some problem he was stuck on. Vayle is apparently good about helping people. But he told him that he couldn’t as he wouldn’t be back to-night.”

“That looks hopeful,” I said.

She nodded. “That’s what I thought. And if you’re not back before dawn I shall see Winton myself.”

“Bless you,” I said.

For a second she hesitated and her eyes held mine. I often wonder whether she was trying to memorise my features for fear she should never see me again. We were very near to each other in that moment. And then she turned quickly on her heels and left me.

When I got back to the pit I came in for a good bit of chaff, but it passed me by. I was thinking of other things. “You and Micky are a pair,” said Chetwood. “Both of you look worried and secretive.”

“Don’t talk so bloody daft,” said Micky violently.

The violence of his reply should have told me something. But it didn’t. I was engrossed in my own thoughts and barely noticed it. Zero hour was very close now.

A
T TEN
we were relieved. Usually the whole detachment went straight to bed in order to get as much sleep as possible. But, of course, Kan and Chetwood had to choose this evening of all evenings to start a discussion about the stage, Chetwood holding forth about the full-blooded qualities of the ham actor, and Kan naturally standing by the more sophisticated modern school. They sat up arguing over a hurricane lamp till a quarter to eleven while I lay in bed and fumed.

At last quiet descended upon the hut. I waited till eleven-fifteen to make certain that every one should be sound asleep. The place was full of the soft, sibilant sound of steady breathing. I slipped out of bed and put on my battle blouse. Except for this, I had gone to bed fully clothed. For the sake of quietness, and if necessary speed, I put on canvas shoes. Before leaving I thrust my kit-bag and overcoat under my blankets, so that when the guard came in to wake his relief he would think I was still sleeping.

None of the recumbent figures stirred as I opened the back door of the hut. It was dark outside save along the western sky where the last light of day still lingered, throwing the pit into silhouette with the muzzle of the gun and the sentry’s tin hat quite visible. I closed the door of the hut softly and paused to listen. Not a sound from inside. I went a little down the slope towards the wire and there sat down to watch and accustom myself to the light. The nearest I had ever got before to my present escapade was
stalking in Scotland, and I knew enough not to hurry even though time pressed.

Gradually I was able to see more and more until at last I could make out the thin coils of dannet stretched tenuously out along the slope of the hill, and behind loomed vaguely the black bulk of the trees at the bottom. But still I waited. I had to know the position of the sentry.

At last I heard him. He was pacing slowly along the inside edge of the wire and every now and then his bayonet clanked in its rifle socket. I waited till he had passed. I was just rising to my feet when I heard a sound behind me. It was a click. I thought for a moment that it must be the latch of the hut door. But there was no further sound, and at length I rose to my feet and moved softly towards the wire. And at that moment the sirens went. I hesitated, cursing. And then I hurried on, realising that their wail would cover any slight noise I might make getting through the wire.

In a second I had reached the sentry-beaten path inside the wire. I glanced quickly along it in each direction. There was no sign of the sentry. I had brought a pair of leather gloves I had had in my case, and with these on my hands I parted two of the coils and stepped into the gap. I then parted the farther side of the two coils and, raising myself on tiptoe, swung my right foot over into this gap. But to bring my left foot over as well seemed an impossibility. The wire barbs were digging into me painfully. I set my teeth and lifted my left leg back and round. I thought I had done it, but a barb just caught my canvas shoes. I lost my balance and fell headlong. I caught my head on the ground—it was as hard as concrete—and there was a searing pain in my left leg.

But when I staggered to my feet I found I was clear of the wire. I listened. The still night air was silent.
No one seemed to have heard my fall. Crouching low and taking advantage of what little cover there was on that bare slope, I hurried down to the shelter of the wood. Looking back, I could see no movement. At the top of the slope there was the vague silhouette of the hut and the gun, and away to the right was the bulk of the dispersal point.

I went cautiously forward into the wood. It was pitch dark here and I had to feel my way, working round trees and bushes by hand. Every yard of progress seemed to take an age, but though my one desire was to get through the wood as quickly as possible to the road beyond, I steadfastly refused to be hurried by nerves.