by Tony Roberts
“Better, mate?” the grinning soldier sat in front of him asked.
“Ahhh…. That’s good!” Casca looked up at the men sat around him, all dressed similarly, in the khaki of the British army, except they had wide-brimmed slouch hats which had one side pinned against the crown. They also had the word Australia emblazoned across the brass rising sun on their felt hats and collars. “So what the devil are you Australians doing here in Egypt?”
“You’ve not heard?” the man to Casca’s left sat up in surprise. He was called Rocky. Casca didn’t yet know what his proper name was, or why he was called Rocky. No doubt he’d find out in time. All he knew was that he was grateful to these men who had taken him away from the scene of his flight to a watering hole they’d appropriated, and had produced a number of beers much to the disapproval of the proprietor. He’d vanished soon enough when a sheaf of notes had been thrown at him.
“I’ve been in hospital. These burns,” Casca waved at his reddened face and arms. “Don’t hear anything there except patients pissing into buckets at night.”
The Australians laughed. “Yeah,” Rocky nodded, “so we can see. Looks nasty. How d’ya get them?”
Casca grinned. He had his story all worked out. “Fell asleep on duty. Got sunburned then some idiot tried to wake me up but instead of throwing cold water on me, used the camp kettle that had just been boiled!”
More laughter. Another Australian, one called Jeb North, nodded towards the Eternal Mercenary. “So how come you’re wearing Arab costume and running from the British? We saw those jokers looking around after we took you away from where we found you.”
“Ah. Well, falling asleep on duty’s punishable, isn’t it?” Casca shrugged. “Once I was declared fit to leave the hospital they were going to arrest me. So I stole this and jumped out of a window. I’m a deserter now. I suppose it’ll be a court martial.”
“Bloody shame,” a third man grumbled. “Wouldn’t like the Poms to charge you.”
“Poms?” Casca crinkled his brow.
“Brits.” Rocky grinned. “Pomegranates. They go that color when they sunburn! Sorry,” he added hastily, seeing Casca’s expression, “wrong thing to say.”
“I’m no Pom,” Casca said. “I’m Canadian. So what do I have to do to join your outfit?”
“Join us?” Jeb said. “Jeez. You asking for trouble, Cass?” Casca had told them his name was Cass Roman.
“What better way of escaping the Poms by joining you boys?”
The Australians looked at each other. Some shrugged, others laughed. “Great to put one over those jokers,” the man with the name of Archie McGrath said. He had a Scottish lilt to his voice. He had a craggy, long face, a long, broken nose and a gap-toothed smile, evidence of past fights.
“So how are we going to explain him in the battalion?” Rocky asked, leaning back in his rickety chair which creaked alarmingly. Rocky was a big man with wide shoulders, short fair hair and a sharp, angular face.
“New arrival. Let’s face it, guys,” Jeb smiled, “there’s a lot of confusion going on with our move from Cairo to here, and there’s all these new blokes who’ve turned up and nobody seems to know who’s where and with whom!”
The others agreed. Casca tugged at his sweaty djellaba. “Well, what about a uniform? I can’t come along dressed in this!”
“We’ll find you a uniform, don’t you worry!” Jeb said. He seemed to be the unofficial spokesman for the group. He was slim but athletic, and possessed a shock of black curly hair and had a firm jaw and looks that could attract most women. “Supplies are in such a mess it won’t be hard to get hold of one, especially with Bill here to sneak some out!”
The man Jeb had indicated was a slightly built, wiry and unkempt looking individual. He smiled impishly. “Bill Halloran, nice to meet you, Cass.”
Casca and Bill shook hands. Archie tapped Casca on the shoulder. “Watch Bill, mind, especially if you’re playing cards against him!” More laughs.
Jeb stood up, stretching. “Come on you lot, we’d best be getting back to camp before dark. We don’t want to have the provosts come looking for us, now we have a new mate around.”
The others agreed and gathered in the road. Casca was thankful finally to have got some new friends and a way out of Egypt. The longer he stayed there the bigger the risk of getting discovered. Also he hoped the switch to an Australian unit would throw off any chance of being found out by the British.
The news the others brought him on the way to camp was interesting. They were earmarked for a landing on the Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey. Casca knew it well, having traveled in that region many times before. The peninsula stood on the European side of what was called the Dardanelles, the narrow gap that allowed sea passage from the Aegean Sea northwards to Constantinople and beyond into the Black Sea. Turkey – or to be more accurate, the Ottoman Empire – had recently sided with Germany and Austria-Hungary against the Allies, and this had isolated Russia from its friends.
It seemed military thinking had decided this had to be broken and getting at the Ottomans was the best way to do that. So the Dardanelles had to be seized and a landing on Gallipoli was the quickest way to do this. Casca wasn’t sure; the terrain was mountainous and the modern weapons of war made it perfect for a few defenders to hold off vast numbers of attackers. Still, going to a war zone was another good way of shaking off a search for him. War always confused matters. And these Australians were keen to get to grips with the enemy. Casca liked their carefree attitude and their dislike of bullshit. So different to the rigid discipline of the British army and their tendency to stamp out individual thinking.
The camp was outside Alexandria, a rapidly thrown together compound surrounded by barbed wire. While Jeb and the others distracted the guards at the entrance in a loud, noisy group, Casca shuffled along the desert ground to the wire and burrowed down, shifting the loose sand aside and making a hole big enough to slide under the bottom strand.
The djellaba caught but Casca tugged hard and the fabric ripped, but then came away and he was in. The others were waiting for him by a stack of oil barrels and they cautioned him to hide there while they got a uniform for him.
It took about an hour, an hour of nerves stretching and the light fading, until two of the group approached and threw a bundle of khaki over the top of the barrels, and it landed on Casca’s feet, making him jump. He quickly discarded the djellaba and shrugged on the khaki flannel jacket and trousers, and the puttees, the lower leg wrappings. The boots were a clean fit, and he thanked Bill Halloran for remembering his size. In fact, the uniform was a decent fit all round. Lastly, he placed the felt slouch hat on his head and finally felt a part of the army.
He walked out from behind the barrels and both Bill and Archie were there, waiting. “Strewth,” Bill exclaimed, “fair dinkum, mate.”
“Eh?” Casca frowned.
“He means smart and genuine looking,” Archie grinned. “You’d best get used to the lingo if you’re going to fit in here.”
Casca grunted. Lingo. Language. English was all very well but its slang terms varied so much across the world. As Archie said, he’d just have to get used to it quickly. Not that it was too big an obstacle; Casca had a talent for picking up languages. Whether this was due to the Curse or just a natural ability he didn’t know, but ever since that day on Golgotha almost nineteen centuries past, he found he could learn new tongues fairly swiftly. Jesus had supposedly spoken to him in Latin on the cross, yet Achron, his squad buddy, had said Jesus had spoken in Syriac! Maybe it was that moment that had opened his mind to learning new tongues?
The platoon sergeant demanded to know who the new arrival was. Casca saluted in best British army manner, which drew smirks from the Australians, and gave his name. “My papers were stolen by a bloody Arab, Sarge. Jeb and the guys here were showing me round the city.”
“Were they?” the sergeant sniffed, unimpressed. “Well, we’d better get you new ones then. And don’t go waving your
wallet round in future. This ain’t Brisbane. And what the bloody hell happened to you? You look like you’ve got every disease going!”
“Accident with a kettle, Sarge,” Casca said stiffly, staring into space beyond the NCO’s shoulder.
“You get down to the medic double quick. I want a report on you. Don’t want you spreading anything to these jokers. You been at the Egyptian brothels?”
“No Sarge.”
“Not so smart, Cass,” Jeb said when the sergeant had gone. “This ain’t the British army.”
“Got you,” Casca nodded. He sank onto the bunk that had been pointed out for him and put his hands behind his head. No roaring RSMs, no screaming sergeants, or crowing corporals. Great!
* * *
Ieaun Clark was a frustrated man. His ship, the Abyrton, was due to depart the following morning, and the mystery man van der Laang was still nowhere in sight. A search had been made for him but so far nothing had turned up. The army was hunting him for different reasons, but to Clark it made no difference. As long as someone found him, then that was so much the better!
The only incident had been a disturbance in the Souk and a squad had run into a mob, but dispersed them with gunfire. Clark had tagged along with a captain who was to question the corporal who had been present, his presence explained as being a medical man who had tended the fugitive and knew him by sight. Not many people did, so Clark was grudgingly accepted.
The corporal was shown in and both the captain and Clark sat behind a table. Other guards stood by the single doorway. Night had fallen and a single bulb hung from the otherwise bare ceiling. “So, Corporal,” the captain said, “tell us about this, ah, incident.”
The corporal retold his view of events. He came to the part where the crowd had been dispersed. “So we followed each alley along to find the man they’d been chasing, a big man in a colorful robe…”
“That’s our man!” Clark snapped excitedly.
The captain turned in surprise. “Are you sure?”
“Yes! He stole the robe from the hospital. And he’s bigger than the average Arab, I can tell you.”
“Very well,” the captain said curtly, and nodded to the corporal to continue.
“Well, I came out of my alleyway to see a group of soldiers across the road walking away with this man. I thought he’d been arrested and that was the end of it. Until that was you called me in to report it.”
“None of our troops,” the captain said. “Very well, thank you, Corporal, you may go.”
The two men waited until the corporal had left, then looked at one another. Clark thumped the table. “He’s got away! Damn him! Who were those soldiers?”
“I’m not sure but over the past few days there has been a large influx of Anzac troops from Cairo, ready to be put on those transporters out in the bay.”
Clark frowned. “Anzacs?”
The captain leaned back in his chair, his oiled leather belt creaking. “Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. Anzacs for short. Undisciplined and rowdy. Bloody nuisance and the sooner they’re sent against the Turks the better.”
“They’re bound for Gallipoli?”
The captain nodded. “We’ll conduct an enquiry with the Australians and find out if anyone matching the description of van der Laang has turned up. Shouldn’t be difficult; not many will look like they’ve been boiled like a lobster!”
“And then?”
“And then we’ll arrest the bugger and put him on trial for desertion and murder. Most likely I’d say he’ll be shot.”
Clark wasn’t happy about that; as a medic the taking of lives was against his morals. “I want him brought to justice, Captain, but not executed.”
The captain shrugged. “The army will decide his fate. But in the meantime I’m going to arrange for you to be assigned on a temporary basis to my investigation until he is found and arrested. You know him by sight; nobody else does. I’ll clear it with your superiors.”
Clark saluted. At least it would get him away from the pompous Dagger.
CHAPTER FIVE
They were marched out of the barracks the next morning at daybreak, not even being allowed breakfast. There was a great amount of grumbling but they trooped along the road into Alexandria and through towards the docks. The city itself was set sprawling along the sea and not very deep inland, so they got through the streets fairly quickly. Casca had avoided the medical check and felt more comfortable now with a rifle and pack and assorted items of equipment, most of which he still hadn’t checked properly.
Plenty of time for that on board. The voyage north to Gallipoli will take a week. Wonder if I’ll get to see Constantinople again? He mused about previous times in the area, and realized he’d not been there since 1453 when Constantinople had finally fallen to the Turks. The discovery of the New World had drawn him away from Europe for much of the time since, and he’d spent time in Africa too. Europe was no longer the center of the world.
Curious eyes watched as they marched down to the docks. The inhabitants were glad to see the strange men with the strange hats leave; their reputation had preceded them from Cairo as wild men, and the Egyptians were afraid.
Riding on the early morning swell were a huge number of ships that seemed to the men to fill the harbor. Destroyers in their dull grey dominated the view but closer to the dockside floated a number of smaller transport ships. Gangways had been raised and fixed to the hull entrances of these and it was towards these ships that Casca and his new friends were directed.
They clumped up the metal gangway of one of these transports, the Derfflinger, one by one, weighed down by their packs, and shown which route to take by bored looking sailors, down to their quarters deep in the bowels of the vessel. Hammocks idly hung between metal roof supports and beams and the men groaned. “Strewth, how d’ya stay in these things?” one Anzac complained after being dumped on the hard, iron floor.
“You stay still, you drongo,” another drawled laconically, a cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth.
“Well you try it then!” the first man challenged him.
The hold was soon full of swearing men trying to get into their hammocks. Casca managed to avoid the embarrassment of being thrown onto the hard, unforgiving iron floor, and slowly relaxed. His skin itched and still burned from the pain of his wounds but it was much more tolerable, and the redness was fading. That was something he was grateful for, as he’d been teased about it. He’d earned a nickname too. Sandy. He was told his skin was the color of the sands of Australia’s barren interior.
So he was ‘Sandy’ Roman to the Anzacs.
“How long d’ya think it’ll be before we get to Gallipoli?” Bill asked, his arms waving uncertainly as he fought for balance in his new resting place.
“No idea. Knowing the army we’ll go via Germany or some bloody place like that!” Archie replied, rolling a cigarette in his fingers.
“A week or so, I’d imagine,” Casca said, remembering the geography of the eastern Mediterranean and the Aegean seas. He’d been through these waters plenty of times in the past, but never before on a coal-powered ship. Things went that much faster these days so he’d had to quickly guess how much the journey had been cut by. “Unless we stop for supplies somewhere on the way.”
“Anywhere good?” Tom Jacobs, another of the group, asked.
“Plenty of islands before we get to where we’re supposed to be going,” Casca said. He shut his eyes and tried to block the chorus of voices that filled the hold. The smell of sweating men was almost overpowering, but Casca had been in such places many times before. He sank into a dozing half sleep, his mind drifting to the many times he’d been in a ship’s guts along with hundreds of others. The slave ship to Greece from Palestine where he was bound for the copper mines; the trader from Greece to Rome where he’d met Shiu Lao Tze; and of course the imperial slave galley where he’d been chained to the bench for years, pulling that damned oar back and forth. That had been the worst of times. Sharing t
he hold of this steamer with hundreds of unwashed Aussies and New Zealanders was a breeze in comparison.
The ship cast off, its cargo of humanity packed below decks and their supplies stowed on deck as well as below, and it joined the other ships steaming north out of the harbor heading for the war. Ahead, the half seen ominous shapes of bigger ships could be seen; battleships and battle cruisers. They would provide the protection and cover. Or at least, that’s what the hope was.
Watching the departure of all the ships from the harbor side were two men with still, expressionless faces. The captain and Ieuan Clark had arrived during the embarkation and spent a couple of hours arguing with a particularly stupid and rule-bound officer, demanding a list of units and what ships they were boarding. Finally they’d gotten what they’d demanded, but only after threatening the man, another captain, with a posting to the frontier in the Sudan. Not that the captain with Clark could have done that, but it helped blow off steam. And it got the list he wanted.
Clark finally looked at the captain. “Any idea which ship he’s on, sir?”
“Not yet, but we’ll go through the list and speak to each of the camps here. Somewhere someone will know of a new arrival looking like our boy, and then we’ll know where he is. I’m going to send you on the next medical ship from here. It’s being arranged. Once we find the unit I’ll send a telegram to you and it’ll be up to you to find him. Send a telegram back to me when you’ve located him and we’ll get the military police to bring him back here.”
“Yes sir. Do I carry on with my usual duties while I’m serving on my temporary assignment?”
“You’re a medic; save lives. But when you get my telegram you drop everything and go to whatever unit it is and identify him. You’ll get authority from me at that time.”
Clark saluted and the two men turned and returned to their vehicle, intent on snaring the elusive van der Laang.