Jack Higgins – Night of the Fox

How ironic that it was the paratroops he’d been inducted into. He’d been everywhere. Crete, Stalingrad, North Africa, a nice flashy hero in his Luftwaffe blouse and baggy paratroopers’ pants and jump boots, with the Iron Cross Second and First Class to prove it. He took another pull at the schnapps bottle, and behind him the door opened and Rommel, Colonel Haider and Hofer entered.

It was midnight and Hugh Kelso had never been happier, up at Cape Cod at the summer bungalow, sitting on the veranda in the swing seat, reading a book, a cool glass to his hand and Jane, his wife, was calling, on her way up from the beach, her face shaded by a sun hat, the good legs tanned under the old cotton dress, and the girls in swimming suits and carrying buckets and spades, voices faint on the warm afternoon air. Everyone so happy. So very happy. He didn’t feel cold anymore, didn’t really feel anything. He reached out to take Jane’s hand as she came up the steps to the veranda and the voices faded and he came awake, shaking all over.

It was pitch dark and the sea wasn’t as rough, and yet he seemed to be moving very fast. He pulled down the zip on the flap with stiff fingers and peered out. Only a slight phosphorescence as the water turned over and a vast darkness. His eyes were weary, sore from the salt water. For a wild moment he thought he saw a light out there. He shook his head, closed then opened his eyes again. A mistake, of course. Only the never-ending night. He zipped up the flap, lay back and closed his eyes, trying to think of Jane and his two daughters. Perhaps they would come back again?

Although he didn’t know it, he had already drifted something like seventy miles since leaving Lyme Bay on the Devon coast and his eyes had not deceived him. What he had just seen through the darkness was a momentary flash of light as a sentry at the German guard post on Pleinmont Point on the southwest corner of the island of Guernsey had opened a door to go out on duty. To the southeast, perhaps thirty miles away, was Jersey, the largest of the Channel Islands. It was in this general direction that the freshening wind bore him as he slept on.

Rommel leaned on the mantelpiece and stirred the flre with his boot. “So, the others would like me to talk with von Stulpnagel and Falkenhausen?”

“Yes, Herr Field Marshal,” Hofer said. “But as you point out, one must take things very carefully at the moment. For such a meeting, secrecy would be essential.”

“And opportunity,” Rommel said. “Secrecy and opportunity.” The clock on the mantelpiece chimed twice and he laughed. “Two o’clock in the morning. The best time for crazy ideas.”

“What are you suggesting, Herr Field Marshal?”

“Quite simple, really. What is it now, Saturday? What if we arranged a meeting next week at some agreed rendezvous with von Stulpnagel and Falkenhausen while I was actually supposed to be somewhere else? Jersey, for example?”

“The Channel Islands?” Hofer looked bewildered.

“The Fuhrer himself suggested not two months ago that I inspect the fortifications there. You know my feelings about the military importance of the islands. The Allies will never attempt a landing. It would cause too many civilian casualties. British civilian casualties, I might add.”

“And yet they tie up the 319 Infantry Division,” Hofer said. “Six thousand troops in Jersey alone. Ten thousand service personnel in all, if you include Luftwaffe and Navy people.”

“And yet we’ve poured so much into them, Konrad, because the Fiihrer wants to hang onto the only piece of British territory we’ve ever occupied. The strongest fortifications in the world. The same number of strongpoints and batteries as we have to defend the entire European coast from Dieppe to St. Nazaire.” He turned and smiled. “The Fiihrer is right. As commander of the Atlantic Wall, I should certainly inspect such an important part of it.”

Hofer nodded. “I see that, Heir Field Marshal, but what I don’t see is how you can be in two places at once. Meeting with Falkenhausen and Stulpnagel in France and inspecting fortifications in Jersey.”

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