Following this delay we kept going for another two hours and continued to make good progress. Seeing that Wilkens was moving prudently, I had begun to feel more confident in him and my uneasiness slowly receded. Frankly, I was also relieved that he had not set a pace that I might have found hard to match. We had been walking for over three hours, quite apart from the dash from our overturned truck to the wood, so we both felt like having a rest. We stopped for ten minutes, but we had no food with us and decided to keep the last bit of coffee in our flasks for later. Instead, we made do with melting snow in our mouths and swallowing it.
We agreed to walk for another two hours and then try to get some sleep for about three hours since we had to be rested for whatever we might be up against on the next day. A short while later I came in for a shock when Wilkens began muttering about being hungry. This was an ominous opening, so I quickly said that I was hungry too and was it not a good job that we had only a few hours to go before we could get something to eat. My transparent ploy failed to work and Wilkens countered by saying, “I think we should look for some food at the next farmhouse.” Being as persuasive as I could, I said that it was sheer folly to go anywhere near a farm and I went on to say, “I think you are daft; we are not starving and we are not weak from lack of food. We may feel a bit of discomfort, but at least we are alive.” The intensity of my little speech seemed to have its effect and, crankily, Wilkens said, “Oh well, I suppose that you are right.” I was able to breathe a sigh of relief, but it was with some trepidation that I continued on my way.
Things went well for a while, but I noticed that Wilkens was getting very quiet and not reacting to anything I said beyond giving a short grunt. Suddenly he stopped dead, saying, “look, I am not going on like this. I intend to go into the next farmhouse and see can I find something to eat.” Although I knew it would be to no avail, I said that we were now only a few hours’ march away from the railway-line. Why risk everything when the end of our trail was in sight? However, I got no reply. Wilkens’ mind was obviously made up and we walked on in moody silence. It could not have been more than ten minutes later when we came upon a farmhouse which was on a slight rise to our right. It was at the end of a straight tree-lined avenue about one hundred and fifty yards long leading to it from our road.
As expected, Wilkens stopped and said, “look here, I am going into that place. I know you don’t agree with this and I don’t expect you to come with me, but I want to ask you to do one thing for me. Will you wait till I get back?” As far as I was concerned, it was sheer recklessness to delay unnecessarily in partisan country. Our progress had been good so far, but there was always the chance of a major problem and we had to be west of Lask by dawn. At the same time, I did not want to desert Wilkens, so I said, “I think you are crazy to risk spoiling everything when we have almost reached safety, but, OK, I am prepared to wait for you.” I then went on to say, “But I will only wait for exactly ten minutes. If you are not back by then or if I hear any shooting before then, I will go on and leave you. There is no point in my joining you in getting shot in the darkness if you run into trouble.”
Wilkens seemed quite grateful for my proposal and thanked me before going on to say, quite unnecessarily, as I thought, “if I do find food, I will share it with you.” This struck me as being so much like a bribe that I found myself reacting rather sharply. I replied, “I have already said that I will wait for you. If you take the risk, you can enjoy whatever food you find. I don’t want any of it.” I had not been able to keep the sharpness out of my voice, but Wilkens did not appear to resent it and off he went, moving swiftly from tree to tree. As soon as he had gone, I looked at the luminous dial of my watch and took up a waiting position hidden by bushes some fifty yards further along the road. From there I had a good view of the avenue and for a while there was no sound to be heard apart from the rustling of leaves in the breeze. A short time later, I suddenly became aware of hurried movement on the avenue. A short glance at my watch told me that seven minutes had elapsed since Wilkens had gone off on his quest. I could see a lone figure speeding towards the intersection with the road, and from the outline it was obviously Wilkens. As soon as he came near to me, I stepped forward from my hiding place so that he would recognise me. I then needed to make quite a spurt to keep up with Wilkens, who had not slowed down as he passed me. All I heard from him was a gasped, “run like hell, the place is swarming with partisans.”
A new danger had now emerged, but I was less worried about the partisans than our headlong flight which, despite the muffling effect of the snow, sounded terribly loud to me. Wilkens just had to be slowed down, but this was where his superior physique put me at a disadvantage. Somehow I managed to pull abreast of him and panted, “For God’s sake, slow down, we’re crashing along like a couple of mad elephants.”
To my great relief he reacted immediately and slowed down. Though normally a good soldier, in this instance he had allowed his complaint to preoccupy his mind to the extent that he had made two serious errors of judgment. This episode proved that even the smallest human failing can assume a critical significance in a situation of life and death.
A few minutes later we had both got our breath back and I heard what had happened. Apparently, when Wilkens got to the farm, he felt sure that it was deserted, but had not been able to get into the building. While trying to open a window at the side of the house, he suddenly sensed danger. Then he heard the soft sound of voices and saw a group of men come spilling out of a barn at the back of the house. As they emerged, they were adjusting their clothing and releasing the safety-catches on their rifles – they were obviously partisans. It was probable that they had not mounted a look-out and that a light sleeper had raised the alarm. Their lack of organisation had given Wilkens a good head start and he was lucky to have got down the avenue without being shot at. Since we had heard no sound of a vehicle starting up, we could consider ourselves to be fairly safe and lucky to have escaped what might have become a very sticky situation.
After our unpleasant fright all went well, we made good progress and then stopped for our planned longer break. It was doubtful whether we would be able to rest very well. An earlier fall of snow had been accompanied by a rise in temperature, but since then the night sky had become clearer and it was again bitterly cold, certainly at least minus twenty degrees centigrade. For a resting place we picked a spot under some trees and broke off branches of bushes to lie on and to insulate us from the freezing snow. As a matter of prudence, we decided to take turns keeping awake and I volunteered to take the first stint. I was surprised that, huddled up in my army coat with the collar pulled in front of my face, I did not feel as cold as I had expected. After all my practice on guard duty, I had no trouble keeping alert until it was time to wake Wilkens and get him to take over from me.
I did not manage to sleep. Maybe it was because I had, after all, got quite cold or I was not sufficiently relaxed. However, I did feel a lot more rested when Wilkens nudged me and I stood up to get the circulation in my body going again. This time we allowed ourselves some tepid coffee from our flasks and moments later we were off again.
Finding the railway-line turned out to be no trouble at all, though it did take longer to get there than we had expected. After crossing it we walked west for one hour and then turned south again until we reckoned that we were about two miles west of Lask. It did not take us long to find a wooded area where we stopped for a rest. As soon as the light improved and we could see the terrain better, we would decide on our next move.