No Man's Land

by Reginald Hill

  Strother himself followed up his blow to Josh’s face by seizing the boy’s right arm and forcing it so high behind his back that the pain of his nose was relegated by this new agony while Nelson stepped forward and hit him in the stomach.

  ‘That’s what I owe you, sonny,’ he said viciously. ‘No one drops me in the shit and doesn’t get ’is card marked, I tell you!’

  ‘Don’t take on so, Nelson,’ said Strother, forcing Josh to follow stumblingly after the others. ‘Show a bit of gratitude. If the boy here hadn’t of got out, think what we’d have missed! Josh, you’re a revelation to me, old son. I reckoned you not to ’ave sense enough hardly to bash your bishop, and ’ere you was all the time, getting your leg over!’

  The men ahead had stopped in a small clearing. Night was falling fast but there was still light enough to see their faces as they stood around the recumbent girl. Two were grasping her arms and legs and Fox was kneeling over her, one hand over her mouth and the other touching her body under the pretext of restraint.

  ‘You fucking bastards! Let her go!’ screamed Josh, trying to break loose despite the pain.

  Fox looked up and the girl took advantage of the momentary relaxation to sink her teeth into the fingers squeezing her mouth. With a shriek, the scab-faced man released his grip and immediately Nicole began to cry out.

  The Moroccan stepped forward.

  ‘Tais-toi,’ he commanded.

  For a second, surprised by the French perhaps, she obeyed. Then a great torrent of words came gushing out. A knife gleamed in the Moroccan’s hand. The point touched under her chin, forcing her head backwards.

  ‘Tais-toi,’ repeated the black man. And this time she obeyed.

  ‘What’s she going on about, Froggy?’ asked Strother.

  ‘Us,’ said the Moroccan whose English was basic. ‘Him,’ nodding at Josh. ‘She think he made trap.’

  ‘Does she now?’ laughed Strother. ‘Well, in a manner of speaking, that’s true, ain’t it, Josh? You brought her to the woods ’cos you wanted us all to have a slice, isn’t that right? Well, me for one, I’m not going to refuse such a kind and generous invitation. Here, Foxy, cop hold of our benefactor ’ere.’

  Foxy, who was standing menacingly over the girl, nursing his hand, reluctantly stepped back and took over from Strother, forcing Josh’s arm upwards till the pain was excruciating. The Cockney took Fox’s place and, bending over Nicole, began to fondle her breast through her dress.

  ‘Not much meat on this one,’ he said. ‘I’ve known young lads with as much to get an ’old of. I hope you’ve not been ’aving a bit of the Oscars, Josh. Viney wouldn’t like that, not one little bit.’

  Slowly he drew the girl’s skirt up over her thighs. Underneath she wore nothing. An audible sigh went up from the men at the sight of the triangle of golden down on her pubic mound. Josh strained forward in anger and hatred, yet he was looking too. Apart from his pre-pubescent sisters, he had never seen a woman naked below the waist. To his other emotions were added shame and disgust as he recognized his own prurience and he screamed abuse at Strother till Foxy produced a bayonet and thrust its point so hard against his kidneys that it pierced both shirt and skin.

  ‘Shut it, if you don’t want gutted,’ snarled Foxy in his ear.

  ‘What did I tell you, boys?’ said Strother, his hand caressing the girl’s stomach. ‘Nothing odd about young Josh, didn’t I say that? Nice normal lad. Might be tempted by a sheep or two up in them mountains he lives in, but it’d always be the ewes he went after. Come on, girlie. Open up.’

  He was trying to force his hand between her legs. The man holding her ankles drew them apart by force, the hand moved down, Nicole screamed, her eyes rolling round till they found Josh’s and locked on them, agape with pleading or accusation.

  ‘Dry,’ said Strother. ‘And tight. Very tight. Josh, you may prove a bit of a disappointment after all. Or ’ave you been saving it up for your old mates? Well, here’s one that won’t be disappointing the little lady.’

  Slowly he began to undo his trousers, sliding them down over pale and flabby thighs to reveal his erect penis, short but enormously thick.

  ‘Hold on, Strother,’ said Nelson suddenly. He was kneeling beside the girl, holding one of her arms. ‘I ain’t sure about this. I owed that little shit one for dropping me in it with Viney but this ain’t right …’

  ‘No, you hold on, Nelson,’ interrupted Strother powerfully. ‘You’ll get your turn soon enough, either with ’er or with me, take your pick. You, Froggy, tell the lady to stop thrashing about, else you’ll slit her throat for her.’

  The Moroccan looked down on the girl’s madly convulsing body which the men holding her limbs were unable to control. Already she had moved her head with such violence that his knife had nicked the soft skin beneath her jaw and a trickle of blood ran down her throat.

  Then the Moroccan’s cold eyes turned to Josh who was struggling and screaming like a madman regardless of the pain in his arm and the prick of the bayonet in his back. After a moment he nodded as though at some conclusion reached, and stepped back from Nicole, returning the knife to its hiding place.

  ‘No,’ he said in his fragmented English. ‘Not me … kill him also or he kills … not me.’

  He nodded his head at Josh, but it was a gesture of neutrality not of support.

  ‘Sod you, you fucking black Frog!’ yelled Strother. ‘I’ll make the cow lie still.’

  He knelt astride the twisting girl and raised his clenched fist.

  ‘To hell with this,’ said the man called Nelson and released the girl’s right arm. Immediately she swung open-handed at Strother’s face, dragging her nails across his cheek, leaving a quadruple track of blood in their wake. He cried out in rage and pain but was only momentarily diverted from his attack. His fist swung back once more.

  Through the darkling stumps, unnoticed by the men in the clearing who were riveted by the drama going on before them, more men came running. First to arrive was Lothar with Viney close on his heels. The German caught Strother’s upraised fist and held it effortlessly, pressing it backwards till the Cockney, his face bestial with rage rose to his feet. Dragging himself free, he plunged towards Lothar who swayed gently to one side and gave Strother an almost playful punch. Normally this would hardly have caused the man to stagger but his trousers were round his ankles and the one pace he took was enough to make him trip himself up. He fell on his face, his white buttocks in the air, and suddenly it was comedy. Someone laughed, others joined in. Lothar grinned broadly.

  But Viney was not amused.

  ‘What the hell’s going on here?’ he demanded. ‘Are you jokers off your tiny heads, or what? Jesus wept! I bet they can hear the noise you’re making at the sodding front! Strother, what the hell are you playing at?’

  Strother got to his feet and began to pull his trousers up. He was no longer erect.

  ‘It was him, that sheep-shagger,’ he said pointing at Josh. ‘We found ’im with this tart. We were just ’aving a bit of fun with her.’

  ‘You were going to rape her, I think you mean,’ said Lothar quietly.

  ‘Shut up!’ bellowed Viney at Lothar.

  Encouraged, Strother went on, ‘Christ, Viney, you know ’ow long it is since any of us saw a woman …’

  ‘So you couldn’t wait? You had to get stuck in right away, out here, only fifty yards from the edge of the Desolation?’ said Viney. ‘I’ll tell you something, Strother, you want to come so bad you’re going the right way about it. They say the last thing that an executed man feels is his cock spurting off, and that’s the road you’re taking all of us on!’

  With sinking heart, Josh realized that Viney’s anger was merely at the location of the proposed rape, not its morality. Nicole had been released, as the men holding her had decided that they didn’t want leading roles in this business till they saw how Viney was reacting. She struggled to a sitting position and pushed her skirt down over her legs. Her eyes were flitting hither
and thither around the surrounding men in desperate search of an escape route. Foxy still held Josh but in much less certain grip. It was easy for the youth to break loose and move towards the girl.

  He dropped on his knees beside her and, not daring to touch, said, ‘Pardon, pardon,’ trying to get her eyes to meet his.

  Lothar came to join him.

  ‘Tell her I’m sorry, Lott,’ begged Josh. ‘Tell her it wasn’t my fault. Please!’

  Lothar smiled reassuringly and spoke to the girl in rapid French. She regarded him distrustingly and he spoke again with greater emphasis.

  ‘What the hell are you saying, Fritz?’ demanded Viney.

  ‘I was just assuring the young lady that no one would harm her,’ said Lothar.

  ‘Well, just you shut it, Fritz. I’ll do all the assuring that’s needed round here,’ said Viney.

  Encouraged by this reproof to the German, Strother said, ‘Depends what he means by harm, don’t it? All right, Viney, I was wrong to be so ’asty, but let’s get her back to the bivvy and ’ave a bit of fun, what say you? Fair shares all round, I don’t think we’ll get many sitting this one out except mebbe the Kraut and his fancy boy.’

  Lothar ignored the sneer which he had heard many times before when his enemies wanted to try to set Viney against him.

  He said, ‘Let us try a vote. This is the English democratic way, is it not? Please, let everyone here who would like to rape this child raise a hand in the air.’

  He turned slowly through a full circle. No one stirred.

  ‘Mr Strother, please, you must raise your hand, I think,’ said Lothar.

  ‘This is bloody foolery!’ yelled Strother. ‘Viney, are you going to let this Kraut take control or what?’

  But Viney was not paying attention to the Cockney’s challenge.

  ‘Belt up!’ he said. ‘Listen.’

  They all listened. Straight away they heard it, a woman’s voice, not too distant, calling, ‘Nicole! Nicole!’

  ‘Now see what you’ve done!’ said Viney, rounding on Strother. ‘Half the sodding countryside’s probably looking for the kid now. Come on. Disappear!’

  With a speed born of practice, the men faded into the undergrowth. Viney himself seized the girl, who had stiffened and turned her head at the sound of the woman’s voice. Her mouth had opened as if to call out in answer but no sound had come. Her desperate dilemma showed in her eyes. Her terror urged her to call for help but her last reserves of control told her that all she would be doing was bringing someone else to share her fate.

  Her silence was an act of courage which perhaps only Lothar of those present was calm enough to appreciate.

  Josh jumped upright as Viney seized the girl, and looked ready to attack the Australian. But the big man only smiled at him half sympathetically and said, ‘That’s right, son. Give us a hand, will you?’

  The voice called again, much nearer. Viney pulled the girl into the trees and Josh followed with Lothar close behind.

  A few moments later a woman of about forty emerged from the dusk and stood at the edge of the clearing. She was dressed in peasant black, her thick brown hair was drawn back severely from her broad forehead and held by a twist of black cloth with ragged edges as though to proclaim its function was practical not decorative. She had a strong face, but hollow-cheeked and with a spottily sallow skin tanned to the semblance of health by sun and wind. Now her face bore an air of suspicious uncertainty, like that of a thirsty animal knowing there is danger near a waterhole but urged on by a need stronger than fear. As they watched, she stopped and picked up a heavy sharp-edged stone.

  She knows we are here, thought Lothar.

  Viney had reached the same conclusion. He released the girl and gave her a gentle push. For a second she hesitated, then with a cry of ‘Maman!’ she rushed forward and flung herself into the woman’s arms.

  It was a clever move of Viney’s. Flight was impossible for either woman in that moment of reunion, and by the time they gave it any thought, they were surrounded by an unbroken ring of men.

  ‘Two of ’em now!’ proclaimed Strother, smacking his lips appreciatively. ‘We hang on much longer, boys, and we’ll end up with one each!’

  ‘Belt up, Strother,’ said Viney. ‘You’ve done enough damage. We could’ve made the girl look like an accident, but two of them’s stretching things. You, Fritz, talk to them, find out what you can about them, where they’re from, who’ll miss them.’

  Lothar approached the two women and began to talk in a gently persuasive voice. At first the older woman merely spat out what even the non-French speakers recognized as angry abuse, but after a while she seemed to calm down, either reassured by the German’s manner, or because she decided this was the best survival tactic, and began to reply to his questions.

  Viney typically became impatient after three or four minutes.

  ‘Come on, Fritz!’ he interrupted. ‘What the hell’s she saying?’

  Lothar said, ‘Please. A little time longer,’ and returned to his questioning. Just when it seemed to everyone that Viney was about to explode, the German finished.

  ‘Merci, madame,’ he said to the French woman. To Viney he said. ‘Her name is Madeleine Gilbert. This is her daughter, Nicole. She says her husband was a farmer with a piece of land near here. More I think what you call a smallholder than a farmer. She says he had to go for a soldier and was killed at Verdun. Their farmhouse was not far behind the old front line when the French held it in 1915. The buildings were hit by our, that is, German shellfire. The stock was stolen by French troops. She does not care for soldiers, any soldiers. Nor any authority much. She has lived with her old mother since her husband’s death and the farm destroyed. But such a life was hard for her and hearing that the war had moved away from her husband’s land, she decided to come back to try to get things started again. The authorities said it was not yet permitted, but she came all the same. It is not easy for her. Two old people, Nicole here, and her brother, a young man made simple by the war but able to work, these are all the help she has. There are relatives of her husband’s in Barnecourt, the village in the valley. The war has not touched them. They might help, but she is too proud to ask, I think. But she will be missed, she says. There will be searches for her.’

  He paused. Viney said, ‘Then mebbe we’d better make sure they’re not found.’

  Lothar said urgently. ‘These people are no threat to us, Viney. They do not know who we are. I shall say we are a special unit of British soldiers in training …’

  ‘Very special,’ said Viney. ‘With a black Frog. And a Kraut too. Your French may be good, Fritz, but I’ll bet you’ve got a Kraut accent. In any case, we look just like what we are, no getting away from that.’

  Lothar let his gaze run round the group of silent men. Viney was right. Even those he had come to know as susceptible to reason and reluctant to survive at the expense of looting and killing looked just as villainous as the rest, with their unshaven faces and filthy ragged clothes. Only Josh, because of his fairness and his youth, looked less than terrifying.

  ‘All right,’ said Lothar. ‘Let us not deceive them. Let us rather trust them.’

  ‘Trust them?’ echoed Viney, screwing up his mouth like a nun forced to speak a blasphemy.

  ‘Why not? What is the worst they can do? Tell the authorities we are here? They know that already, is it not so? How many of us do they see? Only a dozen. Where is our hiding-place? They have no idea. These women are no threat to us, Viney! I believe they hate the authorities almost as much as we do!’

  Viney nodded abruptly, not in agreement but as a command for silence which Lothar felt it politic to obey. The big Australian stood deep in thought. Strother was obviously bursting to say something and Lothar willed him to speak before Viney was ready.

  Finally the Cockney exploded.

  ‘For fuck’s sake, what are we waiting for, mates? ‘Ere’s a gift from ’eaven. We can take ’em back with us and shag them rotten, and who�
�s going to miss ’em but a couple of antiques and a loonie, who shouldn’t be where they are anyway from what the Kraut says? It don’t need no thought that I can see!’

  Thank you, Strother, said Lothar mentally.

  Viney swung on the Cockney, his eyes blazing.

  ‘You’re the bossman now, are you, Strother? First the Hun here starts taking votes and then suddenly you’ve elected yourself king. Well, let me tell you something, the only way to get on top of this heap is by pushing me off and any time you fancy your chances at that, just let me know.’

  He turned to Lothar.

  ‘You’re a clever cunt, Fritz,’ he said. ‘But in my experience, there’s nothing more cunning than a pair of sheilas. What guarantees are there they won’t talk?’

  Lothar said, ‘Their need to survive. If they complain, they will probably be removed. Also they are in great need. If we give them food, they will be grateful or at least dependent. Eventually they may have for us fresh milk, fresh butter. Sooner perhaps if you permit someone go from time to time to help with heavy work on the farm. But not Strother, I think.’

  There was a small ripple of laughter at this.

  Encouraged, Lothar added, ‘They have contact with the world outside. They can see and hear things we cannot. They could be our forward observation post.’

  ‘All right, all right,’ said Viney. ‘Don’t overdo it, Fritz. Say all this to them, see what the older one says.’

  Lothar spoke to Madeleine Gilbert, who looked at Viney appraisingly before replying.

  ‘What’s she say?’

  ‘She’s guessed what we are. She says men who have left the war are in her opinion the only sane men in France. She will not do anything to harm them.’

  ‘You believe her, Fritz?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Lothar. ‘I do. Viney, they don’t know anything that can harm us, not how many we are, nor where we are hiding. Let them go!’