Civvies

by Lynda La Plante

  Dillon struggled on against the wall of human panic, the babble of voices all around, mingled with weeping and choking screams as the horror of it all sank in. 'My wife, where's my wife'… 'Brian, where are you'… 'Me sister's in there somewhere'… 'I lost me handbag'… 'Get out, gotta get out'… 'Johnny help me, please, please'… 'Where's me shoes'… 'Meg, Meg, MEG!'…

  There came a soft whooosh, a sudden brightening of flames from the darkened interior of the bar, and a coil of smoke like an evil black tongue writhed through the gap where the door had been blown off its hinges.

  'FIRE!… FIRE!… FIRE!…'

  Above the pandemonium Dillon heard the braying wail of sirens – fire engines, ambulances, police – racing along country lanes, converging on the pub from all directions. But there wasn't time to wait for them. Minutes, seconds, were vital. He had to get in there now! Dillon had almost given up, raging and despairing that he'd never make it, but suddenly, magically, a space appeared and he dived for it, head down through the smoke, crouching low, eyes tight and stinging as he scanned the carnage of what five minutes earlier had been a roomful of happy young people enjoying themselves, having a great Saturday night to the sprightly rhythms of the folk group and the pounding of Jerry Lee's piano.

  Now, to Dillon's right, the smashed juke-box lay on its side, a dim glow blinking feebly from its innards. In the lurid light of flames he saw Harry, legs braced apart, holding aloft a table to shelter those underneath from the debris showering down from the jagged, gaping hole in the ceiling. Directly above, one of the severed oak beams, a good half ton of it, made an ominous groaning sound and started to slant down. A chunk of concrete hit the table-top and Harry's legs buckled. Somehow he held on, gritting his teeth and yelling for help. Dillon scrambled towards him. But Jimmy, red hair now totally white with plaster, eyes raw-rimmed, was nearer and got there first. The muscles on his tattooed arms bulged as he gripped the table's edge, back-to-back with Harry, the two men straining to shield the injured beneath as they tried to drag themselves clear.

  A couple of them managed to, the third couldn't, lying face down with his legs trapped. 'Get him clear!' Jimmy shouted, coughing and spitting out dust. 'Somebody-'

  Hands reached for the man, gripped his collar, and he screamed in agony as they pulled him free.

  Jimmy glanced down. 'Is he clear?' His face tautened under its mask of plaster. He could see legs. A girl's blood-streaked legs through torn and shredded tights – Christ Almighty! He looked round for help, saw Dillon through the smoke, but Dillon was twenty feet away with a mountain of tangled wreckage to climb first. More concrete and brick thudded down on the table. Any second now the whole bloody roof was going to cave in. Harry again took the entire weight on his back, sweat dripping off his chin, and snarled at Jimmy, 'Go on, move her – I can't hold on much longer. Move her!'

  Alive or dead, or just concussed, Jimmy didn't know, getting an arm around the girl's waist and lifting her, limp as a rag doll, from the debris of splintered tables and chairs.

  'Jimmy… Jimmy!' Harry's legs were giving way, his body doubled over under the terrible strain. 'For chrissakes, I can't hold it, I can't…'

  The table shuddered as another load fell, split in two, and as Harry went down, scrabbling on hands and knees to get out from under, Jimmy executed a swift side-roll straight out of the para landing technique manual, the girl clasped in his powerful arms.

  It was a miracle, Steve thought. A total freak that the kid, young Billy Newman, had survived and was still alive, if barely, after sitting right on top of the bomb that had killed his five companions outright. Somehow Billy had been thrown horizontally instead of vertically by the force of the blast, and when Steve had found him and hoisted him onto his back, the boy had been groaning and muttering something about his jacket, he was wearing a new jacket, 'Is me jacket torn? Is me jacket damaged?' His eyes were unfocused, childlike, and he seemed unaware of his injuries. A terrible gash down the left side of his face, the pale cheekbone exposed through the ragged open wound; his left arm hanging uselessly like a tube of jelly; both legs charred to a black crisp, giving off the sweet sickly stench of barbecued human flesh. Cowardly murdering swine… choking hatred burned in Steve's throat like stale vomit. Round up all the IRA scum, stand 'em against a wall, have done. What the fuck did the politicians know, the bleeding-heart, so-called 'human rights' groups? What about Billy Newman's human rights?

  'Steve… Steve!' Dillon was at his side, sliding his arm across Billy's back, taking half the weight. 'That front wall's going to give any second, get out this way…' Dillon swung round, bellowed through the smoke: 'EVERYBODY MAKE FOR THE BACK… STAY CLEAR OF THE FRONT ENTRANCE!'

  Above their heads an ominous creaking and splintering as another oak beam tore itself loose and canted down, teetering in mid-air.

  'Taffy!' Dillon yelled. '- Taffy!'

  Scrambling through the debris, the big Welshman got his broad back underneath the beam as it came down, bringing with it a snowstorm of plaster and shredded laths. Hands clamped to his knees, Taffy heaved upwards, giving Dillon and Steve the space to duck underneath with the injured boy. As they dragged him towards the bar at the back of the room, Dillon knew for certain – once that beam went, the entire front wall would go, taking half the ceiling with it. Only one escape route. One chance any of them would come out of this alive.

  'Make for the stairs… GET UP TO THE NEXT FLOOR!'

  The unwritten rule, the unspoken code, in any kind of situation, in any kind of emergency, you never abandoned a comrade, no matter what. Steve had darted back, tossing furniture aside like a madman, to go to Taffy's aid. Harry was there too, the combined strength of the three of them hurling the beam away so that it swung in a wide arc, hanging in space, and then came hurtling down, smashing through the floor with a crash that shook the building to its foundations.

  Hoisting Billy in a shoulder-lift, Dillon gripped the banister rail and hauled himself up the narrow staircase. He heard the rumble and felt the shudder as the ceiling caved in, filling the air with a whirling duststorm. Behind Dillon, Jimmy halted halfway up the stairs and looked anxiously down. 'Harry?' he called hoarsely. 'Taff…?'

  The complete frontage of Hennessey's had collapsed. One moment the upper storey was lit by flames, the next obscured by a pall of black smoke, clouds of red sparks billowing through the rafters of what was left of the roof. Behind the fire engines, their hoses snaking over the cindery, puddled ground, police cars and a cordon of uniformed men kept the groups of survivors at a safe distance. The Army had arrived, three Bedford four-tonners, MPs in jeeps, officers in quilted flak-jackets deploying their men to seal off the perimeter. Through the hissing of hosepipes and the roaring crackle of the inferno, a child's voice could be heard, screaming 'MUMMY!' and screaming again 'MUMMY!' and again 'MUMMY!'

  'Oh God Almighty…' The landlord's wife, face blackened, hair singed, a blanket around her shoulders, tried to break through, screaming hysterically, 'My kids… My kids are still in there!' Held back, she stared up with wild, petrified eyes, white runnels on her cheeks where tears had eaten through the grime.

  The door splintered and swung wide, hanging off its hinges from Dillon's force-kick. Smoke was sifting through the cracks in the floorboards. Dillon charged inside, Billy Newman draped across his shoulders, and turned to the wall, shielding both their faces as Taffy and Steve came through the doorway like an express train. Without breaking their stride they hurled a long section of what had been the bar-top through the window, taking out four panes and part of the frame. Grabbing the end, they held firm, the bar-top forming a slippery, slanting bridge between window-ledge and toilet roof ten feet below. Dillon checked it out, a cold inner core of his brain insulated from the noise, chaos and confusion, the total professional coolly estimating angles, the breaking strain of the corrugated roof, the risk of over-balancing under Billy's weight. Thank Christ he had his Pumas on, Dillon thought, stepping up onto the window-sill, inching out one foot to ma
ke sure of his grip.

  'Frank, wait -' Steve leaning out, gripping his elbow. 'You'll never make it!'

  Through the smoke and flying sparks, Dillon glimpsed a fireman on a hydraulic platform rising towards him, but prevented from coming too close because of the spread of flames. Dillon gritted his teeth. If he could just get Billy those extra few feet nearer the fireman's reaching arms… he edged further along the treacherous surface, feeling Steve right behind, the two of them balanced precariously on the wooden bar-top, now starting to bend under their combined weight.

  'Hold onto me, Steve,' Dillon ground out. 'When they get Billy I'll lose my balance. Keep me steady!'

  'I got you, mate.' The collar of Dillon's windcheater bunched in one fist, Steve's other arm was clamped like a vice to the inner wall. 'Another couple of feet… easy now… easy…'

  With a final heave Dillon got the boy across the gap, saw him clasped safe and secure in the fireman's arms, and felt the wood split beneath his feet. His leg went through, he dropped, arms paddling thin air, and then hung, legs dangling as Steve hauled him up by the collar.

  'Couple of Hail Marys, Frank.' Steve's handsome mug was split in a broad grin, the pair of them in a heap on the floor. 'Then I reckon we should get the hell out of here!' Dillon stared at him, raising his fist, then gave him the grin back, punching him on the arm.

  Taffy was at the door, thumb jerking frantically over his shoulder at the smoke-filled passage streaked with orange. 'Frank, there's kids up here!'

  Dillon leapt up, cursing. At the window he shouted down to the knot of firemen spraying the side of the building. 'Drench us! Come on – get those hoses on us, we're going back in!'

  Standing in line, bracing each other, the three men took the full force of the jet, which sent them staggering backwards. Dillon wrapped his sodden windcheater around his head and dropped to his hands and knees, preparing to scuttle back in, when Harry, crouched low, appeared through the smoke, a little girl cradled in his arms.

  The firemen, aiming their hoses to either side, formed a sheltering spray for the platform as it rose level with the window-ledge. The gap slowly closed, the platform inching nearer. Holding the little girl close to his chest, Harry stepped across.

  Dillon stood next to an Army fire tender, drenched to the skin, gazing with sick eyes at the flames leaping towards the sky. The front of the pub was practically burnt out, the fire still raging at the back, rapidly devouring the upper storey and roof.

  The little girl Harry had rescued was nearby, wrapped in a blanket, being comforted by her mother. Her two boys, barely a couple of years separating them, were huddled in their father's arms as he knelt between them. God knows how Taffy had done it, Dillon thought… the bloke was asbestos, somehow finding them in there and smashing his way out through a rear window, bringing them out alive with hardly a scorch mark apiece. That brand of courage didn't grow on trees.

  Dillon closed his eyes, jaw muscles clenched tight making the scar on his left cheek stand out through the smeared dirt. His lads. None of them over twenty, with all their young lives ahead of them. If he lived to be a hundred, two hundred, he'd never forget this, never forgive. Jimmy's voice brought him back to his senses.

  'They're bringing them out now.' Jimmy was pointing to where the firemen had hosed the front entrance to a charred frame of smouldering timbers. Bodies were being stretchered out.

  'I'm game.' Harry, his hands bandaged, was staring at Dillon with bloodshot eyes, one old pro reading the thoughts of another. 'Come on, let's go for another try…'

  'You crazy?' Jimmy tried to grab Dillon's arm as he started forward. Dillon shook him off. 'Frank, the whole place is gutted. Frank!'

  'My lads…' Dillon choked on the words. '…are still in there.' A spasm creased his face. 'My lads.'

  'Frank, for God's sake, don't be crazy!'

  'I'm with you, Frank,' Harry said. 'Let's go for it!'

  'FRANK!' Fists clenched at his sides, Jimmy watched them get another drenching under the fire hoses and head towards the building, a fireman and two MPs trying to cut them off.

  'Oh shit!' Shaking his head wearily, Jimmy started to run. 'Wait for me…'

  The young doctor, fair hair ruffled by the breeze to reveal his premature bald spot, moved along the line of stretchers, stooping every now and then for a closer look, moving on, signalling to the attendants those to be taken to hospital and the others who were beyond the power of medicine.

  Doors slammed and ambulances sped away.

  The firemen were reeling in their hoses, working mechanically, faces blackened, weariness etched into every pore. A single hose still played on the pile of smoking rubble, the damp hissing of the embers the only sound, clouds of steam and mingled soot drifting away into the darkness.

  Jimmy came through the huddle of Army trucks and found Dillon having cream and gauze applied to his hands by a civilian nurse, who despite looking about sixteen seemed to know her job. Jimmy hesitated, watching the nurse lightly wrap and tie a bandage around the raw wound. The frozen stillness of Dillon's face, the absolute fixed, unblinking intensity of his eyes, scared Jimmy. The man looked possessed.

  'You okay?' Jimmy asked at last.

  Dillon gave a tight nod, the harsh lines of his face carved out of stone. 'Did any of them make it?'

  Steve came up, overhearing Dillon's question, his mouth set grimly. 'No, they didn't stand a chance.'

  'What about Billy?'

  Steve shook his head, almost in tears. He gestured vaguely. 'They want you over by the trucks. Taffy's refusing to go to hospital -'

  'Harry?' Dillon asked.

  'With the medics. He's okay.' Steve tried again. 'They want you to -'

  Dillon ignored him and walked over the wet cindery ground to the dark-grey body bags ranged side by side in a neat, military row. Some already had plastic tags, name and rank in black felt-tip, the ones in bits or too badly burned for recognition didn't. Dillon sank slowly to his heels, head bowed. He reached out, as if in silent meditation, his fingertips resting gently and briefly on one of the anonymous shapes. He stood up, about to turn away when he realised they were grouped round him, the four of them, his comrades and best mates, the men he'd crawled through shit and bullets with, two of them, Harry and Taffy, for getting on twenty years.

  Without anger or emotion of any kind, as if all feeling had been drained out of him, Dillon spoke to them in a drab monotone.

  'Those two guys, the ones at our table when we came in. They must have planted it.' Dillon looked at each of them in turn – Jimmy Hammond, Harry Travers, Steve Harris, Taffy Davies – searching each face with a cold, implacable scrutiny. 'I want them, no matter how long it takes. We find them, agreed?'

  The C.O. had arrived, climbing out of his staff car. Jimmy touched Dillon's arm. 'C.O.'s here, Frank,' but Dillon brushed his hand away and went on in a throaty rasp, 'We make this personal. Agreed? We're gonna get those two bastards, agreed?' Fixing each man straight in the eye. 'Yes? YES?'

  They were with him, he knew it, and only when he knew it and was satisfied did he turn to acknowledge the C.O.'s presence, standing a little distance away.

  'Dillon, there's a truck waiting for you and your lads, get yourself cleaned up and then… well,' he cleared his throat, 'soon as you're fit I'll need – you know, the usual procedure.' Looking down at the row of body bags, his voice sank to a whisper. 'I'm sorry. Tragic… it's bloody tragic…'

  Dillon nodded once, staring at the ground, made a pretence at saluting, and turned away. Taffy drew him forward, hugging him, almost like a father comforting his son. 'Like you said,' Taffy muttered under his breath. 'We make this personal.'

  One by one they all touched Dillon's shoulder, each man making his private, unspoken vow.

  The truck was chugging blue diesel fumes, the tailboard down, and Dillon was about to climb aboard when he stopped and went rigid. Across the carpark, standing between two MPs, Malone was staring about him with a look of dazed bewilderment. Dillon pus
hed the others aside, growling in his throat to get at the yellow bastard, beat the holy shit out of him. Jimmy and Steve hauled him back. 'Cool it, Frank – let's just get the hell out of here.'

  Dillon was ashen, trembling. 'Okay, okay…' He subsided, wiping his mouth. 'But one day I'll have him for this!'

  Two scores to settle. The IRA and Malone. One day for certain, both of them. He'd never rest till it was done. Never.

  Dillon stood, holding onto the swaying truck as it bumped over potholes to the road, seeing them lift the body bags, so very carefully and gently, and slide them into the military ambulance. And even when the truck turned and the sight was hidden from view, Dillon continued to stare out. Never.

  FRANK DILLON

  CHAPTER 3

  Thin curtains of chill wintry drizzle swept over the gleaming drill square, neat gravel paths and sodden grass verges of Browning Barracks, Aldershot. Known as The Depot, this unlovely collection of flat-roofed, slab-sided buildings, resembling nothing more than an inner-city council estate, housed the three regular battalions of the Parachute Regiment and units of Airborne Forces. Through the rain-streaked window of the Sergeants' Mess, lingering over his second cup of lukewarm coffee, Frank Dillon watched two truckloads of raw recruits just pulling in, 'Joe Crows' fresh from Civvy Street. Some of them would jack it in tomorrow, Dillon knew, others not last till the end of the week. As for the rest, they would go on to experience the joys of twelve weeks of mental and physical torture before they faced the ultimate test of 'P' Company – five days of sheer undiluted hell on earth.

  Steeplechase, Log Race, Endurance March over twenty-eight kilometres of rough country, bergen rucksack loaded with 22kg of bricks and gravel, Speed March, Assault Course, including the dreaded Shuffle Bars – scaffolding poles fifty feet off the ground and no hand-holds -Stretcher Race with a twelve-man team hauling 75kg of steel bars and sandbags over twelve kilometres of Welsh peaks and gullies.