Blood of Honour

the approaching men had not seen or heard anything untoward; the noise of cicadas was evidently proving a good distraction.

Three men. Cretans, not soldiers, but carrying rifles, creeping forward, and past him, but then something made one turn. Balthasar knew that feeling – a sixth sense that something else was there. It was, however, the last movement the man made because, in that moment, Balthasar plunged forward with his rifle, the twenty-three-centimetre blade of his Gebrheller bayonet glinting in the gloom, and thrust it into the man’s chest. A gasp, and the Cretan fell backwards, but already Balthasar had pulled out the blade and swung the rifle into the side of the next man’s head, knocking him sideways. The third tried to run, but he was startled and scared and within a few steps Balthasar had caught up and had stuck the blade through his back. He fell forward with a cry, and Balthasar punched down with the bayonet again. The second man was groaning on the ground, and Balthasar kicked him hard in the side, rolled him over and then, placing the tip of the bayonet over the man’s heart, pressed downwards. Quickly, he wiped his blade on his victim’s side, then signalled to his men to continue forward. Surprise. It was such a good weapon, and now there were three less enemy to worry about.

He moved forward again, through another olive grove, this time so dense the branches were touching one another so that he had to crouch to get through. At its edge he paused again and glanced to either side of him. Yes, there were his men, ready. In front of him was a small, rough field, a donkey standing in one corner. Dogs began barking to his left. Up ahead, the first houses, mostly white with flat roofs, although some were pitched, with terracotta tiles. They stretched away towards the walls alongside rough dirt roads. Balthasar looked at his watch: 1948. Two minutes.

He moved to his right, hurrying deftly between the trees, past men clutching rifles, until he reached Schulz.

‘Ready, Oberleutnant?’ said Schulz. Above, stars were beginning to twinkle.

‘Yes, Herr Major,’ said Balthasar. He could now see the walls clearly and a few men on top. Bringing his rifle into his shoulder, he aimed carefully, training his sights on one particular man, a Greek soldier, his helmeted head silhouetted against the fading sky.

Schulz looked at his watch. ‘All right, Balthasar,’ he said. ‘Let us begin.’

Balthasar felt strangely calm. His heart rate had lowered, his breathing was steady. This was what he was trained to do; in truth, it was what he enjoyed doing – the thrill of the fight, the euphoria of action. His target was, he guessed, ninety metres away, moving slowly. Balthasar steadied himself, waited for the man to stop moving, then squeezed the trigger.

The crack of the shot rang in his ears, but his aim had been good. Atop the walls the man crumpled, and now there was more rifle fire, a deafening fusillade. In moments, the night had come alive, and men were running forward, towards the houses, bursts of sub-machine-guns and return rifle fire filling the air. Balthasar was now beside Schulz, hurrying through the olive grove away from the main gate.

Balthasar had been half expecting enemy troops to be dug in around the edge of the town, but there appeared to be no one. The only return shots were coming from the walls and the houses in front. Good. As he was now up ahead he could see the crumbling walls and their point of attack. He took a couple of deep breaths, nodded to Schulz, then sprinted across a short stretch of open ground. Bullets spat around him, but he reached the wall around the first house unscathed. Others followed. He saw one man fall, but the rest were making the crossing safely. Moving off again, he hurried forward, using the darkening shadows for cover. There would be enemy in the houses, he knew, but he had told his men to ignore them as much as possible – to keep within the shadows, and to move swiftly to the walls. Shots rang out nearby and he heard the ricochet of a bullet. Forward he went, and then he was at the walls.

Slinging his rifle across his back, he swung his MP40 to his front, and pulled back the cocking handle ready. A large part of the wall had collapsed – the stone had evidently been taken away, reused, he supposed, so that now there was no more than a three-metre climb. Opposite, on the other side of the road, a building extended from the walls and it occurred to him that it might be possible to work their way through that and into the town. Other men had now joined him. He signalled to several to start climbing the walls, then saw Obergefreiter Mohne hurrying from the shadows.

‘Mohne!’ he hissed. ‘With me!’ He scurried across the street as several shots rang out from the windows above. Pressing himself against the wall between the window and the doorway, he took out a grenade, unscrewed the cap, dropped it beside the doorway and moved away. A blast, and then he stepped out in front of it, kicked open the shattered wood and, opening fire, ran inside. Without pause he raced through the smoke. Ahead, a set of wide stone stairs. He sped up, vaguely conscious of men following and further gunfire. Reaching the first floor, he stretched out his arms and fired another burst, then scrambled onto the landing and pounded up a second flight of stone stairs.

Men behind him, and now men ahead – Greek soldiers – coming down the stairs. Another burst, and two enemy tumbled down towards him. Were there others? Jumping over the dead men, Balthasar continued up. Then, at the top, he took out another grenade, unscrewed the cap, counted to three, and lobbed it onto the next landing. A second later the grenade exploded, the sound deafening in the confines of the stone walls so that Balthasar’s ears rang. Springing onto the landing he fired again into the swirling cloud of dust and smoke, kicked open a door and fired. A pistol shot rang out but the bullet whizzed harmlessly past his head, and now one of his men was spraying the room with bullets. A cry and another man collapsed to the ground. Balthasar saw that the room was otherwise empty. An officer, he thought as he hurried past the dead man and over to one of the two large windows.

Quickly he pulled out his magazine and replaced it, then cautiously peered through one of the windows. Below was the street and the gap in the walls. Men were clambering up but he saw two hit and tumble backwards. Where was the firing coming from? A muzzle flash from a building within the walls. Unslinging his rifle, he aimed at a dark window and fired.

‘Quick!’ he called. ‘Get some covering fire up here!’

Unteroffizier Rohde was now beside him. ‘The building is secure, Herr Oberleutnant,’ he said.

‘Good,’ said Balthasar. ‘Now order some men up here. Where’s the MG? Get Mohne.’

One of the other men called to Mohne, who appeared a moment later with a private, Schutze Meier, in tow, clasping an ammunition box.

‘Get to the window, quick!’ ordered Rohde.

Balthasar turned to him. ‘We need to find a way into the walls.’

‘I think maybe on the floor below,’ said Rohde. ‘There is a door cut into a deep recess.’

Balthasar nodded as Mohne opened fire, the room quickly filling with the sharp stench of cordite. More men came into the room. ‘Show me,’ he mouthed above the din. Rohde led him downstairs and into a similar-sized room below. At the far end was the recess, a good metre deep, at the end of which was a wooden door.

‘This has to lead into the town,’ he said. He called more men to him, and they stood back as another grenade blasted open the thick oak door. The smoke and the shock of the explosion were an advantage when storming through a building such as this. Rohde fired blindly past the splintered wood, then hurried through, Balthasar following, holding his breath. They were in a narrow stone corridor, but Balthasar now saw a rectangular opening at the far end. Only an iron gate barred their way, but Rohde tried the handle and discovered it was not locked. Beyond, a flight of stone steps descended at a right angle to the street. Rohde glanced at Balthasar, his face taut.

‘Out of the way,’ said Balthasar. ‘I’ll go first. Cover me.’

Pressing himself against the wall, he peered through the gate. Outside, he could hear fighting but the street opposite looked quiet. His heart had quickened again, but he pushed open the gate, then stepped out and ran down the steps, his body tense, waiting for a bullet to smack into him. But it did not come, and he was able to cross the street undetected, then signal to the others to follow.

As a dozen men, one by one, hurried down the steps, Balthasar looked around. The light was fading rapidly, and the sky twinkled with stars. A road ran beside the wall, but immediately opposite there was a long row of buildings. As he crouched in the shadows of one, he could see that the enemy occupied the buildings opposite the broken wall and that, even with the help of the MG firing, his men were struggling to get across. They needed to storm the building, and preferably from more than one side.

Rohde was now beside him with Gefreiter Reinert.