by John Harris
To keep everybody happy, No. 2 Transit contained a cinema run by an Egyptian called Sharif and known as Sharif’s Shambles because of the number of times it broke down. There were also the usual church parades on Sunday when padres with nothing better to do set up their stalls in the Naafi while nearly everybody else searched out their books and packs of cards and pocket chess-sets and fought to get seats at the back. The sermons invariably started off with a swear-word and a risqué joke, which pleased the padre and raised a smile among the faithful in the front rows but didn’t for a moment disturb the more distant murmurs of ‘I’il go a bundle’, ‘Two no trumps’ or ‘Knight takes bishop and that, cock, is bloody checkmate’.
Life was a round of PT, collecting rubbish, route marches and lectures on venereal disease. Because they were bored, it never required more than an abrasive jest - usually about a regiment - for belts to be brandished. Captain Francis Amos, once of the Light Ack-Ack and now in charge of No. 2 Transit while he recovered from a bout of dysentery caught in the desert, had long since given them up as a bad job and put in for a posting himself.
‘If the buggers fight the Germans half as hard as they fight each other,’ he said bitterly, ‘they’ll be unstoppable.’
Since it didn’t seem as though they were to be involved in the coming battle in the desert, every night at No. 2 Transit had come to be regarded as a Saturday night. When Murray’s order to fetch them all in had arrived, almost everybody not on duty was in the clubs, canteens and gin mills in the in-bounds area of Akkaba; and the Paradise Dance Hall, a misnomer if ever there were one, was full to the door jambs, the noise so violent the walls seemed to billow like a marquee in a high wind. Despite the fact that the bar looked like the Charge of the Light Brigade they’d gone quietly enough, forming up by the lorries to be transported back to camp. From behind her desk, Madame had shouted in an excess of emotion, ‘God bless you, boys, I love you all’-- ‘She’ll have her work cut out,’ Sergeant Bunch observed - and they were taken away, bouncing about in the backs of the lorries like corks on a rough sea. Except for the difficult few like Private Fidge, who at that precise moment in time was rolling in a bed that stank like a dog’s basket with a half-caste Arab girl wearing only a white blouse. When the patrols arrived he managed to dive through the window while the girl swore blind she’d been alone.
With the bored and the penniless in camp there should have been no problem. But there was, of course. There always was.
The Naafi was full of men trying to forget they were a long way from wives, girlfriends, children and good English bitter by trying to suck down the frothy swill that in Egypt went by the name of beer. The Scots were sitting in suspicious little groups muttering about clans despite the fact that most of them came from Lowland cities. The cavalry were calling the infantry mud-crushers and the infantry were calling the cavalry horse-shit collectors. The Hostilities Onlys were jeering at the Regulars who, they claimed, had only joined the army because they were too dim to earn a living as civilians, while the Regulars were calling the Hostilities Onlys rotten skiving bastards who’d sat smugly on their fat backsides and let the Germans chuck the BEF out of France. They were as friendly as a lot of cats in a sack. The British Army off duty.
It should have tailed off into the usual sullen fed-up sort of evening, everybody going quietly to bed and only the diehards determined to show they were drunk when they weren’t by bawling a few dreary songs, but instead Herbert Kitchener Waterhouse, a lunatic if ever there were one, discovered Sugar-white’s first names and started doing what Sugarwhite found all ill-mannered bastards always did in those circumstances.
Because Sugarwhite carried a burden which would have made the Garden of Eden turn sour. Not only was he called Sugarwhite, which was bad enough in anybody’s language, but he also bore the Christian names of Lancelot Harold. He’d often wondered what his mother and father had been at when they’d chosen them. ‘Lancelot Harold’ he might just have got away with, but ‘Lancelot Harold Sugarwhite’ was enough to make a man worry rats. Still a virgin despite his ambitions to the contrary, Sugar-white blamed even that on his name. For God’s sake, any girl looking bright-eyed across the pillow, all rumpled, flushed and pleased with herself, to ask ‘Well, it’s about time I got to know your name, isn’t it?’ and getting ‘Lancelot Harold Sugarwhite’ as a reply, would more than likely fall out of bed laughing.
So when Waterhouse gave his great adenoidal yell of glee and slapped his thighs - ‘Lancelot Harold Sugarwhite, for Christ’s sake! Oh, sweetheart, where have you beed all by life?’- Sugarwhite didn’t hesitate. He simply threw his beer at him.
Unfortunately, Waterhouse ducked and the beer went over a Royal Sussex who promptly lashed out and in a moment the canteen was a mass of brawling figures, with the elderly Egyptian who ran it down on his knees behind the counter praying to Allah to take the infidels out of his beloved country and sink them in the slime of the Nile delta.
Not far from where the main struggle was going on, Private By was sitting at a table which looked more like a tea-tray under his vast fist. It took a lot to rouse Ed By but when he was roused, he was capable of taking on a whole army corps, and when someone landed a backhander on his nose that made his eyes water, he swung a haymaker that caught Waterhouse on the jaw and lifted him clean off the floor. The top of Waterhouse’s head struck the taller Sugarwhite under the chin, and his head cannoned into a third man’s with a click like a billiard ball.
‘Mon,’ an awed Seaforth had said as the Military Police arrived to pick up the bodies. ‘Three o’ the buggers wi’ one crack!’
When Hockold arrived next morning the prisoners were all waiting in the corridor outside Captain Amos’s office. The sergeant-major, six foot of lean hard Regular by the name of Rabbitt - a dangerous label in the electric atmosphere of No. 2 Transit -- stood chatting with the corporal of the escort, and as Amos swept past him he turned and followed.
‘What was it this time, Mr Rabbitt? Bannockburn or the Peterloo massacre?’
‘Boredom chiefly, sir.’
‘Well, we’re all bored, but we can’t tear the British army apart because of that, can we? What shall we do with ‘em? Crucify ‘em or just give ‘em twenty years in the glasshouse to slow ‘em down?’
The waiting men heard every word and were just visualizing a life of endless stamping about the detention barracks when the door at the end of the corridor opened and an officer appeared. He was tall, beak-nosed, and wearing desert boots. As he stalked past them into Amos’s office they saw he was a lieutenant-colonel.
The door swung shut behind him so that they could hear only muffled voices, though once they caught Amos’s voice raised in a single startled exclamation. ‘Let ‘em off, sir?’
There was another long wait and a great deal more muttering beyond the door, then Sergeant-Major Rabbitt appeared. ‘All right, you lot,’ he said briskly. ‘Something’s come up. March ‘em off, Corporal. Find ‘em something to do for an hour.’
As the startled men about-turned and marched out of the building, Amos watched them through the window. He was delighted to learn he was losing the bored unwilling soldiers who had made his life a misery but he was also having sudden visions of some spiteful army authority promptly filling the empty camp up again with another ration of similar types.
‘Not wanting an extra officer or two, are you, sir?’ he asked.
Hockold turned. ‘Want to come along?’
‘Can you fix it, sir?’
Hockold smiled. ‘Anybody else?’
Amos grinned. ‘Mr Rabbitt’s beginning to look as though he’s got mange,’ he said.
Shortly afterwards a lorry stopped outside the guard-room where Rabbitt’s four criminals were now scrubbing the verandah. Fidge jumped out, unshaven, frowsty and ashamed.
The military policeman who had accompanied him gave him a push. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘Shove off.’
‘Ain’t Oi gowing in the knocker?’ Fidge asked.
‘Not as far as I know. Better find some blankets and get your head down. You’ll be needing all the sleep you can get before long.’
The buzz went round the camp like wildfire. They were being posted. It stuck out a mile. They were being sent home for training at last. Scotland was where they trained commandos, wasn’t it? And the beer up there was good. For the first time in weeks, there was an air of excitement in the camp.
‘We’re moving on Friday,’ the next buzz said. ‘And it’s Cape Town, not Scotland. They’ve set up a commando camp in the middle of the Karroo and the instructors have all been drawn from the Special Service Battalion because they’ve got a reputation for not liking the British.’
Kits were packed in readiness. And not a moment too soon, because almost immediately they were paraded and told to be ready in an hour. Sergeant Bunch got them into a column. ‘Heads up,’ he roared. ‘Backs straight! Chests out!’ A glittering eye like the muzzle of a Spandau swept over them. ‘You look like a lot of nasty old age pensioners,’ he complained. ‘You’re not lumps of pudden, you’re human beans. Right! Company -le-eft turn! By the Christ - qui-ick march . . .!’
They were crammed into the lorries waiting outside the gate until they looked like sardines. The engines started and the convoy began to move. Someone started a song that inevitably lapsed into the usual filthy ballad.
‘Stanna shwaya. Oh desire!
Stanna shwaya, pull your wire!’
Private Docwra, staring around with a dropped jaw, stopped it dead. ‘Wheyhey,’ he said. ‘Where are they takkin’ us? This isnae the way to Cape Town.’
No more it was. They were heading west, which was nearer the fighting.
They finally stopped, alongside a stretch of drab tents, forlornly flapping in the dusty breeze as though they’d been standing there on the edge of the desert since Napoleon had fought the Battle of the Pyramids. There was no village - just an escarpment with a succession of wadis, a puddle of water round a few rocks and a couple of palms. To the Arabs it was known as Gott el Scouab. In addition to the tents, it contained a few huts and two or three marquees, a lorry park, a cookhouse, a petrol store, an arms store, a Naafi, a bored staff and a church. Since it had once been used as a prisoner of war camp for Catholic Italians, one of the wire-mesh windows of the church had been taken out and reverently replaced with one made from the bottoms of brown, green and white beer bottles. It now served every denomination in the army, and was known as St Martin’s-in-the-Sands.
A fat dough-faced cook-corporal called Rogers and a dozen greasy minions served them a meal. Then Sergeant-Major Rabbitt, who had arrived by car half an hour ahead of them, began to get them organized. ‘All right, all right, all right,’ he roared. ‘Get yourselves into a half-circle! The colonel wants a word with you!’
Aware that whatever it was they’d landed this time it was obviously going to be infinitely worse than Death Valley, they reluctantly shuffled into place. When Hockold appeared, Sugar-white and Waterhouse recognized him at once as the man who’d got them off when they’d looked like spending the rest of their natural lives pounding the dusty square at Akkaba. They began to cheer up. If he could work one miracle of that sort, he could perhaps work a few more.
‘Right -’ someone had placed an ammunition box on the sand and Hockold climbed on to it ‘- just gather round, so you can hear’
‘Thingks ‘e’s the gederal.’ Waterhouse’s nasal whisper sounded above the muttering as they moved nearer. ‘ ‘E goes id for this, they say.’
Hockold lifted his cane to indicate that the muttering should stop. ‘As of this moment,’ he said, ‘you are no longer Jocks, Welsh or British. You’re not East Yorks, Argylls, Seaforths, Susseckers, Buffs or whatever else you were before.’
There was a buzz of comment. No British soldier liked to have his regiment snatched from under his feet. To lose your regiment was one degree worse than losing your trousers. If you joined as a light infantryman, you were a light infantryman for the rest of your life, while a Guardsman remained a Guardsman for ever and ever, amen, right to the Last Trump. A Buff was a Buff. A Diehard was a Diehard. And nothing on God’s earth could make a Gordon into a Black Watch. Except authority. And authority seemed to be throwing its weight around at that moment.
Hockold drew a deep breath. ‘As of now, you are Number 97 Commando,’ he said, and waited with bated breath for a bolt of thunder and lightning from Combined Operations HQ to strike him down because he had no authority whatsoever as yet to give them such a title and it had only been agreed on as a temporary means of giving them an identity.
There was a moment’s silence then Bradshaw grinned. ‘Detribalized, by God,’ he said, and there was another buzz of muttered conversation. They weren’t sure whether to be pleased or not, but in most of them there was a feeling of relief. A few were even happy, because it meant they were on their way. In a few breasts like Lieutenant Swann’s, glory even lit a small lamp.
To one or two others - like Private Fidge - the announcement brought a quiver of alarm. This was something he hadn’t expected. When the buzz had gone round that they were going to South Africa, his day had been made. There was no conscription in South Africa and all you had to do was get on a train to Johannesburg and call yourself Cronje.
Hockold was speaking again.
‘I’ve looked at your records,’ he was saying, ‘and I notice some of you have been out here since the war started. That’s a long time, but if it’s any consolation, so have I.’
Well, that’s something, they thought grudgingly. At least he wasn’t some toffee-nosed puff from Cairo who hadn’t yet got his knees brown.
‘We’re here to train,’ Hockold went on. ‘For a special operation that could have a great deal of influence on the battle which we all know is brewing up out here. We don’t have long so it’s going to be tough and you’re going to have to work hard.’ He jerked a hand at the silent figure standing just to his right, and everybody’s eyes switched direction. ‘This is Major Murdoch, and it’ll pay you to give attention to what he says. It might save your lives.’
They all took a good look at Alexander Mackay Murdoch who stared back at them with his cold yellow eyes. He had dressed for the occasion and he looked like a walking armoury. He wore his kilt and, in addition to a Highland dirk honed to razor sharpness, he carried a .45, a .38, and a sniper’s rifle with a telescopic sight with which he’d shot more than one man in Spain. They didn’t like the look of Murdoch, and Murdoch didn’t like the look of them. The advantages were all on Murdoch’s side, of course, because he knew he could do something about them, while they knew they couldn’t do a damn thing about him.
Hockold was speaking again, searching his mind for something funny to say that would jerk them out of their apathy. ‘I expect you to do as you’re told,’ he went on. ‘And do it well because we want to pull this thing off and win ourselves VCs.’
He was pleased to hear a distinct laugh this time. You didn’t go out and get a VC because they looked nice on your coat. VCs were usually handed over at Buckingham Palace to your widow or your bereaved mum.
He paused. ‘I can’t tell you yet when it’ll be,’ he said. ‘Or where it’ll be, or what it’s for. But I will see that you do all know before we leave, because no one can do anything well unless he knows what he’s supposed to do. There’s just one snag -’
‘ ‘Ere it comes,’ Waterhouse said.
Hockold sensed the waiting hostility and went on quickly. ‘From now on, just to prove you’re no longer what you were, we’re going to separate you all.’
Sugarwhite’s eyes flicked to Waterhouse’s. Waterhouse looked at By. In similar fashion, the Argylls looked at the Gordons, and the Gordons looked at the West Yorkshires, and the West Yorkshires at the Royal Sussex. The look went right round the-whole crowded half circle.
Hockold continued mercilessly, accepting that Murdoch, who had suggested the move, had the experience to know what was best. ‘Regimental loyalties are no longer im
portant,’ he said. ‘The only thing you think of now is this unit.’ He gestured at the small group of commandos under Sergeant Jacka. ‘Ask these chaps. They know what I mean. There will be two of them in each tent to encourage and advise. Otherwise, no tent will be made up exclusively from any particular regiment. That’s all. Training will start tomorrow.’
While they were still gaping, startled, shocked and disgusted, Hockold stepped from the box, thankful it was done. He turned to the sergeant-major with a forced smile. ‘It’s all yours now, Mr Rabbitt,’ he said, trying to drum up another joke to break the silence that hung over the gathering like the kiss of death. ‘Let t’battle commence.’
5
A training programme was organized and naval vessels were earmarked for the task.
As Colonel Hockold was dismissing his men from his mind, Colonel Hochstatter was busy examining his. His conclusion was much the same as Hockold’s.
‘They’re a pretty mixed lot,’ he said. ‘And there aren’t many of them.’
Major Nietzsche, who had called the parade, shrugged. ‘Qaba’s not very big,’ he pointed out. ‘And after all the Luftwaffe’s responsible for the airfield.’
He glanced at Captain Schlabrendorff, for an outline of the anti-aircraft position. Schlabrendorff was none too confident. ‘The town’s ringed by guns,’ he said. The whole area’s covered by heavy and light flak. Unfortunately, if they get into trouble in the desert, they’ll take them all away.’
Hochstatter looked at his lists. ‘A few guns,’ he said. ‘A few engineers, a few gunners, and a few transport men, together with eighty-seven experienced grenadiers. Two hundred and fifty-three altogether. Tarnow -’ he swung round in his chair to the signals officer ‘- did you inform army headquarters of our needs?’
Tarnow’s cold face was impassive. ‘As strongly as I could.’
Hochstatter stared again at his lists, and finally at the map of Qaba and its defences. ‘Wutka,’ he said, looking up. ‘We must have your engineers.’