Book Title: Farewell, My Boy
Author: Garrick Jones
Publisher: Moshpit Publications
Cover Artist: Garrick Jones
Release Date: March 1, 2023
Genres: Adventure Spy Thriller
Themes: Strengthening bonds, the love of a child, men at war
Heat Rating: 1 flame
Length: 120 000 words/ 372 pages
It can be read as a standalone. It is Book #3 in the Seventh of December series and does not end on a cliffhanger.
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Blurb
From the deserts of North Africa to the dark forests in the Third Reich, Tommy Haupner, together with his American lover, Henry “Shorty” Reiter, lead their team in a daring mission to rescue a gifted young savant from Nazi Germany’s T4 euthanasia program.
They are forced to flee in a stolen bus in the dead of night across enemy territory with a precious cargo of 24 handicapped children destined for extermination. In a supreme effort to save their charges and to avoid capture and execution themselves, they mount the most daring and dangerous rescue mission possible, the results of which almost end in disaster.
This third book in The Seventh of December series is an action packed wartime adventure set in the early months of 1942. Stolen aircraft, kidnapped senior Nazi officials, doctors of death and bloody revenge massacres, all of which are intertwined with the love of a helpless, rescued child. “Farewell, My Boy,” deals with not only the frailty of men’s hearts, but the truth that even the bravest are not exempt from the pain of loss, even when it is for a greater good.
At ten o’clock in the evening, I looked up from the report I’d been drafting, ready for it to be coded then taken back to London by Gladys. She and Peter Farnsworth were due to return to England on Saturday morning. The rest of us were to fly out in separate groups, mine on Saturday evening and Andrew and the Americans early on Sunday morning.
I lit a cigarette and stretched back in my chair, crossing my legs at the ankle while I went through our travel plans. My party was to first fly to Malta at night, after which to Gibraltar—the most dangerous leg of our journey—thence Lisbon and finally Zürich. The next morning, Andrew, Shorty, Al and Szymon were to leave for Istanbul, then fly overnight to Lake Balaton.
I picked up the message that had come from the MI6 office just before dinner, reading it for at least the third time. Andrew was bringing one of the newest suitcase radios from America. Half the size of the standard SOE Mark II, it had a removable battery that could be hooked up to the alternator of any car to recharge and also had a hand crank attached to a flywheel at the bottom of the case that could generate enough electricity to transmit and receive. Excluding my brother with his nimble keyboard fingers, Luc was the quickest transmitter of Morse code I’d ever known. I had to accept that perhaps it was fortuitous that he’d landed on our doorstep. The suitcase would go with the Americans—far easier to hide in a vehicle than with us, who were travelling by train.
I messed up my bed cover, rumpled the sheets and threw two of the pillows on the floor. I left a half-glass of water next to the bed and my nearly full ashtray on the bedside table then slipped on my dressing gown and picked up my overnight bag, in which I’d placed my clothes for the morning. I opened my hotel room door a crack. The hotel was silent, so I made my way down the corridor to Shorty’s room and slipped inside. He was sitting up in bed reading a book, totally naked, the ceiling fan whirring quietly above.
“Hiya,” he said.
“Anyone could have walked in,” I said.
“Shucks! Just my luck! It’s only you.”
I laughed and stripped, smiling as he watched me undress. Sitting on the edge of the bed, I kissed his toes.
“What’s this?” he asked, closing his book.
“I’m kissing your toes.”
“Higher,” he said.
“I’m kissing your toes,” I repeated, in falsetto.
He leaned over and smacked my arse, chuckling, then drew me up the bed into his arms, where I snuggled on my side, his arm underneath my head, which lay on his chest.
“Are you cross with me?” he asked.
“About Luc? Nah. I was a bit at first, but after I heard his story …”
“I’m quite excited to be honest, Tommy. I’ve never been to Germany. It will be strange to see the country my parents came from and to see somewhere where the things we did in our house, which were considered odd by my pals when I was growing up, are just normal.”
“Well, I hate to disappoint you, but when I was there last year it was far from what I remember of Germany before the war. Having said that, I’ve never been there before Hitler came to power. I can’t believe he’s universally loved—no dictator ever is. But I did notice how careful everyone was with their words. The carefree times of the early thirties when I first arrived seem to be a distant past. A bit like London, really, except without the cheery faces and the ‘we’re all in this together’ spirit that we’ve become used to back home.”
“I like Dietrich,” he said. “Even though you mauled him in the bushes.”
I laughed. “If putting my hand on his knee is mauling, what do you describe what I do to you?”
“I’ve forgotten what you do … care to remind me?”
“What’s the hurry?”
“Maybe seeing you in your bathing suit most of the day has had some sort of effect on me.”
“Do you want me to go back to my room to fetch it?”
“You’re fine as you are,” he said, rolling over on top of me.
I rubbed my hands over his back slowly, while kissing his neck. “Shorty …?”
“I’ll be careful, don’t worry. I won’t take any risks. Besides, Andrew will be with us.” He sat up on my thighs, running his fingers through the hair on my chest.
“I wasn’t going to say that … for a change.”
“What, then?”
“Don’t worry, you’re halfway there already,” I replied, wriggling my hips, and reaching up to pull his mouth down to mine.
From the outback to the opera.
After a thirty-year career as a professional opera singer, performing as a soloist in opera houses and in concert halls all over the world, I took up a position as lecturer in music in Australia in 1999, at the Central Queensland Conservatorium of Music, which is now part of CQUniversity.
Brought up in Australia, between the bush and the beaches of the Eastern suburbs, I retired in 2015 and now live in the tropics, writing, gardening, and finally finding time to enjoy life and to re-establish a connection with who I am after a very busy career on the stage and as an academic.
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