The Carhullan Army

by Hall, Sarah

  Since the settlement we had been together a number times, in the dark storerooms, against the walls of the nearby cave where Carhullan’s mushrooms were grown in moss troughs and it smelled of underground spores and mould. We had gone wherever there was a private space, wherever we could undress enough, and not be heard. We had risked each other’s curtained berths once or twice at night, and the outdoor shower, and there the cold had not mattered as I cupped my fingers inside her. And in the warm drying room of the farmhouse, with the women’s wet clothes hung on wooden dollies around us, dripping steadily on the flagstones, she’d knelt over me, her tongue slow at first, then frantic as I pushed my hips towards her mouth.

  I knew her body now. I knew that the burns on her skin felt like chalk. She was a soft-hearted woman and she had fallen for me. She’d looked after me through the violent sickness and aches of giardiasis, for ten days bringing me nettle teas and small dry pieces of bread, apologising all the while for letting me drink water from the croft barrel, and waving Lorry away when she approached my bed.

  The temper she had once had was now held firmly in check, though when she came she clutched my hair and hissed my name. I knew she felt something more than just fondness for me, and I liked that. She had heard my own confessions, my account of life in the town with Andrew. But I hadn’t asked her history, whether it had included the men at the crofts or some of the Sisters. Whom she had last been with, and the crimes of her earlier life, did not matter to me. She had killed, but it was clear there was nothing of that fury left in her now.

  The others were in another part of the spinney, tossing logs onto the wheelbarrow and barracking, but she lowered her voice when she next spoke. ‘Honestly? I think Jackie’s restless. It’s always better when there’s something for her to do, when there’s something going on. She wasn’t as hard-nosed when I first came here. She had Vee for company. She was more relaxed. It’s almost like she wants to start again, differently, you know?’

  I sat on a tree stump. There was a fresh smell of sap. ‘She implied when I first came that the women should act differently, that we might need to.’ Shruti laughed. ‘Yeah, she implies that to everyone. Maybe it’s true. But. We’re still here, aren’t we?’ I nodded and bit the dry skin on my lip. ‘What do you make of her?’ I asked. ‘Who, Jackie? Well, she’s not crazy. I know that. No matter what some of them say about her when she’s not around to hear. She isn’t crazy. She should be though, she really should be. You’re very interested in her, Sister. Careful. I might start getting jealous.’ The tape creaked as she uncoiled the adhesive strip. I smiled at her. I knew now was my chance to find out more about Carhullan’s history. I decided to press her on the one subject I had so far been unable to broach with anyone else. ‘Nobody’s told me how Veronique died. I haven’t really asked. But it seems to be off limits.’

  Shruti tore off a length of plaster, wrapped her finger with it, and passed me the roll back. She crouched on the ground in front of me and tucked her hands in the folds of her knees. ‘Yeah, I know,’ she said. ‘No one talks about it. I knew you were going to ask me. That’s what I get for being good to you, eh?’ She smiled sadly. ‘Vee got cancer. She found a lump. They knew what it was, straight away. But it was after the Reorganisation, and she wouldn’t go down into the town and ask for treatment. Jackie wanted her to, so did Lorry, but she said there was no point – they’d just be turned away and it might ruin things here in the process. None of us are listed on the census, we all made that choice – well, you already know that.’

  She paused, untucked her hands, picked up a twig and snapped it. ‘They argued like mad and both were as stubborn as each other. God, the house practically came down around us all. I heard Jackie yelling at her upstairs once. She said she’d served her fucking country by killing as many sand niggers as the coalition wanted and now her country could serve her by keeping her nigger alive. Shit. You know how she talks. Well. This was one argument Vee won. They didn’t go.’ Shruti sighed. ‘It took about eight months for her to die. She was in agony. Lorry did everything she could. She even cut her open and tried to get it out, but you can’t treat something like that up here.’

  She sighed again and blinked. Her eyes were bright with emotion. She swallowed uncomfortably and looked at the ground. ‘In the end Vee started begging. For them to help her finish it. She just kept asking, over and over, saying if they loved her they would help her. So they did. They carried her out to the Pins, because she loved that place, and they shot her. Jackie did it. Everyone was there. Everyone loved her, you see. She was an incredible woman. My God, she was so full of optimism. Nothing fazed her. Not even Jackie. I wish you’d met her. I really do.’

  She put her hand into the debris of the copse floor as if searching for something under the brittle leaves and twigs. When she brought it out there was a small brown kernel on her palm. She dropped it. I knew she was finding it all too difficult, trying to compose herself. She took a deep breath and continued. ‘And Jackie … She kept hold of the gun. She wouldn’t put it down afterwards. We thought she wanted to kill herself too. There was that crackle around her, you know, that feeling you get when people are a danger to you, and to themselves. When anyone tried to take it from her she pointed it at them. Even Lorry. It took about a dozen people to get it off her. They knocked her out cold.’ She paused and swallowed again. ‘I’ve never seen love like that before. Never in my life. I know I couldn’t have done what she did. You see now why nobody talks about it.’

  Shruti stood up abruptly and shook her head. There were tears spilling from the corners of her eyes. I stood as well, made a move to comfort her, but she waved me away and forced a smile. ‘I knew you were going to ask me,’ she said. She wiped her face with her gloves, picked up the saw and fitted it into the pale gash in the trunk. I took the other end and drew it back and forth with her. We worked in silence. I tried to concentrate on the task at hand but my mind would not cooperate. All I could see was a picture of myself, holding a gun to Shruti’s head and the redness in her spilling through her hair onto the ground. I let go of the saw and stood back. ‘That’s why people put those little idols out there by the stone circle, isn’t it? For Veronique?’ Shruti nodded. ‘Yes. Something like that.’

  That evening, the meeting did not run with its usual smoothness and civility. For most of the day the women had been ruminating on the events of the night before, working themselves up about it. They were tired and they were shaken. Those who spoke out did so with anger, interrupting, chipping in over the top of one another, breaking the rules of the meeting.

  Jackie stood beside the fire, listening to the comments of each woman who took the floor, and she did not object to the swell of voices, nor to the disorder. She nodded a couple of times whenever a new protest was shouted out. It was loud in the kitchen, and full of unrest, and she made a point of turning her left ear to the speaker, as if she was partly deaf and was trying to hear what was being said on her good side. It occurred to me that the scar on her face marked some internal damage. There was nothing of the previous night’s swagger about her, though she still wore her fatigues and stood tall, with her chin held high. Instead she seemed every bit the mediator, collecting up a list of grievances as if she might be planning to pass it on to an arbitrating body. But I could see she was acting a part, it was simply another rotation of her personality. Her eyes were focused on nothing and no one.

  I did not know how she could stand there, confronted by so many angry women, and not be intimidated by them. At that moment she was colossal, more incredible than even the iron-jawed woman I had dreamed in the dog box. But the mystery of her was less profound now. Before, I had wondered what had gone into the creating of her. I knew her stock, her inheritance. She was part of the old North, the feuding territories, and those antagonistic genes rubbed in her, creating the friction that fired her pride. And perhaps her time in service had aggravated that configuration, contracting with it, organising it; eventually making her unbreakab
le.

  But there was more to her than regional spirit and vocational strength. In a book she had lent me there had been a quote, written out in her own hand at the beginning of the first chapter. It is not those who can inflict the most, but those who can suffer the most that will conquer. And I could see it now – the portion of her that had been immolated the day she pulled the trigger and took Veronique’s life. She carried a piece of dead self with her always, and still she lived, and it was this tumour, this mass, that gave her system the supreme immunity it had. It was this that gave her a shield, that she could better blunt her enemy’s sword, and drive in harder her own. She had killed her love with her lover, and cured herself of human weakness.

  When the women had finished talking and the murmurs of discontent faded, she stood up, tossed a few more logs into the range and closed its grate. She cleared her throat. ‘How long?’ she asked. Her voice remained low key, moderate as ever, but the question was clearly audible. The room was quiet but for the cracking and spitting of the fire. ‘How long have we got?’

  When nobody spoke she surveyed the women in front of her. There was a resinous stillness surrounding them. They were all waiting for her and, if they understood the question, they were unwilling to answer it. Only she moved, bringing her hands from the pockets of her breeches to her hips. Her arms looked like skinless wings. ‘I picked up a transmission this week on the radio,’ she said. ‘There’s to be no succession to the throne. The Authority is working on a new land charter. They’re setting up a commission to evaluate the current level of jurisdiction. In the next eighteen months they’re going to sweep the unofficial zones, and readministrate the areas not under their control. They’re going to come up here and they’re going to take us apart. So. We have a year and a half before this place goes.’

  *

  Only Carhullan’s children went to bed that night. The Sisters stayed up, keeping a vigil, keeping the fire banked and trying to manage what they had heard, and as the dawn began to dispel the greyness in the east, Ruthie began work on a breakfast that would feed every person in one shift. At first no one knew how to respond to what they had been told. There was disbelief, and upset. It was rare to see tears at the farm – ordinarily the women were resilient – but some broke down and leant on the shoulders of their friends and partners. Others drew back into themselves and stared blindly at the flagstone floor. And there were those less willing to accept the proposition.

  The debate resumed. Jackie answered every question that was thrown at her, rebuffed allegations that she was lying, twisting the facts, or overdramatising the situation. This was not some elaborate and cruel hoax, she said. It was the truth. She called on those in her unit who had been on point with her the day the broadcast was intercepted to stand up. They did so and vouched for her veracity, relaying the same message, almost word for word.

  I watched Megan, wondering how she would act, how she would feel about the matter, and about potentially losing the only home she had ever known. She stood to the left of Jackie and she seemed composed. If I saw anything in her it was preparedness, resolve, and loyalty to the clan’s principal mother. If she was anyone’s progeny, then she was Jackie’s. I knew that she would follow her to the ends of the earth; she had been made in the crucible of this wild place, she was a daughter of its brutality, and the overriding influence in her upbringing was the woman in charge. After the news had been confirmed, Jackie leant close and whispered to her. Then Megan and Corky left the kitchen. Through the window I saw them exiting the courtyard, with rifles slung across their backs. A soft snow was falling from the sky. It was the first day of February.

  Among those speaking out, Chloe stood and made an address. Her face was lumpy and there were bruised crescents beneath her eyes where Corky had laid into her. We had not got to the bottom of why they had fought, what had kicked it off. Of the two of them, she had come off much the worse. But her spirit still seemed strong, and there was a recklessness to her tone, a note of challenge in it, as if she had nothing to lose. ‘So what do you propose, Jackie?’ she asked. ‘You’ve got something up your sleeve, obviously. You’ve got a plan.’ Jackie gave her a measured look. ‘I do,’ she replied. ‘But first, why don’t you tell me what you’re thinking, Sister?’ Chloe tipped her head and crossed her arms. ‘There are weapons here. Everyone knows that. This is our home. We must have some sort of claim. We’ve surely got a right to stay, and to disagree with the government’s policy. It seems to me we’re well equipped to defend ourselves if we need to. So. Why don’t we just sit it out and see if your forecast is right?’ Helen was rocking baby Stella in her arms. ‘Yes, that sounds like the best thing to do,’ she agreed. ‘We could refuse to go. We could hold out long enough for them to lose interest in us. We’re no threat to anyone.’

  Jackie was quiet and though she looked to be calculating an answer, she must already have prepared it. ‘I’d give us about a month. It depends when the American satellites pick us up, if they haven’t already. That won’t take long. Once they know who they’re dealing with.’ She paused and nodded, then went on. ‘We’re in a good position here, hard to get at. It’s to our advantage in a ground assault. But we’d be on our back foot. And they could wipe us out with a single air strike if they wanted.’

  ‘Be serious!’ Chloe cried out. She laughed incredulously, but her laughter quickly died in her throat when she saw the face of her opponent. Nothing in its aspect was light. ‘You think we’re a small operation, Sister?’ Jackie asked quietly. ‘You think we’re not consequential enough for those in charge to worry about, tucked away as we are? Do you know what grading we have? We are category-one insurgents. All of us, on the same hand. Finger through to thumb.’ Her right arm was raised, the digits on it spread wide apart. She let the words hang in the air. ‘No, Chloe. I’m not going to waste ammunition on a bolt-hole. The only real chance we have is to go out and disable the Authority’s mechanism in Rith, rally the people there. And that is exactly what we are going to do.’

  There was another swell of noise. From the back of the room someone swore loudly, and charged her with glory hunting, trying to write her name into the history books. ‘You’re not fucking Mao, Jackie!’ She did not answer to this, but she stared down her accuser with formidable patience.

  ‘Oh come on! Rally who?’ Chloe persisted, running her hands through her hair. ‘Those idiots down there who have been walked all over for the last ten years? And because a bunch of women from the hills tell them to? I don’t think so.’ Lillian backed her up. ‘Chloe’s right. People are too afraid now. They won’t put themselves at risk. Why would they break the only system keeping them alive? If we start attacking the town we’ll just come across as bloody bandits. It’s too late, Jackie, it’s all too late! That’s why we’re up here, isn’t it! Because everything else is a mess. And we don’t want to be part of it.’

  There were murmurs of agreement. It was remarked with biterness that the idea was impossible; that life below in the towns was not Carhullan’s problem, not Carhullan’s responsibility. Jackie looked around the room, her eyes tracking over the faces. For a second or two she stared at me, then she came over, reached down, took hold of my arm and lifted me onto my feet. ‘Stand up, Sister. Stand up. Tell them. Tell them why you came here. Tell them you have it in you, and that you’re not so different from women down there. Tell them you’re willing to fight.’

  All eyes in the room turned on me. She had taken me by surprise. My guard was down. My face flamed red and I was speechless, mortified to have been singled out by her at such a time. Then I felt a cold trickle of horror in my gut as I realised what she intended, what she was asking of me, the choice I had to make. Of all the women, I would be the first to make it, publicly and under pressure. She was affording me no luxury in the decision. But she knew exactly what she was doing. As ever, her timing was perfect. Jackie knew I was a guaranteed recruit. She knew what I wanted. It was why she had turned me down when I offered to train, why she had ke
pt me waiting in the wings during the past few months. I was a sleeper agent.

  I almost hated her for it, hated her for marking me out, and using me, as if I were a piece in a game she was playing. But I could not hate her. And this was not a game. There was some deep part of me she had reached, some purpose to me she had foreseen. Her words had always clarified my thoughts. And her voice was the one I had always been listening for inside my own head. Whatever her methods, whatever her strategy, I knew that I was on her side. ‘Tell them, Sister’, she urged me.

  From the corner of my eye I could see Shruti, sitting cross-legged and calm, as she had done on the wall of the croft; as she always did. She was waiting for me to speak, giving me the benefit of the doubt. I wanted the room to empty, or to be able to whisper to her, and tell her what she meant to me, that I was sorry. I wanted to say I loved the goodness of her, the mild pepper of her skin in my mouth, the way she could forgive all those who had injured her, including herself. I knew that I would have to give her up.

  I don’t remember what I said. The words were lost to me even as I spoke them. I felt Jackie’s arm on my shoulder, acknowledging my allegiance, binding me to her. I felt the flow of energy leaving her frame and filling mine, circulating with my own blood through the vessels of my body. She had always understood what my potential was, the apparatus she could work with. She had known from the beginning, when the old photograph taken of her and Veronique standing at the door of Carhullan was handed to her from my tin box. After I had spoken she thanked me. It was the first and last time that she would.

  In the kitchen the women became sedated, and I knew their anger had diffused. Standing before them, I had become their conscience, their empathy, a walk-in who had arrived long after anyone else was expected, long after Carhullan had locked itself down and disconnected from the collapsing world. They could no more send me away than they could their old selves. They were not so far apart from the ones left behind and they knew it. I was the best argument Jackie Nixon could make for solidarity, for intervention, and for hope among the people. She had made a soldier out of me without even giving me back my father’s gun.