A New Kind of War dda-17

by Anthony Price

  ‘So I was. But that doesna make me a fool, by God!’ (Pause. And then the finger wagged again, this time at Audley.) ‘You know where I was, in the winter of ’39?‘

  (Pause.) ‘You were in on the poison gas trials in the Sahara, Alec.

  You’ve told us.’ (The boy’s voice fell just short of disrespect.)

  ‘So I was. And on the anthrax trials, on that wee island – that wee island where no man nor beast will step in our lifetime, and live to tell the tale. So what would that make me, if the Geairrmans had won, eh?’

  (Pause.) ‘A war criminal, Alec. You told us.’

  ‘A war criminal. And they would have stretched my neck for it.

  And me just a slip of a lad, obeying orders.’ (Contempt.) ‘Nazis!’

  ‘Nazis – yes.’ (Amos de Souza, smooth as ever from down the table.) ‘Get to your point Alec.’

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  ‘My point? Why, I’m there, man: none of ye understand what the Nazis were all about . . . and how the Geairrmans didna understand the man Hitler, until he had them in the palm of his hand – how the Right saw the man as something temporary, which they could cut down to size. And the Left – the Socialists and the Communists both . . . they didna understand him either: they thought he was parrt of the Right. Whereas in fact he was sui generis.“

  (Longer pause, while ‘sui generis’ echoed in the dark, above the candle-light in the wet-smell, faint-alcoholic-tobacco-soap-and-underarm-sweat-and-khaki-smell . . . British-Army-smell, not so different from Greece – Germany-now-smell; but what was different now was that this man was in an altogether different officers’ mess from anything Fred had experienced before: it was bloody weird –)

  ‘Alec, my dear fellow . . . regardless of your quaint theories about Hitler himself – ’ (Now it was Colonel Colbourne himself at last, equal-to-equal, and slightly cautious.)‘ – to pursue Amos’s point . . . Nazis – ?’

  (Pause.) ‘Aye, sir – Gus . . . We’ve been arresting the wrong men, is what I’m saying – it’s a bluidy nonsense, is what it is.’ (Pause.)

  ‘And I don’t mean just us, of course . . . But it’s beginning to be our problem, with nobody to talk to, who can give us answers.’ (Pause.) ‘Och ... I mean, they’ve been taking in the police inspectors, and their sergeants . . . and the wee bluidy postman, and the station-master, and the schoolmaster . . . never mind the mayor, and the little civil servants . . . And I’m fed up, and sick, and bluidy tired of getting “don’t know” from what’s left, dummy4

  when I ask what you want me to ask.’

  ‘So what are you suggesting, then?’

  (Pause.) ‘What I am suggesting, sirrr – Gus ... is that we do like the Russians and the French have already done: we either shoot them out of hand, if we don’t like them. Or we leave them where they are, to do our work, which needs to be done.’ (Pause.) ‘And we get back all the middle rank servants too, from the camps – all young David’s Nazis, who had to join Corporal Hitler’s democratically-elected Party, or lose their jobs . . . They’re the ones who’ll do our work for us now, much better then we can do. And then we can always shoot them afterwards, if someone tells us to do so.’ (Pause.) ‘Because, having won the war, that’s our privilege –

  right? But, in the meantime, we have to make this country work, do you see?’

  (Pause.) ‘We see what you mean, Alec – and we have heard it all before, actually.’ (Major Macallister’s voice was calm and donnish now that his plate was empty.) ‘And ... I do agree that our work would be a lot easier if our people – ours and the Americans’ –

  behaved more pragmatically, as the Russians and the French are doing ... I would agree there. But – ’

  ‘But it isn’t our job to run this country.’ (Amos de Souza’s tone poured oil on troubled waters, in default of imposing ‘mess rules’

  on his brother officers in a more generalized grey area of argument.) ’Our job ... is to obey our orders as best we can, with things as they are.‘

  (Pause.) ‘And there are still people who can help us, you know, dummy4

  Alec.’ (Audley sounded eager and very young suddenly, and ingratiating with it; but that might be to keep the Crocodile away from Sergeant Devenish and Driver Hewitt!) ‘I found a super policeman, just the other day. And he said – ’

  ‘Shut up, David!’ (Colonel Colbourne’s sharp command belied its own ‘mess rules’ friendliness.) ’That’s enough.‘

  ‘You were saying, Alec – ’ (De Souza moved in smoothly behind his commanding officer, to obliterate Audley’s gaffe.) ‘ – you met this AMGOT fellow, who was shitting bricks ... so what did he have to say, then?’

  ‘Eh?’ (The Crocodile struggled with de Souza’s direct question for a moment, unable to avoid it.) ‘Listen to the rain, man – do ye no hear it?’

  (For another moment they all listened to the sound of the rain splashing distantly over brimming gutters.) ‘So it’s raining?’ (Amos de Souza smiled.) ‘According to Gus’s American friend, Major Austin, it’s raining all the way from here to London

  – and Land’s End in Cornwall ... So what?’

  ‘Aye. And that’s the sound of Europe starving this winter, man.’ (The Crocodile had forgotten his Nazis, and Sergeant Devenish and Driver Hewitt with them. But suddenly he was looking at Fred now.) ‘Was it England ye flew from this day, man

  – ?’

  ‘What – ?’ (The memory of the hair-raising flight was equally best-forgotten!.) ‘No. It was . . .’ (Best forgotten!)

  ‘Oh aye! From Greece, it was – ?’ (Pause.) ‘Are they starving dummy4

  there?’ (Pause.) ‘If it goes on raining, and the harvest fails . . . then the Americans will be feeding us by the autumn – aye, and feeding the Geairrmans too, if they’re lucky – the Nazis and all the rest, as well as Number 21 in the picture tonight – ’

  ‘Alec!’ (Colbourne didn’t say ‘Shut up!’ to Major McCorquodale, but he came close to doing so.)

  ‘I was in England not so long ago, actually.’ (A new voice came from down the table, almost as lazy as de Souza’s, from one of the faceless officers outside Fred’s direct range of vision.) ‘In London ... it was quite dreadfully . . . threadbare, you know. So I thought about Paris. But, apparently, it’s just as bad there – the fellow at the Embassy I spoke to said that you had to bow and scrape to head waiters to get any sort of decent meal . . . and as I wasn’t going to do that I ended up going down to our place in the country, where my wife is ... where I thought I might at least get a square meal – away from the rationing with no bowing and scraping – ?’

  ‘Oh aye?’ (The Crocodile leant forward to fix an insulting eye on the interrupter.) ‘And, of course, your family does own half of Wiltshire, doesn’t it, Johnnie. Or is it Berkshire? So they wouldn’t be starving, then.’

  ‘Starving – ?’

  They say – ‘ (Amos overbore the beginnings of Johnnie’s outrage diplomatically, like the good adjutant he was.) ’ – they do say that the hunting in the shires will be exceptionally good this autumn. Is that true, Johnnie?‘

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  ‘Is that a fact?’ (The Crocodile got in first.) ‘And how do they eat the foxes down in Wiltshire? Da they roast them over a slow fire?

  I’d have thought fox-meat would be a wee bit tough, and stringy . . . Maybe you should ask Otto how he cooks foxes, man?

  That is, unless Oscar Wilde knew what he was talking about – “the unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable”, didn’t he say?’

  (Christ! The Colonel must do something now! Because that was as naked an insult as might be imagined in this company – not even Amos de Souza’s diplomacy could gloss over the Crocodile’s deliberate scorn!) ‘

  ‘Eh – ?’ (Down among the candles and the silver and the glasses

  ‘Johnnie’ wasn’t quite sure he’d heard what the Crocodile had said.) ‘Who – ?’

  ‘My ancestors ate rats,’ said de Souza. ‘The rats ate the ship’s biscuits – and then they ate the rat
s. But that was in Nelson’s time, in the navy. But they used to say that a biscuit-fed rat was as good as a rabbit. So maybe rabbit-fed fox isn’t so bad, perhaps?’

  That’s a most interesting proposition, you know.‘ (The mention of food enlivened Philip Macallister’s otherwise dry, academic delivery.) ’Dog, which I ate in Shanghai . . . dog is perfectly edible

  – even potentially delicious. And rat certainly has a long and honourable history of consumption in the extremities of siege-warfare.‘ (Now the voice was gourmet-academic.) ’Human flesh is preferable to both, I’m told. But I’ve never been reduced to that extremity.‘ (Horribly, the voice was characterized by faint regret, rather than distaste.) ’I believe that sailors ate it often enough in the old days. But as it was usually uncooked; they left no recipes dummy4

  for it.‘

  ‘Oh aye?’ (The favourite Crocodilian-Scottish interruption.) ‘Well, there’ll be Gearrimans able to satisfy your curiosity there, Philip, before this time next year, I shouldna wonder. So dinna give up hope, man.’

  (Pause – pause elongating into embarrassed and horrified silence as those who had not finished their wild boar suddenly contemplated it with wilder doubt for an instant, and then with distaste.)

  ‘I see.’ (Amos coughed politely.) ‘What you’re saying, Alec ... is that the Germans will be starving soon – is that all?’

  (Fred swallowed his last mouthful of boar with an effort, feeling it go down insufficiently chewed, to join the deer ham which was churning up in his guts.)

  ‘What I have been saying, Amos – ’ (The Crocodile pushed his empty plate away and reached for a toothpick with which to dislodge a morsel of meat from between his teeth.)‘ – is that the wee foolish men who are supposed to be making policy for us do not know what they are doing. They are starving the Geairrmans by accident, not by design. While the Russians, they have no such problems because they have no romantic notions about their roles as conquerors. So, with them, the Geairrmans know exactly where they are . . . Whereas, with us – why man, they know us for the fools we are! So the clever ones among them . . . they are neither scairt of us, nor do they trust us.’ (The Crocodile reached for his glass, and held it up to the candles’ light for an instant, and then drained it in one swallow, knowing that he had the whole table dummy4

  hanging on his next pronouncement.) ‘Waiter!’ (He waited while the one-eyed Otto refilled his glass and then raised it mockingly to the Colonel.) ‘Which may well be why this unit is having such little success, I’m thinking – eh, Colonel sirrr? Or may we hope for better luck tonight – ?’

  Click-click-click!

  For Christ’s sake! thought Fred, in a panic: he should have been clicking and he’d clean forgotten!

  Click-click-click!

  ‘Fred?’

  Utter darkness, all around him: dripping, utter darkness.

  And . . . ‘ This is how it must have been,’ Audley had said. But what had he meant?

  ‘David?’

  A sodden, muted-crunching sound. ‘Thank God for that! I thought I’d never find you – I’ve been straining my ears, but I couldn’t bloody-well hear a sound . . . You have been clicking, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ He still couldn’t really see Audley. But somehow the voice created the person.

  ‘It’s the rain.’ Amos de Souza’s voice came out of an adjacent area of darkness. ‘Don’t let it confuse your senses.’

  ‘It doesn’t seem to confuse you, I must say,’ Audley half-grumbled. ‘But I suppose we should be comforted by that. Or is it dummy4

  just adjutant’s quiet, misplaced confidence?’

  ‘Probably. Hullo there, Freddie. Sorry you’ve been left alone like this. Hope you’re not too wet.’

  ‘I’m fine. David gave me his umbrella.’ He could just make out the loom of them now. And de Souza’s quiet confidence was somehow comforting. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

  ‘Yes, there is, actually. David explained what’s happening, did he?’

  ‘Ah ... no, I didn’t actually – ’

  ‘Why the devil not?’ De Souza’s tone sharpened.

  ‘Hold on, Amos! I didn’t get the chance before dinner –or after.

  And then we had the devil of a job getting to the start line here, I tell you. So there just wasn’t time. Apart from which we should have left him behind, in any case – ’ Audley caught his complaint.

  ‘I don’t mean that insultingly, Fred. But we had Caesar Augustus’s briefing before you arrived. And I thought you’d rather have a decent night’s kip than tag along behind this shambles – ’

  ‘Do shut up, David, there’s a good fellow.’ Mild reproof overlaid de Souza’s earlier sharpness. ‘It isn’t a shambles–’

  ‘Thank God for that! We can’t afford another – ’

  ‘ Shut up . . . Captain Audley.’ De Souza paused just long enough to make sure that discipline had been reestablished. ‘Let me assure you that it isn’t a shambles, major. In fact, thanks to the efficiency of our loyal American allies, it seems to be going strictly according to plan at this moment.’

  A shaded flashlight illuminated the ground between them suddenly in a pale yellow circle. ‘Don’t worry, major – we’re a mile from dummy4

  the objective, and several hundred feet of well-forested undulations. But I want to show you the map. And then Captain Audley can fill you in with the details . . . Just hold your umbrella up, over us – okay?’

  Fred glimpsed a cellophane-covered map, and below it a soiled canvas bag at de Souza’s feet on the edge of the yellow circle, as he raised Audley’s umbrella over them both.

  ‘We’re here – ’ The flashlight seemed to be attached to de Souza’s waterproof jacket somehow, leaving him a free hand ‘ – that red circle marked “A1”. And next we’re moving up to “A2” – there.’

  It was not an issue map. But that didn’t matter – what mattered was that he could see the operation at a glance: the objective was an isolated building in thick forest, and there were a number of routes

  – forest tracks? – converging on it; and each was marked with a series of numbered letters and times which brought different groups to precise points simultaneously on the circumferences of ever-smaller circles, until they reached the centre.

  ‘Yes, sir?’ It all seemed rather elaborate, until he remembered all TRR-2’s ‘bad luck’ in the past. And it wasn’t for him, as a new recruit, to criticize, anyway. ‘Nobody’s going to get out of there.’

  But then he became aware of the darkness outside their own yellow circle. ‘Except ... it is damnably dark – ?’

  ‘Don’t worry. Our American friends are bringing up searchlights –

  “B”, “D” and “F” will illuminate the objective at 0230 hours precisely. Then it’ll be brighter than daylight around the whole perimeter. And in case you’re wondering how we’re going to dummy4

  manage a silent final approach, just don’t give it a thought.’

  ‘No – yes?’ Fred had been worrying about no such thing, but the mention of the American involvement made de Souza’s confidence all the more surprising. This was their zone, of course, so presumable they had a right to be involved. But he remembered floundering all-too-noisily in Italian darkness (and Italian mud), hauling equipment across country to several disastrous river-crossing attempts.

  ‘Yes.’ De Souza chuckled softly. ‘Dealing with silence will be Major Jake Austin’s contribution – you met him this afternoon, off the plane, I believe – ?’ The adjutant bent down to retrieve the canvas bag. ‘A most efficient officer, Jake . . . But here, Freddie – ’

  He thrust the bag at Fred ‘ – you hold on to this, and follow David here . . . And David – you tell him what’s what, eh? Any questions?’

  Audley emitted a strangled sound, but then silenced himself.

  ‘You were going to say something David?’ The torch went out, leaving them in blind man’s darkness. ‘Spit it out, man!’

  How the hell
were they going to find their way to A2? thought Fred despairingly as he hugged the bag. For Christ’s sake ask that!

  ‘N-no.’ Audley trailed off.

  ‘Good. Then I’ll see you again at A2. And do try to be on time for once.’

  Gradually Fred’s night-sight returned, so that he could just make out the large vague shape of Audley as he squeezed the bag’s contents. It had an incomprehensively soft feel to it ... but it wasn’t dummy4

  entirely soft: in fact, from its weight it almost certainly contained a weapon of some sort, wrapped in some sort of thick material . . .

  and also what felt uncommonly like ... a pair of boots. A pair of boots – ?

  There were two slight crack-crunch sounds as de Souza trod on fallen branches in departing. Then the sodden, dripping forest-silence closed in on them – a not-so-quiet silence, to go with the not-quite darkness.

  ‘God, it’s miserable, isn’t it!’ exclaimed Audley. ‘Although, you know, I don’t think it’s raining quite so hard, actually. And the American weather chaps said it would be clearing from the west before dawn – that was Jake Austin’s final contribution at this afternoon’s briefing before he went off to collect you . . . Do you think it’s clearing, Fred?’

  Dawn was still a very long way away, thought Fred. ‘Jake Austin is the pig-fancier, is he?’

  ‘Yes. Good chap, though – jolly efficient, like Amos said. Ex-Mustang pilot . . . but into all sorts of nefarious enterprises now.

  Shall we go, then?’

  He sounded confident! ‘You know which way to go, then?’

  ‘Oh yes – sure . . . You know, it is raining less – good show!

  Actually, I’m blind as a bat at night – it was a great mercy that we couldn’t fight tanks in the dark, in the late nastiness . . . “Just follow the rear light of the tank in front”, when they wanted to get us somewhere before dawn, out of the laager . . . and I could depend on my driver for that. But at least they didn’t expect us to dummy4

  fight. Next time round, it’ll be done by radar – goggling at screens and pushing little buttons. But with a bit of luck I shall n’t be there