Alistair Maclean - The guns of Navaronne

«But you would let him down,» Louki said quietly. «Is that it, Major Mallory?»

«What the devil do you mean?»

«By not doing as he wishes. He may be hurt, killed even, and if you go after him and are killed too, that makes it all useless. He would die for nothing. Is it thus you would repay your friend?»

«All right, all right, you win,» Mallory said irritably.

«That is how Andrea would want it,» Louki murmured. «Any other way you would be—»

«Stop preaching at me! Right, gentlemen, let's be on our way.» He was back on balance again, easy, relaxed, the primeval urge to go out and kill well under control. «We'll take the high road — over the roofs. Dig into that kitchen stove there, rub the ashes all over your hands and faces. See that there's nothing white on you anywhere. And no talking!»

The five-minute journey down to the harbour wall — a journey made in soft-footed silence with Mallory hushing even the beginnings of a whisper — was quite uneventful. 'Not only did they see no soldiers, they saw no one at all. The inhabitants of Navarone were wisely observing the curfew, and the streets were completely deserted. Andrea had drawn off pursuit with a vengeance. Mallory began to fear that the Germans had taken him, but just as they reached the water's edge he heard the gun-fire again, a good deal farther away this time, in the very north-east corner of the town, round the back of the fortress.

Mallory stood on the low wail above the harbour, looked at his companions, gazed out over the dark oiliness of the water. Through the heavy rain he could just distinguish, to his right and left, the vague blurs of caiques moored stern on to the wall. Beyond that he could see nothing.

«Well, I don't suppose we can get much wetter than we are right now,» he observed. He turned to Louki, checked something the little man was trying to say about Andrea. «You sure you can find it all right in the darkness?» «It» was the commandant's personal launch, a thirty-six-foot ten-tonner always kept moored to a buoy a hundred feet offshore. The engineer, who doubled as guard, slept aboard, Louki had said.

«I am already there,» Louki boasted. «Blindfold me as you will and I—»

«All right, all right,» Mallory said hastily. «I'll take your word for it. Lend me your hat, will you, Casey?» He jammed the automatic into the crown of the hat, pulled it firmly on to his head, slid gently into the water and struck out by Louki's side.

«The engineer,» Louki said softly. «I think he will be awake, Major.»

«I think so, too,» Mallory said grimly. Again there came the chatter of machine-carbines, the deeper whiplash of a Mauser. «So will everyone else in Navarone, unless they're deaf or dead. Drop behind as soon as we see the boat. Come when I call.»

Ten seconds, fifteen passed, then Louki touched Mallory on the arm.

«I see it,» Mallory whispered. The blurred silhouette was less than fifteen yards away. He approached silently, neither legs nor arms breaking water, until he saw the vague shape of a man standing on the poop, just aft of the engine-room hatchway. He was immobile, staring out in the direction of the fortress and the upper town: Mallory slowly circled round the stern of the boat and came up behind him, on the other side. Carefully he removed his hat, took out the gun, caught the low gunwale with his left hand. At the range of seven feet he knew he couldn't possibly miss, but he couldn't shoot the man, not then. The guard-rails were token affairs only, eighteen inches high at the most, and the splash of the man falling into the water would almost certainly alert the guards at the harbour mouth emplacements.

«If you move I will kill you!» Mallory said softly in German. The man stiffened. He had a carbine in his hand, Mallory saw.

«Put the gun down. Don't turn round.» Again the man obeyed, and Mallory was out of the water and on to the deck, in seconds, neither eye nor automatic straying from the man's back. He stepped softly forward, reversed the automatic, struck, caught the man before he could fall overboard and lowered him quietly to the deck. Three minutes later all the others were safely aboard.

Mallory followed the limping Brown down to the engine-room, watched him as he switched on his hooded torch, looked around with a professional eye, looked at the big, gleaming, six-cylinder in line Diesel engine.

«This,» said Brown reverently, «is an engine. What a beauty! Operates on any number of cylinders you like. I know the type, sir.»

«I never doubted but you would. Can you start her up, Casey?»

«Just a minute till I have a look round, sir.» Brown had all the unhurried patience of the born engineer. Slowly, methodically, he played the spotlight round the immaculate interior of the engine-room, switched on the fuel and turned to Mallory. «A dual control job, sir. We can take her from up top.»

He carried out the same painstaking inspection in the wheel-house, while Mallory waited impatiently. The rain was easing off now, not much, but sufficiently to let him see the vague outlines of the harbour entrance. He wondered for the tenth time if the guards there had been alerted against the possibility of an attempted escape by boat. It seemed unlikely — from the racket Andrea was making, the Germans would think that escape was the last thing in their minds. … He leaned forward, touched Brown on the shoulder.

«Twenty past eleven, Casey,» he murmured. «If these destroyers come through early we're apt to have a thousand tons of rock falling on our heads.»

«Ready now, sir,» Brown announced. He gestured at the crowded dashboard beneath the screen. «Nothing to it really.»

«I'm glad you think so,» Mallory murmured fervently. «Start her moving, will you? Just keep it slow and easy.»

Brown coughed apologetically. «We're still moored to the buoy. And it might be a good thing, sir, if we checked on the fixed guns, searchlights, signalling lamps, life-jackets and buoys. It's useful to know where these things are,» he finished deprecatorily.

Mallory laughed softly, clapped him on the shoulder.

«You'd make a great diplomat, Chief. We'll do that» A landsman first and last, Mallory was none the less aware of the gulf that stretched between him and a man like Brown, made no bones about acknowledging it to himself. «Will you take her out, Casey?»

«Right, sir. Would you ask Louki to come here — I think it's steep to both sides, but there may be snags or reefs. You never know.»

Three minutes later the launch was half-way to the harbour mouth, purring along softly on two cylinders, Mallory and Miller, still clad in German uniform, standing on the deck for'ard of the wheelhouse, Louki crouched low inside the wheelhouse itself. Suddenly, about sixty yards away, a signal lamp began to flash at them, its urgent clacking quite audible in the stillness of the night

«Dan'l Boone Miller will now show how it's done,» Miller muttered. He edged closer to the machine-gun on the starboard bow. «With my little gun. I shall …»

He broke off sharply, his voice lost in the sudden clacking from the wheelhouse behind him, the staccato off-beat chattering of a signal shutter triggered by professional fingers. Brown had handed the wheel over to Louki, was morsing back to the harbour entrance, the cold rain lancing palely through the ifickering beams of the lamp. The enemy lamp had stopped but now began flashing again..

«My, they got a lot to say to each other,» Miller said admiringly. «How long do the exchange of courtesies last, boss?»

«I should say they are just about finished.» Mallory moved back quickly to the wheelhouse. They were less than a hundred feet from the harbour entrance. Brown had confused the enemy, gained precious seconds, more time than Mallory had ever thought they could gain. But it couldn't last. He touched Brown on the arm.