by Alan Evans
Jameson nodded; he already knew that and that he and his men were to form part of the defensive screen in case of a Turkish patrol coming this way. Smith told Brand, “Get up to that crest now. The lighters are coming in.” He ran down the bank again to stand beside Edwards who held a masked torch, its glow pointing seaward. They waited by the ford as the lighters came on, in line ahead as they ran into the mouth of the river steering by that pinprick of light from the torch held by Edwards. Smith looked for the motor-boat from Dauntless and saw it by the far shore. The first lighter was thrusting in steadily, easily now in this sheltered water, and Smith could hear the putter of its engine. A low, flat, black shape with just a creaming of a bow wave. A shift of the wind brought the smell of horses to Smith’s seaman’s nostrils. He wondered how Jackson and his troop of hard-swearing horsemen had coped with their mounts on the long run from Deir el Belah.
He flashed the ‘A’ again and the engine of the lighter stopped, thrashed briefly astern, stopped again. She slid on gently with the way left on her, and grounded on the ford. There was a trampling and clattering aboard her. Smith saw a horse’s head lifted briefly above the bulwark and a voice came clearly, “Hold still, yer flamin’ cow —!”
The ramp was coming down and Smith waded out on to the ford towards it. Buckley loomed beside him and Smith said, “Tell Captain Brand the Australians are coming ashore.” Buckley splashed away and Smith waded on, the river nearly up to his waist now, but he could feel firm sand under his feet.
He came to the lighter as the ramp hit the water and drenched him in spray. He wiped with one hand at his face, saw a man, tall, slouch-hatted, striding over the hump in the ramp and then down into the waters of the ford. He was half-turned to heave on the reins of the horse that followed him gingerly. Smith recognised Jackson and waved with the pistol, pointed, shouted, “Head for Edwards! On the bank! See him?” Edwards in his robes was a pale blur.
Jackson answered laconically, “I see him.” He waded towards the shore. The horse bucked and kicked as it plunged into the river but Jackson cursed, hauled it on, and as it became surer of its footing it followed him more easily. A trooper towing his horse was following Jackson over the ramp and another came after him. The second lighter slid in close alongside the first and grounded with a thump! Smith waded on past it, was drenched again as its ramp crashed down and Taggart ran over it to jump into the water.
Taggart carried a rifle across his chest. He grinned at Smith, a flash of teeth in the darkness, and headed for the bank. Smith pushed on, seeing the third lighter and beyond it the fourth, creeping in. And there against the far bank lay Dauntless’s motor-boat.
Smith splashed out on to the bank and was met by Lieutenant Griffiths, the gunnery observer. He was out-of-breath but he reported with satisfaction, “Our marines are deployed at the top o’ the bank, sir. Sergeant Harriman’s up there. The whole country seems quiet but the Vickers is set up with a good field o’ fire.” He added, “We slipped in ahead o’ the lighters like you said, sir. Kept as close in to the bank as we dared.”
Smith nodded and used his torch, shielded inside his hand, to glance quickly at his watch. They were two or three minutes ahead of time but he might need all of that and more.
He re-traced his wading passage across the ford and this time he had to push his way among the men of Taggart’s battalion who streamed towards the shore in a stumbling, breathless, hurrying mob. They stared straight ahead and Smith had to fight his way through them. And silently they moved, he never heard a word.
All four lighters were aground now. When the water fell to his knees he managed to run, awkwardly, lifting his feet high like a prancing horse. He thought briefly that he must look a fool but he didn’t care if it got him ashore the quicker.
The bank swarmed with men. Their boots whispered, scuffing, trampling in the sand, and there was an overtone of hoarse whispering, “Ack Company here!” “Beer Company here!” “Charlie Company —” He ran past them and came on the Australians where the solid block of them stood holding their horses’ heads. Edwards stood by Jackson, and he held the reins of two horses.
Smith asked, “Ready?”
“Yes.” Then Jackson added, “— sir.”
Smith took a breath. Now for it. He said to Edwards, “Hold the thing still.” Smith had ridden horses but knew he was no horseman, nor ever wanted to be. But Edwards held the horse’s head, Smith found a stirrup and clawed himself up into the saddle, gathering the reins. There was a guffaw in the Australian ranks, cut short as Jackson said, “Shut it, Jasper!”
Edwards mounted with the ease of practice and Buckley said, “Sir?”
Smith stared down at Buckley, remembering him too late. “There isn’t a horse.” Smith was astride the only spare.
But Jackson said, “Jasper Beaver! You put this sailor up behind you! Mount!”
The troopers mounted as one and the voice of Jasper Beaver complained, “Aw, Christ! Come on, Buckley, chum. The ol’ neddy ain’t going to like this but he’ll stick it.”
Smith saw Buckley hauled up behind the big trooper but then Edwards was spurring his horse at the bank. Jackson swung alongside and his hand shot out to grab at Smith’s reins so they went up the bank together with Smith clinging on for dear life.
Up. And over. Smith was bouncing along, Jackson on one side of him, Edwards on the other. The track was faint, only just discernible in the darkness but following the line of the river as it curved to run south and then turned eastward again. There Edwards reined in and said, “One man.” The track joined another that ran due south and this was broader, clearly seen.
Jackson said, “Phil!” And a man wheeled out of the ranks to wait at the junction to guide the foot-soldiers coming on behind as the rest of the troop turned on to the main track and rode on to the south.
The track was climbing gently now but the horsemen were hurrying, Edwards leading at a fast canter, a muffled thrumming of hooves in the sand, squeak of leather and jingling of harness. Smith risked a glance behind him and saw the troop closed up tight behind, hastening, eager. And beyond them was the black glint of the river with the white of the surf at its mouth.
He faced forward. They passed a hump of ground rising on their right hand and briefly the track descended before lifting again. Now he could see the ground falling away on either hand, to his left to the plain, to his right down to the sea.
Dauntless was out there, somewhere.
There was a village ahead, a scattering of houses closed and dark on both sides of the track: Summeil. They dashed through it. Stealth was pointless; the villagers could tell no one of what they heard, if they knew what they heard. And anyway, stealth was impossible.
Smith’s legs and rump were sore. The track was climbing again now and they came on a road that was the Jaffa-Tul Karam road but deserted in the night and they crossed it without pause, leaving another trooper to mark the way. To the left and a quarter mile away lay the houses of the village of Sarona, dark and silent, but the troop hurried southward, rode on up a long, gentle rise until they came to the crest, lifted over it and trotted down on the other side for two hundred yards. There they halted. They had ridden some three miles.
Smith slid off the horse and shoved the reins at the nearest trooper. He was done with it and thought the horse might be almost as glad as himself. He hobbled stiffly forward, rubbing his thighs, to stand by Edwards and saw Buckley coming up, walking as gingerly as himself. So somebody else was in the same boat. He grinned at Buckley. “Enjoy yourself?”
Buckley was not amused, answered shortly, “No, sir. Me arse feels as if its up between me ears.”
So Buckley was all right. But Smith was looking around. He had been able to afford that moment of humour, just, because the railway track was empty. It ran away down to his right, twin lines of dull silver in the night, towards the distant black hump of Jaffa. Further round to his right he could make out the black, square-cut shapes of houses, slightly below him and about a quart
er-mile away. That was the little Jewish township of Tel Aviv but now it was deserted. The Turks, believing rightly that the Jews sympathised with the British, had threatened to deport them. So the Jews had evacuated it, left a ghost town in the desert. He wondered if the war dragged on for years whether the little town would go back to desert? To be dug over by some archaeologist a thousand years from now?
But that was only with a part of his mind. The orange groves grew close and thick on the other side of the railway track. Here on this rise was the point where the line coming up from Jaffa swung in a curve to run away downhill to his left and towards Lydda.
The Australians had dismounted, one man from each section of four holding the horses, the others gathering behind Jackson, who ordered, “Flankers out.” Troopers broke away from the group and trotted off, two up the line and two down it, and were lost in the darkness. Jackson pointed and the horse-holders led their Walers across the railway track and into the orange groves.
Smith called, “Follow me!” He ran down the track towards Lydda for a hundred yards, Jackson and his troop at his heels, gasping and swearing as they stumbled in the darkness. Smith halted and panted, “One of these. That one!”
Two troopers crossed the track, axes glinting in their hands and a moment later the blades chunked into the orange tree. Another trooper shrugged a coil of rope from his shoulder and made one end fast around the tree, while the others paid out the length of it and took up the slack as he stepped back. The furious chopping sounded loud in the stillness. The Australians threw their weight on the rope and the tree creaked and swayed.
Smith ran back up the track to where Buckley waited, halted beside him and stared down towards Jaffa. From Dauntless he had seen the pinprick glow of the train go down into the town — but what if it did not return? He swallowed and rubbed at the sweat on his face. The desert troops would be moving up to mount the attack on Beersheba and if he failed there would be slaughter.
Somewhere a jackal howled. From far to the south came the mutter of the guns before Gaza and their flashes lit the sky. But there was another light, closer and moving, a tiny pulsing red glow that crept up the hill from Jaffa towards Smith. Thank God.
There was a crash away to his left and he ran back to where Jackson and his men were hauling the felled tree from the grove to lie across the rails. Smith gasped, “The train’s coming! Where’s that trooper —” Then saw the man on hands and knees close to where the tree lay, emptying out his haversack, pushing the contents into a heap, scraping a match. The yellow flame caught the paraffin-soaked rags and the fire blazed for a second, then sank to a steady burning. Three of the troopers lay down beside the little fire, their rifles under them.
Smith glanced around, saw only Jackson and Edwards facing him across the track; the other troopers had vanished. Jackson lifted a hand, then he and Edwards retreated out of the firelight. Smith backed away from it, pulled the Webley from its holster and sank down in the outer darkness. A trooper was bellied-down only a yard way, smelling of horse and tobacco, holding his rifle in front of him in his right hand, his left spread flat on the sand.
Smith’s gaze went back to the little fire that just lit the tree and the sprawled figures of the seemingly sleeping men in their tattered, unrecognisable uniforms. Then his head jerked around. The pulsing glow was in sight, the train rounding the long curve where the track bent around the orange groves. It moved slowly after the long haul up from Jaffa, smoke from its chimney lifting against the sky as it trundled down towards him, a black mass taking shape out of the darkness and with brakes squealing now. It was close enough for him to see the driver leaning out from the footplate, outlined against the glow of the firebox.
The train ground to a halt right above him with its buffers only feet from the felled tree. The driver bawled, outraged, and jumped down, advanced into the firelight where one of the prone figures stirred sleepily. The driver stopped short, peering and Smith shoved himself up shouting, “Now!” He ran at the footplate, conscious of the trooper beside him, of the three figures jerking upright like puppets yanked up on the one string, their rifles pointing. He jumped at the steps leading up to the footplate, grabbed at the handle and pulled himself aboard. There was a soldier, a Turk, swinging the slung rifle from his shoulder and backing away across the footplate in the face of the Webley. Smith snarled at him, “Keep still!” The man still fumbled at the rifle, the engine’s fireman peering over his shoulder, eyes wide, mouth gaping. Then Edwards appeared from the other side of the engine, materialising like a ghost in his white robes. He shoved the fireman aside, laid the blade of the knife across the soldier’s throat and tore the rifle from his slackened fingers as he stood rigid under the cold pressure of the flat of the knife. Jackson came crowding in after Edwards, grabbed first the fireman, then the soldier and bundled them off the footplate to the little knot of troopers waiting for them by the track.
Smith thought: “Not a shot fired so far.” The rest of the train? He jumped down and started back past the tender, shouting, “Douse that fire!” He glanced around and saw a trooper kicking sand over the flames.
As the darkness closed in Buckley came trotting up from the rear of the train. “Right y’are, sir! Eight trucks and not a soul aboard. Only these two at the front are loaded.”
Smith halted and took stock. They had the train without raising an alarm; that was one more step along the way. Eight trucks. He had expected eight, based his plans on that figure because every reconnaissance that had seen this train had reported eight trucks or more. It was just enough. He would have tried with less if he’d had to, simply because he’d had to, but was relieved there were eight.
Jackson appeared on the top of the wood-stacked tender and leapt across to the first truck and balanced on its load. Troopers climbed up to join him and started hurling sacks and crates over the side into the orange grove. Smith called up, “They’ve got to be out of sight!”
A voice answered impatiently, “Aw, we know that, for Christ’s sake.”
Smith grinned and set out on a rapid tour of the position, Buckley hurrying at his heels. He checked the flankers at either end and found the country silent, empty. He passed along the edge of the grove where the cargo from the train was disappearing into the lanes between the trees, the prisoners lay under guard and the Walers stood patiently with the horse-holders. He rounded the front of the train and found the track clear, the tree dragged away into the grove. Jackson and his gang were working on the second truck. Smith called up, “Quick as you can! I’m going to look for Taggart!”
Jackson lifted a hand in acknowledgment. Smith turned and ran up the slope to the crest, stood there peering back along the trail they had followed from the Auja river. It was too soon for Taggart but — something moved out there in the darkness below him. There was a rhythmic whispering that might have been wind in trees but there was no wind, nor trees on this crest and the whispering came steady but rapid. A snake coiled up the hill towards him, thick and black, hurrying, and as it came on out of the night it grew legs. The whispering was the scuff of boots in sand and the laboured breathing of Taggart’s battalion.
Smith ran down to meet them and fell in by Taggart who marched at their head, stepping out at a rapid pace, head thrust forward and thumb hooked in the sling of the rifle over his shoulder. Garrett, his runner, came behind him like a shadow. The two Australian troopers left behind as markers now rode out on the flank.
Smith told them, “Ride over the crest and report to Mr. Jackson. Tell him we’re coming.” He looked at Taggart and asked, “What about the men?”
“They’re all right,” Taggart jerked out between panting.
“Any stragglers?”
“We don’t — have — stragglers.”
Smith could not believe it. The men had been cooped up aboard the Morning Star for days, and it had been a killing march: Taggart must have doubled them for some of the way. And the men who carried rifles were the lucky ones; others humped Vickers mach
ine-guns or deadweight boxes of ammunition.
He halted on the crest to watch them go by. In the darkness he could see little, though he stood in close to the ranks that flicked past him, peering into faces. He recognised a lot of them now and Taggart’s battalion was a live thing, not a mass of uniformed numbers. All of the faces were like Taggart’s, drawn and sweat-slicked, mouths gaping as they panted, eyes wide and fixed on the back of the man in front. He saw why there had been no stragglers. Here and there was a man who carried two rifles, and there were pairs of men who supported another shambling along head-down between them. But nobody halted the column, nobody interrupted that quick pace set by Taggart at their head.
And at the side of the column moved the sergeants and warrant officers, hurrying up the length of their respective companies, “Keep closed up! Keep the step an’ keep closed up! Not far now! Close up!” Repeated again and again until they reached the head of the company, waited for it to pass them and all the time keeping up the chant: “Close up! Close up!” And when the tail passed them, hurrying forward again: “Keep closed up! Keep the step!”
There were no stragglers but there should have been. Smith watched the last company come up to the crest and called, “Well done!” Some eyes slid his way, blank, then blinking with recognition. That was all.
And at the tail of the column, last of all, came the battalion’s medical orderlies towing their little cart with its stretchers and cases, Merryweather the surgeon at their head and —
Smith burst out incredulously, “What are you dong here?”
Adeline Brett did not check her pace any more than the soldiers ahead of her, but she wiped at a tendril of hair that clung to her sweating brow and answered, “I should think it was obvious. The men have their duty — I have mine.”