by Mark Jackson
In the hallway upstairs, Keilty stood at the corner with the stairs behind him. He listened.
At the other end of the wide corridor, Janni and Kruger waited. They looked across at each other.
Keilty stepped across the opening and fired one shot. He reached the other side as two bullets slammed into the wall. One smashed into the doorframe he had been moments before, the other to a foot wide of where he had now moved on to.
He checked his chamber. Five bullets left.
Slowly and carefully, Keilty lowered himself until he was laying full length on the floor. He levelled his sniper rifle and lying down, with one hand, threw it across the opening. Two shots rang out as before. Keilty moved slightly and fired at floor level.
Janni fell backwards clutching his ankle.
Keilty heard the pained Afrikaner swearing. He smiled coldly. He waited.
McDonald stood listening at the double doors that lead into the Great Hall. He turned at a noise. It was Karen. He signalled her to stop. She nodded and offered him a small tight smile.
The giant arched doors burst open, and Campbell, wielding a mighty curved sword charged at McDonald. Karen’s mouth formed a warning, but no sound came, as McDonald ducked the blow and swung away. McDonald blocked another heavy stroke with his Enfield. He pushed Campbell back and swung his rifle round, pointing the bayonet at Campbell.
Karen raised her rifle, but the two men were locked together. They were circling too close together for her to get in a clean shot.
Campbell bellowed a war cry and charged again.
This time McDonald stepped forward, deflecting the heavy downward stroke and jabbed the bayonet forward. The men stood, staring at each other.
The bayonet embedded in Campbell’s torso. Campbell’s sword fell from his hand, ringing as it struck the stone floor. McDonald jerked the bayonet out and Campbell tumbled to the floor.
McDonald studied the body for a second, then turned to face the huge double doors.
“Laird.”
Keilty edged down the corridor. He was straining to hear even the smallest of sounds. Nothing. He reached a door and looked down. He was following a trail of blood. It stopped at this door. He looked down the remainder of the corridor, which led into a brighter area, with a huge stained glass window at the end.
He stepped back and kicked the door open and launched himself through it.
Keilty landed and rolled. He came to rest against a giant four-poster bed. He stopped and listened. He slowly scanned the room; the gap between the curtains and the floor, under the bed. His eyes fell on a large wardrobe and a small door on the opposite side of the bed to him.
Keilty frowned. He worked his way along the side of the bed. Blood stains led to the huge wardrobe. He looked at the open door. Raising himself up, he fired twice into the small door. The wardrobe burst open as Janni frantically charged out. Keilty swivelled and loosened two rounds into the wardrobe door and the desperate Afrikaner. Janni crashed back in to the wardrobe’s dark recess.
“Did you serve in South Africa?”
Kruger was standing at the door, a pistol aimed at Keilty.
“Herd my mother and sister like cattle into your camps to rot?”
Keilty was still. A knife slid from his cuff.
“You’ve shot your last bolt, Engelsman.”
Keilty’s eyes were slits.
“I’m Irish, you ass.”
Kruger’s scar twitched. Kruger brought up his pistol.
“Is there a difference?”
“Of course, there is. We’re Celts.” Said Thomas, in a soft burr.
Kruger swung around into the hallway. Thomas, holding his weighty Webley with his good arm, emptied the revolver rounds into Kruger. The kick of the pistol made Thomas’s aim wild. Kruger spun against the wall. The bullets turned him in slow motion. The last three sent him smashing through the tall, stained glass window at the end of the corridor.
Thomas lowered the revolver. He was exhausted.
Keilty picked up Kruger’s gun, a well-kept Luger, and checked the chamber.
“Let’s find Mac, Doubtin’.”
McDonald crashed through the double doors into the Great Hall. He landed heavily and covered the room with his rifle. The hall was still packed with crates. There was no sign of Laird.
“A fine entrance. Welcome to my kingdom, McDonald.”
McDonald rose to his feet.
“You have always been a thorn, McDonald. I should have left you to die.”
McDonald conceded the point.
“Perhaps you should have.”
McDonald walked carefully forward; still no sign of Laird.
“But then you’d have had no cover for your treachery.”
“Treachery! Who have I betrayed – an uncaring, snobberyridden, decaying Empire? Riddled with prejudice and selfloathing. Divide and rule, McDonald. Class and creed, McDonald.
“English despising Scots, laughing at the Irish, pouring scorn on the Welsh.
“Look at me, McDonald, a Lord of the Realm, despised because my mother was a Boer. Look at me!”
McDonald turned to see Laird. The lord was bedecked in full regalia. His manic eyes looked out from under a royal crown, the St. Edward’s Crown. It was tilted at an angle as though far too big for him. He was wrapped in a fur cape, which ran to the floor. The lining was rich dark vermillion. Laird’s walking cane was in his hand.
“Another mother and I might have risen to the highest office.”
McDonald looked at the lord with contempt.
“Another mother and you might have had no title.”
Laird fixed McDonald with one eye.
“You were always a little man, McDonald. Do you know what they called me in Africa? Colonel Blood.”
“I should have remembered.”
“Why? Because I knew how to use the lash.”
“That’s when it came to me. Colonel Blood. If a Seventeenth Century rogue could pull it off, why not a modern gentleman. And I could watch the Empire crumble.”
McDonald planted his feet.
“You’re no gentleman.”
Laird stopped his tirade to consider the man in front of him.
“Why are you here, Sergeant Major? Do you think you can stop me? The damage has already been done.”
“I came to kill you.”
Laird looked surprised.
“Kill me? Your own Clan Chief? But we’re both Scots, man!”
McDonald snapped.
“You don’t even speak my language!”
“No!”
Laird half turned away as if shamed and the crown slipped a little. His hands fiddled with his cane. Unseen by McDonald, he twisted back, drawing a long blade from inside his cane.
“But you’ll understand this.”
His arm snaked out and Laird lunged forward like a fencer. The blade pierced McDonald’s chest. Laird leapt back triumphantly. The handle of the cane, with the wolf ’s head jutted from McDonald’s chest.
“Feel the wolf ’s bite, McDonald!”
McDonald studied the silver handle. He dropped to his knees. Slowly he raised his arm. The Enfield came up.
Quietly, McDonald mouthed the words,
“Bydand.”
Laird’s scream filled the Great Hall.
“NO!”
The Enfield went off.
Laird’s crown rolled along the floor, coming to rest at McDonald’s knees.
The old cemetery was perched on a slant on the Drumgoyne hillside. A Church Minister stood with a small group of mourners. Tight grieving faces. Thomas, Gordon and Karen, Keilty and Inspector Reeves, with a couple of police officers. There was no Battle, McDonald or Ritchie. Thomas had a sling bound around his arm. Gordon, his head and hand bandaged, was supported by Karen. The Minister was speaking, but there was no sound. The wind whipped away his words before they could reach the mourners. Keilty looked at the three graves. He looked across the island; at the beauty of it.
General Hastings
, Governor of the Tower of London, was at his office window; his customary perch.
“A most disagreeable business. Dreadful shame about Battle and McDonald.”
He turned to face Thomas and Keilty.
“Returning to Chelsea, Thomas?”
Thomas considered the question and the Governor.
“Thought I might go and convalesce with some family first, Governor.”
The Governor frowned.
“Didn’t know you had any.”
“Forgotten I had, sir.”
The Governor was put out.
“No mention of this will appear on your records, including going AWOL. Not something to be encouraged.
“Not a word to anyone. It never happened. Unthinkable. Dismissed.”
Thomas saluted and turned to go, but Keilty remained at attention.
“What about Laird?”
The Governor and Thomas froze at Keilty’s tone and the lack of the respectful “sir”.
Hastings gathered himself.
“In view of the death of your friends, Yeoman Warder Keilty, I will overlook your lack of manners.”
Keilty waited.
The Governor hesitated. His voice was soft with irony.
“Lord Laird died in a hunting accident.”
Hastings flicked a newspaper at Keilty.
“You can read his obituary. It’s in The Times today.”
Keilty saluted and turned out of the room without glancing at the paper. Thomas followed him out.
In the Tower Courtyard, it was business as usual. A crowd of school children and their teachers were gathered around a yeoman warder. Keilty smiled at them. He stood on a small step.
“Now, the Tower of London has had its fair share of rascals and rogues. Villains of the highest order.”
He studied their rapt faces and it warmed him.
“But perhaps the greatest rogue of them all was Colonel Blood. Does anyone know what he did?”
Keilty scanned the crowd of small faces. As he did so, his eyes rose and he spied General Hastings eyeing him darkly from his narrow turret window.
The world stood still for Keilty. Somewhere in another part of the Tower of London, someone was playing Greensleeves. Keilty could hear Tommy Battle laughing, too.
Blinkin’ shoot me, Ged. We did it.
Keilty fixed on Governor Hastings, who was still watching him.
Keilty turned away to face his audience. Some arms were raised, waiting to tell him about Colonel Blood.
“Many of you will have heard of him, stealing the Crown Jewels from King Charles II. But I’m not going to tell you about him, I’m going to tell you another darker tale of the Tower. Yes, it features Colonel Blood, but you won’t read this in any of your history books at school.”
Keilty started to speak. As he did so, one of the young children at the back was writing furiously, trying to keep up with Keilty’s tale, despite his sore fingers.
Epilogue
Glengoyne, Scotland, 1926
A man was standing near the summit of a steep hill. From here he could see the castle. He turned scanning the horizon, a walking staff in his hand. He looked in the direction of a small croft. A woman was splitting logs in the yard. It was Karen Gordon. Her hair hung loose. She stopped and waved to him, shielding her eyes from the sun.
He waved back and began to walk towards her.
The ghillie flicked a coin in the air. The sunlight caught it. It landed in his palm. It was a golden doubloon.
McDonald, now with a healthy beard, continued his descent, whistling Bonnie, Bonnie Scotland as he picked his way down.
He had travelled the world, fought in the heat and the dust. Dragged his wife, Elaine, from one barren fort to another. Now, she was gone, and that life with it.
He and Karen had both lost people, her to the Great War; him to many wars.
He strode down the hill to a new life.
Karen waited for him. His future waited for him.
He was a man at peace. McDonald had come home.
Mac and Skinstad fight
LONDON, ENGLAND, 1930
The fog seemed to magnify the sound of the footsteps of the man ahead.
Evan Thomas could tell which way his quarry turned from the echo of his boots down the narrow alleyways.
Thomas was conscious of his own steps.
However, the man on his tail was quieter. Well-trained. A professional.
Thomas tried to keep his pace steady. Ahead, the footsteps stopped.
After counting 22 paces, Thomas found his man. He had been dead for less than 20 seconds. There was no sight or sound of his killer. Just a small wooden-handled dagger stuck in his chest. He must have walked on to it.
A slight movement behind him and Thomas realised he had company. A well-built, blunt-featured man. He and Thomas considered each other, as the stranger’s arm came up. Thomas acknowledged the silenced pistol and braced himself for the bullet.
“Not good odds,” murmured the assassin, as he took half a step forward, then another. Thomas frowned as the man in front of him sank to his knees. He folded awkwardly, as Keilty extracted his blade from the man’s back.
Keilty and Thomas stared down at the two dead men.
“Jack was right,” Keilty’s voice was soft as he wiped his knife.
“We have a problem, Ged.”
Keilty deftly slid his weapon away. The movement was so fluid it was difficult to figure out where the knife had gone.
“Mac?”
“Mac. If he’s willing…”
Acknowledgements
There are many people who have given their time, advice and support to make this book possible. It would have been much harder without them. In fact, it might not have happened at all.
The list should probably be longer than this, but here goes….
My love and heartfelt gratitude to my family, Douglas and Rosemary Jackson for travelling with me on the journey, who together with Lesley and Danny, have put up with me being stuck in 1925 for years, as well as for their constant encouragement.
Special thanks go also to Leo Callaghan for believing in this story. Thanks also to his talented cousin Matthew Gooder for taking up the challenge and to my dear friends Nigel and Katie for all their patience and support – from Hull and back.
For having faith in this forgotten piece of history, many thanks to Jesper Ericsson, Chris Henry, Dougie Irvine, Sara Harkins and Denise Taylor.
Also to the late James T Duthie, Henry Duthie MBE, Paul Main and The Mannie Glennie, Anne Reid, Stefan Dickers and The Gentle Author, Saskia Gibbon, Don Coutts and Bruce the Navigator, also Richard Findlay, Laurie McMahon, Davie McDonald and the original Ged Keilty.
Not forgetting the Gibson family, Brem and Brenda Bing.
My gratitude and appreciation to Lynne Forsyth for her editing skills, artist Mary May for her stunning cover, publisher Jeremy Thompson and his team at Matador, word whiz Julie Beedie and creative Jonathan McKay. Their help and advice on all aspects of production pointed the way.
Finally, for their expertise and enthusiasm, I salute the staff and volunteers at The Gordon Highlanders Museum, The Tower of London and The Royal Hospital Chelsea. They are inspirational.
Thanks to you as well, for helping me get this far.
About the Author
Mark Jackson is a BAFTA Scotland nominated writer and an award winning short filmmaker; a sometime journalist, photographer and one-time restaurant manager. He was born in England and lives in Scotland, where he works for a small charity.
He can be contacted at:
[email protected]
Tommy Battle
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