The Burning Shore c-8

by Wilbur Smith

  Sean Courtney charged through them, going straight into the flames, oblivious of the seaTin& dancing waves of heat, but four of the young officers leaped forward and seized his arms and his shoulders, and pulled him back.

  Sean was struggling in their grip, so wildly that three others had to run up and help to restrain him. Sean was roaring, a deep, throaty, incoherent sound, like a bull buffalo in a trap, trying to reach out through the flames to the man trapped in the crumpled body of the yellow aircraft.

  Then quite suddenly the sound ceased and he sagged.

  If the men had not been holding him, he would have fallen to his knees. His hands dropped to his sides, but he went on staring into the wall of flame. had Years before, on a visit to England, Centaine watched with horrid fascination as the children of her host had burnt the effigy of an English assassin called Guy Fawkes on a pyre that they had built themselves in the garden. The effigy had been cleverly fashioned, and as the flames rose up over it, it had blackened and begun to twist and writhe in a most lifelike fashion. Centaine had woken in the sweat of nightmare for weeks afterwards. Now, as she watched from the upper window of the chateau, she heard somebody near her begin to scream. She thought that it might be Anna. They were cries of the utmost anguish, and she found herself shaking to them the way a sapling shakes to the high wind.

  It was the same nightmare as before. She could not look away as the effigy turned black and began to shrivel, its limbs spasming and jack-knifing slowly in the heat, and the screams filled her head and deafened her. Only then did she realize that it was not Anna, but that the screams were her own. As these gusts o agonized sound came up from the depths of her chest, they seemed to be of some abrasive substance, like particles of crushed glass, that ripped at the lining of her throat.

  She felt Anna's strong arms around her lifting her off her feet, carrying her away from the window. She fought with all her strength, but Anna was too powerful for her.

  She laid Centaine on the bed and held her face to her vast soft bosom, stifling those wild screams. When at last she was quiet, she stroked her hair and began to rock her gently, humming to her as she used to do when Centaine was an infant.

  They buried Michael Courtney in the churchyard of Mort Homme, in the section reserved for the de Thiry family.

  They buried him that night by lantern light. His brother officers dug his grave, and the padre who should have married them said the office for the burial of the dead over him.

  I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord Centaine was on the arm of her father, with black lace covering her face. Anna took her other arm, holding her protectively.

  Centaine did not weep. after those screams had silenced, there had been no tears. It was as though her soul had been scorched by the flames into a Saharan dryness. O remember not the sins and offences of my youth -The words were remote, as though spoken from the far side of a barrier.

  Michel had no sin, she thought. He was without offence, but, yes, he was too young, oh Lord, too young.

  Why did he have to die? Sean Courtney stood opposite her across the hastily prepared grave, and a pace behind him was his Zulu driver and servant, Sangane. Centaine had never seen a black man weep before. His tears shone on his velvety skin like drops of dew running down the petals of a dark flower.

  Man that is born of a woman hath but a short time to live, and is full of misery Centaine looked down into the deep muddy trench, at the pathetic box of raw deal, so swiftly knocked together in the squadron workshop, and she thought, That is not Michel. This is not real. It is still some awful nightmare.

  Soon I will wake and Michel will come flying back, and I will be waiting with Nuage on the hilltop to welcome him. A harsh, unpleasant sound roused her. The general had stepped forward, and one of the junior officers had handed him a spade. The clods rattled and thumped on the lid of the coffin and Centaine looked upwards, not wanting to watch.

  Not down there, Michel she whispered behind the dark veil. You don't belong down there. For me, you will always be a creature of the sky. For me, you will be always up there in the blue- And then, Au revoir, Michel, till we meet again, my darling. Each time I look to the sky I will think of you.

  . . .

  Centaine sat by the window. When she placed the lace wedding veil over her shoulders Anna started to object, and then stopped herself.

  Anna sat on the bed near her, and neither of them spoke.

  They could hear the men in the salon below. Someone had been playing the piano a short while before, playing it very badly, but Centaine had been able to recognize Chopin's Funeral March, and the others had been humming along and beating time to it.

  Centaine had instinctively understood what was happening, that it was their special farewell to one of their own, but she had remained untouched by it. Then later she had heard their voices take on that rough raw quality.

  They were becoming very drunk, and she knew that this too was part of the ritual. Then there was laughter drunken laughter but with a sorrowful underlying timbre to it, and then more singing, raucous and untuneful, and she had felt nothing. She had sat dry-eyed in the candlelight and watched the shell-fire flickering on the horizon and listened to the singing and the sounds of war.

  You must go to bed, child, Anna had said once, gentle as a mother, but Centaine had shaken her head and Anna had not insisted. Instead, she had trimmed the wick, spread a quilt over Centaine's knees and gone down to fetch a plate of ham and cold pie and a glass of wine from the salon. The food and wine lay untouched on the table at Centaine's elbow now.

  You must eat, child, Anna whispered, reluctant to intrude, and Centaine turned her head slowly to her.

  No, Anna, she said. I am not a child any longer. That part of me died today, with Michel. You should never call me that again. I promise you I will not, and Centaine turned slowly back to the window.

  The village clock struck two and a little later they heard the officers of the squadron leaving. Some of them were so drunk that they had to be carried by their companions and thrown into the back of the truck like sacks of corn, and then the truck puttered away into the night.

  There was a soft tap on the door, and Anna rose from the bed and went to open it.

  Is she awake? Yes, Anna whispered back.

  May I speak to her?

  Enter Sean Courtney came in and stood near Centaine's chair.

  She could smell the whisky, but he was steady as a granite boulder on his feet and his voice was low and controlled: despite that, she sensed there was a wall within him, holding back his grief.

  I have to leave now, my dear, he said in Afrikaans, and she rose from the chair, letting the quilt slip off her knees, and with the wedding veil over her shoulders went to stand before him, looking up into his eyes.

  You were his father, she said, and his control shattered. He reeled and put his hand on the table for support, staring at her.

  How did you know that? he whispered, and now she saw his grief come. to the surface, and at last she allowed her own to rise and mingle with his. The tears started, and her shoulders shook silently. He opened his arms to her, and she went into them and he held her to his chest.

  Neither of them spoke again for a long time, until her sobs muted and at last ceased. Then Sean said, I will always think of you as Michael's Wife, as my own daughter. If you need me, no matter where or when, you have only to send for me. She nodded rapidly, blinking her eyes, and then stepped back as he opened his embrace.

  You are brave and strong, he said. I recognized that when first we met. You will endure. He turned and limped from the room, and minutes later she heard the crunch of wheels on the gravel of the drive as the Rolls with the big Zulu at the wheel pulled away.

  At sunrise Centaine was on the knoll behind the chAteau, mounted on Nuage, and as the squadron took off on dawn patrol, she rose high in the saddle and waved them away.

  The little American whom Michel had called Hank was flying in the lead, and he waggled hi
s wings and waved to her, and she laughed and waved back, and the tears ran down her cheeks while she laughed and they felt like icicles on her skin in the cold morning wind.

  She and Anna worked all morning to close the salon again, cover the furniture with dust sheets, and pack away the service and the silver. The three of them ate lunch in the kitchen, terrines and ham left over from the previous evening. Though Centaine was pate and her eyes were underscored with blue as dark as bruises, and though she barely tasted the food or sipped her wine, she spoke normally, discussing the chores and tasks that must be done that afternoon. The comte and Anna watched her anxiously but surreptitiously, uncertain how to take her unnatural calm, and at the end of the meal the comte could contain himself no longer. Are you all right, my little one? The general said that I would endure, she answered. I want to prove him to be right. She stood up from the table. I will be back within the hour to help you, Anna. She took the armful of roses that they had salvaged from the salon, and went out to the stables. She rode Nuage down to the end of the lane, and the long columns of khaki-clad men, bowed under their weapons and packs, called to her as she passed, and she smiled and waved at them, and they looked back after her wistfully.

  She hitched Nuage to the churchyard gate, and with her arms full of flowers, went around the side of the mosscovered stone church. A dark green yew tree spread its branches over the de Thiry plot, but the newly turned earth was trampled and muddy and the grave looked like one of Anna's vegetable beds, only not as neatly dressed and squared.

  Centaine fetched a spade from the shed at the far end of the churchyard and set to work. When she had finished, she arranged the roses and stood back. Her skirts were muddy and there was dirt under her fingernails.

  There, she said with satisfaction. That's much better.

  As soon as I can find a mason I will arrange the headstone, Michel, and IT come again tomorrow with fresh flowers. That afternoon she worked with Anna, hardly looking up from her tasks or pausing for a moment, breaking off just before dusk to ride up to the knoll and watch the planes come back from the north. That evening, there were two moire of them missing from the squadron, and the burden of mourning that she carried as she rode home was for them as well as for Michel.

  After dinner she went to her bedchamber as soon as she and Anna had washed the dishes. She knew that she was exhausted and she longed for sleep, but instead the grief that she had held at bay all that day came at her out of the darkness and she pulled the bolster over her face to smother it.

  Still Anna heard it, for she had been listening for it.

  She came through in her frilled bed-cap and nightdress, carrying a candle. She blew out the candle and slipped under the bedclothes and took Centaine in her arms, crooning to her and holding her until at last she slept.

  At dawn Centaine was on the knoll again, and the days and weeks repeated themselves, so that she felt trapped and hopeless in the routine of despair. There were only small variations from this routine: a dozen new SESas in the squadron flights, still painted in factory drab, and flown by pilots whose every manoeuvre proclaimed even to Centaine that they were new chums, while the numbers of the brightly painted machines that she knew dwindled at each return. The columns of men and equipment and guns moving u p the main road below the chateau became denser each day, and there was a building current of anxiety and tension that infected even the three of them in the chateau.

  Any day now, the comte kept repeating, it's going to begin. You see if I'm wrong. Then one morning the little American circled back over where Centaine waited on the hillock and he leaned far out of the open cockpit and let something drop. It was a small package, with a long bright ribbon attached to it as a marker. it fell beyond the crest of the hillock and Centaine urged Nuage down the slope and found the ribbon dangling in the hedgerow at the bottom. She reached up and disentangled it from the thorns, and when Hank circled back again, she held it up to show him that she had retrieved it, and he saluted her and climbed away towards the ridges.

  In the privacy of her room Centaine opened the package. It contained a pair of embroidered RFC wings and a medal in its red leather case. She stroked the lustrous silk from which the silver cross was suspended, and then turned it over to find the date and Michael's name and rank engraved upon it. The third item, in a buff envelope, was a photograph. It showed the squadron aircraft drawn up in a wide semi-circle, wingtip to wingtip, in front of the hangars at Bertangles, and in the foreground the pilots stood in a group and grinned self-consciously at the photographer. The mad Scotsman, Andrew, stood beside Michael, barely reaching to his shoulder, while Michael had his cap on the back of his head and his hands in his pockets. He looked so debonair and carefree that Centaine's heart squeezed until she felt she was suffocating.

  She placed the photograph in the same silver frame as that of her mother, and kept it beside her bed. The medal and the RFC wings she placed in her jewelbox with her other treasures.

  Then every afternoon Centaine spent an hour in the churchyard. She paved the raw grave with red bricks that she had found behind the toolshed.

  Only until we can find a mason, Michel, she explained to him as she worked on her hands and knees, and she scoured the fields and the forest of wild flowers to bring to him.

  In the evenings she played the Aida recording and pored over that page of her atlas that depicted the horse-headshaped continent of Africa, and the vast red expanses of empire that were its predominant coloration, or she read aloud from the English books, Kipling and Bernard Shaw, that she had retrieved from her mother's upstairs bedroom, while the comte listened attentively and corrected her pronounciation. None of them mentioned Michael, but they were all aware of him every minute; he seemed to be part of the atlas and the English books and the jubilant strains of Ai'da.

  When at last Centaine was certain she was utterly exhausted, she would kiss her father and go to her room.

  However, as soon as she blew out the candle, her grief would overwhelm her once again, and within minutes the door would open softly and Anna would come to take her in her arms, and the whole cycle would begin again.

  The comte broke in. He hammered on Centaine's bed room door, awakening them in those dark and early hours of the morning when all human energy is at its lowest ebb.

  What is it? Anna called sleepily. Come! the comte shouted back. Come and see. With gowns hastily thrown over their nightclothes, they followed him through the kitchens and out into the paved yard. There they stopped and stared up at the eastern sky in wonder, for although there was no moon, it glowed with a strange wavering orange light as though somewhere below the horizon Vulcan had thrown open the door to the furnace of the gods.

  Listen! commanded the comte, and they heard the sussuration upon the light breeze, and it seemed that the earth beneath their feet trembled to the force of that distant conflagration.

  It has begun, he said, and only then did they realize that this was the opening barrage of the great new Allied offensive upon the Western Front.

  They sat up the rest of that night in the kitchen, drinking pots of black coffee, and every little while trooping out again into the yard to watch the fiery display as though it were some astronomical phenomenon.

  The comte was exultant as he described to them what was taking place. This is the saturation barrage which will flatten the barbed wire and destroy the enemy trenches. The boche will be annihilated, he pointed to the fiery sky, who could withstand that! The thousands of artillery batteries were each firing on a front of a hundred yards, and over the next seven days and nights they never ceased. The sheer weight of metal which they hurled on to the German lines obliterated the trench work and parapets, and ploughed and reploughed the earth.

  The comte was aflame with warlike and patriotic ardour. You are living in history. You are witness to one of the great battles of the ages, But for Centaine and Anna, seven days and seven nights was too long a time; the first amazement soon turned to apathy and disinterest. They w
ent about the daily life of the chAteau, no longer heeding the distant bombardment, and at night slept through the pyrotechnics and the comte's summonses to Come and watch! Then on the seventh morning, while they were at breakfast, even they were aware of the change in the sound and intensity of the guns.

  The comte sprang up from the table and ran into the yard again, his mouth still full of bread and cheese, and the corf ee bowl in his hand. Listen! Do you hear it? The rolling barrage has begun! The artillery batteries were rolling their fire forward, creating a moving barrier of high explosive through which no living things could advance or retreat.

  The brave Allies will be ready for the final assault now In the forward British trenches they waited below the parapets. With each man in full battle-dress, his equipment burden was almost sixty pounds in weight.

  The thunder of the bursting high-explosives Tolled away from them, leaving them with dulled senses and singing eardrums. The whistles of the section leaders shrilled along the trenches, and they roused themselves and crowded to the feet of the assault ladders. Then, like an army of khaki lemmings, they swarmed out of their burrows into the open, and peered around them dazedly.

  They were in a transformed and devastated land, so ravaged by the guns that no blade of grass nor twig of tree remained. Only the shattered tree stumps stuck up from the soft fecal-coloured porridge of mud before them. This dreadful landscape was shrouded in the yellowish fog of burned explosives.

  forward! the cry passed down the line, and again and whistles trilled and goaded them on.

  The long Lee Enfield rifles held out before them, the fixed bayonets aglitter, sinking ankle and knee deep into the soft earth, slipping into the overlapping shell holes and dragging themselves out again, their line bulging and lagging, their horizon limited to a mere hundred paces by swirling nitrous fog, they trudged forward.

  Of the enemy trenches they saw no sign, the parapets had been obliterated and flattened. Overhead passed the continuous roar of the barrage, while every few seconds a short shell from their own guns fell into their densely packedlines.