‘And what was that?’ Gabriel enquired cynically.
‘More like the way my people used to go to war, armies lining up against each other, rules of battle, honour. All I’ve been doing here is chasing bloody Boers all over the countryside, and when I haven’t been doing that, I’ve been frightening defenceless women and children and slaughtering cattle and chickens.’
Gabriel snorted in amusement, licked his thumb and index finger and pinched out his half-smoked cigarette, carefully putting it in his shirt pocket. Tobacco was scarce. ‘And I’ve spent the last two bloody years telling people what direction they should be pointing in.’ He laughed. ‘Most of them British couldn’t find their own arse with both hands.’ He stood up and stretched mightily until his spine cracked. ‘Looking forward to going home. Haven’t seen me mother for a couple of years.’
‘Do you have a wife?’
‘Not likely, I’m only eighteen — plenty of time for that later.’
Joseph was startled; he’d assumed Gabriel was in his twenties. ‘You must have been young when you signed up then,’ he said, slightly awed.
‘Sixteen, mate.’
‘I was nineteen.’
‘And I was bloody bored. Come on, time to start work.’
Joseph and Gabriel did six hour shifts, then had six hours off, during which they were spelled by two other guards who, like them, sat at the doors at each end of the ward, trying not to hear the piteous groaning of sick, frightened children. As many of the patients had enteric fever, there were frequent embarrassing noises accompanied by equally embarrassing smells. It was tedious and stultifying work, and no one except the camp commander expected any trouble.
By the end of the second day, Joseph was beginning to wish he’d volunteered to spend the last few weeks of his active service out on the veldt. Gabriel didn’t seem bothered, shunning his wooden chair and sitting motionless for hours in a trance-like state on the floor, staring at nothing. Joseph envied his ability to disconnect mentally. Sister Abercrombie lent Joseph dog-eared copies of Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the d’Urbervilles and Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, which he regarded as ‘women’s books’, but read from cover to cover anyway, and a handful of penny dreadfuls sent from England. He’d consumed the lot by the end of his fourth shift and was bored again in no time.
He then turned his attention to entertaining the children. They were wary at first, eyeing his khaki uniform and the rifle propped casually against his chair, but began to thaw when he started his bird whistles, carefully enunciating the Maori name of each bird as he mimicked their sound. Even Gabriel took notice, nodding in appreciation. Joseph whistled until his lips and cheeks ached, furiously trying to think of some other way to entertain them before he lost the ability to smile. Cat’s cradle was next, and had the advantage of taking ages to show each child how to successfully manipulate the length of twine.
Joseph also tried to engage Lina Van der Hoeven in conversation but she refused to be drawn, although he noticed her smiling when he’d been whistling earlier. She’s a moody one, all right, Joseph reflected after his third attempt had been rejected.
Mealtimes were the highlight of Joseph’s day. The food for camp staff was certainly nothing to write home about, but it was better than the field rations he’d been subsisting on for the past year. The meat was tough, but at least it had been alive relatively recently, and the vegetables were reasonably fresh, if overcooked. In the field, fresh fruit and vegetables had been a rare luxury.
After dinner one night towards the end of his first week at Camp Irene, Joseph stuffed his pockets with hard buns and fruit, as had become his habit, and went back to his room, planning to retire early for a decent sleep before he was woken in the small hours for his next shift. Lying on his rickety cot, boots and jacket off, he had the door open to let out the ever-present musty smell. As he munched his way through a bun and then a pear, he heard footsteps, raising his eyes when they stopped outside his door.
Lina Van der Hoeven was standing in the doorway, watching him. There was a hungry, furtive look in her huge eyes as they followed the pear core when he placed it on the floor.
‘Hello,’ Joseph said, sitting up and wondering what she wanted.
‘Good evening,’ she replied. She looked nervous. ‘May I please enter?’ she added, her English heavily accented.
‘Of course,’ Joseph responded, shifting up the cot so she wouldn’t have to sit too close to him. He was somewhat startled when she stepped in and deliberately closed the door.
She sat on the foot of the cot and looked at him. There was an embarrassing silence that Joseph interrupted by getting up and lighting a candle. As he returned, he was surprised to see she had removed her bonnet. Her straight blonde hair, freshly washed and shining, was loose about her shoulders, framing her face becomingly. The candlelight accentuated the startling allure of her wide eyes and Joseph thought he glimpsed, deep within them, an unnerving combination of despair, hate and expectation.
He was even more shocked when she undid the buttons of her plain blouse, slipped it off, then lifted her short chemise over her head. Naked from the waist up, she leaned back on the cot, provocatively displaying her breasts as she stared unsmilingly but directly into his eyes.
Joseph was torn between sudden embarrassment and excitement, although his rapidly growing erection suggested the latter was overtaking the former. But there was an air of desperation about this woman, and a distinct sense of unwillingness that made him uneasy; he suspected whatever was being offered would have a price and involve little dignity.
He picked up Lina’s clothes and handed them back. ‘Get dressed,’ he said impassively, and sat on the floor with his back to the wall, facing her.
‘British bastard!’ she spat as she roughly pulled her chemise and blouse on. ‘You think you are too good to bed a Boer woman?’
‘No,’ said Joseph. ‘I think you’re too good to bed me. And I’m a New Zealand Maori, not British. Why are you doing this?’
‘It does not matter. I made a mistake,’ she said bitterly as she rose, snatched up her bonnet and stepped towards the door.
‘Yes it does,’ Joseph replied, jumping to his feet and intercepting her. ‘You came here for something, but it wasn’t me. What was it?’
Lina looked at him with such vitriol he stepped back. ‘Food!’ she hissed. ‘Food for my starving children. I have seen you stuffing your face like a king for the past four nights while my children’s stomachs growl. They are dying and you are wasting good food!’ She pointed angrily at the abandoned pear core on the floor.
Joseph was mortified. ‘Why didn’t you ask for something?’
‘Because I am a Boer woman,’ replied Lina haughtily, ‘and I do not ask the British for anything! I will trade, but I will not beg.’
‘And you were willing to trade your body for stale buns?’
‘Your leavings are better than the rubbish fed to us.’
Joseph shook his head and said, ‘I had no idea.’
‘Go and look in the prisoners’ dining halls if you want to see what our children are expected to survive on! It is not even enough to make their bowels move once a week!’
Feeling suddenly tired and profoundly sick of the whole stinking mess this war had become, Joseph said wearily, ‘I am sorry. For insulting you regarding your offer, and for being unaware of your children’s need for food. I will bring you as much food as I can — I’ll leave it under the blanket on my cot and you can help yourself.’
Lina stared silently at Joseph for some time, as if debating whether to trust him or not, then finally said softly, ‘Thank you, Private Deane. Your kindness will be appreciated.’
Joseph nodded and held the door open. As she brushed past him he said quietly, ‘I was tempted, Mrs Van der Hoeven. Very tempted.’
Lina glanced over her shoulder and allowed him a small smile as he closed the door after her.
Over the following five days, Joseph scrounged food for Lina and he
r children and left it in his room. It was always gone by the time he came off shift. With interested amusement, Gabriel watched him sneaking fruit into his pockets and, once, stuffing almost a whole loaf of bread down his trousers, but he said nothing.
On 8 June Joseph was scheduled to board a train at Pretoria bound for Cape Town, to connect with a troopship on 12 June. Two nights before he left Camp Irene, Lina came to his room and this time gave herself freely to him.
Joseph had enjoyed intimate associations with a handful of girls since the fiasco with the charming Emerald almost a decade ago, but had deliberately avoided Durban’s whores during his furloughs. Many of them had been appealing but, with Cass Heke’s admonitions still clear in his mind, he had left them to the attentions of those with less personal discipline. Observing a good number of them only days later complaining of excruciating urinary tract infections, Joseph had congratulated himself on the wisdom of his decision.
Lina Van der Hoeven, however, was not a girl. At thirty-one she was ten years older than Joseph, and it showed in her lovemaking; with her, Joseph was transported to heights of physical pleasure he had so far only glimpsed. She was passionate and exquisitely responsive, and demonstrated no inhibitions whatsoever when it came to demanding what she wanted. Despite his delight in her, however, Joseph felt a sadness; in the generosity of her passion he sensed a lingering grief for her lost husband.
Afterwards, they lay together in companionable silence, Lina’s head on his shoulder, until she murmured, ‘Do you think I am a whore?’
Joseph looked at her in shock. ‘What did you say?’
‘A whore. I barely know you and we have slept together.’
He rolled over and studied her face in the moonlight shafting through the small, high window. ‘No, I don’t. A whore would ask for money, not food for her starving children.’
Lina shook her head and smiled sadly. ‘You have a lot to learn, Joseph Deane.’
He turned onto his back and pulled her against him. ‘Lina?’ he asked tentatively. ‘What do you want most in the world?’
She didn’t hesitate. ‘To have my husband and my baby alive.’
‘Did you love your husband?’
‘Yes, Piet was a fine man, and he died fighting for the things he believed in. I loved him very much.’
Joseph thought for a moment. ‘After that, then, what would you most want?’
Again no hesitation. ‘To get my children and myself out of this stinking prison so I can carry on the fight. It is not over yet and there is work to be done. I have learned a lot here about nursing, and there is much I could do to help our men.’
‘What would you do with the children?’
‘I have family who have not been imprisoned. They would take them.’
‘What if I could help you escape?’
‘From this camp?’ she asked, her eyebrows raised sceptically. ‘How? You would be shot for treason if you were discovered!’
‘If, yes, but I think I know a way to avoid that. I can find out when the late-evening shifts for the perimeter guards start and end, and I know for a fact that they’re pretty casual about getting to their posts on time. If I could open the wires, you could wriggle through with the children and be miles away by the time anyone noticed you’d gone.’
Lina reached up and gently stroked Joseph’s cheek. ‘Why would you do that for us?’ she asked.
‘Because it’s wrong to lock up children. Despite what you think, Lina, I have learned a lot in South Africa, and I don’t like much of what I’ve seen. I’m going home in a few days and I can’t just leave it like this.’
‘You could die,’ she reminded him.
‘So could you.’
‘Yes, but my children and I have nothing to lose. You do.’
‘Could you live with yourself if the children were hurt or killed?’
‘It would be easier than watching them die here.’
Joseph, his heart racing now the idea had been voiced, said, ‘It would have to be tomorrow night.’
‘We will be ready.’
CHAPTER THIRTY
Joseph sat through his last day in the hospital ward, anxiously awaiting the end of his shift and trying not to look at Lina as she went about her duties in case anyone suspected a connection between them.
He had confirmed the time the guards would be changing over on the stretch of perimeter fence behind the hospital ward, and knew who they would be — two British troopers who were habitually late. But Lina would still only have ten minutes to get herself and her children through the fence and away into the darkness. In that time Joseph would also have to loosen and bend the fence wires, then replace them so there was no evidence of an escape.
Off duty now, he had packed his kit ready to leave the following day, and was lying on his cot waiting for darkness, his stomach churning and his mouth dry. If they were caught, the best he could hope for would be ten years in a military prison; Lina would probably be shot. He checked his pocket watch; the guards would change at ten o’clock and it was eight thirty now.
At nine forty-five he heard a discreet tap, the signal that Lina and the children were ready. He waited until the tap came again then opened his door. Lina was standing in the corridor, a dark shawl over her hair and carrying a small backpack. The children were dressed in every item of clothing they owned; the nights were growing cold and Lina had no idea how long they would have to sleep in the open. Their eyes were huge and they clung to their mother’s skirts, but Lina appeared calm.
‘Ready?’ she whispered.
Joseph nodded. They moved quietly down the hall to the outside door. Joseph stopped, opened it and cautiously stuck his head out, looking in both directions. The hospital ward was situated at the rear of the camp — a well-meaning but futile effort at segregating infectious patients — with the perimeter fence thirty feet beyond. Their plan was to breach the wire directly behind the hospital building, which was sheltered from the view of the rest of the camp.
Joseph whispered to Lina to wait, then pushed the door to again, leaving an inch through which he peered for the next few minutes. As he glanced at his watch to check the time, he was alerted by the sound of footsteps crunching in the gravel around the side of the building. He stood holding his breath as two soldiers passed, laughing at something Joseph did not catch. As their footsteps receded, he opened the door, checked in both directions and stepped carefully down the wooden steps. Lina and the children followed and they crept along the side of the building until they turned the corner of the wall running parallel with the perimeter fence. Halfway down, they stopped.
Joseph walked rapidly towards the wire, hoping like hell their scrunching footsteps would not be heard. The further away from the shadowed safety of the back of the building they moved, the more wildly his heart pounded. They had about seven minutes.
He grasped two of the lower wires strung four inches apart all the way up the fence, put his foot on the bottom one and violently wrenched the top one up, making a gap of about eighteen inches. He suddenly panicked, realising that while the children would fit easily, Lina in her long full skirts would not be able to wriggle past the barbs. In desperation, Joseph yanked harder, feeling sweat pop out on his face and the wire bite into his hands. The gap increased by a further inch, but it would still not be enough. Behind him he could hear Lina ripping at her clothes.
‘No!’ he hissed. ‘There isn’t time!’
Not stopping to consider the wisdom of what he was about to do, he squatted, one foot still on the lower wire, put his head and shoulders through the hole, and straightened up as far as he could, forcing the gap open an extra half foot. Straining, he heard his uniform jacket rip as the barbs bit into the fabric. ‘Go!’ he urged over his shoulder.
Lina pushed both children through one after the other, their small bodies easily clearing the wire, followed by the pack, then crouched down, her skirts bunched up around her white thighs. She lowered her head, flattened her back and ducked throug
h. On the other side she hefted the pack over her shoulder then turned back to Joseph, reaching for the top wire so he could release himself.
He was stuck fast, the barbs holding his jacket as viciously as the teeth of a starving dog. ‘Take the jacket off!’ she said. He couldn’t; his webbing was buckled tightly over it, trussing him as securely as a lunatic’s straitjacket. ‘Go!’ he said again. ‘Go, Lina! Now!’
She looked at him for seconds that felt to Joseph like hours, then reached out and touched his lips with her fingers. ‘Goodbye, Joseph Deane,’ she whispered. Then she stood, grasped each child by the hand and ran into the darkness.
Joseph knew the ten minutes were almost up. He felt like a miserable little monkey he had seen on leave, squatting in a cage, a hunched and dejected captive. He closed his eyes and waited for the guards to spot him as he heard footsteps approach.
‘You in the shit, mate?’ asked an amused Australian voice. Joseph couldn’t turn but knew it was Gabriel Lightfoot. He listened as the Aborigine removed his ragged shirt, then felt him slip into the gap in the fence next to him.
‘When I push up, move forward and unhook yaself, then back out,’ Gabriel directed.
Joseph did just that, releasing himself and landing on his arse inside the fence. Gabriel was still within the wires, the barbs digging into his naked back. As he heaved backwards to extract himself, Joseph winced at the sound of wire scraping on flesh.
‘Fuck,’ said Gabriel mildly as he snatched his shirt off the ground. ‘Let’s go, mate.’
They scrambled for the hospital building just as a shadowy figure turned the corner at the far end of the wall. Joseph and Gabriel didn’t dare breathe. The guard stopped for a moment, had a cursory look around, farted in what he believed was complete anonymity, then walked off again, his heavy footsteps receding.
‘Wondered what you were up to,’ whispered Gabriel as they slunk off in the opposite direction. ‘It were that nurse aid, eh?’
Joseph nodded.
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