Tramp in Armour (28 page)

Nothing shows, Mandel told himself, nothing shows at all.
He cannot possibly suspect anything so why is he taking such a
great interest in it? With a tremendous effort he compelled
himself to assume an attitude of complete indifference, even going so far as to clasp his hands over his stomach while he
looked up at the sky as though checking the weather situation.
The major had walked right round the haystack now and he made a small gesture with his free hand. Driving forward, the
car pulled up close to the officer who now stood with his back to the road facing the haystack. Again he spoke without look
ing at Mandel.

'I do fear that the cognac you so stubbornly concealed is
going to prove a most expensive proposition.'

Raising his right hand he aimed with great care, tossing the
burning cigarette high in the air so that when it fell it landed
out of sight on top of the stack. Then he stood and waited, one
hand close to his holster flap, studying Mandel's face closely. Appalled, the Frenchman showed only the reaction expected. Hanging his shoulders, he gazed at the stack in glum despair,
then very slowly he turned away and walked back to the farm
house, forcing himself not to hurry, hoping that by removing
himself from the scene of the conflagration the German would
lose interest and go away.

The officer stood watching the top of the stack which was
now crackling and sputtering, suddenly flaring up until the
entire roof was a crown of flames. Satisfied, he got back into his seat and the car drove off at a high speed.

Only by exerting his will-power far beyond its normal limits
was Barnes able to keep himself pressed down inside the ditch.
He had seen the German officer studying the stack, he had
even seen that he was smoking because now he risked using his
field-glasses. But as if some telepathic intuition had been transmitted between them he had understood Mandel's action
when he slowly trailed back to the house. Seen from this great
distance the burning stack presented an even more alarming
spectacle as grey-black smoke billowed in a huge cloud above
the road, and from where he lay Barnes could see red tongues of flame licking their way along the full length of the roof of
hay. He felt Penn stirring as Mandel walked away.

'We'd better get moving - we've got to try and put that lot out. We can shoot those two while we're about it.'

'Keep yourself down,' Barnes rasped. 'We're not moving till
that staff car is well on its way.'

'You've got the machine-pistol,' Penn protested. 'And we've
got our revolvers.'

'And they've got their car, you idiot. As soon as they see us
coming they'll drive off and then be back with half that
column.'

It wasn't only the unit he was thinking of. More important
still he had no intention of putting the Mandels into further
danger, no matter what the cost. And the cost could be very
high.

'You're just going to let Bert burn?' Penn protested again.

'The car's off now. No one gets up till I give the word.'

Lifting himself cautiously only a few feet, his body still well-
concealed behind the weeds, he watched the car racing away.
When it reached the next hill crest and vanished he started running, running as he had never run before, keeping easily ahead of the others in spite of his smallness. The stack was
roofed with flames, flames which drove the smoke several feet
above the top of the stack. He was drawing close to the conflagration when he heard the power-grab coming across the
field, moving forward so fast that the elevated arm was sway
ing wildly. They were all arriving at once - Etienne with the
power-grab, Barnes, Mandel hauling and heaving desperately
at a huge coil of hosepipe.

'Give Reynolds the grab,' Barnes shouted. 'I'll take that
hose. Leave this to us - the tank is full of diesel and it may
blow at any minute. Get back inside the house.'

'No!' Mandel shouted back. 'Etienne knows how to use the grab. Help me with this hose. It will take all of us to save it.
The tank, I mean - the stack is gone.'

Marianne came running forward with several pitch-forks
and Mandel told her to drop them and go straight back to the
house. It was developing into a horrible muddle until Barnes
took charge. Pitch-forks for Reynolds and Jacques. Etienne was left to work the grab. Barnes began to unloop the hose
while Mandel fixed the other end to an outlet pipe from a
small pump-house. While he worked Barnes was shouting in
structions for Mandel to pass on to Etienne.

'Get Etienne to scoop the burning bales off the top - he's to
drop them well clear of the stack so the men with forks can
carry them to the road. But the grab must be used to clear off
the burning hay. I'll hose down the lower walls - we'll never
save the top.'

They worked like demons. As Barnes directed the powerful jet of water on the lower walls he tried to keep an eye on the spread of the fire, scared stiff that at any moment the fuel tanks would go up, wondering whether there had been a blow-back of fire from the top down into the hollow interior, a disaster which might not be seen until the whole stack suddenly burst into flames. And there was high-explosive inside that inferno - seventy rounds of two-pounder shells and ten boxes of Besa ammunition. He was close to the front wall now, spraying his jet in a steady arc, while nearby the grab was scooping up burning masses of hay above his head and throwing them clear. As the scorching bales hit the ground they crackled and spat angrily like live things. The heat was almost unbearable and Barnes was shielding his face with one hand while he held the bucking hose in the other, hardly able to see what was happening as acrid smoke filled his lungs and blinded his eyes. Behind
him the men with pitch-forks were skewering the burning bales and carrying them over to the road where they dumped them and then ran back for more. Each bale was so heavy and unmanageable that it took two men to spear one bale and then lift it between them, and unknown to Barnes his corporal had seized a fork and formed a team with Mandel, holding the fork low down because he found it impossible to lift his right arm.

The turret of the tank was visible now, again protruding strangely like the conning tower of a submarine, but this time
like a submarine trapped in a sea of burning oil. It gave Barnes a pang to see it standing there and for a moment he moved back out of the smoke to assess the position. It looked quite hopeless. They had removed the greater part of the upper walls and the roof but the haystack still seethed with smoke and from inside it he could hear that horrid flame crackle working farther down. He saw Penn helping Mandel to carry away another bale and he opened his mouth to stop him, then closed it again without saying anything as he directed the water jet on to the hull of the tank. The temperature inside there must be ferocious, and never for a second could he forget that Bert was bloated - bloated with fuel, with shells, with ammunition - a state of affairs which only a few hours ago he had congratulated himself on but which might now bring about the death of the tank and several of its would-be rescuers. They were working at such a frenzied pitch that they hardly realized the injuries they were suffering from the scorching heat, but Barnes had already noticed that Reynolds' 'right forearm was an ugly mass of blisters. As he began hosing down the outer walls again Barnes himself narrowly escaped the most appalling injuries. He was directing the jet low down when he heard a shout from Etienne above him. Instinctively he jumped sideways. A mass of burning hay which had been balancing precariously in the power-grab shovel smothered the spot where he had stood a moment before. He swivelled the jet and drenched the hay, but it took several minutes to put the fire out and afterwards he couldn't understand why it hadn't set light to the main wall low down.

Some time later he again stepped well back from the stack
to see how much progress they were making, almost bumping
into Reynolds who was carrying a blazing mass of hay towards
the road when suddenly it disintegrated, almost collapsing in the driver's face. He just had time to jump clear but a shower
of red-hot sparks sprayed over his already badly-blistered arm.
Wiping his hand over his sweating forehead, Reynolds headed
back to the stack while Jacques who had been leaning on his own fork, joined him.

'We've nearly done it,' said Mandel.

'Have we?'

Barnes was astonished. Once he had emerged from the clouds of smoke the stack looked far quieter than he could
ever have dared to hope. Bert was now exposed to halfway
down his hull at the front, and although the turret was only
occasionally visible behind the pall of smoke the vicious
redness of the flames had died away. He paused to wipe his
eyes with his handkerchief and then ran forward, switching on
the hose: a line of flame had appeared along the top of the
front wall and was growing with alarming speed. They'd never
get the thing out. And close to the tank the temperature was
still incredible, so fiercely concentrated that it seemed to come
towards him in an invisible glow from the metal plates. It
would happen so suddenly that they would probably have no
warning - fuel first, one blasting outward thump, then the
series of sharp explosions,as the ammunition started to burn,
but they would probably never hear that second sound being as
close to the tank as they were. It's like being on top of a ruddy
great bomb, he thought. Through the smoke he could see
figures moving without knowing who they were. Then, some
time later, he thought, they at last had the inferno finally under
control. It should only be a matter of dousing with water until
even the smoke faded away. At that moment he heard a
frenzied shout from Reynolds.

'A burning bale's just dropped down Bert's side - it's flaring
up close to the fuel tank.'

Barnes tried to run forward through the smoke and was
jerked backwards. The hose was trapped round the wheel of
the power-grab. He lost precious seconds releasing it and then
jumped up on to the front wall. The flaring bale had fallen
down over the far side but. someone had got there first. Reynolds. He lifted his pitch-fork behind him to the fullest extent
and then rammed it down like a bayonet, plunging the fork deep into the huge bale which was trapped between the hull
and the rear wall of hay. Twisting it to tighten the fork's grip, he began to lift. From behind him Barnes could see the veins
standing out on his left arm under the frightful strain. Two
men had been handling these intact bales and now Reynolds
was trying to hoist one by himself, to hoist it upwards from a
position below him. Incredibly the bale began to come loose,
edging upwards as flames danced round the buried fork. Rey
nolds went on lifting, his legs splayed wide on the hull, his broad back arching. The bale came up suddenly with a rush,
but Reynolds was ready for that and he regained his balance
by leaning back against the turret. He must have seen Barnes
waiting with the hose because as he turned he shouted, 'Get
out of my way!'

Without the least idea of what the driver was going to do
Barnes leapt back to the ground. Reynolds began to swing the bale in a slow arc through a hundred and eighty degrees, hold
ing the massive weight at arm's length as the fire spread to
wards him along the fork. Stepping down off the wall he
nearly lost his balance, but again he recovered as flames burst
out all over the bale. Then he calmly walked across the grass
to the road, still holding the flaming mass at arm's length. He
had almost reached the road when it ignited into a small in
ferno, burning back and enveloping Reynolds. Barnes saw him
hurl the bale forward, pitch-fork and all. It landed in the road
and burst as Reynolds turned round to face the stack, both
arms badly burned now, his hair singed, his face a brick-red
colour. Ten minutes later Barnes was moving the hose over hay which barely smoked and the fire was out, but he still
played the hose over the remaining walls and across the huh*. He had sent the others back to the house and now only Mandel wandered round the relic of the stack, holding a pitch-fork and
finding nothing to do with it. Leaning over the wall Barnes
touched the hull and quickly snatched his hand away.