Blood of Honour

quicken again.

‘Here,’ whispered Vaughan, and now Tanner carefully placed a package on a ledge by a shuttered window. Then Vaughan took them off Plastira and halted them by the alleyway that led to the rear of the building. ‘What do you think?’ he said. ‘Worth risking?’

‘Hold on a moment, sir,’ said Sykes. He crept soundlessly along the alley. Watching from the end, Tanner could barely see him. Suddenly voices rang out – someone was leaving the back of the building – and jarringly loud in the still night air. Quickly they moved back, away from the mouth of the alley. But Tanner stood right on the corner, protected by the shadows. The German paused, lit a cigarette, then walked towards them. Damn it, thought Tanner, but somehow the man walked straight past where Sykes must have been. Of course, thought Tanner, he’s not expecting trouble. He now felt in his trouser pocket and closed his fingers around his small knife, silently pulled it out and opened the blade. The German was almost upon them, only the faint shape of his side cap showing in the light of the stars and the red glow of his cigarette. Tanner let him draw level before quickly moving forward, bringing his arm tightly around the man’s neck and in the same moment plunging the knife into the German’s side. The man was dead – his body shutting down the moment the blade had skewered his kidney – but Tanner held him upright and dragged him clear of the alleyway.

Moments later, Sykes was back beside them.

‘Blimey,’ he whispered, ‘that was a bit bloody close.’

‘You dropped the TNT all right?’ asked Peploe. Sykes nodded. ‘What are you going to do with him?’

Tanner hoisted the dead man over his shoulder and, seeing a bombed house a short distance across the street, hurried over and dumped the body among the debris.

They moved on, making the most of the rubble still piled high along Kalokerinou and Dedidaki to cross those two main streets without being seen, and dropped the last of the packages near the Ayios Andreas Bastion by the sea. Barely a soul moved – a few guards on the walls, but that was all. A curfew had clearly been imposed on the town and, with the blackout as well, the six men were able to slip through the streets of Heraklion with ease.

The rubble had still not been cleared from the narrow lane that led to Pendlebury’s arms store. Clambering over it, they reached the wooden door in the wall, passed through into the courtyard, and took the steps, Vaughan leading the way. In the first chamber of the cellar, Vaughan took out his torch and quickly dismantled the trip wire he had set a few days earlier, then led the others down into the lower depths of the cellar. A stack of boxes of various sizes stood in the far corner of one room.

‘What have you got here, sir?’ asked Sykes.

‘I can’t quite remember, to be honest,’ said Vaughan, ‘but there are some grenades and more explosives. No more weapons – they’ve all gone.’

‘It’s the explosives we want, sir.’ There were three wooden boxes of Nobel’s Explosive No. 808, which Sykes immediately opened. ‘This stuff is beautiful,’ he said, grinning. He took out a cardboard carton. ‘It’s the way they’re packed, you see. There’s five pounds’ worth of four-ounce cartridges in each of these packets. Now, twenty pounds of gelignite makes a very nice bang. A very nice bang indeed.’

‘Excellent, Sergeant,’ said Vaughan. ‘Well, let’s take what we can, then get rid of the rest. It’s a shame to blow this place up after hundreds of years, but such is life.’

‘Can’t let Jerry get his hands on it, sir,’ said Tanner. ‘And the buildings nearby are either destroyed or empty. We won’t be killing anyone.’

‘Set to blow with another time pencil?’ Sykes asked.

‘Yes,’ said Vaughan.

‘What length of time, sir?’

They looked at their watches. ‘The first bomb is due to go at twenty-two fifty hours,’ said Vaughan.

‘It’s nearly ten now, sir,’ said Tanner.

‘Another white?’ suggested Sykes. ‘It’ll blow just as they think everything’s calmed down.’

Vaughan nodded. ‘All right.’ He glanced around the room, and at the ancient vaulted brick ceiling.

‘I know,’ said Peploe, ‘but Sykes is right. You didn’t struggle with this stuff all the way from Suda for the benefit of the Germans.’

‘I was thinking about Pendlebury,’ said Vaughan. ‘He would have loved being part of an operation like this. In some ways he did regard it all as something of a game, yet he passionately believed in the cause too. He really, truly loved Crete.’ He hitched his Schmeisser over his shoulder. ‘Anyway, no time for sentimentality. We should get going. There’s a partly bombed-out house overlooking the harbour. I thought we might hole up in it for a while. We can do a visual recce from there.’

Having stuffed their pockets with packets of gelignite and grenades, and with Sykes having set another time-delay switch, they climbed back up and out into the courtyard, then scrambled over the rubble once more. As they worked their way the short distance down towards the harbour the sound of traffic – engines and squeaking tracks – suddenly filled the night air. Pressing themselves into the shadows of a side-street, they watched a small column of three trucks and two British Bren carriers head down the Street of the August Martyrs, the main road that led from the centre of the town down the hill to the harbour.

‘Damn it,’ whispered Vaughan.

‘On the other hand, sir,’ said Tanner, ‘it means there’s some transport about.’

They moved on, picking their way down a back alley until they reached the rear of the bombed house. Part of the roof had collapsed, but the back of the building was still intact, so they climbed over a pile of rubble to the rear doorway and stepped inside. The building was little more than a shell. Several rats scurried past, and grit and stone crunched underfoot, but having climbed the stairs they entered a dark room on the first floor and, feeling their way, reached one of the windows, stepping over broken glass. Tanner tensed at the sound – it seemed so loud suddenly in the confines of the empty house – but from the window they had a clear view of the harbour, the arsenals and the Megaron building, sticking up over the domed roofs of the arsenals.

The motorized column they had seen a few minutes earlier had now come to a halt by the harbour’s edge. The two Bren carriers and one of the trucks were in front of the row of Venetian houses along the southern edge of the harbour, while the two other trucks had parked at the mouth of the harbour wall. Men were milling about the vehicles, then the Brens started up again and drove off in the direction of the Megaron and the Sabbionera Bastion.

‘What are they up to?’ whispered Vaughan.

‘I like the look of that Snipe,’ said Tanner, pointing towards the Humber. It was an eight-hundredweight truck, with room for three up front and half a dozen in the back. More importantly, however, it had a six-cylinder engine and four-speed gearbox that gave considerably greater speed than either the carriers or Morris Commercials the Germans had taken from the British.

Tanner looked at his watch, angling it so that the light of the stars shone on the face. It was nearly half past ten. Another engine started up and this time it was the Snipe. Thin blackout lights shone from its headlamps and it now drove on down the harbour wall, stopping thirty yards short of the fortress in front of some tracked derricks that overlooked the water. Men clambered out of the back and appeared to go into the fortress.

‘Ideal,’ said Peploe, in a low voice. ‘Look, I’ve got an idea.’

‘Yes?’ said Vaughan.

‘We move back down to the street and get as close to the mouth of the harbour wall as we can. As soon as the first bomb goes off, there’s going to be confusion, isn’t there?’

‘I should think so,’ said Vaughan.

‘They’ll probably load up into that truck. If they do, we could walk straight past them and down the harbour wall. Tanner’s right: we need that Snipe. If anyone tries to move it out we stop them.’

‘How, sir?’ asked McAllister.

‘Preferably verbally. Captain Vaughan can just tell them to wait. I can do the same – we can give them spiel about being ordered to stay put.’

‘It’s a good idea, sir,’ said Tanner. ‘They’ll be surprised, and hopefully not thinking quite right.’

‘And assuming we get the truck?’ said Vaughan.

‘Then we get Mac in the back with the MG,’ said Tanner, ‘and you, sir, sit in the front. The rest of us then go into the fortress.’

‘Yes,’ said Peploe, ‘and if anyone comes down the harbour wall causing trouble, McAllister can open up.’