Eleven Eleven - By Paul Dowswell Page 0,26

held up his hand for them to stop and listen. ‘Where are Binney and Moorhouse?’ he whispered.

‘I were just thinking that,’ said Jim. ‘Don’t tell me they’ve scarpered.’

The patrol retraced their steps. The two missing soldiers, who had been at the end of their line, were close by the plane, where they had all stopped to look. Binney lay on his side on the ground, as if asleep. Will noticed how smooth his face was. It was all too easy to imagine him as a young boy, waiting for his mother to come and kiss him goodnight.

Moorhouse was lying on his back. His eyes were open. He looked surprised.

They had both been shot through the head. Moorhouse was obviously dead, but Jim went over to Binney to check for a pulse. He shook his head. Weale knelt over Moorhouse’s body and closed his eyes. ‘Poor sod. Four years of this,’ he said to no one in particular. ‘Four years.’

All at once Will felt a knot tighten in his gut. ‘We never even heard anything.’

‘He must have timed his shots with the artillery barrage,’ whispered Jim. ‘Clever bastard. Well, he’s stirred up some trouble for himself.’

He gathered his patrol together. Will could see the others felt as shaken as he was. ‘There’s a sniper here who’s firing whenever the shells drop. When you hear a shell, dive for cover – that’s when he’s going to fire. And when he cocks it up – he’s bound to mistime one, then that’s when we’ll get him.’

Jim went over to the bodies again to collect the men’s identity tags. Then he said, ‘I’ll take point. Franklin, you take second.’ Will always took a moment to register when Jim called him by his surname. But he liked the idea of being behind Jim, peering through the forest, looking out for signs, protecting his older brother.

Sergeant Franklin’s courage had given the men heart. A single sniper and a patrol. The odds were in their favour. He was probably up a tree somewhere. Once they heard him they’d hunt him down.

CHAPTER 11

9.30 a.m.

High in his evergreen perch, a sniper watches the patrol. Despite the cold morning fog, he is sticky with sweat. He calculates his chances. In the silence, there are too many to pick off in a quick brace of shots. At the first bullet they would scatter and hunt him down. He must wait for the shells to fall, and then he can strike. If there are no more shells, then he must come down from his eyrie and shoot from a position that allows him retreat. He has been doing this for six months now. Every day brings further peril. But he has convinced himself that if he is careful, he has a greater chance of surviving than an ordinary infantryman. Being a sniper lets him gauge his own risks and he alone is responsible for his actions. Unlike the infantry. If they are ordered to charge to almost certain death, then they have no option. He is a lone wolf. Picking off the stray sheep.

He waits another ten minutes. There are no more artillery barrages. He decides he must stalk the Tommies, rather than wait for them. Slowly, agonisingly slowly, he begins to descend from the treetop. There is a dip in the ground close to the eastern end of the forest – near his own lines. He will hide in there and kill as many of them as fate allows, then retreat.

He is fleet-footed and sure in his sense of direction. As the British soldiers comb through the northern side of the forest, he reaches the spot he remembers and quickly gathers together twigs, branches, brushwood, to hide his position and, most especially, the flash of his rifle.

He hears the patrol in the distance. They are good. They make barely a sound. But a group of men in a forest cannot help but give themselves away. The swish of feet in bracken. The crisp footfalls on dead leaves and brittle twigs. They are coming his way. The one in charge, the one with the great bristling moustache and the stripes on his tunic, he is at the front of the line. Perfect. Cut off the head and the body will cease to function. He studies them through the telescopic sight of his Mauser 98, waiting for them to come into range. Maybe he can get two shots off. The sergeant and the younger fellow behind him. They look similar enough to be