Windrush: Crimea (Jack Windrush Book 2)

by Malcolm Archibald

  For when she will, she will, you may depend on't

  And when she won't, she won't, so there's an end on't'

  Do you like poetry, Jack?'

  Her eyes held him, so he did not want to withdraw. 'I find your poetry intriguing,' he said. 'It is nothing like Homer.'

  Helen laughed. 'That's because Homer is long dead and I am very much alive.' She looked away and spoke quietly, so he had to strain to hear her. 'Please try to forgive me, Mama, for what I am about to do again, and say thereafter.'

  Without another word, she kissed him, long and soundly, and then pulled away. 'Do you know what my mother would say about this?'

  'No,' Jack touched his mouth. 'Tell me. What would your mother say?'

  'It is something she read somewhere. She would say,' Helen lowered her voice an octave to mimic her mother's deeper tones. 'All the world loves a lover, Helen, but that does not keep that same world from watching their every movement and criticising severely any breach of good manners. Any public display of affection anywhere at any time is grossly unrefined. Love is sacred, and it should not be thrown open to the rude comments of strangers.'

  'I see,' Jack said. What would my mother have said? Or my step-mother, rather?

  'So that is why I had to ask for mother's forgiveness in advance for I am about to give another public display of affection.'

  'You are…' Jack's conversation stopped when Helen cupped his face in her hands and kissed him longer and with more passion than he had ever been kissed before. 'There now, Jack Windrush. If that does not tell you something of my feelings for you, then I don't know what will.'

  Jack stared at her, touching his lips with his right hand. 'I think you have made your feelings very plain.' He dropped his hand. 'Now all that remains is for me to reciprocate.' His kiss took her by surprise and afterwards both were very quiet as they looked over the harbour.

  'It is getting dark,' Helen said at last.

  'It is,' Jack agreed.

  'I had better be getting back to mother.'

  'You had,' Jack said. Please don't go yet. There is so much I wish to say.

  Helen made no move to leave. Jack did not encourage her.

  'Jack,' she said at length. 'You will be careful won't you?'

  'Of course, I will,' he said.

  'I don't want to lose you so soon after I have found you.'

  Jack could think of nothing to say. He touched her lightly on the arm, and then they walked down to the village, passing a score of red-coated soldiers and blue-jacketed seamen. He returned their salutes automatically.

  'Good-bye, Jack.' They stood on the threshold of her house.

  He could think of nothing to say that would help. 'Good-bye Helen.'

  As he turned, she followed him, crushing him in a suddenly fierce embrace. 'Oh, I wish you did not have to go!'

  He allowed her a few moments before freeing himself. He kissed her lightly on the forehead. 'But you know I must. It is a soldier's duty, and I am a soldier.'

  Helen reached out. 'I know,' she said, walked into the house and closed the door.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Inverman Heights

  5th November 1854

  Mist rolled in during the night, accompanied by a drizzling rain that soaked through the men's coats and penetrated every layer of clothing that they had. Jack huddled at the bottom of the trench, cursing the weather. He checked his men. The old Burma hands of the 113th had placed a sock or a piece of rag over the muzzles and locks of their Minie rifles to keep out the rain and had waterproofed their ammunition pouches as best they could. The men of the 118th, young soldiers straight out from England, had taken no such precautions and had their rifles stacked, muzzle up to the rain. Jack moved among them, telling them what he wanted to be done and showing them how to do it, man by man. He knew it was too important a task to leave to the sergeants, for a soldier whose rifle could not fire had only his bayonet and one main advantage the British had was the quality and stopping power of the Minie rifle.

  'Everything all right, Windrush?' Dearden asked. He hunched into his great coat, turned his back to the wind and lit a cheroot. The tiny pin-prick of light was the only warmth in their section of the trench.

  'All right, sir,' Jack said. He was cold, wet and afraid but cold and wet was a soldier's lot, and he would never admit to his fear. He wondered if any of the other soldiers out on Inkerman Ridge were afraid or if it was only him. He glanced around. Logan would never know this knotting of the stomach every time he heard a Russian cannon; Coleman may be afraid but he would merely grouse about it and move on to something else. Riley was as cool-headed a man as he had ever known; he would rationalise his fear and put it in some compartment within his head and forget it.

  'Some of the men look a bit apprehensive,' Dearden nearly echoed Jack's thoughts. 'We all are of course, but we can't let it show.' He pulled at his cheroot. 'You don't indulge do you, Windrush?'

  For a moment Jack thought Dearden was asking if he was afraid. 'Cheroots? Oh, no sir. I don't smoke.'

  'Very wise. It's a filthy habit although it does help to settle the nerves.' He gave a brief grin. 'Well keep alert, Windrush and make sure the picket at Fatal Redoubt it changed regularly. I don't want the men to be out there for more than three hours at a time. Now that would be bad for the nerves, what?'

  'Yes, sir,' Jack agreed. He looked up; the weather was deteriorating. After a full day of rain there had been a temporary lull when mist and drizzle took its place, but now the rain returned, battering down in a chilling downpour that turned the ground to a slippery quagmire and lowered the morale of the men.

  'We've got the position of honour here,' Dearden said. 'We are one of the furthest forward of all the British regiments. If the Russians were to break through us, they could roll up the entire line.'

  'Yes, sir.' Jack said. He peered forward. 'I can't even see Fatal Redoubt, sir, in this muck.'

  'Nor can I, Windrush.' When Dearden tossed away his cheroot, the lit end made a red arc through the air until it landed in a puddle, sizzled for a few seconds and was extinguished by the water. 'Maybe it would be an idea to take a few men forward and ensure the lads there are still all right?'

  That was the most casual order Jack had ever heard given. 'Yes, sir.'

  'I haven't heard any firing, but it would do the men good to know we have not forgotten them.' Dearden lit another cheroot. 'I hear that the pickets on Shell Hill have already been withdrawn. We only have a dozen men there at Fatal, but I don't think they should withdraw; indeed I think we should reinforce them. If I were a Russian, I would choose tonight to send forward a party to probe our defences.' He paused to draw life into his cheroot. 'The word for tonight is Rule, and the answer is Britannia.' He nodded, 'best take some extra rations with you too, Windrush; we don't know what may happen.'

  Jack nodded. It was evident that Dearden also had a feeling of foreboding, much as Helen had voiced. 'Thank you, sir.' He watched Dearden slip further along the line of entrenchments.

  'O'Neill, bring Coleman, Thorpe and the Bishop,' Jack said. 'No, bring all our old 113th lads. We're going to have a look at Fatal Redoubt.'

  'Why us?' Coleman asked. 'Why always us? Do these 118th buggers not know how to soldier?'

  'Those men of the 118th have been in Fatal Redoubt for hours,' Jack said, 'while you've been lying comfortably in a nice warm trench. Besides, Coleman, you are one of the 118th now, remember?'

  Coleman's retort was too low for Jack to make out although he did hear some oaths. He hid his smile: if Coleman ever stopped complaining, then it would undoubtedly be time to get worried. He looked up; after one last savage downpour, the rain abruptly ended. Now they only had to contend with the mist.

  Jack checked the men's equipment and looked out into the sodden dark. He remembered Helen's ominous warnings that something was going to happen and shrugged them off. She was a little upset, nothing more. They had defeated the Russians in every encounter so far and they would do so ag
ain, and again and again if need be.

  'Ready lads? Keep close and don't get lost out there. I don't want any of us to wander around in this muck all day.'

  'Oh how amiable is our officer; he cares for us,' Thorpe said.

  'Does he buggery,' Coleman said. 'He just doesn't want the Ruskies to get these new Minie rifles.'

  'They're good.' Logan said quietly. 'I cannae wait to shoot a few Russians.'

  'I heard you have a good Russian friend in Sebastopol,' the Bishop gave one of his rare contributions to any conversation. 'You saved his life, and he saved yours.'

  Logan glowered at the Bishop as Ryan smiled and glanced away before Logan noticed.

  'You watch your mouth, Bishop!' Logan said.

  'Enough talking,' O'Neill snarled. 'Keep your voices down. The Russians may have pickets out as well.'

  Jack felt that familiar tension building up as he cleared the lip of the trench and led them forward through the scrubby oak trees. In the mist, he could hardly see twenty yards in any direction and felt as if he was swimming through a grey, clinging blanket. When he spoke to the men, his voice was distorted, while every footstep seemed to echo again and again, with the scrape of studs on the men's boots as loud as cannon and the soft slither of their uniforms screaming their presence to the Russians.

  'Listen!' O'Neill stopped and held up a hand. 'Listen.'

  There was definite sound in the mist. Jack heard the pad of horses' hooves, the jingle of harnesses, and the regular tramp of marching men.

  'I hear it,' Thorpe said. 'Bloody Russians!'

  'Aye, but where are they? In this muck, it's impossible to tell.' Jack listened, aware that his decision may be crucial to all their lives. 'That may just be the normal Russian troop movements along the Post Road. Keep moving to the redoubt men, but be careful.'

  With possible Russians on the prowl, they moved slower, testing each step, checking that each bush was what it seemed and was not a Russian soldier waiting for them. Each stunted oak tree was eminently capable of sheltering a Russian sharpshooter and had to be watched and scouted.

  'Listen!' That was Coleman, 'church bells!'

  Jack heard them, carried by some freak twist of the fog from Sebastopol. 'Carillons, calling the faithful to worship.'

  'I haven't heard that before at this time of night,' O'Neill said.

  The sound of bells drifted away as a thicker pocket of mist enveloped them. Thorpe flapped his hand in front of his face. 'I can't see a bloody thing here,' he said and cursed as he tripped over the trailing root of a tree.

  'Can we not just shout out and order the picket back?' Coleman asked.

  'Not with these bells battering away as if the Pope was visiting,' O'Neill grumbled.

  'The Russians don't have a Pope,' the Bishop said quietly. 'They're Orthodox.'

  'Stand to your arms!' The voice floated to them from somewhere in the mist, and then there was silence.

  'Who said that?' O'Neill asked.

  'Not me,' Jack said. 'Keep moving; let's get to the redoubt.'

  The musketry was sudden and definite, an outbreak of firing too intense to be merely the reaction of a nervous man.

  'Where did that come from?' O'Neil knelt behind the twisted wreck of a tree and cocked his rifle. 'Can anybody tell?'

  'Halt now until we can work it out,' Jack pulled the revolver from his holster.

  'Shell Hill,' Coleman said. 'That came from Shell Hill.'

  Dearden said we had withdrawn our pickets from Shell Hill. Have they been sent out again? What the devil is happening?

  'It's stopped now.' Thorpe said.

  'Or perhaps we cannot hear it anymore like we can't hear the church bells.' Jack said. 'Move on, but keep quiet for God's sake.'

  The mist was shifting in a fluky wind, one moment dense, the next sufficiently thin to see twenty yards.

  'There it is again,' Riley said. 'That's artillery as well.'

  This time it was quite distinctive, volleys of musketry one after the other, too close together to be only one side firing, and then the more substantial boom of cannon.

  'That's the Russians,' O'Neill said flatly. 'We don't have any artillery out here.'

  'Nor do they,' Jack said, 'or rather they didn't.'

  'Well, somebody has now,' Riley said.

  'Pick up the pace,' Jack ordered. 'Get forward to the Fatal Redoubt and see if they know more than we do. Keep together.'

  No longer concerned about making a noise, Jack led them at the double, ignoring the shrubs whose trailing branches ripped at their clothing and the gnarled trees that loomed through the gloom. The sound of firing intensified and then drifted away.

  'Halt!' The sound of a British voice was welcome. 'What's the word?'

  For a second Jack's mind blanked, and then he called out: 'Rule!'

  'Britannia,' the word came back. 'Pass friend.'

  Fatal Redoubt was little more than a gun emplacement hacked out of the rock and reinforced with sandbags. There was no artillery in place, nothing except a breast-high U of sandbags with the ground scraped away behind them and a view of tangled trees disappearing into the mist. The garrison was taut-faced, with rifles held in white-knuckled hands.

  'Who's in charge here?' Jack asked.

  'Me, sir.' Despite the situation, the corporal sounded cheerful as he saluted. 'Corporal O'Hara sir.'

  'Ah, the Minie expert. Is there no officer here?' Jack looked around. There were about a dozen men, none of any higher rank than the corporal.

  'Not any longer, sir. Ensign Thatcher took a party of men to find out what the firing was all about.'

  'When was that?'

  The corporal screwed up his face with the extra strain of calculating time. 'About half an hour since, sir.'

  Jack peered forward into the mist. 'Has anything happened here, Corporal?'

  'Nary a thing, sir. We are just sitting tight waiting for Russians or orders.' O'Hara touched the lock of his Minie. 'Are you our relief, sir?'

  'We're your reinforcements, O'Hara. Captain Dearden wants us to keep this redoubt secure.'

  'Yes, sir.' O'Hara accepted the order without question.

  'What are your names, men?' Jack looked at the privates of the 118th. They were lean, like all British soldiers in the Crimea, haggard, bitter-eyed and swaying from fatigue.

  'Brodie, sir.' A tall man with a Highland Scottish accent.

  'Fraser, sir.' Quiet voiced, older than his peers and with eyes that slid away.

  'Raeburn, sir.' Northern English and still a boy, holding Jack's gaze with defiance and self-respect.

  'Aitken, sir.' Pug-nosed and freckled, he looked even younger than Raeburn.

  'How old are you, Aitken?' Jack remembered him; a Borderer from Selkirk.

  'Eighteen, sir,' his voice broke as he spoke. Jack deducted at least two years from his stated age.

  'Fletcher, sir.' He looked ill, with a yellow tinge in his face that was noticeable even in the grey light of dawn.

  'When we get back, Fletcher, I want you to visit the surgeon. You are not well,' Jack said.

  'I'm all right, sir,' Fletcher said indignantly, stiffening to attention.

  The names continued, a roll call from all quarters of the British Isles from Donegal to Cornwall, Caithness to Pembroke. They were homely names, ordinary faces, names with the lilt of the Hebrides or the music of Wales, broad Yorkshire or the thin whine of Essex. These men were his responsibility now in this foreign land, fighting for a cause few would understand. They had joined the army out of poverty or a desire for adventure, to impress a girl or because they lacked the skills or the luck to find employment elsewhere. They had no malice toward the Russians or anybody else; they were here because the Army had sent them here and that was all that mattered.

  'The breastworks could be higher, corporal,' Jack pointed to the breast-high barricade of sandbags in front of the shallow scrape of trench.

  'Aye sir,' O'Hara replied, 'but if we made it so, we could not get over it to attack t
he Russians, could we sir?'

  It was a typical reply from a British soldier. Jack gave a little smile. 'That is so, corporal. When did you men last eat?'

  'Dunno, sir,' O'Hara said.

  'We've brought some black bread and dried pork,' Jack said. 'It's not much but better than grass and mud.'

  'Thank you, sir,' O'Hara said.

  'Is there any rum, sir?' Fletcher asked. 'It helps keep the cold out.' He coughed harshly, doubling up in obvious pain.

  'No, Fletcher…' Jack began until Riley intervened.

  'Begging your pardon, sir, but I think Logie… sorry sir, Logan, has something that may suit.'

  Logan edged past them. 'Whisky sir. It's not the best sir, but these lads of the 42nd haven't all the equipment, sir.'

  Jack was no longer surprised at the ability of British soldiers to find something alcoholic in even the worst of circumstances. Nor was he surprised that the Highland troops of the 42nd would somehow build a still to create whisky out of whatever they could find.

  'That's good stuff, Logie,' Fletcher approved.

  Leaving them to it, Jack peered over the breastwork. The firing had died down again, or the mist had blanketed the sound.

  'Sir!' Hitchins lifted a hand, like a schoolboy hoping to catch the attention of his master. 'I hear something.'

  Jack listened, straining into the eerie hush. 'So do I,' he said.

  'Something is coming out of the mist,' Hitchins said.

  'Bloody Russians,' Logan agreed.

  'Stand to your arms!' Jack heard the bite in his voice.

  Chapter Twenty

  Inkerman Ridge

  5th November 1854

  Now Jack had a decision to make. Should he stand and meet whatever came against them, or withdraw his handful of men to the slightly more secure lines of the 118th, quarter of a mile to the rear? He looked around him. He knew the mettle of his Burma veterans and guessed that Logan and Hitchins would fight. He was not sure about the Bishop with his religious affiliations while Riley was calm in some situation and nervous in others. The men of the 118th seemed to be typical British infantry; they would fight and die if ordered. That was what British soldiers did.