Storm Force from Navarone. Sam Llewellyn

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      ‘And that,’ said Evans quietly, ‘is Hugues. Hugues is our personnel man. Knows the Resistance on the ground. Practically encyclopaedic. Looks like a German. Don’t be fooled. He was at Oxford before the war. Went back to Normandy to take over the family chateau. The SS shot his wife and two children when he went underground.’

      Hugues was tall and broad-shouldered, with light brown hair, an affable pink-and-white Northern face, and china-blue eyes. When he shook Mallory’s hand his palm was moist with nervous sweat. He said, ‘Do you speak French?’

      ‘No.’ Mallory caught Miller’s eye, and held it.

      ‘None of you?’

      That’s right.’ Many virtues had combined to keep Mallory, Miller and Andrea alive and fighting these past weeks. But the cardinal virtue was this: reserve your fire, and never trust anyone.

      Hugues said, ‘I’m glad to meet you. But … no French? Jesus.’

      Mallory liked his professionalism. ‘You can do the talking,’ he said.

      ‘Spent any time behind enemy lines?’ said Hugues.

      ‘A little.’ There was a wild look in Hugues’ eye, thought Mallory. He was not sure he liked it.

      Evans cleared his throat. ‘Word in your ear, Hugues,’ he said, and took him aside. Hugues frowned as the Naval officer murmured into his ear. Then he blushed red, and said to Mallory, ‘Oh dear. ‘Fraid I made a fool of myself, sir.’

      ‘Perfectly reasonable,’ said Mallory. Hugues was fine. Pink and eager and bright. But there was still that wild look … Not surprising, in the circumstances. A Resistance liaison would be as vital as a guide and a radio operator. Hugues would do.

      The last man was nearly as big as Andrea, wearing a ragged, oddly urban straw hat. Evans introduced him as Thierry, an experienced Resistance radio operator. Then he drew the blinds, and pulled a case of what looked like clothing towards him. ‘Doesn’t matter about the French,’ he said, ‘you can stick to German.’ From the box, he pulled breeches and camouflage smocks of a pattern Mallory had last seen in Crete. ‘I hope we’ve got the size right. And you’d better stay indoors for the next wee while.’

      It was true, reflected Mallory wryly, that there would be few better ways of attracting attention on a Allied air base than wandering around wearing the uniform of the Waffen-SS.

      ‘Try ‘em on,’ said Evans.

      The Frenchmen watched without curiosity or humour as Mallory, Miller and Andrea pulled the German smocks and trousers over their khaki battledress. Disguising yourself in enemy uniform left you liable to summary execution. But then so did working for the Resistance, or for that matter operating behind German lines in British uniform. In occupied France, Death would be breathing down your neck without looking at the label inside your collar.

      ‘Okay,’ said Evans, contemplating the Feldwebel with Mallory’s face, and the two privates. ‘Er, Colonel, would you consider shaving off the moustache?’

      ‘No,’ said Andrea, without changing expression.

      ‘It’s just that-’

      ‘SS men do not wear moustaches,’ said Andrea. ‘This I know. But I do not intend to mix with SS men. I intend to kill them.’

      Jaime was looking at him with new interest. ‘Colonel?’ he said.

      ‘Slip of the tongue,’ said Mallory.

      Evans looked for a moment faintly flustered. He strode busily to the dais, and unrolled the familiar relief map of the western part of the Pyrenees. There was a blue bite of Atlantic at the top. Along the spine of the mountains writhed the red serpent of the Spanish border.

      ‘Landing you here,’ said Evans, tapping a brisk pointer on what could have been a hanging valley above St-Jean-Pied-du-Port.

      ‘Landing?’ said Mallory.

      ‘Well, dropping then.’

      Miller said, ‘I told Captain Jensen. I can’t stand heights.’

      ‘Heights won’t be a problem,’ said Evans. ‘You’ll be dropping from five hundred feet.’ He smiled, the happy smile of a man who would not be dropping with them, and unrolled another larger-scale map with contours. ‘There’s a flat spot in this valley. Pretty remote. There’s a road in, from Jonzère. Runs on up to the Spanish border. There’ll be a border post up there, patrols. We don’t want you in Spain. We’ve got Franco leaning our way at the moment, and we don’t want anything to happen that would, er, make it necessary for him to have to show what a beefy sort of chap he is. Plus you’d get yourselves interned and the camps are really not nice at all. So when you leave the drop site go downhill. Jaime’ll remind you. Uphill is Spain. Downhill is France.’

      Andrea was frowning at the map. The contours on either side of the valley were close together. Very close. In fact, the valley sides looked more like cliffs than slopes. He said, ‘It’s not a good place to drop.’

      Evans said, ‘There are no good places to drop just now in France.’ There was a silence. ‘Anyway,’ he said briskly. ‘You’ll be met by a man called Jules. Hugues knows him.’

      The fair-haired Norman nodded. ‘Good man,’ he said.

      ‘Jules has been making a bit of a speciality of the Werwolf project. He’ll brief you and pass you on. After that, you’ll be on your own. But I hear you’re used to that.’ He looked at the grim faces. He thought, with a young man’s arrogance: they’re old, and they’re tired. Does Jensen know what he’s doing?

      Then he remembered that Jensen always knew what he was doing.

      Mallory looked at Evans’ pink cheeks and crisp uniform. We all know you have been told to say this, he thought. And we all know that it is not true. We are not on our own at all. We are at the mercy of these three Frenchmen.

      Evans said, ‘There is a password. When anyone says to you, “L’Amiral”, you will reply “Beaufort”. And vice versa. We put it out on the BBC. The SAS used it, I’m afraid. No time to put out another one. Use with care.’ He handed out bulky brown envelopes. ‘Callsigns,’ said Evans. ‘Orders. Maps. Everything you need. Commit to memory and destroy. Any questions?’

      There were no questions. Or rather, there were too many questions for it to be worth asking any of them.

      ‘Storm Force,’ said Miller, who had torn open his envelope. ‘What’s that?’

      ‘That’s you. This is Operation Storm,’ said Evans. ‘You were Force 10 in Yugoslavia. This follows on. Plus …’ he hesitated.

      ‘Yes?’ said Mallory.

      ‘Joke, really,’ said Evans, grinning pinkly. ‘But, well, Captain Jensen said we might as well call you after the weather forecast.’

      ‘Great,’ said Miller. ‘Just great. All this and parachutes too.’

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