Winter of the World (104 page)

The sky was overcast, but the clouds were faintly luminous, presumably because the moon had risen beyond them. There was a blue light at the tip of each wing, and Woody could see as his plane
moved into formation with others, forming a giant V shape.

The cabin was so noisy that men had to shout into one another’s ears to be heard, and conversation soon ceased. They all shifted in their hard seats, trying in vain to get comfortable.
Some closed their eyes, but Woody doubted that anyone actually slept.

They were flying low, not much above a thousand feet, and occasionally Woody saw the dull pewter gleam of rivers and lakes. At one point he glimpsed a crowd of people, hundreds of faces all
staring up at the planes roaring overhead. Woody knew that more than a thousand aircraft were flying over southern England at the same time, and he realized it must be a remarkable sight. It
occurred to him that those people were watching history being made, and he was part of it.

After half an hour they crossed the English beach resorts and were over the sea. For a moment the moon shone through a break in the cloud, and Woody saw the ships. He could hardly believe what
he was looking at. It was a floating town, vessels of all sizes sailing in ragged rows like assorted houses in city streets, thousands of them, as far as the eye could see. Before he could call the
attention of his comrades to the remarkable sight, the clouds covered the moon again and the vision was gone, like a dream.

The planes headed right in a long curve, aiming to hit France to the west of the drop area and then follow the coastline eastwards, checking position by terrain features to ensure the
paratroopers landed where they should.

The Channel Islands, British though closer to France, had been occupied by Germany at the end of the Battle of France in 1940; and now, as the armada overflew the islands, German anti-aircraft
guns opened fire. At such a low altitude the Skytrains were terribly vulnerable. Woody realized he could be killed even before he reached the battlefield. He would hate to die pointlessly.

Captain Bonner zigzagged to avoid the flak. Woody was glad he did, but the effect on the men was unfortunate. They all felt airsick, Woody included. Patrick Timothy was the first to succumb, and
vomited on the floor. The foul smell made others feel worse. Sneaky Pete threw up next, then several men all at once. They had stuffed themselves with steak and ice cream, all of which now came
back up. The stink was appalling and the floor became disgustingly slippery.

The flight path straightened as they left the islands behind. A few minutes later the French coast appeared. The plane banked and turned left. The co-pilot got up from his seat and spoke in the
ear of Sergeant Defoe, who turned to the platoon and held up ten fingers. Ten minutes to drop.

The plane slowed from its cruising speed of 160mph to the approximate speed for a parachute jump, about 100mph.

Suddenly they entered fog. It was heavy enough to blot out the blue light at the tip of the wing. Woody’s heart raced. For planes flying in close formation this was very dangerous. How
tragic it would be to die in a plane crash, not even in combat. But Bonner could do nothing but fly straight and level and hope for the best. Any change of direction would cause a collision.

The plane left the fog bank as suddenly as it had entered it. To either side, the other planes were still miraculously in formation.

Almost immediately, anti-aircraft fire broke out, the flak exploding in deadly blossoms among the serried planes. In these circumstances, Woody knew, the pilot’s orders were to maintain
speed and fly straight to the target zone. But Bonner defied orders and broke formation. The roar of the engines went to full throttle. He began to zigzag again. The nose of the plane dipped as he
tried for more speed. Looking out of the window, Woody saw that many other pilots had been equally undisciplined. They could not control the urge to save their own lives.

The red light went on over the door: four minutes to go.

Woody felt certain the crew had put the light on too soon, desperate to dump their troops and fly to safety. But they had the charts and he could not argue.

He got to his feet. ‘Stand up and hook!’ he yelled. Most of the men could not hear him, but they knew what he was saying. They got up, and each man clipped his static line to the
overhead cable, so that he could not be thrown through the door accidentally. The door opened, and the wind roared in. The plane was still going too fast. Jumping at this speed was unpleasant, but
that was not the main problem. They would land farther apart, and it would take Woody much longer to find his men on the ground. His approach to his objective would be delayed. He would begin his
mission behind schedule. He cursed Bonner.

The pilot continued to bank one way then the other, dodging flak. The men struggled to keep their footing on a floor that was slimy with vomit.

Woody looked out of the open door. Bonner had lost height while trying to gain speed, and the plane was now at about five hundred feet – too low. There might not be enough time for the
parachutes to open fully before the men hit the ground. He hesitated, then beckoned his sergeant forward.

Defoe stood beside him and looked down, then shook his head. He put his mouth to Woody’s ear and shouted: ‘Half our men will break their ankles if we jump at this height. The bazooka
carriers will kill themselves.’

Woody made a decision.

‘Make sure no one jumps!’ he yelled at Defoe.

Then he unhooked his static line and went forward, pushing through the double row of standing men, to the flight deck. There were three crew. Yelling at the top of his voice, Woody said:
‘Climb! Climb!’

Bonner yelled: ‘Get back there and jump!’

‘No one is going to jump at this altitude!’ Woody leaned over and pointed at the altimeter, which showed 480 feet. ‘It’s suicide!’

‘Get off the flight deck, Lieutenant. That’s an order.’

Woody was outranked, but he stood his ground. ‘Not until you gain height.’

‘We’ll be past your target zone if you don’t jump now!’

Woody lost his temper. ‘Climb, you dumb fuck! Climb!’

Bonner looked furious, but Woody did not move. He knew the pilot would not want to return home with a full plane. He would face a military inquiry into what had gone wrong. Bonner had disobeyed
too many orders tonight for that. With a curse, he jerked the control lever back. The nose went up immediately, and the aircraft began to gain height and lose speed.

‘Satisfied?’ Bonner snarled.

‘Hell, no.’ Woody was not going to go aft now and give Bonner the chance to reverse the manoeuvre. ‘We jump at a thousand feet.’

Bonner went to full throttle. Woody kept his eyes on the altimeter.

When it touched 1,000 he went aft. He pushed through his men, reached the door, looked out, gave the men the thumbs-up, and jumped.

His chute opened immediately. He dropped fast through the air while it spread its dome, then his fall was arrested. Seconds later he hit water. He suffered a split-second of panic, fearing that
the cowardly Bonner had dropped them all in the sea. Then his feet touched solid ground, or at least soft mud, and he understood that he had come down in a flooded field.

The silk of the parachute fell around him. He struggled out of its folds and unfastened his harness.

Standing in two feet of water, he looked around. This was either a water meadow or, more likely, a field that had been flooded by the Germans to impede an invasion force. He saw no one, enemy or
friend, and no animals either, but the light was poor.

He checked his watch – it was 3.40 a.m. – then looked at his compass and oriented himself.

Next he took his M1 carbine out of its case and unfolded the stock. He snapped a 15-round magazine into the slot, then worked the slide to chamber a round. Finally, he rotated the safety lever
into the disengaged position.

He reached into a pocket and took out a small tin object like a child’s toy. When pressed, it made a distinctive clicking sound. It had been issued to everyone so that they could recognize
each other in the dark without resorting to giveaway English passwords.

When he was ready, he looked around again.

Experimentally, he pressed the click twice. After a moment, an answering click came from directly ahead.

He splashed through the water. He smelled vomit. In a low voice he said: ‘Who’s there?’

‘Patrick Timothy.’

‘Lieutenant Dewar here. Follow me.’

Timothy had been second to jump, so Woody figured if he continued in the same direction he had a good chance of finding the others.

Fifty yards along he bumped into Mack and Smoking Joe, who had found one another.

They emerged from the water on to a narrow road, and found their first casualties. Lonnie and Tony, with their bazookas in leg bags, had both landed too hard. ‘I think Lonnie’s
dead,’ said Tony. Woody checked: he was right. Lonnie was not breathing. He looked as if he had broken his neck. Tony himself could not move, and Woody thought the man’s leg was broken.
He gave him a shot of morphine, then dragged him off the road into the next field. Tony would have to wait there for the medics.

Woody ordered Mack and Smoking Joe to hide Lonnie’s body, for fear it might lead the Germans to Tony.

He tried to see the landscape around him, straining to recognize something that corresponded to his map. The task seemed impossible, especially in the dark. How was he going to lead these men to
the objective if he did not know where he was? The only thing of which he could be reasonably sure was that they had not landed where they were supposed to.

He heard a strange noise and, a moment later, he saw a light.

He motioned the others to duck down.

The paratroopers were not supposed to use flashlights, and French people were subject to a curfew, so the person approaching was probably a German soldier.

In the dim light Woody saw a bicycle.

He stood up and aimed his carbine. He thought of shooting the rider immediately, but could not bring himself to do it. Instead he shouted: ‘
Halt! Arretez!
’

The cycle stopped. ‘Hello, Loot,’ said the rider, and Woody recognized the voice of Ace Webber.

Woody lowered his weapon. ‘Where did you get the bike?’ he said incredulously.

‘Outside a farmhouse,’ Ace said laconically.

Woody led the group the way Ace had come, figuring that the others were more likely to be in that direction than any other. He looked anxiously for terrain features to match his map, but it was
too dark. He felt useless and stupid. He was the officer. He had to solve such problems.

He picked up more of his platoon on the road, then they came to a windmill. Woody decided he could not blunder around any longer, so he went to the mill house and hammered on the door.

An upstairs window opened, and a man said in French: ‘Who is it?’

‘The Americans,’ Woody said. ‘
Vive la France!
’

‘What do you want?’

‘To set you free,’ Woody said in schoolboy French. ‘But first I need some help with my map.’

The miller laughed and said: ‘I’m coming down.’

A minute later Woody was in the kitchen, spreading his silk map over the table under a bright light. The miller showed him where he was. It was not as bad as Woody had feared. Despite Captain
Bonner’s panic, they were only four miles north-east of Eglise-des-Soeurs. The miller traced the best route on the map.

A girl of about thirteen crept into the room in a nightdress. ‘Maman says you’re American,’ she said to Woody.

‘That’s right, mademoiselle,’ he said.

‘Do you know Gladys Angelus?’

Woody laughed. ‘As it happens, I did meet her once, at the apartment of a friend’s father.’

‘Is she really, really beautiful?’

‘Even more beautiful than she looks in the movies.’

‘I knew it!’

The miller offered him wine. ‘No, thanks,’ said Woody. ‘Maybe after we’ve won.’ The miller kissed him on both cheeks.

Woody went back outside and led his platoon away, heading in the direction of Eglise-des-Soeurs. Including himself, nine of the original eighteen were now together. They had suffered two
casualties, Lonnie dead and Tony wounded, and seven more had not yet appeared. His orders were not to spend too much time trying to find everyone. As soon as he had enough men to do the job, he was
to proceed to the target.

One of the missing seven showed up right away. Sneaky Pete emerged from a ditch and joined the group with a casual ‘Hi, gang,’ as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

‘What were you doing in there?’ Woody asked him.

‘I thought you were German,’ Pete said. ‘I was hiding.’

Woody had seen the pale gleam of parachute silk in the ditch. Pete must have been hiding there since he landed. He had obviously panicked and curled up in a ball. But Woody pretended to accept
his story.

The one Woody really wanted to find was Sergeant Defoe. He was an experienced soldier, and Woody had been planning to rely heavily on him. But he was nowhere to be seen.

They were approaching a crossroads when they heard noises. Woody identified the sound of an engine idling, and two or three voices in conversation. He ordered everyone down on their hands and
knees, and the platoon advanced crawling.

Up ahead, he saw that a motorcycle rider had stopped to talk to two men on foot. All three were in uniform. They were speaking German. There was a building at the crossroads, perhaps a small
tavern or a bakery.

He decided to wait. Perhaps they would leave. He wanted his group to move silently and unobserved for as long as possible.

After five minutes he ran out of patience. He turned around. ‘Patrick Timothy!’ he hissed.

Someone else said: ‘Pukey Pat! Scotch wants you.’

Timothy crawled forward. He still smelled of vomit, and now it had become his name.

Woody had seen Timothy play baseball, and knew he could throw hard and accurately. ‘Hit that motorcycle with a grenade,’ Woody said.

Timothy took a grenade from his pack, pulled the pin, and lobbed it.