MAJOR JOHN RANDAL CLIMBED INTO THE POLICEMAN’S NEARLY fourteen-year-old dilapidated Ford Model A truck, and the two strikers X-Ray and Vanish took their places in the back. At the wheel, Lieutenant Dick Courtney set off in a direction opposite to the safari camp. They cruised three miles south and then looped back through the bush and finally came to a stop, parking the truck in defilade in a dry stream that may or may not have been a mile over the border, deep inside Vichy French territory.
Dismounting, Lieutenant Courtney raised the hood on the truck and removed the distributor cap before quietly lowering the hood. “The locals are right bloody handy at hotwiring.”
Major Randal produced a small jar of dark-green theatrical face paint one of Captain Terry “Zorro” Stone’s stage actress girlfriends had donated to the war effort. As the three GCBP men looked on, he removed his beret, tucked it carefully in a bellows pocket (Major Randal always preferred to patrol without headgear), and then striped his face and the back of his hands with the green paint. Without a word, he proceeded to paint stripes on a surprised Lieutenant Courtney’s chiseled brow, and then he striped Vanish and X-Ray. The strikers stood proudly. They were on a mission of war, not a sport-hunting safari for the pleasure of some pampered client.
The four moved out silently: the order of march was X-Ray on point, Major Randal, Vanish, and Lieutenant Courtney. In that way both of the trackers and their boss could keep a watchful eye on the newcomer exactly as they would a novice hunter following up a wounded Cape buffalo. The purpose behind the patrol’s organization was not lost on Major Randal.
Though nothing had been said to that effect, Lieutenant Courtney was in command. On small patrols, leaders were sometimes the last man in the column, though it took confidence to do it that way. With the exception of Major Randal, the team had worked together so long they were virtually telepathic. All talking from this point on would be no louder than a stage whisper, and only rarely that.
Lieutenant Courtney was carrying his favorite Rigby 7x57 magazine rifle over one shoulder, holding it casually at the muzzle. The weapon was the caliber of choice, Major Randal noted, of his own snipers and stalkers, the peerless Lovat Scouts. X-Ray and Vanish were armed with well-maintained Short Model Lee-Enfield .303-caliber rifles. The Commando had turned down the offer of the loan of a rifle. This excursion was a reconnaissance job, not a fighting patrol.
Circling overhead almost out of sight an eagle keened a cry that razored the late-afternoon air. Crickets chirped and an elephant trumpeted a short blast in the distance. The four men traveled on azimuth, moving carefully but steadily covering ground. Danger was all around. The little band patrolled for over an hour through tall stands of sharp-edged gray-green elephant grass, heavy clumps of yellow acacia, brach-ystegia, and an assortment of thorny gnarled laurel mixed with hardwoods.
Suddenly Major Randal sensed they were getting close. He clicked on hard, the enemy encampment was up ahead somewhere. He came to a sudden halt.
X-Ray paused in mid-step and glanced back over his shoulder with an inquiring look. Behind him Vanish froze. Lieutenant Courtney stared with a heavily wrinkled brow. The trio of GCBP watched as Major Randal silently slipped the double-edged Fairbairn stiletto from its sheath. He leaned down and deftly sliced a canopy-shaped fungus the size of an Eskimo pie from its short fat stem on the ground. Then he impaled it on the razor-sharp tip of the fighting knife and held it up for inspection.
All three Gold Coast policemen watched with curiosity.
The Commando thumped the big fungus solidly with his forefinger. A puff of spores exploded in a small cloud of fine dust, which drifted back into his face. Major Randal smiled. X-Ray smiled, Vanish smiled, and Lieutenant Courtney relaxed. They were downwind of the camp, so their sounds and scents wouldn’t betray them to their enemy. The setup seemed about perfect.
The patrol eased into a thick patch of eight-foot-tall elephant grass and huddled up. This was what the staff of the Special Warfare Center at Castle Achnacarry, Scotland, called an “objective rally point.” Each GCBP man silently checked his primary weapon, carefully easing open his rifle’s bolt a notch to visibly triple-check that a round was in the chamber, and then sliding the bolt closed, careful not to make any metallic sounds.
Major Randal checked his High Standard .22, racking the slide a crack until he saw the gleam of brass. He hoped he would not have to use the pistol today, but if he did he could take advantage of the fact that it was silenced. When fired, the pistol made a sound no louder than striking a wooden match.
X-Ray was dispatched to move forward alone until he could determine the exact location of the camp and then come back to report. Vanish, Lieutenant Courtney, and Major Randal lay in a tiny perimeter facing out, weapons at the ready.
The tension and stress in an objective rally point, by the very nature of its being located in immediate proximity to the enemy, is always almost unbearable. Although Major Randal had done this kind of thing many times before in the Philippines, operating against Hukbalahap guerrillas, his heart was pounding. Vanish and Lieutenant Courtney looked calm, but both of their faces were pinched tight with concentration.
Stalking armed men is exceedingly hazardous, especially when one of the men you are pursuing is a full colonel in the Nazi SS, the most ruthless killers on the planet. SS Colonel Doctor Rudolph von Himmel was a dangerous opponent. And heavily armed SS and tough Ashanti askaris surrounded him, each of whom would just as soon murder as look at you.
Nevertheless, after a while, the waiting in an ORP can be as boring as watching paint dry, because if everything is working out the way it should, absolutely nothing is happening and that can be dangerous. Sometimes it’s difficult, Major Randal knew, not to lose your concentration and begin fanaticizing about some girl you knew back in high school or college. In his case that would be the suntanned beach bunny Miss UCLA, his student teacher in English Lit his senior year. She was hard to forget, though it dawned on him that he did not seem to think about her as much ever since he had met the drop-dead gorgeous Captain the Lady Jane Seaborn.
Ever since Baldie had informed him Lady Jane was a talent spotter for the secret services, Major Randal had privately questioned if that was what their relationship was all about. Was she merely recruiting Raiding Forces to carry out clandestine missions and showing a romantic interest in its commanding officer as a way to accomplish that task? It was possible. He forced himself to get back in the moment, which was on full alert, not thinking about his girlfriend—drop-dead gorgeous or not. Drifting off like that can get a man killed. Still, he wondered.
There was a whispering sound as X-Ray slithered back into the ORP. Using the tip of a small twig, the tracker diagrammed on the ground the layout of the safari camp, which was located approximately one hundred yards away. He made his report in his native language, and although Major Randal could not understand, he could tell X-Ray seemed disturbed by something.
“Camp is straight ahead,” Lieutenant Courtney mouthed, translating semi-silently. “X-Ray says all the camp followers have departed. Except for the Europeans, the askaris, and a handful of native staff, the place is virtually empty. Normally a safari base camp is teeming with visiting locals.
“Let’s check it out.”
Suddenly a flurry of shots rang out from the direction of the German camp. Major Randal immediately recognized them as shotgun rounds. X-Ray jabbered softly, unalarmed by the gunfire.
“Bird hunting,” Lieutenant Courtney mouthed. “Stay right on my heels, Major,” he ordered, then crawled out, cradling the Rigby in the crook of his left arm.
It seemed to take an eternity to make their way the short distance to a point where they were able to observe the German position. Major Randal’s hammering heart cut out the moment he actually laid eyes on the objective. Once the target came into view, he became very calm, breathing slowly. And, out of old habit, he made it a point never, ever to look directly at anyone in the camp. “Tiger Stripe” and “Hammerhead,” the two 26th U.S. Cavalry Regiment master sergeants who taught him the skills required to out-guerrilla the elusive Huks, had firmly held to the belief that if you stared at an enemy or made eye contact they would instinctively sense it, look right down your line of sight directly into your eyes, and spot you—no matter how well concealed you might be.
Maybe that was true and maybe not, but Major Randal was not taking any chances today.
The German safari camp looked exactly like a Boy Scout troop on a weekend jamboree except for the blood-red Nazi flag with the prominent black swastika flying from a small flagpole. The green Egyptian cotton tents were lined up with military precision. They were all the exact same size except for two, which were much larger. Clearly the big tents were the bwanas’ sleeping quarters and the safari mess. Smoke was coming out of the tin stovepipe chimney on the mess tent, and native staff could be seen working inside. The motor pool was set off to one side so that drivers would avoid covering the tents in dust clouds when they drove into camp.
Lieutenant Courtney produced a small pair of hunting binoculars, and the two officers took turns scanning the layout. The count and his bride were sitting in canvas chairs outside their tent, firing at every bird that winged over. Most of the birds were not edible, and no one bothered to retrieve them. Dead birds littered the ground and the trees, and scattered feathers drifted in the breeze. It was a depressing sight.
As they continued their observation, Major Randal and Lieutenant Courtney identified two professional white hunters, four muscular SS types who were the bodyguards, with MP-38 submachine guns slung over their broad shoulders, and ten tall natives with bandoleers of ammunition strapped across their chests—the Ashanti askaris. Another six unarmed natives moved through the camp completing their appointed tasks.
X-Ray was right. The safari headquarters was extremely quiet. At long last, Lieutenant Courtney turned carefully to look at Major Randal. The Commando nodded one time and the two men carefully withdrew, crawling backward until they were out of sight of the camp, and then they made their way back to the objective rally point.
Not wasting any time, the officers picked up Vanish and X-Ray, and, moving out as rapidly as the team possibly could while maintaining noise discipline and security, they returned to the truck as the amber sky blushed crimson from the slowly setting sun. The reconnaissance patrol was not particularly worried about running into anyone as darkness set in. A lot of animals with big sharp teeth liked to come out at night to hunt, so the odd native made it a habit to be where he or she was going long before sundown.
When they drove back into the GCBP camp, Major Randal discovered that all the natives from the German safari camp had trooped over to see the night’s magic lantern show. Word had spread by bush telegraph that a famous film star was in camp, a mighty warrior who would be appearing in tonight’s feature film. The Gyaman on the Vichy French side of the border could not resist the temptation to come across and see the spectacle. The native population on the Gold Coast side of the border had more than doubled.
Many, many more were on the way. In fact, the entire Gyaman tribe was migrating to the British side of the checkpoint to see what all the excitement was about. But because of the onset of darkness most would not arrive until the next day. Because the same propaganda film was scheduled to be shown every single night that week, the natives were not going to miss a thing.
No one realized it at the time, but a major international political flap was in the making. And it had nothing to do with the wholly unauthorized plan three rogue officers had cooked up to slip across the border and kidnap a senior Nazi SS intelligence official on his honeymoon.