by CL Skelton
Suddenly Andrew stiffened. A shadowy figure emerged from the far side of the building. The figure leaned over the guard, who moved convulsively only once, and then was still, his musket still across his knees. MacMilan straightened up and beckoned them towards him. The guard looked just the same as before, only now there was a thin cord drawn tightly around his neck.
The door was not locked. They pushed it open and slipped inside, closing it quietly behind them. It was pitch-dark inside as they stood by the door waiting for their eyes to become accustomed to the light, each man clutching either dirk or revolver. And then they found him.
Willie was lying naked on a pile of filthy straw, trussed up like a chicken, but alive.
‘Leave him,’ hissed Andrew as one of the men started forward to cut Willie’s bonds. ‘Now, two of you guard the door and the other three down underneath the window.’
Andrew crept over to where Willie lay and cut the filthy gag which was around his mouth. ‘Willie, are you all right?’ he said.
‘It’s guid to see you,’ said Willie. ‘Thanks.’
‘Listen,’ said Andrew, ‘I’m not going to cut you loose yet. The battalion is moving in and we don’t want to attract any attention here until they arrive. You have to look just the way you are if anybody looks through that window. The guard’s dead, but he looks as if he’s asleep. We’re all right there, unless anyone tries to talk to him. Do you understand?’
‘Aye,’ said Willie. ‘I wouldna be much use anyway. They were a bitty rough wi’ me yesterday, but another wee whilie will no mak all that difference.’
Andrew crept back to the men at the other side of the hut and crouched down with them. Corporal Campbell and Private Gibson were either side of the door.
‘If anybody comes through that door,’ said Andrew, ‘kill them. But kill them quietly, for God’s sake. No more talking now. Nothing should happen until we hear the pipes. As soon as we hear them, Private Maclean, you go and cut Major Bruce loose and you can give him your revolver. Until then, we’ve got to wait and hope that we don’t have any visitors.’
As the light slowly began to filter through the single window, their surroundings became more clear. It was a single room, so there was nowhere anyone else could be concealed within the building, and there was only the one entrance with its dead sentinel sitting outside.
They had not been there long, between five and ten minutes, when Corporal Campbell whispered to Andrew, ‘I think that’s them, sir.’ They strained, listening, and sure enough, clear and sweet on the morning air came the sound of the regimental march.
‘Now,’ said Andrew.
Private Maclean crept to where Willie was lying and cut through his bonds. Willie flexed his hands and struggled into a sitting position. ‘Thanks,’ he said. He was obviously suffering, and the marks of the lash could be seen all over his body.
‘Do you want this, sir?’ asked Maclean, offering him the Webley.
‘Nay, laddie,’ said Willie. ‘You’ll be able to make better use of it than I can. Gi’ me yon dirk, just in case one gets real close.’
‘Quiet,’ hissed Andrew. ‘Visitors.’
The door opened and two Pathans came in, carrying curved swords. Corporal Campbell and Frankie Gibson let them get right inside, and then, each picking his man, stepped up behind them and cut their throats. They left them where they fell, in a gurgling pool of blood.
‘Shut the bloody door,’ called Andrew.
Campbell was about to do this when another figure appeared in the doorway and the body of the guard fell across in front of him. Campbell fired twice and slammed the door. ‘Now we’re for it,’ he said. ‘The bastards ken we’re here noo. We’ll have the whole bloody lot of them on top of us.’
‘We could still be lucky,’ said Andrew.
There was a great deal of noise coming from outside and it became obvious that the Pathans were already clearing out of the village and heading for the hills.
Somebody came to the door and as it started to open, Andrew fired through the wood. There was a scream, followed by a babble of voices from outside.
‘Come on, lads,’ cried Andrew. ‘We’ll gather round Major Bruce and try to hold them off until the regiment gets here.’
They waited but nothing happened; it had even gone quiet outside.
‘I dinna like this,’ said Munroe.
‘Why the hell don’t they do something?’ said Maclean.
‘They just have,’ said Corporal Campbell. ‘Can you no smell the smoke? They’re burning us oot.’
Sure enough, wisps of black smoke followed by small flickering flames were beginning to creep around the base of the hut.
Andrew turned to Willie. ‘Willie, can you walk?’
‘Awa oot, I’ll look after ma self.’
‘Campbell,’ ordered Andrew, ‘help the major. We’ll have to get out, but we’ll go as late as possible.’
They had little time, however. The dry timbers were soon well ablaze. Their only exit was through the door, and on the other side of the door the Pathans would be waiting for them.
‘Now, lads, let’s go,’ cried Andrew. ‘We’ll take as many of them with us as we can.’
Lieutenant Farquhar, who had moved his Gatling gun forward to a hillock overlooking the whole village with a range of less than five hundred yards, saw the smoke. He also saw the armed men outside and guessed what was happening. He gave his gunner the target and ordered him to open fire. As the firing started, he was horrified to see figures emerge from the hut right in the middle of the fleeing Pathans. Three of the seven who came out fell and lay still before the order to cease fire was out of his mouth.
Chapter Twenty-three
Andrew put down his three-day-old copy of the Bombay Times and looked up as Willie came into the hospital room they were sharing. It was a pleasant room, and there were two beds and the usual array of functional hospital furniture, but the two weeks spent in bed were starting to bore them both.
‘I envy you, Willie,’ said Andrew. Willie was to be discharged the next day. ‘I never realized the joy of just being able to move around until this happened.’
He glanced ruefully down towards the foot of the bed. ‘One and a half legs. Poor Farquhar will never forgive himself. But he did the right thing, we were just unlucky. Campbell certainly was.’
‘Aye,’ said Willie, ‘I’ve written to his people.’
‘Thanks, Willie. Ah well, it’s back to Culbrech for me; my soldiering is over.’
‘Och, awa, man,’ said Willie. ‘Your father managed on one and a half eyes, I don’t see why you shouldn’t manage on one and a half legs.’
‘Willie,’ replied Andrew, ‘you could never wear a pegleg with the kilt. But have you heard the news? I’ve just been reading it.’
‘What news?’ said Willie.
‘It’s about us. We’ve got a name at last. We’re not the 148th Foot, not anymore.’
‘You mean a proper name? Like the Coldstreams?’
‘Better,’ said Andrew. ‘From today, we are officially the Maclaren Highlanders. What do you think of that?’
‘Great, man, just great,’ said Willie. Then, noticing Andrew’s expression, ‘Is there something wrong wi’ it?’
‘No, no,’ said Andrew. ‘Not really. But you know that you are getting the regiment. You will be the first commanding officer under that name. There could be no better, Willie. Forgive me, but I wish you had been a Maclaren, and not a Bruce.’
‘Och, man,’ said Willie, laughing, ‘is that all? I’m every bit as much a Maclaren as you are. Did ye no ken that I was spawned from the same pair of breeks as yoursel’? Do you mean to tell me that you’ve lived all these years and not known that?’
‘You mean that it is true?’ said Andrew, barely concealing his delight.
‘Och, aye,’ said Willie. ‘I never thought that you didna ken. I never talked aboot it, but why do you think that our father made me an allowance of three hundred pounds a year so that I coul
d take a commission in our regiment?’
Andrew looked at Willie for a long time before he spoke. ‘So you really are my brother.’
‘Well, your half-brother, anyway,’ said Willie, making light of it.
‘Take my hand,’ said Andrew. ‘For all my life I have wanted a man for a brother, and now I find that I have always had him, the finest Maclaren of them all.’
‘Aye,’ said Willie. ‘Now speaking as family, I think it is high time you produced the bottle of The Glenlivet which you had smuggled in this morning.’
‘I might have known,’ said Andrew.
‘I’ve brought some glasses, just in case you’d forgotten them.’ Andrew leaned over the side of the bed, but Willie stopped him. ‘Here, it’s all right, I’ll get it for you. I ken where you hid it.’
Willie rummaged about under Andrew’s bed and came out with the bottle. He put the two glasses down on the table and filled them to the brim, and handed one to Andrew.
‘Well, Willie,’ said Andrew, ‘here’s to the Maclaren Highlanders!’
They raised their glasses.
‘The right of the line,’ said Willie.
‘The terrors of the Punjab,’ said Andrew.
‘The bloodsuckers of Burma,’ said Willie.
‘And the pride of the British army,’ they chatted together.
‘For God’s sake, don’t man,’ said Willie as Andrew was about to throw his glass, ‘there’s more in the bottle.’
There was a tap at the door and Willie, with a dexterity born of the long years in the ranks, had the bottle and glasses out of sight before the nurse came into their room.
‘There is a lady asking to see you gentlemen,’ said the nurse.
‘Who?’ said Andrew.
‘She said that I was to tell you that it was Maud. She would not give her surname.’
‘Ask her to come up,’ said Willie, and as the nurse went out, he turned to Andrew. ‘It’s better to get this over now.’
‘But Willie ‒’
‘Dinna say anything, let the lassie decide.’
A moment later Maud came in. Though she had been travelling most of the day, she looked fresh and beautiful and somehow serene. She came in and walked between the two men and leaned over Andrew.
‘I’m so sorry, Andrew. Please get well soon.’
Then she turned to Willie. ‘Willie, darling, I’ve come to take you home. May I?’
Willie looked down at Andrew and saw that he was grinning. Not smiling, but grinning. Willie turned to Maud.
‘Nay, wife,’ he said. ‘You’ll tak me to a hotel here in Rawalpindi so that we can come and visit ma brother every day till he’s better.’
‘Your ‒?’
‘Get oot, I’ll tell you when I’m good and ready.’
The Matron walked slowly and silently down the polished corridor of the hospital on her rounds. She paused for a moment outside of room 24. She tut-tutted as she heard the chink of glasses from within. She pursed her lips as she heard the boisterous laughter, and she shrugged her shoulders in resignation as she heard Andrew’s voice burst into song, soon taken up by that other major and the lady, if anyone who would sing so vulgar a song could be a lady.
We are Maclaren’s army,
The Highland Infantry,
We cannot fight, we cannot sing,
What bloody use are we?
And when we get to India,
We’ll hear the Viceroy say,
Hoch, hoch, mein Gott,
What a bloody fine lot,
To earn sixpence a day.
The Matron turned and headed back down the corridor. She would really have to report this behaviour to the Principal Medical Officer.
Sweethearts and Wives by C. L. Skelton
Sweethearts and Wives, part two in the Regiment Family Saga, is the gripping sequel to The Maclarens. Keep reading for a preview of Chapter One and details of where to buy the book.
The north-east wind had brought with it the hoar; that mist which is nearly rain, that fills the air with droplets of water so fine as to be near invisible, but which will cut through a man’s thick woollen doublet and give his shirt a clammy dampness that lies cold and cloying on his skin.
The barrack square was deserted and silent and miserable in that cold, grey, near dawn. It was surrounded by the shadowy piles of the barrack blocks, which glistened pink from the Moray sandstone of their building whenever the sun struck them, but now, in the gloom, were grey and damp. Here and there little rivulets ran half-heartedly down the walls where some imperfection in the guttering allowed the water which had oozed down the Ballachulish slates of the roofs to escape to the earth whence it came.
The square itself, upon which a thousand boots had stamped a million times, was scattered with little pools where the water had gathered wherever there was an indentation in the pounded surface. Here and there a yellow light was reflected fitfully in a pool, a light which gleamed pathetically through a window as it awaited the approaching dawn. But there was no one there, no single person in sight; it was a world damp, deserted, and dead.
It was November, 1883, and the first battalion the Maclaren Highlanders, until recently the 148th Regiment of Foot, were parading at their home barracks just south of Beauly, some nine miles north of Inverness. They were not on the parade ground, for the work they were to do that morning was not a deed that could be performed in an area cocooned among tall buildings of pink Moray sandstone.
They were standing easy, grim faced, on the east side of the buildings which comprised their home. They had formed three sides of a hollow square, the open side of which led down to the mud flats of the Beauly Firth. In the centre of this gap, standing like a grim sentinel, was a single raw, rough wooden post some six inches in diameter, driven into the sandy ground.
They had put it there last night, four of them. They had gone out, stern faced and solemn, to the scrub birch which grew, like a weed, in profusion around the Beauly Firth. There they had felled a young tree. They had stripped it of its bark so that it was slimy to the touch. Then they had added a point at one end. They had carried it to the barracks and hammered it firmly into the sandy ground. All of this they had done in total silence, for, rough soldiers though they were, they did not talk of the purpose of their task.
Facing the post the battalion were dressed in review order, kilts, spats, red doublets, crossbelts, and feather bonnets. They carried no packs but leaned silently on their Snider rifles, without even an attempt at an illegal whispered conversation when their pacing N.C.O.s were out of earshot.
Behind the waiting men and out of their sight, shielded by the tall barrack buildings, a small squad of men marched from the armoury towards the guardroom. At the guardroom, Lieutenant Donald Bruce was pacing nervously as the squad halted facing the open doorway. These twelve men had been drawn by lot from the various companies in the battalion, three from each. They stood in open order, six to a file, rifles at the slope, as Donald walked quickly through the ranks in a cursory inspection. Lieutenant Bruce was tall; even taller than his father who commanded the regiment, and Willie was all of six feet. Donald had his father’s looks, reddish-blond hair and blue eyes, but lacked something of the colonel’s ruggedness, the squareness of jaw, and the set of his shoulders. Of course, he was barely twenty and would fill out as he grew older, but his features were more finely etched, gentler. Gentleness was probably his most outstanding characteristic. Willie Bruce had been brought up on a small croft and then in the rough, tough world of the barrack room. Donald Bruce had known none of that, he had always been treated as a gentleman and a gentle man he had become. The eyes of father and son, which were so alike at first glance, were different in reality. The colonel’s seized you with their power and held you until they were ready to allow your release; the colonel’s commanded. Donald’s did not. His eyes welcomed you and inspected you almost with deference. They were the same blue as his father’s, the same blue as all of the Bruces and the Maclarens, but they were
not the same eyes.
Donald had a habit, whenever questioned, of drawing the three middle fingers of his right hand slowly down the line of his jaw-bone and stopping at the point of his chin. Then he would rub his lips together and, having made his consideration, give you his reply in a softly modulated tone. He was slow to talk, as if words were important to him, but he was quick to listen, ever willing to hear the other point of view. Those who met him in civilian clothes were always surprised to discover that he was a soldier. A cleric or a doctor, yes, but Donald Bruce did not give the impression of being the military type. However this was not quite a fair assessment, for he had studied at the Royal Military College at Sandhurst with rare distinction, winning that august establishment’s highest award, the Sword of Honour. He had joined the regiment flushed with success, only to have his father make it abundantly clear to him that academic prowess and the Sword of Honour were no guarantee of a good regimental officer.
The inspection over, he stood the men at ease and continued his fretful pacing, expressionless. He glanced quickly at the other party which stood waiting in front of the guardroom; four men, two on either side of a long box of rough pine, painted black. Then with equal haste he averted his gaze. Donald glanced at his watch. It still wanted ten minutes until nine o’clock; that would be dawn, officially. He tried with no success to keep his mind off that which he knew was taking place beyond the door of the guardroom, and what he would have to do during the next fifteen minutes. In his mind’s eye he could see his father reading out the sentence of the court martial and the warrant for the execution of that sentence. It had been the only possible verdict. But it had had to go to the office of the Commander-in-Chief Scotland, in Edinburgh, for confirmation. So the condemned man had lived on a few more days waiting for the inevitable return of his sentence of death. It had arrived the previous afternoon and now Jimmy Grigor would be listening to Willie Bruce as he read it.