By kind permission of Clutterbuck, Jones the Song had acquired a portable gramophone – like Erwin’s once part of some British officers’ mess – together with a set of records of popular English ballads. Their repetition drove everybody mad.
‘It’s for after the war,’ Jones insisted. ‘I’m learnin’ ’em, see. Thought mebbe I’d go on the stage.’
‘You have to wash to go on the stage,’ Caccia pointed out.
‘If you want to move into the top bracket,’ Clegg agreed, ‘you have to behave as if you’re already there. Washing’s important.’
Jones wasn’t the only one who had profited. Conscious that he was sitting on a tremendous scoop, Micklethwaite was writing on stolen paper with a stolen typewriter reams of notes for when he was in a position to make use of them in the story he was going to publish as soon as he was free. It had always been his ambition to write something sensational and in his notes he had the scoop to end all scoops. Drama and comedy – even a touch of scandal.
Even Clinch had acquired a German radio receiver that was twice as good as anything the British possessed and had collected reams of information for Dampier to collate. Since Clutterbuck had stolen a code book from Scarlatti’s signals office, they knew exactly which signs meant which units and Clinch was busy pinpointing where they were on Dampier’s map.
Nevertheless – Dampier was suffering from a mixture of nerves and guilt – the thing had gone wrong. They had arrived in Zuq intending to return to the British lines with the Italian plan and order of battle, to say nothing of a few additions such as notes on German weapons and Italian morale. With Dampier’s full approval, they had even stolen Italian equipment to improve their disguise, while Morton had prostituted – Dampier couldn’t think of a more apt word – his skill at languages to pick Scarlatti’s brains. But now, he realized, the thing was out of control. The tail was beginning to wag the dog. Clutterbuck had pushed them further than they’d intended so that they were now stealing Italian equipment merely because it was there, and Morton was behaving with the arrogance of a subaltern in the Brigade of Guards. It was affecting the lot of them.
Only Dampier, it seemed to Dampier, had failed to get much out of their extraordinary circumstances. Then he remembered the bed strung with inner tubes and covered with Italian army blankets, the stretcher pillow, the inspection lamp that enabled him to read – even the English copy of The Pickwick Papers, found by Clutterbuck among the loot of a defeated British column in Scarlatti’s store to replace Le Raggazze, II Amore and the other books he’d originally produced. When he thought of them, Dampier’s shame was almost enough to overwhelm him.
If only, he thought in a depressing moral scour-out, they could move from their passive role to an active one. If nothing else, it would ease his feeling of guilt.
‘It seems to me,’ he said to Rafferty, ‘that we ought to try to put someone across the lines with the information we have.’
He frowned at the map stretched on the table near the bed Clutterbuck had built for him. He still moved with difficulty and it irked him that he couldn’t do the gathering of information himself.
He produced a file – looted – and from it took a bundle of paper – also looted – on which he had scrawled his views, and they began to consider what they had collected.
They had seen nothing of Scarlatti since the raid on his dump and could only assume that, busy sorting out his inventories, he was covering himself to account for what had disappeared – ‘’E’s at it like a bloody market trader fiddlin’ ’is income tax,’ Clutterbuck said – but, though he himself didn’t appear, Scarlatti clearly had no intention of losing his grip on the man he thought was Count Barda, and Mondi appeared regularly with titbits for Morton’s pleasure. And, though he was apathetic enough about the war to be depressing, Mondi had a deep insight into the attitudes of the ordinary Italian soldiers.
Wavell’s shattering advance at the beginning of 1941 had destroyed Italian confidence and for the most part they were men without hope. With their poor weaponry and a government that bred cynicism, they considered themselves to be despised by their allies and a laughing stock to their enemies. This was all useful information that went down under the heading of ‘Morale’, to be passed on, like all the other items they’d collected, when 64 Light Vehicle Repair Unit returned to the British lines just ahead of the Italian advance.
‘But,’ Dampier demanded, ‘when are they going to make their advance?’
‘According to Scarlatti’s estimate,’ Morton said, ‘in about seven days. They’ve got to open the minefield first and they haven’t started yet.’ He picked up Dampier’s map and jabbed with his finger. ‘He said it would be about there.’
‘And the Germans?’
‘More than willing to take advantage of any success.’
‘You’re sure of this?’
‘Scarlatti likes to talk. His dinner parties are a great success.’
Dampier gave him a bitter look. ‘I wouldn’t mind sharing them with you,’ he growled.
‘I could always,’ Morton smiled, ‘take you with me as an orderly, sir. They’d probably give you something in the kitchen.’
As Morton disappeared, Dampier stared after him sourly. ‘Mr Rafferty,’ he announced to the warrant officer, ‘any minute now that damned man’ll start ordering me about.’
‘Perhaps, sir,’ Rafferty said, ‘we should be grateful that he’s pretty good at it.’
A thought occurred to Dampier. ‘Why isn’t he an officer, Mr Rafferty? The boy’s a born leader.’
‘Those are my sentiments entirely, sir.’
‘The fact that we’re still free – if you can call free being stuck behind the Italian lines and subject to
