Beneath Gray Skies by Hugh Ashton Page A

they’re certainly important and no-one else is meant to be seeing them right now. Even you,” he added half-apologetically to his friend.
     
    “All right, Davy, I’m not going to poke my nose in where it’s not wanted.” The light was fading, and David was only halfway done. Feeling rather disappointed that he hadn’t been able to do more in the time, and more than a little concerned about Brian’s behavior, he gathered up the Colonel’s original maps and his copies, and carried them back to the company office area. On the way, he debated with himself whether to tell the Colonel about his suspicions concerning Brian, but, as he told himself, he had no definite proof of anything that Brian had done wrong. And if he was mistaken in his suspicions, he’d lose the best friend he had. Come to that, he reflected, he’d lose his best friend if he was right. He kept his mouth shut as he handed the papers back.
     
    “Well done, Davy,” said the Colonel. “These are real good, I want you to know that. I wasn’t expecting you to finish them tonight anyway. Tomorrow morning is fine, as long as you’re all done by twelve o’clock, since there’s a lot of folks stopping by tomorrow afternoon. Make an early start on them.”
     
    -o-
     
    T he next afternoon was taken up with an officers’ conference, with all the officers and a group of about twenty visiting Germans sitting at one end of the warehouse, looking at a blackboard, and reading David’s maps. David could recognize Major Goering, sitting in the front row, next to a smaller dark-haired man with a mustache.
    David reckoned the meeting lasted about two hours. When it had ended, the Lieutenant came over to David’s platoon, and explained how they were all to leave the warehouse at five o’clock the next morning, and walk over to another area of Berlin. There, they would be met by a truck which would be carrying their rifles and ammunition. Picking up their rifles from the truck, they were then to stand around a ministry building and arrest anyone attempting to enter or leave. Other trucks would then carry away the arrested people.
     
    “And,” he added. “You’re all to be wearing one of these, so we know who’s on our side.” He opened a bag, and pulled out a swastika armband. “Y’all take one now, y’hear, and put it on when you pick up your guns and ammo tomorrow. Not before, y’hear now?”
     
    They filed past and each took an armband. Brian held his as though he’d just pulled it out of the latrine, thought David.
     
    -o-
     
    F ive o’clock came, and David’s company hungrily filed through the streets in the morning half-light. “Sure wish we’d had some coffee,” whispered David to Tom.
    “Sure wish I was back at home,” replied Tom. “I kinda got this feeling someone’s going to get hurt today. Don’t want it to be none of us that gets it.”
     
    “Quiet, you two,” came the hissed order from the sergeant, and the company walked on in silence.
     
    At the point where David had drawn a cross and a number “1” on the map, a gray covered truck was waiting. As the company approached, the driver climbed out of his cab, and let the tailgate fall.
     
    “OK, fellas. Get your own rifle, and the ammo’s in the box in there,” said the sergeant. “Ten rounds each. Keep the chamber empty. Don’t want anything going off by accident. And get those armbands on. Right arm, Hiverton. You know which arm your right arm is? Jeezus…”
     
    They walked the last few hundred yards to the ministry and took up positions round the entrances. “You’re not to shoot,” the Lieutenant reminded them. “Not unless they start shooting at you, and they won’t, because they’re civilians. Understood?”
     
    “Sir? What if the cops come by and try to stop us, sir?” asked Tom.
     
    “We’ve been told they won’t, but if they do, just stop them. But shoot only if you’re being shot at, understand?”
     
    The first worker at the