Beyond the Horizon

by Peter Watt

  The young Frenchman looked at Tom with surprise. ‘I have heard that the Boche is reluctant to fight you Australians. Maybe the war end soon, non?’

  ‘I hope you are right,’ Tom said. ‘You intend to give me back my things?’

  The Frenchman didn’t answer. Tom guessed he was in his late twenties, but he had the haunted eyes of a man who had already seen far too much. He was handsome in a Gallic way and Tom guessed that he was mixed race like himself. Maybe Algerian and European parentage. ‘You speak bloody good English,’ he said in an attempt to gain common ground with the man. ‘Where did you learn?’

  ‘I was a seaman before the war and travel much,’ the Frenchman said. ‘I like England. I even travel to Australia. I see that you are like me, not all white.’

  Tom was surprised at the man’s perceptive observation and guessed that as a former sailor he would have been in contact with many races. ‘I have Aboriginal blood,’ Tom answered and saw the beaming smile on the other man’s face.

  ‘You are half-caste like me,’ he chuckled. ‘We fight for the white man who does not care if we die for him. That is why I desert. My name is Chason, and I was a gunner. My comrades wish to cut your throat, but I say no. We just rob you instead, and let you live.’

  ‘How about you give me back my papers and keep the money?’ Tom said. ‘Then we can go our own way.’

  Chason frowned and used the pointed tip of his knife to clean under his cracked nails. ‘I do not steal from comrades. I give back your papers and keep the francs. But I will help you so that you cannot say Chason is a thief.’

  Tom was bemused by the man’s logic but he was grateful to have his help. He told the man the name of the street he was looking for and Chason beamed.

  ‘I know it,’ he said. ‘It is a place where officers go to find woman. You know a woman there?’

  Tom did not know how to answer that question. ‘I don’t know. Maybe.’

  ‘We go there today,’ Chason said, standing and addressing his two companions in French before turning back to Tom.

  ‘They say they will go but they will take their share of your money. I cannot stop them but I will work for my share. I meet mes amis later. I have friends in Marseilles who can get me a berth on a merchant ship back to Africa. Maybe if you have money you can go with me.’

  ‘When I find the woman I am looking for I will be returning to my battalion at the front,’ Tom said. ‘All they can do is throw me in prison.’

  ‘Okay, we go,’ Chason said. ‘I know a café on the street and we will spend your money on breakfast there.’

  Tom rose from the ground and brushed himself down. He followed the Frenchman, who waved to his companions as they sauntered away.

  ‘Here are your papers,’ Chason said, handing back the crumpled pieces of valuable paper reproduced by the postmistress of the village. ‘They are very good forgeries.’

  Tom did not comment but felt uneasy that Chason had spotted them as forgeries. They stepped onto a broad avenue lined with trees and already filling with civilians on bicycles, as well as a scattering of soldiers in the uniforms of many nations. What made Tom nervous was the occasional sight of a British red-capped military policeman or a French gendarme.

  Chason turned into a narrower side street on either side of which were double-storeyed buildings that looked almost as old as Paris itself. Now it became busy with more uniformed soldiers bumping each other and walking off the excesses of sex and alcohol from the night before. They ignored the two filthy men wearing long civilian coats.

  ‘Here is the café,’ Chason said, indicating a small shop that smelled of coffee and croissants. Tom realised just how hungry he was and, despite being anxious to seek out Juliet, realised he needed to eat.

  The two men went inside and Tom noticed that the proprietor cast them a disparaging look as he poured a cup of coffee for an American officer. He was about to say something to Tom and Chason when Chason produced a fistful of Tom’s francs, placing them on an unoccupied table by the large glass window. The proprietor sniffed and turned his head as both men sat down.

  Chason ordered and their breakfast appeared minutes later.

  ‘Better than damper,’ Tom said, biting into the butter rich pastry and swilling down a mouthful of hot coffee.

  ‘What is damper?’ Chason asked, halfway through his pastry.

  ‘It’s bread we make in the campfire back home,’ Tom replied and surprised himself with a flash of a memory of another place and time. ‘This is pretty bloody good.’

  They ordered a second round of breakfast and Tom glanced out the glass window onto the street. ‘Bloody hell!’ he gasped, startling Chason.

  Tom scraped back the chair as he leapt to his feet and pushed past the American officer leaving the café. ‘Juliet!’ he yelled, running towards her down the narrow street. But she was not alone and the burly man with her was vaguely familiar. When Tom reached Juliet she was standing frozen in surprise. She was carrying a basket just as Tom remembered from their first meeting, and it was obvious that she was pregnant. For a moment Tom struggled for words.

  ‘Juliet.’ Tom reached out and touched her arm. ‘I have been looking for you.’

  ‘Get back, you black bastard,’ said the burly man accompanying Juliet, shoving Tom in the chest. ‘This woman is my property.’

  ‘Smithers,’ Tom said, putting a name to the man. ‘Now I remember you.’

  ‘Tom,’ Juliet said and he could see that all colour had drained from her face. ‘I . . . I am not free . . .’

  ‘If yer know what is good for you, Sergeant Duffy, you will piss off real quick before I call a copper. From the way yer dressed I doubt that the army knows yer here. Me now, I have a good workin’ relationship with the local gendarmes.’

  ‘Get out of the way, Smithers,’ Tom growled, preparing himself to strike with all his force, but he hesitated when Smithers produced a long dagger in his hand. Damn! Tom cursed himself. Chason had not returned the knife to him and he was virtually defenceless against the blade.

  ‘Here, mon ami,’ a voice said close to Tom’s shoulder and he felt the knife slipped into his hand.

  ‘Yer mate ain’t goin’ to be much help,’ Smithers snarled, seeing the Frenchman approach and provide Tom with his defence. ‘I’m goin’ to gut yer.’

  Smithers lunged and Juliet screamed.

  Tom stepped back, avoiding the wicked blade, but he was also aware of shouting and a whistle blowing. Before he could counter Smithers, Tom felt his arms pinned and a voice shouting at him in French. Two nearby French police had been alerted to the confrontation and were on Tom before he could react. He was slammed into the ground and hit the stone road so hard that he saw a red haze of stars. The last thing he remembered was the terrified expression on Juliet’s face as she was dragged away by Smithers.

  ‘You should bloody well be court-martialled and the key thrown away,’ the commanding officer roared as Tom stood hatless and to attention before him. It had been over a fortnight since Tom had been arrested by the French authorities and handed over to his battalion on the insistence of the brigade commander. ‘I have had to stretch a lot of favours with our French allies to have you released to us when you should be facing criminal charges in Paris,’ he continued and Tom winced. ‘If it were not for the sworn statement by Sergeant Bourke that you had not set out to desert but to look for your fiancée, I would have left it in the hands of the French. Sergeant Bourke’s statement and your sterling record as an NCO has got you back to us, but I cannot dismiss the affair without our own charges of you being absent without leave. What have you to say, Sergeant Duffy?’

  Absent without leave was not as serious as the crime of desertion. Tom might be stripped of rank and face a short period confined to barracks, but he would not face a hefty prison sentence.

  ‘Sir, I know that I acted outside regulations but I had to find my fiancée. I accept any punishment I have coming.’ Tom saw that the stormy expression on his commanding offi
cer’s face had dissipated a little at this answer.

  ‘I am not sure if you have heard the rumours going around that the Hun is on the verge of capitulating, Sergeant Duffy, but it seems that I have the power to deal with your offence at my level,’ the CO said. ‘As it is, I am busy and may not have the time to deal with you, so in the meantime you are to return to your duties as platoon sergeant as we have not had a replacement officer sent to us. If it were not for the fact we need you to lead the platoon, I would hand the charges to the adjutant, who would no doubt deal severely with the matter.’ Tom was not sure but he thought he saw just the slightest flicker of a smile on the CO’s stern face. ‘As it is, if the rumours prove to be true, no doubt your indiscretion will be forgotten in the administration of the battalion preparing to go home. In fact, you would not have a black mark in your service record. That is all, Sergeant Duffy, you are dismissed to resume your duties with the company.’

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ Tom said, replacing his slouch hat and saluting smartly. ‘March out, Sergeant Duffy,’ the RSM roared behind Tom. Both men marched out with a crash of boots and in the hallway the RSM brought Tom to a halt.

  ‘You can count yourself bloody lucky . . . again, Tom,’ he said quietly. ‘It just shows the high regard the army has for you. The CO would normally have any other soldier in the clink faster than you can say Jack Robinson, but you have done your duty more than any NCO I know. Let us hope that the rumours are right and not just furphies.’

  Tom returned to his company and his platoon. He was visited by the company commander, Major Cooper, and nothing was said about his absence without leave. All went on as if it had never happened – except that the pale face of Juliet haunted Tom. It had brought back all the memories of the only true love he had ever known.

  23

  The Ottoman Empire had surrendered to the Allied advance on 31 October 1918, and now Matthew’s war in the skies of Palestine was over. He did not know whether his squadron would be transferred to the fighting on the Western Front, which continued with its usual ferocity. He was sitting on his camp bed in his tent, staring out at the rugged arid hills on the horizon, when the leading ground-crew NCO popped his head around the entrance.

  ‘Got some mail for you, boss,’ he said.

  ‘Thanks, Archie,’ Matthew replied, accepting two envelopes from the soldier. He could see that one of the letters was from his mother, writing from Townsville, but the other letter bore the embossment of an American legal firm. Matthew immediately opened the American letter and read the contents. It was a demand on behalf of a Mr James Barrington Snr that Captain Matthew Duffy AFC provide all assistance to a team being sent to Palestine to search for and recover the remains of one Miss Joanne Barrington so that she could be returned to her home in the USA for a Christian burial.

  Matthew stared at the letter and his first impulse was to screw it up and toss it to the desert winds. Joanne had loved this land and probably would have wanted to be buried in its soil, he thought. Then he remembered they had two children growing up in America and that it would be better for them to have a gravesite they could visit when they were older. And maybe by conceding to Barrington’s wishes might help Matthew gain access to his son and daughter.

  The letter went on to mention certain high-ranking names in the British forces in Palestine, and the Australian flyer could see the extent of Barrington’s influence on international politics. Matthew would arrange to speak with his commanding officer and explain the situation, producing the letter as evidence. Now the fighting had ceased in the Holy Land the CO would more than likely release him from his duties to assist the American search and recovery team.

  According to the letter, the team would arrive in Jerusalem within a month, and a contact had been left for Matthew there. When Matthew looked at the date on the letter he saw that a month was actually within a week.

  A fellow officer appeared at Matthew’s tent and poked his head in. ‘The bar has been opened, old chap,’ he said. ‘We’re celebrating the victory, and young Goddard’s promotion to captain. It came out in the gazette yesterday, and the PMC has said Captain Goddard will be shouting the mess.’

  Matthew glanced up and acknowledged the invitation as he well knew that when the president of the mess committee made an invitation it was virtually an order. He read the letter from his mother before changing out of his flying suit into his dress uniform. Joanne, and the guilt and grief that came with her memory, was never far from his thoughts. Maybe this was a way to start to lay the past to rest and look to the future with hope.

  A week later, Captain Matthew Duffy sat in the foyer of British military headquarters in Jerusalem. The building had cool marble floors and overhead fans that clacked and rattled. High-ranking officers wearing red flashes on their collars passed without noticing Matthew, although he was careful to stand and salute if one of them did catch his eye.

  Eventually three men dressed in expensive suits entered the foyer, chatting with a British Army brigadier armed with the traditional swagger stick tucked under his arm. Matthew rose to his feet, sensing that the men might be those he was to meet. The brigadier strolled over to Matthew with the three civilians in tow. Two were in their mid-thirties, but the third man was in his late forties. Immediately Matthew knew that the older, aristocratic man was Joanne’s father; he had her eyes.

  ‘Ah, Captain Duffy,’ the brigadier said when Matthew saluted him. ‘I have the honour of introducing Mr James Barrington from America.’

  Slowly, Matthew extended his hand to Barrington who looked at him with open contempt and hate.

  ‘I don’t think we need introducing, Brigadier,’ Barrington said, ignoring Matthew’s conciliatory gesture. ‘Captain Duffy and I have an understanding.’

  ‘Good show, then,’ the brigadier said, flushed by the chill he could hear in the prominent American’s tone. ‘I will leave you chaps to discuss the matter in hand.’

  He departed, leaving Matthew in the company of what were obviously three very hostile men. It was Barrington who opened the conversation. ‘I am led to believe that you were with my daughter when she was killed, and you had her buried somewhere out in the wilderness,’ he said in a cold tone. ‘That must mean you know where I can find my Joanne.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Matthew answered, his eyes flicking to the men standing either side of Barrington. They were tough-looking men with eyes as icy as Barrington’s, and Matthew sensed that they were not the usual run-of-the-mill clerks employed in banking. They had the look of soldiers – or thugs. Neither attempted to introduce themselves but remained silent, allowing their employer to do all the talking.

  ‘My daughter died because she was foolishly attempting to rescue you,’ Barrington said bitterly. ‘She would still be alive if you had not come into her life.’

  Matthew did not respond to the accusation. War made no discrimination in those it took from the earth. ‘If I am to lead you to where Joanne is buried I will need the services of her guide at the time, Mr Saul Rosenblum,’ Matthew said, returning Barrington’s hard gaze with his own defiant expression.

  ‘That is a Jewish name,’ Barrington said. ‘From my experience you can’t trust Jews.’

  ‘Saul was one of your daughter’s best friends in this part of the world, Mr Barrington, and Joanne trusted him with her life,’ Matthew retorted.

  ‘I would rather you not use my daughter’s name with such familiarity, Captain,’ Barrington said. ‘I am sure you know that if I had my way your kind would be wiped from the earth.’

  ‘My kind, Mr Barrington?’ Matthew asked coldly.

  ‘Jews, Negros and Papist Irishmen are destroying the American way of life, Captain Duffy, and now your blood has contaminated my line,’ Barrington said. ‘Our Anglo-Saxon heritage is under threat from the insidious cancer your kind bring upon America. But this is neither the place nor the time to discuss such matters. I have arranged to put you up in this hotel until we leave to find my daughter. If you think the Jew you ment
ioned can help, I will pay for his services. My men will check upon your progress here each day. I have already cleared your secondment to me through our ambassador in London – and your military staff in Jerusalem. You are for the moment – how you would say it in your military protocol? – under my command. Good day, Captain.’

  Matthew watched as the three Americans turned and walked away. He was shocked to hear that he had been seconded to Barrington without having had any say in the matter. Then he remembered something he had seen tattooed on the right hand of one of Barrington’s men. It was three letters – KKK – Klu Klux Klan. Matthew also remembered a trip to the USA before the war, and how he had heard of the infamous organisation while travelling in America’s south. It was hardly believable, he mused. That the rich and powerful Barrington patriarch was a supremacist bigot, when his daughter had believed that all humans were equals.

  It was time to seek out his old friend and comrade in arms, Saul Rosenblum. Matthew had the feeling that he would need someone to watch his back. He had survived a war and was not ready to be quietly murdered in the lonely and isolated holy lands of the Bible.

  *

  An hour or so later, armed with a bottle of good Scotch, Matthew found a nearby airfield occupied by British airmen. He introduced himself to the commanding officer and explained that he needed to borrow an aircraft for a few hours. The CO made some enquiries to clarify that Matthew was a man to be trusted and, after he’d been cleared, accepted the bottle of Scotch across his desk.

  Before long Matthew was in the air in a Bristol with a British officer as his observer to ensure that the aircraft was returned. After a couple of hours of flying Matthew circled Saul’s village and set down on an airstrip he knew had been constructed the year before. He was met by a crowd of curious Jewish settlers, who directed Matthew to the village where he found Saul with his family. The British officer remained with the aircraft and soon found himself the centre of attention from many little boys who crawled over his aircraft asking questions in a language the airman did not understand.