No Man's Land

by Reginald Hill

  Denial looked at Maggs assessingly, wondering how much to tell him. He’d already been assured that everything he’d been told on the telephone was top secret. This he took to be preliminary to the inevitable official cover-up. But he himself was resolved this time that he was not going to be part of any cover-up. And in any case, sooner or later every military policeman in France would have heard some version of what had happened.

  ‘There’s been a mutiny,’ he said in a low voice. ‘The camp’s been taken over by the troops. They’ve been aided and encouraged by deserters living in the country-side round about. Officers have been locked up, even assaulted.’

  ‘And our lads?’ said Maggs.

  ‘What do you think, Sergeant-Major?’ asked Denial bitterly. ‘An impossible job done badly. Yes, they’ve been abused, assaulted. And some of them have been killed.’

  A light of fury blazed in Maggs’s eyes. Denial saw it unhappily. Those deaths at Étaples would be paid for a hundredfold by unfortunates all over the battlezone once the news spread.

  He said, ‘This means we’ll have to cancel our visit to the Gilbert farm, of course.’

  ‘No need for that, sir,’ said Maggs. ‘I’ll take the lads up there and have a look round as planned.’

  Denial shook his head wearily and sat down on his bed. He took a notebook from his pocket and began to scribble on a sheet which he then tore out.

  ‘Here you are, Mr Maggs,’ he said, handing it over. ‘I’ve put it in writing so there can be no ambiguity. My orders are that the operation be cancelled and under no circumstances be renewed until my return. Do you understand that?’

  ‘Sir!’ bellowed Maggs, snapping to attention.

  ‘We are policemen, Mr Maggs, policemen. Our task is to administer the law without fear or favour. Let’s just do our duty, shall we?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Maggs.

  But as he moved away he thought savagely: Duty, you poncy bastard! Oh yes, duty! You want to have him down on the ground in front of you as much as I do, kicking his balls to a pulp and hearing him scream, that’s what you really want, you bastard, and you know it. You try to hide it with all this talk of duty, but you know it, you bastard. You know it!

  5

  Josh was usually the third person up in the morning. There was no way to be first or second. Let what he would be his alarum – cockcrow, the first streak of light in the east, even the grey of the false dawn – yet Auguste would already have moved out like a silent ghost to milk his beloved cow and Madeleine Gilbert would be moving equally silently about her first tasks.

  ‘Bonjour, madame,’ said Josh as he passed her on his way out of the barn to the pump where he performed his morning ablutions. There had been a heavy frost and it took all his wiry strength to persuade the frozen handle to move. The air was still and white with mist. He listened intently. No sound except the thin calls of a few birds and a shuffling of hooves as Auguste worked in the byre reached his ear. It was a blessed silence. For days now as the cold weather took its grip, the rumours of war which reached them from the east had grown less and less. Winter, the soldier’s traditional enemy, in this most untraditional of conflicts had become his friend. It would nip him and bite him and starve him, but the tighter its embrace, the more it held him in his own trench line and kept him from the rapacious emptinesses of no-man’s land.

  Josh was no keen student of his own inner life, so he did not think it significant that he could now think about the front with something approaching objectivity. There was emotion there, of course, but no longer the emotion of horror, despair and panic. It was a more uncertain and manageable feeling, compounded of pain and pity and perhaps even the smatterings of guilt. But such detailed diagnosis was not Josh’s way. He did not analyse. He felt. And the great difference was that those old feelings seemed burned into the living tissue of his being while these new ones, though strong, were easily sloughed away with the first shock of icy water on his naked torso, and even more by the sight of Nicole’s face grinning at him through the doorway as he roughly towelled himself down.

  She had disappeared when he re-entered the barn, which was now unlike any other barn he had ever seen. With Evans’s and Hepworth’s assistance, and especially since the growing coldness had begun to inhibit work outdoors, the rebuilding had advanced by leaps and bounds. A living-room had been built by the erection of two more walls against an angle of the barn. The new walls were solid for about five feet when they became wattle frames, but the effect was one of considerable cosiness, enhanced by the construction of a proper fireplace against one of the barn walls. This had been Taff Evans’s device, the Welshman showing considerable expertise on the question of draughts and ventilation. And now a huge wood fire could burn there merrily with scarcely any driftback of smoke into the room. Madame Alpert was more delighted with this fireplace than she would have been with a million francs. She constantly drew attention to it, as if the others might have missed some of its excellences, and Evans paid for his expertise by becoming the object of her gratitude which was expressed in interminable and, to him, incomprehensible sagas of family history, from which he was usually rescued by Madeleine who was equally grateful to him for giving her mother this new lease of life.

  At present, the living-room served as sleeping quarters for the women and old Alpert, while the men bedded down in the remaining section of the barn. Madeleine, who was the arbiter of all things to do with the farm, seemed content enough with this arrangement, but Evans felt differently.

  ‘Got to have a bit of privacy, don’t they? We live tight down in the Rhondda, got to, haven’t we? But we like to be private and decent.’

  And without more ado he’d set about constructing some small sleeping chambers alongside the living-room. Madeleine had shrugged, but offered no larger opposition, and now the work was well advanced.

  Lothar had assisted to the best of his abilities but his lack of practical ability compared to the others had reduced him to the level of unskilled assistant, and since their return on a permanent basis to the farm, his old authority had suffered a similar reduction. When he tried to organize a sentry roster, this change became quickly evident. Hepworth, who seemed in some obscure way to blame Lothar for Quayle’s death, voiced the new attitude.

  ‘The weather will stand sentry,’ he growled. ‘If anyone wants to hang around out there in the cold, he’s welcome. This isn’t the fucking army, is it?’

  ‘No,’ said Lothar, frowning. ‘It’s not the fucking army.’

  And Josh noticed thereafter that his friend from time to time drifted off to take a long look down the valley and soon his main job was that of almost permanent sentry.

  This morning Hepworth was still lying wrapped in his blankets from which he rarely emerged till the smell of cooking blunted the sharp morning air. As Josh passed the entrance to the Gilberts’ living-room, he glimpsed Nicole pulling a chemise over her head, slim brown legs forking provocatively beneath the turbulent garment. Involuntarily he paused, then gasped as something hard prodded him in the kidneys. Behind him stood Madeleine. Her weapon was the spout of an old tin kettle which she had just filled from the pump.

  ‘Vast’en,’ she ordered sternly. ‘Vite, vite!’

  In his blankets, Hepworth sniggered and Madeleine went towards him and none too gently dug her foot into his ribs, rattling away at him far too fast for Josh’s limited comprehension and for Hepworth’s too, but it was clearly uncomplimentary. The Yorkshireman’s hand snaked out from under the blankets and grasped the woman hard about the ankle so that she almost lost her balance. She re-doubled her abuse, and at the same time gently tipped the kettle so that a trickle of icy water fell on to Hepworth’s face.

  Swearing, he jumped upright. Whatever emotion their contact had roused in Madeleine, its effect upon Hepworth was quite evident in the stiff pyramid formed at the crutch of his long woollen underwear. For a moment the pair of them stood face to face like a pair of boxers preparing to fight. Then outside the s
tillness of the morning was disturbed by a distant rumbling.

  ‘Listen!’ ordered Lothar, turning at the doorway to strain his eyes into the mist.

  ‘Thunder, is it, Lott?’ whispered Josh in a futile effort to delay an obvious truth.

  ‘No, Josh. It’s a barrage,’ Lothar confirmed quietly.

  ‘Ours or theirs?’ demanded Josh, forgetful who he was speaking to.

  ‘Yours,’ said Lothar certainly. ‘There must be an attack.’

  ‘Attack? It’s nigh on the end of November!’ exclaimed Josh. ‘They’ll not be any big push now until the spring, surely?’

  His face was working as he demanded this reassurance. He had lowered his defences that morning with his thoughts of the quiet months ahead, for the men in the front line as well as himself, and this violation of their merited peace brought into doubt his own.

  ‘Not a big push, no,’ agreed Lothar. ‘But someone has decided, perhaps wisely, that men should not be allowed too long a time to think. Come, everyone, soon it will be too cold to fight or work. Let us use the time as best we can.’

  Evans had meanwhile headed out to the pump. Suddenly they heard him cry out in alarm. There was another voice and footsteps on the cobbled yard and the men in the barn moved rapidly towards their neglected weapons.

  But they were too late. The new arrival was already at the door.

  ‘Great lookout system you’ve got here,’ said Viney, filling the doorway as effectively as a square of oak. ‘What’re you all looking so surprised for? I said I’d be along to see how you jokers were shaping up, and here I am.’

  As he spoke his eyes were never still. Lothar guessed that he had taken in every detail of the barn and its inmates and stored them up for future reference. The Gilbert family were regarding him with grave suspicion. Lothar could not blame them.

  ‘You heard the guns, Viney?’ said Taff Evans. ‘Some poor bastard’s catching it. What do you think it is?’

  ‘Fuck knows. Can’t be anything big, not with winter coming on hard. It’ll just be some brass-hat worried in case the poor bloody infantry get bored with having nothing to do.’

  So the topic was dismissed. It was curious, thought Lothar. Viney spoke not with that dreadful pseudoknowingness of the bar or barrack-room bore, usually found in a cushy billet miles behind the lines, or safely ensconced in a nice Home Front job, but with an irresistible, almost godlike certainty. He tried to imagine what it would be like if some freak of chance put Viney in total charge of the British and Allied armies. Instant peace or bloody devastation? Of one thing he was certain: the men would be out of their trenches and moving one way or another within a very short time.

  Viney stayed all day, cheerfully giving a hand and taking instructions without demur. One effect of his arrival was that all the men took their turn at standing sentry, even Hepworth, without being told. Josh, who viewed Viney’s arrival with mixed feelings, tried to keep out of his way. The upset of that distant gun-fire had been bad enough, but the Australian’s presence was even more disruptive. The guns only reminded him of the past, of what he had fled from. Viney reminded him of the present, of what he had fled to.

  It would have been good to explain some of this to Nicole, but today she was more than usually uncertain in her moods, at one moment seeming to meet him as the closest, and dearest of friends, the next mocking and evasive. Lothar had suggested he should think of learning French as he did of learning to imitate bird-calls and this approach was showing results. But Nicole’s shifts of mood would probably have left him tongue-tied even in his own language.

  Late in the afternoon as darkness began to fall, Lothar said diffidently to Viney, ‘Will you spend the night here?’

  ‘I don’t think so, Fritz. They’ll be missing me back in the Warren, so I think I’ll head on back. But I’d like a little confab with you before I go.’

  He clapped his hand on Lothar’s shoulder and led him out of the barn and away from the buildings. Sensing something important was going on, the others came and stood in the doorway and watched. At first it seemed friendly enough, though it was impossible to hear what was being said. Then suddenly Lothar broke away from the affectionate restraint of the Australian’s heavy arm and it rapidly became clear that they were far from in accord.

  For the onlookers, it was almost purely a visual impression, though the discussion increased in volume as it increased in vehemence, with the two men silhouetted against the western skyline like warriors in a shadow play, antagonism visible in every line and movement, and breath-clouds of anger lowering over them in the frosty air.

  It ended with Viney turning away, taking a few paces towards the barn, then wheeling round and thrusting out an admonishing finger, stiff and threatening as a pistol barrel.

  ‘You’ve got it cushy here, sport, and don’t you forget it! There’s plenty back there that don’t. So, either we play things my way, or we change the fucking game!’

  He spun round again and strode towards the others who stood by the barn door, including Madeleine and Nicole, who grasped Josh’s hand tight in defence against the Australian’s anger. But his expression relaxed in a moment and he was smiling broadly as he reached them.

  ‘Au’voir, madame, m’moiselle,’ he said gallantly. ‘Cheers, young Josh,’ – ruffling the boy’s hair and winking – ‘don’t you be overtaxing your strength. Heppy, Taff, behave yourselves, sports. See you soon!’

  He made off at a rapid pace into the already bitter night. Evans looked enquiringly at Lothar who had walked slowly back to join them, but the German just shook his head and went into the barn. Madeleine, not to be put off by any strong silent man act, went after him, stabbing questions at his back, and Evans and Hepworth followed.

  Josh and Nicole stood together and watched till the voracious darkness had completely swallowed Viney. Josh would have been content so to stand for hours, as long as the girl’s hand was in his, but already he felt her fingers beginning to gently disengage. Impelled by an urge far removed from conscious decision, he turned suddenly to the girl and aimed a kiss at her face. He half missed her lips and found himself pecking almost fraternally at her cheek. But a bonus of his awkwardness was that his free hand, reaching up to steady the surprised girl, accidentally came to rest on her breast. Heat flowed through his body – sufficient, it seemed, to melt the frozen air for a mile around into balmy summer.

  Then she twisted away and went after her mother.

  Josh stood alone under the triumphant stars till the cold threatened to freeze his lips together, then went back into the barn.

  Inside he found Madeleine and Lothar in a discussion as intense if not as antagonistic as that between Viney and the German earlier, while Evans and Hepworth stood uncomprehending but troubled on the sidelines. Josh by concentrating with all his power might have picked up enough words to get the gist, but most of his attention was focused on Nicole going demurely about her business, from time to time shooting him glances beneath lowered eyelashes, by turns accusatory and conspiratorial.

  So it was only when the debating pair divided with not much evidence of accord that Josh was able to find out the cause of the agitation.

  It was simple enough. With a long hard winter in prospect, Viney was concerned to build up a store of supplies sufficient to keep the Warren going to the spring. This was understandable. There’d already been several flurries of snow and when it came down thick, not only would it turn the trenched and cratered Desolation into a death-trap, it would also mean that any raiding party would leave tracks even a staff-officer could follow.

  Viney was planning a series of raids to stock his larder and his strategy included, among the usual assaults on supply dumps in the support fines, another expedition into the living countryside behind the Desolation.

  ‘Listen,’ he’d said. ‘What do we get from Army supply dumps? A lot of danger, that’s what, and what for? Plum jam and hard-tack as often as not! There’s real grub out this way. Fresh stuff, eggs, meat, fruit. O
fficers’ grub. And civilians’!’

  ‘You can’t get away with it!’

  ‘No?’ Viney had smiled wickedly. ‘We’ve already tried out our hand, you know that, sport. We got ourselves some nice vino, remember. But that was small-time stuff to what I’ve got in mind!’

  Lothar resisted as best he could, protesting vigorously that innocent civilians were not legitimate targets even for a few desperate men.

  That was when the discussion got lively.

  ‘Listen, Fritz, you promised us fresh grub and Christ knows what else when you got us mixed up with this place. Well, it might be keeping you well fed, but it’s doing nothing for the rest of us. So I don’t see how you or these Frogs can object to helping your mates out in keeping body and soul together.’

  ‘Helping?’

  ‘Yeah. Oh, not with the dirty work. Your lilywhite hands’ll stay nice and clean! But it’s a long way from the Warren to the fat lands. What we need is a staging-post and storehouse for a couple of nights and this is it! Tell the Frog queen and tell her so she understands. There’ll be no arguing! This is it!’

  All this Lothar now told the three British soldiers. Hepworth and Evans received the news in silence, then turned away to digest it. But Josh was not silent, for once surpassing his friend in his outcry against Viney.

  ‘They can’t come here! They can’t!’ he protested. ‘It’s not right. Lott, you mustn’t let them!’

  It was curious, thought Lothar, how suddenly he was the leader again. From each according to his ability!

  He said gently, ‘What would you like me to do, Josh? Go after Viney and shoot him?’

  For the first time in their acquaintance, Josh regarded him with anger in his eyes. Then, turning on his heel, he went to join the others, leaving Lothar standing by himself, apart, and suddenly once more foreign.