Swordpoint (2011) (24 page)

It was no longer a matter of maps and charts, he thought, but of flesh and blood –
his
flesh and blood, and the flesh and blood of his men.

With one eye on his watch, Warley kept the other on the far bank. The two companies at the end of the track from Capodozzi must have already started. As the extra minutes he’d requested drew to a close, against the deafening sound of the barrage, he yelled ‘Go!’ and they all grabbed the boats and started to drag them down to the mud.

Immediately, the launching assumed the proportions of a disaster. Boats put into shallow water bogged down at once and refused to budge, and Deacon started screaming frustratedly.

‘Get out!’ he yelled. ‘Get out! You’ll have to wade further out! Syzling, get out of that bloody boat!’

Struggling and splashing in the shallows, they carried the boats into deeper water and pushed them out again. Once more, Syzling climbed aboard and sat down on the starboard side. But when two other men joined him, the boat upended and the river began to pour in. In no time, it was on the bottom again and they were waist-deep in water.

Warley appeared among them. Having a boat of his own at Bridlington, he knew something about them, which was more than his ham-fisted clodhoppers from the hills did. Some of them even came from the south-west tip of the county, which was about as far as you could get from the sea in England, and they had no experience whatsoever. One boat, caught by the current, went wandering off with only three signallers on board, paying out the wire of the field telephone, and Deacon began to shout at them to bring it back. But as the signallers dug at the water with their rifle butts, the boat merely swirled round in helpless circles, and continued to drift downstream until it was lost in the darkness. Another boat, held steady until everybody was aboard, simply sank under them. There were a dozen splinter holes in it.

The confusion was appalling. Watching with dilated eyes as his boat vanished beneath him, 766 Bawden gulped and cried out, ‘I can’t swim.’

As he found himself struggling in the water, 000 Bawden grabbed him by the collar and hauled him towards the bank. Scrambling to safety, they looked round for other transport. Such was the discipline instilled in them, it didn’t occur to them for a moment that they’d done all they could. They found Warley pushing off another boat and climbed in. Before they knew where they were, they were in midstream again, terrified it too would sink and they would drown under the weight of their equipment.

In those boats which were under way, men tried to row with paddles, rifle butts and hands. Already wet through from the rain and liberally daubed with mud, the spray from the slashing paddles and rifle butts now drenched them again, so that they crouched with heads down as if battling their way through sleet. Only Gask sat upright – bolt upright – as if he were riding on a Number 11 bus and didn’t expect any problems.

They were half-way across when the smoke began to break up and the Germans found them. The gun-fire was intense and concentrated, mostly heavy machine-guns and mortars, coming from the slopes just above the bridge. Glancing back, 000 Bawden saw that the Engineers were already in position on the stonework, apparently indifferent to the fire, dragging up girders and planks to throw across the broken span. He felt like a sitting duck, and was just turning to say so to 766 Bawden, sitting next to him, when he saw his head whipped off by a shell. Spattered with blood and brains, he leaned over the side of the boat, weak and sick with terror.

From the shore, Warley watched the shambles in silence. It was horrifying to see the unprotected boats driving on in a sidling movement against the stream towards the other side. Huge spouts of spray kept shooting up as shells exploded, and the small arms fire churned the water until it looked as if it were boiling. The flames were catching the movement of the river, so that it seemed alive with copper-coloured lights. Then he saw a shell score a direct hit on a boat, and when the smoke had cleared he could see nothing but one arm – one arm reaching up out of the water, black and stark against a patch of flame-tinted river, with clawing fingers reaching for help that didn’t come.

Shrapnel was ripping into the little flotilla. ‘For Christ’s sake,’ someone screamed from the near bank. ‘Somebody direct those bloody guns on to the Germans!’

But the shells were German. The British artillery and the tank gunners had had to stop, now that the boats were approaching the opposite shore, for fear of hitting their own men who could see the Germans standing up to aim at them, an officer in a steel helmet directing the fire.

In Hunters’ boat they were crouching down, keeping their heads as low as possible, aware that the frail canvas sides gave them no protection whatsoever. Then the Engineer at the rudder touched Hunters’ arm. ‘Take the tiller, mate,’ he said, and flopped forward into Hunters’ arms. Pushing him aside, Hunters reached over him, trying to steer by staring over his shoulder, his backside in the air towards the German lines.

‘I must be the only bloody man in the world who’s crossed the Liri on all fours backwards,’ he thought wildly.

Up in the bow, Corporal Carter, clutching his basket of pigeons, was trying to direct him, but a shell exploded in the water nearby and Hunters felt something hit him in the side. For a moment, the boat swirled round, out of control; then, uncertain whether he were badly injured or not, dying or not, Hunters managed to grab the tiller again and steer towards the bank.

A lifting breeze had blown the remains of the smoke screen to shreds of white mist, and the Germans could now see well enough in the glare of the flames to turn their attention to individual boats. Trying to avoid the fire, Hunters steered the boat in a circle. There was another crash, and he realised it too had been hit and was sinking. Amidships, a man was yelling at him something he couldn’t understand, and as the boat vanished from under his feet he found himself standing in water no more than waist-deep and knew he’d reached the other side. Without waiting to see what had happened to his companions, and certain he was dying, he scrambled up the bank and cowered under a muddy tufted knoll that was being clipped by machine-gun fire. His uniform was soaked – he had no idea how much of it was water and how much blood – and all he could feel in his side was a numbness which turned into a sharp pain every time he moved.

As the boat had sunk, Corporal Carter, his Number Two vanished in the confusion, had grabbed his basket of pigeons and lifted it in his arms. He had no idea how he was supposed to swim with it but his job was to save the birds if he could. He was just about to forget the pigeons and think of himself when, like Hunters, he realised his feet were on the bottom and, holding the basket high above his head, he waded ashore, dripping water. As he looked up, another boat beached alongside him, every man in it dead but the man at the tiller. It was Corporal Gask, still blank-faced and unemotional, who yanked him from his seat and literally threw him into shelter.

As the tanks began to lay a fresh smoke screen, two more boats arrived. In one of them Deacon kicked at Syzling to get him on his feet, gave Puddephatt a shove which stirred him to life, and then began to climb up the bank, determined to do something even if it were wrong. Hunters crawled from his shelter to follow him, curiously exhilarated to find himself still alive. The pain in his side didn’t seem to be bothering him much, so perhaps it was just a cracked rib and he hadn’t been properly wounded at all. Somehow or other more boats were arriving all the time, and out of them more men were landing to follow Deacon.

Hunters had never been very fond of Lieutenant Deacon and his shrill voice, but he had to admit that at least he was no coward.

There were further casualties as they crossed the open ground, before reaching a small hollow where they flung themselves down and turned their weapons on the slopes just above. Behind them the river bank was now littered with dead and wounded men. Among them moved the stretcher bearers, trying to pull them into the shelter of the tufted knolls, stretching them out on the mud in the only places where it was safe from the flying metal.

From where he crouched on the opposite bank, Warley had been gathering his scattered group together. What was happening at the end of the Capodozzi track, he didn’t know. He’d already had several of the waiting men wounded, but the German small arms fire was beginning to slacken a little, as if Deacon’s weapons were beginning to take effect. Now that the Engineers had got their vehicles down to the river bank and were unloading them, the tanks had been able to follow up on to their little sidings of wire matting, and their fire was also helping the struggling infantry.

Nevertheless, he had a suspicion that everything possible had gone wrong. War was never easy, but battles had a feel about them and Warley had been in enough to know that this one was going to give them the horrors until their dying day.

The rain was still drifting down, thinner now, coming in grey waves that seemed to wander down out of the darkness and then turn into a coppery haze in the light of the flames; only to disappear in the smoke that was beginning to drift across the river again as the smoke shells from the tanks took effect. He could see the boats heading back now, sidling across the river like black water-bugs against the red-tinted ripples. Glancing about him to make sure his men were ready, his eyes fell on the strained face of Jago. He looked more worn out than Warley had ever seen him before.

‘You all right?’ he asked.

Jago had once been offered a job on the staff by an uncle of his who was a brigadier with Montgomery and had promised to do what he could for him. Feeling that no real man could sit at an office desk and push flags about over maps, Jago had turned the offer down but now, exhausted by the long struggle north from Sicily, he wished to God he’d accepted.

‘Yes,’ he managed. ‘I’m fine.’

Warley didn’t agree and made up his mind at once. ‘Look, Tony,’ he said. ‘It looks to me as though this is the biggest balls-up since Hastings, and I think I ought to be across there to help Deacon; he seems to be doing very well. So I want you to stay and organise the final dribs and drabs. There are bound to be a few who’ll hang back.’

Jago nodded, his face taut. Once – years ago, it seemed – he’d been fresh and had found in war some of the basic exhilaration of the hunt, the pitting of his own wits against other men’s wits. But it had gone on too long and the winter had taken too much out of him.

By this time, the remaining boats were approaching the bank in a ragged wave. Most of them were way off course, and Warley saw at once that they were going to arrive a hundred yards further down. Calling to his men, he led them along the bank to meet them. The Engineers had already got girders across the broken span of the stone bridge, and he was staggered at the speed with which they’d worked. But at that moment another clutch of shells came down and, as the smoke cleared, he saw that the span beyond the one they were repairing had now collapsed.

A groan went up from the men around him but he tried to shut his ears to it. It wasn’t his job to worry about the Engineers. He knew they wouldn’t let them down if they could help it, and even now he could see a group of them lying flat on their faces at the far side of the partly repaired span and staring at the newly broken one, trying to decide if the pillars were still strong enough to support their work.

Watching from the other side, Captain Reis realised he had to move fast. The British seemed to have a foothold across the river and it was up to him to see that they were thrown back before they could enlarge it.

‘Thiergartner,’ he yelled into the telephone above the din. ‘Can you see where they are?’

Thiergartner said nothing and Reis yelled again.

‘You all right?’

Thiergartner’s voice came at last. ‘Yes, Herr Hauptmann,’ he said uncertainly. ‘I’m all right.’

‘Then for God’s sake, find out where they are! We’re probably going to need help!’

‘I’ll do what I can, Herr Hauptmann.’

‘Never mind “I’ll do what I can.” Your job’s to feed me reports about what’s going on. Above all, it’s to hold that post. Understand?’

Thiergartner still sounded uncertain and, slamming the telephone down, Reis called Pulovski towards him. Writing out an order, he handed it over. If it were in writing, Thiergartner wouldn’t be able to claim the right to use his own initiative. There was no such thing at that moment, and Reis was making sure that Thiergartner wasn’t given the opportunity to back away.

‘Take this down to Lieutenant Thiergartner,’ he said. ‘You know where he is?’

‘Exactly, Herr Hauptmann.’

‘Then be off with you. As soon as you’ve given it to him, come back here. Understand?’

‘Jawohl, Herr Hauptmann.’

Pulovski glanced at the shells flashing on the plain below and seemed to hesitate. Reis gave him a shove and he began to move off.

‘Not that way, you damned idiot!’ Reis yelled as he drifted to the left. ‘They’re covering the road with their machine-guns. The other way. Down the front slope.’

As Pulovski vanished, Reis wondered again if he dared leave the defence of the river bank in Thiergartner’s hands. He’d have liked to have gone down there himself but it was his job to stay where he was and co-ordinate the defence from a position where he could see everything that went on; from where, if it became necessary, he could easily retreat to the stronghold they’d constructed in San Eusebio.