Partisans. Alistair MacLean
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hundred metres, which is an excellent way of ensuring that no-one gets out of that plane alive.’ Petersen tapped the envelope. ‘That way the message never gets delivered. So I go by boat. When?’
‘Tomorrow night.’
‘Where?’
‘A little fishing village near Termoli.’
‘What kind of boat?’
‘You do ask a lot of questions.’
‘It’s my neck.’ Petersen shrugged his indifference. ‘If your travel arrangements don’t suit me, I’ll make my own.’
‘It wouldn’t be the first time you’d borrowed shall we say, a boat from your—ah—allies?’
‘Only in the best interests of all.’
‘Of course. An Italian torpedo boat.’
‘You can hear one of those things twenty kilometres away.’
‘So? You’ll be landing near Ploče. That’s in Italian hands, as you know. And even if you could be heard fifty kilometres away, what’s the difference? The Partisans have no radar, no planes, no navy, nothing that could stop you.’
‘So the Adriatic is your pond. The torpedo boat it is.’
‘Thank you. I forgot to mention that you’ll be having some company on the trip across.’
‘You didn’t forget. You just saved it for last.’ Petersen refilled their glasses and looked consideringly at Lunz. ‘I’m not sure that I care for this. You know I like to travel alone.’
‘I know you never travel alone.’
‘Ah! George and Alex. You know them, then?’
‘They’re hardly invisible. They attract attention—they have that look about them.’
‘What look?’
‘Hired killers.’
‘You’re half right. They’re different. My insurance policy—they watch my back. I’m not complaining, but people are always spying on me.’
‘An occupational hazard.’ Lunz’s airily dismissive gesture showed what he thought of occupational hazards. ‘I would be grateful if you would allow those two people I have in mind to accompany you. More, I would regard it as a personal favour if you would escort them to their destination.’
‘What destination?’
‘Same as yours.’
‘Who are they?’
‘Two radio operator recruits for your Četniks. Carrying with them, I may say, the very latest in transceiver equipment.’
‘That’s not enough, and you know it. Names, background.’
‘Sarina and Michael. Trained—highly trained, I might say—by the British in Alexandria. With the sole intent of doing what they are about to do—joining your friends. Let us say that we intercepted them en route.’
‘What else? Male and female, no?’
‘Yes.’
‘No.’
‘No what?’
‘I’m a fairly busy person. I don’t like being encumbered and I’ve no intention of acting as a shipborne chaperon.’
‘Brother and sister.’
‘Ah.’ Petersen said. ‘Fellow citizens?’
‘Of course.’
‘Then why can’t they find their own way home?’
‘Because they haven’t been home for three years. Educated in Cairo.’ Again the wave of a hand. ‘Troubled times in your country, my friend. Germans here, Italians there, Ustaša, Četniks, Partisans everywhere. All very confusing. You know your way around your country in these difficult times. Better than any, I’m told.’
‘I don’t get lost much.’ Petersen stood. ’I’d have to see them first, of course.’
‘I would have expected nothing else.’ Lunz drained his glass, rose and glanced at his watch. ‘I’ll be back in forty minutes.’
George answered Petersen’s knock. Despite Lunz’s unflattering description George didn’t look a bit like a killer, hired or otherwise: genial buffoons, or those who look like them, never do. With a pudgy, jovial face crowned by a tangled thatch of grey-black hair, George, on the wrong side of fifty, was immense—immensely fat, that was: the studded belt strung tightly around what used to be his waist served only to emphasize rather than conceal his gargantuan paunch. He closed the door behind Petersen and crossed to the left-hand wall: like many very heavy men, as is so often seen in the case of overweight dancers, he was quick and light on his feet. He removed from the plaster a rubber suction cap with a central spike which was attached by a wire to a transformer and thence to a single earphone.
‘Your friend seems to be a very pleasant man.’ George sounded genuinely regretful. ‘Pity we have to be on opposite sides.’ He looked at the envelope Petersen had brought. ‘Aha! Operational orders, no?’
‘Yes. Hotfoot, you might say, from the presence of Colonel General von Löhr himself.’ Petersen turned to the recumbent figure on one of the two narrow beds. ‘Alex?’
Alex rose. Unlike George, he had no welcoming smile but that meant nothing, for Alex never smiled. He was of a height with George but there any resemblance ended. His weight was about half George’s as were his years: he was thin-faced, swarthy and had black watchful eyes which rarely blinked. Wordlessly, for his taciturnity was almost on a par with the stillness of his face, he took the envelope, dug into a knapsack, brought out a small butane burner and an almost equally small kettle, and began to make steam. Two or three minutes later Petersen extracted two sheets of paper from the opened envelope and studied the contents carefully. When he had finished he looked up and regarded the two men thoughtfully.
‘This will be of great interest to a great number of people. It may be the depths of winter but things look like becoming very hot in the Bosnian hills in the very near future.’
George said: ‘Code?’
‘Yes. Simple. I made sure of that when I made it up. If the Germans never meant business before, they certainly mean it now. Seven divisions, no less. Four German, under General Lütters, whom we know, and three Italian under General Gloria, whom we also know. Supported by the Ustaša and, of course, the Četniks. Somewhere between ninety thousand and a hundred thousand troops.’
George shook his head. ‘So many?’
‘According to this. It’s common knowledge of course that the Partisans are stationed in and around Bihać. The Germans are to attack from the north and east, the Italians from south and west. The battle plan, God knows, is simple enough. The Partisans are to be totally encircled and then wiped out to a man. Simple, but comprehensive. And just to make certain, both the Italians and Germans are bringing in squadrons of bomber and fighter planes.’
‘And the Partisans haven’t got a single plane.’
‘Even worse for them they don’t have antiaircraft guns. Well, a handful, but they should be in a museum.’ Petersen replaced the sheets and re-sealed the envelope. ‘I have to go out in fifteen minutes. Colonel Lunz is coming to take me to meet a couple of people I don’t particularly want to meet, two radio operator Četnik recruits who have to have their hands held until we get to Montenegro or wherever.’
‘Or so Colonel Lunz says.’ Suspicion was one of the few expressions that Alex ever permitted himself.
‘Or so he says. Which is why I want you two to go out as well. Not with me, of course—behind me.’
‘A little night air will do us good. These hotel rooms get very stuffy.’ George was