“They know what to do with it. And with themselves. Come on, we had better not be found near here either.” Johann’s advice was good. Lennox followed him wearily, imitating Johann’s bent shoulders and half-running pace. He would have liked to stay to see the lorries arrive, but it was safer to leave curiosity unsatisfied. The drivers must have heard the noise. They were probably travelling still more slowly, for they would now be expecting some kind of trouble. Then their lights would pick out the skid-marks on the road, for the surface had been badly torn. But even if they guessed that some accident had happened—a tyre suddenly blown out or a turn too sharp and too quick—they could see little over that precipice edge. It was too steep, too deep, and the night was too dark. Later, when the moon came up, they would be able to see something. But there could be no salvage party until daylight.
Once they were over the spine of the hill Johann’s pace slackened, and he walked upright. But even being able to move more naturally didn’t lessen Lennox’s exhaustion.
“I’m tired. I’m damned tired,” he said to Johann. “I’m out of training, remember.”
“Maybe,” Johann said, without much conviction. “What happened in the village?”
“I’ll tell you when we see your uncle. I need my breath for climbing. I suppose we are heading in his direction now?”
“Yes. We’ve got to report.”
“At Schönau?”
“Yes. Good job you know how to cross the waterfall. It’s tricky at night.”
Lennox groaned. He had forgotten the waterfall.
“You’ll manage it,” Johann said cheerily. “After tonight we could manage anything, couldn’t we?”
Lennox wasn’t so inclined to agree with that.
Anyway, he thought, there was one thing they had managed to do. The reports and suspicions which that car had been carrying to Kastelruth had been blotted out. Other reports would be made, other suspicions might grow, but these particular ones would do no more damage. That was one thing they had managed to do. They and Eva Mussner.
22
Schönau—the beautiful high-meadow—was earning its name. The sun was strong today, so Lennox had taken off his jacket and opened the collarless neck of his shirt. He stretched his body contentedly on the carpet of fine green grass. There were more flowers spreading, their miniature petals close to the ground. The scent of pine and new leaved trees from the surrounding woods was stronger. Each day there was a little more of the promise of summer.
Lennox stopped looking at the blue sky with its soft white clouds, high and unmoving over the line of mountain-tops, and turned to watch the foresters’ hut. No one had come out yet. Either they were giving him plenty of time to make up his mind, or they were discussing some new points. Not that he could imagine them finding a new point: since he and Johann had arrived here last night, there had been enough careful discussion to fill a mill-pond.
It was the American who came out at last from the hut and walked casually towards Lennox. Nothing in his leisurely step—he was a loose-limbed sort of chap with easy movements—nothing in his placid face showed he was coming here with a purpose.
Lennox rose to his feet... “Private Lennox, sir, reporting.”
“Cut that out,” Thomson said, with his good-natured smile. He dropped into the grass, and motioned Lennox to sit beside him. “You’d better be careful,” he warned, “or we’ll commission you temporarily on the field.”
“I’d prefer to remain as I am,” Lennox said.
“Determined guy, aren’t you? But you’ve certainly been more co-operative than we expected.”
“Thank you,” Lennox said. He half-smiled, and he suddenly thought of the colonel. Not co-operative...was that the colonel’s description of him? Anyone seemed not co-operative when he was asked to do what he didn’t want to do. Especially if his mind had been quite made up otherwise. “I suppose I was a sort of resentful blighter,” he added, his smile broadening.
“You probably only needed a rest up here in these mountains. They’d cure anyone.”
Lennox nodded. “I didn’t know I was cured either. That’s the funny thing. I didn’t know it, until the two Jerries dressed as American airmen walked into the Schichtl kitchen. I had been telling myself all winter that I was a useless crock—” Lennox halted in embarrassment. He was saying too much. The American was so easy to talk to. He just sat there, with his arms around his knees and a friendly grin on his face. Not too much of a grin, either, but just enough to make you go on talking. Lennox went on, “There didn’t seem anything I could do up here. You fellows were coming, and I was only a stop-gap. There didn’t even seem much for me to do if I ever managed that escape to the south. The Army would probably discharge me. This hand has been getting worse all winter. A prison camp wasn’t the best place to cure it properly.”
“Tough luck,” Thomson agreed. “But I’ve heard of left-handers who were crack shots. Don’t see why you couldn’t learn. Besides, this war won’t last for ever. You’ll be thinking of going back to your old job then, and it won’t matter a damn whether you can shoot a gun or not.”
Lennox was silent.
“Will it?” the American asked sympathetically.
“No. I don’t suppose it will.” His voice had changed, and the American watched him curiously. If the American had lost eight years of his life, Lennox thought, he wouldn’t be so puzzled. Eight years learning to paint, scraping up money for tuition, living from hand to mouth so that he could get abroad where the light was warm and the colours were bright. There had been trouble with his people because he wouldn’t settle down to a profession. There had been a lot of private trouble and disappointments because he had insisted on going on with his painting. And then, after eight years, there had been the beginning of some success. That was the summer of 1939. Eight years...eight years, hell! He wasn’t the only chap who was now finding that after this war he would have to start all over again.
“Have you made your decision?” Thomson asked. “Do you take, your long-promised trip south, or do you go into the North Tyrol with Johann?”
“It’s a long walk either way.” Lennox’s voice was quite normal now. “I’ll travel north with Johann.”
“Fine.” Thomson was genuinely pleased, perhaps even relieved. He rose. “Come on. They’re waiting for us in the hut.”
As they walked slowly over the broad meadow the American said, “Lennox, I should be keeping my mouth shut, but I won’t. If you travelled south there might be still hope for your hand. If you go north—well, you could get no specialist’s treatment there. You realise that?”
“Yes. I’ll just have to make my left hand useful,” Lennox said. And if I lose that one, he thought, I’m damned if I don’t learn to paint with my toes. He began to smile.
“We are about ready to push off,” Thomson said. “We’ve been given two of those guides you were talking about. You and Johann will leave tonight. Schroffenegger’s son is going along with you.”
Lennox nodded. “Is Johann still asleep?”
“Yes, he’s earned it.”
And that was true. For last night Johann had gone back to the village to scout carefully around. He had returned at dawn with a variety of news. The people had left the hillside, some to reach their distant houses, others to return to the village. They knew grimly that there had only been a respite and no material gain for them. Even now the Germans would be planning a change of policy towards their Austrian “cousins.” But there had been a moral victory for Eva Mussner. It was the girl’s death which had shocked the people most of all. They had been angered by the fact that the Germans had chosen their feast-day in order to gather a rich haul of what they would call volunteers. But it was the girl’s death they were talking about. Mussner’s treachery and the danger to the village, coming from all such treachery, had been clearly shown in that last scene in the garden. Those who had witnessed it were describing it in detail to those who had already fled. They told how the girl had stood with h
er uncle’s revolver, no longer pointing, no longer threatening. Yet the Germans had killed her. And she had not shot her uncle as a murderess would have killed, out of envy or greed or evil. Yet the Germans had killed her. Without a trial. From now on, Johann had reported, there were no more neutrals in this district. Mahlknecht’s list of those who were doubtful friends of the Allied cause, because they were neutral, could now be scrapped.
“He’s earned it,” repeated Thomson. “By the way, we got some more news when you were asleep this morning. The Fifth is rolling up the Krauts like a red carpet. The Eighth is slugging right up the middle of Italy. I’ll lay you five to one we’ll be in Rome within the month.”
Lennox shared the American’s wide smile for a moment. “No takers,” he said. “I’m on your side.” He turned to stare at the mountain peaks to the south. He had stopped walking.
“Wish you were with them?” Thomson asked. “So do I. And yet we are, in a kind of a way. We’re an advance unit. That’s us.”
When Lennox didn’t answer he asked quietly, “What made you choose to go into the North Tyrol with Johann? You’ll be useful there. We need you. But why did you choose it?”
The American would never have got his answer if he hadn’t been so easy to talk to. If Shaw had asked that question Lennox would have said, “It’s a nice climate, I hear.” But to Thomson he said, “I’m trying to show someone I’m not just the selfish fool she thought I was.”
“Hope she appreciates that some day,” Thomson said. He looked as if he wanted to ask more, but he didn’t. It was just as well. Lennox couldn’t have answered that one. He couldn’t have answered, “She is dead. She was shot by the Germans.”
In embarrassment he said quickly, “I’ll do more damage to Jerry up there than I could from a hospital behind our lines.”
Thomson was satisfied. Lennox suddenly felt satisfied too.
In the hut there were Mahlknecht and Shaw and young Josef Schroffenegger. Johann was snoring steadily on one of the straw mattresses. He could sleep until dusk came. And then he and Lennox and young Josef would set out together. They would climb to the mountain-hut near the top of the first peak on their journey. They should reach there before midnight, and sleep there, and leave there—to tackle the difficult part of crossing a mountain—in the good light of early morning.
On the bunk next to the one where Johann lay there was the equipment they would need, and the small packages of food which they could carry. Schroffenegger’s son had brought these necessary supplies this morning. He would be useful on this trip. Both he and Johann had climbed through that sea of mountains once before. Then it had been to avoid Italian recruitment for the Albanian campaign. Now it was to win recruits for the fight against Germany.
“He’s going,” Thomson said to Shaw, and they both looked satisfied.
Mahlknecht too was in good spirits. The plans were well made. They had purpose, careful arrangement, and more than a chance of success. The months of worry were over: action lay ahead. He laid his hand on Lennox’s shoulder. “I didn’t kidnap you this time, did I?” he asked jokingly. And yet he was anxious, too, as if he wanted reassurance that Lennox no longer thought of him as a whip-cracker.
Lennox said, “So it was you who insisted on giving me time to decide?” His voice and his smile showed that resentment was dead.
Mahlknecht laughed. “Last time I had no choice. It was you, or nothing. And it did some good, didn’t it?” He nodded towards Thomson and Shaw. “They wouldn’t be here unless you had come up on to the Schlern.”
“Oh, perhaps they would,” Lennox said, but he was pleased that Mahlknecht had spoken that way.
A bird-call came from the path which Schroffenegger’s second son guarded.
“It’s a friend,” Mahlknecht said, in answer to the three foreigners’ tension. “That’s the signal for a friend.”
“Better keep him out of here even if he is a friend,” Shaw said crisply.
Mahlknecht nodded and stepped outside.
After a few minutes he returned with a bundle. “More food,” he said. “It’s Katharina. She wants to see you, Peter.”
“Was it wise of her to come here?” Shaw asked sharply. Thomson too was looking worried.
“My sister sent her. Katharina says no one followed her. There are only four policemen at the Golden Roof Inn now, and they’ve stayed there all day. Perhaps they are waiting for instructions, or perhaps they feel they need reinforcements. The village is in an ugly mood. My sister thought it was safe, and I think we can trust her. She has sent a specially marked map which her husband made when he was a guide, and some more food, and some brandy.”
“All right,” Shaw said. “But send the girl away quickly.” He offered no further objections.
“She has a message for you, Peter,” Mahlknecht repeated.
Lennox walked to the door, very conscious of the look in both the officers’ eyes.
“Business and pleasure mixed?” Thomson was saying with a laugh. “We could learn a tip or two from him, Roy.” But in the joke there was a neatly conveyed piece of advice.
* * *
Katharina was waiting down near the path into the wood. She held a neat package in her clasped hands. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes smiled as she watched him approach.
“Frau Schichtl sent me with this. She said you needed it.” She held out the small package with the same directness in her movement as in her words.
It contained a small pad of paper, something which he could slip into his jacket pocket easily. And his two favourite pencils. And some of the sheets of paper which had lain his bedroom: the first attempts to sketch with his left hand were there, along with the drawings he had made last week. Frau Schichtl was telling him that if he could make so much progress he could make still more. He had thought she had never paid much attention to his scribbling, but in her quiet undemonstrative way she had known all the time.
Katharina looked at the contents of the package with disappointment. “Is that all?” she asked. And then she noticed Lennox’s face. Something had pleased him. Something had made him happy. So she smiled too.
“Frau Schichtl tells me that you are going into the mountains for the summer, like all the younger men.” She nodded in the direction of the Schlern peaks.
“Yes,” he answered. Obviously the girl knew nothing about the mission into the North Tyrol. And he was not leaving for just this summer, either. The job he had to do now would last through the autumn, perhaps even into the winter as well. It might be spring before he saw Hinterwald again. With luck...
She gave him her hand and said, “I wish you a safe journey, and a quick return.”
“Thank you.” He was equally grave.
She turned to go back along the path which would take her to the waterfall. And then she halted and said in dismay, “I nearly forgot... Frau Schichtl gave me a message for you. After the war is over the church walls will need a man who can paint.”
When he didn’t reply Katharina said, “That was the message. It sounds silly, I know. But that was what she said.”
“It isn’t at all silly. It makes a lot of sense.” He smiled and added, “I shan’t forget that invitation. Tell Frau Schichtl that.”
He stood watching the girl as she walked away with that long, even stride. She looked back and waved as she reached the curve in the path. She hesitated for a moment, and he knew how she would be smiling. Then the gold-braided head was hidden by the green trees.
Lennox moved towards the hut. He walked with a lighter step. In the spring, he thought once more, and then he laughed. For he knew he was indeed cured. He had stopped brooding about the past: the long, bitter, wasted months and years had lost their power to nag him. And now they didn’t even seem so wasted; he might find that they had taught him something if only he were willing to learn. Anyway, he was cured. He could think of the future.
* * *
Back in the hut Thomson and Shaw were showing signs of impatience. Mahlknecht
and young Schroffenegger were talking quietly together. “Is this the way you always work?” Shaw said with a slightly raised eyebrow, and an acid smile.
“She’s on the young side, if you ask me,” was Thomson’s milder reproof.
Lennox laughed. “Don’t be bloody fools,” he said, and he didn’t even remember their rank. “Now, what are these final instructions?”
His whole manner was so different, so confident and alert and interested, that the two officers exchanged glances. Their annoyance left them. Shaw, who had been on the point of deciding that Lennox might be too erratic and undecided a man for this North Tyrol job, was thankful he had kept his mouth shut. Plans depended on the men who carried them out. It was better to have a plan incomplete and a man who was sure of himself, than to have an excellent plan and a man who was unsettled.
“Good,” he said, most emphatically, and motioned Lennox to sit down at the rough wooden table and look at the outspread map as they talked.
* * *
When Johann woke the hut was in darkness, and the Englishman and the American had already gone. Young Josef Schroffenegger was sitting with Paul Mahlknecht, and they were talking together in the quiet, slurred drawl of men discussing important things. Johann stretched and yawned. “That was good,” he said with satisfaction. “I could travel for days now. Where’s Peter?”
“Outside. He’s waiting for you to wake up. He’s getting impatient.” There was a pleased note in his uncle’s voice which wakened Johann still more.
“So?” he said, and went out of doors. Some cold water from the spring at the side of the hut would freshen him up. He was fully awake by the time he had dashed the icy water over his face and neck. He couldn’t see Lennox at first, and then he noticed—as his quick eye scanned the trees which encircled the meadow—that the Britisher was sitting on the ground as motionless as the log lying beside him.
Johann crossed over towards him. Lennox was watching the Alpine Glow.