Tramp in Armour (30 page)

But it was from this conversation that Barnes had gleaned
the final scraps of information which led to his ultimate decision, and as the tank rumbled down the hill away from the
Mandels he was pretty confident that the French lad had no
idea which route he was taking - something he had been par
ticularly careful about in case the lad were picked up by the
Germans and made to talk. He scanned the sky and it was
empty, further proof that they were still moving through a vast
gap in the Allied lines, since had there been any Allied forces
in the area the Luftwaffe would have been bombing them. An
hour later they had turned off the main road to Cambrai and
had almost by-passed the southern approaches to the town. He
called a temporary halt to go down and see Penn.

'How's it going?' he asked him.

'Not too bad, although I do feel a bit woozy. I'm getting
double vision every now and again.'

Penn was propped up with a wedge of blankets and he was trying to hold himself upright, but earlier when he had looked
down into the fighting compartment Barnes had seen him
sagging limply, his head flopped forward as though he couldn't
hold it up any more. What the devil are we going to do with him, Barnes thought, but he spoke cheerfully.

'Can you stand a bit more of this? I know the movement of
the tank must be giving you hell.'

'It's not so much that as the lack of fresh air down here. It's
like sitting inside a furnace.'

The description was apt enough. Even standing on the turn
table for only a few minutes was enough to bring Barnes out in a prickly sweat and he was surprised that Perm was still con
scious.

'I'll be all right,' said Penn.

'Do you want to try and stick your head out of the turret for a while?'

'I doubt if I could get up there.'

Barnes kept his face blank but a chill of fear gripped him.
He had to keep moving, had to keep the tank heading west and
then north, but he had to find a doctor for Penn, too. It seemed
as though fate had deliberately kept Penn in a state where he was wounded but not desperately ill until they had left the Mandel farm, and now Penn was becoming desperately ill,
Barnes had little doubt of that. His skin was a strangely pallid
colour and his eyes appeared to have sunk.

'The next place we come to we'll see if we can find a doc
tor,' he said.

'Not necessary. I'm not doing anything except sitting and
I'll probably feel better by evening. It's just this heat.' He
tried to speak lightly. 'Calais next stop?'

'We've a long way to go before we get there, Penn.'
'How far is it?' 'About a hundred miles.'
'Seven hours' drive if Bert goes flat out.'
'You're assuming there'll be nothing in the way, Penn. We can count on there being plenty in the way.'

It seemed an odd way for Barnes to be talking to a seriously
wounded man but already he was foreseeing the moment when
they would have to leave Penn behind if they could find a sanctuary for him. The realization of what they were driving
into might make that moment when they left him a little less hard to bear. He hoped so. He also hoped th
at they found that
sanctuary soon. Considering his physical state, Penn's mind
was remarkably alert.

'A hundred miles, you said. Have we got the diesel for
that?'

'Yes, with what we took off Lebrun, that is, providing we keep to the road all the way, which we probably won't. You
know what happens when we move across country - fuel con
sumption is doubled.'
'You know what,' Penn began brightly, 'I think we're going
to make it. I've had a bit of time to think down here and it
strikes me there may not be all that much in our way if we keep a sharp lookout.' He paused and Barnes realized that
Penn was wondering whether anyone was observing.

'It's all right, Penn. I told Reynolds to get out and stand on
the hull while I was down here. Now, what were you think
ing?'

'Well, Jerry is pushing on fast with his tanks and his pop
guns but the old foot-sloggers haven't put in much of an
appearance down here yet. I reckon that with a lot of luck we
could sneak up behind those Panzers before we run into much.
Then it's up to us.'

'We might do just that, Penn.'

'And by that time I'll have pulled myself together. You'll
see me hugging the old two-pounder again before we reach
Calais. You can bet on it.'

'I never bet on certainties, Penn.'

With a heavy heart Barnes climbed back into the turret, told
Reynolds in a loud voice that Penn was coming along nicely,
and then gave the order to advance. Half an hour later he
looked back along the road, frowned, and grabbed his binocu
lars. The twin circles of glass brought forward a four-seater
Renault with a single occupant, the driver. Jacques was racing
towards them on his way to Abbeville.

The twin circles of glass focused and brought forward a toy
line of white cliffs glistening in the sunlight. The white cliffs
of Dover. General Storch lowered his binoculars and frowned.

'There we are, Meyer, the citadel of the enemy - the main enemy. Let us hope the 14th Panzer Division will be the first
to be put ashore on the British beaches.'

'We have to beat them over here first,' Meyer pointed out.

'That will be dealt with in the next forty-eight hours. Here we stand on the coast west of Calais with our forward troops
on the Gravelines waterline and Calais is under siege. Now we only have to take Dunkirk and the whole British Army is sur
rounded.'

Meyer screwed his monocle into his eye and found that he
was looking through a film of perspiration. In the hour of
victory he felt exhausted, overwhelmed by the dazzling series of triumphs Storch had produced since that day so long ago
when they crossed the Meuse at Sedan. So long ago? It was
the afternoon of Saturday, May 25th, and they had made their
way over the pontoons at Sedan on May 14th. Meyer felt
stunned. Perhaps, after all, this was a war for the younger
men, for the Storches. The general stood gazing out to sea,
talking rapidly.

'I want an immediate investigation made of this French Fascist's story - that informant from Lemont. He says there is
a second road direct to Dunkirk - a road the enemy may' not know about now that the sluice gates have been opened.'

'The French were very quick about that - the floods will make it very difficult for the Panzers to move on Dunkirk...'

Storch broke in impatiently. 'This is why this second road
may be decisive. I want you to interrogate this man personally.'

'I can't find such a road on any map...'

'But that is the whole point, Meyer. Our Fascist friend has
explained that for some reason it is not included on most French maps. So if the British are holding the sector at the
other end they may not know it exists now it is under water. Even if there are French units in that sector they will probably come from another part of France. That road could be the key
to final victory - the road along which the Panzers will advance
to Dunkirk.'

'I don't think we should count on it.'

They paused as they heard the humming sound of a host of
engines above them. Craning their necks they stared into the
sky where an armada of small grey dots was approaching from
the east, the humming growing steadily louder as the planes
came forward like a swarm of angry bees. Storch nodded his
head in satisfaction.

'General Goering is on time again and I see he has the sky
to himself. When Mr Churchill opened the cupboard this
morning he must have found his shelves bare.'

'We mustn't count on air immunity any longer,' said Meyer sharply. 'After all, we can actually see England from here.'

Storch tightened his lips at this sign of caution. 'I want a
very detailed report about your conversation with, this Fascist.
He says this road will be covered by only a few inches of water
- sufficient to conceal its existence but not enough to prevent
the passage of the Panzers. Since he is a local he may well
know what he is talking about.'

'I'd better go now.'

But Meyer did not go immediately because his sharp ears had heard a fresh sound in the sky, an engine sound different
from that of Goering's huge aerial fleet. Whipping up his
glasses he focused them towards the west while beside him
Storch also stood with his binoculars aimed upwards. High above the Channel, at an altitude much greater than the Luft
waffe bombers, several squadrons of RAF fighters flew steadily
on course, heading for an invisible point which would take
them over the heart of the oncoming bombers, although from the ground it seemed that the two air fleets were advancing on
a collision course. Less than a minute later the RAF formations dived to the attack, roaring down like avenging hornets
on the massed planes below, weaving in and out of the pattern
of bombers which was now becoming disorganized as the pilots
forgot their objectives and desperately began to take evading
action. In less than two minutes the huge German air armada
was flying in all directions, its attack formation completely
shattered. One bomber spiralled to the ground and crashed
into the fields a mile away, to be followed by a second, but this one was heading for the coast close to where Storch and Meyer
stood. As one man they dropped flat behind the hull of a
nearby tank only seconds before the bomber hit the earth three hundred yards away, its bomb load exploding a few seconds after the moment of impact. The vibrations of the shock wave
rattled the tank behind which they sheltered and a shower of
soil rained down on Storch's neck and shoulders. Meyer spoke
quietly.

'Mr Churchill must have found something at the bottom of his cupboard.'

* * *

'Driver, halt! There's a parachute coming down,' Barnes
warned.

The air battle had raged over their heads, out of sight, for
several minutes - out of sight even though the sky was cloudless because the planes were high and against the glare of the
early afternoon sun. From the noise it sounded as though
several machines were wheeling and diving as they fought each
other to death in the sunlight. The engine sounds had come
closer and faintly he had heard the stutter of machine guns but
they went on manoeuvring in front of the sun so that he had
found it impossible to locate them until he had heard the
ominous sound of a plane plunging into a tremendous power dive. Then he had located a small dark shape spinning earthwards a long way to the west, much too far off to identify its nationality quite apart from the fantastic speed at which it
approached the ground. It vanished and he heard a distant
cough. Petrol tank gone. A thread of black smoke crept up
from the horizon. Overhead the sky was full of warm silence.
He gave the order to advance, reversing that order almost at
once as he saw the tiny inverted cone of the single parachute
floating down. He waited.