Jones the Song put on a fit of hysteria to beat all fits of hysteria.
Company Sergeant Major Fee, listening with interest, put his bewilderment into words. ‘A bloody German general?’ he said.
‘No worse than an English general,’ Clegg observed. ‘Probably neither of ’em knows anything about it.’
Jones the Song was in full spate. ‘What’s a good Welshman doing, bach,’ he yelled, ‘singing to a German general? Why, aye, I shall lose my voice with nerves, see, and he’ll want to know what’s happened, and will come and look!’
Dampier interrupted the indignation. ‘Couldn’t you have put him off?’ he asked Morton.
‘Would you have tried to put off a German general?’ Morton said sharply. ‘Under the circumstances.’
Dampier had to concede the point.
‘Dhu, I shall have one of my headaches,’ Jones wailed. ‘Sure of it I am.’
‘You’d better not,’ Dampier warned. ‘There’s a lot hanging on this concert of yours – if only to keep the swine from investigating us too closely.’
‘Can’t we just up sticks and bugger off?’ Clegg asked. ‘What about Caccia?’
‘We could hit him with something hard.’
Dampier had to admit that it sounded much more sensible than what was being planned. But he was a man of uprightness and integrity – more important, he was a realist, a good soldier and a patriot, who believed in putting first things first.
‘No,’ he said. ‘We must honour our promise. Besides,’ he added, ‘we need that map. It contains the information we need.’
Jones flapped his hands. He looked like an excited and rather grubby gnome. ‘What’ll I sing? I don’t know any German songs.’
‘He’s not expecting German songs,’ Morton pointed out. ‘He’s expecting Italian songs.’
‘Dhu, I don’t know any of them either!’
‘You sang “Ave Maria” in Italian. I bet you know “Santa Lucia”.’
‘My mam used to sing it. She called it “Bright Stars of Italy”.’
‘I’ll write the words down for you. Erwin’s Italian’s as limited as yours.’ With the walking stick he had taken to carrying, Morton slapped the smart Italian field boots he’d obtained from Scarlatti’s dump. ‘Can you read music?’
Jones drew himself up to his full scruffy height. ‘All Welshmen can read music, man.’
‘Right then. I’ll get Scarlatti to find something.’
Jones desperately sought an escape. ‘What about accompaniment?’
‘Clegg’ll help. We’ve got a piano accordion among the Ratbags’ effects.’
Clegg shied like a startled foal, but in the end he agreed and, as Morton had expected, Scarlatti was able to produce a book of popular Italian songs, several of which Jones discovered he knew the English version.
‘There’s just one thing, boyo,’ he said. ‘I’m not going to stand up in front of him and sing.’
‘What the hell are you going to do?’ Morton snapped. ‘Lie on your back?’
Jones’s grubby little fists clenched. ‘I’m a Welshman,’ he protested. ‘Llewelyn ap Iorwerth wouldn’t stand up in front of an invader and sing.’
‘I’ll bet Llewelyn ap Bloody Thing never served in the Western Desert,’ Clinch said.
Jones gave them an agonized glance. ‘Look you,’ he admitted, ‘it’s not that exactly. I’d be scared. I’d lose me voice.’
Morton had an idea. ‘Suppose,’ he said, ‘that we arrange for you to sing out of sight?’
Dampier studied Jones. Tatty wisps of greasy black hair stuck out from under the oversize Italian cap he was wearing, his shorts fitted where they touched and there was a rent in the sleeve of his shirt. ‘It might be better if he were out of sight,’ he observed. ‘No self-respecting general would want anyone as scruffy as he is singing alongside his table.’
Jones looked indignant but Morton grinned.
‘You can just imagine it, can’t you?’ Dampier went on. ‘Jones leaning over to croon in his ear and a button dropping off his trousers into his soup.’
‘And suppose he found out he was British?’ Clegg added. ‘We’d probably lose the war as a result.’
It was going to be a tight programme for Morton with Caccia, the only other Italian-speaker, occupied with getting married, but Rafferty, as usual, was ready with the answer. ‘I’ve worked out a schedule,’ he said, his sly shadowy smile appearing to mock them all. ‘The Humber will take Driver Caccia and Corporal Morton to the wedding. In the morning, of course, because the bridegroom is due to go to war that evening. Corporal Morton will attend the reception, returning here for when Erwin arrives around four. He’ll then dance attendance on the Germans until the singin’s finished, when he’ll return to collect Driver Caccia and his girl after their wedding night. Held a little earlier than normal, of course, but under the circumstances I presume they don’t need it to be dark.’
‘He’s going to be pretty occupied,’ Dampier growled.
Nevertheless, he thought, despite the rushing around, Morton was going to have all the fun. Drinking champagne at Caccia’s reception and German hock at Erwin’s little celebration down the wadi. In spite of being a full colonel, he, Dampier, hadn’t got much out of the adventure except a bad back.
Chapter 3
The RAF came over again that night, but apart from a few bombs on the airstrip near the Wadi Sghiara and a few in the harbour as usual, 64 Light Vehicle Repair Unit were never in any danger. It kept them awake for a lot of the night, however, and Clegg decided it was going to be a busy day. Fortunately for him, he had no idea how busy.
With the aid of Clegg’s hairbrush and comb, one of Clutterbuck’s many spare shirts and a spot of shoe polish borrowed from Dampier, in no time they had Caccia tarted up to meet his bride.
‘Pity you have to wear the bloody King of Italy’s uniform instead of the King of England’s, old comrade, bosom friend and pot companion,’ Clegg observed critically as he walked round Caccia, tugging
