Sergeant Randall was pleased to have something more demanding than surveillance of the fort to do. It was two weeks since he had had a woman and he was restless. Even in the sparsely populated wilds around the Raiding School he had found a doxy. She was a decade older than he, her husband and two sons had gone to the war. She ran a small general store alone. She was plain and dowdy and by a Thursday the effects of her weekly Saturday night scrub had worn off and she was smelly; but she reciprocated Randall's lust and he was missing her badly.
It was not only the physical delight that he craved, but also the pleasure of female companionship and the satisfaction of imposing his personality and persuasiveness on a woman. He was vain about the fact that he often succeeded where good-looking men failed. His conquests were made by the impression he gave at first sight: spruce, his uniform or civilian clothes well pressed, his footwear polished to a high gloss; by his jocularity and persistence. Finally, he knew, women recognised from the outset what his intention was and that however evasive they might be he would eventually prevail upon them. When thwarted, he was unpleasant and could be violent. They recognised danger: the willing ones welcomed it, the reluctant ones responded to it and persuaded themselves afterwards that it had not been their fault.
Sergeant Randall disappeared. He had an extraordinary ability to arrive, when required for any duty, no more and no less than fifteen seconds in advance. He seemed to appear out of thin air. If wanted on the parade ground, there would be no sign of him within a minute's walk a minute before falling-in time; then, forty-five seconds later, he would be seen at the edge of the square, ready to march on. Similarly, when dismissed, he left the impression that he had evaporated.
Now, ordered on a reconnaissance, he equipped himself and without a sentry or picquet being aware of it, he slipped out of the perimeter and was gone.
He glided among the rocks, referring from time to time to map and compass and the sun. He melted out of view against the dun background and the patches of verdure. He padded across open spaces like a ghost. When he came to a ridge or hillock, he squirmed up it on his belly and peeped over the crest, then slithered down the far side without showing himself on the skyline.
It took him three hours to reach the well, and when he crawled to the lip of the shallow valley in which it stood, he watched an Arab woman drawing water. She was unveiled and he saw that she was young. Her movements tightened her black garment around her, and he saw the shape of her breasts.
He looked around, peering through his sniper's sharp eyes for some sign that she was not alone.
Unshaven, unwashed, soaked with sweat and wearing a soiled uniform and sand-caked boots, he reminded himself of another time, in India, when he had been forced to rape an Afghan woman on the Frontier: forced, because, he excused himself, he was a mere man endowed with a vast amount of sexual energy, not a saint; what chance had a humble mortal against the force of nature?
When he was sure that there was nobody else within earshot or view, he began to make his cautious descent into the wadi.
***
Taggart sent out three-men parties to keep watch over the fort. Patrol activity had died down. No more lorryloads of troops arrived and none came from the fort. In the early afternoon he went himself to a vantage point from where he could survey the fort and the area around it, and stayed for more than an hour; but the gate remained shut.
‘You shouldn't have anything to worry about tonight, Angus. They've evidently given up searching.’
‘That's a crumb of comfort. I don't know which will be worse, to find the Brig or not to find him!’
‘I don't want him on my hands. I can do without being infuriated by his wanting to take over the operation. But you'd better bring him in if there's any chance at all. You can stay a long time at the D.Z., as there won't be any enemy patrols out.’
‘It won't surprise me if we find the old bugger already there: and the first thing he'll say will be, ‘Where the hell have you been? I've been waiting for hours’.’
‘You're probably right.’ Taggart's tired smile was of resignation rather than amusement.
Two more long days lay ahead. They were all bored. The enemy patrols had kept them alert and interested. In view of the sloppy way in which most of the searching had been done, he would rather the Italians were still hunting them than have to endure another two days and nights of tedium.
***
Captain Pennati was probably the most disgruntled officer in the Italian Army at that moment. The signal he had received from his Colonel had put an end to his pleasant preparations for the two days’ leave he had asked for and been granted. He had just emerged from his bath when he was called to the telephone. He had no premonition of disappointment. The Colonel's first words and the genial, avuncular tone he used, sent his high spirits plummeting.
‘I'm very sorry, my dear boy, but Headquarters have insisted that I cancel your leave...’
‘But, sir!’
‘I know, I know...’
‘But why, sir?’
‘I can't give you the reason on an open line, in plain language. You will receive a coded signal presently.’
‘When can I go on leave, sir?’
‘Not for a while yet, probably.’
The signal, when it came, caused Pennati to swear with a virulence that astounded his hearers. He was habitually equable and seldom used profanity. Those who had also read the signal, however, thought that, in view of the information it contained, he had expressed himself with remarkable restraint.
***
Sergeant Randall approached to within arm's reach of the woman. There was only a faint breeze through the wadi, but he had taken care to keep up-wind.
He spoke softly. ‘Naharak sa'id, bint.’
She screamed as she spun to face him: but he had anticipated that and his hand across her mouth smothered all but the first cry.
She grabbed her garment and jerked it over her face; but he did not remove his hand.
Glaring and trembling, she struggled to free herself. On the instant that she heard his greeting, ‘May your day be blessed, Woman,’ she had been terrified. She knew it was no Arab accosting her. His accent and the ungrammatical phrasing of ‘Naharik sa'id, ya bint’ had been enough to tell her that.
Randall had exhausted a large part of his Arabic vocabulary in these few words. He said ‘All right, m'dear, don't be scared,’ in as gentle a voice as he could summon. Then, recalling the Arabic for pretty, added ‘Letif. You very letif, m'dear.’
This made the girl struggle more violently.
Randall loosened his grip and she bit his hand. He swore and tightened his grasp again.
He lowered his voice. ‘It's all right... ta'ala... come...’ He pulled her towards the side of the wadi, where there were palm trees and shade. She tried to drag herself away from him.
‘You bloody well ta'alla hene’ (he pronounced it ‘taller hinner’), ‘you bitch.’
His Tommygun slung over his shoulder, he hauled her away from the well. All the time, he maintained his low-voiced flow of persuasion and reassurance.
Under a tree, he pushed her to the ground. She was still fighting, her eyes wide and rolling in fear and anger, her breath panting and gasping.
He removed his hand and forced his mouth down on hers. She bit him and drew blood. As he jerked his head away, she screamed: a long, piercing call for help.
Randall slapped her face and she shrieked again. He hit her on the side of the jaw with his fist and she went limp and silent.
He was dragging her garments up to her waist when a shot broke the stillness.
***
When, an hour before nightfall, Sergeant Randall had not returned, Taggart put the troop on full alert for an attack on their camp.
In discussion with his officers and Troop Sergeant Major Vowden, he said ‘If the enemy continued patrolling in the area of the well, and have got Sergeant Randall, we can expect an attack any time; probably tonight. Even if Randal
l gives no more away than his rank, name and number, there'll be a general alarm and there'll be Italians swarming over a hundred square miles around Bir Faarig, looking for us. If they search seriously, they'll find us; and if they find us, there'll be a battle. I'm thinking seriously about pre-empting anything the enemy might do, by putting in the raid on the fort tonight.’
‘What about the Brigadier?’ Gosland asked.
‘He'll have to take his chance. We were ordered here to eliminate the fort, not rescue hot-headed brigadiers.’
‘Are you still going to send me out to look for him?’ asked Stuart.
‘Yes, Angus. I've thought about it. I don't want to weaken my force, whether we have to defend this place against attack or mount an attack on the fort. But we've got to make some effort to find him: he's too valuable, unfortunately, to be allowed to fall into enemy hands without a serious attempt to prevent it. Anyway, dammit, he's one of us, so we have to. But I want you to do a recce of Bir Faarig on the way: see if the enemy are about. Try to find Randall, or find out what happened to him. Send a runner back to me with a report.’
‘There could be bedouin in that area. Randall might have been unlucky.’
‘Not Randall.’ Troop Sergeant Major Vowden was definite in his opinion. ‘There can't be a better man for that kind of work in the whole of the Commandos, sir. He'd never be taken by surprise.’
‘Take extra water bottles with you, Angus. We're running seriously short of water.’
Stuart rubbed his bristly face and grimaced. ‘You're telling me. And I feel like the chap in the advertisement, whose best friends wouldn't tell him.’
‘We all stink,’ Taggart told him briskly, ‘so we cancel each other out. But if we can't have a drink, we won't last the course.’
***
Two hours before midnight, on that evening of 10th February, when he should have been keying himself up for the raid on the fort, Stuart was lying above the wadi, in the same spot from which Sergeant Randall had surveyed it twelve hours earlier.
The moon was big enough to make it easy for him to discern the parapet of the well. His eyes moved from there to the few palms. In the shadows cast by their trunks and foliage, he saw what looked like a pair of legs protruding beyond the edge of the dark area onto the sand which shone palely in the moonlight.
He gave his orders in an undertone.
‘Sergeant Quested, send five men to the other side of the wadi. If they go that way,’ he pointed, ‘they can get across under cover. I'm going down to take a shufti. If there's anyone down there, Italians or Arabs, and I'm seen, I'll tell them I've got the place surrounded. If I raise my right hand and touch the top of my head, you fire one round at the ground near where I'm standing. After that, use your own judgment. If you have to rush the place, do it quickly.’
‘I understand, sir.’ The thick-headed sergeant did not sound as though he did: there was a discouragingly dubious tone about his reply.
Stuart crept down into the wadi and walked quickly to the trees. He stopped two paces away from the shadows. He did not need to go further to see that Sergeant Randall lay dead, on his back, with his trousers down to his knees and his severed private parts stuffed into his gaping mouth. Near him lay a dead woman with a bullet hole in her forehead and a grimace on her stiff face that would recur to him in nightmares for the rest of his life.
He did not hear the two men who came out from the trees. Each held a rifle, pointed at him.
Stuart stepped back, to draw the two Arabs into the moonlight. They followed him, but one said ‘Stand still.’
‘Who are you?’
‘You speak Arabic? I am Abdul Waraq bin Yeminak. Who are you, who wear the same uniform as he?’ Abdul Waraq kicked the dead man's foot.
‘May all your days be blessed, Abdul Waraq bin Yeminak.’
‘May all your days be happy and blessed.’
‘Have you come from afar?’
‘My tents are further along the wadi, around that bend. And you?’
‘What happened here?’
‘What are you to this evil man? Whence come you?’
‘What happened here?’
‘Are you Italian?’
‘No.’
‘German, then? They say the Germans and the Italians are allies, and the Italians, being defeated by the English, would summon them here.’
‘You are wise and well-informed.’
‘So, you are German?’
‘What happened here?’
‘This dog dishonoured my wife. I killed him in the act. I also killed her. I do not think I can let you go to inform your friends the Italians, who delight in hanging men for taking even a worthless life.’
Stuart touched the crown of his head. There was the report of a Tommygun firing a single shot. A bullet thudded into the ground and threw up a spurt of sand.
‘My men are on both sides of the wadi, Abdul Waraq.’
‘And mine are all around us.’
‘Is this the hospitality of your tribe, O Sheik?’
‘You do not come as a friend, whoever you are.’
‘Will you allow two of my men to bury the dead man?’
‘They may do so.’
‘Why did you leave your wife lying there in her shame?’
‘So that if the friends of the man who dishonoured her came, they could see the evidence of what happened.’
‘Abdul Waraq, I have this to say to you: we are not your enemies, we who wear this uniform. We are your friends, who will soon liberate you from the oppression of the Italians. Anyone whom you see thus dressed, know that he is your friend.’
Abdul Waraq again kicked Randall's foot. ‘This, a friend?’
‘My people will make compensation to you, as far as such is possible. I give you my word on that.’
Stuart turned and walked away. He stopped when he had covered several yards, cupped his hands and called ‘Send two men here.’
He returned to the two Arabs. ‘They come to bury the dead man. I wish to talk to you.’
‘Come to my tent.’
Stuart heard two voices exclaim ‘Bloody hell!’
‘Bury him. Then go back and tell Sergeant Quested that I'm going to Sheik Abdul Waraq's tent to drink tea. Remember that: Abdul Waraq. If I'm not back in half an hour, come and get me.’
***
Taggart took the note that the runner brought from Stuart. He showed it to Gosland and Vowden.
‘It looks as though Sergeant Randall used his stalking skill once too often: the bloody idiot. I didn't know he was that sort of man, Sergeant Major?’
‘A notorious ram, sir. It didn't occur to me that he would ever let it interfere with his duty: he was a good soldier. I certainly didn't think his habits were any kind of a weakness here, in this howling wilderness, sir.’
‘I'm not blaming you at all. What a damn fool: now we'll have the bedouin against us; despite the good job Angus has obviously done.’
‘Tough on the Brigadier if he falls into their hands,’ Gosland said.
‘Oh, God! We'll have to wait and see how well Angus managed to placate them. Anyway, he'll most probably find the Brig at the D.Z.’
‘It was lucky the shot Sergeant Quested had to fire wasn't heard. At least it shows there are no Italian troops around there.’
‘It's even luckier,’ said Taggart ironically, ‘that Quested didn't hit Angus.’
Vowden spoke in defence, quickly. ‘He may be dim, sir, but he's a fair shot. He's a holy terror with the bayonet, sir: I've been told he skewered Jerries like picking daisies, in France, when his company was in hand-to-hand fights.’
‘I know. And it's going to be useful on this operation. Damn Vowden: I can't afford to lose a seasoned senior N.C.0.’
‘Corporal Nolan's a good man, sir.’
‘Yes, he is.’ Taggart looked at Gosland. ‘Bad luck, Ted. You think Nolan can manage all right?’
‘Obviously I'd rather have Randall alive than dead: he was a first-class senior N.
C.O. But Nolan will cope: the more responsibility he's given, the better he seems to like it.’
‘Good. I think I'll get some sleep. Call me in a couple of hours. I want to be up when Angus brings the Brigadier in.’
Stuart had told Taggart that the Senussi bedouin who lived in the desert roamed in small tribes, each of whose leader bore the honorific ‘Sheik’. A sheik might be the head of a group of as few as twenty families, and forty was considered quite a large number. There were traditional alliances and animosities among them. Taggart wondered about the tribe against whom Randall had committed his gross offence. Even if Stuart had parted from them with apparent amity, was that only because the sheik believed himself surrounded by troops with more fire power than he could muster? Would there be treachery? As soon as Stuart had left, was a messenger sent to inform the Italians of what had happened? Had other tribes been sent the message?
He lay awake for a quarter of an hour, worrying about the questions he kept asking himself, and about what he should do in anticipation of betrayal.
These were the first thoughts he had when MacIntosh woke him.
‘Has Mr Stuart come in?’
‘Not yet, sir.’
There was no water to spare for a mug of tea. Here was another anxiety: they were waiting for the patrol to come in, to bring back a small quantity of water. He could not risk sending a party to Bir Faarig on the same errand as Randall, because he could not be sure of its reception by the bedouin there.
Thirst was beginning to irritate all of them. He envied Stuart and the other men who were with him: they had been able to slake theirs at the well.
The sun rose and Stuart had not returned. A fresh anxiety was added: had the Brigadier injured himself when baling out, and was he now a physical burden on the patrol?
It was two hours later when a runner came from the observation post nearest to the fort, to report that an Arab had ridden up to the fort on what Jorrocks described as ‘a ewe-necked, goose-rumped bay, fourteen hands and badly in need of being clipped out’; and, after a brief talk with a sentry, had been admitted.
A quarter of an hour later a second messenger arrived, to say that the Arab had left, seen off by an officer: therefore the bearer of important information.
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