A Prospect of Vengeance dda-18

by Anthony Price

  '"Jenny", please.' She felt the smile painted on her lips as she wondered if the child watched television, and how good her memory was from not so long ago. Because after the Beirut business, when they'd had all the television coverage, the TV

  people had made a big thing of 'Fielding-ffulke', making a joke of it all the way back to 1066 and all that. 'Yes, I know there was a battle here — 1812, was it? And have you found any musket balls, Cathy?'

  'No.' Cathy looked at her steadily. 'I'm not having much luck.

  In fact, I'm not having any luck, to tell the truth.'

  Jenny felt firmer ground under her feet. 'Did you expect to find any?'

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  But now Cathy was looking past her, at Ian.

  'Oh — Cathy, I'm sorry!' She had clean forgotten about Ian herself. And she had done that in the past, and felt guilty about it: but now all she required of him was politeness. 'This is Mr Ian Robinson, dear: he's a friend of mine.' She looked down at the broken earth at her feet, and couldn't see any bullets (why the hell should the child look for . . . bullets, for God's sake!). 'Ian — Miss Catherine Audley — ?'

  'Yes.' His voice came soft and cold, and quite without interest. 'Hullo, Miss Audley.'

  'Mr Robinson.' The child stared at him.

  Jenny felt her doubts increasing. Because Mr Robinson had also appeared on the damned television programme, even if only briefly: Ian typically self-effacingly, even though he'd been the real hero, and she'd not really been-the heroine at all. Damn!

  But if Cathy Audley remembered him, and recognized him, his lack of interest froze her out now — just as it had frozen Jenny herself out, these last few hours. Ian was only interested in one woman, and she wasn't here. Indeed, she wasn't anywhere.

  'Did you expect to find any . . . musket balls, Cathy?' Jenny controlled her fears carefully. Because Ian's Frances Fitzgibbon obsession was all very well, in its place, however unhealthy. But now, when this eccentric child could lead them straight to Audley, Ian and his obsession were an dummy2

  inconvenience — even, a quite unnecessary obstacle, which made her wish that he wasn't here with her, when she had more urgent questions on her mind. So — sod Ian!, as she looked down at the earth at her feet. 'Musket balls — here?'

  'Oh yes!' Cathy Audley matched her move. 'On the Somme I found lots of them. Or not musket balls, actually — lots of shrapnel balls, I mean. But musket balls must be just like shrapnel balls — like round — ?' Her head came down so close to Jenny that she exchanged a strong whiff of childishly over-applied scent ' — and there should be lots of them hereabouts . . . because the poor Portuguese charged up here . . . and then down again . . . and then the French charged after them. And finally the British charged. So there should be lots. But I just can't find any . . .'

  Cathy trailed off, and they both concentrated on scanning the field together for a moment, to the exclusion of all other matters.

  Jenny straightened up finally. 'No — I see what you mean.

  Perhaps they've just been ploughed into the ground, Cathy?'

  'Oh no! It doesn't work like that.' Cathy shook her head vehemently. 'There's someone I know who's an expert, and he says that ploughing brings them up to the surface, it doesn't bury them. And I'm sure this is the right place.' She reached into the back-pocket of her jeans, producing a crumpled piece of paper which she then unfolded with grubby fingers. 'This was practically the centre of the battle

  — at the start, anyway.'

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  It was a map, neatly hand-drawn, but now rendered incomprehensible with its profusion of little red and blue squares, and diagonally red-and-white and blue-and-white rectangles, which followed the criss-crossing arrows of the rival armies' advances and retirements around and beyond the Greater Arapile.

  'We're here — ' Cathy stabbed the map, and then shook her head. 'I simply don't understand it. It's most vexing.'

  'Yes.' It was curious how, when Cathy Audley had stared at her she had seemed grown up, but now she was a child again.

  'Do you collect . . . bullets and things, Cathy?'

  'No ... not really.' The child-Cathy grinned at her. 'But, it's interesting finding things — isn't it? I got some super barbed-wire at Verdun. My father says it's German. It's got very long barbs on it, and they're much closer together than on modern barbed-wire.'

  Jenny felt her jaw drop open.

  'People in America collect barbed-wire, you know.' Cathy Audley nodded seriously. There are hundreds of different varieties, going back to the middle of the nineteenth century, almost. Some bits are worth hundreds of dollars, my father says — the first bits they used in the Wild West, I suppose.'

  The repetition of 'my father says' recalled Jenny to reality.

  She had established herself with the child. And now the child would lead her to the father, complete with an introduction of sorts. 'And your father collects battlefields, does he?'

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  The child's eyes sparkled suddenly, and she laughed.

  'Oh ... he collects everything — he's like a great big jackdaw, Mummy says: he never throws away anything.' She shook her head, becoming older again as she shared her mother's despair. 'But . . . yes, he does collect battlefields. In fact, this is a "battlefield holiday" — at least, the first two weeks are.'

  She grinned fondly. 'Medieval ones coming down: Crecy, Poitiers and Chastillon — that's the place where the French finally beat us, in the Hundred Years' War, you know — did you know?'

  'No.' Jenny sensed Ian chafing nearby. But Ian was wrong to chafe: so long as they had the daughter, then they couldn't lose the father.

  'Oh yes! There's even a monument to poor old John Talbot, who got killed there, by the river. And my father says . . .

  losing the American colonies was no great loss — no one minds losing them. But losing Bordeaux, where the wine comes from — that really was the most rotten luck. Because it's much too good for the French, he says.' She giggled again.

  'And he said all that to a French couple and an American couple we met at the Parador at Ciudad Rodrigo — honestly, I thought Mummy was going to kill him . . . But that was later on. Because from Chastillon we came over the Pass of Roncesvalles — where Roland was killed . . . that was super . . . And then down the other side, to a lovely old Parador, in a medieval hospital — that was so he could show us the battlefield at Najera, where the English longbowmen dummy2

  wiped out that Spanish-and-French army in five minutes —

  like machine-gunners, Father said — wow!'

  Suddenly, Jenny understood: this poor child had been holidaying for nearly a fortnight now, with her overwhelming father and disapproving mother, between whom she hadn't got a word in edgeways. But now she'd met a sympathetic English-speaking stranger, so the floodgates of pent-up speech had burst, just as they had done with the Spanish waiters.

  'But this isn't a medieval battlefield surely, Miss Audley?' Ian intruded suddenly with the same silly question which he had put to her.

  'Oh no — ' Cathy Audley fielded the statement almost joyfully. 'But we did the medieval battles the first week, you see — and Mummy's having a week in Paris, for shopping, on the way back — ' the grin twisted. ' — and so am I ... Father's going back to work and we are going shopping, Mummy and I!'

  So 'Mummy' wasn't so stupid, thought Jenny: Audley himself paid for his idiosyncrasies — and quite properly, too!

  'The middle week's the Peninsular War,' Cathy Audley concentrated on Ian. 'We've just come from Ciudad Rodrigo: another super old Parador . . . except Father hated the food there — ' She cocked her head at him suddenly, almost shyly, yet unchildlike. 'Are you staying at the Salamanca Parador, Mr — Mr Robinson?'

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  Ian nodded, matching her shyness. 'We just checked in this morning, Miss Audley.' Then he blinked. 'The Peninsular War?'

  'Yes.' Nod. 'We stormed Ciudad Rodrigo in 1812. And my father ... he wanted to see where "Black Bob" Crauford was kille
d — and where they buried him in the ditch there ... I mean, he used to flog them, and hang them, but they loved him, my father says . . . He's a great admirer of General Crauford.' Cathy Audley nodded seriously. 'He wanted me to see Badajoz too, where our army did a lot of raping-and-pillaging. But Mummy said we didn't have enough time for that.'

  'Why the Peninsular War?' Ian, when a 'why ' eluded him, was as persistent as any child, regardless of raping and pillaging.

  'Oh, not the whole of the war.' The child accepted his curiosity as quite natural. 'It went on for years and years, you know. But my father is only interested in 1812. And really he's only interested in here, because Salamanca is our special battlefield, Mr Robinson: my father has been talking about coming here for ages and ages.' She blushed slightly. This is a sort of reward for my A-levels — ' The blush combined with a grin ' — this . . . and Paris.'

  A-level exam results were a blow below the belt: she had waited herself for them, through endless days a dozen years ago, to find out whether she had been accepted by the dummy2

  university of her choice, and it had been Philly who had been there, waiting for her at the last, as she'd scraped through by the skin of her teeth, with champagne ready for congratulation or commiseration! Philly, oh Philly — damn them all!

  'So . . . you passed then?' Now it was her turn to grit her teeth and concentrate on the matter in hand, all sweetness and light, (it had been mid-August then, a month ago now; so, to travel safely from Parador to Parador, Audley must have booked ahead, planning this holiday-reward; so that meant he hadn't prudently removed himself from the country, to avoid awkward questions after Philly's body had been found — ? Or had it been just luck, and not just confidence in his clever daughter?)

  'What's so special about Salamanca, Miss Audley?' Ian, having decided to be involved, was even more single-minded in seeking answers to questions which were bugging him —

  quite oblivious of the child's awkward modesty about her results (straight bloody A-grades, with distinctions in the special papers, the clever little beast? But she mustn't let her sour grapes betray her smile!).

  'Oh yes!' The child seized on the question eagerly again: it saved her from immodesty, for a guess; but also (if she was normal) she properly preferred men to women now, for another guess. 'My great-great-great-grandfather was killed here, you see. In 1812, at Salamanca, Mr — ' she floundered dummy2

  momentarily.

  '"Ian",' Jenny supplied the Christian name tartly. 'He answers to "Ian", Cathy. But . . . your great-great . . .

  grandfather was killed . . . here?'

  'Oh?' The child blinked at her for another moment. But then her years increased again as she measured Jenny up, and took in her slightly battered condition to even up the reckoning. And then turned back to Ian coolly. 'Not actually here, I mean.' She smiled at Ian and then swung on her heel and pointed away past the rocky headland of the Greater Arapile towards the distant ridge behind it, on which a long line of scrubby trees marked the skyline. 'That's where the British cavalry charged. And my great-great-great-grandfather was in the charge: he charged right through two whole French divisions . . . before he was killed, right at the end. So this is our special family battlefield, do you see?'

  Wow! thought Jenny: Ian had wanted an answer to his 'why'

  — and he had got it to the last syllable. 'Like . . . the Charge of the Light Brigade — ?'

  'No — not at all!' Ian's voice was stiff with contempt. 'He must have been in General Le Marchant's charge — ' He began by addressing her, but then dismissed her, to turn the words back to Cathy Audley ' — and General Le Marchant was killed up there, too — in the moment of victory — ?'

  'That's right — gosh!' The child was quite enchanted by this supremely useless piece of information. 'You know about the dummy2

  battle, Mr Robinson?'

  'I know about Le Marchant, Miss Audley.' Whether Ian really knew about 'General Le Marchant' hung in the balance for an instant: it could be either that he had always known, because it was the sort of thing he knew: or it could be that he had just done his homework last night, to know just enough, but no more than that. 'He was the one man in the army who was a scientific soldier — ? A Guernsey man — from the Channel Islands?'

  'That's right!' Cathy Audley positively bubbled with pleasure.

  'You really do know about the battle, don't you!' Then she frowned. 'But that's silly, isn't it!'

  'Silly?'

  Not silly, thought Jenny, amending her previous contempt abjectly as she realized what Ian was doing — and what he had done, which she hadn't even thought to do —

  'I don't mean you — gosh! I mean me.' Cathy hunched her shoulders. 'I mean . . . you wouldn't be here, traipsing around like this, if you weren't interested in the battle. So ... you're probably a historian — are you a historian?' She cocked her head at Ian, but not coquettishly: it was a simple, straight question, as unfeminine as it was unshy, but with logic behind it. 'Or are you a dragoon?'

  'A — ?' Ian was good, having done his homework. But he wasn't that good. 'A ... dragoon, Miss Audley?'

  'My father was a dragoon, in the war . . . Not the Peninsular dummy2

  War, I mean . . . but his war.' Cathy threw out her inadequate chest with filial pride. 'He wasn't on a horse, of course — he was in a tank ... He doesn't even like horses . . . But, then, he doesn't much like tanks, either. Even though he's always talking about them.' Pride quite vanished beneath honesty.

  'But. . . my great-great-great-grandfather was a horse-dragoon, you see. And he was shot right beside General Le Marchant — in "the moment of victory", just like you said . . .

  And my father says all British dragoons should come here, because this was one of the best charges they ever made. But, of course, he wanted me to see it because of great-great-great-grandfather . . . Are you a historian, Mr Robinson?'

  'Not a historian, Miss Audley. Or a dragoon. But we are writers, Miss Fielding and I.' Ian smiled and nodded at the child. 'And we are thinking of writing a book on Spain —

  aren't we, Miss Fielding?'

  'Possibly, Mr Robinson.'

  'And if we do, we shall certainly mention the battle of Salamanca, Miss Audley — General Le Marchant's charge.'

  'And the dragoons, Cathy.' It was Jenny's turn to smile. 'At least, we will if your father will tell us all about them — would he do that, do you think?'

  'Oh . . . yes — ' Cathy looked up towards the Greater Arapile '

  — well, I don't see why not.' She came back to Jenny. 'So long as you make allowance for him not being in a very good mood, I mean.' She made a face at them both. 'He's been like that ever since — ' She stopped abruptly.

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  'Ever since — ?' Ever since they tipped him off that there was trouble back home, thought Jenny. It was only to be expected. And with Fielding and Robinson on the loose it was doubly to be expected. 'Something he ate, dear?'

  'Oh no!' Cathy was quite disarmed by the fatuousness of the suggestion. 'He just got a phone call from home. And he hates being bothered by the office when we're on holiday, you see.'

  'Don't we all, dear!' Jenny laughed. 'But ... is that him up there, watching over us? Up by that . . . what is it? It looks like a sort of monument — ?'

  'Yes.' Cathy followed her glance. Then she waved suddenly.

  'All right — let's go and see him, then — '

  Once she had her second wind the climb wasn't so bad, really: even, it was preferable to the corn-stubble, so long as she took care to avoid the occasional thistle.

  'See these walls, Jenny?' Ian had stopped to let her catch up, while the child bounded ahead. They must have cultivated this land right up to here in the old days — ' He spoke loudly, but then dropped his voice as she came level with him ' — if Mitchell's phoned him he'll know who we are, and what we're up to. So he may even be expecting us, Jen.'

  She waved at Cathy, who had also stopped now. 'Surprise, surprise. So he's expecting us, t
hen.' She turned, as though to admire the view, and saw that the deceptive undulations of the fields had already flattened out far below her. It was hard dummy2

  to imagine that flesh-and-blood could ever have been so brave (or so stupid?) to march all the way she'd come, buttoned-up and constricted in silly uniforms and weighed down by weapons and equipment, and through a hail of Cathy Audley's elusive musket balls. But then, it was also fairly way-out, the process which had brought her so far from home, to this unlikely place: she was here because Philly had once carried Daddy on his back in far-off Korea (another unlikely place, by God!) — and because an Audley ancestor had once charged to death-and-glory here, to find his unmarked grave.

  Philly had almost had an unmarked grave of his own, she thought. And the thought turned her round again. 'Come on, Ian. We've got work to do.'

  Cathy was waiting for them.

  'See there, Miss Fielding — Jenny — ?' She pointed at the ground.

  'What?' Behind the child the final tumble-home of the Greater Arapile rose more steeply, in a jumble of rocks. But it would be no more exhausting than climbing up to Piccadilly from the Underground without the benefit of the moving escalator.

  'Autumn crocuses, Miss Fielding.' The child pointed again.

  Jenny looked down. And there at her feet was a tiny delicate pale-mauve flower with a bright white-into-yellow centre, dummy2

  thrusting out of the dead grass like a promise of life-in-death.

  'Isn't it beautiful, Miss Fielding?'

  'Yes, dear.' Jenny stepped carefully around the crocus. And then she saw another, and another . . . and some were already wilting in the fierce Spanish sun, as ephemeral as butterflies. 'Very beautiful.'

  'Here, Jen — ' Ian reached down to help her up over a steeper place, almost like the old Ian.

  Now they were on the edge of the summit, with bedrock and tumbled rock all around them.

  Their hands and their eyes met. And it wasn't strange that he looked sad: they were at the beginning of their long goodbye; which had always been going to come one day, inevitably; but that didn't make it any sadder, now that they could both see it ahead of them: maybe they would write a Spanish book together, but it would be their last book; or maybe he'd write it, while she was frying some other and very different fish.