The Tunnel (23 page)

‘It’s definite we’re going?’ Peter still thought there might be a hope.

‘The day after tomorrow,’ Hugo said.

Having been prepared for disappointment for so long, Peter was able to hide it. ‘You can go to the funeral if you like,’ he told Hugo. ‘There’s no point in my going now.’

‘No, it’s OK,’ Hugo said. ‘You’ve got the uniform together now. You’d better go.’

‘What’s
Stalag-Luft III
like?’ Peter asked. ‘Is it a new camp?’

‘I think so – it’s in a pine forest, I believe.’

Peter could imagine it. Virgin ground. They’d get in early and stake their claim for a tunnel. Get cracking as soon as they arrive. The last tunnel had been good experience, now they would make one on their own. Keep it small and take no unnecessary risks. ‘Which purge are we going in?’

‘The first. We leave at eight o’clock in the morning - we’d better start getting packed right away.’

‘I hope there’s a theatre,’ Saunders said. ‘Don’t want to waste all that energy I used learning my part.’

Stewart came in with a handful of letters. ‘Last post you’ll get for a few weeks – better make the most of it.’

‘Is it a fact we’re all going?’ Peter asked.

‘Yes,’ Stewart said. ‘Rotten luck on you chaps. You’d nearly finished, hadn’t you?’

‘We were going out next Friday,’ Peter said. ‘What’s the new camp like?’

‘Wooden huts,’ Stewart said. ‘Eight in a room. By the way – the funeral party meets at two o’clock at the main gate.’ He put the letters down on the table. Among the official letter forms was one envelope deeply edged with black. It was addressed to Hugo. Stewart looked at the letter, then at Hugo, but said nothing.

They watched Hugo as he opened it, watched his face drain of colour as he read.

‘Who is it?’ Saunders said. ‘Your aunt?’

Hugo fought hard to control himself. ‘No,’ he said, in a strangled voice. ‘It’s the cat.’

‘What a day!’ Saunders said. ‘What a bloody day!’

As he sat polishing his buttons for the funeral Peter had an idea. The Russian compound. Why couldn’t a group of them drive a shaft up from the middle of the tunnel and come out in the Russian compound? They could hide there until the others had gone and then complete the tunnel at their leisure. He pulled on his clogs and hurried down to Tyson’s room.

Tyson was sitting alone at the table, sewing bars of chocolate into a watertight packet made from a rubber groundsheet.

‘I’ve got an idea,’ Peter said.

‘It’s all right,’ Tyson said. ‘There are stooges out.’

‘Why not come up in the Russian compound?’ Peter said. ‘Hide there until the others have gone?’

‘We’d thought of that.’ Tyson’s smile was almost gentle. ‘I’ve just spoken to their head man about it, but he won’t play. Says they’d all be shot if we were caught. I expect they would be too. He went so far as to say he’d tell the goons if we tried it.’

‘Need the Russians know?’

‘They know where the tunnel is, they’ve heard us digging. They’ll be on the lookout for it now. Can’t blame them in a way, you know.’

‘I don’t blame them,’ Peter said. ‘It’s just rotten luck.’

‘I’m going to hide down there,’ Tyson said, without looking up from his sewing.

Peter waited.

‘I’ll stay down there till you’ve all gone, then I’ll come up from our end. There’s just a chance the compound will be left unguarded.’

‘You can’t get out from inside,’ Peter said. ‘We found that out this morning.’

‘I’ve arranged for the Pole who drives the night cart to come in and let me out.’

Peter felt a deepening of his admiration for the man. He certainly hadn’t wasted time in useless regret since he had learned of the move. And there he was calmly sewing food into waterproof bags, giving his life into the hands of a man he hardly knew.

‘Supposing he doesn’t come?’ Peter said.

Tyson went on sewing.

‘He might be too scared,’ Peter said. ‘Or there might be Germans here.’

‘It’s worth the risk,’ Tyson said.

‘Is there room for two?’ Peter, as he said it, felt that he was abandoning John; but there obviously wouldn’t be room for three.

‘I thought you’d ask that,’ Tyson said, ‘and the answer is no. There’s not enought air for two. I’ve talked it over with the Committee and they’ve decided it’s a scheme for one.’

Peter met the rest of the funeral party – there was one representative from each block – at the main gate and, after the usual German delay, they set off by car to the cemetery.

He sat next to Mueller in the back of the small German car and thought miserably of the fruitless months he had spent slowly driving himself forward through the heavy clay. Hugo was right, it was just so much wasted effort.

They did not talk on the way to the cemetery. Peter felt that Mueller was anxious not to discuss the shooting, and for his own part he preferred the silence. As they drove through the poor looking streets of the Polish town he thought how different it would have been had they not been moving to another camp. What he now saw with litle more than ordinary interest he would then have seen with an eye to cover, and eye to the safest way of passing through the town. He was on parole now, outside the wire, bound by honour not to escape. That’s how it was with all privileges; the theatre, the church, funerals – all received on conditions, all accepted with a slight feeling of guilt.

They met the cortège party just inside the gates of the churchyard. There was a detachement of armed German soldiers drawn up on one side of the gravel path. An RAF service cap surrounded by a wreath of leaves rested on the top of the plain wooden coffin in the horse-drawn cart.

Peter and the other prisoners lifted down the coffin, and followed the British padre. The soldiers formed up behind them.

By the side of the open grave the padre, his white surplice tugging in the breeze, read the service, while the German escort, un-comprehending, stood at ease in two ranks. Peter wondered whether the guard who had done the shooting was there. Probably not – probably sent on leave as a reward for his efficiency.

The padre was reading from his small black book.
‘I held my tongue, and spake nothing: I kept silence, yes, even from good words; but it was pain and grief to me;

‘My heart was hot within me, and while I was thus musing the fire kindled: and at last I spake with my tongue;

‘Lord, let me know mine end, and the number of my days: that I may be certified how long I have to live …’

Peter stood and looked at the coffin lying across the ropes by the side of the open grave. They had not been able to cover it with a flag. The cap with its faded gold and red badge looked strange surrounded by the German wreath. He wondered to whom the cap belonged.

He came to himself again. They were lowering the coffin into the grave and the padre was sprinkling the dark earth on to the hollow wood. Peter took a handful of earth and threw it on.
‘Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust …’
the padre read from the book. As Peter rubbed his hand on his trouser leg he tried to think of Loveday, to remember the kindliness behind the restless fear. But the dark gaping hole reminded him too much of the tunnel. Of Tyson shut down there; struggling for breath, wondering if the Pole would keep his word. He was safe enough, Peter supposed. No man would be evil enough to leave a man to die. But what a risk to take. He was secretly glad that Tyson had refused to take him. Glad.

There would be another tunnel. He must learn to treat each failure as a preparation, a preparation for the next attempt. There was no giving up now. He would go on digging until he had dug his way out.

The padre finished reading. The wailing notes of a German trumpet haunted the sad air of the Polish churchyard. The rifles crashed. One by one the British officers stepped forward and saluted the grave. Slowly the funeral party walked past tortured iron and carved stone towards the cars which waited to take them back to the camp; back to release from parole, perhaps to another tunnel from another, unknown camp.