Dauntless (Commander Cochrane Smith series)

by Alan Evans

  Smith strode along beside her and glared across at Merryweather. “Are you out of your mind?”

  Merryweather said defensively, “Not my fault, sir. I didn’t find her till I was aboard the lighter. Too late then.”

  “You could have stopped her landing!”

  “No, I couldn’t sir. Somehow she was ashore before me.”

  They were over the crest and marching rapidly down on the train. Smith could see the battalion already lining out along it, a confused mass of figures in the dark, spreading out and thinning.

  Adeline Brett said quickly, her breath returning on this last downhill stretch, “You have duties to attend to, Commander. It was not my intention to distract you from them. We’ll go along as best we can, help when we can and when we can’t we’ll keep out of the way. If you’d only stop thinking of me as a woman, I would present no problem.”

  Smith grabbed her arm, pulled her out of the column and halted. Stop thinking of her as a woman? That was not only difficult, it was impossible. He said, “I don’t want you involved in — I don’t want —” He could not put it into words.

  She said softly, “I know what to expect, David. I’ve seen dead and wounded before, too often.”

  He knew that. But here she was not behind the lines, would have only the doubtful protection of a Red Cross flag. He stared at her, the short fair hair tousled, the eyes that looked steadily back at him. Let her go on with the rest to what surely awaited them? It was unthinkable, but ... He looked beyond her to the men of her battalion who were clambering into trucks now, looked ahead to the morrow’s dawning, when these men would need Merryweather and he would have his hands full. He said, “I’m very glad you’ve come. Take care, that’s all.”

  It was her turn to stare, bewildered at the sudden change in him.

  He saw a short, plump figure easing out of the tail of the little cart to stand on fat legs. Adeline Brett followed his gaze and explained, “We had to put him in there. He couldn’t keep up. He’s just not built for marching.”

  Smith said, “I don’t care how he got here as long as he does the job.” He called to the muscle-easing, groaning figure, “Come on!” Then he turned and ran and Charlie Golightly waddled after him.

  He found Taggart striding along the edge of the track marshalling his men into the trucks. Smith said, “Three companies, no more. Anyone who had to be carried —”

  Taggart turned to grin at him. “The N.C.O.’s are sorting them out. Three companies to go. The rest stay here with Jackson.”

  Smith said, “Quick as you can. Let me know when you’re ready. Come up to the cab and ride with me, or —”

  “I’ll come to the cab now but I’ll ride with the men.”

  Smith nodded. He had thought that would be Taggart’s decision. It would have been his. He ran towards the head of the train and in the glow that seeped out round the edges of the firebox door he saw Charlie Golightly on the footplate of the engine looking round gloomily. Smith clambered aboard. Buckley hovered in the background, or as much in the background as he could be in that restricted space. Edwards leaned on the far side of the cab.

  Golightly said, “Right bloody lot this is. They run it by praying and bugger-all else by the look of it.”

  Smith frowned, “Can you drive it?”

  “Well, understand, sir, it’s not like what I’ve been used to and an engineer like me, I’m used to a proper way o’ going about things and —”

  Smith broke in, exasperated, “Can you make the bloody thing go?”

  Charlie Golightly tried to step back from that icy glare but found Buckley behind him. Aboard Dauntless Smith had said, “You don’t have to come. I’m not giving you an order. I’ve engineers aboard this ship who will make that engine run somehow. You just might be able to do it a little quicker. You can come with me and I’ll do all I can for you. Or you can go in the cells now and take your chance back at Deir el Belah.”

  Prison had seemed chillingly close to Charlie just then and Smith wasn’t asking him to fight, only to drive an engine. Charlie could do that, was confident he could drive any engine but he doubted if he would come out of prison alive.

  Now he stood on the footplate and wondered if he would come out of this alive. Prison now seemed solid and safe by comparison, but it was a long way off and the Germans and Turks stood between it and him. His life depended on this young naval officer and the breathless, hurrying men about him. Charlie said huskily, “I c’n drive it all right. It’s just been a bit neglected, like.”

  Taggart appeared by the cab. “Ready.”

  Smith answered, “Right.” He turned on Charlie Golightly. “Full ahead.”

  Charlie wound off the brake, rammed the reverse lever to forward and eased over the regulator handle. The engine wheezed, chuffed rapidly, jerked with a rattling of couplings, then eased forward.

  They were moving.

  Smith shoved past Charlie Golightly to lean out over the side of the cab and look back. He saw the figures of Jackson and his troopers, slouch-hatted, lined out along the side of the orange groves. Somewhere in the orange groves were a hundred or more of Taggart’s battalion and Adeline Brett’s cart, but the rest, three hundred of them, were packed into the trucks behind him. He could see them standing, heads and shoulders above the sides of the trucks, but only by the pale blur of their faces. There were no distinguishable figures, just blocks of humanity that lurched as one as the train moved forward. And Adeline Brett was somewhere among them.

  He swung back into the cab to see Charlie Golightly peering out of a round window over the footplate. Smith called to him, “Can’t we go faster than this?”

  Golightly sniffed and rubbed at his nose with a fat hand. “I should say so, as soon as we gets down on the flat. But I don’t want her to run away on this hill ’cause this orficer ’ere —” he jerked his head at Edwards, “— he tells me there’s a bend at the bottom. After that I’ll let her out for what she’s worth and Gawd ’elp us all.”

  Smith leaned out again and peered ahead down the slope. The train rocked as it swung around a right-hand curve, straightened out, steadied, and chuffed on. It swung again, to the left this time and Edwards shouted, “That’s it! Should be a straight run from here!”

  Smith turned and saw Golightly’s hand grope back and find the regulating lever as he peered out of his window at the track running into the darkness ahead. He eased the lever over and the train’s panting breathing quickened until it was hammering along with the wood smoke from the chimney pouring back even more thickly over the roof of the cab.

  Golightly turned his head for a second to yell at Buckley, “Chuck some wood on!”

  Buckley staggered across the footplate as it rocked with the speed, clawed down an armful of logs from the tender, kicked open the firebox door with his boot and fed the logs into the flames within. The red glow lit them all, Buckley sweating as he threw in the logs, Edwards hawk-faced and eyes glittering, Charlie Golightly’s round face turned to keep an eye on how Buckley fed the furnace, professionally watchful.

  Buckley slammed the door and for seconds they were all blind. When Smith’s night vision returned he saw they were rushing past more orange groves. The little old engine was giving all she had, screwed out of her by Golightly, and probably running faster than she had in twenty years. Not even Jackson’s horsemen could have stayed with her now. Smith enjoyed a brief moment of exhilaration, then was jerked back to reality as Edwards shouted, “Beit Dejan!” And pointed.

  Smith peered past him and saw the cluster of houses away to the right of the track. He asked, “How far now?”

  “Half way. Another ten minutes at this rate, if that!”

  Ten minutes or less. Ten minutes in which mentally to skim over the plan again to see if he had forgotten anything — but he could not anticipate every possibility. Plan as he might, an operation like this was dependant on luck, necessity its sole justification. Smith was gambling with the lives of three hundred men but only because
he had to. The lives of thousands hung on the outcome. Not for the first time that night he was afraid, swallowed his fear, or tried to.

  Suppose they were too late, that somehow the Afrika Legion had already passed through, the supply dump was stripped bare and the whole reckless adventure nothing but a waste of lives? And Allenby’s attack was stalled after all?

  He tried to shake off the haunting possibility but failed. The Legion was pressing on as fast as it could, which was very fast. Only by sea could it have moved faster with all its equipment and supplies — the thought raised in him a suspicion that he had overlooked something, that was eluding him — something obvious.

  “We’re getting close!” That was Edwards.

  Smith said, “Slow down!” He peered past the length of the engine and ahead along the track. He knew what he was looking for, a little bridge. The speed of the train was falling away.

  He heard Golightly say, “Keep clear o’ that brake ’andle, Mr. Buckley, if you please. I might want it any time now.”

  And Edwards said, “Here it is! Stop her!”

  The stone parapet of the bridge came up out of the darkness, flicked past, was gone. Now the brake was winding on, beginning to bite. And Charlie Golightly knew his job: the wheels did not lock and there was no grinding nor showering of sparks. The train slid smoothly to a halt with just the barest of jerks as it came to rest in a sighing of steam.

  But Smith still thought they must have been seen. The smoke and sparks from the engine’s chimney would have marked them and while the train was expected at Lydda station, lying a mile south of the town itself, it was not expected to stop here. Soon the sentries at the dump and the station would start to wonder and shout for their non-coms. He dared not waste a second.

  He dropped down from the cab, Edwards and Buckley leaping after him and stared out across the dark countryside. A half-mile away to his left and north were the scattered lights of Lydda but there was another light closer and to the south-east, so he did not need Edwards’s pointing finger.

  Edwards said, “The dump. A quarter-mile away, no more, and fairly open country as I said.”

  Just ahead of the hissing engine the track curved to run south. In half-a-mile it joined the main line and Smith could see the junction with his mind’s eye, as he had seen it on the map and Edwards had described it, though now the night covered it. The station lay there. The two lines, the main and the spur from Jaffa, made a V as they ran down to the junction. The wood and the dump it hid lay in the top of that V.

  Smith turned to find Taggart at his shoulder, face calm but eyes staring at the lights. Beyond him the men poured in a cataract of shadows over the sides of the trucks and again there was that whispering: “Ack comp’ny here!” ... “Beer comp’ny here!” Figures came running out of the night, slipping and stumbling in the darkness on the uneven going. They halted in a semi-circle behind Taggart, the warrant officers and sergeants of the battalion.

  Taggart turned on them. “Ack company cross the line there —” his finger stabbed, “— deploy and move up on the right of the dump now. Charlie company deploy and move up on the left now. I’ll lead Beer company in the centre and we’ll give you five minutes start to work around the sides, then I’ll head straight for the light.” His finger pointed at the solitary light marking the dump. “No firing till we’re fired on, then rapid and get in! Flare men in the rear of Beer company with Sergeant Carmichael and the demolition party.” He paused, went on: “Ten rounds rapid, then we’ll do the work with the bayonet.” He paused again, then finished, “This won’t be like Salonika. This is to show them.” His head jerked at those far, far behind him, Finlayson, the generals, the whole military machine that had locked him and his men away in the hold of the Morning Star. “Carry on!”

  The group dissolved, the men trotting back to their companies and Taggart glanced at Smith. “Those are all the orders they need. They know what they’re doing.”

  Buckley murmured at Smith’s shoulder, “That Arab feller, sir.”

  Smith turned and saw Edwards in his robes drifting spectral through the deeper shadow by the engine. “Colonel Edwards!” Smith strode over to him. “You’ll come with me.”

  Edwards said flatly, “Not on your life. My orders were to guide the attacking force to the dump and I’ve done that. I agreed your plan gave a fighting chance of taking the dump but getting out again is another matter. When your attack goes in you’ll raise the countryside and even if the Turks are a bit slow coming out of Jaffa, that regiment north of the Auja will have a bit more time and they’ll come down like the hammers of hell. I’m an Intelligence officer, I’d be no help as just one more rifleman and I’m too valuable to risk in that kind of scrap.” He finished cynically, “Don’t worry about me. I’ll make my own way home from here and I wish you the best of luck.”

  Smith thought that Edwards must have seen his chance when he had disclosed his plan back aboard Dauntless, and had made his own plans to slip away before the attack on the dump. That was the reason for his sudden change from depression to his old cock-sureness. Smith said softly, “I told you that we sank or swam together in this and that means right to the end. No one walks out. And besides, we may need you on the way back.” He glanced at Taggart. “I want him guarded.”

  Taggart nodded, turned and saw Garrett at his heels. For a moment Taggart hesitated, then jerked his head at the rifleman. Garrett stepped forward and Smith ordered, “Put this officer in the front truck along with the Vickers and its crew. You can all keep an eye on him.”

  Edwards exploded, “Don’t be bloody ridiculous! Surely you can see the sense —”

  Smith finished, “If he tries to escape, shoot him.”

  Edwards glared but Garrett’s rifle was trained on his chest and Garrett said, “Into the truck — sir.” There was unmistakable menace in the words; Garrett would shoot.

  Taggart said quietly, “I’d advise you to do as he says.”

  Edwards muttered under his breath but recognised that menace, swung away and climbed into the truck, followed by Garrett.

  Smith looked up at Golightly where he stood on the footplate. “So far you’ve done all I asked. Now stay where you are and be ready to go. There are twenty men and two machine-guns with you.”

  Golightly stared uneasily about him into the darkness, cleared his throat and said, “I won’t leave her, sir.”

  Smith turned away, his anger with Edwards subsiding. The man was neither a fool nor a coward, simply coldbloodedly selfish — prepared to take any risk that furthered his ambitions but not one step beyond. Objectively Smith could appreciate his argument but equally he could not let one man walk away. And he might indeed need Edwards yet.

  For a moment the night was quiet, the men of B company still ... and in that silence the thought came from nowhere: was it coincidence that Walküre broke out as the Afrika Legion headed for Beersheba? But what could be her purpose? Now, admittedly, she was a prisoner in the Gulf of Alexandretta, but would her captain; a man with the skill and daring to break out of the Dardanelles, accept that? But what could he do —?

  The silence and the train of thought were broken as the long line of B company moved forward and he followed them, Buckley at his side. Taggart was a moving blur ahead of his men, the last of a thousand randomly thrown together when the battalion was formed but made by him into a unified fighting machine, with a heart and inner loyalty of its own. He had said they had been caged too long and were ready to fight anybody. Now they were isolated in a hostile country but as they marched steadily forward Smith could sense the power in them. He had wondered whether they might prove more explosive than the massive cargo of ammunition in the after holds of the Morning Star. If so, then that explosion was close now.

  Great clumps of cactus made gaps in the long line, they caught in Smith’s clothes and tore his skin but the line washed around each clump as it came and formed again. A blacker edge of darkness rose against the sky as they advanced. That was the wood, a
hundred yards across and hiding the dump. Edwards had said the Germans had strung barbed wire between the trees and hung it with empty tins, not as a defence but to keep thieves out. The battalion would have to get through it.

  Somewhere out to right and left were A and C companies that had moved off before B so as to strike at the sides, surrounding the dump, while B company struck in the centre. There was no steady tramp of boots, the step deliberately broken so there was a continual rustling as the boots scuffed the sand.

  The wood was close; he could make out branches of trees traced against the dark. Off to the right a German voice called, uncertain, then after a moment’s pause called again and this time louder, a definite challenge. The line was trotting now and Smith went with them, the dust rising around him. Flame spat briefly away to the right and was answered by a ragged volley. Taggart’s command lifted in a bellow: “Get in! Get in!”

  The line was ragged now because the men were running and the faster ones got ahead of the others. They were close to the wood and above the pounding of the booted feet Smith heard shouting from inside the belt of trees that suddenly overshadowed him. The line halted, the men kneeling before him. The wire was a web between the trees and the tins bounced and jangled together as the kneeling men thrust rifles through the wire and rifle-fire exploded around the wood, the bolts worked furiously in ‘ten rounds rapid’. Others with gloved hands and cutters were snatching at the wire, cutting, the strands parting with a dull thwang and trailing. The men around him and right down the line were bawling madly, “In! In! In!” The bayonets were coming out, long streaks of silver snapping on to the muzzles of the rifles. Grenades exploded. Away to the left a machine-gun hammered and tracer sailed through the darkness.

  Taggart was right forward against the wire, his face turned back to Smith and mouth opening and closing as he shouted. Smith could not hear a word above the din but the men passed it back to him and he threw it on: “Sergeant Carmichael! Flares!”

  “Sir!”

  Taggart lurched forward, tripped, staggered then recovered. Smith lost sight of him as the men came up off their knees and poured through the gap cut in the wire in a yelling, cursing flood. Smith went with them, swung right when the flood split on a square bulk that was no building but crates stacked under a camouflage netting hung on poles to form a roof. Deeper darkness covered him and the men around him but there were phantom figures ahead. A single shot was fired, the flash blinding them all, then a flare burst overhead, brilliant blue-white and smoking. Smith saw the men of the German guard, half-dressed and bare-headed as they had run from their tents, saw them only for the blink of an eye then Taggart’s men were on them.