by John Harris
Despite his fury at being trapped and his own sick misery at the death of the Iraqi, Beebe couldn’t help being impressed by Pentecost’s professionalism. The books of verse had vanished and he had seemed to come to life. The old languid manner was still there, but there was a gleam in his eye suddenly as though this were what he had been born for and he were actually relishing it. He appeared to be everywhere at once, listening to the sergeants, the zaids, Minto trying to organise a sick bay, and the deputations of civilian drivers and clerks who insisted on being allowed to leave, despite the fact that the Hejris clearly had no intention of permitting them to. Barbed wire was laid in the gaps between the stony outcrops and the ancient mortars were taken from the lorries and placed where they could command the rocks. In addition, Lack had produced the rusty 1½ inch Martini mountain guns and a quantity of dubious ammunition that had been captured during some distant foray against the Hejris, and Fox had set to work to make them function.
A scale of rations had been fixed, though there was no bread because the civilian bakers had been on the lost lorry, and Pentecost had set Stone searching through the battered library for a recipe. Within twenty-four hours they were producing loaves of a sort. So that it couldn’t be taken over in the event of treachery, he moved the officers’ quarters into the armoury, and it was there they conducted their first conference, Pentecost at the head of the table in a smartly brushed uniform.
Lack seemed to think he was slightly mad. ‘You can’t hold a place like this, Billy,’ he said. ‘I’m all for biffing ’em for six but one good-sized artillery shell would bring the walls down! People just don’t get besieged these days!’
‘The French were,’ Pentecost pointed out. ‘At Dien Bien Phu.’
‘For God’s sake, we haven’t the men! We should get out! Abandon the place!’ Lack’s face twisted sarcastically. ‘With honour, of course, but if necessary without. After all, if anybody was let down, we were.’
Pentecost didn’t appear to have heard. ‘I’d like every room searched,’ he said, ‘and a list made of everything we have that might be useful.’
Lack stared at him frustratedly but he did as he was told and produced his lists that evening.
‘Coffee, sixty pounds; sugar, five hundred pounds; tomatoes, two hundred and seventy-five cans; dried fish, forty pieces; olive oil, two hundred and fifty quarts…’
Pentecost listened to him carefully as he continued his recitation.
‘…condensed milk, a hundred and fifty cans. There’s wheat in the stables outside we can bring in, forty-five goats in the fort…’
‘Weapons?’ The word stopped him dead.
‘We’ll have to base the defence on small arms” Lack said. ‘All we have are two mortars and those two old Martinis, together with eighty rounds of ammunition, all in a highly dangerous state.’
‘I wish we had a few land m-mines,’ Minto said. ‘We’ve got pentolite for blasting,’ Pentecost pointed out. ‘What about the machine guns?’
Lack pulled a face. ‘They’ve been a joke for years. They’ve been stripped down for instruction so often by those bloody clumsy Toweidas they shake to pieces when they fire.’
Pentecost seemed unperturbed. ‘Never mind, they’ll be useful. We’ll have a guard put on the grain. I wouldn’t like it to be filched. We ought to be able to hold out for around three months with luck.’
Lack exploded. ‘Billy, we can’t! When I think of what those rat-faced gnomes in Khaswe have let us in for I bleed internally, but – we – can’t – stand – a – siege!’
Pentecost blinked. ‘We’ll negotiate as often as possible,’ he pointed out.
‘With those bastards?’
‘While we’re tailing, they’re not shooting. All the same—’ Pentecost smiled, blandly indifferent to Lack’s fury ‘—we’ll have the loopholes strengthened with wood and use the timber from the bazaar to make the stables stronger. And all fodder must be brought from the stables into the fort. We’ll do that tonight as soon as it’s dark. We’d also better get Stone to give some of the Toweidas a little more instruction in musketry. One of the Dharwas was hit by a Toweida bullet yesterday and we can’t afford that.’
2
Beebe was still suffering from the bitter knowledge that for once he had guessed wrong and from the miserable awareness that no one but himself was responsible for the Iraqi’s death. It had come as a shock, too, to discover that the Stars and Stripes meant nothing to the men outside the walls, and he had been carefully keeping out of the way, certain that Pentecost’s fury when they met would be blistering.
He crouched on the ramparts, well away from everyone else, digesting his bitterness and guilt. The plain towards Hahdhdhah was empty and shimmering in the heat. There was a wild confusion of granite shards to the south, then the broad valley towards the village where the flat stones laid in the earth like flagstones had been polished by the passing of countless feet. Near the village there was a cairn of white rocks erected by travellers but it was falling down now because no one bothered to propitiate Allah these days,
Beebe stared at it with narrow eyes, angry with himself, angrier still with Pentecost at whose door, despite his own procrastination, he still somehow managed to lay his situation. Down in the courtyard, he could hear Chestnut’s clipped Scots and Stone’s harsh command. Everyone seemed to have a job to do except himself and the women, and it made his resentment even more bitter.
He jumped as he heard a footstep near him and he saw it was Pentecost. Beebe stared at him uncomfortably.
‘I guess I owe you an apology,’ he growled.
Pentecost was staring through an embrasure and didn’t bother to turn his head. ‘We all make mistakes, Mr Beebe,’ he said calmly.
‘I killed that guy.’ Beebe was determined to scourge himself.
‘It happens, Mr Beebe.’
Beebe stared at him, wishing to God he’d offer something in the way of comfort, something to set his mind at rest.
‘I thought they’d let us go,’ he went on.
Pentecost turned at last and gave him a twisted little smile. ‘The first rule of siege warfare, Mr Beebe,’ he pointed out, ‘is that one must always stop anyone getting out who will otherwise be a drain on the rations.’
He offered the comment in the dry prim manner that Beebe had seen countless times on films where the cavalry had been held up by Indians and he wondered for a moment if in his own dry private way Pentecost was deliberately acting the part, pretending to be just what he was expected to be, carrying it a little too far even so that he had become a caricature. It would have explained a lot, because no one who was as purposeful, incisive and professional as Pentecost was now could be so completely unreal. But then he realised that Pentecost wasn’t acting at all. His family history was so firmly written across his life he had come to believe that everything that was worth doing could only be done by such people as himself, and because of this the present situation made special calls on him and demanded sacrifices which, because he felt himself a member of a privileged caste, he had to make without hesitation or fear. He even seemed to consider belonging to his class a prerogative and in return tried to give it style in his own old-fashioned way.
Beebe was startled by his discoveries but he knew he was right, and he felt curiously at a disadvantage. He felt he had to try to make amends. He lit a cigarette quickly, his hands shaking.
‘How long will it be before someone gets through to us?’ he asked.
Pentecost shrugged and, in his correctness, his military precision, Beebe would have liked to have grabbed hold of his neat little figure and shaken it until his head rattled. ‘I wouldn’t like to say,’ he said.
‘Won’t they send help from Dhafran?’
‘I doubt if it’ll be very easy. They’ve got to hold the Fajir Pass open and, if I know my Hejris, they’ll have thought of that, too.’
‘You mean the bastards are all round us?’
‘That’s exactly what I mean, Mr Beebe.
I’m sure you can find a parallel from the Indian Wars in your country.’
Beebe already had. It was standing in front of him, clean despite the recent confusion, well-shaved, an example to everyone. He was the arch-commander from every Indian film Beebe had ever seen – dry, efficient, humourless, unloved – an example to his men. Beebe almost expected him to claim acquaintance with Custer. He could even smile, God damn him!
‘And while you’re at it, Mr Beebe,’ he was saying cheerfully, ‘I think you should hoard your cigarettes. It might be a while before you can buy any more.’
Guiltily, Beebe snatched the cigarette from his mouth and stared at Pentecost. ‘You really mean we’re here to stay?’ he grated.
‘Until help comes.’
‘You mean, weeks?’
‘I mean months, if necessary. One remains faithful to one’s calling. We are at the moment only in the process of what the army calls “taking a grip”.’
‘Jesus,’ Beebe said. ‘All these kids!’ He stared again at Pentecost, dislike strong inside him but driven to offer help. ‘I can work a radio,’ he said bluntly. ‘It’d free Chestnut for other duties.’
‘That’s uncommon good of you, Mr Beebe,’ Pentecost said in his out-dated way. ‘We might need every hand before we’ve finished.’
‘I’ll get him to show me around and then I guess he’s yours. I’ll get my set in there and keep the watch. I’ve slept with headphones on before now. It’s the safest place down there, anyway. There isn’t even a window.’
Pentecost smiled. ‘You’ll be alone most of the time, Mr Beebe. I always think that makes the job twice as difficult. You have too much time to think.’
Beebe scowled. ‘I’m not a thinking type,’ he said. ‘I never had the equipment.’
3
That night in the darkness, they heard the sound of a horse’s hooves and the jingle of harness over the thudding of the motor that gave them electricity, and they all crowded to the ramparts, their hearts thudding, in expectation of an attack.
‘Bin T’Khass!’ Pentecost decided the voice wasn’t that of Aziz but one of his lieutenants who had picked up the name from him. ‘You are now shut in!’
Pentecost turned to Zaid Fauzan alongside him. ‘Tell him that we wish to send out the women and children,’ he said.
The voice from the darkness came back at once as Fauzan shouted the message.
‘We are camped across the road to the south,’ it announced. ‘No one will leave. Neither woman nor child. Not sick. Not injured. Not the American. Feed them so that your men will go short. Toweida is Hejri country.’
There was a long silence then the Hejri horseman, unable to resist a little private hostility of his own, loosed off his rifle against the fortress. The bullet struck the wall, throwing up chips of stone, then, twisted shapeless, whined away into the darkness.
‘Give him a burst, Sergeant,’ Pentecost said to Fox. ‘I don’t suppose you’ll hit him but it might encourage them not to come too close.’
The rattle of Fox’s gun shattered the silence and the flash at the muzzle dazzled them for a second.
There was another shot that struck the wall above the gate, then they heard the horse’s hooves clattering among the rocks. One of the guns in the stables opened up but nothing happened.
‘That seems to be your answer, Mr Beebe,’ Pentecost said with a smile.
4
Rather to everyone’s surprise, the first few days were quiet, as though the Hejris, thwarted in their first attempt, were having to do a little thinking about their next move, and with the disgraced Toweidas repeating in manic detail every firing, loading and maintenance move after Sergeant Stone, when the next attack came they were all ready.
‘Wish we had a rocket or two,’ Stone whispered to Fox as they stared over the ramparts in the darkness. ‘A Sidewinder in the middle of Addowara village’d send ’em back to Khusar – but fast.’
‘You’ve a hope,’ Fox murmured. ‘The bloody Khaliti could never afford anything more than pea-shooters.’
Stone gazed into the blackness among the rocks. Behind them they could hear Chestnut sorting out his clansmen for an attempt to start work on a barbed-wire defence. Wire was the only thing they were short of and they hadn’t enough men to patrol it, and the knowledge that it wouldn’t take long for one of the Hejri horsemen to hitch his mount to it and tow it away in the dark, posts and all, didn’t help Chestnut to feel enamoured of the Toweida Levies he was picking out to make up his party.
‘—Forsyth,’ he said. ‘MacNab. Dowd. Murray—’
Stone grinned. ‘The bastard’ll have ’em in kilts, given a chance,’ he said.
‘Khaliti tartan.’ Fox smiled. Then his smile died. ‘I expect those bastards in Khaswe are having a great time arguing whose fault it was,’ he went on, ‘with Billy Pentecost and the rest of us eyeball to bloody eyeball with the Hejris.’
‘Never mind,’ Stone said softly. ‘They’ll always give you a bit of coloured ribbon to sew on your chest when it’s over.’
‘Don’t you kid yourself,’ Fox said realistically. ‘Not for Hahdhdhah. They can’t even pronounce it in England. They’ll never get round that mouthful of bloody aitches. It looks the same either way and sounds like a cross between a sigh and a belch. There’ll be no gongs for this little lot.’
Chestnut’s party crept through the gate carrying the coils of wire and steel posts and mauls. There was only the sickle of a new moon to see by and they seemed to make a tremendous clatter, even before they started their work. Standing near one of the embrasures, Pentecost peered out in the hope of keeping them in sight. Above him, Beebe was stringing an aerial from the look-out tower and every now and then the flash of his unguarded torch swung round so that with every minute Pentecost expected a burst of firing to knock him off his perch.
When the firing came, however, it was not towards the tower but towards the wiring party. There were a few scattered shots, then a lot of shouting and the sound of running feet, and almost at once it seemed there were Toweidas outside the gate demanding to be let in.
Shooting was still going on, bewildering in the darkness, but nothing was coming near the fortress, then they heard yells and the sound of horses’ hooves, and soon afterwards Chestnut reappeared with the rest of the Toweidas, a group of contemptuous Dharwas and a furious Fauzan dripping blood from one hand.
‘Yon bastards lost their heids, sorr,’ Chestnut said as Fauzan was led away by Minto. ‘Just a few scattered shots. One happened to hit Fauzan in the hand, and yon bastards upped an’ bolted. Fauzan did all right. He didna lose his head. He got his boys among the rocks gie’in’ as good as they were gettin’. But we’ve lost a lot o’ the wire, sir. Yon bastards oot there hitched their gees to it and towed it awa’.’
Pentecost shrugged. ‘Well, it was sooner than I expected,’ he admitted. ‘What’s left of it we’ll use on the walls.’ He gave a little troubled sigh. ‘All the same, it makes a difference. What if they come at night? How are we off for lights?’
Chestnut shook his head. ‘Bad off, sorr. Yon’s a big drawback. We canna’ see. But Ah reckon ah can fix somethin’ wi’ a couple of Aldis lamps.’
‘Have a go, Chestnut.’
‘Aye, sir.’ Chestnut hesitated. ‘I’ve had another idea, too, sir. I’ve seen yon Dharwas cookin’ their grub. They don’t use dung like the Toweidas. They keep pinchin’ chips off yon zanhae wood we’ve got stored in the north corner. It flares. It’s got natural turpentine in it, sorr. Burrns wi’ a hot bright flame. How aboot gettin’ some of yon spare drivers and clerks on the saw mill? We can mix it wi’ straw an’ bits of thorrn bush and soak it in paraffin, and wrap it aroond wi’ one of yon plastic sheets. It ought tae gi’e us enough light tae shoot by.’
When daylight came, the reason for all the fuss during the night became apparent. The Hejris had built a sangar of stones and bundles of green branches in front of the fort, not more than two hundred yards away. Beyond, towards the village, th
ey could see tents and horsemen alongside the road on both sides, their ranks marked here and there with green banners.
Pentecost stared at the breastwork with narrowed eyes. ‘That’s where they’ll come from,’ he observed to Fox, ‘and we ought to knock it down. But I can’t risk losing Dharwas, and the Toweidas are going to be no good outside the walls. We’ll just have to let it stand and hope that before long someone in Khaswe pulls his finger out and sends a relief.’
5
What Pentecost didn’t know, what his wife didn’t know, what no one but Cozzens knew, was that orders didn’t even include a relief.
‘No rescues,’ Cozzens had been told firmly by the British Minister in the privacy of his office. ‘And no heroics. We back up the Sultan, and such borders as he’s agreed upon with his neighbours, but we don’t create any new ones or support artificial old ones. If the border’s in dispute, we must wait for it to be settled by UNO.’
‘What about Pentecost?’ Cozzens had demanded.
‘He volunteered to be seconded to the Khaliti army,’ the Minister had said, frowning.
‘Encouraged by the Government,’ Cozzens had pointed out.
The Minister had sighed. ‘We can’t make distinctions for individuals,’ he had said. ‘For the purpose of the treaty, we have to regard him as a Khaliti soldier.’ He had seemed to be squirming in his clothes with wretchedness at what he was having to say. ‘We have to! We have no option and we can’t risk involvement.’