Force 10 from Navarone by Alistair MacLean Read Free Book Online Page A

the other, each plane bound for its separate destination.
    Jensen, alone on the tarmac, watched both planes climbing, his straining eyes following them until they disappeared into the overcast darkness of the moonless sky above. Then, just as General Zimmermann had done that afternoon, he shook his head in slow finality, turned and walked heavily away.

THREE

Friday

0030–0200
    Sergeant Reynolds, Mallory reflected, certainly knew how to handle a plane, especially this one. Although his eyes showed him to be always watchful and alert, he was precise, competent, calm and relaxed in everything he did. No less competent was Groves: the poor light and cramped confines of his tiny plotting-table clearly didn’t worry him at all and as an air navigator he was quite clearly as experienced as he was proficient. Mallory peered forward through the windscreen, saw the white-capped waters of the Adriatic rushing by less than a hundred feet beneath their fuselage, and turned to Groves.
    ‘The flight plan calls for us to fly as low as this?’
    ‘Yes. The Germans have radar installations on some of the outlying islands off the Yugoslav coast. We start climbing when we reach Dalmatia.’
    Mallory nodded his thanks, turned to watch Reynolds again. He said, curiously: ‘Captain Jensenwas right about you. As a pilot. How on earth does a Marine Commando come to learn to drive one of those things?’
    ‘I’ve had plenty of practice,’ Reynolds said. ‘Three years in the RAF, two of them as sergeantpilot in a Wellington bomber squadron. One day in Egypt I took a Lysander up without permission. People did it all the time – but the crate I’d picked had a defective fuel gauge.’
    ‘You were grounded?’
    ‘With great speed.’ He grinned. ‘There were no objections when I applied for a service transfer. I think they felt I wasn’t somehow quite right for the RAF.’
    Mallory looked at Groves. ‘And you?’
    Groves smiled broadly. ‘I was his navigator in that old crate. We were fired on the same day.’
    Mallory said consideringly: ‘Well, I should think that might be rather useful.’
    ‘What’s useful?’ Reynolds asked.
    ‘The fact that you’re used to this feeling of disgrace. It’ll enable you to act your part all the better when the time comes. If the time comes.’
    Reynolds said carefully: ‘I’m not quite sure –’
    ‘Before we jump, I want you – all of you – to remove every distinguishing badge or emblem of rank on your clothes.’ He gestured to Andrea and Miller at the rear of the flight-deck to indicate that they were included as well, then looked at Reynolds again. ‘Sergeants’ stripes, regimental flashes, medal ribbons – the lot.’
    ‘Why the hell should I?’ Reynolds, Mallory thought, had the lowest boiling-point he’d come across in quite some time. ‘I
earned
those stripes, those ribbons, that flash. I don’t see –’
    Mallory smiled. ‘Disobeying an officer on active service?’
    ‘Don’t be so damned touchy,’ Reynolds said.
    ‘Don’t be so damned touchy,
sir.’
    ‘Don’t be so damned touchy,
sir.’
Reynolds suddenly grinned. ‘O?, so who’s got the scissors?’
    ‘You see,’ Mallory explained, ‘the last thing we want to happen is to fall into enemy hands.’
    ‘Amen,’ Miller intoned.
    ‘But if we’re to get the information we want we’re going to have to operate close to or even inside their lines. We might get caught. So we have our cover story.’
    Groves said quietly: ‘Are we permitted to know just what that cover story is, sir?’
    ‘Of course you are,’ Mallory said in exasperation. He went on earnestly: ‘Don’t you realize that, on a mission like this, survival depends on one thing and one thing only – complete and mutual trust? As soon as we start having secrets from each other – we’re finished.’
    In the deep gloom at the rear of the flight-deck, Andrea and Miller glanced at each other and exchanged their wearily cynical smiles.
    As