Soldier No More

The urgency of the whole procedure, rather than the idea behind it, threw him out of the vehicle. While he was still straightening up, before he could turn to slam the door, he dummy5

heard it snap shut behind him—his last impression had been of Galles reaching across after him—and the truck was moving again. He stopped thinking about it instantly, and concentrated only on making himself scarce in a few yards of ground which he had seen only once before in daylight, and never studied with that aim in view.

But Galles had known it well enough, and had allowed for that: the Tower was fifty yards away down the track, and the cottage itself another fifty or more, both in the open and too far off to be worth a second glance. But the blackberry tangle was thick and in full leaf.

Three strides forward and two—three—sideways carried him away and down from sight of the road, into the long grass behind it, in automatic obedience to instructions.

He held his breath, and for a moment heard the blood pounding in his ears . . . and then exhaled slowly . . . and heard only the already distant sound of the Citroen's engine fading into the trees down the road, halfway to the Chateau Peyrony already.

There was no other sound—no other sound within miles, by the absence of sound—least of all a bloody motor- cycle making up for lost time!

Roche counted off his heart-beats, through another minute, while regaining his breath. During the minute a sound did register . . . of a dog barking far away, angry at something—

something which was most likely a grey garagiste Citroen being driven too fast, with imaginary motor-cyclists in hot dummy5

pursuit.

He sat up behind the blackberry bush, feeling more angry with himself than with Galles—if they'd given him a superannuated old fool, living in the past on memories of outsmarting the Gestapo and the Milice, then what else could he expect? He could only hope that Audley and his cronies hadn't witnessed the whole charade.

Still no sound. He rose to his feet and brushed himself down irritably, observing that he had scuffed the knees of his clean slacks with grass stains.

Not a whisper of sound. The road was clear, and the woods on the other side of it dark and empty with that peculiar evening stillness which always presaged the awakening of the night-hunting creatures.

He sighed, and picked up the brief-case. Because of the Frenchman's imagination he had another hour to kill— and an unnecessary hour too, in Audley's awkward company . . .

and Audley, being Audley, would surely want to have a look inside the case!

Well... he could kill that idea stone-dead by pulling rank—

captain now, but major-to-be—because as yet Audley had no rank, he was still just a bloody civilian, nothing more.

He smiled to himself as he set off down the track. Not major-to-be, but major-never-to-be, thank God!

Also, the cottage was as dark as the Tower, even though Audley's ugly black Morris Cowley was parked outside it.

dummy5

With just a bit of luck, the man would be busy making his farewells to Madame Peyrony and the girls down the road, and he wouldn't have to bother with him at all. He would leave him high and dry, in the middle of another great British intelligence disaster—that would be good training for him, if it didn't put him off altogether—

The sound of the motor-cycle engine shattered his rosy dream into fragments.

It swung him round in disbelief, like a hand on his shoulder, and the dream-fragments flew together again into nightmare as he saw men behind him on the road, which had been empty a few seconds before—

The disbelief and the nightmare became real instantaneously as the sight-line between them met, and they saw that he had seen them.

He was right alongside the Tower, where the stone steps leading up to the door met the track, and the door itself—the heavy oak door—stood invitingly ajar, offering him protection as nothing else did, beyond any second thought.

His feet took off, every muscle and sinew springing them so that he hit the door with his shoulder to burst it inwards as though it had been closed against it—

The door crashed back into darkness— not quite darkness, but yellow light— faces and people and yellow light and darkness, which registered for an instant, utterly confused, dummy5

and then exploded into a chaos of ear-splitting noise— and he was falling into the chaos, with something soft under him

—

—yellow light flared up, screaming at him— and the thing under him was no longer soft, it was insanely alive, with its sharp nails raking his face across forehead and cheek, and nails then turning into fingers grabbing at his throat—

— the light and the noises meant nothing any more— the fingers were digging into him, sickening him with unexpected pain—

— he swept them aside— they were feeble, compared with his pain— and caught his own fingers into hair, twining them in it as he smashed the thing now in his hands on to the floor again and again— again and again and again— until there was a different feel about it, and the pain had gone from his neck, and what was under him was soft and boneless again