The Twisted Patriot Page 15

  Sebastian gestured for something to drink, though once in possession of the mug of schnapps he had to use both hands to raise it to his parched lips, so badly they were shaking. Some of the alcohol failed to make it and dribbled down his chin and onto his shabby uniform, making him look even more dishevelled and listless. He allowed the schnapps that did make it past his lips to settle in the pit of his stomach before recounting in fairly rambling fashion the subjects they had discussed. Once he had finished, Johns and Grosvenor along with the other two went into private conference, none of which Sebastian could make out before they broke from their little huddle and the group left it to Johns to address their stunned audience. “The damage has been done but there is always recourse to limiting it and if this plan is to go ahead we have to ensure that both Liebenberg and Macready are out of the way . . . permanently,” he added with a theatrical flourish. Sebastian glanced at Grosvenor, hoping he would be as against this as he was but he was horrified to see him nod meekly in acceptance while Oates and Reilly also gave their assent. “Hold on a minute, gentlemen!” yelled Sebastian and all four looked at him in astonishment at the vehemence of his tone. “How do you know all this is true? We don’t know, with all due respect, Colonel, whether you are who you say. You float in here, spin this tale and declare two men should be murdered on the basis that we should believe you. Shouldn’t we at the very least hear their side of the story before taking matters into our hands?”

  “Out of the question, I am afraid, Stuart,” sighed Grosvenor sadly. “They already know enough to scupper our plans and we don’t know what they have already relayed back to the local Gestapo in the nearest town.”

  “That’s all the more reason to bring them in, surely? We’ll force them to tell us what has been handed over and then we can deal with them. Summary execution is not exactly helpful for either party and, Colonel, I would have thought interrogation is one of your areas of expertise,” Sebastian protested. However, it was all to no avail as Johns stuck to his guns while the other three went along with him. “Very well, I have only one resort left to me and that is to refuse to go on with the mission. Evidently the whole caper has been compromised and I am not willing to put my life on the line just so you can say to your grandchildren that you had a good war because you tried to escape as officers are duty-bound to. So stuff you and your dreams of glory,” Sebastian said forcefully. Grosvenor was clearly irritated by Sebastian’s obfuscating and paced up and down the small room, whose air was so musty that Sebastian wished the windows were opened to alleviate the claustrophobic atmosphere.

  “Very well, Stuart, but this will go down on report and I can’t say that it will look very good . . .”

  “Excuse me, Grosvenor, but I am afraid Stuart has little choice but to go through with his part of the plan,” interjected Johns silkily. Sebastian stared blankly at the smooth intelligence officer before letting him proceed. “You see, he is as much of a risk inside the camp as the other two. Either he will be taken in and questioned if the Germans learn that he is out of the equation or else how do we know he isn’t going to surrender the information voluntarily to Liebenberg, given his reluctance to accept our case against him? No, it serves us better that he goes out as planned and returns with the information while we dispose of our two German friends and hope they haven’t yet delivered their report to a higher authority.”

  “That’s utter rubbish. I wouldn’t do such a thing even if I am out of it! Jesus, how come you have got free rein on what we might or might not do? You can’t be that bloody good at intelligence if you got yourself captured!” stormed Sebastian angrily. Johns bristled with indignation at the impudence of the younger man and raised his eyes to the tatty beams that somehow held the ceiling of the hut up. Everyone remained silent, hoping the set to would just go away but to no avail as Johns returned to the fray with extra vigour.

  “Well, if you consider the alternative, Stuart, I would imagine you would take the original plan,” he said icily.

  “And that is, my colonel, oh my colonel?” asked Sebastian sarcastically.

  “The same fate as our German agents,” replied the Colonel evenly. Even Grosvenor was stirred from his acquiescence to everything the Colonel had suggested thus far in protesting against such an extreme measure. Both Oates and Reilly joined in the debate, arguing forcibly against Johns’ condemnation of Sebastian while the focus of the Colonel’s ire laughed derisively at the sexagenarian peacock’s outlandish statement. “That is risible, Johns. Just because I won’t play ball with you and your evidence, I have to be disposed of as well. No wonder so many of us didn’t even make it to prison camp and were left to die on the battlefield. With intelligence like that there was no hope. All based on supposition and circumstantial evidence, you are the epitome of the barrackroom lawyer. I admit I have no time for Macready but to think that little twerp would have the cunning to be a German officer sent in as an informer is just not plausible. I’ve had enough of this farce,” Sebastian retorted angrily and stormed out, slamming the rickety old door on his way out which left it hanging tenuously from just one hinge.

  “He’ll come round, gentlemen,” proffered Johns with his usual self-confident tone. Grosvenor shook his head in disagreement. “You don’t know Stuart, Colonel, he is stubborn and like a lot of loners, very hard to persuade he is wrong. Furthermore, I don’t see threatening him with death is a very useful way of bringing him back on board and without him I think we are sunk,” he said despairingly.

  “Not at all, Grosvenor. I’ll go, but on condition that Stuart goes as well,” said Johns. “Don’t be a fool, Colonel. You wouldn’t last a minute out there, a man of your age. At least Stuart is relatively fit and he is a young man,” protested Grosvenor. Johns, though, refused to give an inch and in the end it was agreed that having disposed of the informants without Sebastian they would persuade their aggrieved confrere to change his mind, though that was far from certain of being a success.

  Sebastian did come around eventually to go on the sortie, pressurized by endless entreaties from mainly Reilly as it had been decided that both Johns and Grosvenor were damaged goods in his eyes. Sebastian also reluctantly agreed, having cooled down and reflected on the dangers posed by Macready and Liebenberg, that they should be got rid of, though he found it hard to continue normal relations with his German guard, such was his angst over his fate and the thought that he had been fooled into believing his story. It was decided that rather than alert the Germans that they were onto them, that the two of them would be taken out on the night of the planned sortie by Sebastian and Johns, though again the former was not told his fellow officer was going out with him just in case he backed out. Liebenberg was on night duty the day that the ambitious plan was to be set into force, so it was to be hoped he would not be assigned to the gate where the guards passed out while Macready was given the wrong day for the escape so as to put them off the scent.

  Sebastian spent the day lolling round the camp, played a bit of football with some of the other prisoners and slept for a couple of hours in the afternoon as he didn’t expect to get much once he was out of the camp. The guards were due out at seven o’clock in the evening so he went to the tailor a good hour before to pick up the uniform which was a perfect fit as it should have been, collected his papers and walked round the barbed wire fence once just to see if he was recognized in his new persona – which thankfully he wasn’t. The minutes ticked anxiously away as he awaited the siren which would be the sign for the guards to stand down, the prisoners to go to their respective huts and for him to join the line that would take him to freedom. As the siren wailed he espied Liebenberg lining up to enter the camp and he felt he should at least go up to him and warn him of the imminent fate attending him once he stepped inside the gates, but he thought better of it and waited his turn to pass through and jump onto the truck which would take them into town. The two lines of soldiers passed each other without thankfully too much repartee between them – most never even met
as the two groups were kept on the same watches – and Sebastian kept his eyes down as he passed through.

  The guards on the gate didn’t even do a count as a carefully orchestrated epileptic fit by one of the prisoners distracted them and by the time he had been sorted out – Maier landing a typically sympathetic kick to his body – he had passed through and was seated on the truck and it was only when the driver had set the vehicle in motion that he espied Johns sitting at the end of the metal bench, who turned towards him and gave him a conspiratorial wink. Sebastian was furious at being fooled once again and thought what use is Johns going to be, or is he just ensuring I don’t do a runner and if I try, am I to be dispensed with as the two are due to be in the camp. However, he fancied his chances against Johns, who, while in not bad physical condition, shouldn’t be a match for him. The truck trundled along several rutted roads, which made the guards bounce up and down in the air, landing painfully with a jolt onto the bare metal surface of the benches, leaving many yelling obscenities in their guttural accents at the driver. Several ignored the pain of the continual taking off and landing by chatting among themselves while paying little attention to Sebastian or Johns, who feigned sleep when they could. They must have travelled about 45 minutes before they hit a much better road. Another 20 minutes passed before they saw lights approaching and a sign for Cottbus, indicating another 5 miles to go. Sebastian had never visited the town while he had been in Germany but he knew of it and he recalled it wasn’t that far from Berlin, which gave him some idea of the task facing his idealistic fellow officers back in the camp in trying to get back to their dear Blighty.

  There was not an awful lot of other traffic on the road so the five miles went mercifully quickly and having traversed some pretty run-down-looking suburbs, the truck dropped them off in a square in what looked like the centre of the town, only because there were plenty of people strutting around, mostly in uniform. There were also families out for their evening’s entertainment, the women generally respectably, if not smartly dressed, while the men out of uniform were in suits, bought off the rack rather than made to measure. Sebastian waited after alighting from the truck for Johns, who engaged him in fluent German, which his companion was grateful for because he didn’t need some elderly cowboy alongside him. Sebastian waited until they had found a crowded noisy bar and ordered two large beers before laying into Johns. The Colonel remained his usual implacable cool self and explained that it had been useless to tell Sebastian of their change of plan because he wouldn’t have gone along with it, to which Sebastian found himself in rare agreement with his older compatriot. “So what are our roles? Am I to defer to you or are we to stick to the original idea that I collate the information and then get back to the camp?”

  “Exactly. However I am here for insurance just in case things go awry. We have 48 hours’ leave so we should be able to get enough information and give the boys what they require,” replied Johns. They ordered two more beers, which Sebastian found himself paying for, much to his consternation, but he found it worth it just for the refreshing taste of the alcohol, which slaked his thirst and briefly pushed the taste of the camp’s coffee and schnapps out of his mind. They were billeted together in a fine looking house just off the central square, which was occupied by a middle-aged couple, whose two sons were in the army and were willing to surrender their privacy just to believe that their home was once again fully occupied as it had been before the war. Mrs Krauss showed Sebastian to his room, which was at the top of the second floor and beside the bathroom. It was comfortable without being luxurious; a single bed, some second-hand prints hung on the wall – mostly of Frederick the Great – and several books on a chest of drawers on which there was also a mirror. The obligatory portrait of the Führer was missing, though that, Sebastian imagined, was probably hanging over the familial fireplace. However, he didn’t bother to pass comment as Mrs Krauss was not exactly bubbling over with conversation and he was happy when she bid him good night and left him to his own devices. Johns’ room was up another floor and he heard a similar routine being enacted as he was taken up there, and as he settled between the soft white sheets which made a welcome change to the coarse blanket he had to put up with in the camp he could hear Johns pacing up and down overhead, though rather than keeping him awake, the footsteps rhythm only hastened him into a deep sleep

  The next morning he awoke not to the familiar siren wheedling away calling them to roll call but to the hustle and bustle of ordinary everyday life Cottbus-style, which in normal circumstances wouldn’t have seemed very pacy but to someone liberated after several months of incarceration it was fast enough, thank you very much. Sebastian rose and having dressed in civvies he strode downstairs to the Krauss’s parlour, which was a fairly nondescript room, its ordinariness only lifted by the bright sunshine pouring through the window, and took his breakfast of bacon and eggs washed down with fruit juice and real coffee when he was joined by Johns, who looked out of place in his brown suit and cotton tie. Mr Krauss had already left for his job in the local administrator’s office while Mrs Krauss busied herself with chores outside, leaving them with the maid for company. Having served them, the stern-looking lady tramped upstairs to do the housework while the fugitive duo contented themselves with filling their bellies gratefully before embarking on their real duty of picking up timetables, maps and any other information they could lay their hands on without being too conspicuous. Johns suggested a trip to the railway station first to which Sebastian had little objection and they set off after attending to their toilette, a funny looking couple indeed with the good looking younger man definitely the smarter dressed of the two alongside the elegant-featured but down at heel, judging by his threadbare suit, elderly man alongside him. They passed through the finely cobbled streets surrounding the main square before descending down a hill to the station, which was a fine piece of Gothic architecture. They entered a massive entrance hall where people went about their business as if the war was far off and nothing to do with them, the only reminders being the notices plastered up on the walls warning them of loose talk and rants against Jews and spies while various soldiers, officers and non-commissioned officers alike, barked orders at their subordinates as they prepared to board trains and head off to the east and the new front, where Hitler hoped to prove that Fascism was superior to another of his hates, Bolshevism.

  Sebastian wondered whether Eric was among this mass of field grey uniformed humanity or was he fortunate enough to be enjoying the fruits of Paris or horror of horrors, he might be dead. What Sebastian feared would happen if he was here and came across him by accident – would he hand him over or would he let him slip idly past? – but he cared not to think of the answer to that question. Johns elbowed him out of his thoughts and gestured towards the boards which held the timetables. They advanced upon them and noted the regular trains leading to Berlin and remarked that the other option was to Munich where they could then try and make a run for neutral Switzerland but whether they could then get back to England was another problem, which would have to be dealt with later. They took a coffee at one of the bars surrounding the concourse, observing whether there was a regular police presence or suited types who could be Gestapo and noted with some trepidation that there were several shadowy looking types who could fit the description of the latter. Sebastian had to answer a call of nature and having got a positive response he returned to discover that one of these goons was talking to Johns, who was trying to brush him off but nevertheless had to hand over his papers. The goon then called over another of his mates and while Sebastian held back, he noticed Johns indicating to him to clear off, which he started to do by making his way out of the hall. He had reached the doorway and was out into the square surrounding it before he heard the words yelled at him, “Halt, Engländer!” He raised his arms and turned to see Johns being frogmarched out while another of the two cheaply suited looking thugs bore down on him. One of them slammed him against the wall spreading his legs and cru
dely bodysearched him, pulling out his papers.

  “Johann Leit, a likely story,” sneered the bruiser to the other Gestapo officer who had joined him. Sebastian protested he was indeed private Johann Leit and they were making a dreadful error, but for that he received a punch to the kidneys, which left him doubled up in agony on the ground. The Germans picked him up and hauled him out to the Mercedes car waiting outside before throwing him into the back. One sat in the back with him while the man who had taken his papers sat up front with the driver. The trio talked among themselves leaving Sebastian to stew and wonder what had happened to Johns and would he be strong enough to withstand the rough treatment that undoubtedly awaited them. Sebastian tried to break the impasse between him and his captors by demanding where they were going but his flat-nosed neighbour just laughed in his face, leaving Sebastian to recoil in disgust at the odour of garlic on his breath. They drove through the streets of Cottbus and from what Stuart could discern from their conversation they were nearing the Gestapo headquarters where he would be handed over to their superiors, though the one in the front added with some relish he hoped to be given a go at breaking him. The driver replied obliquely that probably wouldn’t be necessary, as they already knew his story for which he was told to shut up by his companions.