An Ice-Cream War

by William Boyd

  Such transient sensations, Gabriel thought. No more than a few seconds, that was all. Then she would cradle his head in her arms, stroking his hair, cooing endearments, calling him their private names, “Gabey, my big boy…Gabbins, my naughty boy…my terrible lovely Gabbey,” and Gabriel would drift off to sleep.

  On their last night Gabriel woke up and found her gone. Half awake, he stumbled out of the bed and along the little passage to the bathroom. He pushed open the door and she was standing there naked, a face-flannel in her hand, in front of the basin. “Oh sorry,” Gabriel said, and backed out of the room. That was the only time he’d ever seen her naked. Her slim pale body like a boy’s, her breasts very small, almost flat, her little dark bush. Her body, he had to be frank, was not what he had expected. Before that night on the honeymoon, he had imagined women to be very soft and yielding, with large soft breasts like pillows. She didn’t come back to bed for a while and he fell asleep. They didn’t refer to their midnight encounter again.

  All these memories returned as Gabriel read her letter. But to hear these endearments and phrases, to have the roles conjured up for him when she wasn’t there, made him feel confused. He felt a heavier sweat break out on his upper lip. He felt his face grow hot. He realized he was experiencing shame. He was embarrassed. Ashamed and embarrassed at his own intimacy with his wife! He felt suddenly appalled at himself. And this realization brought guilt and self-contempt in its train. What kind of person was he, he asked himself? What kind of a person was he to feel so ill-at-ease, so uncomfortable with the truth?

  Gabriel never re-read her letter. Now, some ten days into the voyage, it still lay deep in his small case in his cabin. He didn’t want to think about it, or about their married life. He found he was becoming almost prudish, as a kind of reaction. Some of the other officers on the Homayun were dubious types, coarse and much given to risqué conversations. Gabriel never joined in their discussions.

  One day someone had passed him an old copy of Nash’s magazine, folded open to a page covered with photographs of a French dancer—one Mademoiselle Sadrine Storri. She was very pretty, Gabriel saw, in a plump coquettish way. Her dark hair was tousled. She wore her dancing costume, a scant toga strewn with garlands. She had heavy thighs, and in one photo leant forward to exposé the swells of nicely rounded bosom. Because she danced with bare legs, the caption said, the censor had determined that on stage she should be lit only by a blue light.

  “Nice little filly,” the man had said on passing the magazine over. Gabriel had given a taut smile and glanced at the photographs for form’s sake. “My Grecian dance is absolutely artistic,” Gabriel read. He turned the page. There were more photographs of her posing in velvet shorts and a skimpy top that showed her midriff.

  “I say, look at Cobb,” the officer called. “We’ve certainly got the newly-wed interested.”

  Gabriel had blushed deeply. He had been interested. But almost simultaneously he hated himself for being so. What kind of husband was he, poring over photos of a French tart?

  He looked out now at the convoy. He had been on the ship for twenty-six days, and it was beginning to affect him. The crushing, annihilating boredom. The constant noise from the bickering coolies. The braying mules and the bleating sheep. His fifth-rate resentful men. His uncouth, unfamiliar fellow-officers. Thank God, he thought, for the two men he shared his cabin with. He never really saw the doctor, who was the busiest man on board, constantly tending the coolies and other ranks who were coming down with all manner of ailments—but mainly dysentery and malaria—at the rate of seventy a day. But at least Bilderbeck was a decent sort, if a little strange.

  Bilderbeck spent a lot of time drawing up information sheets and maps of German East Africa, compiling official intelligence notes on the climate, population and terrain based on journals and records he’d kept while serving in British East some seven or eight years previously. He was a lean, ascetic-looking man in his mid-thirties with a slightly weak chin. He spoke very quickly with a low voice, delivering his words in short bursts, as if from a Maxim gun. He would sometimes laugh or smile at stages in conversation which didn’t seem to warrant any such response at all, as if he saw jokes and ironies invisible to others all the time. Talking to him was extremely disconcerting, as his wry smiles and cynical looks seemed to imply that these observations were shared. Rather than seek for an explanation Gabriel had decided that the best thing to do was simply to copy Bilderbeck’s expression as it changed: smile when he smiled, roll eyes and sneer when he sneered. The other officers were not so accommodating and clearly thought Bilderbeck a little mad. Consequently, as time moved on, he and Gabriel spent more time in each other’s company.

  They talked about the war. Bilderbeck asked Gabriel if he’d ever been in action. Gabriel admitted he hadn’t. Bilderbeck said he’d personally killed upward of thirty people during his service in Africa. “But they were all natives,” he added, as if this somehow wasn’t so remarkable.

  Gabriel looked curiously at him. “What…? I mean, what was it like?”

  “Just shot ‘em,” Bilderbeck said. “I shot three of my own men once. Native soldiers. A fine lot of men in fact, but these ones had killed a woman and outraged a girl. I shot them there and then. I had to set an example, you see. To the others.” He smiled broadly. Gabriel smiled automatically in return.

  “Actually I did kill a Russian once,” Bilderbeck mused. “In Constantinople.” Bilderbeck paused. “What do you think of this lot?” Bilderbeck jerked his thumb in the direction of the officers’ quarters.

  “I haven’t really got to know them,” Gabriel said.

  “Sportsmen,” Bilderbeck sneered. “If they’re not senile all they think about is ponies and women.” He darted a look at Gabriel, smiling weirdly again.

  “I shall find my girl,” he said suddenly. “I know I will.”

  “Your girl?” Gabriel repeated, mystified at this turn the conversation had taken.

  “One day I shall find her.”

  Gabriel wondered what he was talking about. “Yes,” he said safely. “I expect you shall.”

  “You’re married aren’t you?” Bilderbeck said. “Love your wife?”

  “What…? Yes, I do, yes.”

  “My God,” Bilderbeck said, shaking his head in wonder. “Is she your girl, then?”

  Gabriel thought it best to agree. “Yes,” he said simply.

  “Hah!” Bilderbeck gave a cynical laugh. “Sportsmen! Treat the army like a social club.”

  Indian Expeditionary Force ‘B’ sailed on steadily towards Africa. Sheer desperation eventually forced the troops on the Homayun to search for some form of distraction. When they crossed the equator they had a crossing-of-the-line ceremony. The Captain of the ship was Neptune. All the officers under thirty were initiated. Gabriel was copiously lathered, shaved with a three foot long wooden razor and was then thrown into the sailbath.

  This effort seemed to stimulate the others and one night shortly after they had a concert—a piano and two mouth organs. A downpour drenched them half-way through but the men played on and the audience remained heedless of the rain.

  As they sailed south the weather grew hotter and hotter. The doctor spent his day moving among the crew with pitchers of lime cordial. Every three days they had to drink a glass of quinine dissolved in water.

  Lt Col. Coutts fell down a flight of steps, was concussed and broke one of his ribs. The news drew a loud snort of disgust from Bilderbeck. Gabriel felt quite sorry for Coutts who was a kindly and lazy old chap in his late fifties. Gamely enough, he was up and about after a couple of days but was clearly in some pain and discomfort. However they were nearing their destination and a slight air of tension was beginning to percolate through the ship so expressions of sympathy were few and far between. Bilderbeck made a trip over to the Kamala, a P&O liner, to pass on his maps, notes and opinions to General Aitken, the commander-in-chief.

  The final distraction of the voyage was less happy. One of the s
ailors on the Homayun had, it so appeared, been found guilty of plotting mutiny. For this crime he was sentenced to six months imprisonment and twelve lashes from the cat o’ nine tails. All the officers on the Homayun were invited along as witnesses. Gabriel went with some misgivings and stood uneasily beside Bilderbeck. The whipping was to be administered by the boatswain of the Goliath, a large man with a bulging ruddy face. In his hands the cat o’ nine tails looked very small and curiously inoffensive. The culprit was brought out, bare-chested, and tied to a wooden triangle, hastily constructed by the ship’s carpenters, his hands at the peak and his feet spread to the other two points. The sentence was read out and the boatswain whipped the man very quickly. The prisoner’s back turned bright pink before their eyes and the skin broke by the seventh or eighth lash. At the end the boatswain was panting heavily from his exertions. Gabriel felt more shocked than sickened.

  “This is 1914, not the Crimea,” he protested to Bilderbeck as they walked back to the officers’ quarters. “It’s barbaric.”

  “No,” Bilderbeck said firmly. “Mutiny in time of war.” He flashed a quick smile. “I’d have had him shot.”

  On the thirtieth of October the convoy halted about a hundred miles off Mombasa. Gabriel felt a pressure steadily build up in his lungs, a sense of nervous anticipation that he couldn’t shake off and that left him feeling permanently slightly breathless. He paced about the decks all day experimenting with impromptu breathing exercises: holding his breath, breathing shallowly, inhaling deeply and letting the air out of his lungs as slowly as possible. But none of this worked.

  He saw another battleship steam out from the direction of land. Shortly after, Bilderbeck was summoned over to it and a boat was lowered for him. That evening the battleship—the Fox—steamed with the Kartnala.

  The convoy sat off Mombasa for another two days. Gabriel inspected his men. They were weary and disgruntled, many of them having been sea-sick for a full month. He got some of them up on deck for P T but the resulting shambles was so embarrassing that he dismissed them after five minutes.

  The Karmala returned to the convoy and Bilderbeck came back to the Homayun to pick up his kit. He was to be permanently attached to General Aitken’s staff. Gabriel stood in the doorway of the cabin watching Bilderbeck pack.

  “Where are we going?” Gabriel asked. “Dar-es-Salaam?”

  “I shouldn’t really tell you,” Bilderbeck said. “But no. It’s Tanga.”

  “Oh,” Gabriel said. He’d seen Tanga on one of Bilderbeck’s maps. A port to the north of Dar, starting point for the northern railway that ran up to Kilimanjaro.

  “Got a pillow?” Bilderbeck asked, holding up his own.

  “Yes,” Gabriel said. “I have. Why?”

  “And a basin? Pillow and a basin. The two most essential pieces of equipment to have on active service. Get some decent sleep and have a chance for a wash and a shave. Always make sure you’ve got them with you. Best advice I can give.”

  “Thanks,” Gabriel said distractedly. “Yes, I’ve got both.” He paused. “Are we invading Tanga?”

  “That’s the idea,” Bilderbeck said, a look of withering cynicism on his face. “It’s the first invasion of a hostile beach for forty years or thereabouts, and they pick this lot.” He put his hands on his hips and shook his head sorrowfully. “There’s another problem, though. It seems the Navy made a truce with the German governor in Tanga at the very beginning of the war. Now the Navy are insisting that we must inform the authorities there that ‘belligerent hostilities’ are going to be resumed. They feel their dignity demands an official abrogation of the truce.” Bilderbeck’s face lit up in one of his most beaming smiles.

  “Good Lord.” Gabriel sat down on his bunk. “Isn’t that a bit…? I mean, won’t they know then that we’re going to attack?”

  “Of course they will.” Bilderbeck gave a great hoot of laughter. “Of course they will. But try telling that to the Navy.” He rubbed his hands together like a fly. His mood seemed one of profound satisfaction, as if he’d just had some hotly disputed fact confirmed in his favour. “Remember,” he said, looking up. “Whatever happens, don’t forget your pillow and basin.”

  Chapter 5

  2 November 1914,

  Tanga, German East Africa

  Gabriel stood at the rail of the Homayun and gazed out at the shoreline a mile away. It was six o’clock in the evening. He looked down at the map in his hand and then back again at the shore. What he was looking at, he calculated, was the headland called Ras Kasone that jutted out on the southern side of Tanga bay. Behind the lee of the headland, about two miles distant, lay the town of Tanga which, from his position, was invisible. At the tip of the headland was a signal tower, and nearby that was a white stone house. Five hundred yards down, to the left of the white house, was a red house. All of these buildings seemed deserted, though the German flag flew from the signal tower. From what he could see through the thickening dusk the shore facing him was composed of cliffs, at the bottom of which was dense and tangled vegetation, and curious twisted trees which he had been told were mangroves. Beneath the red house, however, was a beach some two hundred yards long. This, according to Lt Col. Coutts, was where the Palamcottahs were to land later tonight: Beach ‘A’.

  At the briefing he’d just attended, and where the map had been issued, Lt Col. Coutts (still in pain from his broken rib) had read out Major-General Aitken’s orders. The first sentence had been immensely reassuring. “From reliable information received,” it read, “it appears improbable that the enemy will actively oppose our landing.”

  Gabriel watched his company edge down the gangway into the huge wooden lighters that had been towed from Mombasa to provide transport from the ships to the beach. All around the headland he could see the ships of the convoy moored in line. Earlier that morning, Lt Col. Coutts had informed them, the Fox had steamed into Tanga harbour and officially abrogated the truce and had demanded the surrender of the town—which was not forthcoming. Tanga, it appeared, was deserted.

  Gabriel followed his second-in-command, 2nd Lt Gleeson, down the gangway. Gleeson was gazetted to the Palamcottahs, a young man, just twenty-two, with pale blue eyes and a blond moustache that reminded Gabriel of Nigel Bathe. He had very yellow teeth. Gleeson seemed not to have the slightest objection to a newcomer being placed in command over him. Gabriel had made some attempts to strike up some sort of a friendship with him during the voyage, but with little success. He suspected Gleeson of being a little ‘simple’.

  Lt Col. Coutts was not fit enough to take part in the invasion of Tanga and the adjutant—Major Santoras—was now in temporary command of the battalion. In the lighter Gabriel looked around for the subadar of his battalion, subadar Masrim Rahman. To Gabriel it seemed that every second man in the Palamcottahs was called Rahman. Unfortunately, subadar Rahman was one of those most prone to seasickness and the pitching and wallowing of the lighter had already rendered his brown skin a pale beige colour.

  “Everything in order, subadar?” Gabriel asked, having to raise his voice above the babble of conversation.

  “Sir,” the subadar replied, removing his hand from his mouth to perform a shaky salute.

  “Do you think you could shut the men up?” Gabriel said, and pushed his way through the press of soldiers to the stern of the lighter where Major Santoras and six of the other officers were gathered, all peering at copies of the map of Tanga by the light of torches. The Palamcottahs could only muster three full companies—illness during the voyage having taken its toll. Two companies were to land and a third was being kept in reserve.

  “What’s this mark?” someone asked.

  “It’s a railway cutting,” Major Santoras replied. “Between the landing beaches and the town.” He went on less confidently: “There’ll be bridges over it, I think…Should be, anyway.”

  “Anyone know what the country’s like beyond the beach?”

  “Someone’s put ‘rubber’ down here. I assume that means
rubber plantations.”

  “Are the North Lancs landing on our beach?” Gabriel asked. These were the only regular British troops in the entire invasion force. Gabriel thought he would feel more secure, somehow, if he knew they were nearby.

  “Don’t think so,” Santoras said. “They’re round on the other side of the headland—Tanga side. Beach ‘C’. No, sorry, Beach ‘B’.”

  “Actually it’s Beach ‘C’, I think,” another volunteered. “In fact aren’t we meant to be landing with them?”

  “Are you sure?” Santoras asked. “I thought the Colonel said Beach ‘A’.”

  “Look! There go the Rajputs!”

  Everyone looked over towards the transports to their right. A small tug was towing a string of three lighters towards the shore. It was nearly dark, but they could just be made out. About three hundred yards offshore the tow lines were slipped and the lighters drifted in towards the beach on the surf until they grounded. As the first men jumped into the water a flat crackle of shots rang out briefly, then there was silence. About two minutes later the Fox fired a salvo of shells. Everybody jumped with alarm. The shells exploded impressively around the red house. Gabriel realized he’d just witnessed his first shots fired in anger.

  The Palamcottahs remained in their lighters for another five hours. Seventeen men in Gabriel’s company collapsed from exhaustion and chronic seasickness and had to be helped back on board the Homayun. It was about one o’clock in the morning when the lighter finally crunched into the sand about eighty yards offshore. It had turned into a brilliant moonlit night and the beach below the red house was thronged with dark figures.