The Leader And The Damned (44 page)

'Again, it was a question of alertness,' he replied.

This whole operation of ambushing the train was an experiment which had been personally sanctioned by Tito. They were, in fact, deep inside the hated Cetniks' country. The plan was to provoke the Germans into heavily reinforcing this area of Yugoslavia which, at the moment, was lightly held, and largely by Cetniks.

A major success north of Zagreb would send shock waves through the German command which could well extend to Berlin. Heljec was well aware of what was at stake and looking forward all the more to dealing the enemy a blow under the belt. It was
worthwhile
.

'I am sure we have enough troops for the job,' Heljec remarked.

'Forty men,' Vlatko again reassured him. 'All strategically placed. And we outnumber them heavily. That is the secret of war, Napoleon once said. Mass your forces - even if inferior - at the point where you will be superior to the enemy. Then you strike with everything you've got.'

'You're right, of course,' Heljec agreed. 'It is the unexpected I am always watching for.'

`So, at Maribor I found the data needed to plan this operation.'

It had, Vlatko reflected without saying so aloud, been tricky on Maribor platform. The crowds had helped as he mingled with them observing the train which had just arrived from Spielfeld-Strass. A meticulous man, Vlatko had counted the number of cars. Eight, including the mail-van at the rear. '

The Germans, knowing the area was swarming with spies, had acted with great secrecy. Not one of the Waffen SS hidden inside the mail-van had been allowed onto the platform to stretch his aching legs. Vlatko, who had once produced hand-made shoes for royalty, was unusually observant. He noticed omissions.

Intrigued by the fact that no mail was unloaded, he loitered against a wall and watched. His patience was rewarded when the officer in charge opened the sliding doors a few inches and peered out. Vlatko, by the light of a lamp outside the coach, had a glimpse of German Army uniforms before the door closed again.

'How long before the train leaves for Zagreb?' he had asked a railway official.

`Half an hour at least. Maybe longer. Water has to be siphoned aboard.'

'Then I have time for a drink if I can find a bar open?'

'Have one for me.'

Slipping out of the station, Vlatko had mounted the cycle he had left hidden in an alley and made his way out of the town to a remote farmhouse. Here he had paused to use a concealed transmitter to radio a brief message to Heljec.

His work at the farmhouse completed, he had changed from using the cycle to an ancient motorbike, speeding through the night along a devious route following little-used side roads. He had reached Heljec's group waiting above the gorge before the train arrived.

Even at this stage of the war, the Partisans' system of communications was remarkably well-organized. The Germans had attacked Yugoslavia in April 1941. Two years later the guerrillas had a whole network of couriers who travelled by pedal and motorcycle. They further employed numerous radio transmitters used only for the most urgent signals - hence the German radio-detector vans had so far not tracked down a single Partisan transmitter. As Vlatko had remarked, it was routine.

'I have kept back one piece of unfortunate news,' Vlatko said in a hesitant voice.

'What is it?' rasped Heljec. 'You- know I like to hear about any problems immediately.'

'This we can do very little about.'

'Spit it out man, for God's sake!'

'While on the platform at Maribor I saw Paco boarding the train, I think she had a man with her...'

'On the train we are waiting for? You think it was the Englishman we are supposed to receive weapons for?'

'Possibly. I could not risk trying to warn her...'

'Of course not! She must take her chances...' Now it was Heljec's turn to hesitate, a rare reaction. 'Which coach did she get inside?' he asked eventually.

'A dangerous one - the coach immediately behind the engine and the tender with the German machine- gunner.'

Heljec remained silent and brooding. Paco was the best courier he had ever met. She could, and would, go into areas any man might cringe at the thought of penetrating. For Christ's sake; she had just taken a group into and out of the Third Reich itself.

'She is born lucky,' he said eventually.

'You salve your conscience with illusions..

'Damn you, the whole operation is set up!' Heljec blazed in an outburst of intense frustration. Why had Vlatko to tell him something like this at the last moment? Better that he should not have known until after the ambush had taken place. Better for myself, he thought. Heljec always made a great effort to be honest with himself.

'Go down and tell the section attacking the engine and tender to use grenades as a last resource, to rely on machine-pistols.'

'Too late. Here comes the train …'

Paco had the corner seat away from the corridor and facing the engine. Her eyes were closed and her head was flopped on Lindsay's shoulder as the train crawled up a steep gradient. He found it a comforting sensation.

It was his sole consolation. The compartment was crammed with peasants shoulder to shoulder, most of them fast asleep. Leg-room was non-existent: a tangled sprawl of legs filled the space. It crossed Lindsay's mind that in case of emergency they were in a good position — next to the door.

He checked the time, carefully easing up the cuff of his sleeve to avoid disturbing her. 3.10 am. He should have woken her at three. They had worked out a roster so one of them would always be awake. He decided to let her sleep on.

'You're cheating, you nice bastard,' she murmured. 'I saw the time...'

'Get back to sleep — I'm quite fresh.'

'Liar, nice liar..' She suppressed a yawn. 'Where are we? Why are we travelling so slowly?'

'As far as I can see we're moving through some kind of gorge...'

'Zidani Most will be the next stop, then Zagreb... 'If you say so...'

'Lindsay, you're comfortable to sleep against.. 'Now she tells me — just when we have all this privacy.'

She snuggled up closer and watched him through half-closed eyes. 'Lindsay, I might accept your suggestion to get some more sleep. You know what? You're a corrupting. influence. I think I like it.— being corrupted...' She kept her voice so low no one could have heard her using his name. She closed her eyes and immediately opened them as she felt him stiffen. The soft murmur was replaced by an urgent whisper. 'What's wrong?'

'It's crazy. I thought I saw someone on the track outside.'

The first phase.of the attack opened when one of Heljec's men jumped on to the train step of the slow- moving coach next to the mail-van. Easing his way round the end, he took a grenade from his belt, extracted the pin, laid the grenade on the coupling and jumped off.

In the confined space between the two coaches the grenade detonated with a muffled thump. The coupling snapped and the mail-van started running backwards down the steep gradient. Near the end of the train a second man flashed a light on and off twice, signalling to the group opposite the engine and tender.

The commander of the Waffen SS unit inside the mail-van reacted in the only way he could, sliding back the door to see what was happening. The muzzles of several machine-pistols poked through the opening at the very moment, five grenades landed inside the coach. A series of explosions shook the coach which was now moving at speed.

The rear wheels smashed into the huge tree trunk dragged on to the line, half-mounted on the obstacle, then the mail-van left the line, smashing over on its side. Flames appeared and the van began to burn. No survivors appeared.

At the front of the train the flashing of the lamp triggered the second phase of the attack. The German soldier crouched behind the machine-gun saw vague shapes moving in the dark. He pressed the trigger, unaware that a grenade had landed on top of the tender a few inches from his side.

The gun began to stutter. The grenade exploded with a loud crack. The German and his weapon were lifted off the tender and hurled on to the track. On either side of the engine dark silhouettes had mounted the footplate. Knives, were wielded with savage efficiency and neither of the two Germans in the cab loosed off a shot. The attack had occupied the space of less than a hundred seconds.

'We're getting out...'

Lindsay had grabbed both cases from the rack as Paco threw open the door. She snatched her case off him and beyond the open doorway felt with her foot for the train step. No point in breaking an ankle. She was by the side of the track as Lindsay jumped down and joined her.

Confusion. Chaos. Men tumbling in panic to leave the train, shouting. The slap of doors opening, slamming against the side of coaches. Women screaming. The horror had only begun.

'We must get clear of the train...' Lindsay. 'It's a Partisan ambush...' Paco.

'Up the side of the bloody gorge!' Lindsay.

He grabbed her arm, hauled her up what seemed like the face of a mountain cluttered with boulders. A searchlight stabbed out from a coach half-way along the train. It helped them to scramble round the huge boulders, climbing higher and higher. A group of Partisans were caught in the glare of the light. The stutter of machine-pistols rattled out a fusillade -
from the train
.

'The Germans are among the passengers,' Paco gasped.

The hail of fire cut down the Partisans illuminated by the powerful light. Out of the corner of his eye Lindsay saw men falling in grotesque attitudes, somersaulting down the slope, falling where they had stood.

'Keep climbing!' Lindsay ordered, dragging her up when she hesitated at the sight.

Retaliation came, ruthless and terrible. Grenades exploded near the searchlight, many falling among passengers trapped on the lower slopes. Intermingled with the thud of grenades, the rattle of machine-pistol fire, came the agonized screams of terrified and wounded passengers.

Regardless of the Yugoslav civilians, the Partisan attack continued to concentrate on killing Germans. It was a bloodbath. A tangle of petrified passengers followed the wrong route, still using the illuminated path of the German searchlight to get away. Lindsay saw more grenades fly through the beam, land and detonate among them.

'Shoot out that bloody searchlight, you crazy fools,' he snarled at the unseen attackers above.

'They have to kill the Germans,' Paco gasped.

There was a sudden silence — as though some unseen commander had ordered a cease fire. Then three rapid rifle cracks. Lindsay heard — in the eery hush — the trickling shatter of glass. The light dimmed, faded, vanished.

'Thank God!' Lindsay was appalled. 'Call this war? Could it be the Cetniks?'

They paused, two-thirds of the way up the gorge, their aching legs hardly able to carry them another step. Oddly enough, both still hung on to their cases. Lindsay had stopped because they were partly sheltered by a semi-circle of boulders.

'No,' Paco said, 'they're Partisans. The Cetniks have allied themselves with the Germans.

'It's bloody slaughter. Did you see those peasants? A woman had her whole arm shot clean away.'

'This is the way we have to fight.'

'And long after the war is over we shall hear about the brave Partisans who took to the mountains — but massacres like this will go unreported. If this is the filthy Balkans you can keep it.'

'You fool...!'

With her free hand she slapped him hard across the side of his face. Quite deliberately he slapped her back, stinging her skin.

'If that's the language you Balkan women understand. Now, let's get to the top...'

Her reaction was unexpected. He had anticipated a vehement verbal onslaught; instead she quietly followed him up the mountain-like slope. From the bottomless pit of the gorge, the occasional pistol shot reverberated up to them. The Partisans finishing off wounded Germans, Lindsay imagined. There was a sudden crackle of rifle fire close by. Answered at once by a grenade which landed a few yards ahead of Lindsay. It detonated like a bomb. He fell into oblivion.

'He is suffering from the concussion.'

The strange voice spoke English with a careful precision like a man who uses the language occasionally but knows it well. The shape of the man was blurred but becoming more distinct, a man stooped over Lindsay. Everything suddenly became quite clear.