by Craig Zerf
‘Rifles!’ Shouted Axel. ‘Fire at will. Pick your targets.’
The four rifles opened up. Slow. Methodical. Each target aimed at and hit.
The Belmarsh charge reversed and became a rout.
Chapter 20
Sam crawled out from his sleeping bag, rolled it up and crammed it into his rucksack. Then he took out one of the bottles of lemonade and took a few sips. The bubbles fizzed in his mouth and went up his nose making him sneeze.
‘Oh-ho,’ he heard someone say. ‘What have we here? Some sort of sneezing animal I venture to say.’
He shrank back into the hedge, trying to make himself as small as possible. And then a terrible beast with huge teeth and massive snorting nostrils pushed its head into the hedge and stared at him.
Sam screamed. High pitched and formless as the build up of terror over the last few days was released in one ragged emotional outburst. The beast snorted and pulled away to be replaced by a man’s face. Ruddy and covered in a large black beard. Eyes a bright shiny blue and eyebrows the size of hamsters.
‘Steady there, boy. There’s nothing to fear here. That merely be Dancer, my old horse. She just be curious, that’s all.’
Sam was frozen to the spot, shaking, his eyes wide in stark horror.
The man’s face disappeared and Sam heard him call out.
‘Mama,’ he called. ‘Come over here and be smart about it. There’s a wee chiseler in the bushes and he be right scared.’
Within seconds a female face showed itself to Sam. An older woman. Smooth skin, long gray hair in two plaits, one on either side of her head. She had the same unsettlingly blue eyes as the old man and she radiated a calm kindness.
Sam relaxed and then he held his arms out to her. She grabbed him under his arms and lifted him to her, picking him up, his head on her shoulders. She stroked his hair.
‘Come on, me wee bairn. Let’s to the caravan and get you a lie down and then something hot to eat.’
Sam shook his head. ‘Not sleepy.’
‘Okay then. Would you like something to eat?’
Sam nodded. ‘Hungry. Only had dog biscuits since the bad men killed my mommy.’
‘Well, you’re with friends now,’ the old lady said.
Sam looked up from her shoulder and saw a row of horse drawn caravans. Twenty of them. All painted in bright primary colors. Seated on the front of each one, reins in hand, was an armed man. In some cases two. Hard looking men, dark skinned, long black hair, beards and moustaches. They all carried assault rifles. A mix of AK’s and American M16’s. One of them winked at Sam and smiled. His blue eyes twinkled with suppressed mischief. Sam smiled back. For the first time since his mommy had died he felt truly safe.
The old lady put him down but continued to hold his left hand.
‘The people call me Mama,’ she said to Sam. ‘And what do we call you?’
‘Sam.’
‘A good name. Sam be it then.’
The old man came over and held out his hand. Sam took it and shook it solemnly.
‘Well met, young Sam,’ said the old man. ‘The people call me Papa Dante. I won’t bother you with all the others names, you seem to be a bright enough lad so I be sure that you’ll pick them up as we go.’
‘Are you gypsies?’ Asked Sam
‘Aye, some may call us that,’ answered Papa Dante. ‘Though we be not too fond of the calling. We prefer to be called Pavees or even Lucht Siuil, which means The Walking People. Now come along to my vardo and Mama shall give you a mug of soul-warming chicken soup.’
Mama led Sam to the caravan, or vardo, as Papa Dante called it. She pulled down some steps and Sam climbed up. She went up next. Then Papa pulled the steps up, vaulted into the front seat, flicked the reins and Dancer shambled into a slow plodding walk.
Mama took out a thermos flask and poured soup from it into a large clay mug. She handed it to Sam. ‘Careful,’ she said. ‘It’s hot.’
The little boy sipped at it cautiously. It was delicious. Thick and unctuous and chickeny. After a week of dried dog biscuits the explosion of flavor literally brought tears of pleasure to his eyes.
‘Are you alright?’ Asked Mama concernedly.
Sam nodded. ‘Nice. Yum. Thank you.’ He continued slurping. By the time he had finished the large mug he was full and, although he professed not to be sleepy he had slept little over the last few days, his slumber light and full of fear.
Mama took the empty mug from him and walked him to the back of the vardo. She pulled aside a curtain to reveal a large double bed, thick feather mattress with a down stuffed duvet spread on top.
‘Not sleepy,’ mumbled Sam.
Mama sat him down, pulled his shoes off, gently pushed him back onto the mattress and covered him with the duvet. He fell asleep almost instantly. She watched him for a while and then went back to her seat beside Papa Dante.
‘Poor mite’s asleep,’ she told her husband.
‘Aye, a bit of time in the scratcher will do him the power of good, it shall. Rest and your magical chicken soup, my love. Never more should a man need.’
Mama punched Papa Dante on the arm. ‘Sure you be lying you charmer you.’ She smiled and lent up against him.
Softly but clearly, Papa Dante started to sing.
If you ever cross the sea to Ireland
And maybe at the closing of your day
You can seat and watch the sun rise over clada,
And watch the sun go down on Galway bay
Maybe some day I’ll go back again to Ireland
If my dear old wife would only pass away,
Now she has my poor old health broke with all her nagging,
And she has a mouth as big as Galway Bay,
After drinking sixteen pints of Arthur Guinness
And she walks down the road with out a sway,
If the auld sea was bare in stead of salty water
A then she would live and die on Galway bay,
After drinking sixteen points in Padgo Murphy
And the bar man say’s its time to go,
Now she doesn’t try to answer him in Irish
But speaks a language that the Traveller’s do not know,
Well on her back she has a map of Ireland,
And when she takes her bath on Saturdays
Well she rubs the care ball soap all round the clada
Just to watch the auld suds go down on Galway bay,
Well her feet are like auld lump of board na Mona
And her hair is like a rake of last years hay,
A and when I rub my around her turage
A she’ll forget about auld Galway bay.
The train of caravans continued its progression as the horses clipped and clopped their slow way towards the next place that they were going.
And the hard faced men who guided them scanned the countryside around them and kept their rifles ready to hand.
Chapter 21
Axel had a decision to make. It was time to take a gamble. The first reckless attack by the Belmarsh boys had been repulsed with ease but, Axel was pretty sure, the next attack would take place in a very different fashion.
If he had been in charge of the criminal gang then he would have attacked simultaneously from four sides at once. As long as one attack got through and into the inner defenses then it was game over.
So he split his meager army up into four groups, placing one group on each fence. He ensured that each group had one rifleman and an officer. As there were only three officers, he put the priest in charge of the fourth group. Their orders were simple. The riflemen would start shooting as soon as they saw anyone that they thought they could hit and the shotgunners would wait until the enemy got within twenty yards before opening fire.
He also placed the extra villagers with their makeshift spears on the walls with instructions to stick anyone who came within sticking distance.
The easy initial victory had buoyed the villager’s spirits and, although Axel and his fellow officers knew that the
victory was almost meaningless, they said nothing to hurt morale.
The second attack happened as Axel had predicted. At a little after three that afternoon the Belmarsh boys charged from four directions at once. But this time their charge was slower. More circumspect as they scanned the ground before them for caltrops and any other nasty surprises that may lie in store.
This slower advance allowed Dom to knock five of them down before they had managed to make more than a dozen yards. When he reloaded and started firing again the group attacking his wall broke and retreated.
Axel’s wall also fared well. His rifleman managed to kill one of the opposition but, as soon as they got within fifty yards, Axel opened up with the old Webley, its massive 455 rounds booming out like a cannon complete with fire and smoke. He fired fast and reloaded just as quickly. Within ten seconds he had hit another four criminals and the group retreated.
Patrick’s rifleman missed all of his shots and the group charging their wall surged within twenty yards before the volley of shotguns fire forced them back. However, they also returned fire and hit two of the villagers.
It was on the priest’s wall that it all went wrong.
Whoever was in charge of the party attacking the priest’s wall used a little more common sense than the others and, instead of simply charging will-he-nil-he, he laid down covering fire as his men inched forward. Using fire and movement they edged closer and closer. Every time that a villager popped up to take a shot at them he was greeted with a fusillade of fire, pinning him back down.
They had almost made the wall when the day was saved by, of all people, the ninety four year old mister Sturgeon.
By now the confusion of gunfire and the screams of the wounded had sent mister Sturgeon spiraling back in time to the Second World War. So, he tottered his way to the wall, stepped up onto one of the ramparts and simply started to fire, point blank, into the faces of the attackers.
‘Take that, you bastard nazis,’ he shouted. ‘Go back to Germany.’ After six shots he calmly reloaded and then recommenced firing. The villagers took advantage of this unexpected turn and all opened up at once. Finally the gang members were driven back.
Attack number two repulsed.
‘Tonight,’ said Axel to himself. ‘The next attack will be tonight.’
He took a deep breath. Exhausted.
Chapter 22
It was late afternoon and Papa Dante pulled the vardos off the road and into a field. They unhitched the horses and, by hand, pulled the vardos into a circle or tabor, as Papa Dante called it.
Usually the horses would be hitched to a tree or fence outside of the tabor but, due to circumstances, they were now kept inside the secure circle to prevent theft.
Sam awoke, went to the front of the vardo and looked out. The first thing that he noticed was the children. They had all been riding inside the vardos when Sam had been picked up so he had not seen them. There were over forty of them ranging in age from toddler to young teens. And all of them were hard at work.
Toddlers carrying kindling, bigger kids toting wood logs. Others fetching buckets of water from a nearby stream and yet more grooming the horses. Rubbing them down with hay and then curry combing their coats to a sleek shine.
The women of the clan were laying a group of cooking fires and setting up trestle tables with mugs and plates and various sized bottles.
Some of the men helped to carry heavy items, bags of oats for the horses or large cast iron cooking pots, but, on the whole, the men stood watch. Their blue eyes constantly scanning their surrounds, rifles held ready.
Papa Dante was everywhere. Helping, chiding, laughing and commanding. He glanced up and saw Sam watching so he beckoned to him to come over.
The young boy climbed down and walked to him.
‘Sam the man,’ bellowed Papa Dante. ‘Meet some of the chilluns.’
Papa reeled off a gaggle of Celtic names, talking fast, like an American tobacco auctioneer. ‘Dylan, Oisin, Keeva, Siobhan, Keraney, Tierney, Shamus, Ultan.’
There was a chorus of greetings.
‘Now, Sam,’ continued Papa. ‘You go with Keeva and Dylan and collect more wood for the fires. Hurry off now.’
Keeva, a blonde girl of around seven grabbed Sam’s hand. ‘Come on, you be with us now.’ The little girl led the way, tugging Sam along with her. Dylan, a tall twelve year old, walked behind them. Another dark haired, blue-eyed male, hovering on the edge of becoming a man.
‘So,’ said Keeva. ‘Where’s your mam and your da?’
‘My dad went to work and never came home,’ answered Sam. ‘Then the bad men came and made my mommy dead. Then I had dog biscuits and then Papa Dante found me in a hedge.’
‘Oh. That’s sad,’ said Keeva, her feelings genuine but shallow as only a child’s can be. ‘But now that you with us you got lots of ma’s and da’s. Papa Dante and Mama are the pa and ma for everyone. Even the big ones.’
‘They’re not the ma and da of Gogo,’ said Dylan. His first contribution to the conversation.
‘Course not,’ agreed Keeva. ‘Nobody is the ma and da of Gogo. She’s too old.’
‘Aye,’ affirmed Dylan. ‘Papa Dante says that she was an old lady even when the mountains were still but mist.’
As they talked they picked up dry wood. Keeva piled the lighter sticks of kindling into Sam’s arms and Dylan carried the larger logs.
They came across a circle of mushrooms under an oak tree and Keeva stopped. She pulled up the front of her skirt to form a pouch and started to pick them, brushing the soil from the roots and putting them into the pouch.
Both Sam and Dylan simply stood and watched, arms full of wood. When she was finished she stood up. ‘Come on, let’s go back.’
She skipped ahead of them as they returned, singing softly as she did. By the time they got back to the tabor things had fallen into a semblance of order. Wood was piled for the night. Three fires were on the go. One large in the center and two separate smaller ones to each side.
Keeva’s find of woodland mushrooms was greeted with applause and she curtsied after handing them over. They were then added to a huge pot of stew that was bubbling next to one of the smaller fires. Canvas water bags had been hung on some of the vardos and Sam noticed that they all seemed to be leaking.
He pointed at one of them and asked Keeva. ‘Why do all of your water bottles leak? Are they broken?’
Keeva shook her head. ‘It’s to keep the water cold, silly,’ she said.
‘How does it work?’
The little girl shook her head again. ‘Don’t know.’
‘So why am I silly then, you must also be silly.’
Dylan laughed. ‘He got you there, Keeva.’ He turned to talk to Sam. ‘The bags leak a bit so that, when the wind blows and evaporates the water, it cools the bag down, just like sweating makes us cool. So there, Sam the man. Now you know.’
Mama started clapping her hands and calling out. ‘Come on everyone. To table now.’
Everyone converged on the long trestle table set out in the middle of the encampment, except for four of the men, one at each quarter of the circle, who sat on top of the vardos, watching outward. Vigilant.
Supper consisted of stew and potatoes. The stew may have contained some chicken, Sam wasn’t sure, but mainly was vegetable. Thick, nourishing and tasty. Mugs were filled with clear cold water that tasted faintly of the canvas it was stored in. It was not an unpleasant taste.
But what held Sam’s attention for the whole meal was the old lady who sat at the head of the table. She had come out of her vardo when Mama had clapped and she had walked straight to her seat at the table, aided only with her walking cane, despite the obvious fact that she was totally blind. Both eyes a blank white stare of opaque cataracts.
At the end of the meal, Sam stood up to help clear the plates and the old women pointed at him. ‘Boy,’ she said. Her voice clear and strong with the timber of youth. ‘Come sit here, Gogo will talk to thee.’
&
nbsp; Sam walked the length of the table and stood next to the old lady.
‘Bring thy face to me,’ she commanded.
Sam lent forward and she put her hands on his face. Lightly feeling.
‘Aye,’ she said. ‘You’ll be all right. You will stay with Keeva and her folk. Now, we can’t be having that English name, my boy. Now you be one of us your name be Somhairle.’
‘That’s hard to say.’
‘You’re right, boy. But never you mind because the short version of Somhairle is Sam.’
‘So, I’m still Sam?’
‘Aye,’ agreed Gogo. ‘But now you are more than you were before. Now, go to Keeva and she will introduce you to your new family.’
Sam walked back down the table to Keeva who greeted him with a curtsey and then put her arms around him and kissed both his cheeks. Then she stood back and gestured to a man and a lady standing next to her.
‘This is my da,’ she said. ‘And this is my ma.’
The man was cast from the same mold as the other Pavees, tall and wiry, dark skin, black hair and beard with eyes like chips of winter sky.
He went down on one knee in front of Sam. ‘Greeting and welcome, young Somhairle,’ he said. ‘I be Fergus. You may call me Fergus or da, whatever makes you more comfortable.’ He hugged Sam and kissed him on both cheeks.
Next the lady knelt before him. She went through the same ritual of hugging and kissing on both cheeks. ‘Greeting Somhaile, son,’ she said. ‘My name is Clodagh, but it would greatly please me if you could call me ma.’
Then all three of Sam’s new family knelt on the floor and hugged him close.
And, for the first time, Sam felt safe enough to cry for the loss of his true parents.
Chapter 23
Nathaniel stared across the green rolling hills at the rows and rows of men. There must be at least four or five thousand of them, he thought to himself. Most of them were busy hauling on many long ropes. The ropes were attached to massive stone blocks that looked to be about six foot wide and at least twenty-five foot long. The marine figured them to weigh in at around forty tons.
