The Burning Sky rtw-1

by Jack Ludlow

  It was Alverson who answered. ‘I reckon the Italians are thinking ahead. Why destroy the most comfortable billet in town when you want to lay your weary head there? When Badoglio gets here, you can bet your ass this will be his new home.’

  They pulled up in front of the portico to be greeted by an officer Jardine recognised: it was the same French-speaking captain he had met at Gondar when seeking to get to Aksum to find Ma Littleton. Obviously about to ask the purpose of their presence, he was alerted by a groan from Corrie Littleton who, waking yet again, began to writhe from deep pain. With nothing approaching haste the officer walked across the gravel on crunching boots to inspect her, his face showing no emotion.

  ‘She requires treatment, and immediately,’ Jardine said.

  ‘The hospital is-’

  ‘I know where it is and I know it’s full,’ Jardine interrupted, looking around as if to underline the difference between this place and the stinking, crowded charnel house they had just left. ‘You have medical facilities here.’

  ‘For the private use of the imperial family and the officials of the government.’

  Cal Jardine had been unaware of that fact; Alverson, for all his skill in questioning, had not elicited the information, yet it could not be said to come as a surprise. He had learnt very early on how callous the Ethiopian high-born were about the lower orders and nothing he had seen since altered that view. If there had ever been any doubt, the way they threw them into battle ill-equipped and tactically ignorant would have proved the point.

  He had a vision then of the pint-sized emperor as he had driven past them on the Addis to Gondar road, and he wondered whether his lack of response to his broken, retreating followers was really despair at the defeat. Could it be indifference, could it be all he saw was people who were obliged to lay down their lives for his crown and his continuing hold on power? It was a proposition that did nothing for his temper, and his voice was cracked with fury as he responded.

  ‘The imperial family might be better served looking after some of their subjects than themselves. Then maybe they would win a war instead of losing one.’

  The man’s nostrils flared angrily: he saw an insult to his sovereign and he was not mistaken. Fearing his temper was going to underline an already decided-upon refusal, Jardine suddenly recalled he still carried the pass he had received from Ras Kassa. Reaching into his shirt pocket he pulled it out.

  ‘You recognise this, Captain, I am sure.’

  ‘It is no longer valid,’ he replied, as Corrie Littleton groaned again.

  Opening it, Cal Jardine made a show of examining it. ‘I cannot see how — there is no end date. Are you saying the ras no longer has any sway?’ Hesitation allowed him to press home his point. ‘I assume the man who signed this still holds the offices he held when it was written? Or are you saying your country no longer has a government?’

  In employing the tone of voice he was using, Cal Jardine was working on instinct, and also on how the man had reacted previously in the face of this pass: this was a staff johnny before him and, in his experience, they were of the type who cared more for their position and prospects than anything else.

  If service in the British army had taught him anything it was that the slippery types, the grovellers, unquestioning of even the most absurd orders, were the ones who got to the top. This captain was of that type and would hesitate to question someone of the stature of Ras Kassa Meghoum for the very simple fear that it might block his future advancement. The fact that his army was beaten, that in essence it would soon cease to exist, and his country was falling apart around him would probably not come into consideration.

  ‘The pass does not apply here, this is the Imperial Palace.’

  It was like playing poker again and there was something in the eyes that made Jardine go straight for an outright bluff. ‘Please ask Ras Kassa Meghoum to come and tell me that personally.’ The man blinked, and encouraged, Jardine added, ‘And be assured, I have the means to make him aware of any impediment to his wishes.’

  Stood still for several seconds, no doubt weighing the effect of all the alternatives on his own future, the captain suddenly snapped, ‘Wait here.’ Cal went back to the Rolls, and a patient now moaning continuously, while he went inside.

  ‘How do you know he was here?’ Alverson asked.

  ‘Wild guess, brother,’ he replied, leaning over Corrie Littleton. Her face was drained of blood, and even if he was not a medic he could see her condition was deteriorating. He brushed a hand across her brow to move aside her unruly hair. ‘And if it doesn’t work, I don’t know what we’ll do.’

  ‘Captain Jardine, Mr Alverson.’ The deep voice identified the speaker, and just as he turned to respond he caught sight of Vince’s face, furious at not being acknowledged. Knowing his friend was capable of saying something offensive, he being no respecter of authority, he spoke quickly. ‘And Mr Castellano, Ras.’

  He was facing him by the time the ras added an indifferent, ‘Of course,’ while behind him came the sound of moaning.

  ‘Miss Littleton is seriously wounded and requires treatment.’

  The sound she made and those words brought what appeared to be enlightenment; clearly the captain, who had emerged behind the ras, had not told him of the reason his presence was required.

  ‘There is no hope that the hospital will be able to save her.’

  ‘Save her?’

  ‘Yes, sir, if she is not treated she will die.’

  The stream of whatever tongue the ras was using had soldiers rushing to take the stretcher, and somewhere in there was a reprimand for the captain, judging by the way his facial skin went tight. The eyes, when they flicked towards the source of the rebuke, had Cal Jardine thinking it would be unwise to turn his back on the man.

  ‘Gentlemen, you must too come inside.’

  Vince gave the Ethiopian aristocrat a full glare. ‘I’ll assume that includes me, guv.’

  ‘The emperor and his family will leave the country and seek to gather international support for our cause. He has asked that, with my language skills, I accompany him.’

  ‘By what method?’ Alverson asked.

  ‘He dare not fly, Mr Alverson, it is too dangerous with enemy fighters so numerous. He will take the train to Djibouti.’

  ‘On a line which might be bombed,’ Jardine said. ‘Not to mention the train itself.’

  ‘As would a long convoy of cars and trucks, Captain, and on crowded roads it would move too slowly.’

  Washed, fed and watered, they were sitting on a veranda at the rear of the Imperial Palace. Given the birdsong, the flowers, even the buzzing of pollinating bees, it was hard to think they were in the midst of a war. The convoy mentioned was telling: Haile Selassie was not getting out empty-handed. The train would have not only his family on board, but also his followers, his treasury and anything of value he could get away. It was hard to blame him: he was going into an uncertain exile and if he left anything the Italians would only steal it.

  ‘The French will let him through?’

  ‘That has been arranged.’

  About to say something, Jardine stopped himself: Djibouti was likely to leak like a sieve. If the train journey had been arranged, then the Italians would find out about it and send every plane they had to make sure it did not get through — five hundred miles, over three hundred planes, it might be suicidal. Achieve that and they would decapitate the government in exile and make a cakewalk of the takeover. But they must have weighed up the risks; his voicing an opinion would change nothing.

  ‘And you, gentlemen,’ the ras said, smiling as his eyes moved to include Vince, sitting slightly apart. ‘What are your plans?’

  ‘That depends of the health of Miss Littleton,’ Jardine replied, which got him a look from his companions, with Vince saying, much to the confusion of their host, ‘It Happened One War.’ No one, least of all an irritated Cal Jardine, bothered to enlighten him, and in any case, a servant entered to bend over
and whisper in his ear.

  ‘Miss Littleton is doing well. The emperor’s own doctor has treated her wounds and given her a blood transfusion. Her wound will heal and he has set her arm properly. So, my question.’

  ‘I can do no more here, can I, Ras?’

  ‘No, Captain Jardine, but you, Mr Alverson, perhaps.’

  ‘No point, sir: whatever I see and want to report, the Italians will not let me send out.’

  That induced a pained expression: up till now none of them had openly referred to the obvious. The Italians would be sitting soon where they were sitting now.

  ‘I could try to get you on the imperial train.’

  Thankfully, there was enough doubt in his tone to make a refusal easy for Cal Jardine, and in this he was going to override anything the others might say: he had no notion to travel on a train he was sure would not get through.

  ‘I think we had already decided to make for Hargeisa by car, sir, but we will not do that unless Miss Littleton is well enough to travel.’

  ‘Unless …’ Alverson added before pausing; he did not need to say more. If the Italians, who had yet to advance, did so, they might have to get out and damned quick, even if it put her at risk.

  ‘It would be interesting to know when the doctor thinks Miss Littleton is up to such a journey.’

  That was two weeks away, yet they were in no danger because the Italians did not move with anything like alacrity. On the radio, Vince listened, and translated for the others, as Marshal Badoglio announced what he called ‘The March of the Iron Will’, which got the soubriquet ‘bollocks’ from the Londoner, given there was nothing to stop what he called the ‘Piedmontese bastard’: there was no love lost between the various provinces of old Italy or the people who lived in them. Kassa had got them houses in a palace annexe and there they waited, played cards and talked in between visiting a recovering patient.

  ‘Strikes me, Cal, that we have been together quite a while and yet I know hardly anything about you.’

  ‘Let’s leave it that way, shall we?’

  ‘Your father, who was he? Your mother too … you don’t talk about them.’

  ‘Spanish flu.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Alverson replied; that epidemic in 1918 had killed millions.

  ‘So how come you speak French and German so well?’

  ‘My father was an international trader, Tyler. We spent several years in Marseilles and the next stop to make his money was Hamburg. It’s simple.’

  ‘And your military service?’

  ‘Is a closed book. Deal the cards.’

  Looking at his hand, Alverson said, in a slightly sour tone, ‘If your old man was as good at business as you are at poker he must have left you a pile.’

  Marshal Pietro Badoglio was furious, but he dared not show it even in front of his most trusted staff. He wanted to curse Il Duce, to say in public what he had always thought of him: that he was a posturing buffoon whose only gift was to appeal to the basest members of Italian society, while people like Badoglio merely tolerated the upstart swine. But that might get back: he could not trust anyone.

  In his hand he had an answer to a request he had made to bomb the train he knew Haile Selassie was about to board. His troops were marching in triumph towards the Ethiopian capital, meeting little resistance, which made him the most potent soldier in Italy. True, Graziani had won in the south, but under his overall command. The fat-bellied swine Mussolini, who dared to wear a military uniform to which he was not entitled, had refused a reasonable request. How could he call himself a soldier?

  The Imperial Palace showed signs of being stripped, everything of value now loaded on to the train wagons in a special siding. Corrie Littleton was well enough to travel: though weak — she had to be helped to the car and aided to get into the rear seat — Badoglio was on the way and it was time to go. The Rolls was now very clean and highly polished, all marks of its travails removed: it had been under the attention of the emperor’s own mechanics and valets.

  They had food, water, fuel and their weapons but there was no grand farewell, no sadness, no Ras Kassa Meghoum to see them off, only that staff captain who let them depart with a look of deep dislike. The road they travelled was no longer crowded now — the warriors of Ethiopia, at least those who had survived, had gone back to their fields to await the invaders, and their emperor, their King of Kings, their Lion of Judah, was on his way to Djibouti and exile, the ship waiting to take him through the Suez Canal the British cruiser HMS Enterprise.

  From Aden they went their separate ways, Alverson accompanying Corrie Littleton back to the USA, Jardine and Vince to London, where the boxer found his gym completely refurbished, freshly painted, the window panes whole and new, while any worn equipment had been replaced and the number of youths using the place had doubled.

  As the man who had looked after the place for him said, ‘You should go away more often, mate.’

  Cal Jardine and Peter Lanchester were at the Army amp; Navy Club, taking luncheon again, talking over what had happened, the former of the opinion that what they had done had been a waste of time. The idea of putting brakes on Mussolini had come to nought, mainly, Jardine insisted, through the appalling and wasteful tactics of most of the Ethiopian commanders, with the caveat that there was no reason why they should alter those to suit the democracies who refused to aid them.

  Lanchester was less sure: had they not garnered some goodwill in a spot where in the future it might prove important? ‘The Italians have got their empire and the Stresa Front’s as dead as a dodo too, old boy. Adolf Hitler came out in favour of the Italian invasion the moment they went in and Mussolini was grateful. Il Duce is now firmly in the German camp and Britain, France and the League have egg all over their faces. I can tell you, on the QT, that the purse strings have been much loosened and we are seriously going to rearm.’

  ‘So, Peter, the road to war just got a little smoother?’

  ‘’Fraid so. Port?’

  Walking towards Piccadilly Circus, only half-listening to Peter Lanchester as he outlined the new fighters and bombers being planned, the new tanks and the expansion of the various services, it was impossible for Cal Jardine not to cast his mind back to Addis Ababa and the bomb damage he had seen there, while looking into the faces of the bustling crowds parading along the pavements, some vacuously, others with real purpose, the notion of mustard gas did not bear thinking about.

  ‘Did you hear what I asked, old boy?’

  ‘Sorry, Peter, miles away.’

  ‘I was asking if you are up for anything else we might need, Cal? Naturally, we all hope it does not come to war, but we must prepare and that might mean the odd little commission for a man of your talents.’

  Over luncheon, asked the same thing, Jardine thought he might have refused. But out here, and with the thoughts he had just had, that had changed. What he could achieve on his own had to be limited, but from now on he must see himself as a cog in a larger wheel; in short, in a phrase so overworked in the Great War, he had to do his bit.

  ‘As soon as I have settled on somewhere to rent, Peter, I’ll send you my phone number.’

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  Jack Ludlow

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