Hammond Innes: Attack Alarm

‘Right.’ Vaguely his form loomed up out of the grass as he scrambled to his feet and started back up the slope.

‘What about the armoured car over by Station H.Q.?’ said Hood. ‘It’s just the thing for this job.’

‘You’re right. When you’ve done that, Helson,’ Langdon called after him, ‘go down to Station H.Q. and rout out the R.A. lads who run that armoured car. Bring it back here.’

‘O.K.’ He disappeared from sight, merging into the shadow of the hillside.

‘They’re getting a Bern gun out,’ Hood said, and his rifle cracked. One of the men, who had appeared on the tailboard again, ducked. I raised my rifle and fired. I had the satisfaction of seeing his legs give under him. But he still continued to hand down first two guns and then four boxes of ammunition. I fired again at the men on the ground. Fire crackled out along the hillside once more. But they got the two guns into cover behind the lorry.

‘Hold your fire!’ Langdon yelled.

There was no alternative. Everyone’s ammunition was getting very low. We had to keep some reserve until reinforcements came up.

Langdon nudged my arm. The Guards are coming up along the wire. See?’ Two men were running along the wire with bayonets fixed and others were moving along the slope of the hill in extended formation.

I suddenly felt sorry for the poor devils behind the lorry. They were doing their job as they saw it, just as we were doing ours — and they hadn’t a hope, unless the time fixed for the landing was very near indeed. The sky was perceptibly lightening. I glanced at my watch. It was nearly four-twenty. I began to feel anxious. There were those other three lorries. So far we had done nothing about them. And though the cylinders which had been carried out along the barbed wire to the south of us were useless, this lorry could still contribute to the smoke screen with the cylinders that had not yet been removed from it.

‘We must do something about those other lorries,’ I said to Langdon.

‘Yes, but what?’ he replied. ‘The armoured car is the only thing that will fix them.’

‘But that may be too late.’

‘Yes, but what the hell can we do? We’ll have to wait for that.’

The paling night had become quiet again. It seemed like the lull before the storm. How long would this quiet last? I had a vision of those big Ju 52s coming in through the smoke, disgorging their hordes of field grey. Two a minute, we had been told, was the speed at which they could land. Something had to be done.

The quiet was shattered by the ugly clatter of a Bren gun. The fire was not directed at us, but at the line of Guards advancing along the slope.

In a flash inspiration came to me. ‘My God!’ I said to Langdon. ‘The Bofors. Number Five Pit has a field of fire right down the slope. It should be possible to bring it to bear on one of the lorries at any rate.’

‘You’re right, by God,’ he said. ‘Take charge, will you, Hood. Hanson and I are going up to Number Five pit.’

‘Wait,’ Hood said. We checked, half standing. ‘Christ! He’ll never make it.’ Hood’s voice was a tone higher than usual in his excitement.

We both crouched, breathless. I felt a horrible sick sensation inside me. At any moment I expected that small figure to double up and pitch headlong down the slope.

It was Micky. He had jumped to his feet and was running like a mad thing. His rifle, complete with bayonet, was slung across his shoulders. ‘What the hell is the fool up to?’ I muttered.

The Bren gun was chattering away. But its fire was still concentrated on the advancing Guards. Apparently they saw Micky too late, for when they checked their fire in order to train their gun on to him, he was already at the foot of the steep part of the slope and within some thirty yards of the lorry. He suddenly stopped and swung his right arm back. For an instant he stood poised like a javelin thrower. Then his arm came forward and a small object curved lazily through the air. At the same instant the Bren gun set up its rat-a-tat again, and Micky checked and staggered.

I lost sight of the Mills bomb he had thrown. But it must have been well aimed, for he had barely fallen to the hail of bullets that bit into the turf all round him, when there was a sudden flash beneath the lorry, followed by the sound of an explosion; not loud, but sharp. The lorry rocked slightly and several pieces of wood were flung into the air.

Complete silence followed the explosion. Then quietly, menacingly, smoke began to rise out of the back of the lorry. At first I thought it must be on fire. But the stuff began to pour out in a great cloud, thick and black like funnel smoke. Then I knew that the smoke cylinders had been hit.

Micky was on his feet again now and running rather jerkily towards the lorry. He made it just as one of the Bren gunners staggered out from behind it. Micky had unslung his rifle. The fellow tried to dive back into the lorry. But Micky was on him before he could turn. I saw a flash of steel in the moonlight and the man fell, pinned to the ground by the force of Micky’s lunge. The last I saw of Micky as the smoke enveloped the lorry, he was struggling to get his bayonet out of the poor wretch.

The smoke lay close to the ground like a thick amorphous blanket, gathering volume with every second. In an instant the lorry was lost to sight as the breeze rolled the smoke up the slope towards us.

‘Come on,’ said Langdon. ‘Let’s get to the Bofors.’

We scrambled up the slope and struck northwards along the brow of the hill. As we ran I asked Langdon what had made the fellow he had spoken to produce a gun. ‘He said he was acting under instructions from Winton,’ Langdon replied. They were going to test smoke as a means of defending the ‘drome against heavy air attacks. I asked to see his instructions. When he said that they were given to him verbally, I told him he would have to get the cylinders back into the lorry and return to Station H.Q. for written instructions. We argued for a bit, and when I made it clear that I suspected him and that I was determined to prevent the cylinders from being set off, he showed his hand.’

We were now in sight of Number Five pit. The slender barrel of the Bofors showed above the sandbagged parapet. Tin-hatted figures were moving about inside the pit and other members of the team were standing about outside their hut, fully dressed. The pit was perched just on the brow of the hill. One of the lorries was almost directly below it and another was just visible about seven hundred yards farther north along the wire.

When we arrived at the pit the sergeant in charge was at the ‘phone. We were challenged, but the guard recognised Langdon and let us enter the pit.

‘Sergeant Guest.’ Langdon’s interruption was met by a silencing wave of the hand. Langdon went over to the fellow and tapped him on the shoulder.

The sergeant turned impatiently. ‘Keep quiet,’ he said. This is important. They’re expecting an invasion at dawn.’

‘I know, I know,’ Langdon said. ‘It’s one of my fellows reporting to Gun Ops. Put that ‘phone down and listen a minute.’

Guest handed the receiver to his bombardier. ‘What do you mean — one of your fellows? What’s happening? There’s been firing — ‘

That was us,’ Langdon interrupted. Briefly he outlined the situation.

When he came to the point of our visit — that the Bofors should open fire on the two R.A.F. lorries visible from the pit, Sergeant Guest said: ‘I can’t very well do that without an officer’s permission. I mean, how am I to know that they aren’t really R.A.F. lorries?’

‘Well, get your men on to tearing down the sandbags so that we can lay on the lorries while we talk the matter over,’ Langdon said.