Chapter 6
London, England, February 1997
In Britain it was an evil and filthy February night that could have been designed in hell itself. The rain hammered down relentlessly, driven nearly thirty degrees from the vertical by a driving and at times gale force, westerly wind. The temperature was just a shade above freezing, but earlier in the day, before the wind had backed away from the north, this same rain had been coming down as hail and sleet. The majority of the city's inhabitants, people, birds and animals, had long since fled to the driest and warmest places they could find.
The black Ford Sierra cut Its lights just before it turned into the side street and with Its engine in neutral it glided almost silently the last three hundred yards before pulling into the kerb, splashing the tumbling rainwater up from the gutter and across the pavement. The wind driven rain was lashing down so hard now that spray was rebounding back up from the ground a good six inches, making it look as if a ground mist hovered over the sodden road.
There were no living places here, just three storey warehouses running along both sides of the street right down to the river. They were without windows, their only openings being large double doors at street level and loading stations with hoists on the upper floors. The driver took great care to stop the car exactly between two street lamps where the road was at Its darkest.
The road in which the car had stopped was one of the dozens in London's docklands that lead nowhere except to one of the many riverside wharves and the distant pin points of light that could occasionally be glimpsed through the windscreen, were in fact on the other bank of the river over four hundred metres away. On this bitterly cold mid February night, only the frantic beat of the windscreen wipers combined with the flat out blast of hot air from the heater fan was keeping the windscreen clear, all the other windows in the car were totally fogged.
The two men in the Sierra were very familiar with the Thames and London's docklands as both worked for Her Majesty's Customs and Excise. On this particularly black and evil night both had left the comfort of their firesides in response to a tip off received late that afternoon. The driver turned to the passenger.
"I might as well turn everything off for all the good Its doing. You can't see anything at more than forty yards except some streetlights and Its cold enough for us to be showing an exhaust plume. There's no point in sneaking in here and then giving our presence away".
Now in his early thirties, Jack Ropell was an athletically built man with thick dark hair and the alert look of an athlete while his accent retained just a trace of North America. He had that natural grace and ability that is god given and would have been a success and a leader in anything he had chosen to have done. It was to he ever-lasting credit that he never realised this to the extent that others did. At this moment his dark blue eyes were hard and bright with the expectancy of action, but that was not surprising, as he seemed only to live for moments like this. If he had not been a driven man he would have realised that for himself, but those who are driven never do and Jack was no exception. At this moment in time he was tensioned to breaking point at the action that was to come and everything else was gone from his mind. He glanced at his companion.
"You listening, Jamie?"
James Hambrowe nodded. He too was tall, but much broader than Ropell and sporting a black, full set naval beard that made him look older than his years. Hambrowe was a Cornishman, although he hadn't lived there for many years. He was thirty-nine years old now and had been contentedly married to a girl from Southampton for the last five years. They had three small children. He had enjoyed rugby up until four years ago when a badly broken wrist had caused Patsy, the girl from Southampton, to give him the choice of giving up or receiving divorce papers. He had given in. These nigh time escapades were nowhere near as enjoyable to him anymore as they were to Jack Ropell although he had never admitted that to his friend. He would rather be at home with his wife and kids. Perhaps the fact that Jack was single made it different for him. Now Hambrowe answered his close friend and long time colleague.
"OK Jack, but ten minutes after you do Its going to be like a fridge in here." He peered through the windscreen. "How far is the wharf from here"?
Ropell thought for a moment, running nervous fingers through thick black hair in a recognised mannerism for Hambrowe.
"I should say about two hundred yards. The road ends right on the riverside and you enter the wharf through an opening on the right, just after the last warehouse."
He looked at his companion.
"That's not the bit that worries me, Jamie. Our information is that as Its only a small wharf the barges are moored three deep and the stuff we want is on the outside one. If they are moored tight it will be bad enough, but if there is any slack between them it will be bloody evil crossing from one to the other in this lot".
The passenger sighed.
"Then why don't we leave it until the morning and then take a dog in, instead of risking both our necks tonight?"
The other stared out at the black rain running down the rapidly clouding windscreen and shook his head. Jack Ropell knew that what James Hambrowe said made sense, but he wanted this lot so badly he could taste it. He turned to face his companion. "This is the third tip off we have received from our guy in a month and while that has enabled us to take nearly one hundred kilos of Cocaine of the streets, Its only bagged us six strong arm boys who were taking care of it."
He shrugged.
"I'm as glad as you are to get it off the streets, but I want the brains behind it, not the brawn. If we check tonight and there are drugs on that barge we are going to set up the tightest surveillance net you have ever seen. It will make a beaver's arse seem leaky. We will watch it around the clock until its collected and when Its delivered we may be able to smash this ring permanently."
His voice became bitter.
"Until they reorganise of course."
He looked again at his watch and then turned his stare back to the filthy night.
"This isn't going to improve so we might as well get on with it."
Both men were already dressed in black rubber soled shoes, dark blue trousers and roll neck pullovers over which were fastened shoulder holsters. Jamie Hambrowe reached into the back seat and picked up two dark blue anoraks, which in the tight confines of the front seats they struggled into with some difficulty. He reached back again and produced two ski caps, which they donned and then two long black waterproof torches. Finally he picked up a couple of sophisticated two way radios. They checked that all items were in working order.
"Lets go then."
Jamie Hambrowe sighed and started to open his door, but Jack Ropell put his hand on his arm to restrain him.
"When we get on that wharf, Jamie,” he said, "I'm the one who is going out to the barge, OK? You stop on the first barge and let me know if I'm going to be disturbed."
He turned to face the other man.
"And don't use the bloody radio for any other reason."
Hambrowe smiled at him. In the faint glow from the nearest street lamp his teeth could just be seen as a lighter line across the dark smudge that was his face.
"I have done this before you know, Jack"
Ropell relaxed and smiled back.
"Yes, I know you have, but it helps me no end to say it."
He switched on his radio and pressed the transmit button. A green light next to it lit up, showing him that he was being monitored. He pressed the transmit button twice more and then switched off the radio and stored it away inside his anorak. He took a deep breath.
"Time to go."
They got out of the car and carefully locked it and then, despite the central locking, manually checked all the doors, this was London and they wanted it to still be there when they returned. With shoulders hunched against the freezing rain that was finding any small gap in their clothing, they walked the two hundred metres down the road and turned right onto the wharf. It was exactly three o’clock am.
It
was not a big wharf being only some fifty metres wide and thirty deep and it was empty apart from two hand operated, mast and derrick winches, taken from some old coaster years before and put to work here, and some piles of rusting chain. In the soaking wet darkness the two men were only shadows as they picked their careful way around the various obstructions.
The river was at the top of the tide and consequently the first barge was up close to the edge of the wharf, the rubber tyres along her side, squeaking softly as she rose and fell. Ropell watched her for some thirty seconds until he had the rhythm and then as she reached the top of her ride, jumped lightly down onto the deck. Twenty seconds later his companion joined him and without exchanging a word they melted into the shadow of the small deckhouse. Hambrowe took up a position crouched alongside the deckhouse, out of the worst of the weather, but where he could see the whole of the wharf. Ropell moved on towards the next barge.
Despite the ferocity of the night the craft were tightly moored together and river was not causing the barges to plunge about as badly as he had feared. He waited until the barge he was on rose level with the next and then stepped lightly across to the second barge, easier than the step from the wharf as this time with both vessels moving he could wait until they were practically level. He froze as a piece of tarpaulin on the deck flapped up at him in the wind. Then, identifying it for what it was he waited several anxious seconds for his heart to start beating normally again before making his careful way across to the other side of the barge. One more to go, but with the third barge he was not so lucky. As he stepped down onto the deck he caught his foot against some unseen object and went crashing to the planking. As he put his arms out to absorb the shock of his fall, the torch flying from his hand and off into the darkness. He scrabbled around searching for it frantically for some thirty seconds before his adrenaline levels, already high from the tension, normalise somewhat and he brought himself under control.
Swearing fluently he Got down onto his hands and knees and started to make a systematic search. In the absence of any glimmer of starlight he was relying solely on touch as he worked his way back and forth across the deck, trying to divide it into one-metre strips and not lose his direction in the wet blackness. After twenty minutes he had just about given up hope when he felt his foot bumped into something that rolled away. He reached carefully backward with his right hand and there was the torch. He could have shouted with relief and felt a cold sweat form in his armpits despite the bitter cold and wet. He risked a brief flash against the palm of his hand. It still worked.
Getting to his feet he made his way to the low deckhouse doorway. It was a yacht style up and over type. He tried it and to his great surprise it moved and he murmured a quiet prayer of thanks. Picking locks with frozen fingers was not something he had been looking forward to with any great pleasure, but no need for fancy keys this time. Sliding the door up into the runners on top of the roof he stepped down into the cargo hold, dropped the door back closed behind him and switching on the torch, shone it slowly it around the black interior.
Nothing. It was just another old barge, dirtier and smellier than most, but completely empty of any cargo as far as he could see. There was just enough room to stand if you didn't mind bending a little, so taking the torch he began to make a careful systematic examination of the hold. Concentrating on the planks of the flooring as that seemed to be the likeliest place for any secret compartment to be located.
Icy water was constantly dripping from the leaking hatches and lying in gathering puddles on the planking, making this difficult. He spent fifteen minutes checking the hold from end to end, but it was completely empty. Perhaps they were on the wrong barge. The thought of searching them all did not appeal to him and besides; their man had been quiet specific about it being this one. He was close to giving it up and following Jamie's advice about coming back in the morning with a dog, but something was nagging at the back of his mind He moved the torch around slowly once more, trying to work out what was puzzling him. The he suddenly realised what was bothering him. One section of three planks seemed to be standing slightly proud of the rest. It only showed when the torchlight was at the right angle to exaggerate the shadows, but it was there. He looked again. A whole section could be removed, he was sure of it.
He felt the adrenaline rush again. Ignoring the icy water dripping down his neck, he moved so that he was standing with his legs astride the three planks. With a wet hand he struggled to remove from his trouser pocket a small red penknife with a white cross on it. Laying the torch on the floor he forced his by now frozen fingers to open out a small screwdriver blade and jammed it into the gap between the end of the middle plank and Its adjoining neighbour. He pushed away from him and managed to raise the whole section of three planks just enough to give the fingertips of his left hand a purchase. With a grunt of triumph he heaved upwards.
The explosion drove the three planks into him with sufficient force to completely smash the left leg below the knee before they hit his body, lifting him and driving him up into the ceiling above. This secondary impact caused further damage to his head, arms and torso, before Its force was spent and it allowed his limp body to fall back to the deck like a broken doll. He quivered once and was still. Blood began to mingle with the water on the planking while the rain drove in through the massive hole that had appeared in the side of the barge.
Back on the first barge a soaked and frozen Jamie Hambrowe turned as the noise from the blast reverberated through the darkness, filling him with fear for his companion. He stared in sheer disbelief at the flames and smoke that were appearing through the deck of the third barge.
"Sweet Jesus Christ. No!"
Pulling himself together he forced his cramped and frozen limbs to work and scrambled across the decking towards the outer barge, dragging the radio from his pocket as he ran.
"Emergency. We have an explosion on one of the barges. Jack is over there. I want Fire brigade and an Ambulance. Quickly."
Barely waiting for an acknowledgement he stuffed the radio into his coat pocket and jumping down onto the first barge rolled like a parachutist, coming up onto his feet all in one go before plunging onward across the deck. He used the same approach to the second barge, but this time crashed into the deckhouse with enough force to bruise his leg from thigh to knee. He got up without feeling it. He slowed enough at the third barge to make the transfer without falling this time and stopped. The beam of his torch showed no damage but on the riverside he could see flame and smoke appearing over the gunwale. He lifted up the sliding door and looked in. The scene that met him was like something from the battle of Trafalgar. The hold was full of smoke and flames. In one wall was an enormous hole where the explosion had taken out half of the planking and as the barge rolled with the movement of the river, water spilled in. he shone his torch around.
Jack Ropell was laying face down in a puddle with his left leg bent at an angle that told Hambrowe it was badly broken. He forced himself to place his fingers on the others throat and felt for a pulse, not expecting to find one. To his surprise he did. He shone his torch on his friend's face and saw the damage that had been caused when he smashed into the roof. He gently touched his fingers to the sodden and bloody hair on the back of his head and felt only softness. He knew he had insufficient medical knowledge to do anything for him and could only wait for the ambulance. He pulled his radio out again and pushed the transmit button.
"Jack's down and badly hurt. He is still alive, but barely. Where is that fucking ambulance?"
He snapped off the radio and as if in answer to his query he heard the distant wail of a siren. He hoped they would get here quickly. He looked down at the body and saw Jack's Browning automatic laying a few feet away where the impact had jolted it from its holster. He picked it up and pocketed it. Much good had it done the man. He felt the tears of reaction running down his cheeks and sitting down on the cold wet decking he took his friend's unfeeling hand and waited for the medics to arrive.
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It was some fifty minutes later as Jamie Hambrowe was standing in the middle of the road still staring into the distance where the ambulance had disappeared, that another black car pulled up by the wharf entrance. A short, slight, white haired man in his sixties got out. Dressed in an full length black overcoat and hatless, but ignoring the rain hammering onto his white hair, he walked towards Hambrowe and gently touched his arm. He jumped.
"Hello Jamie, a bad business. Are you unhurt?"
Hambrowe nodded. When he spoke his words were staccato but controlled.
"Hello Commander. Yes, I'm all right. Sorry about this balls up, but we were set up. They had it all waiting for us. The bastards had booby-trapped the barge and I think they may have killed Jack. They deliberately blew him up. The technical people have arrived. The bomb was under the decking in the bilges. They reckon it was only the fact that the Semtex had been placed against one of the main framing timbers of the barge that he was not killed outright, but he was in a terrible mess when I got to him. If he had lifted that section of decking up from the other end there would have just been pieces left. As it was the bomb was packed against one of those big oak cross members and he was on the other side of that. I think that is what protected him from the worst of the blast. The oak beam deflected the worst of the blast, causing it to take the path of least resistance and out through the left hand side planking of the bows. There is a bloody great hole there you could walk through. But they planned to kill one or both of us. Fucking bastards."
He seemed exhausted by his long speech, delivered at machine gun speed. His lips were white with his pent up fury and his shoulders were shaking. Peter Romsey man nodded. He had been in charge of the Anti-Drug Squad for the last ten years and knew shock when he saw it. This wasn't the first time he had experienced this type of drama and knew it usually affected the survivors as much as the victims. His results had been as much because his men would go to hell and back for him as they were to his operational expertise and it showed now in his handling of James Hambrowe's obvious distress.
"That's what it looks like, Jamie, but he's not dead yet. I'm going to the hospital now to make sure he gets the best treatment available. Its the least and only thing we can do"
He patted the other's arm before continuing.
"Jack is our second casualty tonight, Jamie. Our undercover man was thrown out into the street from the back of an old Ford Transit van outside of West End Central Police station half an hour ago. According to the Police Surgeon he had lost all his finger nails to a pair of pliers and someone had wired up his testicles to a generator at some time. He had been dead for about twelve hours according to the Doc"
"So it wasn't him that rang in with the tip off?"
The newcomer lifted his head and looked up at the taller man.
"No, it would seem not. Look, Jamie, you go home now and call me in the morning. There is nothing you can do here and Patsy will be worried about you." He pointed to the two police cars parked with their blue lights flashing. "Leave it to the CID for now lad." He patted the arm again. "Until the morning then?"
Hambrowe nodded making the rainwater run from his beard and then Romsey returned to the rear seat of his car, which promptly drove away. Hambrowe watched it out of sight and then walked up the road to the black Ford Sierra, still parked where they had left it. He went to the passenger door before he realised that he was now the driver and then he remembered that the keys had been in Jack Ropell's pocket. Turning once more to face into the pouring rain, he trudged back to the police cars.
At first glance the scene at the hospital looked to be total chaos. Two ambulances were unloading stretcher cases and another was just turning into the grounds with their emergency lights flashing and the sirens on full song, lighting up the wet road and car park with a million blue and orange reflections and filling the air with a sound like some mad hatter's disco. Inside the Emergency Reception Area nurses were scurrying about fixing up drips and wheeling loaded trolleys off through the double doors at the far end, while a uniformed policeman stood against one wall trying to keep out of everyone's way, his soaked uniform gently steaming. He looked relieved to be out of the rain. The white haired man approached him.
"Good evening, officer. What's causing all the activity?"
The policeman turned and looked down at the short figure in the wet, navy blue raincoat and then at the identity card that he was holding up in front of him. He read it and stiffened to attention.
"Good evening, Commander. Wasn't expecting to see Customs and Excise in here."
He waved a hand in the direction of the fevered activity.
"Multiple RTA up on the M25. Unbelievable really. Traffic Control reckon that because of the weather the traffic flow is nearly sixty percent down to a normal night at this time, and yet three cars and a coach load of Japanese tourists still manage to spread themselves all over the road." He went on. "They never learn do they? Doesn't matter how bad the weather is, fog, snow, hail or driving rain. Foot down and Gung bloody Ho!"
He thought about what he was saying, stopped and caught him self.
"Sorry sir. Was it some of your lads in one of the cars?"
"No, officer, but one of my lads is in here tonight. Who is in charge?"
The policeman pointed across to the reception desk where a dark haired woman in her early thirties, wearing a white and bloodstained overall was talking rapidly into a telephone. The white haired man nodded.
"Thank you."
He turned and headed for the desk. There he waited and while the woman talked he read the name displayed upon the badge pinned to her breast pocket. Dr Susan Garrett. Susan Garrett stopped talking and slamming the phone down angrily, turned to face him. He decided that whoever she had been talking to that had upset her so much, he would probably feel the result of her anger whichever approach he used, so he went straight for it. He held his identity card up in front of her eyes.
"I am Commander Peter Romsey of HM Customs and Excise. I know you are very busy, Doctor Garrett, so I will come straight to the point and I assure you we will both save time if you co-operate with me."
Her eyes narrowed as she read the card and she glared at him with resentment that he was keeping her from her patients. Romsey ignored the glare and after some moments she relaxed and nodded.
"All right, Commander, but please make it quick. People are literally dying over there."
He nodded.
"One of my men was brought in here less than half an hour ago, injured by an explosion. His name is Jack Ropell. Who is responsible for him?"
She hesitated before replying, the sudden softening of her features causing him acute anxiety for Jack Ropell's condition. Doctors never looked like that when it was good news.
"I was. That is I saw him first of all. He has severe internal injuries, a compression of the skull and several fractures. He is undergoing emergency surgery right at this moment, but I have to tell you that the prognosis is not good."
Romsey's facial expression did not change, but his eyes were suddenly full of pain. She did not spare him.
"Even if he does recover he may well be crippled for the rest of his life." She made a small helpless gesture. "I am afraid they will probably have to amputate his left leg."
That caused Romsey to react.
"Can you get in touch with the operating theatre from here?"
She nodded, surprised at the question. He pointed to the phone.
"Then do so." He went on, "Whatever they have to do to the rest of his body tonight is up to them, I am only grateful they are trying, but you tell them that unless Its life threatening, please do not remove any limbs until he has seen an orthopaedic surgeon."
He took a card and a gold pencil from his inside pocket and wrote.
"This one"
He handed the card to the doctor who read the name and raised her eyebrows. Then she turned and picked up the phone. Romsey ran a hand over his wet hair and then wiped it on his coat whil
e she relayed his message to an unseen medic on the other end of the line. She put the phone down and nodded to him.
"Thank you."
He turned and walked out of the emergency area and into the night. He had done all he could. As he walked across the streaming car park to his car the ambulances were still arriving.
Peter Romsey was one of those people who tend to accept their position in life only awake discover their full potential when face with a crisis. In Romsey's case it was as a conscripted soldier, serving in Aden. When he had left school his intention had been to become an engineer in one of the large companies in his native Tyneside. This he felt would have been a sufficiently ambitious goal for someone born in the terraces of Nansen Street, Jarrow and who had attended the local secondary modern school, as most of his class mates were quite happy to go down the local pit to earn a living.
This wasn't for Peter Romsey. His father had been a miner all his life until silicosis had killed him at the relatively young age of forty-two, leaving his wife alone to bring up five children as best she could. Romsey was twelve years old when he died. He had watched his father gasp his last hours away and knew he was not going to spend his life down the pit. Better to be in the shipyards or the engineering works. He also knew that to avoid the pit he had to stop coasting at school and do some real work at his education. His teachers were surprised, but pleased at the transformation in the formerly easygoing youth who now suddenly threw himself into his lessons and had been more than glad to help some one who genuinely wanted to learn. The result was that he left school at sixteen with five good GCE's, including English and Maths, and obtained an engineering apprenticeship. This meant he suffered the five years of earning a pittance while his mates from the pit had money for beer and fags. What he did earn went to his Mother for the housekeeping and because he could not join in with the others in their drinking and general girl hunting, he devoted himself to his studies and gaining good results in his exams. This paid off and he finished in the top three of his year.
Because of his apprenticeship his conscription into the army was deferred until his training was completed at the age of twenty-one. Then as often happened, because he then had to do his national service and would be absent for two years his firm decided to release him. Come back when you have got some real experience he was told and you will be taken on again. So there he was jobless and conscripted. The delay did him no harm. At twenty-one he was a serious young man and extra three years in age combined with the discipline of his engineering training stood him apart from the other teenagers of his draft. Because of this and the fact he had a bank account, a rare thing for a working class man in the fifties, after his basic training he was immediately made a lance corporal. He turned out to be a natural leader. His ability to get his men to do what he wanted without puffing out his stripe was noticed and within six months he was asked if he would like to take officer training. At the time recruiting officers from the ranks was a new departure for the army and the young Romsey grabbed it like a shot. Because of his engineering background he was transferred to the REME and after basic officer training was sent as a sub lieutenant to Aden, where they were having a little local difficulty with the natives. The local difficulty turned out to be a full-scale war of insurrection against British rule. He and the rest of his group were not told just how bad it was until they arrived. Consequently, all thoughts of spending the rest of his service time sitting happily in the sun were quickly dispersed and the young men had to rapidly learn how to survive in an atmosphere or urban guerrilla warfare.
One hot and sticky day about three months after he arrived, Romsey and a REME sergeant and two engineers, were sent with eight guardsmen and their lieutenant to recover two Bedford trucks that were stuck down by the dock area after being sabotaged by putting sugar in petrol tanks. The lieutenant explained why. It was the practise when there was trouble for a platoon of guardsmen to be sent out in the Bedfords to the trouble area. Because these things sometimes got out of hand, the trucks would keep their engines running for a quick retreat should it be needed. On this occasion the trouble had been handled easily and the platoon had returned to the vehicles in minutes. In the meantime somebody, probably young children who would not be suspected of sabotaged, had managed to approach the trucks and had tipped sugar in both petrol tanks. Within minutes both engines had died. The officer in charge of the platoon had radioed for more transport and the trucks had been abandoned. That had been hours before and the lieutenant had little hope of finding anything worth salvaging.
When they arrived at the abandoned vehicles the lieutenant expressed surprise that the trucks had not been set on fire in the intervening twelve hours and worried that they were being drawn into a situation they would find hard to control. At this time in the troubles, British soldiers were being stoned by a mobs of teenagers any time they were not insufficient numbers to impose their will on the crowd, a thing that was to be repeated years later in Belfast. He was even more concerned at the location. The trucks were in a square some forty metres by thirty with only two roads entering the square. One was the road by which they had approached while the other led down to a small dock and then stopped in a dead end leaving only one way out. Most of the buildings around the square were houses without any alleyways between them. The exception was a dirty and seedy cafe.
When they arrived there were several old men sitting drinking coffee, but within a few minutes of their arrival the placed was locked, shuttered, and looking as if it had not opened in years. The lieutenant was right to worry.
They had cleared the first tank of contaminated fuel and flushed it through without a problem. The truck had started up at the first try and they moved on to the second. Romsey and his sergeant had decided that it would be better to tow the second truck back to base with the first rather than try to repair it here in the open in obviously hostile territory and had informed the others of this. The infantrymen, who at first been very edgy at being there in such small numbers, had begun to relax. They were connecting up the tow bar when it happened. The shot came from one of the flat rooftops and the bullet hit the lieutenant in the left hand side just below his lowest rib. He was flung sideways and his Sten gun fell at Romsey's feet. For a moment he was stunned. He had never seen a gun fired in action before. Before anyone could react another soldier went down under the fire from the roof. It was the infantry sergeant that was down and holding his left leg just above the knee. Another gun to the left of the first started to hunt for Romsey himself and he realised they were going for the officers in the hope of causing panic and confusion. Before he could react a grenade landed in the back of the truck they were working on and all of a sudden he unfroze and he and his own sergeant sprinted for cover the first truck and dived behind it. The explosion of the grenade seemed much louder in the confines of the square than he remembered from the practise ground and fragments of the truck's wooden sides and tailboard whistled through the air. Nobody seemed to be injured by the blast.
Their guardsmen's disciplined quickly returning the rest of the platoon were by then scattered into any corner or doorway that would give them cover, while searching the rooftops for the snipers and an eerie silence had fallen, broken only by the groans of the lieutenant who by now was lying in his own blood. The rifles on the roof started up again but were now less accurate as they were hampered by the return fire from the guardsmen and no longer were allowed the luxury of time to draw a bead. Romsey called to the wounded sergeant to drag the wounded lieutenant under the serviceable truck away from the bullets that were sporadically slamming into the stones all around them. It was only a couple of yards. He watched as the sergeant crawled painfully out from under the truck and taking the lieutenant by his Sam Brown, struggled to pull him to the precarious safety the truck offered. They were temporarily safe from bullets, but not from another grenade.
Romsey was sharing his doorway with one of the guardsmen and turned to him. To his surprise he found he was not frigh
tened, but extremely angry. He noted the lance corporals stripe on the others arm.
"Where are the bastards, corp.?"
The corporal looked at him. Guardsmen have no great regard for the fighting qualities of the REME. Romsey held his stare. He was in charge here with the lieutenant and the sergeant stranded under the truck. The corporal made his decision and dropped his eyes.
"They are up on those two roofs by that cafe‚ over there."
He pointed at the seedy buildings about thirty yards away directly straddling the road they would need to take to leave the square.
Romsey couldn't see all the building and went to look around the corner. The corporal stopped him.
"I wouldn't do that, sir."
Romsey nodded. The corporal knew what he was talking about. He took of his hat and holding it by the rim he pushed it out slightly. Two shots rang out and the ricochets from the stone paving whined angrily. He looked at the corporal.
"Anywhere near it?"
The corporal shook his head.
"Not really. Missed by at least a yard I reckon, both of them." The Scottish accent showed his disgust at such piss poor marksmanship. "They are only using rifles and I reckon they are getting jittery. Good job they only had one grenade."
The thought of what would happen if reinforcements arrived with grenades turned Romsey's blood cold and he shivered.
"Did anyone get a message out?"
The corporal shook his head and pointed across the street. There, lying in his own blood was the radio operator, his radio still strapped to his back the man showed no sign of movement or life. The other thing that Romsey noticed was the lieutenants Sten gun, still lying where it had fallen and he cursed himself for a panicking fool for leaving it there. The corporal followed the direction of his stare and read his mind.
"I would leave it if I was you. Sir. Probably waiting for someone to try and pick it up."
Romsey nodded.
"Let's not disappoint them then. I can't do much with a revolver except make a lot of noise so I need that Sten. I bloody left it there so I will go and get it. When I leave the doorway I want everybody to give me covering fire. Tell the others will you?"
He waited while the corporal went through the pantomime of sign language that let the rest of the squad no what was happening. Then he turned to him.
"Ready, Sir."
Romsey nodded and went into a crouch.
"Go."
He left the doorway like a sprinter. He had already made up his mind how he was going to grab up the gun and where his next destination lay. He ignored the deafening gunfire that filled the little square and the scream of the bullets from the stones. He seized the Sten gun by Its front handle and instead of stopping at the relative safety of the truck carried on in a zigzag across the square. Bullets were kicking up chips of stone all around him and his breath was rasping in his throat as if he was in the last stages of a cross country, but he kept going until he threw himself in the doorway of left hand building from which the terrorists were firing. The doorway offered scant protection as it was only some eight inches deep, but after the openness of the square it beckoned like a fortress. As he hit the door there was a sound of cracking timber and it opened and he tumbled into darkness.
Halfway in he instinctively turned in the air and fell onto his back, pointing the Sten into the dark interior. After the brightness of the sunlit square he was totally blind and waited in a sweat of nervous agony for a bullet of knife to find him in the perceived blackness. There was only the sound of his breathing as he waited the twenty seconds that seemed like a lifetime for his vision to adjust to the gloom. When nothing happened he reached out with a foot and gently closed the door behind him so that he was no longer lying in the sunlight. The only light now came from some cracks in the shutters over the single window. Another twenty seconds went by.
He was in what appeared to be a sitting room. There was a low table in the middle with cushions around it. More cushions were spread around the walls. Through a door less opening he could see what was evidently the kitchen because it had a stone sink and what looked like an ancient hand operated water pump. No one else was there. In one corner of the room was an open staircase leading to the second floor and he presumed, the roof, as light was coming down from somewhere. He was pleased to see that it was made of concrete and not creaking wood. As far as he was able in the gloom he checked the Sten gun over, but apart from some scratches it seemed undamaged by its rough treatment. He checked the magazine to see it was full.
By now his adrenaline levels had returned to somewhere near normal and his blood had ceased to pound in his ears. He listened. The sharp crack of a single shot rang out followed by a small fusillade as the guardsmen answered the sniper's fire. While the echoes were still sounding he crossed the room and went to the stairs. He listened again. He forced himself to remember his basic training and slowly ascended the stairs in a crab like motion, one step at a time with the Sten gun always leading the way. On the second floor there were two rooms that led off a small landing. These had doors but both were open and a quick glance told him they were empty.
There was another door at the end of this landing. It was half open and was the source of the light he had seen. Beyond it he could see more concrete steps. Gently opening this door he discovered that from this point the stairs ran up the side of the building in plain view of the street. It was on the side of the building where the road led out from the square and down to the dock and invisible to his squad. He realised he was going to do this alone.
Again using the crabbing motion he ascended the stairs. When he got level with the flat roof he risked a peek over the top, praying that no one in any of the adjacent houses was about to shout a warning to the terrorists or even be drawing a bead between his shoulder blades. He was soaked in his own sweat by now, but again fear had curiously left him.
On the roof was one man. He was crouching down behind the two-foot high wall that ran the perimeter of the roof and looking through a hole that had been made by the removal of a brick. Romsey risked a glance around the rest of the roof, but apart from a truckle bed, obviously used by the owner when the nights grew too warm to stay in the bedrooms, it was empty. He could see everything with a startling clarity and noticed that the wood of the bed was cracked and dry and that the terrorist was short, squat, raggedly dressed and unshaven. His rifle was a British Army model and he wondered who had died for him to own it. He had just taken all this in when the man by the wall started to rise up for another shot.
Things started to move very quickly. Romsey lifted the Sten gun and called for the man to drop the rifle. His answer was to spin around and fire straight at him. Romsey noticed the shock on his face and heard the bullet whistle past. He fired a short regulation burst holding the barrel of the gun down firmly as it tried to climb evermore skyward as each bullet left the barrel. At least one of them hit his adversary who was thrown backwards onto the low wall. For a minute he hovered between roof and falling. There was another fusillade of shots from the square and Romsey saw the bright red splotches appear on the man's upper torso. He hung there until gravity took over and he toppled into the square. From across the street another man arose. His face too showed shock. He made no attempt to fire the rifle he was holding, but dropped it and sprinted off across the roofs. Romsey fired the remaining twenty-five bullets in the magazine after him, but although the man stumbled once he kept going. Romsey cursed the Sten's propensity to spray bullets all over the place and dropping the useless weapon drew his pistol but the man had gone.
There was a crash from the door to the roof and within two seconds the corporal arrived on the roof with two more guardsmen. He surveyed the surrounding roof areas and his demeanour told Romsey he was anxious to get away from such an exposed position. Romsey stooped and picked up the empty Sten. And headed for the stairs. He looked at the sergeant.
"I wonder which Pratt decided to adopt this heap of rubbish,” he said. "At twenty
paces you couldn't hit a house with it. Never mind a person."
The corporal smiled at him.
"Good job they only give to the officers then, isn't it, Sir."
Romsey looked at him sharply, but the corporal just grinned.
"If you want to join the Guards, Sir, me and the lads will recommend you to the colonel.
Romsey grinned back.
"Thanks for the vote of confidence corporal, but I think you buggers are a bit too close to the sharp end for my liking."
The radio operator was dead. The lieutenant survived, but with the damage he suffered to lower lung and liver, was invalided out of the army. Romsey's sergeant also recovered and Romsey himself was offered a permanent commission. He refused as he didn't see himself as wanting to help with the job of hanging on to bits of the Empire that were prepared to fight for their independence. Because of this he unknowingly avoided several more "Police Actions". At the end of his national service he joined Her Majesties Customs and Excise. He never came into contact with engineering again for the rest of his life