1955-04-20 — Page 4

Page

T

In the shadow

By W. STANLEY MOSS

HE plan was a simple one. I would

go

'down to the

church at

Daphnais every Sunday,

there.the

messages

and would be

waiting, hidden inside a candle near the altar.

נ'

The priest drew a little diagram showing which socket the candle would be put into and all I would have to do would be to remove the candle, as does in the Greek Orthodox service, and take the message from h hole in the bottom of it.

Up 1 now I had kep: constant touch with the priest, either by going to his house in the early hours of the morning or cise, if things were difficult, by sending for him to meet me at some rendezvous among the foothills of Mount Ida.

1

He was

a fine-looking man, tall, long-bearded, and pious of countenance, yet he was able disarmingly to mingle a war- like spirit with the more peace ful requirements of his calling, Each flower-pot upon his porch concealed

hand- primed NOTICI grenade, there was a crucifix at the he

head of his bed and an

within his prie-dien you could take your pick of either Scriptures or cartons ammunition.

D

one

to follow the day-to-day pro- Rress of German workings

caught by

THE CHINA - MAIL, - WEDNESDAY, APRIL

*1 took the third candle in the rock" the Gestapo," he message. It was in the form of on said, the less he knows the a sketch-map, accurate and the new aerodrome down in the better-because he always spills carefully drawn, and it told me

he the beans in the end, however. plain; but now, suddenly,

to know that be had discovered

was brave he thinks he is going to everything I wanted and it was be."

about the workings on the aero- under suspicion,

Stome, 1 replaced the paper in therefore vital that all meetings between the two of us

should

my pocket, knelt down to drink cease.

fram

which the

ran stream parallel to the track, then set off up the mountain towards the hide-out. And all the way back

Moreover, he suspected that there was a traitor man named Bourealls-actualy living this in the same village, and

the made doubly urgent necessity for him to lie low for the time being.

He had managed to find some ane, ke said, who was willing

**But

Plenty of time

was wondering who my unknown colleague was.

1955.

DID IT HAPPEN?

This is the FOURTH

story in the China

Mail series that will

keep you guessing.

had only pretended that he was going to stop operating so that if ever I got caught and tortured by the Gestapo there would be no chance of my betraying him.

For several months Icon- tinued sending reports to Cairo, telling headquarters at every piece of information my UA- known colleague gave me con-

cerning And then, on the

the building of the new.

day that the construction Very was complete and the Bold was crammed nose-to-tail with every sort of German aircraft, the RAF came over and blew the whole place to smithereens.

with Everyone went crazy excitement and the news spread like wildfire all over, the island, This was the best thing to have the German occupation, and when I set off happened since for church on the following Sunday I told myself that unless I was very careful I would find myself walking through congregation congratulate ing everybody there so as not to miss the che person who had been responsible for the whole thing.

A glimpse

the

Author W. STANLEY

MOSS

mide a war-time, reputation in the bland of Creta, scena el hij story today. The securd at how ke, kidnapped · Cesural Kreipe. Cermat GOC there, has been Told mill Met by Moonlight,.

b War wê Shadows - be and -described Ala later adventures as rachtet-sucrat agant, in Crete, Greece and. Slum,

At 33 he has been tweelin round the world and valled the Far East three times.

He was in Latvia when the war began, came back to join the Coldstream Cuards and was „A major at 22.

i 1943 he married Pallch

Zania Counters

Tamowsky, They Kva with their twe skildren in Ireland..

And then, suddenly, I had a strange feeling: I felt that would be able to find out the without answer to everything having to move from that very spot.

A Calypso By Nat Gubbins

Suggested by Princess Mar- that will make you feel dopay, M. garet's visit to the Islands of When she asks how you feel, the Calypso, here is a calypso

whatever you say,

"Jolly good, jolly about the Grocer's Ward of the She cries,

Food" and is of and away London Hospital, where your to ask someone else who, Uncle Nat has been a patient. he is glum,

Ju

N London E1, Com. mercial Road, White chapel, There is a most appalling

smell.

+

Jolly good,

if

She says,

good, Jolly

good, well done i For the one fing to avoid in this hospital in London City Is being un-British and full

of self-pity..

'I had a hat on I would take but It to Scottish doctor

Some of it comes from the

'barrow boys' stalls perhaps.

opppalte me

A lot of it comes from un- Who is not only Scottish but very. Brotish in pain and washed chaps.

misery!

But right in the middle of this

awful smell

There is the lovely London

Hospital

Where people can avoid this

horrible smell But really go there

because

they are not very well Where they can lie in clean white beds and sniff nothing but flowers and antiseptics Whether

suffering they are from ulcers, tumours, or ad- vanced dyspeptics.

And whether you have your eye in a sling, like me, or just have the gripes

are

You can't help noticing that the

nurses in Grocer's Ward smashing types Who make models dressed by

Dior Look like a bior.

■

*

I saw the candle-my candle still in its place on the rack. but I knew it would be empty. Besides, what message have been of any importance With only one eye now?

I said nothing; indeed, there was nothing to be said.

"In any case," he continued. 'stroking his board, "there's no

your nced for you to know

because the opposite number, two of you will never mest. The other one will come to to take over his job. prefer not to tell you who this church and put the message into he continued, be the bottom of the cardle, and

I must have Holy cause there is always the chance during the service you will take up the candle and hold it in the .38 that you might get caught." of

manner. There'll be normal My consequent look of Thanks to the information he jured pride caused him to smile plenty of time for you to remove in "Once a man' is the message from the hole had provided, we had been able indulgently,

the bottom??

Turkish rifle beneath it, and

person is,'

have learned trust

People have

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It was as simple as that, I left the priest's house that night and made my way up the goat-track which led to pur hid out in the mountains, and it was a long time before I spoke to him again. I used to see him often-every Sunday at the church--but

we never ex- any pass

changed a word, nor did look of recognition ever between us.

17 people...

The first Sunday it was EX- citing, because I knew

that

among the 17 people who had

who had been

present time I had come to the church. One was

an elderly shepherd, who had skin like the kind that grows on top of a cup of cocos,

in

But when I reached the top It was after seven or eight of the cobbled strest and look. Sundays that I began to have ed down at the church, I saw some idea who the person might that something was very wrong be, because there were now only There were two German soldiery four people in the congregation on either side of the door, and every standing.between them, smoking a cigarette, was Bourealis, the traitor. I wasted no time jumping into the stream, Jad there I chose a spot behind an oleander bush from where I could watch what was going on below. I guessed there plenty more Germans inside the church, and the men posted at the door were only there to prevent anyone trying to run away.

#SUPERADADAMUANS

TOMORROW

the

the and

Did it really happen to

Sir Compton Mackenzie

?

טרי

was

*

...

I waited

were

could

stood in that

I can see that small leg o' mutton sleeves and white collars on giris

Make them far more attractive than plunging necklines and ropes of pearls. ...

spot for quite a long time, because the water from my boots. had formed a little puddle and some of it was already trickling away down a slepe in the un-And if you are not feeling fine Who wants to see a plunging even floor,

neckline?

Then I looked at the altar. I

had not expected to and what wanted there: but I was what I saw now that really shook me. Or, rather, it was what I did not see.

The dowers were. missing: there was no

of wild bunch flowers beside the altar.

have caught her

So now I knew. They must as she had entered round and went

the perch, I turned back to the entrance and there were

the flowers, all trampled on and kicked away into a dark corner.

He nodded

а

It was 10 minutes before any one came out of the church, First there was an officer, then followed about a dozen soldiers, and in the middle of them they were leading someone who had had a sack tied over his head. and shoulders. I tried hard to see who the person was, for come to the service. was

thought might recognise hirs he was old-fashioned by his build, but there were so person who had brought message. It was interesting, al- enough to wear an embroider- many soldiers all around Mim

Then I heard someone coming trying to guess ed bolero, a turban, mest maddening,

and a that I had no chance of catch up behind me, and I looked who he was; and as time went broad cummerbund.

ing more than a glimpse of the round and saw the priest stand- on I found that every member

shapeless sack.

ing at my back. "He said noth- the of the congregation--even

Then there

the old

ing and for a long moment humblest shepherd-had deve- woman, dressed all in black and Then the officer shouted. a did not speak either. Then I

of mysterious looking very small

dry, command, and in a moment the said and

"I would never have loped a mantic possibilities. Bourealis, the And then there was the girl whole party, including Bourealis, guessed it was the girl."

there, and I

young and pretty, who, i bad marched quickly away down He just nodded. He did not Traitor, was mor in the know- noticed, always brought a large nad

look like a man of God at that to ledge that he, at least, was not bunch of wild flowers

moment. He looked like There beside

the

altar. And

murderer. my opposite number.

and an old there was were also a girl

young woman standing quite close to man, who wore a me, and I was fairly certain that of clothing every time

he ap It could not have been either of

Peared. He

had a Cretan-cut them.

beard, very rin

and biblical, of the

type which is worn either Presently, when the time came by students

Sheep-thieves. to go and fetch a candle, 1 went But I began to think that he to the pillar nearest the altar was the only person likely to and took the third candle in the have been putting the messages zack. Then I went back to my in the candles, because, for one place,

and while everybody thing, he had an extremely in-

other On the

NOW has W.- Stanley around me was singing, I took telligent face, and, for another side, and it was quite some time Moss imagined the story he the screwed-up piece of rice he did not look the sort of before I reckoned it was safe to tells today or did it really paper from the bottom of the character would come to go down and try to break my candle, and dropped it into my church just to listen to the silence with the priest,

happen to him? See to pocket.

singing.

There was no one to be seen "Just before the service ended I decided to leave, so 1 slipped

All the same, I still wasn't as I entered the church, and the out of the door at a moment completely sure, and one even- whole place looked somehow when everyone was kneeling ing, lying awake under the stars, derelict like a discarded theatri- with bowed head, and made my I even got to thinking that the cal set I went and stood in the way up the cobbled street which priest, in spite of what he had centre of the floor, my boots was continuing to do squelching out water with each led to the goat-track. There I told me, stopped and had a look at the the job on his own, and that he step I took.

IN

who

من

differ suit

For

was

"You must get Bourealis," be said, in a voice as dead as rock.

But

when Bourealis several minutes, still pushed over a cliff three days standing in the water, I waited, later it didn't seem to help very listening to the sound of a much. heavy German transporter re-

ceding up the valley. I could sze Yesterday's story,, "The ing out of the main door of the FICTION. some of the congregation.com- Jungle House, was church, but most of them left by the vestry

morrow.

DID IT REALLY HAPPEN↑ No. 4: In the Shadow.

YES

NO

LABOUR'S RANKS ARE DIVIDED

London." Socialist Britain's circles, hardly anybody seeris to like anybody.

JOHN MCKENNA analyses the Election prospects of the Socialists

vote for "

candidate,

Or mooty, superior girls In pearls?

No wonder when lovely blondes and brunettes feel your pulse you can't be very formal And

no wonder your pulse is hardly ever normal Even when they arrive with a needle and give you a jab And say, "One hour from now

you will be

on the slab," You don't worry much and you

don't care

Because they have pretty, smil- ing faces and white caps on their hair.

*

The Sister, too,

good eye

through one

Looks dark and beaming and as

sweet as pie.

She is efficient and kind and if

you feel ropey Will soon give you a draught

Although he is worse off than

all the other folks

He still laughs with the nurses

and makes little jokes.

We all admire him because ho

finds life full of fun "Jolly good, jolly good, "jolly

good, well done."

One thing I cannot like about

this hospital

Is that I And it impossible to

sleep very wal

This is because I am next to who an 82-year-old grocer has nightmares

And thinks he is always falling!

downstairs.

One night he nearly fell out of

bed

But the smashing night nurse - caught him before he fell on

his head.

If he had cracked it he might have gone to Kingdom Come jolly "Jolly good, jolly good,

good, well done."

And just when you are dozing or and without any warning

The night nurse switches on the "Good hights and sings out, morning, good morning." This is about the only time I

feel like bashing The night nurse and do not

think her very smashing.

I think the nurses are at their

best

a long anesthetic rest, Then they hold your hand and

it is certainly very nice Because you think you are coming out of darkness into paradise.

When you are coming to after

It is only when your senses 'you

are properly regaining

That you realise it is part of - their training

And gıderstand

That they hold everybody's hand And are not thinking "You are the one, you are the che" But anyway, "Jolly good, jólly, good, jolly good, well done."

AN ESCAPEE'S STORY

RESISTANCE IN

ESTONIA

(FROM A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT)

Soviet

London. trary to their policy in most of all the countries be. the areas which have become

officially of the Estonia is probably the they can find to stamp out the most closely guarded. Estonian language. Fiercely nationalistic, the

Nearly all the officials in tho little country on the Baltic

At the country are Ruslans, has never been far from school he went to half, the revolution.

pupils were the ses and Caughters of Russian oüicials.

Ohind the Iron Curtain, feia are trying evay means

:

*

But he was not allowed to. associate with them.

The Russian policy ci "ron- !} fraternisation” is riddiy

This week, for the first time in eleven years, Bri- tons got their first eye- witness report on what goes on there.

The story was told by a frightened 20-year-old steve forced and,, at play time, the dore, Manivald Rastas. children are kept separated.

Rastas bad stowed Away

one thing kept hope Only aboard 11 ship bound for alive in Rastas his contact London, scrambled ashore, and with the “Prothers of the turned himself over to the Forest," the Estonian under British pollee.

ground organisation which, he

has thousands Huwag sayay

....

resigned his seat and his party ticket to fight as an Independent "Ban the H-bomb" was hard at work. Mrg Braddock, well-built saying the decision not to re thunderer of the Socialist back nominate Mrs Braddock tras But It was a less dogmatic Sir Richard who was blasting In Harrogate, Mrs Annie

benches,

fell out with her con- "quite in order."

his ex-friends in the Socialist Maxton, Chairman of the stituents nearly two years ago.

So there

Party. It wHS also a more But the thing may be serious telling Sir Richard. Independent Labour Party when she refused

the Bevan line,on German re- for all that, nowadays a splinter groups armament

at a party, national There are scores of con · He admitted that there were stituencies where the local party "terrible risks" in the policy he the remains of the biggest breakaway of "leftists".

organisations are Bevanite

After more than three weeks adherents. and proposed But he insisted that the MPs are not

the alternative involved ever

ot intensive questioning, British Buthorities made him a free Most of the people who vote more terrible risks. Labour

Bevanites are not.

man and Restas told his story. either, but they don't belong

Estonians, he said, never got to the local party organisations.

a chance to find out what goes If Britain built the H-bomb, The largest group of them are he said, "we would add nothing

on in the outside world trade unionists, affiliated to the party through their own unions to the deterrent value of the the and not through the local party. bombs already made by t The rest are not even affiliated United States and we would to the party.

enter the arena of hate."

Socialist Party history in conference.

The constituents decided they wouldn't

nominate her again.

nounced that Aneurin The National Executive sent Bevan could expect little an investigating committee to look into it. The investigators support from the ILP.

decided that the voters dia want Mrs Braddock after all

Said Mrs Maxion: "When I think "of Mr Bevari, I think of a little wild rabbit that comes Into our garden....he nibbles

the

Virtually all of them

into the dente fled forests,

have Baltie

There they cko out a meagre existence, waiting for the day. when they will be able to take effective action.

contact landet Rastas in trouble, At 16, he was to arrested and convicted of being

a "dangerous, bandit.”

*After Your mont transferre

He had never managed hear a Voice of Am nadcast a British casting Corporation prog

had never seen a Western newsper, the

He

Was

But the constituents have a bit here, a bit there...then ever been happy and, last he scuttles away back to his week, aided by Bevanites re- But in constituencies like It Britain doesn't bulla the burrow

craited from nearby Edge Hill Liverpool Exchange the Bevanite bomb, he thinks the British And in Liverpool, Labour which was recently incorporated milly can neatly vetc chances constantive peace Party member's in the Exchange Inte

constituency, they candidate, even a candidate like munking” would be enhanced. Division dedded they didn't like voted to throw Beanie cut again. Mra Braddock, " who would Mirs Bessie Braddock as their by a margin of one vote, probably be almost a sure thing A slim chance, he admitted MP the Labour Party

National

But a chance worth taking. for re-election, Once more, the National or

Tha oficial party has no one Execullve decided it, didn't like

At school, he learned, no the attitude of the leadership Executive announced any in- the game' aprende, it looks nearly hystings— padaNO SUR

A Persuasive on the Estonian history, only Russian. Kata like more headaches for Mr. Gravesend of the Exchange Division and vestigation.

straw.poll indicated that it was Nearly all the radio the leadership of the Exchange

pro- became va sizvedore - anki decided that it still But this week the constituency Division

Finally

in ^ In Gravesend, Sir. Just Cossible that Siz Richard grammes he heard were waited for his chance to star didn't lik

lon-Ming Braddocks. --- organisation passed a resolution Richard Acland, the MP WHO -would get elected,

Russian The Russians, cons

he was work, as

to a. school for des

eased and allowed to

carpente

He moved to the docks and