They stopped.
Smith had his face pressed in his folded arms to hide it, the Webley under his chest. He peered up under his brows and saw the three soldiers close, winced as a match was scraped and the glare set him blinking, saw the man with the match hold it to the pipe, his cheeks sucking. The match went out, the pipe glowed then was cupped in one hand.
One of them spat out into the darkness and it landed before Smith’s face.
Then they tramped on, out of sight and sound.
Josef got to his feet and Smith and the others followed him in file as he went along the path, moving more quickly now with the patrol behind them. So that they nearly ran into the sentry. They had come to a chest-high wall and Josef started to follow it then dropped down on all fours, pressed in tight against it. Smith, kneeling behind him, saw above the wall the head and shoulders, the rifle barrel, the flat round cap and caught a glimpse of the face below it, the round lenses of spectacles above a big moustache. Smith could see him against the glow of light in the building behind him but Smith and his party had moved against a background of trees, otherwise the sentry must have seen them. He passed them, his boots crunching on gravel on the far side of the wall, turned and passed them again, his back to them as he paced back along his beat. That beat was the length of the wall that was some fifty feet long with the break of a gate at its centre. He paced along the inside of the wall and they, crouching, tip-toed behind him outside.
The wall bounded the yard of the guard-house and that was about fifty feet square. At the head of it stood the house and there was an uncurtained window. Through it Smith could see a long room that ran the width of the ground floor. It was a dormitory with beds down each side and men sprawled on them fully-dressed. Rifles stood in racks in the aisle between the rows of beds. All this he saw by the light of the lamp that stood on the table in the middle of the room and half-a-dozen men sat there playing cards.
A sentry stood by the back door of the house, his back propped against the wall, clasped hands holding the muzzle of the rifle, its butt resting between his feet.
Smith went down again with the rest of them. The sentry was coming to the end of his beat. He turned and passed them, the crunch of his boots fading. Smith saw Josef’s face turned pale towards him as he watched the sentry then he rose and moved on. He did not halt until they were well clear of the wall and then he looked at Smith. “Well?”
The back of the house was as hopeless as the front. They could do nothing. It had been a dangerous waste of time and they had a long way to go to get back to the ship. He looked at his watch and saw that forty-five minutes had passed since he sent Lorimer away and embarked on this folly. He had made a fool of himself and all of them would know it and Trist would smile. All for a woman just because she was a woman. Or was it because Buckley and the men expected him to perform some miracle and his vanity had led him to try?
They stood around him with their shoulders hunched against the rain, heads turning as they quartered the darkness but they shot quick glances at him. The carrot-headed Hec McGraw, and Galt, the mouth-organ playing tough. Dour Finlay and Buckley. He would have to tell them it was no good. He had risked their lives for nothing.
He asked, “Where does the path go?”
Josef shrugged. “I don’t know but I suppose it runs into the road again on the far side, the inland side of the village.”
“We’ll keep on, then.” Something nagged at him, something he should have thought of, that had eluded him so that he went over in his mind what he had seen, looking at it again as they walked on through the night, following the path as it bent slowly to the right. He recalled the road running between the houses and the sentries at the front of the house, at the rear. The wandering patrol. The single light on the upper floor suggested the woman might be there. Might? The square was empty so maybe the transport had not arrived and she was in there somewhere. It was too soon for the transport to have come and gone and surely they would have heard it, seen its lights — That was it!
He heard it then, and saw its lights as the factor that had eluded him snapped into place. The lights were moving, he could see them through the trees that ran in a line that marked the line of the road and he could hear the engine. The vehicle was about four hundred yards away and he was twenty yards from the road.
He started to run and shoved past Josef. “Come on!” He called it, not shouting but loud enough for all of them to hear and their boots pounded and splashed behind him. He made out two low gaps in the hedge and broke from the path that meandered on and ran straight through the long grass at one of the gaps and jumped it. He landed in the ditch beyond in a fountain of spray that stank and knee deep in water, fell forward, recovered and splashed out of the ditch and ran along the road towards the approaching lights. There were splashings and muttered curses in Scots accents and Buckley’s hoarse chiding: “Shut that gab! Save your breath!”
They needed it. Smith was already panting but he kept on running as the lights came towards him. Two hundred yards away? He stopped and dragged his torch from his pocket, switched it on and shoved it at Josef. “Get in the road and stop him!” And crouched in the ditch, the water up to his middle, waved down the others as Josef stood on the crown of the road and waved his torch at the vehicle lumbering down on him.
Smith gasped, “Point the pistols but no shooting unless they try it. Understood? It’s got to be quiet!” He saw them nod and his eyes swung back to the road.
It was a staff car. He saw that much behind the yellow orbs of its lights as it slowed, a mist of spray rising from its wheels, a leather or canvas top to it but no windows, open at the sides above the doors, two faces in the front…
It halted abreast of him, brakes squealing and only feet short of Josef. A head poked out at either side, one in a round cap, the other in a cap with a peak. A voice snapped a question, curt, impatient.
Smith could see faces in the back of the car now. Two? He shoved out of the ditch and straightened as he took the long stride that brought him up to the car to put his pistol to the face there. “Still!”
Buckley was around the other side, pistol pointing. So was Galt. McGraw was beside Smith and yanking open the rear door with his pistol pointed, threatening. “Keep still ye bastards or ah’ll shoot ye where ye are!”
Smith doubted if the words meant anything to the two soldiers inside but the pistol did. Like the two in front they sat frozen. He snapped, “Get ’em out! Quick! And watch for any tricks!” He eased back half a pace, tugging the door open with his free hand then beckoning: “Out!” They all climbed down, hands lifted above their shoulders. The two in the back were infantrymen, their rifles left in the car. One from the front was the driver, the other, in the peaked cap, was a Major. Smith recognised that rank. He was young and hard-faced and the face was scarred. He was startled and wary but already recovering. He took in Smith’s uniform and those of the men with him and broke into German.
“Shut up!” Smith told him.
For a moment he did. Then he started again. “You are English —”
Smith shoved him towards the ditch, snatched the cap from his head and snarled at him. “Shut your mouth or I’ll shut it for good!”
He sounded as though he meant it. The Major believed him and was silent. But he was angry, not afraid.
Smith said, “Buckley, Galt, cover the other three. Finlay! You and McGraw make this officer fast and gag him. Use his belt, anything that’ll do and sit him in the ditch.”