They piggybacked men who stank from dysentery, their eyes hollowed and black. Each man they saved was a miracle all the greater because it happened time after time. You carried on, you did your bit, you didn’t ask for thanks. Of all of theirs, only one name would be remembered. One name, which stood for all of them.
The donkey carried on as well, day after day, into the night and then again in the morning.
CHAPTER 33
The Donkey
Gallipoli, July 1915
The days grew hot. The few shreds of grass left on the shattered soil grew brown. The flowers withered into the dirt. The sea changed colour, grew a deeper blue. The sky changed too.
The noise didn’t change. Nor did the sounds of pain.
The smells changed though. Now more and more men smelt of sickness as well as blood. The smell made the donkey cry, he who rarely made a noise these days, even when the mules whickered hello.
Hee haw! Hee haw!
And then the day came when the man called Henderson didn’t come to lead him up onto the plateau, along the paths among the waiting men. The donkey waited as one by one the mules were led out to carry water up the hills, while he was left alone.
What had happened? He didn’t know. He didn’t care either now. The noise and fear and loss had buffeted him too much.
He just endured.
More days. More nights. Some nights were wild, with lights and human thunder. Other nights were almost calm, the only movement the wounded being carried out on barges.
It didn’t matter to the donkey.
He carried water up and down the beach for a while, tin cans bouncing at his sides. But these days he didn’t carry water up the gully. The mules were bigger and stronger. They could carry more and further. He drank. He ate.
There were fewer men now than there had been before. He noticed that at least.
Someone tried to burn the piles of dead men in the hills. When the wind came from that direction the beach stank of roasted flesh.
The shadows had the purple depth of autumn, but nothing else about the land could change. The brush had all been cut and burnt, used for fences or to prop up the trenches the humans dug deep into the ground. Any flowers were trampled into mud. Nothing lived on the scrawny hills now but humans, rats and flies. Day by day there were more rats and more flies and, even though so many had died, more men still came.
Fog thickened the air at night now, so thick it was hard to see the hay before his face. The sea turned smooth, as though even the waves had left this land.
And then things changed again. A busy night; busier than any night before. A day of almost calm. Another night, with men scurrying in the dark, boats pulled up onto the sand then pushed out again, of giant burps from the big ships out on the cold grey sea.
And the words muttered from man to man: ‘We’re leaving! Can’t let the enemy know.’
And then another word. ‘Evacuation.’
CHAPTER 34
The Donkey
Gallipoli, 18 December 1915
Up on the cliffs the night was torn with lights and noise, but down here the darkness ruled as the barges slipped in to shore. Ripples lapped against the chilly sand, lit by starlight on the foam. Men plodded by candlelight along the beach, their feet wrapped in scraps of blanket to muffle the noise, their flickering lights half hidden in empty biscuit boxes, as they followed trails of flour or salt to the waiting barges. They pulled barbed wire behind them, leaving tangles on the paths.
Men limped. Men staggered. Others dropped in the lines, to be hauled up by friends and trudge on, propped up between their mates.
Sometimes men paused by the graves, and muttered something. One man saluted. ‘I hope the dead won’t hear us go,’ he said.
The officer said nothing.
The donkey watched as one by one the mules, too, were led onto the barge.
‘That’s the last of the mules, sir.’ The voice was almost a whisper.
A nod in the dimness. ‘Cast off then.’
‘Oi, Lieutenant!’
‘Shh! Want Johnny Turk to hear you? This is supposed to be a secret evacuation. What part of “secret” don’t you fellows understand?’
The indignant voice spoke more softly. ‘What about Simmo’s donkey? We can’t leave him behind.’
‘Haven’t you Australians ever heard of calling an officer sir?’
The first man lowered his voice to a whisper. But the tone made the donkey think of wild winds up on the hills. ‘That donkey saved two of my mates. Him and Simmo, they was mates too. We may be leaving Simmo here, but I’m blowed if we should be leaving his blinking donkey behind.’
‘There’s no mention of donkeys in my orders.’
‘Then to hell with your orders. Sir.’
There was a pause, broken only by the shelling from above. And then the first voice said, ‘Perhaps you’re right, soldier. To hell with my orders. Bring the donkey with the mules. And quietly, remember!’
The face was a white grin in the darkness. ‘Yes, SIR!’
Hands pulled at his lead rope. The donkey snorted. He dug his hooves into the sand.
There was no way he was going anywhere near that sea.
‘Hey, Harro, give him a push from behind will you?’ The second voice was an urgent hiss in the darkness now.
‘No fear. I was kicked by a donkey once.’
‘But this is Murphy’s donk!’
‘Don’t mean he won’t give us a kick. Ow! Get out of it, you blighter!’
Heee haw! The donkey snickered in the darkness.
‘Holy hell, he’ll have Johnny Turk down on the lot of us in a minute.’
‘Here. I have seen this with horses in a fire.’
It was one of the tall men with dark skins and white cloth about their heads, and a voice like when the Man with Kind Hands sang. The donkey watched as the man unwrapped the cloth from his head. His dark hair gleamed in the starlight.
One of the other men stared.
‘Don’t think I’ve ever seen one of you Sikhs without your turban before.’
The tall man nodded. ‘It is forbidden. I do this for Bahadur, the bravest of the brave. Simmo or Murphy, as you call him. Now then…’
Suddenly the donkey’s world was pale; soft cloth lay about his face. For a moment he lifted his head in terror, but hands stroked him, voices whispered to him. There was the scent of hay by his nose. He took a bite automatically, and chewed. It soothed him. The world was less confusing now, with no chaos of humans moving around or bright explosions to startle him.
This time, when someone pulled the lead rope, the donkey stepped forward. One step, and another, the scent of hay always in front of him.
‘By gawd, he’s going…’ Hands patted his sides again. ‘Good luck, matey. You saved a good few of my cobbers here.’
‘Aye, good luck.’
‘Three cheers for the donkey…’
‘Shut up, you fool!’
‘Shhh!’
Hands guided his feet. The donkey stepped up, then down.
The world rocked again. But kind hands held him close.
CHAPTER 35
The Donkey
Gallipoli, 20 December 1915
The world was black when the white cloth was pulled away. Not dark like the night time, with the stars and moon providing light. This was the dark he’d known before, smelling of wet hay and frightened animals.
Now there were other scents too. The sour scent of illness; the smell of blood. They were stronger now, not diluted by the wind travelling over soil and sea.
Men moaned in the blackness above him. Long hopeless moans and muttering that frightened him, though he wasn’t quite sure why.
The man who had lent the white cloth finished tying it back around the top of his head. He stroked the donkey’s nose again. ‘I must go. But we will not forget you.’
The donkey listened to his steps grow fainter.
The wood beneath his hooves rocked. He had felt rocking li
ke that before they had flung him into the sea. But somehow it was not so frightening this second time, despite the scents of human death.
Suddenly a noise rose from the land; an explosion so loud it was as though the earth had screamed.
Then it was gone.
The rocking beneath his hooves grew stronger, and stronger still, so at times he staggered and almost fell. The smells of land grew fainter, and fainter still. Then there were only the smells of humans and the sea.
The human kept his promise. Water came in a bucket, with gentle hands that stroked him as he drank. There was hay always in front of him. The mules called for food, but only he had hay all the time. He was glad that the mules were tethered and his food was safe.
More rocking. More water and more food.
And then the rocking stilled.
CHAPTER 36
The Donkey
Moudros Harbour, Lemnos Island, 26 December 1915
The ship emptied of men smells and noise, but the donkey stayed down in the darkness with the mules.
He sniffed the air. Dawn scents! But there was something else, something familiar…
The land out there was home!
He shifted his feet impatiently. Hee haw! It was a cry of recognition. It was a call of longing. Somewhere out there was peace, beyond the insanity of men.
Home.
He called again and tugged on his rope and then he called again. Hee haw! Hee haw!
And finally, someone came.
‘Hey, old boy, we ain’t forgotten you. Come on. Reckon you’ve earnt your right to go ashore afore the mules.’
This time the donkey followed, his hooves clip-clopping as they went. He didn’t break away even when they reached the deck, and he saw the rolling waves, and remembered that horrifying swim.
The daylight hurt his eyes again, after the darkness below. But when he blinked they were there, just as he had known, brown hills, and white houses crouched into the land. The tents were still there, too—even more of them now. He could hear their flapping; smell the wounded they housed. Smell his home…
Someone pulled a strap around his body. He was lifted up.
And now he did struggle, remembering his fall into the sea, but not for long. His hooves met something solid again—or almost solid, for this tiny boat rocked even more than the big ship he’d been on.
Men moved their arms. The boat pulled forward, towards the land. Closer…closer…then he was lifted up again, then down. His hooves clopped onto wood, then soil. The soil that smelt of home.
The world still seemed to sway, but after he’d walked for a bit, the swaying stopped.
There was still too much yelling, and screams and groans from tents, and the scent of blood. The explosions had stopped, though, and beyond the tent-smells was the sharp scent of the hills.
The men tethered the mules to a long fence down past the tents. They tethered the donkey there, too, slightly apart from the mules. Lantern light spilt across the darkness. Women passed in long grey skirts, quiet with weariness as they walked from tent to tent, straightening up and placing smiles on their faces as they entered to tend the wounded men. Pannikins clinked somewhere, and the scent of a coke fire drifted by.
Men with white-clothed heads brought water in buckets to the mules and the donkey, then hay—not much, but enough for a mouthful to chew before dawn, enough to know that more would come when it was day. Then the men left, too.
The mules stamped and snickered amongst themselves.
Someone screamed in the darkness. ‘No, no, no, sister! Not my leg! Don’t let them take my—’ The words melted into a scream again, and then all noise was gone.
The donkey shivered in the night.
There was the smell of illness here, even more than at the place they’d been before. He might be home, but this still smelt all wrong.
He had to get away.
The thought startled him at first. Where had it come from?
He had never tried to run away, not since he was small. Dimitri’s stick had beaten him when he had tried to go back to his mother. But suddenly he could hear another voice: the Man with Kind Hands. ‘Nay, to hell with them. Come on, laddie. We’re better on our own.’
Away. That was what he needed. To be Not Here.
He had gone away before. Gone away now many times, from one place to another. Every time a man had led him. Now he needed to do it by himself. Away. Away from all the wrong smells and the men, the lantern light and noise. Away into the night—
He tugged on the rope, then tugged again. It didn’t move. He dug all four hooves into the ground and heaved.
The fence creaked, but it held.
He stopped. He knew instinctively he would only hurt himself if he kept on. And yet…
It was almost as though the whisper came again, telling him what to do. He shifted so his mouth could reach the rope. He bit on it, and then began to chew.
It was tough, tougher than a young tree branch, with no bark to sweeten the job. But as with a tree branch if you chewed long enough your teeth went through.
The rope dropped to the ground, leaving a bit dangling from his halter.
He took a step, expecting to feel the pull of the tether about his face or neck. He stepped again, and then another step.
One of the mules cried. Hawwww hawww hawww!
Someone yelled, ‘What’s up with the mules?’
The donkey started. The mule would call the men!
He began to trot. It had been so long since he had gone faster than a walk that he wondered if he had forgotten how. But his legs remembered. He sped up almost to a gallop.
The way was rough, but then he found the track. It was rough, too, and once or twice he stumbled in the dark. But soon the bad smells were all behind him, leaving only a whisper of men and blood on the wind. The donkey slowed down to a walk.
The softness of the darkness closed around.
CHAPTER 37
The Donkey
Lemnos Island, 26 December 1915
The donkey plodded along the track. The moon had risen: a gold sickle among the stars. He passed a house, huddled white against a hill with a fringe of trees around it.
It felt wrong to walk alone.
Lonely, lonely, lonely…
He had been alone before. But always he had known that in the morning a man would come. This man or that man, harsh or kind, bringing water, bringing food and work.
There was food all around him now: grass to graze, bushes to nibble. He could smell a spring where he could drink.
He didn’t want to drink. His legs ached. He could almost doze…his eyes began to shut…
‘Jesu Christi! A donkey! Here!’ A laugh rang out, triumphant.
Something jerked his head. The donkey reared, but it was too late.
The man had a firm hold of his halter.
He was an island man, younger than Dimitri, dressed in sheepskins, with sheepskin on his feet as well. Someone was by his side.
A voice snapped, ‘Well, do not stand there like a fool, Creon! Help me onto him.’ The voice was old. A woman’s voice. Her dress was black, so it was hard to make her out even in the moonlight.
‘But Kyria Calliope…’
‘Do you want your son to be born with no midwife? Heh? Then help me up onto the donkey.’
The donkey stood there, automatically quiet, as the woman clambered onto his back. She sat sideways, awkwardly at first, then wriggled till she was more comfortable. She was so tiny her legs didn’t touch the ground. Her legs felt skinny, but her bottom was big.
The woman grasped his mane, then sighed. ‘Ah, this is better. My legs are not as young as they once were. Now lead him carefully.’ Her voice was thoughtful now. ‘I have never ridden a donkey before. I think I like it.’
‘Yes, Kyria. But we must hurry.’
‘Then walk faster! If you walk fast the donkey will walk fast too, isn’t that right?’
‘Yes, Kyria. But…’
‘Walk!’
They walked.
It wasn’t far. Two curves around the track, and then the man veered off across the fields to another house: a pile of stones with a well, a stone fence and a tree. A flicker of light shone inside, and the scent of burning sheep fat oozed out the door.
Sounds came from the house—panting—and the smell of blood, too. The donkey sniffed. He knew the smell of blood. This smelt…different.
‘Ah.’ The woman slid off his back, and the donkey saw she had a bundle in her hands. ‘Sounds like we are just in time. I hope you have enough firewood for hot water.’
‘I—’
‘If there is not, then get some more!’
A young woman’s voice cried out from inside the house. The old woman spat three times at the doorstep, then hurried in.
The young man still held the remnants of the tether. Now he led the donkey behind the house, and found a longer rope. He knotted it to the donkey’s halter, then tied the other end to the tree. Callused hands felt the donkey’s shoulders and his haunches. The man snorted in satisfaction. ‘Ha! He’s young. And fit.’
A bucket splashed down into the well, then there was water to drink. The man dumped an armful of straw by the donkey’s front legs, then went to sit on the doorstep of the house.
The cry came again.
Suddenly there was another sound: a thin wail. The man stood up, but the woman’s voice spoke firmly from the house.
‘Not yet! Yes, Creon, you have a son. But do not come in yet!’
The donkey drank, then chewed the straw. It didn’t satisfy—not like grass or leaves or the hay he had known for the last few months. But it was something to fill his mouth.
He was strangely content, as well. There was no need to think now, to wonder what to do. The humans would decide. And while the smell from the house was strange, somehow it was a good smell, a smell to make you happy, not sad.
The Animal Stars Collection Page 11