Those first days, the weather held. The sky was blue and the temperature manageable, and they were excited to be back in their homeland. But once they were able to get their bearings, the team was surprised to learn they had landed not in the marshy regions east of Uglflott, a short ways from Vemork, but on a mountainside east of Songadalen, a good fifteen kilometers away.
Normally that was merely a half day’s hike on skis for experienced hill men such as themselves. But they had to transport over seven hundred pounds of heavy equipment, comprising their rations for a month, a Primus stove, radio equipment, the Eureka landing signal, and their weapons. And making things even worse, their stove had been severely damaged in the drop. In the mountains, a stove wasn’t just for cooking food; it was needed to dry out wet clothes, sodden from snow and sweat. What this meant was that they could no longer travel across the more direct route over the mountains, but had to traverse around them, cutting through the Songadalen Valley at a much lower elevation in order to find wood for fires, which would delay them another three days.
And as they set out, on the third day after they arrived, a snowstorm descended into the valley and the manageable weather that had characterized that autumn ended with a fury.
In the mountains, brutal storms can kill an inexperienced man in hours. Because it is a vast plateau, spotted with few high peaks, it is easy to forget that the Hardanger plateau is over three thousand feet above sea level, and its exposed, unencumbered terrain allows the winds to lash viciously across it on the path from the North Sea. To those familiar with the vidda, it is apparent why Scott and Amundsen chose this place to accustom their men to the brutal conditions they would face before their trek to the South Pole.
For the Grouse team, the temperature suddenly plunged well below zero; icy gales whipped up the snow, which blinded them. Lugging their cargo step by grueling step, the four Grouse members could barely see inches in front of them, heading into the blistering winds, fortified only by the inner belief that no one other than a hardened Norwegian hill man could withstand such a journey.
After a few hours, it was clear the storm wasn’t letting up and they would have to find shelter.
Poulsson said he knew of a hut in the Haugedalen valley, where he’d hunted as a youth. In the sparsely populated wild, such dwellings not only provided needed shelter from a storm, but were frequently stocked with firewood and edible supplies for hunters and hikers to make use of and then replenish later. Ankle and all, Helberg said he would go with him to find the place.
Two hours in, with visibility nearly zero and the wind shrieking like a chorus of angry ghosts, Helberg turned to Poulsson. “When was the last time you saw this cabin?” he asked, shielding his eyes from the lashing ice balls.
“I don’t know. When I was fifteen, maybe.”
“That’s thirteen years ago.”
“Yes. I see you can count as well.”
They trudged against the storm’s fury to find it, only to come to the conclusion it had either been destroyed or moved. Now they had to trek the same two hours back against the frozen gales in darkness.
While they were away, Knut Haugland tried over and over to establish radio contact with SOE back in England, without success. In the narrow valleys, with steep hills on each side and high winds rushing through, it was next to impossible to find a signal. They were basically stranded; all they could do was hope that Poulsson and Helberg could make it back.
*
At Avainaire, Jack Wilson had no idea what fate had befallen their men. It was now three days, going on four, and still no radio contact. He feared that one or more of them had perished on the drop. Had their chutes been spotted, and now they were captured and presently sitting in an interrogation room of the local Gestapo? Had they already been taken out and executed as spies? The lack of news left the SOE planners in a state of near panic. The advance party was essential to getting the main team across the vidda to Vemork. Not to mention Nordstrum and Grouse’s fellow countrymen, who every day pressed their British handlers for news.
With each passing day without word, panic turned to despair.
“What should we say?” Wilson asked his chief mission planner, Henneker. Final training was under way for the main raid that was scheduled to follow. Each day, German heavy water production was increasing. In London, Whitehall pressed them for answers.
Nordstrum and the rest of the team pushed the officers for any news of their friends. “There must be something. What have you heard?”
“Nothing,” Corporal Finch, the radioman, told him. His answer contained a measure of worry. Everyone felt it. They could be dead. They had become close in the time here. One unit. With everyone’s nerves frayed, the mission to destroy Germany’s heavy water program simply waited.
*
It took six days, but at last the words everyone waited for came over the wireless.
“Sir…” The radioman rang Wilson, who was in bed. “Corporal Finch here. I know it’s late, but I think there’s something you should see.”
Half dressed, Wilson rushed down to the radio room. The message from Grouse read: Happy landing in spite of rocks everywhere. Sorry to keep you waiting for message. Snowstorm forced us to go down valleys. Four feet snow impossible with heavy equipment to cross mountains.
He and Tronstad cheered. Their first reaction was elation. The mission was still on! But just as quickly, caution overcame them. Six days had been a long period without contact. What if the Germans had captured them and intercepted their code? What if they were being tortured and had divulged their mission? Haugland might succumb to interrogation, and Helberg, Wilson thought. But Poulsson … never. The man was made from a different mold. They’d have to kill him first.
The two had established a secret question and response for just such an eventuality. One that only they knew. Wilson wrote it out by hand and handed it to the radio operator. “Send this.”
The wireless man looked at it curiously and raised his eyes.
“Send it, Corporal.”
The radioman tapped out the cryptic message: What did you see at the Strand on the morning of October 10th?
They all waited. Everything depended on the reply. The mission. The heavy water production at Vemork. Likely the fates of their friends. Within seconds an answer came back. The radioman translated the code and handed the message to Wilson.
“Read it,” the colonel instructed him.
“‘Three pink elephants,’” the radioman said after a pause, and looked up with uncertainty.
“It’s them!” Wilson shouted ebulliently, with a fist to the table. That was the answer they agreed on. Poulsson would never have betrayed it.
The opening act was set. The advance team was on the vidda.
Now it was on to the main show.
14
November 12 Baker Street, London