To the left the fields of Belgium stretched away to disappear inside a curtain of black smoke, the result of RAF bombing and BEF heavy artillery fire. In front of the curtain small figures moved like the inhabitants of a disturbed anthill, but always the apparently chaotic movement was forward, except in the sector ahead of the tank. They were now perched a good twenty feet above the surrounding countryside and to Barnes’ dismay he realized that the embankment was gradually rising all the time the farther south they progressed, the sides growing steeper, making their descent from the railway more difficult every yard they moved forward. His eyes scanned the ground on the Allied side of the embankment and saw nothing which comforted him. As he had anticipated when he had decided to mount the embankment and make a dash along the railway, it gave him an excellent view of the battle area. The outskirts of the Belgian town of Etreux had been badly battered by the Stuka raids, but even at this early stage of the campaign he was becoming used to these scenes of devastation. What he had not expected was that the desert of rubble would be unoccupied, and as his eyes searched and searched again for signs of life a chill began to crawl up his spine. The wireless crackled: someone was coming on the air again.
‘Hullo, hullo! Troop calling. Parker here. Anything to report, Barnes?’
‘Barnes here, sir. No sign of our friends yet. Repeat, no sign of our friends. I am a quarter of a mile out and no sign of them yet. Repeat, at least a quarter of a mile. Over.’
‘Are you quite sure, Barnes? I’ve got to report to Brigade at once. I must be quite sure. Over.’
‘Quite sure, sir. I’m twenty-five feet up here and the place has been flattened, so vision is good. I’m a quarter of a mile out at least and there’s no sign of them ahead. Do I proceed farther or return? Over.’
‘Proceed a farther quarter of a mile if you can, then report again. Over.’
‘Barnes OK. Off.’
At least it was a convenient distance. The tank was still moving ahead along the railway line, the embankment straight as a ruler, and about a quarter of a mile farther along the line disappeared into a steep hillside. Barnes could see the arched opening of a tunnel clearly now. So the distance was all right, but the timing probably wasn’t. He glanced at his watch and calculated that within the next two or three minutes the Germans would have wirelessed back for artillery support to lay down a barrage along the top of the embankment. Soon the first ranging shots would be falling, a spotter would be reporting their fall, and unless Barnes was very much mistaken they would hardly have completed their quarter-mile run before the shells began to bracket the tank. The fact that the embankment was so damned straight would make the German gunners’ work that much easier. He wondered how the others liked being stuck up silhouetted against the skyline and glanced down inside the turret. Davis had the shoulder-grip tucked into position and he couldn’t see the gunner’s expression, but Penn happened to look up and on his thin, intelligent face Barnes thought he detected signs of worry, but then it would always be Penn who worried first because Penn had the imagination to think of all the things which might happen. Too much intelligence could be a distinct disadvantage when you were locked up inside a tank. He spoke briefly into the mike, urging Reynolds to keep up the speed.
Below him the ruins of Etreux glided past while he continually watched for the first sight of a gun position, for French troops. There had been a muck-up, the certainty of this was growing on him. First, there had been the hectic rush forward on May 10th when news of the German invasion of Holland and Belgium had come in, a rush from behind prepared defences on the Franco-Belgian frontier out into the open to meet the German onslaught in head-on collision. And now it was Thursday May 16th, only six days later. To Barnes it felt more like six weeks later, but at least they were stuck into them. For a brief moment he glanced back to where the line of German dead lay, victims of the Besa’s murderous sweeping arcs. He felt not a trace of pity, but he also felt no exultation, only perhaps a certain satisfaction that one of the few British tanks with the BEF was already proving its worth.
The railway tunnel was very close now, barely two hundred yards away, the black arch coming closer every second as the tank ground forward. And still no sign of the French, no sign at all. He’d have to report back soon now. Even in this sector there was a lot of noise – the heavy boom of the big artillery, the whine of shells – and this was why Barnes failed to detect the arrival of the enemy. Also, in his concentration on Etreux, he had neglected to search the sky for the past minute. It happened with terrifying suddenness – the appearance of a plane above his head screaming down in a power dive. He looked up as he dived inside the tank, saw the Messerschmitt hurtling earthwards, its guns blazing straight at Bert, and rammed down the lid, almost crushing his fingers in his haste. But he was just too late – one bullet whistled in under the closing lid, missing Barnes by millimetres, and terror entered the tank.
With the driver’s hood closed and with the turret lid down, the occupants of a Mk II Matilda tank in 1940 could feel themselves reasonably secure against everything except a direct hit. On the other hand, if by some mischance a bullet from a rifle or a machine gun were able to enter the armoured confines of the tank, then what had once been a haven of comparative safety immediately became a death-trap. Entering the mobile fortress under the impetus of its own tremendous velocity the bullet has to spend its velocity somewhere, and it does this by ricocheting back and forth off the armour-plate hull of the interior of the tank, flying about unpredictably in all directions until its force is spent – normally by its entry into human flesh. As soon as the bullet entered, the three men knew what they were in for, and knew that there wasn’t a thing they could do about it – except to wait and pray. The biting sound of bullet tearing from one metal surface to another only lasted for a brief period in time, but nerves stretched to breaking-point by the wear and tear of battle reacted to screaming pitch as the danger flashed into three battered minds, drawing from them in seconds reserves of physical and mental strength they would normally have expended over hours. Then there was a momentary silence while Reynolds drove at top speed towards the tunnel. Penn was the first to speak.
‘I think it went into the wireless set.’
Barnes checked his communications and banged the microphone while he looked at Penn, who was examining the set. Then suspicion flooded into his mind and he scrambled up the turret, pushing the lid back and staring up into the clear morning sky. The clever bastards! They’d sent the Messerschmitt down not hoping to hit anybody but to get him to close the turret. In this way his vision would be restricted and he wouldn’t see what was coming next, but he could see it now coming from the east – an arrow-shaped formation of ugly, thick-legged birds – Stuka dive-bombers coming for Bert. He spoke into the mike, his voice dry and harsh, using his driver’s name.
‘Reynolds, we’re going to be dive-bombed unless you get us into that tunnel first.’
He stayed in the turret to check the course the Stukas were taking, remembering that these were the planes which had battered Poland. He might well die in this war, he knew that, but not yet, not yet! He wanted to see Germany smashed first. With narrowed eyes he watched the tunnel draw closer as the Stukas came over at a bare thousand feet. Yes, he’d been right – they were coming for Bert. They’d change direction now and he waited for the first one to peel off, waited for the hair-raising shriek of those screaming bombs which would put fear into the dead.