ALISTAIR MACLEAN, the son of a Scots Minister, was brought up in the Scottish Highlands. In 1941 at the age of eighteen, he joined the Royal Navy; two and a half years spent aboard a cruiser was later to give him the background for HMS Ulysses, his first novel, the outstanding documentary novel on the war at sea. He is now the author of twenty-two best-selling novels, of which Goodbye California is the most recent; sixteen of them have now sold more than a million copies throughout the world. Many of his novels have also been filmed—Bear Island, Where Eagles Dare and Force 10 from Navarone are among the most famous—and there are plans to film many more books including Goodbye California. Available in Fontana by the same author: H.M.S. Ulysses, The Guns of Navarone, South by Java Head, The Last Frontier, Night Without End, Fear is the Key, The Golden Rendezvous, Ice Station Zebra, When Eight Bells Toll, The Dark Crusader, The Satan Bug, Breakheart Pass, Caravan to Vaccares, Circus, Force 10 from Navarone, The Golden Gate, Bear Island, Puppet on a Chain, Seawitch, The Way to Dusty Death. ALISTAIR MacLEAN Where Eagles Dare FONTANA/Collins First published in 1967 by William Collins Sons & Co Ltd First issued in Fontana Books 1969 Twenty-ninth Impression April 1980 © 1967 Cymbeline Productions Ltd. Made and printed in Great Britain by William Collins Sons & Co Ltd, Glasgow