Bel Ria

by Sheila Burnford

  Sinclair stopped, unable to tear his eyes away for a moment. On the far side of the crater the dog suddenly appeared, standing utterly still, his head up as though pulled back by the monkey’s hands around his throat. Two pairs of eyes stared unwaveringly at him. It was as though they drew him down to their plight and size, so that he was in proportion to the animals dead and alive of this little ruined crater world. This raw wound in the earth which exposed the roots of a tree like entrails, this scattering of small limp bodies, the aborted doe — all was suddenly an unendurable desecration. The roots of one scrubby pine among a hundred pine, some twenty of the most prolific vermin dead — yet somehow a blasphemy so incomprehensibly terrible that he felt quite giddy and shaken.

  In a sudden blind rage he shouted and swore at the dog, threatening with upraised arm, desperate to drive it away, to be rid of those remorselessly reminding eyes. They must not follow him, hopelessly, uselessly, into the seaport. They must find some other human association — some farmhouse sanctuary perhaps. “Get out!” he yelled. “Go back! Go away. . . . Shoo. . . . Allez!” He picked up a stone, feinted a throw to no effect. He threw it, deliberately short. The monkey buried its head, but the dog crouched steadfast, its eyes unwavering.

  It was useless. He was wasting energy. Once more he turned his back resolutely, and set off at such a cathartic pace that he reached the outskirts of St. Nazaire shortly before sunset. Only then did he look back. They were still there. But in the town center he lost his followers at last. In the empty streets of blind shuttered houses and shops, he took cover for a while against the falling flak. He saw the dog momentarily, obviously terrified by the barrage, cowering against a wall; then, as shrapnel rained down he bolted from cover, and the last Sinclair saw of him was the little gray form streaking away down the cobblestones, veering wildly, the dark shape of the rider crouched low to the outstretched neck. Sinclair pressed himself farther into the stone arch of a garden wall, feeling at once both disquiet and relief to see them go. They had been incongruous enough before, but here their pathetic jockey-and-steed comicality was almost an outrage before the human tragedy of a wartorn town. Behind the shuttered windows of the house beyond, a crackling radio blared the Marseillaise.

  The bombardment increased. It was dark before the first lull fell and he found his way to the military control post. The blacked-out town was still full of troops, patiently awaiting embarkation orders, dim silent forms hunched on the curbs now, or propped against walls, identifiable only by the occasional firefly glow of a furtive cigarette. He had a mug of coffee at a canteen operating in the crypt of a roofless church, considered reporting his wound but decided against it when an ambulance drove up to a first aid post and he saw what one medical corps orderly had to contend with single-handed. He joined a file of silent men converging on the docks towards the black bulk of a destroyer lying alongside, but the bombardment started up again, the destroyer slipped away, and the file scattered for shelter.

  For hours he crouched within the sandbagged emplacement of a wrecked gun with a dozen or so other men. Among them he recognized the young Lancashire Fusilier, last seen on a bicycle’s crossbar, his feet now forced back into unlaced boots, the collie crouched by his side. When the boy’s head fell forward and he slept momentarily, the dog stretched across his knees, whining, pawing at his chest until he wakened. Sinclair offered him a cigarette. The boy had reached the beaches of Dunkirk to find the last of the rescue craft pulled out. The collie had been one of a pack of abandoned dogs still roaming the water’s edge. It had attached itself to him, following him back on the tortuous retreat across France, by truck at first, then on a train until it was derailed, and after that on foot. When he had crossed the Loire the dog had swum behind. The boy would not abandon him now. Somehow he would get this dog back to England.

  His tale sparked off an exchange of experiences over the last hectic weeks among the group. One man, a dispatch rider, told how he had skidded off a sharp bend and into the ditch minutes before a German column had rolled by. The machine was wrecked, but when he had crawled through the hedge he had found, miraculously awaiting him in the field, a horse, unaccountably saddled and bridled. There was no sign of an owner. Knowing little more than one end of a horse from the other, he climbed gratefully aboard this providential transport, and set off to regain his signals unit on a cross-country course which lasted for nearly a week. Eventually he ended up at La Boule and there, with much regret, he was dismounted.

  Sinclair told something of the caravan and its entourage, and a voice to his left spoke of seeing a proper circus, a whole convoy of bright modern wagons and trailer cages, including two elephants, heading out of Paris.

  The talk fell away and the group dozed fitfully. Unable to ease his ribs into any comfortable position, Sinclair remained awake. Taking a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket, he came across the medicine bottle. The swig, small though it was, exploded in his head, then spread its remembered warmth through his veins. He drank to the generosity of the old man, and then to that fierce-eyed brave woman — and at that moment, almost as though summoned, he felt rather than saw the wraithlike presence of the dog. A nose touched his hand, then quested within his open battle dress blouse, moving over the binding there. He drew deeply on the cigarette and in the red glow saw the familiar shape of the dog’s head, and the dark limpet blur that was the monkey. They had found him, the one tenuous link with their destroyed past; their claim still strong in her scent on the strip of clothing around his ribs, from her hands that had bound it there. The dog’s eyes looked almost crazed with terror.

  The man beside him flicked a shaded lighter. “Cor,” he said, “look what’s here —” and a hand reached out to the monkey; but the dog whirled with bared teeth as the monkey gibbered fearfully and clung tighter. Another hand proffered a piece of chocolate, but the dog, trembling violently, pressed closer to Sinclair, thrusting his head into the shelter of his arm.

  The monkey reached out to grab the edge of his blouse, then with quick nervous decision thrust its head within. Sinclair knew nothing of monkeys, had never touched one before, and felt almost repelled by the dry warmth; but some instinct caused him to cup a hand over its haunches and the little thing burrowed in. He did up the buttons without a thought for the consequences of his action other than vaguely hoping that it would not sink its teeth in him later when he removed it. The black collie, ears pricked inquisitively, moved over to investigate, and the dog snarled. Lazily, Sinclair stretched out a proprietary leg and barred the collie with his boot, resting his hand reassuringly on the quivering dog — acknowledging the wrongness, the false premise of his responsibility even as he did so. He should have driven them off immediately.

  When the order reached them to move he paused, his hand irresolute over the buttons. It was too small, too naked and human a burden to return to the shoulders of a small distraught dog. Even if he did so, it would not be easy to abandon or drive them away now that they had made contact; they had proved their tenacity. He buttoned up his blouse. The medicine bottle had made him quite light-headed and carefree. Let them take their chance. Let someone else make the decision. Let some authority risk its fingers over the dislodgement of the monkey, the sharp teeth of its guardian dog. He would not think further than the moment. He shared a last sip on French soil with the fusilier. “Here’s luck,” he said cheerfully, patting the almost imperceptible bulge on his chest.

  The dog kept close to his heels. Ahead groups of men were moving out of cover to the shaded pinprick of light that marked one gangway between the dock wall and the awaiting destroyer. As he drew nearer, he saw the collie running up and down the edge of the dock, gathering itself for a spring, hesitating, barking, running back to try again, and always failing before the ten-foot gap. As he awaited his turn to embark, he saw that two MPs were stationed on either side of the gangway and were turning back with well-directed boots the frantic attempts of yet another dog to board.

  He bent down and felt aro
und the neck of the gray blur at his feet. The bell was firmly attached to some form of metallic thread, but he silenced it by wrenching out the clapper. The next time he looked down his shadow was no longer there. He shuffled forward in his turn and produced his identifying paybook, feeling the small warm stillness under his pocket as he did so. A gray-faced naval officer, flanked by a keen-eyed Master at Arms, inspected his paybook briefly, glanced up at his face, then down to the front of his battle dress. Sinclair looked down too, resigned, expecting to find a telltale paw or tail sticking out, but “Wounded?” asked the officer.

  “Not seriously, sir,” said Sinclair.

  “Report to the Medical Officer when you board the Lancastria,” said the officer, his eyes already on the man behind him.

  As he boarded the gangway, Sinclair could just make out a small still form pressed against and merging into the canvas sides, only a few inches away from the gleaming boots of an MP. Between the boots and the canvas was a space of some eight inches, and he marveled at the strategic positioning of this extraordinary little dog. Sure enough there was a momentary brushing, light as a feather, against the inside of one leg as he took the first step up the gangway, and at the end as he stepped down he felt it again.

  It was impossible to move forward through the packed mass of humanity already on board the destroyer. His group was almost the last to be taken aboard before the gangway was removed. He remained jammed agonizingly against the rail as the destroyer slipped away from the dock and headed out to the great bulk of the liner that lay at anchor three miles out in the roadstead.

  When they transferred to the Lancastria, it was impossible to distinguish anything at deck level among the milling boots in the darkness, but he had no doubt now that somewhere beyond the blue pinpricks of light in the dark cavern at the end of his second gangway crossing, his shadow would attach itself to him again.

  Everything on board the liner was proceeding with calm efficiency. The Lancastria’s crew remained as imperturbable as though the throngs of weary unwashed troops and ill-prepared civilians — women and children among them — and wounded were privileged passengers about to set off on a peacetime cruise. White-jacketed solicitous stewards were everywhere. He was directed where to report, where to collect a life jacket, where to stow his kit; he was allocated a mattress in number two hold, and even a time to appear in the dining saloon, and finally he was directed to the sick bay.

  Up to this point, he had luxuriated only in being part of an unthinking process again. Now he had to force himself to make a personal decision, and his tired mind rebelled. A medical officer would obviously take a dim view of the monkey’s unhygienic haven, and if he were once listed as wounded he would be caught up with medical officialdom the moment they landed in England. Was he really going to see this thing through? Was he really going to burden himself with the ultimate acceptance of transferred ownership? The smuggling ashore, the concealment? And then . . . ?

  But the dark woman had not hesitated to accept responsibility for him . . .

  Then scrub the sick bay, said Sinclair to himself, suddenly resolute. And scrub the mattress in number two hold as well, he decided a minute later, feeling the strong revulsion of the countryman against the constraint of walls and packed humanity. The upper deck might be packed too with silent huddled shapes, but above was the velvet night sky of June and fresh salt air. He made his way up and found a place beside a sleeping civilian at the end of a row of back-to-back seats; and even before he had wedged himself in, he was aware of a small shape slipping down the narrow tunnel formed at their base. After a while he put a hand down and smiled in satisfaction when he felt the touch of a nose. So far so good.

  He had been handed two thick bully beef sandwiches soon after boarding. He ate one, then took the meat out of the other and passed it behind him, but it remained uneaten on the deck. He pushed a crust inside his blouse, but drew no response from the monkey. It seemed to be asleep. Sinclair closed his eyes and dozed uneasily.

  When he woke they were anchored out in the searoads beyond St. Nazaire. There was the promise of another still warm morning. The long low shape of Les Étoiles rose from the flat dawn sea to the west, and to the east lay the silent waiting coastline of France, plumes of black smoke rising lazily in the misty air. There was a suspenseful unreality about it, as of a backdrop to an empty stage before the play begins. On the Lancastria, reality lay in the spectators, in the gray unshaven faces of men huddled into ground sheets or gas capes against the dawn chill, and in the stirring unease that they were still there, a vulnerable audience for any show the enemy might care to put on.

  Sinclair’s immediate concern, however, was that the slight bulge at his chest was no longer there. He felt around in the folds of his blouse. The man beside him opened one eye. “The monkey which is emerged from your vestments is now there —” he said in very French-accented English, and pointing vaguely behind him. “It has sullied the floor,” he added severely. “A sailor has expressed considerable chagrin.” He closed the eye.

  Sinclair was relieved; at least it was not his vestments that had been sullied. The chagrined deckhand must have dealt with the offense for there was no sign. Nor was there any sign of the offender or the dog; they must be deep in the fastness of their tunnel. He decided to leave well enough alone and went off to line up for a mug of tea and another sandwich.

  On his way he saw the black collie of the night before, leaning possessively against a pack and rifle. A steward told him that he had seen at least a dozen other dogs on board, not to mention several cats, and a rabbit. And one of the army nursing sisters had even brought a tortoise along with her — he had managed to find some lettuce for that, he said proudly. He was obviously an animal lover, and his day was made when he heard about the monkey. He produced an apple and some raisins, and his final triumph was a package of biscuits with bumps which he assured Sinclair were nuts. “Come back here before we get to the other side,” he said. “Once they’re off the ship most of those animals will be collared by the officials — but there are ways. . . .” He let the words fall significantly.

  Fate seemed determined to steer his course, sending such a useful contact. Sinclair settled on a later rendezvous and made his way back. He had just emerged onto the upper deck when, almost simultaneously with the shipboard uproar of alarm bells and gongs and gunfire, there came the scream of aircraft engines. The liner shuddered convulsively to two nearby explosions, and men flattened on the deck like a pack of cards as the dark shapes passed over and veered off towards the coast before the barrage of gunfire. A choleric-faced Indian army major a few yards ahead of Sinclair lowered a hastily snatched rifle as he watched them go. “I didn’t lead them enough,” he said regretfully. “Just wait till they come round again —” But the aircraft seemed to have been driven off for the moment; the ship’s bells and a bugle rang the all clear soon afterwards. Men picked themselves up off the decks and resumed their grumbling, sunk back into lethargy, or went in search of a beer.

  Too stiff and painful to bend down and peer along the seat tunnel, Sinclair shoved the fruit and biscuits and a mug of water just inside. The animals must have been terrified by the explosions and gunfire, and he tried to entice them out with encouraging noises.

  His seat mate gazed down with such raised eyebrows that he felt some explanation about how he had acquired his companions was due. The Frenchman was interested and in his quaintly pedantic English was able to supply some background to those “peoples of the roads,” as he called them. They came from the Basque country to travel the side roads and villages of France, as seasonal as the onion vendors, as shrouded in antiquity as the gypsies — possibly of Moorish blood, he thought. Sometimes singly, more often two or three wagons together, always with a small troop of performing dogs; and selling pegs and withy baskets as a sideline. As a child in Brittany he remembered seeing one with two dancing bears.

  As the morning wore on and still the Lancastria lay at anchor the sense of unea
se deepened and spread from group to grumbling group. There was another raid at lunchtime, this time met with men’s rifles and machine guns joining in with the ship’s defenses, and again driven off, but two miles away a black pall of smoke hung over their sister ship, the Oronsay. She had received a direct hit. It could have been them. Why didn’t they push off now? At least underway, they could take evasive action next time. What were they doing, tempting providence in this huge conspicuous liner out here in these shallow Loire waters? There were reportedly over six thousand troops and civilians aboard — true, every now and then another handful of weary men would be brought aboard from a fishing boat, but was that enough to justify the risk to six thousand lives? The silence from the coast became more and more oppressive, like the silence of a beast before it springs. Rumors spread: they were waiting for this, they were waiting for that; they would leave when the tide flooded, they were hemmed in by half the German navy; they were waiting for the rear guard to turn up, a naval escort, fighter aircraft escort; they were waiting to know where the hell to go, for England had been overrun as well . . .

  As though sensing the unrest, the dog crept out of shelter at last and pressed shivering against Sinclair’s knees; woebegone and bedraggled with terrified eyes and tucked-in tail, he was almost unrecognizable from the jaunty little leader of the caravan. Sinclair noticed that almost the entire left flank of the close curled coat had been singed. The monkey, on the other hand, seemed quite unscathed. It sat back on its haunches close to the dog, grimacing and rolling its lips back over its teeth between sips from the mug. It then emptied the remaining water over the dog’s unflinching head and sidled swiftly up to a nearby soldier, newly woken, about to light a cigarette. Quick as a flash, the monkey grabbed his lighter, dropped it in the mug, then snatched the cigarette and stuffed it into its own mouth. Then, like a child showing off, the monkey rocked from one foot to the other and gibbered triumphantly as it waved the cup, wondrously preserving the lighter within and always tantalizingly out of reach of the owner.