by John Eider
So here I’ve been up on the mezzanine, typing till the small hours. In the role I’ve held these months I am already producing reports for base, and so have a laptop with built in fax-style printer ribbon, a typewriter for when we have no power, and all my pilfered pens and paper for writing longhand when I feel like it. Lord knows what anyone will make of this mess of a manuscript.
I rise at dawn, I work till three, and then I come back here: sometimes to sleep, always to write, and also to think. Ours is a new operation in new territory, with few communication links. We’ve been here eighteen months now.
On my most recent journey from the ‘requisitioned’ farms back to our regional base, I sought a word with my commander there, a good sort called Greening.
‘Sir, now the new farms are settled and running I want to request some leave. It’s the first I’ve asked since E-Day, and I’ll be back before the cropping begins.’
‘Will you now?’ He had a way sometimes of letting you decide for yourself what his answers meant. ‘A lot of people asking me for leave have told me when they’d be returning, and I dare say they meant it. And what’s it for?’
‘I want to travel to marry.’
‘Really. Someone from before?’
‘Someone I worked with in the early days.’
‘And where abouts is she?’ he asked, to which I told him.
‘A long way…’ he mulled. My hopes rested on his next words. ‘But no further than others have attempted. You know there’s little hope of the Army taking you?’
‘There’s a civil firm, I’ve seen their stall in town. They tag along with the convoys, almost semi-official.’
‘Almost.’
‘I’d like to do this, sir. I’ve put it off a long time.’
Now that he knew what the interview was for, he came closer and spoke quieter,
‘And you know exactly where she is?’
I nodded.
‘Crofts, you may have made promises all those years ago…’
‘She’s true, sir.’
‘And how long were you together before?’
It struck me I had known her mere weeks in six years. But he didn’t press the point,
‘Crofts, you know what you’re really asking here?’
I did, I knew it was a one-way trip.
He continued, ‘You’ve worked well for me. You came with good references and you’ve lived up to them. This situation we’re in has asked a lot of us, our duties have extended way past any notion of personal freedom. I lost my own wife, you know.’ (I hadn’t known.) ‘I mean properly lost, I know she died – I got to speak to her former neighbours, still living in the same street would you believe. There was a fight with looters and she took a blow to the head.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be, she died bravely. They kept that street going till they were dying of starvation, throwing the bodies into the river to carry them away before disease spread. Eventually an aid station was set up near enough for them to get to across town at night. There are two-hundred and fifty of the stations now, you know.’
‘Yes, I know.’
Even in his sadness was the communal pride I had seen in our personnel before. He paused for reflection, before continuing,
‘It’s such a shame isn’t it, that so many of us service personnel, who’ve been so called-upon since the calamity, were so far from our loved ones on that day. So yes, I know why you came here. It does you credit too that you asked me, and didn’t just desert, like so many have once they knew that they were in for the long haul. Six years it is now, as long as they gave in the last War.’
However, he was soon back to practical matters,
‘It’s good country up there, where you’re going, but well ordered – I don’t know what they’d use another soldier for. A commune you say, on the system? And you’ve emailed her before? Then I’ll leave you here for half an hour. Use my laptop – I’m already signed in. Find her number and call her on the satellite phone.’ He patted another piece of kit on his scratched schoolteacher’s desk, also giving me his security code to dial before dialling any number. He could have been had up for such a breach.
‘When you’re done I’ll call the commander up there, see if they’ve anything for you. Maybe one of his men have a sweetheart down here, eh? You come back here in a week and we’ll see what they say.’ He smiled and left me to it.
Alone in the room, I quickly found the number in the directory. The call was nervous, but with no need for it to be, as she was bound to be out in the fields that time of day, and so unable to answer it herself. Even speaking to whoever took the message though would be exciting, simply by dint of their being there. Frustrating too, as this would be someone who’d get to see her every day, maybe every day since I’d last been there. As it rang out I waited and tried to remember where in the Council House the phone had been, but couldn’t recall even seeing it there. Then the ringing was replaced by a continuous tone, and then an automated message,
‘Sorry, couldn’t connect. Please try again later.’
I did try again later, and got the same message.
The anti-climax was like a lead-weight in my stomach, as if all the adrenalin in my bloodstream instantly solidified and sank there. So, signed into the computer, I wrote her an email, care of Commander Greening and addressed to the commune’s inbox. I titled it ‘For the attention of’, and paused. It had been well over a year since our last communication.
Eventually I typed,
Hello all at the commune. If you are reading this then I hope you are all well and things going productively. This message is intended for Mill, your Head Grower, as there are important things I need to discuss with her.
Thank you,
Private Crofts
Hello Mill,
Sorry for not being in touch sooner, but since our last communication I have moved and have had no access to email. My area Commander has allowed me to send this from his computer, and has given me permission to speak to you about the possibility of leaving my current post for one in your sector, the intention being that if you wished it then this would allow us to marry.
I know this is dramatic, but necessarily so, for without my knowing that you are still there and still willing then there are no grounds for this request. As you know, such chances are rare and I do not even know when I would be able to be in contact with you again.
I will be meeting with my Commander again a week today, please try and reply to his email address by then.
Whatever your reply, I wish you and your community all the best in your efforts.
With regards,
Crofts
Leaving the office, I walked through the townlet sprung up amid the ruins of our nearest village. Hawkers called out offering this and that, with their large signs advertising even more. Such figures provided both the necessities of life: I bought soap and a Scandinavian breakfast cereal that set like porridge when mixed with water – less horrid than you’d think. And also the emotional: the promise to this scattered nation of calls or letters home, people traced or journeys arranged.
I found the man whose board I’d noticed before, and pointed out the commune town on his map – the towns were pinned with flags, the routes between them marked with bright highlighter-pen lines. It could be done, the stall-holder said, but was tricky, it might be three different coaches, and all would need paying… I asked he give me the worst, and he quoted a figure that floored me. Could it be cheaper, I asked – going off a rumour I’d heard – if I travelled with my gun and acted as security? He said he’d see what he could do, but couldn’t speak for the drivers on the second and third legs who he never himself saw.
I smelt an ambush, of my being bundled up and dumped in a ditch the moment the first of these ‘three different coaches’ left sight of the town. It was a bright day but I went home full of gloom, knowing then that when I left I would be doing so under my own steam.
I also felt the absurdity of a situation where those
in the ‘new economy’ came and went as they pleased, owed nothing to no one, lived a dangerous kind of liberty; while we in the ‘services’ slaved away duty-bound, grateful for our pitiful allowance, and having almost to beg for the right to live anywhere we weren’t billeted. The difference was of course that we were working for something bigger than ourselves.
I got back to the farmstead, where the men and women of my group were sat about in the sun enjoying the good weather, overalls hanging to the waist. This Army uniform of mine had begun to feel a straightjacket. I spent the afternoon taking books back to the ‘big house’ library.
The next week, with something like what I recall of job interview nerves, I met again with Greening, who told me that he had good news; but it wasn’t from Mill, rather his Lincolnshire counterpart, who had replied to say he had a new project I might be suited for, but that it was more technical than agricultural. I said I’d be glad of the challenge. Amid the relief though, it made me think of what I was leaving behind: I was in a good situation there and had earned it. I had grown to like the farming life, and on sunny days like those we had been having, then there was nowhere better to be than with my team out in the open, or up in my nest in the big quiet barn. I had gotten such a lot done there, but it was time to move on.
‘So, she confirmed it, did she?’ asked Greening. ‘On the phone?’
I thought quickly – he was talking of last week, obviously thinking I had gotten through to Mill and all was arranged, not knowing I was still awaiting a message. I lied, ‘Yes, all sorted.’ To which he answered,
‘O, lucky man. It’s a wonderful feeling, yes, to have a woman be in love with you? Shall we say a fortnight then, to hand your lieutenants the reins?’
‘She said she’d send you an email,’ I thought on my feet, ‘with some extra details, of local transport routes?’
But he shook his head, ‘Sorry, nothing’s come through, and I check my inbox every day, the junk folder too. I wish you well then.’
‘Yes, sir. You too, and thank you.’
We shook, saluted, and parted, the last time we would meet.
This wasn’t a scenario I could have planned for: all systems go yet with no word from her. I had somehow conspired to earn my way out while missing the key piece of data required – proof that an actual marriage would take place when I got there.
This was a sadness but also an excitement, for though I had no idea why she hadn’t replied, I knew I would find her soon regardless. It was also a terror: although any fear I may have had of getting there and finding I wasn’t wanted were academic, as having asked for it and having got it I couldn’t now not go. I walked back to the farm slowly that day, dreading telling my team the news; then after having done so, promising to answer their many questions later that evening, before disappearing to the barn to think.
Chapter 39 – The End
All this was almost two weeks ago. Tomorrow evening I leave. I have rushed these last few notes late on a couple of the more sweltering evenings, I wanting to spend as much time relaxing with the others after shift as possible. I will miss them like hell. I will never see any one of them again or have any way to keep in touch.
In many ways, this time in the West Country has made me. It is perhaps my best work. Certainly I sense an end to something here, a phase of life. I still can’t believe they put me in charge – though perhaps I shouldn’t be so surprised at my rapid promotions, for that’s what happens to soldiers in wartime, and isn’t this just such an emergency? I don’t complain (much), I don’t steal, I don’t beat my staff, I haven’t killed anyone (lately) – Lord, I’m almost Four-Star General material.
Yesterday morning before dawn I went into town and set fire to the makeshift stand of the transportation agent, after writing on the wall behind his hoarding, ‘THIS MAN IS A CON, YOU WILL BE MURDERED ON HIS COACH’. I had been coming into town most days since our discussion, and had not seen one single transport of passengers arrive.
Tomorrow will be busy in the morning, then in the afternoon there will be cake and home brew – not the best preparation for a night hike, but I will love every minute of it. After the eating and drinking there will be hugging and kissing, before I wave goodbye and head off into the dusk. We have formed such a bond on our farm in its glorious location. I love them all and I will love them for the send-off.
I expect my first feeling on the road will be one of massive guilt, though I won’t be the first to have done a bunk. I’ve hardly any fears for where I’m going and how I’m getting there. I’ve gone through my stuff for what I’ll need for the journey: six years of wear has left me with hardly any of the original marching gear; and as for that long coat, it was ditched at the first opportunity. I have my old emergency transmitter of course, my lucky rabbit’s foot.
I had thought of seeing if I could find any other way of contacting the commune, even following the rumours and asking around in town if anyone had an unregulated Internet connection; but I don’t need to take the risk – I know where she’ll be if she is to be found.
Now I need to stop writing, and tuck these final pages into the bottom of the waterproof pack with the rest. Sylvie, a girl in our group, when she arrived brought with her books in English published in Paris. Her charity relieve her in three months, and her family are in Calais. She told me she will take my papers back with her when she goes and show them at the offices of Le égal. It is a kindness I have no way to repay.
Anyway, I must go, I must catch some sleep before my final day, before I head out again across our unreadable landscape. I think it’s time to find out if these legs still have some hiking in them.
The End