Silence Over Dunkerque (16 page)

The captain, with that peculiar talent of the French for creating a scene on any issue, was shouting violently at the German, who kept stubbornly shaking his head. He was obviously refusing permission to leave with a crew of three. Such were his orders, they could not be broken.

The Sergeant had a picture of Fingers, rowing alone across the Channel, or himself, alone in a dory. By this time every trawler save theirs had slipped away from the jetty. At last, weary of the discussion, the German snatched at their identity cards and jumped up to the pier, followed by the non-com, evidently to consult a superior.

The Sergeant understood the problem. One man could never row that heavy dory alone. So there stood the captain, feet apart, shaking his head and declaring he was suffering from arthritis, that he would not leave short of hands. No, he would never....

“Ah, par exemple... non... je ne peux pas... peux... pas... impossible
...
imp
...
poss... ible....”

The whole thing was a terrific act. The Sergeant felt he might well have saved it for the German security officer, now vanishing down the end of the pier, and not wasted it on the two immobile soldiers in the stern. However, like so many French, once he got wound up he was unable to stop. It was this flow of language which gave validity to the scene.

Finally, after an eternal wait, the German officer could be seen down the quay. He came toward the vessel, the non-com several paces to the rear. Reaching the trawler, he sent the two soldiers off the boat with a wave of his hand, turned to the captain, and ordered him to line up the crew.

“Léon,” bawled the captain down the companionway. The set of his head showed that he was elated at having won an argument with a German, even in a good cause, and even if he was risking his life.

Scowling as usual, Léon appeared on deck.

The German officer, carrying a large book, took their identity cards and checked off each name as he called them out. Then he entered them in the book.

“Le Capitaine,
Guiscard, Paul.” He handed over his papers.

“Georges, Léon,
Contremaître.”

“Grandchamps, Émile-Louis,
matelot.”

“Dubois, Jean-Phillipe.”

Then, shutting the book, he turned to the captain and declared in bad French that his trawler would be carefully checked the next morning on return.

The captain was mollified.
“Bon. Compris!”
Next he turned his back on the German and addressed his quartermaster.
“Léon. Vite. Léon, depêches-toi. Le moteur....
”

Léon, quite unhurried and as surly as ever, sauntered below, making a face at the back of the German climbing to the pier with his non-com. The Englishmen stood ready to haul in the lines fore and aft. The engine spluttered, roared. The captain, from the pilothouse, gave an order into the speaking tube, and a dock worker on the pier threw off the lines as the boat glided ever so gently away from the stone jetty. In several minutes they were moving down the outer harbor, taking their place at the end of the line of trawlers moving out to sea.

The wind had died away, a good sign. The summer night cast a magic over the water, the sky ahead was golden, the Channel a mirror. Faint columns of smoke still rose from the smoldering town, making a kind of pattern above the shore line.

The Sergeant leaned over the rail, the dog beside him. Good-by, France. Good-by, Monsieur the veterinary. Good-by, Gisèle. Good-by until we meet again. As we surely shall.

Now they were leaving the breakwater, bombed half to pieces, then out of the harbor mouth. There, directly ahead, plain and sharp in the evening light, were the cliffs of Dover, with the town nestling along the water. He could almost see the streets, the houses.

“Look back, Sarge, I think we’re being followed.”

He swung quickly around. There was the roar of a Daimler engine, and a German
Schnellboot,
or E-boat, a fast seventeen-foot torpedo boat, capable of eighteen knots, raced up the column of slow-moving trawlers, sending an enormous cloud of spray from her pointed bow. She took her place at the head of the file and led them out into the open sea.

“This isn’t going to be so easy, Sarge,” said Fingers.

T
HE CAPTAIN REALLY DID
have arthritis badly. Not all his indignation with the German security officer was an act. He betrayed the pain in his right arm directly they had drifted about five miles offshore and slung out the nets. He worked with the rest, but only with great difficulty. Dusk came, then blackness, as the trawler lay motionless on the flat sea. The three men hung over the rail, watching the E-boat bird-dogging them every minute.

The captain, it appeared, had for many years been an officer on a Channel steamer and, as he explained, “I speak a kind of English.”

Worried about his return to port and the checkup, the Sergeant asked how he would manage with the German security patrol the next morning at Calais.

“Pouf!
These Germans... all alike... no imagination.” His exhilaration at outwitting the security officer was only too obvious. “They check
Marie-Louise
with attention; the others, not. So I take a man from two different boats. I take your identity papers. In early morning, they check crew from the book.
Le Capitaine,
Guiscard, Paul. Georges, Léon,
Contremaître.
Grandchamps, Emile-Louis,
matelot.”
He stood stiffly, imitating the German officer checking them with an imaginary book in his hand, mocking perfectly the horrible French accent of his enemy. For just a second he
was
the security officer there on deck beside the Sergeant.

It was funny but dangerous. He was gambling with his own life and Léon’s. The Sergeant shook his head. “Here’s hoping it works out that way. But then, if we take your dory and row off, surely they’ll notice it’s gone.”

“Of course they notice. My fran’ there in
Celeste,
he lend me his dory. They not check
Celeste
carefully, so O.K.
Hein?”

“I hope so. You French are a brave race.” He was thinking of the stout-hearted old veterinary and a fourteen-year-old Girl Scout.

The captain spat into the sea, thus indicating that to outwit a German was what made life endurable for a Frenchman these days.
“Ouf....”
He shrugged his shoulders, half in denial of the charge. “Franchman like everyone else—some good, some bad. Las’ month a fran’ of mine here in Calais, he have new trawler, he make wan voyage to Dunkerque, bring back fifty, sixty soldiers. Then he... how you say?...
sabotage....”

“Yes, sabotage, damage....”

“Oui, oui.
He put his engine to the bad, so he won’t be obliged to return to Dunkerque. Many Franchman in German
Stalag
now. Not good. So... what time? At midnight, the Germans tired, they sleep. You leave then.”

But at midnight, with the nets out and
Marie-Louise
slowly sweeping some
six
or seven miles from shore, the E-boat was as aggressive as ever. Her tactics were simple. She floated dark and motionless for fifteen or twenty minutes. Then, without warning, her searchlights would stab the entire fleet, and she would patrol up and down for ten minutes or so. The captain was by this time as far from shore as he dared to get.

When the E-boat was past and several miles away, the captain carefully hailed a nearby trawler, evidently waiting. This vessel drifted over, shielding them from the E-boat. Their dory was lowered to the water, and a sailor transferred from the other boat to
Marie-Louise.

They were ready. The identity cards had been handed over. The two Englishmen shook hands with the captain and thanked him. He seemed pleased and unusually jovial, quite a different character from the silent, gloomy sea captain who met them first in the little café in Calais. Slapping both on the back, he wished them luck. The dog, seeing Fingers climbing into the dory and the Sergeant about to leave, began to run up and down the slippery deck, barking. Everyone aboard
Marie-Louise
grabbed at her, as the noise could be heard for miles across the water. The Sergeant finally picked her up, panting.

“You’re going along, old girl, don’t worry, you’re coming too.”

He handed her over the rail to Fingers, who was balancing himself with difficulty in the dory, and climbed down. A hand was laid upon his shoulder. It was the surly Léon.

“Bonne chance! Bonne chance, mon vieux.”

Then they were afloat, rowing vigorously away from
Marie-Louise,
from the trawler fleet, from the E-boat, from the
Capitaine
Guiscard, Paul, from the shores of France. The oarlocks had been covered with cloth, yet every stroke seemed to ring through the quiet night. With a small flashlight and a compass the veterinary had given them, they struck due north. Then the roar of the E-boat’s engines sounded loudly a few miles off.

Had they heard the bark of the dog? The warship seemed to be heading toward them, so they pulled with all their strength into the blackness. Her searchlights began stabbing at the various trawlers, first one, then another. The Sergeant, watching anxiously, figured they might pass a few yards astern if they kept on course.

“Lie down, ship that oar and lie down. It’s easier to spot a moving object.”

They lay down, the dog nestled between them, as the noise of the E-boat grew louder and louder. The searchlights kept stabbing the waters, glancing over the ships, getting nearer and nearer. Right then, several squadrons of R.A.F. bombers, making a sweep of the French coast, could be heard. The lights of the E-boat went out quickly, her engines were muffled. The two Britishers sprang again to their oars, rowing desperately in the darkness. The sound of the throbbing engines grew fainter. They crept farther and farther away, pushing with all their strength for half an hour before they dared to rest. They needed a rest. Both had blistered hands.

The Sergeant glanced at his watch. It was two-thirty in the morning. They resumed rowing, less vigorously. It was three o’clock, and soon faint streaks of light could be seen in the east. Surely some passing tanker, freighter, or patrol boat, returning from sweeping the Dutch coast, would pick them up. Yet, as day broke, no vessels were visible on the vast expanse of the Channel, save the trawler fleet in the far distance, returning to Calais. They were still six or seven miles from Dover, he estimated.

Planes had been overheard much of the night, both British and German. Shortly after dawn, Spits jumped a flight of Ju 88’s, returning to the Continent after a night over London. There was a fearful clatter above, the guns of the Germans and the cannon of the Spitfires going all out. Most of the fight was too high to be seen, but they caught occasional glimpses of planes through the vapor clouds. Then out of the morning mist a plane with a black cross fluttered, descended, dropped to the sea. Seconds later a parachute opened, and a flyer came slowly down.

He was falling not too far away, so the exhausted Englishmen raced hard to the spot. He hit the water some forty yards distant, loosened his parachute quickly, kicked out strongly, and paddled toward them. Although he seemed to be wearing a sort of life belt, the heavy flying suit was dragging him down, and they reached him just in time.

The dog, her paws on the gunwale, watched intently, trying to keep her balance in the swaying dory. It was the first time she had moved. Fingers reached out and grabbed the struggling German, but was unable to pull him in. Finally, with the help of the Sergeant, they hauled him, wet, panting, breathless, over the side. He lay in the bottom, exhausted.

“Search him, lad. You never know about these clods. Go over him careful-like, just in case.”

Fingers zipped the flying suit open and sure enough, there was a Luger, strapped under one arm in a holster. The flyer, evidently a captain or a major, made no protest. He was far too happy to be alive.

“The bugger,” exclaimed the Sergeant, as he took the weapon. “Well, here’s a nice souvenir of our war in France. Good job we found it, too, us without a gun or pistol. Put him to work on the rowing.”

When Fingers handed him an oar, he protested. Neither could understand the words, but the tune was obvious. An officer of the Luftwaffe was not supposed to work for a couple of dirty French fishermen.

“Right, toss him back, we will.” The Sergeant stepped forward, holding the pistol, indicating plainly his intention. “Let him swim for it.” Sullenly the German sat up on the seat and took hold of the oar, scowling. Fingers reached for the other.

The Sergeant lounged comfortably in the stern, the dog at his feet, inspecting the Luger, which was new and looked as if it had not been used. He watched with pleasure while the angry German bent to his oar. It took work to move the boat, for now the current was turning, the rowing much harder, and a breeze began to ruffle the waters of the Channel.

Surely the Dover patrol would pick them up soon. Far astern, several British Motor Torpedo Boats were also making their way to port, but much too distant to see them.

After another half hour of struggling, Fingers’ palms and hands were bleeding, so the Sergeant rose. “Here, lad, I’ll take over. Hold on to this gun and sit back there.”

He stepped forward in the pitching dory. Suddenly there was a stinging blow on his right hand, the pistol clattered to the bottom of the boat, and there was a flash overhead in the sun.

There was something else. The Airedale, who had been watching, leaped forward, caught the German by the haunches, and a knife fell from his hand. With the dog’s teeth in his thigh, the flyer slipped, lost his balance, fell into the sea with a splash.

“The sot!” said Fingers. “It all happened so quickly I hadn’t a chance to move. That’s what we get for yanking him from the water and saving his life.”

He reached for the gun and pointed it at the German struggling in the sea. But the Sergeant knocked it from his hands. All the while the dog stood stiff and bristling, growling at the enemy flyer in the water.

“No, lad, we can’t do that.” He leaned over and picked up the gun.