Dark Full of Enemies(42)

“What happened in Narvik?”

“Ah—that may have been why they came by. We were questioned, our papers checked, and the boat searched. Most thoroughly. And the Germans took their time about it.”

That much is clear, McKay thought.

“We had also to refuel,” Petersen said.

“So you’d be ready for a trip to the dam? Reconnaissance?”

“Impossible.”

“Why?”

Petersen’s fork stopped halfway to his mouth, and he looked up. “Not possible.”

“You know why I’m here,” McKay said. “I can’t do what I’ve been sent to do without intelligence.” Petersen snickered and McKay flushed for a moment at the pun. The man was mocking him now. He relaxed, loosened his arms from his chest, and tried again. “I understand that your crew needs rest. So does mine. But we’re here now and ready to go.”

Petersen took his bite. McKay waited. He would say nothing else. When Petersen finally spoke, McKay marked a change in the man’s face. He looked ill.

“All right,” Petersen said. “Tonight, 2200. But my men will not go ashore with you. Not again.”

“Again?”

Petersen flinched, as if he had bitten the inside of his cheek, but did not otherwise respond. “I will go with you—I know the ground—but no one else of my men. Is that clear?”

“Outstanding,” McKay said. He sighed, satisfied. He did not feel triumph, but the dull gratification of one more obstacle out of thousands bypassed. He had not felt triumph in a long time. “I’ll bring one of my men. The other two will deliver the radio.”

“Ah, yes.”

“You have people for that?”

“Yes.”

“Good. I figure you can make those arrangements. We’ll be ready at 2200.”

Petersen had finished his meal and stood. He stared for a moment at the table, dabbing his mouth. McKay watched him.

“I want you to remember,” Petersen said, “none of my men goes ashore with you.”

“This is just a reconnaissance.”

“I know, but remember that.” He looked hard at McKay, and pointed. “Not one.”





McKay climbed down the stairs to the basement room. He had a lot to go over with the team before their departure in just a few hours. And he felt badly, for a moment, that he had lost his temper with Stallings again. He shook the thought away. Stallings could have gotten all of them killed. He had seen it happen before. Many times.

He let himself into the basement. Only Ollila lay awake.

“You did not knock,” he said, in German.

McKay swore to himself. A smile flicked across Ollila’s face in the dim light and he closed his eyes.

McKay sat. He still had the Welrod, now unloaded, in his coat. He took it out, removed the magazine entirely, and put it in its place. He looked at the team. Graves and Stallings had brought down two of the pallets and lay asleep on either side of the card table, which still sat on their bags. Ollila, it seemed, had not moved for hours, but lay sleeping, embracing his Mauser.

McKay leaned back against the winerack, bit into the cold sausage, and thought ahead. He needed to wake them, give them orders, but he decided against it for the moment. Let them sleep, he thought. God knows I can’t.





8





He left Graves with Stallings for the delivery of the radio and chose Ollila to help reconnoiter the dam. At 2200, they parted ways, Stallings and Graves on foot with two Norwegians—neither known to them from Petersen’s crew—and McKay and Ollila aboard the Hardr?de.

He had had time to think about the German cars, about Stallings nearly getting them killed. He thought about the other concussions he had seen, about the strange behavior they had caused. He told Graves to keep an eye on Stallings, to report to him any oddities. Stallings was an electrical genius, he said, and any slips in the installation of the radio would be telling. If Stallings’s head trauma had been too severe, they would have to leave him out of the sabotage operation.

McKay considered whether they should travel armed, and decided in favor of it. There was no reason for three people to be hiking the cliffs and mountains around the dam in the middle of the night. If caught, the Germans would know immediately why they were there. McKay brought his Thompson with one pouch of extra magazines, the Browning Hi-Power, the Welrod, and his ka-bar. Ollila brought his rifle and pistol. They left all other gear behind. Once on foot, they needed speed.

The sky was clear, and the moon would wane into nothingness by the next night—the dark of the moon, the moment on the lunar calendar that all military planners hoped to begin assaults. He thought of the long foxhole nights on Guadalcanal, the kill zones that gradually filled with bodies in the dark, and thought about something else.

They sailed slowly, taking their time, hoping to look unsuspicious. Grettisfjord reached ten miles south from Ofotfjord and lay about a mile across at its mouth. From there the mountains pressed quickly in on the fjord, narrowing it to a few thousand feet in places until reaching the neck where the dam stood, holding its tributary waters ransom for electricity. Beyond Grettisstad, there were no roads. Beyond Grettisstad, there were no more towns or villages. Beyond Grettisstad there was only the dam, the power station, the railway, and the garrisons that guarded them.