The Valley of Death

by Garry Douglas Kilworth

  ‘It is in the north of the town, on the edge – a small hut of a goatherd – with grass top.’

  ‘A surfed roof? Tell me exactly where.’

  Ali drew a map on the ground, giving Crossman and Wynter some landmarks to know the hut by. Later, he went back out into the town, returning with a quantity of food, which they shared with other prisoners, thus making themselves popular quite swiftly.

  Soon they had befriended one or two small groups amongst their fellow convicts, who quickly came to trust them and hold them in high regard.

  Progress, thought Crossman, though he was anxious that these new friendships need be tested quite so soon.

  8

  After a week, Crossman and Wynter had worked hard at gaining the confidence of a disgruntled hard core of the convicts. Now Crossman, for Wynter was inhibited by his lack of language, started spreading discontent and hinted at rebellion. He felt he was doing rather well, having received murmurs of agreement from many of his fellow prisoners.

  However, one morning while he was labouring at helping to defend Sebastopol against the external forces of evil – an ironic touch which tickled some strange sense of humour in him – he looked up to see Colonel Todleben, the chief engineer of the city’s defences, standing talking to one of the overseers. Crossman looked away again quickly, as Todleben glanced across at him, still talking with his man.

  Crossman felt a wave of apprehension go through him and, hoping he had not been recognized, he dared not look up again. He had fought Todleben in a duel recently – the result of an aborted attempt to assassinate the brilliant engineer – which had left the sergeant wounded. The pair had battled it out with swords in a marquee not very far from where he was working now and Crossman had lost. Although later pursued through the city, the wounded sergeant had been allowed to leave the tent alive due to a prior agreement. Whether Crossman’s face had left an impression on the colonel’s mind was not something the sergeant wanted to put to the test.

  Just at that moment there came about one of those incidents which can either seal a man’s fate or leave him full of regret for the rest of his life. In front of the spot where the sergeant was labouring was an unstable wall of a building, now standing alone, devoid of supports. When a nearby cannon went off, firing at the British lines, it caused a judder and a tremor to run through the ground. This was enough to topple the wall, which leant down towards several workers. They scrambled out of the way – all except one man, who had his head down, bent to his task of clearing rubble.

  Crossman and others, including Todleben, shouted at the fellow. He looked up, but he seemed transfixed by the teetering edifice above him. Crossman was left with an agonizing choice, but it was not in his nature to hesitate. He ran forward instinctively, grabbed the man by his collar, and hauled him backwards out of the path of the falling wall. The brickwork crashed to the ground, heavy lumps flying, spinning away from the masonry, but the man was safe. He clutched Crossman’s arms by way of thanking him, unable to speak after his near escape from death. The dust billowed, then began to settle.

  Crossman felt an ominous tap on his shoulder.

  He turned to look into the face of Colonel Todleben.

  ‘I thought I knew you,’ said the colonel in German, as Crossman’s heart sank. ‘It’s the sergeant, isn’t it? So, what are you doing here, sir? Pulling down our defences from the inside, eh? Destroying us from within?’

  Wynter, on one side of Crossman, melted into the crowd of convicts around him. Out of the corner of his eye Crossman saw them close ranks around his lance corporal, and he knew that at least one of them was safe.

  Staring into the colonel’s eyes, he said, ‘I’m – I’m a prisoner, sir. Captured by your Cossacks and sent here to assist the – the convicts.’

  Colonel Todleben smiled and shrugged, the disbelief evident in his features. Then, turning to two of the marines accompanying him, he ordered, ‘Take this man into custody. Bring him to the attention of Major Zinski.’

  He then said to Crossman: ‘I’m afraid you’re out of my hands from now on. I’m colonel of engineers, not of captured spies. I’m sorry. We duelled and you fought honorably – for that I wish you well.’ He paused before adding with a frown, ‘That was a very brave thing you did just a moment ago. You must have known it would bring you to my attention. Why did you risk it?’

  Crossman smiled wryly. ‘I could not help myself.’

  Todleben shook his head sadly. ‘I believe that. Unfortunately you make a poor espionage agent, Sergeant . . .?’

  ‘Crossman.’

  ‘Yes, Crossman. A man in your job needs to be cold-blooded, ruthless. Lives should be expendable to spies. Never mind. It is in your nature. Good luck.’

  ‘Listen . . .’ cried Crossman, but he felt a bayonet prodding him in the neck, and promptly closed his mouth.

  He was taken to a large building which he guessed was Todleben’s headquarters, and placed in a cell below ground level. There was dirty straw on the floor, but no furniture of any kind. It was damp and cold. There were no windows. He was left to his own thoughts most of the time, with interruptions only by the two brutish guards, who seemed to enter his cell at whim to maltreat him.

  An hour later he stood before Major Zinski. The major was a thickset man, big-boned and heavy-jawed. Everything about him was oversized, from his huge hands to his massive head with its short bristly haircut. The eyes in that head were humourless. They stared at Crossman as if he were a beetle that had scuttled out from behind a wainscot. In short, Major Zinski had the look of a policeman.

  Crossman had been roughly treated by the two marines. He presented himself sporting a black eye and a split lip. The major asked him how he had acquired them.

  ‘No serious matter,’ said Crossman. ‘It seems your men cannot keep their hands to themselves.’

  Zinski spoke sharply to the two marines in Russian, so that they stiffened and stared ahead with worried eyes, but Crossman wondered whether they had indeed been reprimanded. Had they been his men he would have dismissed them and brought in another two guards, but these men were allowed to remain.

  ‘Now, Sergeant, we’ll start with your name.’

  ‘Sergeant Jack Crossman.’

  ‘And which regiment? Are you a pioneer, or a sapper?’

  ‘Neither of those, but my regiment must remain my own business, Major.’

  The major looked sharply at Crossman, and the sergeant sensed a movement in the men on either side of him. He fully expected to feel a rifle butt come smashing down on his foot, but nothing like that happened. After a short period of silence, Zinski sighed.

  ‘What are you doing here, Sergeant?’ asked the major. ‘You were never captured by the Cossacks and I’m absolutely certain you are not a deserter to the Russian side. Why are you helping to build our defences? You’re over here on one of your furtive activities. Why do you come here to fill baskets with bricks and soil and plug our walls, eh?’

  ‘All right,’ replied Crossman, as if confessing, ‘you’ve found me out, Major. You see, I’m a volunteer soldier. I joined the army because I love fighting and I get paid extra for fighting in a war overseas. Promotion comes quickly on the battlefield, so war is what soldiers like me want the most.’

  Crossman leaned casually on the desk.

  ‘Now, if the defences of Sebastopol fall too quickly, it’ll all be over, won’t it? So I thought, during my time off picquet duty, when other men are writing their letters home and resting, I would come over here and help build up the city’s defences, so that when the allies attack, the city will hold out longer. You see what I’m up to? I want to perpetuate the war, keep it going, and that way I’ll rise swiftly through the ranks.’

  The major raised his eyebrows and yawned.

  ‘An ingenious plan, Sergeant, and worthy of a good storyteller. I’m sending you back to your cell now. These men won’t beat you again, but you will receive no food or water. When you’re ready to talk to me, simply mention
my name to the guards and they will bring you to me.’

  He was beaten again, when the guards changed. It seemed it was part of the ritual of all the guards to knock their prisoners about. When Zinski asked to see him again, a day later, and noticed that he had fresh marks on his face, the major spoke sharply to his new jailers. However, these two men were replaced shortly afterwards with a fresh couple, and the whole process began all over again.

  Crossman could not decide whether it was a system defined by the senior officers, or normal practice amongst the guards, which was only curbed individually.

  Time in the cell passed very slowly for Crossman. All he had to do with himself was concentrate on his terrible thirst. The hunger was not so bad, but the thirst drove him crazy. He tried licking the damp stones on the cell floors and walls, but this seemed to make his parched state even worse. He found it better to sip beads of water from the bricks through a piece of hollow straw, keeping his expectations low.

  Nightmares began to invade his head, which now throbbed and hammered with pain as he became dehydrated. He tried befriending the marines, attempted to wheedle water out of them, but they would not budge. He tried thinking of other things, anything but drinking, but images flew into his mind of waterfalls, bottles of beer, lakes and streams, cool refreshing rain. They tormented him, awake or asleep, and he realized he would become a husk and die if he did not soon receive a sufficient quantity of liquid in his body.

  The third time he came up in front of Major Zinski was after three days of no food or water. Crossman was weak and giddy, and desperate. He felt a wreck and he knew he looked it too. Major Zinski shook his head sadly.

  ‘You are very stubborn, Sergeant. All you have to do is tell me what you’re doing here. If you don’t, I shall be forced to have you placed in front of a firing squad and shot to death as a spy. Or hanged from a flagpole. I would not like to do that. Execution is such a humiliating death.’

  ‘I cannot – I mean I can’t tell you why I’m here,’ said Crossman in a low husky voice. ‘I was told to come, then I would be contacted later. I – I think they wanted me to mine your main magazine – blow it up – destroy your ammunition stores. But that’s just a guess, you understand. I have no real knowledge of my task, not until I’m contacted.’

  ‘Who was supposed to contact you?’

  ‘A Hungarian fellow. I don’t know his name.’

  ‘Why were you working with the convicts?’

  Crossman shrugged. ‘It seemed a good place to hide myself, amongst prisoners.’

  Zinski leaned forward and played with a pen.

  ‘They say you worked very hard – you were one of the best men they had on the work party.’

  Again Crossman shrugged. ‘We’re taught in my country that if a job’s worth doing, it’s worth doing well. I can do no other than give my best, to whatever cause.’

  ‘There was no other reason?’

  ‘What other reason could there be?’

  ‘I don’t know, Sergeant, I’m sure. I find you as devious as a monkey. You say things, but I can’t believe them.’

  The major then spoke to one of the guards, who reached for a jug of water and a glass, and then poured a drink, offering it to Crossman. The sergeant took it and sipped it slowly, but before he had taken very much, the glass was knocked out of his hands and shattered on the stone floor. A few more words were spoken to the guards, who stared straight ahead.

  ‘Clumsy fellow,’ murmured the major, turning again to address Crossman. ‘Now, you were saying . . .?’

  ‘All right, I give in,’ said Crossman, sinking to his knees. ‘I planted explosives in the walls as I was working. I had my pockets full of gunpowder, you see, and I packed it in with the fascines and gabions. Subtle, eh?’

  He looked up and stared into Zinski’s eyes.

  ‘Even when I tell the truth you choose not to believe it – so why don’t you just have me shot here and now? I’m fed up with all this. Just get it over with.’

  An order was snapped and one of the guards took a pistol from his pocket and pressed it to Crossman’s temple.

  ‘Goodbye, Sergeant,’ said Major Zinski. ‘It is a sad end for a man of your character.’

  Tears sprang to Crossman’s eyes involuntarily.

  ‘Goodbye,’ he croaked.

  Nothing happened for a very long time. Crossman could feel the muzzle of the pistol against his forehead. It began as a ring of cold steel, but his body heat warmed it, and after a while he could only feel its pressure on his skin. Finally, he gave out a long sigh and fainted.

  When he woke, he was being held on his feet by the two marines, but the pistol had been removed from his head.

  Zinski said, ‘You may have another drink of water now.’

  ‘No thank you,’ whispered Crossman, hoarsely.

  ‘Drink it. It will not be dashed from your lips. Don’t be a fool now.’

  Crossman took the water and drank it, the cool liquid hurting his parched, raw throat as it went down. He wisely refrained from taking too much, since his stomach had shrunk over the three days. Sugared plums were then offered to him from a bowl on the desk and he took them and ate them noisily, with the guards looking at him with blank expressions on their faces.

  Major Zinski spoke. ‘You were not told which magazine you were intended to destroy?’

  ‘I’m not even sure that was my mission. I simply believe it might be. I suppose it would be your largest magazine. Or perhaps more than one? I’m not certain.’

  ‘All right, I believe you. A quantity of foreign explosives was discovered by the Star Fort magazine last night, ready to be detonated. It was successfully dismantled and made safe. I think one of your compatriots must have been sent over to do the job you were supposed to do, but he too failed.’

  Lovelace, thought Crossman. So the major’s fox hunt had been foiled too. They were both failures.

  ‘Ah, I see by your expression that I’ve touched a truth nerve,’ smiled Zinski. ‘Good, I’m glad not to have to execute you. You will be returned to your cell to await transportation out of here. I’m sending you to Russia, isn’t that nice?’

  He was taken away again. This time there were no beatings. Food and drink were brought to him. The food was not particularly appetizing but it was adequate. The water was gratefully received and cherished. To a thirsty man a bottle of water is a treasure. He cuddled it to his breast, drinking it slowly, in small quantities. It tasted better than any wine his father had offered him, and his father was a lover of good wines, a gourmet with an excellent palate.

  One day not long afterwards, the guards came to him and roughed him up again, before dragging him before Major Zinski. The major was furious. He was pacing up and down in his office, slapping his thigh with his gloves. He rounded on Crossman as soon as the sergeant was pulled through the doorway and presented to him.

  ‘A riot, amongst the convicts. Do you know how much damage they’ve done? Set us back ten days. Ten days. I expect you’re pleased. I suppose you know nothing about this? You are innocent of any involvement? Tell me your lies.’

  Well done, Wynter and Ali, thought Crossman – but only ten days? – he was not as pleased as Zinski expected him to be. Obviously from Zinski’s reaction a ten-day setback was a disaster to the Russians, but to Crossman it seemed only a minor achievement.

  ‘Did any get away, over to the other side?’ asked Crossman.

  ‘Some.’ Zinski suddenly seemed distracted, perhaps his great mind working on how to pursue repairs quickly. ‘Naturally one or two go every day, just as we get the occasional man from your side. There are always malcontents. Today, however, we lost several dozen convicts. They went over the wall – braved fire from both sides.’

  Crossman’s spirits plummeted.

  ‘Only a few dozen? Out of thousands?’

  Zinski smiled grimly. ‘My marines and sailors shot some of them, of course. But it was not the mass exodus you seem to have hoped for. Most of the prisoners kno
w that freedom is just around the corner for them here. Why would they risk that?’

  Crossman conceded, ‘It was very clever of you to offer an amnesty. However, you didn’t tell them it would only be for those who survive the massacre to come, when the allies open up with their artillery, and our ships’ guns blast you from the seaward side. Do they realize a storm of iron and lead is coming their way soon? Have you told them?’ asked Crossman.

  ‘They know they’re putting up defences against something.’

  ‘Yes, but it will be a holocaust that visits them when the siege guns begin raining death on this town.’

  Zinski shrugged and ran his fingers through his hair.

  ‘Never mind, we will work that much harder to repair the damage you have wreaked.’

  ‘I still have not said I was to blame.’

  ‘But you were.’

  Sergeant Crossman nodded, seeing no gain in continuing to deny it. ‘In part, yes.’

  ‘There are others, then?’ growled Zinski.

  ‘Were. They will have gone now.’

  ‘Leaving you?’

  ‘Of course – I am expendable,’ said Crossman. ‘We all are – except perhaps men like Colonel Todleben – engineering geniuses.’

  Zinski snorted. ‘Engineers?’

  ‘Colonel Todleben is much needed by your people, but I am considered only a slight loss to mine. One or two will be sorry, others will be mightily pleased. A week from now and I shall not be missed.’

  ‘How very sad,’ said the major. ‘So much damage too. We can unspike the guns, of course, but they burned and looted, destroyed tools, pulled down walls – killed several of my marines – for which you will be held responsible.

  ‘It’s a mess out there. Once I straighten it up, I’ll come back and deal with you properly. You will have to be hanged, of course – there’s nothing I can do about that now. There are others who will want to witness your execution: Admiral Korniloff for one. In the meantime, you will be whipped.’

  He barked an order at one of the guards, who took a quick, pale glance at Crossman.