The body lay against the opposite wall, nearer to where Vince was moving, his aim to get behind a long cart, loaded with sapling-type poles for making frames; that would give him some cover. As soon as he was there, Cal gave him the signs for one man down and his location and got a nod in return. Then, with his eyes adjusting to the gloom, Cal held up a trio of fingers, the sign that as soon as they disappeared he would move on three, that also acknowledged as Vince would move immediately after, his rifle ready to use.
When Cal came out from behind the hay it was as a dive into a forward roll in which he spun up onto one knee, pistol out and moving in search of a target. The bullet aimed at him passed his ear with a crack and he began to squeeze on his trigger, aiming at the hatless man in Civil Guard uniform on the open staircase, only to hear another shot and see him jerk backwards. Naturally he looked to Vince; he just twitched his head back and chopped to the rear with his hand.
Looking over his shoulder, Cal saw Laporta standing in the gap created by the armoured van, silhouetted against the sunlight at his back, a sitting duck of a target for anyone who wanted to shoot him. The shout, in French, which included the words that told him he was a stupid arse, at least moved him till his back was against stone. By that time Cal and Vince were moving rapidly for the stairs and, once there, taking them three at a time, though there was a slight pause to make sure the man Laporta had shot was no longer capable of being active.
At the top of the staircase there was just an open floor space, better lit than the ground floor, below which they stopped. With Cal crouching and aiming, Vince laid aside his rifle, pulled the pin on his grenade and tossed it in the general direction of where he thought the machine gun might be, before they both dropped several steps and covered their ears, the thud of the thing landing and rolling audible.
The blast passed overhead, but no other sound came, and with great care Cal lifted his head to the point where his eyes were level with the floor, his pistol horizontal to it and ready for use. In air full of dust he took his time but it was soon clear there had been more than two men on a weapon; number three lay against the outside wall, just below the window from which he had been firing, his face covered in blood, with more, from some other wound, seeping from his body.
Even so, it was with some caution that Cal and Vince moved upwards and onto the first-floor planking, eyes searching in case there was an unknown threat. Not Juan Luis Laporta; he had followed them up, having stopped only to strip the man on the stairs of his weapons: a rifle and a pistol on a leather belt.
He came right up as if he were in his own home and marched noisily over to where the other body lay, looked at Cal and Vince, nodded, then went to the window, holding up the pistol belt to show his comrades. The second he came into view, stone chips began to fly, as did he as he dived back into safety, screaming curses at his own men, who could not hear him, damn them, for nearly killing him.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Taking the machine gun out of the equation did not solve the problem completely; that bridge still had to be crossed and it was very quickly obvious, indicated by the level of movement, that whoever was in command over the other side had decided to hold his position. Shadowy figures carrying weapons, scurrying about, seeking cover and good fire positions were not about to withdraw. The light was going too; it would be dark soon and the decision had to be made whether to try a crossing immediately or wait until dawn.
Canals throw up different military problems to rivers, which, when not in spate, usually present crossing points, fords or flood plains where the water level is low. Add to that the banks are slopes, not walls. A lack of maps had been bad enough before; now it was crippling, because no one knew if there was another bridge within marching distance – there was certainly on this side no lateral road they could use – by which they could outflank the defenders, and nor did they have boats; if those had existed, owned by the locals, they had either been sunk or removed.
The answer lay in a forced crossing at another point, but for people who lived in a port it was shocking how few of them could swim, and in truth, to get them across the canal would require they march to a point out of sight of the town without alerting the opposition – not something Cal Jardine thought the anarchists capable of; moving in formation on foot was no more their forte than silence. Also, they would have to get across without mishap and that too, given the aversion to discipline, seemed unlikely.
They would have to fight their way to the bridge and help to secure it intact, because without the vehicles they would be moribund and on foot: any notion of going on to Saragossa hinged on the column remaining fully mobile. The option of moving back to find another route and another bridge foundered on the same problem; they could travel miles and find the road just petering out, and it had been obvious from the outset that few of the people they could question knew anything beyond the confines of their own village and their nearest neighbours.
Task number one was to repair the armoured van, which, naturally, had only one spare wheel, and on the face of it that meant cannibalising another one from a second lorry and it had to be an exact match, not easy given the vehicles in the convoy consisted of every kind of commercial transport in existence, a lot of them French, a few Italian or American and none of them with common features.
In fact it was worse; driving on the rims to take out that stonework had deformed them, and it was only by a stroke of sheer luck that some of Laporta’s men, mechanics and those from engineering factories, had the ability to undertake the required repairs. That, of necessity, took time and as the light faded it was necessary to bring forward other trucks and use their headlights so that work could continue in darkness. It was telling that, even at long rifle range, the insurgents made no attempt to impede the repair.
A conference was convened, lit by oil lamps, with Florencia on hand to translate for Cal if Spanish was employed; when it came to attendance, Manfred Drecker was much more willing than he had been to bring forward and risk his men or offer material support. Asked his opinion, his sole idea, made with his fastidious cigarette hand, was that Laporta and his fighters should just charge the bridge at dawn, using the repaired armoured van, and blast their way on to the other side.
Tellingly, and once more worryingly, the man to whom he addressed this madcap idea did not demur, so it was left to Cal Jardine to point out the inherent flaws: the notion that a strong party could just advance behind the van was nonsense. The bullets they faced would come from up and down the canal banks, reducing the level of protection the further forward they went. And what if the armoured van lost its tyres again, all four this time, and was rendered immobile? – that would block the bridge completely.
‘He is asking if you suggest doing nothing,’ Florencia said when Drecker barked Spanish at him.
‘For such an assault you must split their defence. If you just rush the bridge, whoever you send will just walk into a hail of concentrated fire, and for all we know that machine gun we took out was not the only one.’
‘And where,’ Drecker demanded, reverting to German, ‘is this machine gun?’
‘It might be more than one and they will be where we can’t see them, just like the weapon that opened up earlier. If you think it’s such a good idea to force a crossing by rushing the bridge, use your own men.’
That induced a look of cold fury but no spoken response, and to Cal it sent a clear message, one that intimated that the loss of life, as long as it was anarchists dying, or even the youngsters he led, was something to be welcomed for its own sake, but Drecker would keep what he called his cadres away from risk.