Colin Forbes - The Leader And The Damned

At Benina airfield in Libya he had sprung his decision in the mess at the last moment. Normally, an officer of his rank would not have undertaken the mission.

'Is that wise?' the station commander had enquired.

'And who is interested in your wisdom?' Murray- Smith had rapped back. 'I'm in charge of this show. I'm taking the Dak myself,' he repeated. 'God knows they've been trying to get this poor swine, Lindsay, out of the shit long enough.'

'It's your decision.'

'Nice to know you've grasped the situation so rapidly. Conway can be my co-pilot. All right, Conway? Happy, Then smile, blast you!

'Whisky' Conway, nick-named for an obvious liking, had been anything but happy and suspected he had been chosen out of sheer malice. Murray-Smith had recently overheard himself referred to in one of

Conway's more inebriated moments as 'that Pocket Fuhrer'.

As the plane flew on at ten thousand feet Conway, acting as map-reader, had a large-scale map spread out over his lap. He didn't know it but this was the reason Murray-Smith had press-ganged him into the job; he was probably the most brilliant navigator between Algiers and Cairo.

'Looks as though the Met stupes got it right for once,' remarked Murray-Smith. 'Sheer bloody fluke, of course…'

The sky was an empty sea of pale blue without a wisp of cloud in sight. Below them the Med was another equally deserted and calm sea of deeper blue. Murray-Smith checked his watch. He never trusted the flaming instrument panel when there were alternative aids at his disposal. He was a terror with the ground staff.

'I have to pilot this flying coffin,' was his favourite phrase. 'You keep both bloody feet safely on terra firma, Corporal,' he had told the mechanic before takeoff. 'One screw loose, up here…' He had tapped his head. '… Or inside here..' He had slapped his hand against the fuselage… 'And I'm a goner.'

Oh, Squadron-Leader Murray-Smith was the cherry on the cake in his world. People ran when they saw him coming – in the opposite direction.

'Be there in sixty min. Agreed, Conway?' he asked as he banked the machine a sliver to maintain course.

'Sixty minutes, sir, and we land in The Cauldron…'

'Heljec, or whatever your bloody name is, here we come!' Murray-Smith shouted. 'We've got the guns, you've got the man, so no frigging about…`

Oh, Christ, thought Conway, he's enjoying himself.

Hartmann and Paco had walked slowly along the full length of the makeshift airstrip, followed by a rebellious Heljec while they examined every inch of the ground. The German had imposed his personality on the Partisan leader, stopping every now and again to insist on the removal of a rock projecting a few centimetres above the surface. Paco acted as interpreter. Afterwards the defective patch had to be filled in with grit and hard-packed soil from a large wicker basket two Partisans carried.

'No wonder they never get anywhere in this benighted country,' Hartmann grumbled. 'Sloppy. I'm sorry, I'm talking about your home…`

'I'm half-English,' she reminded him. 'And I don't think I'm going to want to come back here. Ever. I can't get out of my mind what the Amazon Brigade did.'

'Go and cheer up Lindsay…'

'When we've finished this job. The plane should be here soon. It's nearly eleven o'clock.'

Lindsay, aware that Hartmann was doing the job he should have attended to, sat on a rock feeling exhausted. The glandular fever was sapping him again. He cursed the timing. Dr Macek appeared from behind a boulder and felt his forehead.

'We are not feeling in love with the world?' he enquired.

'Not too bad. I should be over there, with Hartmann and Paco.'

'No temperature. A period of convalescence is needed. It is good that the plane is coming after so many months…'

'I want to thank you for all you have done…'

'But it is my profession. Thank me by resting when you arrive at your destination. Maybe we shall meet again one day.'

'Somehow I don't think so…'

Macek nodded, a smile on his gentle face, and walked away. The whole plateau was deserted in the brilliant morning light apart from the group checking and putting finishing touches to the airstrip. Heljec had cleared the plateau of men and weapons, concentrating them on the rim at the head of ravines – inside the ravines – leading up to the plateau. He was convinced he had sealed off all approaches to his temporary stronghold.

Lindsay made the effort, forced himself up off the rock and trod step by dragging step towards the airstrip. He used the stick Milic had fashioned for him. Poor Milic, killed in the German mortar attack a hundred years ago. Milic who was never mentioned, whose existence most of the Partisans had forgotten. 'How's it going, Hartmann?' he called out. 'Plane's due soon now, isn't it?'

'The airstrip is level, my friend,' the German replied. 'As level as it ever will be. And yes, the Dakota should arrive any moment if it's on time.'

'If it ever finds us, you mean.'

'Surely you have faith in the RAF?' Hartmann spoke jocularly, realizing what the walk was costing Lindsay. He deliberately made no attempt to help the Englishman: Lindsay wouldn't welcome being treated as a cripple. 'He will come in from the south, so that is the direction we should watch…'

'I'm as nervous as a girl about to have her first baby,' Paco said. 'Isn't it ridiculous?'

'We're all a bit on edge,' Lindsay reassured her as he halted and lifted a hand to scan the sky.

Was it old instincts returning? A throwback to the days when, behind the controls of a Spitfire over the glorious green fields of Kent, he had learned to look everywhere. Constantly…'

He looked to the south, as Hartmann had suggested, then continued searching the sky slowly in a three-sixty degree radius. Not a cloud anywhere. Incredible after yesterday's snow. The jagged peaks of mountains silhouetted against the blue. Nothing to the east. East-north-east. Nothing. He turned slowly, circumscribing the points of the compass. He had always been noted for his exceptional far-sighted vision. Soon he would be facing due north. He turned through a few more degrees. Oh, my God! No!

'All aboard for the Clipper! See it coming over that ridge – there, to the south…'

It was Reader joining them with his transceiver carried inside his back-pack. He had been to the high point of the plateau, attempting a last-minute contact. The elevation had given him the first sighting of the approaching Dakota.

'Look to the north, you stupid sods!' shouted Lindsay. 'The Germans are coming – a whole armada of troop transports…'

Aboard the Dakota Conway was hammering his clenched fist on his lap with excitement. He smashed a hole in the map.

'There's the plateau! There's the marker – the Communist star, five-pointed, laid out with rocks. God, there's not a helluva lot of margin for error…'

'Calm down, man,' Murray-Smith reprimanded. 'I can land this on a bee's bum…'

'And that's about what it is!'

Conway snatched up a pair of field-glasses and focused on the tiny figures staring up towards the Dakota. One of them waved a stick with one hand, elevated the other in the thumbs-up sign. Then he began gesturing madly with the stick.

'I think that's Lindsay down there, the one with the stick. He's waving the thing about like a lunatic. Understandable, I suppose…'

'Considering the whole bloody Luftwaffe is coming in from the north, it is understandable,' said Murray-Smith in a tone of biting sarcasm. 'We're much closer, we might just make it.

'God Almighty…'

For the first time Conway saw what Murray-Smith had spotted seconds earlier. A fleet of dark blips growing larger as he watched them. Jerry troop transports. At a fairish height. Well spread out and stepped in layers, no one aircraft above another.