Avenging Steel: The First Collection Read online

  “James, is that you?”

  “Yes, Mum,” I swung the heavy door closed, making sure the catch held, and the curtain didn’t get caught up. The thick maroon velvet buffeted against the draughts, an essential element of our apartment’s insulation.

  “Have you eaten?”

  “No.” I knew that some food would appear on a plate within the next half hour, a miracle of left-overs and the proverbial vegetables.

  I hung my coat on the stand, and walked past the serene workings of the tall grandfather clock. I had never known of a time when it was not there. I had watched its low polished brass pendulum for hours, and at the age of eight, had proudly been allowed to wind it up for the very first time. That job now lay with my younger sister, Frances. I heard the strains of jazz swing from behind her closed door. Her collection of 78’s already eclipsed my own.

  Mother was at the sink, the dimming light from the large window silhouetting her against the Meadows beyond. I walked to her, embracing her from behind, resting my face in her escaped curls. “I went to Princes Street today.”

  She turned, pushing me away from the embrace. “And to the pub too I see.”

  I accepted her recrimination, yet still corrected her. “The Student Union.” In my mind there was a distinct difference; a pub was for browsing, working-men’s drunken tomfoolery, the Student Union was a lofty place of researched, educated debate.

  “They still sell beer,” Mother chided. Then her thin lips lost some of their strident appearance. “What was it like? Princes Street?”

  I almost cried as I began my recollection. Almost.

  Frances came into the kitchen as I was explaining, and hung at the door ear-wigging. At fourteen she was somewhat up to speed with events, yet still tied to her own world. I made no effort to censor my words; it was now a reality we all lived in.

  I didn’t attend University the rest of the week. I had no desire to put myself at the root of my treason, and rationalized that such classes might have been curtailed anyway.

  On Saturday morning, loud knocking on the apartment door roused us from our usual morning.

  The person outside used the iron rapper, but the insistence and volume of his labors hammered along the hallway. In all my life, I had never heard the door so abused.

  My mother brushed Frances and I into our rooms, steadied herself, brushed herself down, then opened the door. I didn’t follow her instructions, but peeked out into the hallway. Beyond her stood a German officer. “Mizzus Baird?”

  Mother nodded.

  “I am Captain Metzler. Our records show that James Baird lives here.”

  “He’s my son.”

  “Can I speak to him please?”

  With some reluctance she retreated back up the hallway. “It’s for you.”

  I nodded and moved past her. In the doorway the officer watched our every move. A soldier behind him had a levelled machine gun pointing up the hallway. I’m not sure if I had even seen such a threatening sight. “I’m James Baird.” I didn’t feel like talking against a loaded gun, and I resented the intimidating pose. In mere seconds my mood changed from fear to loathing.

  “You will come with us.”

  “I’ll get my coat.” I turned without his permission to the stand, slowly pulling first my jacket, then my coat. Lastly, more in defiance than necessity, I tugged my scarf free, and wrapped it round my neck; Edinburgh University colors, sky blue and maroon, with tramlines of white and black.

  “Where are you taking him?” My mother suddenly clung to my arm, her grip insisting and tight.

  He didn’t even answer; just motioned with his head as if talking English to us plebs were a chore. I gave Mum a hug, then gently prized her fingers away. “I’ll be fine mum, I’ve done nothing wrong.”

  As I walked down the stairs, I glanced back at the doorway, now filled with mother and sister Frances huddled together. I wondered if I’d ever see them again.

  A Feeling of Hopelessness

  George Street runs parallel to Princes Street, a hundred yards north, along a ridge a mile long. It made sense that the Germans loved the rectangular layout of the new town, its regimented streets and alleys were filled with pubs and high offices.

  Taken to the second floor of a deserted solicitor’s office, I was surprised to see Professor Grieg, a faculty member of the University. He looked up when I was ushered inside, yet stayed silent. He continued so until the door was closed behind me, Captain Metzler and his stooge disappearing somewhere outside. In the small room, chairs sat on either side of a plain empty desk.

  “Sit down, James.”

  I took note of his cagey demeanor, and wondered if we were being listened to; it would account for his unusual reticence. I too remained silent, looking around the room. It was not becoming for a student to question a lecturer.

  “I’ve been set as a member of a local steering committee.” He said, pacing behind the desk. Like his lectures, his delivery was slow, methodical, every word carefully considered before speaking. “Amongst many other things, we have the task of working with local businesses, directing our students towards gainful employment.”

  ‘Gainful employment’. There was a phrase to send goosebumps to any student. “And how does that involve me?” I was in third year reading Philosophy, I considered myself hardly likely to be the first pick for any task.

  “It’s a University policy, done at the highest level.” Grieg began. “Your father is in the army, yes?”

  I nodded, frowning. “He’s an officer in the Scots Greys, Palestine.”

  “Then if his wages haven’t stopped already, they soon will. The Germans will take over the financial institutions; without your cooperation in this program your family will be de-funded.”

  Reality’s cold hands clutched at my heart; I would be set to work. Instantly I pictured myself working in a potato field, up to my knees in cold cloying mud; I almost shivered at the prospect. “Do I have a choice?”

  He looked at a list printed on a piece of paper. Some of the lines already had pencil lines drawn through them. “You’ve been assigned to The Scotsman.”

  Edinburgh’s biggest newspaper. “Is that my only option?”

  Grieg grinned, looking down the list. “Deal’s butchers, Edinburgh Transport, van driver… do you get the idea?”

  “I’ll take the job at The Scotsman, thank you.”

  “I thought you would.”

  In an instant I had accepted my new position. There seemed little point in rejecting the offer, perhaps drawing prying German eyes to my Mother and sister. I was now the man of the house, and I had to face up to my new responsibilities. “Will the University continue with classes?”

  Grieg smiled. “This job will be in addition to your studies.”

  “When do I start?”

  “Tomorrow morning, nine o’clock. Go downstairs to Trudy at the desk at the door, she’ll get you sorted out with an Identity Card.”

  “I already have the University one.” My matriculation card had been my proud possession for three years.

  I knew by the slow shake of his head what he would say. “Worthless. You’re in a different world now, James.”

  My new Identity Card showed the German eagle, its swastika, all the words in German apart from my name and address. The formal stamp was crooked, its rectangle going over the lines. I pocketed it and looked for Captain Metzler, who was nowhere to be seen; obviously I had to make my own way home.

  As I walked along the street, airplanes flew overhead. I had no need to look to see if they were all German; the time had long passed since the RAF flew over Edinburgh. Awkward looking Policemen stood on street corners, their uniforms blue, faces familiar, but the pristine swastika armbands branded them as a ‘turned’ force in the city.

  I turned down Frederick Street to see the silhouette of Edinburgh Castle high on the rocks. The huge swastika banners rippled in the morning breeze. I swear I felt physically sick, the sight repelled me so much.

 
As I walked up Lothian Road, it fully sank into my bones that Edinburgh was now in occupied territory, any signs of resistance long crumbled, the Royal Air Force conspicuous by their enforced absence. It had been three days since we had heard Churchill’s voice on the radio, another rousing torrent of…

  “the Empire will rise, and free once more the mother who gave birth to it”

  I’d heard a few versions of the now famous oration, and under present circumstances it failed to move me. ‘fight them on the beaches’ had been just a short two months ago. Fight them in the hedgerows had lasted barely two weeks. When the tanks had thrust through Scotland, there weren’t too many hedgerows still standing.

  We actually knew a fair bit, what we’d picked up in gossip, from retreating soldiers, deserters, and rushed phone calls to panicked friends. The BBC had long packed their bags to Ireland, the politicians and King too. Not that we cared unduly about them; there’s a long four hundred miles between Edinburgh and Buckingham Palace.

  I was about to cross the street at my usual point, just past Tollcross when a hand gripped my arm. My assailant pulled me onward and away from the busy junction. “What’s going on?” I asked, but my question was answered when a German staff car, standing still at the tram lines blew into a thousand pieces. Thrown round the corner into Lochrin Terrace, my rescuer let go my arm and ran. Almost immediately, I met a German soldier, face determined, brooking no nonsense.

  “Papiere!” He held a struggling man roughly by the arm, and seemed in two minds as how to deal with the two of us. In the end he let the man go, throwing him to the ground. My pristine papers were already in my hand. I just wanted it all to go away.

  But the man got up and ran.

  I’d never been close to gunshots before, just heard the distant reports. The machine gun just six feet away literally blasted in my eardrums, bullet cases tinkled onto the pavement, all brass and shiny.

  The man staggered maybe ten yards before the hail of bullets ground him down. He died in a pathetic dance, falling heavily onto the curb. If the machine gun hadn’t killed him, his skull hitting the stone certainly did.

  “Go!” The soldier shouted at me. I shook in fright, then walked away, my feet seemingly reluctant, my eyes seeing the man fall time and time again. By the time I got back to Barclay Terrace, I’d calmed outwardly, but my heart still raced. I’d just witnessed my first resistance act in Edinburgh, well anywhere really. I stood outside Mr. Teaser’s violin shop and tried to calm down before going up the stairs. The window display of old fiddles and scattered sheet music seemed to ground me, although what I really wanted was a stiff glass of whisky from the Golf Tavern round the corner.

  I turned up at The Scotsman office the next morning, my first University class was at one, and the two were not that far apart, just a short walk up the Bridges.

  The Scotsman’s office had always been an architectural favorite of mine, its baronial towers leaning over the smoky Waverley railway station far below. It took a fair bit of mental attitude to walk through the doors, but as I walked to the front desk, I felt my confidence grow.

  “James Baird, reporting for work,” I said to the coiffured lady behind the high oak desk. I was about to offer more, but she was already searching a handwritten list.

  “Yes, I’ve got you, third floor. David Paton is the name on the door you’ll be looking for.”

  “David Paton, right,” I looked around, finding steps upward, and I set off, my nervousness returning. The third floor sat in the eaves of the building, the angled ceiling attesting to the fact that I couldn’t climb any higher.

  David Paton was an elderly, balding man, whose teeth clung tightly to an empty pipe in the corner of his mouth, which he worried and sucked on repeatedly. He did not seem surprised to see me.

  “Is your Dad in the service?”

  I nodded. “Scots Greys, Palestine.” I looked around the office to see drab written all over it.

  “You’re just in time to join the meeting with the boss, Arthur Brooks. He’s the chief editor, a no-nonsense chap, but he’s been in meetings with Jerry all morning, we’re due in at any time.”

  The idea that the Germans were taking a close interest in a newspaper startled me. I stood for a moment, sorting out which questions to ask, but we were interrupted, the man at the door motioning seriously.

  “Let’s go.” Paton said with much reluctance.

  In the smoky atmosphere of his main office, Arthur Brooks had little to say. He’d been under German dictation for two hours. “We’ll still report the news, as usual, but the German High Command in the castle will edit after us.”

  In all, nine men stood in the room listening to Brooks’ hesitant words.

  Paton broke the silence. “So we’re being censored.”

  “David, there’s no use in crying about it.”

  “Arthur, for Christ’s sake, it’s what we do, we’re journalists! We don’t tell lies to the people!”

  “You’ll do as you’re damn-well told, or you’ll be out in the street!” Brooks snapped back. I saw Paton physically recoil from his boss’ outburst. “Your stories will be taken up to the castle every day. That’s the new rule.”

  “What?” One of the other men objected. “We go up there? What’s wrong they can’t work here?”

  “Barney, are you going to be stupid all your life?” Brooks gave a wry grin. “Do you want Germans working in the office? Listening to every word you say?”

  David Paton fell immediately silent.

  “So, from today, you tell lies. Every story better have a positive German slant, or they’ll shut us down. Get out, the lot of you.” He snarled. “Stories on my desk by eleven as usual.”

  Back in the office, David Paton paced for five minutes, cursing under his breath. Then he stopped and placed his hands on the desk, leaning heavily, his knuckles whitening. “All our work with the newspaper will be censored, James. That’s the reality of German rule.”

  “That’s a tough pill to swallow.”

  He stared at me for a moment. “I don’t like this any more than you, so we’d better just be friends and get on with it. If we refuse to do the job, they’ll just find someone else to take our places.” He nodded, obviously finding some satisfaction getting it off his chest.

  “What exactly are we to do?” I asked.

  “Humph. Didn’t you listen? We tell lies, dear boy, tell lies.” He patted a pile of typed papers. “We get the raw stories up here in the attic. We cross off all negative German attributes, we add useless pro-Nazi platitudes, and we return it for print.”

  “And the Germans think the people of Edinburgh will believe it?”

  “No,” he gripped the pipe with steady fingers, but did not remove it. “But in time they’ll get used to it.”

  I felt a little piece of me die right there. I could not dispute the reasoning behind the remark, yet I yearned to argue the point. In the end I just nodded in acceptance and settled down to work.

  That day I began a double life. I was the dutiful son and bread-winner for the family, and I was a collaborator, a dissembler of the truth and a teller of lies.

  But the job with The Scotsman did have one huge benefit; I had up-to-date information of the world’s news, until now denied me by my Nazi oppressors.

  I read exhaustively.

  Basically the British Army had ceased to exist on our shores; embarked by a fleet of Royal Navy and Merchant Marine at Oban, Ullapool and from the beaches of a thousand islands. In all, more than a quarter of a million men had sailed westward for Canada.

  From hastily rigged bases in Ireland, RAF Bomber Command had flown to Spain despite the Spanish Government’s disapproval, and then on to North Africa, Fighter Command doing likewise a day later. It seemed that the British Empire’s resistance that Churchill had mentioned so much, was to be fought in the sands of the Sahara.

  There was a form of organized resistance here in Britain. It didn’t happen all at once, but little by little, we got news of
prominent policemen being assassinated. Some local politicians also found themselves caught up in the obvious culling. From our headquarters, we could not fail to see a methodical removing of prominent figures, and the extended pattern was difficult to ignore. When the Procurator Fiscal of Edinburgh was shot outside his home, a sniper’s bullet through the forehead, it made the local news in every paper; it was difficult to put an alternative slant to the story.

  News began to filter regarding German reprisals against localized raids. Again, the ordinary man in the street knew nothing about them, but to my position inside the news, the raids obviously were organized. When these reprisals increased, the Germans were forced to make radio announcements.

  “Any act of sabotage will be met by the internment and punishment of local civilians. The Third Reich will not stand for these futile acts, and the punishments will be sharp and severe.”

  We printed the message every day under our front page banner, but the raids continued unabated.

  “Auxiliary Units!” Paton announced on my arrival one morning.

  “What?” I hadn’t even unbuttoned my coat.

  “That’s what they’re called; the resistance fellows.”

  “They have a name?” I could hardly believe it. “They’re organized?” I voiced the question, rather than disclose my own reasoning.

  He nodded, grinning widely. “Oh yes, from Winston Churchill’s own desk!” His eyes gleamed, making him look twenty years younger. “And it’s not just around here. They’re all over the country.”

  “But the army’s long gone. Who’s in command?” I pulled my scarf firmly onto the brass peg. It seems I too had been caught up in Paton’s excitement.