Last Man to Die by Michael Dobbs
‘William. To what do I owe this decidedly ambiguous pleasure?’ He swept the dishevelled strands of greying russet hair back into place and reached out greedily for the tea, which he proceeded to slurp.
‘There’s been a POW break-out.’
‘From where?’
‘Yorkshire. Camp 174B. It’s just north of …’
‘Yes. I know it,’ Churchill interrupted, the tea temporarily forgotten. There was a gleam – a twinkle, even – in the Old Man’s eye. ‘Some men never seem to know when they’re beaten. How many?’
‘Nearly two hundred and fifty.’
Churchill jumped. The tea slopped into the saucer and began dripping onto the sheet.
‘Nearly two hundred and fifty,’ Cazolet repeated. ‘Several thousand troops are being sent to the area, but as always they’re in the wrong place, waiting on the south coast to embark for Europe. To fill the gap we’ve activated detachments of the local Home Guard to man road blocks around the camp.’
He was good, Cazolet, damned good. No undue emotion or unnecessary hyperbole, measuring out the details so as to inform rather than to incite. After a late night out the Old Man could be like an unexploded bomb which required the most delicate of handling, yet he seemed to be taking all this in his stride.
‘There’s something else. I’ve instructed the Chief Constable in charge of co-ordinating the operation that news of the break-out must be treated on a strictly need-to-know basis, that on no account must the numbers involved be released. He complained that this makes it very much more difficult for his men; not knowing the full facts ties their hands behind their backs.’
‘Did you manage to persuade him?’
‘Not until I reminded him that the war coming to an end and the next Honours List would be bound to include many civilians who had been particularly helpful on the home front. I think he saw the point.’
‘But the news is bound to get out eventually,’ Churchill mused. ‘It will be the best news Herr Hitler will have heard in months.’ His tea was momentarily forgotten, the cup stranded halfway between saucer and chin.
‘But not before most of the escapees have been rounded up. By then it can be treated as a success story and not used by our enemies to undermine you.’
‘My goodness, William. You have been busy guarding my back. Commendable!’
‘Not really.’ Cazolet’s tone was impish. ‘Pure self interest. Prime Ministers are not brought down without creating waves. In your case it would be a veritable tidal wave, which would quite swamp small boats such as mine …’
‘Then may I wish you many long years of carefree sailing.’
There was an almost familial informality between the two born of a meeting of intellects and emotions, more like father and son than the formal courtesies demanded between master and civil servant. Anyway, it was difficult to be left in excessive awe of a man propped up in bed, swathed in three yards of pale pink pyjama silk and already puffing away at a huge cigar between mouthfuls of tea.
‘The local police stations are being inundated with reports of suspicious characters; several have already been apprehended.’ Cazolet glanced at his notebook. ‘Two men were caught as they rode a stolen bicycle in full Luftwaffe uniform the wrong way down the village High Street. Apparently they would have been caught earlier, except for the misfortune that the bike they stole belonged to the local police constable.’
‘Remind me of that when I call to congratulate the Chief Constable and thank him for his co-operation …’
‘Four others were found early this morning, dead drunk behind the bar of a local pub. Seems they never had any intention of escaping further than the nearest drink. I suspect that most of them will be rounded up very quickly.’
‘I’m sure you are right. But as we know, most of them don’t matter; it’s the one or two slipping through the net who carve their names in the history books, who light a fire across a whole continent.’ He paused. ‘Keep me well advised, William. A great deal may ride on such an escape, I want to know everything that happens on this one.’
Cazolet stood at the end of the bed, waiting. ‘Any further instructions?’
The Old Man looked up, his expression serious. ‘This may be a difficult day, which calls for unusual measures.’ There was a frown of concentration. ‘I shall have two eggs with my bacon and toast. And another cup of tea.’
Cazolet turned and left. For the first time in several days he was laughing out loud.
Hencke counted the barrels of eight Lee Enfields, all of which were pointing straight at him from a distance of less than ten feet. He could try to run them down, of course, but by the time he had slipped the clutch and moved no further than a few inches he reckoned that at least six of the eight bullets would have found him. Not much of an option, that. Neither was surrender, but what was the alternative? Already he could see the tips of the barrels dancing nervously and could sense the fingers tightening around the triggers. As he throttled back and put the gears in neutral, Hencke’s hand went to his throat, checking that the uniform he was wearing was properly buttoned. No surrender. Never that. There was too much at stake. He would try to bluff it out.
‘Sergeant Cheval, Fourth Royal Quebec,’ he snapped. God, could they really take his accent for a French Canadian? But don’t wait and see – grab the initiative! ‘Who’s in charge?’
The rifles were still pointing at him, but some were beginning to waver in uncertainty. He began to study the men behind the muzzles; only two were in uniform, the rest were in an assortment of crumpled civilian clothing with nothing more than armbands for identification. Behind them, strewn amongst the hedgerows, lay several pedal cycles which apart from the battered tractor were their only apparent means of transportation. What luck! He had run into Dad’s Army dragged out of their beds. Perhaps there was a chance, after all …
From behind the line of rifles stepped a man in his sixties armed with a Webley pistol, a fierce look in his eye and a carefully trimmed white moustache. He was the only one wearing a military cap. His uniform was smartly pressed and his boots were immaculate. A veteran, and a man who wore his lieutenant’s shoulder pips with pride, Hencke decided. Still astride the motorcycle, he came to a salute.
‘Lieutenant, I am Sergeant Cheval of the Fourth Quebec,’ he repeated the introduction. ‘My regiment is guarding the camp.’
The Webley was still pointing straight at him and there was a bead of nervous perspiration across the bridge of the lieutenant’s nose, but to the officer’s rear Hencke could see the barrels of several rifles beginning to droop towards the ground.
‘Less than two miles down the road there are thirty escaped Germans,’ Hencke continued, waving behind him in the general direction of the north of England. The look of ferocity in the officer’s eye had changed to one of suspicion and he was about to aim a flood of questions which Hencke knew he had no chance of withstanding. ‘Many of them are armed. They’ve already killed several of my company!’
At this point the rifle barrels were raised once more in anxiety; this time they were pointing not at Hencke but back down the road. The lieutenant’s lips were working away in agitation beneath his moustache. He was being overwhelmed by Hencke’s news and the responsibility which had suddenly been thrust upon him after so many years of waiting, like the fishes, for an invasion which had never come. He had the rank but he couldn’t match the experience suggested by Hencke’s regular army uniform. He had a thousand questions to ask but could find the words for none of them.
‘Lieutenant, the Germans are headed in this direction, they’re not far behind. You must maintain your position here and be ready while I go and warn headquarters.’ It was all so ludicrously makeshift. He hadn’t the slightest idea where headquarters were located, but he supposed they must lie somewhere to the other side of the road block. That was enough. He began gently to rev the bike engine, testing the officer’s resolve. ‘And remember. They’re dangerous!’
For the first time th
‘Good luck, Lieutenant,’ Hencke shouted above the noise of the engine as he weaved around the tractor and the line of men. Their rifles were at shoulder level once more while their boots scratched nervously away at the pavement, trying to find a solid firing position. When Hencke looked behind him he could see a long row of backs. Only the officer was looking in his direction, the agonies of uncertainty twisting his face. But already it was too late …
Hencke waved and was gone.
The portrait of Louis XIV was nothing more than a cheap reproduction but there was no mistaking the profound look of disdain as it gazed down from the painted wooden walls. Eisenhower’s daily briefing session with his military aides was coming to an end. The noise and bustle caused by the fifty or more advisers clattered around the dining room of the dingy red-brick secondary school in Reims which served as SHAEF’s forward military headquarters.
‘D’you know, Dwight, that old bastard wouldn’t have bothered with all this.’ General Omar Bradley, three-stars and Eisenhower’s right hand, waved at the portrait. ‘None of these briefing meetings, no listening to endless advice, no worries about whether the fuel was in the same place as the fighting. Just an order for the peasant army to pick up their pikes and start walking while he went back to his roast pig and mistress. What a way to fight a war.’
Eisenhower winced. Even with as good a friend as Bradley he wasn’t in the mood to discuss mistresses. ‘You’re not suggesting I dress up in silk tights and a red wig like him?’
‘Well, he ruled for something like seventy-odd years. Not bad for the times when you counted yourself lucky if the pox killed you off before the Black Death. And he was big in arts ‘n’ stuff. They called him the Sun King. After all this is over, Ike, d’you think the sun’s going to shine out from under your periwig?’
Eisenhower laughed. Bradley was always able to make him relax even when the going was particularly tough. As commander of the 12th Army Group which formed the backbone of the European command, Bradley shared the weight. While Eisenhower ordered and authorized, it was Bradley’s job to implement. They shared both the successes and sacrifices of war, and it had built trust and affection.
‘I wonder how that old bastard would have coped with the British, Brad?’
‘What’s dear old Monty been up to this time? Another press conference to let the world know how you and the Pope have got it all wrong? Or is he complaining again that he hasn’t got a zipper big enough for his flies?’ The disdain for General Bernard Montgomery was evident in both of them. A relationship which had always been difficult with their British colleague had become incandescent in recent months as Montgomery complained, cajoled, and claimed credit for other men’s victories. He was Bradley’s equivalent and Eisenhower’s subordinate, but he rarely acted as such, particularly in the presence of the media when a poised pen or the pop of a flashbulb would send him off into grandiloquent summaries of the European battle scene which would have made even the Sun King feel uncomfortable.
‘No, it’s not Montgomery this time,’ Eisenhower responded, blinking as the blinds were drawn back from the high windows to let in a flood of springtime light. ‘It’s the Old Man. Churchill. Didn’t want to raise it in front of everyone, but I’m having real trouble getting the extra division out of him. Should have arrived days ago, but all I get in its place is flannel and soft soap. First he keeps complaining that the British forces are left sitting idly on their backsides, then he won’t give me the troops to do anything other. What does he expect me to do? Scare the Germans into surrender by dropping my pants?’
‘This isn’t some screwball way of putting pressure on you to let him have Berlin, is it? You know, Berlin or nothing?’
‘Could it really have come to that, Brad? Monty, yes, but surely not the Old Man. Sweet Jesus, I thought we were fighting this war together.’ Eisenhower’s square jaw began to work back and forth in exasperation. The allied command had worked so harmoniously right up until D-Day and the invasion of Europe, but once they had set foot on French soil the co-operation seemed to vanish in a political quagmire as deep and impassable as the trench mud of the First War. He cracked his knuckles as he recounted the times the British had got in the way, been stubbornly slow off the mark or had brazenly attempted to trip him up. Caen. Arnhem. Antwerp. The Ardennes. The Rhine … He had run out of knuckles, and of patience. ‘I’ll not let them make a damned fool of me any longer, Brad. I’ve taken about as much flak as I can stand. Hell, I wouldn’t take this sort of crap even from the French! It’s about time someone made our allies realize just who’s in charge of this shooting match.’
There was an edge to his voice, uncharacteristic in a commander renowned for seeing the other man’s point of view. Bradley said nothing, gratified that at last his superior seemed determined to clamp down on the petulance of their colleagues. And not before time. Eisenhower dug deep into his pocket for the lucky pennies he always carried. ‘Like worry beads,’ he had once explained, ‘except it scares the shit out of the men if the Supreme Commander is seen to worry. So I play with my pennies.’ They were cascading from one hand to the other as he tried to pour away his frustration and waited for an orderly to bring coffee. The orderly was pouring before Eisenhower returned to the point.
‘It truly galls me to think of thousands of British troops sitting outside Dover doing nothing,’ he muttered distractedly.
‘I’m not sure where the general gets his information, but those troops sure as hell ain’t there,’ the orderly interrupted in a slow Texan drawl. He had been with Eisenhower a long time, not so much because of his valeting skills as his ability to read his master’s moods, and to respond appropriately, usually with a humorous tale or a choice piece of gossip which otherwise would never have reached the Supreme Commander’s ears. And Eisenhower loved a good gossip; it helped remind him there was still a real world out there.
‘What d’you mean, Mickey?’
‘Well, sir, you’ll remember I’ve just been on leave in London?’ he began. One of the perks of working for the boss was an almost limitless ability to contrive seats on transport planes flying away from the battle zone.
‘Sure do,’ Eisenhower responded. ‘Only time for weeks I got a decent cup of coffee.’
‘The general is so kind,’ the orderly continued, completely unabashed. ‘I got talking to some of our British friends. Strange little watering hole called the Ferret and Firkin. I never did figure out what the “firkin” bit was.’
‘This story’d better be good, Mickey, or I’ll have your balls on toast,’ Eisenhower chuckled; the orderly’s calculated impertinence was beginning to work its usual magic.
‘There’s these two Brit quartermasters ferretin’ and firkin’ and feeling pretty relaxed about the whole thing. Seems they were just about to join the fun here in Europe when most of their unit got orders to ship north, to York-Shire or wherever.’ He managed to make it sound somewhere beyond the Arctic Circle. ‘So this pair were left waging war with a mountain of supplies and equipment while the rest of their buddies were off opening a new battle front.’
‘New front?’ Bradley enquired.
‘Well, General, I’m not supposed to breathe a word. Honest to God, they swore me to secrecy …’ Mickey’s eyes wandered theatrically around the room in search of eavesdroppers. ‘But it seems like there’s been a big break-out, a whole prison camp full of Germans on the loose with half the British army in hot pursuit. Sounded like the biggest roundup east of the Shenandoah, ’cept nobody’s supposed to know a thing about it … Cream, General Bradley?’
But the two generals had lost interest in the coffee. ‘Could it be, Brad? Could it really be so cretinous?’
‘A break-out??
‘But to hold back an entire division from Europe at a time when Churchill is screaming for more action, just to cover up their own blunder …?’
‘Politics, Dwight. Capital “P”. This whole damn war is growing to be all about politics.’
Eisenhower’s easy mood had vanished, steel re-entered his voice. ‘That’s no excuse for incompetence and duplicity, not when the lives of my men are at stake. Check this story out for me, Brad, see if it’s true.’
‘And if it is?’
‘Fight fire with fire. Take on the politicians at their own game.’ The lucky pennies jangled into the palm of his hand, where he gripped them tightly in a clenched fist. A tight smile of determination and of decision broke on his face. ‘You know, Brad, maybe Mr Churchill could do with some help rounding up his strays. From some of the drovers in our press corps …’
He hadn’t realized how cold he had become until the petrol ran out. He’d shaken the machine to slop every last drop from the tank into the fuel line and it had given him a few extra miles, but then it had started coughing once more, slowed, and died. It was only then as he had tried to dismount that he discovered his fingers, clamped firm and senseless around the handlebars, wouldn’t move, frozen solid by the hours of forcing his way through the clinging mid-English damp. At first all he could manage was a spastic twitching of a little finger and it took him several agonizing minutes before the rest had followed and he had loosened his grip. Then he discovered he couldn’t stand straight. His clothes were drenched to the skin, his back locked as if he were still thrusting his way forward in the saddle, his eyes scraped raw by the night air. And it got worse.