Last Train to Waverley

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Last Train to Waverley Page 14

by Malcolm Archibald


  Ramsay tapped his fingers against the handle of his revolver once more. If he had to, he would use it and chance the consequences.

  “Right lads, keep together now and with luck we will be back in our own lines before dark. Food, boys. We can get food!”

  Naturally, it was Cruickshank who grumbled, ‘It will probably be bloody iron rations, bully beef and dusty tea.”

  “Less of your lip, Cruickshank!” Flockhart snarled. “Just get on with it.”

  Used to the cover of night, Ramsay felt near naked as he marched in the growing light of day. They passed a scattering of bodies, men from various British regiments and a larger number of Germans, twisted in the grotesque attitudes of death.

  “There was a stand here,” Flockhart said. He indicated a group of German soldiers, all with bullet wounds across their midriff. They lay contorted in the mud. “A machine gun got that lot.”

  “I hope the bastards suffered,” Cruickshank said and spat on the nearest enemy body.

  “Enough of that!” Ramsay ordered sharply. “These were brave men doing their duty, just as we are!”

  “They’re bloody Huns,” Cruickshank muttered. “They were murdering bloody Hun bastards.”

  Ramsay chose not to hear the words. He marched on, fighting the waves of tiredness that threatened to overwhelm him. With each hour that passed he was increasingly aware of the hollow complaint of his stomach. He had eaten nothing since the iron rations of the day before, and they were not designed to take a man on a forced march across enemy-held territory.

  “Sir!” McKim lifted his hand in warning. “I can hear something.”

  “So can I,” Cruickshank said, “Oh, yes. It’s the bloody guns.”

  As Flockhart hissed Cruickshank to silence, McKim stepped to the right. “It’s not that, listen. There’s somebody nearby.” He worked the bolt of his rifle, putting a round in the breech, ducked low, and slid twenty paces to the side. He stopped at the lip of a large shell crater. “Here we are, sir. It’s a German, sir.”

  “A bloody Hun?” Cruickshank stepped forward, raising his rifle.

  Ramsay was there first. He looked into the crater and stopped. There had been a German position here once; the remains of a section of men was scattered around like fragments of meat. There was no way of knowing how many men there had been, for now there were only pieces; heads and shattered heads, limbs and fragments of limbs mingled with shreds of unidentified meat and broken bones. In the middle of the carnage was a man. He lay on his back with both heels drumming on the ground and both fists raised above his head while he made small mewling noises.

  He’s only about sixteen years old, the same age as Mackay. The poor wee boy should be at school, not in this nightmare.

  McKim pointed to him. “Poor bugger. He’s shell shocked and no wonder with all his chums dead.”

  “He’s a bloody Hun.” Cruickshank levelled his rifle, but Ramsay knocked the barrel up.

  “He’s a badly wounded man,” Ramsay said quietly, “and no threat to us.”

  “I can’t see a wound,” Cruickshank said sourly.

  “It’s there nonetheless,” Ramsay told him. He hesitated for a moment. “We can’t just leave him here. The fellow will die.”

  Cruickshank shrugged. “Let him. He’s a murdering Hun.”

  The boy’s voice raised an octave and he began to howl. His twitching increased as he lay on the ground amidst the shattered blood and bones of his erstwhile comrades.

  “We can’t take him with us, sir,” Flockhart said quietly. “We left one of our own behind in the trenches.” He lowered his voice further. “The lads are tired, sir. They’re nearly too tired to sweat so they won’t take kindly to carrying one of the enemy.”

  Ramsay considered his words. “I agree. We’ll just make him as comfortable as we can and leave some sort of marker so the Germans can find him.”

  As Ramsay moved the shell-shocked German to a safer spot, his men gathered together the German rifles and arranged them in a pyramid at the lip of the crater.

  “That will have to do,” Ramsay said. He placed a German helmet on top.

  “It’s more than our lads got,” Cruickshank said. “And a bit too much for a bloody Hun.”

  Ramsay grunted. The howling of the shell-shocked German was getting on his nerves. “Let’s get away from here. Keep on toward Carnoy. Take the lead Flockhart.”

  He gave the order in as casual a tone as he could and Flockhart obeyed without comment.

  Come on Fritz, shoot the bastard. I helped one of yours, so repay the favour and kill one of mine.

  Every step brought them closer to the firing, the crackle of musketry and sinister chatter of machine guns became louder and more dangerous

  He began to count his steps, watching the slow progress of his feet across the wasted mess of land. There were a few thistles here, protruding stubbornly from the mess of mud, and he grunted at the bitter sweet memory of home.

  There had been thistles in that field as well, tall, purple-topped beauties with feathery down, swaying slightly to the gentle hiss of the breeze. She had looked at him with laughter in her eyes and a smile of kiss-shaped lips. “David,” she had said, soft and sweet and low, “David. Now we will have to get married.”

  His laughter had died on his lips when he realised she was deadly serious. What had started as a tumble in the hay with a willing country girl had turned into something far more intense.

  Enough! Stay alert. With luck I can get these men to Carnoy and join our army. Now what do I know about Carnoy? It is on the road from Albert to Peronne, about 7 miles south east of Albert and there is a railway train there. Stay alert and stay alive.

  “Keep moving lads!” Ramsay said. The words were unnecessary; the Royals were plodding on without any encouragement from him. He glanced at them. Turnbull had lost the puttees from his left leg somewhere and those on his right were trailing behind him. Aitken was looking around him nervously; Niven was glowering in the direction of Carnoy with pure determination; Blackley was whistling softly between his teeth; McKim was marching as solidly as if he was twenty years old; Cruickshank was grumbling about something: these were his men and he was more proud of them than of anything else in this world.

  “Sir!” Flockhart came to Ramsay at a trot. “There’s something you should see.” The sergeant was obviously excited. “There’s a transport limber ahead! Food and ammunition!”

  About to blast the man, Ramsay paused with his mouth open. Flockhart was speaking a lot of sense. “Good man. He must have taken a wrong turning in the dark. Lead on, MacDuff.”

  That was Gillian’s expression.

  He waited and sure enough, Cruickshank mumbled the expected response. “That bloody officer still doesn’t know the sergeant’s name.”

  Rather than move in a straight line, Flockhart ducked and weaved across the ground, the Royals trotting behind him, their energy restored by the prospect of food.

  The limber lay on its side, the bodies of four horses a mangled mess in front and the remains of the driver lying on his back with both arms outstretched. The steel guard on his left leg was dented and his head was missing.

  “A shell must have caught them,” Turnbull said casually. “Permission to look inside, sir?”

  “Of course, McKim, you and Cruickshank keep watch. The rest of you, see what you can find. We need food, water and ammunition.”

  The men descended on the wagon with a rapacity that reminded Ramsay of the tales he had heard of Wellington’s army looting during the Peninsular War. They used their bayonets to rip open the stout canvas covering and dived into the interior, laughing at the prospect of loot.

  There was a box of iron rations which they opened without delay. In normal circumstances the soldiers would have treated such a thing with scorn, but three days and two nights with hardly a bite had rendered them too hungry for niceties and the tinned bully beef and crack-tooth biscuits were eaten as voraciously as if they were the choicest morsel
from a fashionable French restaurant.

  “Chocolate!” Mackay looked terribly young as he handled the box as if it was gold. He tore open the top and delved inside, throwing bars of Fry’s milk chocolate to the men with a wide grin on his face. “I’ve never seen so much chocolate at one time!”

  “Don’t eat too much or you’ll get sick,” Flockhart warned, but Mackay stuffed an entire bar into his mouth at the same time as he opened a second.

  “Bread! Real bread!”

  “Plum jam … what other kind of jam could there be?”

  “Look! Tobacco!” Turnbull produced half a dozen tins of ‘Three Nuns’ tobacco. “Here you are, corporal!” He threw a tin to McKim, who caught it with practised ease.

  “Thanks, Turnbull!” McKim gave a gap-toothed grin, drew his broken pipe from the top pocket of his tunic and began to stuff tobacco into the bowl. Turning away from the slight breeze, he sheltered behind the wagon and scraped flame from a match and puffed his pipe to light.

  “God, that’s good,” he said. He looked around with the pipe thrust between his teeth. “It has been a long time since I could stand in the open and smoke a pipe without wondering if some German has me in the sights of his rifle.”

  Flockhart spoke without looking round, his eyes continued to scour the landscape for the enemy. “Maybe that’s the silver lining in the dark cloud of the German advance – Kenny McKim can get a pipe full of baccy.”

  McKim’s grin was far too mischievous for a man of his age. “A decent smoke makes it all worthwhile!” He blew a cloud of smoke in Flockhart’s direction and chuckled. “All things come to an end, Sergeant, and Kaiser Bill is no exception. The Royals will put salt on his tail yet.”

  Mackay was laughing with his mouth full of chocolate while Turnbull used the tip of his bayonet to spoon plum jam into his mouth. Ramsay saw the vestiges of German blood on the blade but said nothing. Out here at the Front people did things that were unimaginable in a more ordinary situation.

  “You men,” Ramsay ordered, “cram your pouches with food. Take all you can. Fill the water bottles, grab ammunition, everything we can get. Move now!” He watched to see his orders were obeyed.

  “Look at this, lads!” Aiken lifted a mouth organ from the ground, tapped it against his leg and began to play a jaunty tune that Ramsay did not recognise. Within seconds the men were joining in, making mouth music around half-masticated food as Flockhart kept watch and half the German army advanced purposely on the retreating British all around them.

  “Look at this, lads!” Niven lifted a small brown envelope and glanced through the contents. “Ooh, la la. Trés bon mademoiselles!”

  “What? Give us a decko!” Edwards leaped over to Niven and grabbed the envelope from his hand. He shuffled through the small pile of postcards, making comments about each.

  “She is nice, not that one though, She’s more my type; lovely eyes … and what a pair she has …”

  “Let me see!” Mackay grabbed at the postcards and they fell to the ground. In a second there were four Royals scrabbling around in the mud to salvage as many as they could.

  “Enough of that!” McKim snarled. He pulled them apart. “Niven, these are yours. Mackay, you are too young to even think of women yet. What would your mother think of you looking at things like that?”

  McKim held a sepia postcard of a voluptuous woman dressed in a frilly chemise that failed to cover any part of her. He smiled. The world in its wisdom thought nothing of sending Mackay to fight and kill and witness all the unbridled horror of warfare, but baulked at the thought of him looking at a semi-dressed woman.

  “You should be ashamed of yourself, Mackay. If you were mine I would fetch you a good clip around the earhole, so I would.” McKim shoved the boy away and winked at Flockhart.

  Ramsay hid his smile as Mackay coloured and turned away. He waited until McKim was alone. “Do you have any children, McKim?” The question was genuine. The corporal had spoken so naturally to Mackay that Ramsay thought he acted more like a father than an NCO.

  McKim removed the pipe from his mouth and nodded. “Oh, yes, sir. My first wife gave me two sons and a daughter and my second wife gave me another daughter.” He smiled. “My lads are in the regiment – in the Middle East now. One of my girls is in service and the other is married to a sailor, God help him.”

  “You were married twice?” Ramsay asked.

  “No, sir, three times.” McKim pulled his pay book from a tunic pocket. “Here they are. Margaret, she died in India of fever. Jemima, she died in South Africa and this …” He produced a small photograph and kissed it fondly. “This is Janet. She is waiting for me in Edinburgh. Once I am time-expired and out of the regiment, Janet says we will open a small pub in the High Street, near the Castle, and grow pickled together.” He showed Ramsay the photograph. The woman could have been in her fifties or early sixties; she stared remorselessly and nervously at the camera lens.

  “Nice looking woman,” Ramsay gave the stock answer. “You are a lucky man, McKim, but I can’t imagine you leaving the regiment.”

  McKim grinned. “Nor can I, sir. When my time is up I will enlist again as I always do. I can’t see myself tied down to a publican’s hours!” He winked, “It keeps the missus happy, though. Gives her something to live for.”

  Ramsay nodded. “I see.”

  Aitken was still playing the mouth organ and most of the men were eating and dancing, thumping their feet up and down in a release of tension as they chanted words that may or may not have been related to the music. Ramsay was tempted to break them up, but he allowed the fun to continue; the men had been through a rough time and needed a few moments of pleasure before they continued with the march to whatever horror lay ahead.

  “Here’s ammunition,” Turnbull said. He passed out a box of 303 clips. “And there’s plenty more where that came from. There are bandoliers as well.”

  “Bring them out, Turnbull,” Ramsay ordered. “Everybody refill your ammunition pouches and get a bandolier or two. If we are going through the Hun lines we will have to fight.”

  “Things are looking up, sir,” Flockhart said. “Food, ammunition and our boys holding back the advance. Up the Royals!”

  Ramsay heard musketry in the distance and the chattering of machine guns. There was still a battle going on; the British were still holding out at Carnoy, although how he was going to get his men through the German positions was a mystery that remained to be resolved.

  “Begging your pardon, sir,” McKim asked, “but are you a married man?”

  There was the scent of the grass again and Grace lying on her back with those wondrous blue eyes. Her statement hung in the air, a tantalising thought that surrounded him with amusement.

  “Marry you?” He had laughed then, at the ridiculous idea. “How on earth could I marry you?”

  Her expression had altered from contented adoration to disbelief within the space of a few seconds.

  “But David, we have to get married after what we have just done.” Her voice had the musical cadences of Midlothian, combined with the grit of the mines. “Mrs David Napier. I want to be Mrs David Napier.”

  Ramsay held her eyes as he shook his head. “After what we have just done?” He mocked her. “We passed a pleasurable hour or two rollicking in the hay, Grace my darling. That is all we have done.”

  Grace shook her head as her eyes filled. “But you must marry me, you must!” Belatedly, she covered herself up. She pulled down her skirt and dragged her shawl over her upper body.

  “Why on earth must I do that?” Ramsay remained where he was, smiling down at her.

  “Because you’ve seen me and you’ve been intimate with me!” She crossed her legs in sudden embarrassment and raised her voice to a wail. “And I might have a baby!” Grace fairly howled out the words.

  “So you might,” Ramsay reached down and lifted his trousers. He brushed a few blades of grass from them and casually hauled them on before fastening the buttons of the fly. “
But on the other hand, you might not, and I certainly am not going to marry you for such a trivial reason.” He adjusted his braces and lifted his jacket. “The idea is ridiculous, given our respective positions.” He leaned closer. “I think you should find yourself a man of your own type, Grace, and quickly, just in case I have honoured you with a bastard.”

  He looked down as Grace let out a howl of protest and tried to step away, but she dived sideways and clung to his leg.

  “No, David. Please, no. Don’t say that!”

  Ramsay lifted his leg and shook it, but when Grace only tightened her grip he reached down, grabbed her hair and pulled her head backwards until she screamed and let go.

  “Get off me, you hussie! Get off!” Ramsay grabbed his boots and strode away, flattening the long grass as he did so. At the edge of the field he stopped, sat on the five-barred gate and was pulling on his boots when the man appeared.

  “Are you a married man?” McKim asked again.

  About to blast him for his impertinence, Ramsay shook his head instead. “No, McKim. I am engaged, but we are not tying the knot until after the war.”

  McKim smiled. “It’s good to have somebody waiting for you, sir. Knowing that there is somebody that cares whether you live or die, it makes all this …” He waved his hand aimlessly at the wreckage around them. “It makes it all mean something, somehow.” He sucked on his pipe again and stuffed tobacco into the bowl with a calloused thumb. “But if you don’t mind me saying, sir, most women would prefer not to wait that long to get married. I mean, sir, we are at war and things happen.”

  Ramsay stood up and retrieved a packet of army issue biscuits. The men were beginning to settle down now so he gave orders for them to start a small fire, brew up some tea and rustle up hot food.

  I should be more in control here, but they need some time before we enter the town. God alone knows how we can get past Fritz, or how many of us make it.

  “You mean I may get killed, McKim.”

  “Yes, sir. And leave your lady without the memory of a marriage.”

 

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