‘I can take a limp with you,’ Grimm replied with a sour smile.

‘Thank you. Something has come to my church that only you can deal with.’

‘What’s that?’

The priest shook his dandelion head as if to send a silent message for Silver Hand to talk about this outside. ‘Two pigeons have arrived from Bray. They need to be dealt with.’

Grimm’s eyes flew wide open and he struggled to his feet. He gripped a walking stick, handed his pack to the priest so he could carry it and hobbled out of the tent. ‘The boy and the girl? They’re here?’

‘I’ve locked them in the bell tower of my church,’ the priest said. He had switched to speaking in German now they were alone.

‘I have spent every day watching the road from Bray. How did they get past me?’

‘That doesn’t matter now. They are here. They need to be destroyed before they betray us.’

Silver Hand tapped the pistol on his belt with his stick. ‘It will be a pleasure to shoot them.’

‘Not in my church,’ Father Gaulle said quickly.

Grimm shrugged. ‘Just get your gravedigger to dig two plots. We’ll take them into the churchyard after dark and shoot them at the gravesides. With any luck they’ll fall straight into the holes and save us a lot of trouble moving them,’ the sergeant said savagely.

The two men passed slowly down the road back to the church. Sergeant Grimm talked quickly in a low voice though there were no living creatures but weary cattle and soaked sheep to hear them. ‘If we dispose of these two young nuisances we can sell the plans for the Whippet tank. I may even be able to do a bit more damage to the British and French before I cross over to the German side.’

Father Gaulle looked at him from under his heavy eyebrows. ‘Are you sure you want to? Germany will be a defeated nation if the war goes on this way.’

Silver Hand laughed. ‘No, Germany is setting a trap. They will go back and back till they reach the strongest defences ever built.’

Father Gaulle nodded. ‘The Hindenburg Line.’

‘Yes, the Hindenburg Line. There will be forts and trenches and tank-traps that the British and their American friends will never break. The only thing they’ll break will be themselves. When they are exhausted we will go back on the attack and drive them into the sea for the fishes to eat. It will be a great day for us, my friend.’

They walked slowly along the damp streets where Grimm’s stick slipped and he had to lean on the priest’s arm. Slowly, slowly they neared the church. A gravedigger was already at work. Father Grimm said, ‘We are expecting two new bodies tonight. Not too tall. No need to dig anything too deep either.’