Here Be Monsters (5 page)

Major Birkenshawe nodded agreement. ‘They were good men—I told you, eh? Proper desperadoes—gangsters, I shouldn’t wonder—probably all enlisted in Chicago!’

The Colonel cast a sardonic glance at his friend. ‘I rather think the Rangers were more like the old frontiersmen, with their fieldcraft and initiative—‘ He caught himself, as though he suspected that he had been sidetracked. ‘—what exactly is it that you want, Miss Loftus?’

They were back to that, thought Elizabeth. ‘You know that in Chester Wilmot’s book—and in another one I’ve looked at—the name isn’t spelt correctly: it says “Pointe du
Hoe
”
, not Pointe du Hoc”?’

‘Is it the Pointe du Hoc you’re interested in?’ The Colonel’s voice was too casual.

‘Isn’t that where they’ve just been junketing?’ the Major intervened. ‘One of the places, anyway—read about it recently—Her Majesty the Queen and the President—that actor chappie—and the Frogs. Kept the Germans out, for some reason—?’ He frowned. ‘Read something else, too. Just yesterday—in the
Telegraph
—
‘ He became aware that the Colonel was quelling him with a look. ‘Sorry! Pointe du Hoc, you were saying—?’

If the Colonel was close to anything, he was too close, decided Elizabeth. ‘The Rangers landed elsewhere, did they?’

‘Yes.’ The Colonel was only slightly diverted from his suspicions. ‘There were two battalions of them.’

‘Yes?’ Elizabeth could see professional memories weakening him.

‘They took heavy casualties. Fifty per cent or more in some companies.’ He drew a breath. ‘Lack of specialized armour, that was largely due to … and a predilection for frontal attacks on strong points—not the way to use elite troops. They should have been infiltrated through the weak points.’ He caught himself again. ‘The main force was supposed to swing west, and link up with their comrades on the Pointe du Hoc, you see, Miss Loftus.’

‘Hah!’ exclaimed Major Birkenshawe. ‘Now
that
was a strong-point, guns or no guns!’ Then he shook his head. ‘She doesn’t understand, y’know!’

‘That was the correct use of Rangers, actually.’ Colonel Sharpe watched Elizabeth, and ignored the Major. ‘Only the best troops could have got up there—and then caused all the trouble they did. I was attached to that American division, and we were expecting a strong counter-attack that first evening—or the next morning. The Germans had a good division in that sector—better than the one our chaps had to deal with on the British beaches, actually. Though of course their tanks were closer to us. If there’d been armour close to Omaha on D-Day as well, God only knows what would have happened … Anyway, we’d been arguing about the position of that good division before D-Day, but we didn’t get confirmation until far too late. And there were several battalions in reserve—so, with the way things were on the beaches, we were expecting to get hit any moment. But there weren’t any tanks. And the Americans had made a pretty amazing recovery, actually.’

The Major started to cough politely, but inadvertently took in too much of his own bonfire, and choked frighteningly for the best part of a minute, to everyone’s embarrassment.

‘Sorry about that, Liza.’ He wiped his face with what appeared to be a square of torn sheet. ‘But do you understand a word of all that?’ He cocked a huge eyebrow at her. ‘Divisions and battalions—all that stuff?’

‘Yes, Major.’ For one fraction of a second Elizabeth began to hit back, irritated alike by his pipe and his assumptions, and sickened by the torn sheeting; but then she remembered that she actually loved the Major, who had always treated her with courtesy and who had now unearthed Colonel Sharpe for her, when everyone else had failed her. ‘Yes, I
think
I do, that is.’ She smiled at him, then at the Colonel, as though she was stretching her knowledge to its limits. ‘So what did these Rangers do on the Pointe du Hoc—or whatever it’s called?’

‘Hah! I rather suspect they did what they were originally recruited and formed to do, Miss Loftus. Which happened far too rarely with the American Rangers—and with other elite formations I could mention.’

Elizabeth waited. When a man wanted to give distilled wisdom to the world, it was better to let him have his way without side-tracking him with too many intelligent unwomanly questions.

‘Half the time they were squandered on conventional warfare. They threw away a whole Ranger battalion after the Anzio landing.’ The Colonel drew a reminiscent breath, and gave the Major a nod. In another moment he’d be fairly launched.

‘Huh!’ This could have been the right moment for the Major to cough usefully. But instead he nodded back wisely. ‘Half the time they should never have been formed in the first place.’ He blinked at Elizabeth, as though surprised that he had formulated a complete sentence. ‘Stripped the rest of the army of good men—ours as well as the Yanks. Never enough good line NCOs—off swanning around on hair-brained schemes in private armies. Could tell you a tale or two about
that!
’

‘Yes.’ The Major’s threat concentrated the Colonel’s mind wonderfully, so that he refocused on Elizabeth. ‘Pointe du Hoc—as I was saying … When they’d finished their business there, there weren’t many of them left. But then, being Rangers, I rather suspect they got up to all sorts of mischief, which probably pulled the Germans away from the right flank of Omaha. God knows what they did—
we
certainly didn’t know exactly, in the Command Post, even though they sent a staff officer off, to try and find out. But I never saw
him
again—they probably shot him, because the Rangers hated staff officers.’ He smiled at Elizabeth. ‘But then I had to go back to report to Monty -I was his spy, you see.’

The Deputy-Director sat up, one podgy hand still fumbling in the wreckage of his chocolate box. ‘How’s that again, Miss Loftus—Elizabeth?’

‘How’s … what?’ He waved the hand vaguely—insultingly—as though he hadn’t really been listening, but then she had said something of unexpected interest, against the odds. ‘This fellow you talked to—?’

She had to reel back. What she had just said had come just before Colonel Sharpe had discoursed at length on Field Marshal Montgomery, and then on the use (and misuse) of elite soldiers, which had ranged all the way from the Rangers on the Pointe du Hoc, forward to the Green Berets in Vietnam (and the Paras in the Falklands), and back to the Spartans at Thermopylae, almost two-and-a-half thousand years earlier.

‘Well … I think he was attached to the Americans so that he could report back to the British—‘

‘Who?’ He was concentrating on her.

‘Colonel Sharpe. The man I told you about—who told me about the Pointe du Hoc.’

‘Yes, yes—‘ He waved away the obvious fact that he hadn’t been listening, quite unembarrassed ‘—but
how
was it that you got on to him—tell me again—?’

Cool it, Elizabeth
! ‘You told me not to consult the records, or anyone in the department.’ Paul would have given her all this in ten seconds flat, even though he was a 1914 -18 man. ‘Or the Americans.’ The nice young CIA man at Grosvenor Square, who was ex-US Navy and knew all about Father’s war record, would have done the same, only better, over an agreeable lunch. ‘So … there’s this friend of my father’s, who had this friend who was on the planning staff before D-Day, and was seconded to the American army as an observer. But he wasn’t really an observer. Or … I mean, he was … but his real job—‘

‘What’s his name?’ snapped Latimer. ‘
Name
, Elizabeth—
name
—?’

‘Sharpe.’ Elizabeth floundered. ‘Colonel Sharpe—with an “e”. I don’t know his Christian name. But his family had an electrical firm in Hampshire, near Portsmouth. And they went into electronics—computers, I think.’

Latimer punched the keys of his machine, while Elizabeth tried to conscript any other morsel Major Birkenshawe had let slip. ‘I think they had a new factory just near Havant.’

Latimer fed
Havant
into the Beast. ‘Next time, Elizabeth, if you talk to anyone, get his full name and address. What is the name of the firm at Havant?’

And his Credit Rating? And his next-of-kin? And the Beast wasn’t helping her, she could see that reflected on the Deputy-Director’s face. ‘I don’t know, Mr Latimer.’ Damn them both—the Beast and the Deputy-Director! ‘He’s—he must be nearly seventy years old.’

‘Yes.’ He prodded the Beast again, but only received another dusty answer, probably
Search continuing
, if not
Insufficient data;
to track down the Colonel, it would have to talk to other beasts, and such linkages took time. ‘Yes.’ He looked up at last. ‘If he was on D-Day planning then he would be, wouldn’t he?’

He was saying
Don
’
t be silly, Miss Loftus
. And, most annoyingly, with some justification.

‘But never mind him, for the moment. Continue, Elizabeth.’

Continue? But after two slaps she was not about to invite a third. It hadn’t been Colonel Sharpe he had been after, when he’d suddenly stopped pigging his chocolates. So she hadn’t reeled back quite far enough.

‘The Americans sent a staff officer to find out what was happening—?’ She repeated the words tentatively.

‘Yes?’ He found the last of his chocolates. ‘Name?’

She had half-feared as much. ‘I don’t know, sir.’ It was no good pretending. ‘Colonel Sharpe didn’t say. And I didn’t think to ask.’ All the same, it wasn’t quite fair. ‘I didn’t think it was important. But then, I didn’t know what was—or is—important.’ The truth was that Paul, or any of the others, might well have done better on this job. But she couldn’t bring herself to suggest that. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘No need to be.’ He popped the last chocolate into his mouth and examined his finger-ends. ‘Not bad at all.’

He looked positively smug. But he must be referring to the chocolates.

‘Colonel Sharpe didn’t know what came of that, because he had to report back to General—‘ Elizabeth frowned. Had it been ‘General’ or ‘Field Marshal’ then? ‘—to Montgomery. But in fact they broke through from Omaha to the Pointe du Hoc within the next thirty-six hours.’

‘Parker.’ He finished chomping and swallowed. ‘Major Thaddeus E. Parker.’

Elizabeth stared at him in genuine and unfeigned astonishment.

‘The name of the American staff officer.’ He attended to the last remnants of the chocolate in his mouth. ‘His name was Major Thaddeus E. Parker.’

Elizabeth thought, first, that she had been quite incredibly lucky—thanks to Paul. Indeed, doubly and even trebly lucky: because, thanks to Paul and dear old Major Birkenshawe and Colonel Sharpe, she had actually touched upon the man in whom the Deputy-Director was interested, and was now aware of him, however belatedly and inadequately. Or even quadruply lucky—because she had accidentally left the Deputy-Director scope to demonstrate his superior knowledge, the exercise of which pleased him as much as his chocolates.

But then, when she thought about the possible uses of her luck, she remembered that he had quite justifiably slapped her down twice, and she had been close to admitting that inadequacy. So, if she wanted to hold on to a possible chance of field-work, she had better assert herself quickly now.

‘”E” for “Edward”, of course.’ she nodded. It was a guess, but it was a fair extrapolation from what Paul had said. All she had to be careful of was not to admit the special knowledge of ‘Ed’ which Paul had given her.

‘What?’ His frown cancelled out the first slap. ‘
Edward-?

Now for the second slip—with acknowledgement to Dr Paul Mitchell, that she owed him a favour. The late Major Thaddeus E-for-Edward Parker, sir.’ But she had better cover the guess, just in case. ‘Presumably.’

‘
Presumably
?’ All his earlier patronizing smugness ,was instantly consumed by the anger of the Deputy-Director, red in tooth and claw. ‘Just what the hell have you been playing at, Miss Loftus?’

The anger frightened her. ‘Nothing, sir—‘

‘You were specifically limited to 1944.’ The anger became cold, and all the more frightening. ‘You were
specifically
instructed not to question the computer.’ He flashed the frown at the Beast’s blank screen, and then shook his head, half at the Beast, and then half at her, in incomprehension; and she knew exactly what that meant—that he had already debarred her from anything the Beast knew about
Parker, Thaddeus E., Major, United States Army
, if not also
Hoc, Pointe du
, and
American Rangers,
and even D-Day itself; and then, if she’d even tried to get any of them thereafter, the treacherous Beast would have signalled her attempt to him. ‘Nor talk to anyone in the department.’ The frown became accusing. ‘But you’ve talked to Audley, Miss Loftus, haven’t you?’

So that was why she’d been kept out of the building! ‘No, Mr Latimer. I have
not
talked to Dr Audley. I haven’t even set eyes on him for—for at least a month.’ The truth of that lent outrage to it, even while she was preparing herself for what might be the next accusation -because Paul would be his next victim.

‘No?’ The Deputy-Director was just not quite so confident with recalcitrant women as he might have been with men, and that gave her the extra half-second she needed, to protect herself and Paul, by defending them both with a counter-attack.

‘I was only guessing.’ She had to get the mix exactly right, to make this cake rise. ‘I don’t think … I don’t seem to recall … that I was
specifically
forbidden to read the newspapers, was I?’

‘What newspapers?’

He hadn’t seen Paul’s cutting. So someone had blundered, somewhere. But her half-truth—and total lie -was alive, and unquestionable.

‘It was an item in the
Daily Telegraph
that I saw.’ That, at least, was the absolute truth—even if the item had been culled from among Paul’s credit cards. But she mustn’t give him time to ask
when.
An
Edward Parker
fell to his death from the cliffs of the Pointe du Hoc just recently.’