Hammond Innes - Attack Alarm

I went over to where he lay, groaning and muttering to himself. And as I stared down at him, I knew I was right. He was the workman who must have planted that incriminating diagram in my pay-book. ‘Well, serve him right,’ I thought. And I was just turning away when I heard his lips mumble; ‘It won’t hurt you if you splash water over it.’

Some childhood memory of playing boats. But because it was spoken in German and not with the slight Scottish accent I had last heard him using, it drew my interest. And I bent down to listen, remembering how Elaine’s sleep babbling could have told me something. But it was partly gibberish, partly childhood memories that he mumbled. It was all in German and occasionally he got a word wrong or mispronounced it. If he were a German, and that seemed probable as he would surely babble his own language in his delirium, it seemed reasonable to suppose that it was a long time since he had been in Germany.

I bent closer. ‘I’m sorry you won’t be with us for the day.’ I spoke in German. It seemed funny to be speaking of der Tag in another way. He showed no sign of having heard. I shook him and repeated my statement.

His eyes remained wide, unseeing and expressionless. But apparently my voice made contact with his subconscious, for he murmured: I’m all right. I shall be there. I’m to drive one of the lorries.’ He tried to raise himself, his eyes sightless. ‘It’ll be all right, won’t it? Say it will be all right.’

‘But you won’t remember what day it is,’ I suggested, still speaking in German.

‘Yes, I will.’ He mumbled so that I could scarcely hear him.

‘I don’t think so,’ I said. ‘You don’t remember the day now.’

‘Yes, I do. Yes, I do. It’s — it’s — ” He struggled desperately with his memory. ‘It’s — I pick the stuff up at Cold Harbour on-“

His moment of lucidity seemed suddenly to vanish. The sweat poured down his ashen face with the effort he had made. He relapsed into the uncouth babblings of his delirium. But I scarcely noticed it. My mind had grasped avidly at the vital point. Cold Harbour! Elaine had talked of a Cold Harbour Farm in her sleep. Cold Harbour was not a very common name.

I was excited. I began trying to draw him again. And when that failed I tried direct questions. But I could get no sense out of him though I shook the poor devil till the sweat turned the blood to water on his face with the pain of it.

In the end I had to give it up. I got back into the car and drove it across to where I had first found it. Langdon’s bike was still there, I was just mounting it when a lance-corporal dashed up and caught me by the arm. ‘What the devil were you doing with that car?’

I had just started to explain when a brass hat with red tabs all over him came panting up. I saluted. ‘What’s all this?’ he demanded. ‘My car. You took my car. Why?’

I told him,

‘That’s no excuse. Monstrous behaviour! Name and unit? Make a note of it, Corporal.’ And with a snort he disappeared inside the car. He was in a hurry to get off.

I rode back to the site. They were all in the pit. Nobody spoke. They were all watching the sky. They looked strained, terribly strained. I realised that my shirt was sticking to me. The air throbbed with the heat. I took my helmet off to wipe the sweat from inside it with my handkerchief. ‘Where’s Micky?’ I asked. Kan was at the firing position.

‘He’s not feeling very bright,’ Langdon said charitably. ‘He’s gone to the shelter at the dispersal point over there.’

‘Not very bright!’ said Bombardier Hood. ‘He’s scared out of his wits. Can’t take it.’

‘Well, we’re none of us feeling very brave,’ said Langdon.

Mason suddenly arrived on a bike. He was the only link with Gun Ops., the telephone having been hit. But I didn’t hear the plot he gave Langdon. I was staring at my steel helmet. There was a scarred dent on the back of it. On the back of it! And I was remembering just where I had been standing and which way I had been facing when that bullet had ricocheted off my helmet. And a cold shiver tingled up my spine as I remembered that I had been facing the field and all the planes had passed in front of me or over the pit. None had passed behind me. Yet the dent was on the back of my tin hat. I hadn’t taken it off until this moment, so that I knew I had not had it on back to front. Besides, I remembered how my head had been jerked forward.

Somebody had fired at me from behind! And into my mind came a picture of the surprised look on Vayle’s face as I had passed him in the hangar.

I was scared. More scared than I had ever been in my life. I could stand up to bombing. I knew that now. There was something impersonal about being bombed — about war altogether. It was not a direct attack. The bomber was not trying for me personally. My life was in the hands of fate — always such a comforting thought. One took one’s chance, and there was nothing one could do about it.

But this! This was totally different. There was nothing impersonal about an attempt to shoot one in the back. It wasn’t just a random shot into the pit by some fanatical fifth columnist, I knew that. I had been the specific target. This was murder, not war. I could face machine-gun bullets — again an impersonal attack. But a deliberate attempt on my life made my scalp crawl with fear. I did not take my chance with others. There was no comfortable feeling that my life rested in the hands of a kindly fate. I had to face this alone. I was under sentence of death at Vayle’s orders. And I knew now why surprise had for a moment ousted the grief from his face when, standing beside Elaine’s body, he had looked up to see me in the hangar.

I suppose I must have looked pretty scared, for John Langdon put his hand on my shoulder. ‘It was nice of you to tow that bomb for me,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t have done it. I had expended what little nerve I had on tying the rope to the bloody thing.’

His remark had the desired effect and, momentarily detached, I watched my ego warm to that kindly praise. It amused me, too, to think that my own fear was a particular and personal one. Everyone else in the pit was scared of one thing — a further attack on the ‘drome. And I didn’t give a damn about that. I was scared because I was singled out for a murderous personal attack. And because their fear seemed trivial by comparison with mine, I experienced a sudden access of confidence. Their hostility seemed unimportant now, and I felt quite equal to any questioning.

But there was no hostility and no questioning. I had known what was going to happen, but I had stayed on the site. That and the business with the bomb put me right in their eyes. But Westley — poor little man, who had eventually obtained compassionate leave to attend his grandmother’s funeral and had left early in the morning, came in for a good deal of discussion.

The ‘planes came back in ones and twos to land as best they could on the pitted ‘drome. The glare of the day wore slowly on. Time lagged in the heat. Exposed though we were, there wasn’t a breath of wind and the drought-baked earth was hot to the touch. Anxiety and impatience combined with fear to nag at my tired mind. Would this interminable alarm never end? I wanted to find out what had happened to Marion — to see that she was all right. And John Nightingale hadn’t come in. The All Clear had gone on the Tannoy soon after the alarm. But we had been kept at our posts. They were no doubt windy, as Langdon said.

Ogilvie came round in his car with chocolate, cigarettes and beer scrounged from the ruins of the Naafi. For once quite human, he stayed and chatted, apologising for keeping us standing-to.