The Odin Mission (34 page)

'It's such a terrible sound!' Anna closed her eyes and
placed her hands over her ears. Then, as the lead Stuka seemed about to plummet
straight into them, it levelled out. From its undercarriage they watched as a
dark cigar- shaped bomb detached itself from the belly and fell, shrieking its
death whistle, seemingly hurtling straight for them. Tanner pushed his foot
down harder on the accelerator and ducked. A split second later a deafening
explosion behind them rocked the truck. Tanner gripped the steering-wheel and
righted it as the second aircraft pulled out of its dive. Another bomb howled
towards them, debris from the first raining and clattering across the tarpaulin
and metal cab roof. Tanner ducked again, Anna screamed, and there was another
explosion, this time ahead.

Tanner felt the brakes lock, and momentarily lost
control of the front of the truck, then regained it and straightened the
Morris. With a screech of burning rubber, it slid across the stony road and
they ground to a halt as a swirling mass of cloud and smoke enveloped them.

'Are you mad?' yelled Chevannes. 'Now we are sitting
ducks!'

'Not in this smoke. Anyway, they're not trying to kill
us, sir,' Tanner shouted back. 'They're trying to stop us!' He wound up the
window, coughing as dust, grit and cordite choked him. Debris - stone, earth, bits
of metal - clattered down once more. 'They want Sandvold alive,' Tanner
spluttered, eyelids stinging. 'As soon as this clears I'll try to get us going
again, but we don't want to fall into any crater.'

As Tanner had suspected, the two Stuka dive-bombers
had gone without strafing. It was the confirmation he needed that the capture
of Sandvold alive was the enemy objective. Knowing this made no difference to
their goal of reaching the Allies, but it meant the Germans had to be careful
about how they attacked them. That, he knew, was a useful advantage.

As the clouds of dust dispersed they could see the
crater just ahead: a large hole spread across more than three-quarters of the
road. The bank on the left, overlooking the lake, had collapsed, while
boulders and other rocky debris were scattered twenty yards around it.

'Bollocks,' said Tanner, stepping out of the cab and
hurrying to the crater's edge. Chevannes had followed him, and now, from the
back of the truck, came Sykes and Lieutenant Larsen.

'Can't help but admire it, can you?' said Sykes, as
they stood there regarding the damage.

'Bloody fine marksmanship,' agreed Tanner.

'We'll never get the truck past,' said Larsen.

'Damn you, Tanner,' said Chevannes. 'I knew we should
have waited until this evening when we would have been out of sight of the
Luftwaffe. Now we're stuck, unless you have any more bright ideas.'

'Well, sir,' he winked at Sykes, then turned back to
Chevannes, 'if you'd take your men and keep a good watch out for any trouble,
the corporal and I will get us moving again.'

Sykes delved into his bag and produced two cartridges
of Polar dynamite. 'See, sir?' Sykes beamed at Chevannes.

'You wish to make another crater?' The Frenchman was
clearly appalled.

'No, sir. We're going to blast away a bit of the bank.
Then we drive round the crater.'

Tanner hurried back to the truck where Sandvold and
the other men were waiting anxiously. Grabbing his pack, he said, 'Get ready
with your shovels.

We're going to have to do a bit
of clearing in a minute.'

'What the bloody hell's going on, Sarge?' asked
Erwood.

'Bomb crater in the road. And we need to get past it,
pronto.' He hurried back and took out his tin of safety fuse, which Sykes tied
round the dynamite and placed in a small hole in the bank that he had already
dug.

'How far back, Stan?' said Tanner. 'I've only got
about forty foot left here.'

'Forty foot! Blimey, Sarge, we don't need anything
like that! A foot or so should be fine. This stuff burns at two foot per
minute, so just give me time to get out of the way. You might want to take the
truck back a bit, though.'

Tanner nodded, cut the fuse and ran back to the truck.
After he had reversed thirty yards, he saw Sykes signal, then put a match to
the fuse and run down the road towards him. He turned to Anna, still waiting
patiently in the truck. 'Might want to duck your head,' he told her. He kept an
eye on his watch, following the seconds ticking by. A breathless Sykes reached
him. 'Any moment now, Sarge.'

An ear-splitting crack rent the silence of the valley,
the report echoing across the lake, while another cloud of dust briefly
obscured the road. Once the rain of rock, stone and grit had settled, Tanner
and Sykes hurried back to the crater to see the result of their efforts.

Hallelujah.
A six-foot wide chunk of the
bank had been blown, most of which appeared to have slumped into the existing
crater. The road was a mess of rock, stone and earth, but it would soon be
passable once more.

'Stan,' said Tanner, patting his corporal on the back.
'You're a genius.'

'I bloody am an' all.' He grinned.

Tanner returned to the truck, brought it forward, then
ordered his men to get out and start clearing. Less than ten minutes later, the
road was ready, and with the men standing and watching, Tanner began to inch
forward. A scrape of metal as the offside wing ground against the bank. Tanner
could feel the resistance of the rock. 'Sorry, Mr Sulheim,' he said to himself,
then pressed his foot on the throttle. A painful screech of metal, and the
truck lurched forward. A moment later, it was safely on the other side.

'Quick!
Vite!'
shouted Chevannes. The men got back into the truck,
Chevannes rejoined Tanner and Anna in the cab and they set off once more.
Tanner looked at his watch again: a little over twenty minutes from the start
of the attack. A glance at the map, open once more on Chevannes' lap. He
wondered how long it would take the Stuka crews to return to their base and
warn the ground troops of their position. With the road blocked behind them, he
guessed the enemy would be coming from the Gudbrandsdal valley, joining the
road at Vinstra. It was a good distance to Vinstra from Tretten, but who was to
say whether the troops would come from Tretten or further north up the valley?
It was impossible to know. He wiped a hand across his brow. Really, he thought,
they might meet Germans at any moment. Perhaps Chevannes had been right, after
all. Perhaps they should have waited.
No,
he told himself.
We need to make ground while
we can.

'Are you all right, Sergeant?' asked Anna.

'Yes - thank you, Miss.' Then he said to Chevannes,

'Sir, we need to watch the road
ahead like hawks.'

'Yes,
thank you,
Sergeant, but all I can see at the moment is the end
of the lake,' said Chevannes, 'so at present there is little I can do.'

'In a couple of kilometres, the road climbs again,'
said Anna. 'It follows the lip of the mountain plateau. You can see a long way
from up there.'

'What about snow?'

'There will be snow on the mountains but the road will
be clear by now. I'm certain of that. There are quite a few farms along it -
they will make sure the road can be used.'

'Good,' said Tanner, then took his German binoculars
from round his neck and passed them to Anna. 'Here,' he said. 'Do me a favour,
will you? Keep a dekko with these.'

'A what, Sergeant?'

Tanner smiled. 'Sorry, Miss. Soldier slang. It means,
could you keep a sharp lookout?'

'Of course.' She returned the smile, and Tanner was
pleased to see irritation on Chevannes' face.

A mile, then two. Suddenly the end of the lake reappeared
and the climb began. Tanner dropped down a gear, the Morris grinding sluggishly
forward. The road was winding, too, so their forward view was never more than a
hundred yards at most. Tanner felt a heaviness in his stomach. He tapped his
fingers on the steering- wheel, bounced up and down in his seat again, then
eventually took out his last remaining packet of German cigarettes, offered one
to Chevannes and Anna - who both declined - then fumbled for his matches. The
effort of getting at them from under his jerkin, then delving into the
right-hand breast pocket on his battle blouse caused him to drive over a
pothole and briefly lose control of the wheel.

'Concentrate, Sergeant,' snapped Chevannes. 'We
haven't come this far just for you to drive us off the road.'

Tanner ignored him, and as he clutched the steering-
wheel, matches now in one hand, Anna said, 'Would you like me to light it for
you?'

'Thanks, Miss,' said Tanner, and passed her both
matches and cigarette. Having lit it, she carefully placed the cigarette
between his lips.

'Thanks,' said Tanner again, inhaling deeply.

'Don't forget to keep watching the road ahead, Anna,'
said Chevannes.

'No, of course - sorry,' she said, hastily bringing
the binoculars back to her eyes. Tanner smiled to himself - as if they'd be any
use on this winding stretch of road. He opened the window and the smoke
dissolved through the narrow gap. It felt cooler already, and Tanner felt a shiver
run down his back.
Christ! Any moment, just round this corner .
.. But then he turned and the
road was still empty. He felt a momentary flutter of relief.

'We're nearly there,' said Anna, as they drove round a
sharp hairpin. Beneath them, away to their right, there was a deep ravine,
dark, forbidding and densely covered with thick forest, but as they crested the
brow the road levelled at last. To the left, they saw the snow-covered mountain
plateau, to their right the ravine and in front, the long, straight road that
hugged the lip for some fifteen miles, almost all the way to Vinstra. 'How far
can you see now?' Tanner asked Anna.

'Three or four kilometres at least. It's empty.'

Patches of thin mud-brown snow covered the road, but
its surface was clear enough for Tanner to push down hard on the throttle and
build up speed. 'See anything at the back?' Tanner yelled.

'Nothing,' came the muffled reply.

Where were they? Tanner wondered. He drummed his
fingers, felt the pistol at his hip; his trusted Enfield was wedged between his
seat and the door.

Another two miles, and the road veered to the left,
round a subsidiary valley to the main ravine, then curved back and straightened
once more. As Anna had told them, there were a number of farms along this high
mountain route, but not a soul stirred. The road was empty - not a cart, person
or animal. Tanner realized he had barely even seen a bird. The place seemed
lifeless; it was almost impossible to think a war could be going on. Tanner
strained his eyes. One of the eyelids flickered. Fatigue was getting the better
of him.

A glint in the distance snapped him out of his
reverie. 'There!' he said. 'What was that?'

Both Chevannes and Anna had their binoculars trained.
Another glint. 'There it was again!' said Tanner.

'It's them,' said Chevannes. 'A convoy of four
trucks.'

Tanner's heart was drumming in his chest, his tiredness
forgotten. 'How far?'

'Seven kilometres, maybe eight.'

'What are we going to do?' asked Anna, fear in her
voice.

'Stop and head into the mountains,' said Chevannes.

'Here?' said Tanner. 'Where? There's no cover at all.'
He glanced at the map. 'Where are we? What's this valley here?' With half an
eye on the map, he pointed to a dogleg in the road.

'It's not far,' said Anna. 'Look, the road turns just
ahead.'

'Good. Another valley to skirt round, then we'll be
out of view. Ten to one it'll be wooded. We can ditch the truck there and take
cover in the trees.'

To his relief, as they turned the corner and lost
sight of the enemy, Tanner saw that the landscape was covered with dense
forest. To their right a mountain stream was tumbling and cascading down to the
ravine. At the corner of the dog-leg, the road crossed the stream and it was
here that Tanner stopped.

'Everyone out! Quick!' shouted Chevannes.

Tanner hurried to the back of the truck and grabbed
his pack, slinging it on to his shoulders, his mind whirling. 'Five miles at
twenty miles an hour,' he mumbled, 'take away five. Ten minutes.' He looked at
his watch. Nearly half past ten. Ten minutes to get Sandvold and Anna away and
come up with a plan to delay the Germans.
Think, man, think.