The Schirmer Inheritance

by Ambler Eric

Then, there was something wet on his face and a thin, high singing in his ears. He was lying face-downwards and everything was dark except for one winking disk of light. Something gave him a violent blow in the side, but he was too tired to cry out or even to feel pain. He could hear men’s voices and knew that they were speaking Greek. Then the sounds of their voices faded and he began to fall through the air towards the trees below, defending himself against the cruel branches by locking his ankles tightly and pointing his toes, as he had been taught in the parachute jumping school. The trees engulfed him with a sigh that seemed to come from his own lips.

When he regained consciousness for the second time, there seemed to be nothing wet on his face, but something stretching the skin of it. The disk of light was still there, but it no longer winked. He became aware now of his arms stretched out above his head, as if he were going to dive into water. He could feel his heart beating, sending pain from all over his body into his head. His legs felt warm. He moved his fingers and they dug into grit and pebbles. Consciousness began to flood back. There was something the matter with his eyelids and he could not see properly, but he kept looking at the disk of light and moved his head slightly. Suddenly, he realized that the disk was a small white pebble lying in a patch of sunlight. Then he remembered that he was in Greece and had been in a truck that had been hit. With an effort, he rolled on to his side.

The force of the explosion had overturned the truck and smashed the floor of it to matchwood, but the main blast had missed the driver’s cab. The Sergeant had been lying in an oil-drenched litter of empty gasoline cans and debris, with his face in the mess of blood which had poured from his head wound. The blood had congealed now on his cheeks and in his eyes. The wreckage of the truck hung over him, shading all but his legs from the sun. There was no sound except the chirping of cicadas and faint dripping noises from the truck.

He began to move his limbs. Though he knew that he had hurt his head, he did not as yet know the extent of his injuries. His great fear was that his hip had been broken again. For several long seconds all he could think of was the X-Ray picture the surgeon had shown him of the thick metal pin which had been inserted to strengthen the neck of the damaged bone. If that had been torn away, he was finished. He moved the leg carefully. The hip was very painful, but it had been painful before the mine had exploded. Fatigue always made it painful. He became bolder and, drawing the leg up under him, began to sit up. It was then that he noticed that all his equipment had gone. He remembered the Greek voices and the blow he had felt and began to realize what had happened.

His head was throbbing horribly, but the hip seemed to be all right. He dragged himself to his knees. A moment later he vomited. The effort exhausted him and he lay down again to rest. He knew that the head wound might be serious. It was not the amount of the bleeding that concerned him-he had seen plenty of scalp wounds and knew that they bled profusely-but the possibility of there being internal bleeding from the concussion. However, he would know soon enough if there were, and there was, in any case, nothing he could do about it. His immediate task was to find out what had happened to the rest of the detachment and, if possible, take steps to deal with the situation. He made another effort to get to his feet and, after a bit, succeeded.

He looked about him. His watch had gone, but the position of the sun told him that less than an hour had elapsed since the crash. The wreckage of the truck lay across the road, completely blocking it. The body of the driver was nowhere to be seen. He moved out cautiously into the middle of the road and looked down the hill.

The second truck had stopped slewed across the road a hundred yards away. Three German soldiers lay in the road by it. Beyond he could just see the canopy of the driver’s cab belonging to the third truck. He set off slowly down the hill, pausing every now and then to get his strength back. The sun beat down and the flies buzzed round his head. It seemed an enormous distance to the second truck. He began to feel that he was going to vomit again, and lay down in the shade of a bush to recover. Then he went on.

The soldiers in the road were quite dead. One of them, who looked as if he had first been wounded by a grenade burst, had his throat cut. All the arms and equipment had been taken, but the contents of two haversacks were strewn on the ground. The truck had some bullet holes in it and was scarred by grenade bursts, but it seemed all right otherwise. For several wild moments he considered turning it round and driving back to Vodena, but the road was not wide enough to turn in and he knew that, even if it had been, he would not have had the strength to do the job.

He could see the third truck plainly now, and with it more dead men. One of them was hanging over the side of it, his arms dangling grotesquely. It seemed probable that the whole of his detachment had become casualties. In any case, there was little point in investigating further. Militarily speaking, it had certainly ceased to exist. It would be in order for him, then, to look to his own safety.

He leaned against the side of the truck to rest again and caught sight of his face in the driving mirror. The blood had congealed all over his hair as well as in his eyes and on his face; his whole head looked as inhuman as if it had been smashed to a pulp; it was easy to see why the andartes had taken him for dead.