Dead Man's Land

by Robert Ryan

  ‘What do you think, Watson?’ asked Churchill. ‘Not quite Savile Row. But the finest that the Section de Camouflage in Marne can supply. They are working on fake heads for us, too. Stick up above the parapet, draw fire. Might get m’self one for the House. Eh?’

  ‘Impressive,’ said Watson, as a soldier appeared to emerge from a tree trunk, like a wood-goblin sprung to life.

  ‘The trees are remarkable,’ said Churchill, who was clearly enjoying himself. ‘Metal skin, with wood and papier-mâché over them. Fool anyone at close range.’ He tossed away the stub of his cigar. ‘Hake, can you debrief the men? The major has something he wants to ask me.’ He turned back to Watson. ‘Isn’t that right?’

  ‘It is, sir.’

  While Hakewill-Smith gathered the men, corralling them into place with his sharp South African bark, they began the walk back to Maison 1875, where Watson had stabled his horse.

  ‘I know it looks like playing silly buggers, all this dressing as trees, but we have to take the fight to the Germans. All this Big Push nonsense that Haig spouts about is just that – nonsense. They haven’t grasped one simple fact. If you send over a hundred thousand shells on one sector, then the Germans bloody well know where you are coming across. Might as well send them a telegram: Hope you don’t mind, Fritz, thought we’d try and take the Wytschaete Ridge tomorrow. Madness. The war has become too static. As I told you at Somerset, we need small, mobile units, to tackle their snipers, take out their machine gunners, take prisoners. There should be no such thing as no man’s land. It must be our man’s land.’

  He turned and looked back at the soldiers, huddled around Hakewill-Smith. ‘Hence the training. I’ll whittle them down to six or seven men. An élite squad. Tough little Scots, mostly. We’ll be out there within a day or two, sniper hunting. We will own no man’s land.’ He tossed aside his now expired cigar.

  Churchill fetched a bullet from his pocket. ‘When you told me about the tower and the sniper, I was sceptical, Watson. Very sceptical. What you called logic, I thought was guesswork. But that was one hell of a wound in the sentry. So we searched the rubble of the church. We found a Mauser and a large number of these.’ He held the steel-and-brass projectile between thumb and index finger. ‘I have sent several to the Royal Small Arms Factory for analysis. But we fired a round through the Mauser. Remarkable effect. If we could duplicate that explosive power for shells . . .’

  ‘You’d copy it?’

  ‘Of course. Illegal as bullets, maybe, but scaled up . . . That’s not to say I won’t complain about the fact it breaches the Geneva Convention. Although I intend to grab myself a few more snipers first, see if this is common issue by the Hun.’

  ‘You? Surely you won’t go out there?

  Churchill stopped walking, put the bullet away and took another cigar from his top pocket, which he shoved into the corner of his mouth. ‘Why do people keep asking me that? I’ll be back in London one of these days. Perhaps in the Cabinet once more. I don’t want them saying that Winston spent his time at the front shuttling between the bordellos of Armentières and the wine cellars of Bordeaux. I don’t want them to think that the man who can order an attack on the Dardanelles is too cowardly to get out there and show some real leadership.’

  He screwed his face into a grimace. Watson could see why he had a reputation as a tricky customer and a hothead, out for personal glory. In this case, though, it appeared there was the need for a kind of redemption, a purging of the soul, too. Those men slaughtered on the beaches at Gallipoli would weigh heavy on any man’s mind, no matter what degree of bravado he presented to the world.

  ‘Even so, sir—’

  ‘What?’

  Watson realized he had displeased Churchill. He wanted an admiring slap on the back. Not reservations about the wisdom of chasing around with men half his age.

  ‘It’s your decision.’

  ‘Glad you think so.’

  This was an argument he wasn’t going to win. ‘When we met previously you mentioned something about a case that might be of interest.’

  ‘Ah.’ Churchill brightened. ‘Yes. Is that why you are here?’

  ‘No. But if you care to give me details, I will think on it.’

  ‘Not much to tell. I told you, The Case of the Man Who Died Twice. It was a distant cousin of Clementine’s. A subaltern. Roddy Blunt. Deserted his post under fire. Left his platoon to be overrun. All of whom fought to the last, I might add. Not one left standing. Well, there was no option but to court-martial him. Excuse me.’ He turned his back to the wind and lit the cigar. ‘There have been grumblings about differential treatment of men and officers. Disproportionate amount of death sentences for other ranks is what they say. What they don’t take into account is that any fleeing junior officer is likely to get shot by his commanding officer out of hand.’ Churchill’s piggish eyes narrowed conspiratorially. ‘Happens more than you think. So, there’s a court martial and before Clemmie hears of it, he’s been shot at dawn. Quite right too.’

  ‘Seems very straightforward,’ Watson said, knowing there was more to come.

  ‘Ah,’ said Churchill, his bad mood now completely forgotten. ‘I said it was called The Case of the Man Who Died Twice, didn’t I?’

  ‘I believe you did.’

  ‘The execution was some months ago. Four weeks back, a body turned up in Wiltshire. Under a hedgerow, where he had been living rough like some gypsy. It was identified as Roddy Blunt.’

  ‘And how long had he been dead?’

  ‘No more than two days.’

  Watson fetched his cigarettes and lit one. He and Churchill turned back and looked over the uneven field, towards the scattered farmhouses that formed the Royal Scots Fusiliers’ reserve positions, and the marks of distant trenches – coils of wire and posts for the most part – where two armies were literally keeping their heads down. In the very far distance there was a speck ascending slowly into the sky. A German observation balloon.

  ‘Curious,’ said Watson at last.

  ‘Have you any thoughts?’

  He smoked on for a while, watching a distant biplane of indeterminate nationality. Dark puffs of ack-ack explosions bracketed it for a while, until it gained height and was lost to the clouds. ‘Where in Wiltshire?’

  ‘Idmiston.’

  Watson smoked on, revelling in the moment. ‘Then I do believe I have a solution.’

  ‘Really?’ Churchill asked.

  ‘But first, I would like to ask a favour.’

  Churchill narrowed just one eye this time. ‘Ever thought of going into politics, Major Watson?’

  ‘I can’t say I have,’ he replied.

  ‘Pity. It’s only blackmail with stricter rules. So what is this favour?’

  Watson explained the deaths and the possibility that poison gas might be involved. He was concerned, he said, about the secrecy that surrounded the whole project. Churchill listened patiently.

  ‘Well, between you and me, Watson, if I go back to Westminster, I suspect it will be as Minister of Munitions. The gas will be mine to control. Not that I have any objection in principle. But in the meantime, I can give you a letter asking for all co-operations as you are investigating on my behalf. Not worth the paper it’s printed on, of course, but the Churchill name might still have some currency.’

  The man knew damned well it did. ‘I am sure it has considerable weight. Thank you.’

  The observation plane he had seen earlier now dropped from its cloud cover and began circling the observation balloon. It was too far away to see the details, but the gas-filled envelope began to descend quickly, as it was frantically winched in. He imagined the observer raking it with bullets from his Lewis gun as it went. Having been suspended under such a canopy, even if only for a few brief minutes, he felt an affinity with the horribly exposed observers.

  ‘You have time for a brandy before you go?’

  Watson looked at his wristwatch and the sun, already beginning to fall, and the temperature alon
g with it. ‘A quick one, perhaps.’

  Churchill slapped him on the back. ‘Excellent. And the solution to my problem?’

  ‘Before I took the opportunity to come out here to preach the gospel of blood transfusion, I was offered a position on the home front. At a place called Porton. It is where the War Department Experimental Ground is based. My role would be to investigate the effects of poison gas on soldiers and possible protective measures and antidotes. I am afraid I refused because I suspected such work might involve human guinea pigs. And besides, I wanted to be closer to the front.’

  The dull crump of an explosion reached them, and they turned to see a dark column spiralling up into the sky. A trench mortar at work.

  ‘Although perhaps not this close. Sir, what if a soldier, under a death sentence, is given an alternative? You can live, but you have to help with top-secret war work. It will involve changing identity, not getting in touch with your family. At the end of the war, some cover story will be released to say that you were acting under the Defence of the Realm Act, and that the story of you being shot was bogus.’

  Churchill looked doubtful. ‘That is all very Buchan-ish.’

  Watson continued with his conjecture. ‘But once you are at the Experimental Ground, you realize the truth. You will be experimented on—’

  ‘By your own side?’

  ‘The man was a coward,’ Watson said, playing devil’s advocate. ‘Deserved to be shot. You said so yourself.’

  ‘Shot, yes. Tortured, no. But really. The British wouldn’t do such things.’

  ‘I am afraid there are scientists who would. Scientists for whom the ends always justify the means. Men who are certain they will not be answering to any higher power for their actions. I should imagine that he escaped and was hunted. He died at Idmiston, not far from Porton, hiding under a hedgerow. Exposure, I would wager, exacerbated by any effects from the chemicals.’

  Churchill had gone quite puce. He puffed on his cigar, releasing a plume of smoke. ‘How can you be certain?’

  ‘It’s just a theory. But it fits the facts.’

  ‘It sounds impossible.’

  ‘No. When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever else remains, however unlikely, must be the truth. Is it possible he died twice? No. So who would have use of a “dead” man in Wiltshire? The scientists who need live bodies to test their theories.’

  ‘If this outrage is true . . .’ Churchill’s jowls wobbled as he shook his head.

  ‘As Minister of Munitions, you’d be able to find out.’

  More furious puffing. ‘I will, Watson, I will.’ They had reached the house, and both men returned the salute of the sentry. ‘Come, there’s that brandy.’

  ‘And my letter,’ Watson reminded him.

  ‘Yes, and your damned letter.’

  Watson paused as a thought struck him. ‘And one other thing.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Can you get me the post-mortem notes from Wiltshire?’

  Churchill waved the cigar as if it were a magic wand. ‘I’m sure I can. Why?’

  ‘I want to know if Blunt had turned blue.’

  FORTY-THREE

  Those who saw the figure of Dr Watson racing through the hospital grounds turned and watched, some in admiration at his turn of speed, others in concern for the man’s heart. It was thumping in his chest, that was true, but not all of that was from his exertions.

  Sister Spence, who was standing with a cup of tea outside her tent, attempted to check his progress. ‘Major Watson—’ she began, but he didn’t slow his pace.

  ‘Later, Sister,’ he managed to gasp. ‘I have some most urgent business.’

  Watson didn’t catch her reply.

  He took the steps up to the Big House two and three at a time, marvelling at his burst of energy. He might pay for it later, but he didn’t care. If he was right, this would be worth a few aches and pains.

  He burst into the room, grabbed the magazine he had been sent and collapsed back on the bed, the air rasping in his throat and his heart pounding at double-time. It was a few seconds before he could pick up a pencil and begin.

  My years of investigations as a consulting detective revealed nothing in the criminal annals that has been quite so baffling or exciting as trying to decipher the behaviour of the humble honeybee, specifically how information is distributed around the hive. Yet during the past three years, my colleague and companion, Thomas Patrick, and I have made considerable progress in this area.

  Despite the best efforts in the last century of august apiarists such as Leon Alberti and Auguste Kerckhoffs, the mechanism by which a foraging worker bee conveys information to its fellows remains a mystery. Every year brings new theories, as regular readers of this journal can testify. After reading the works of von Frisch (Zoologische Jahrbüch, copies of which, despite the hostilities that exist between our two countries, are still imported by several learned institutions, including the Zoological Society of London), we installed glass windows into several of our hives, the better to observe events normally hidden from human eyes. Round-the-clock observations were made and records kept. Where the bee had come from – direction, type of flowers visited – was noted where possible. Any abdominal movement sketched. The direction of the ‘dance’ indicated. Several of the bees were marked with dabs of paint to help distinguish individuals. On several occasions field trips were made to try to observe where the bees from our hives were foraging. Notable

  Watson couldn’t wait any longer. Along the top of the page, he wrote down the sequence of letters he had circled.

  My Dear Watson

  A blast of euphoria coursed through him. He looked at the phrase again.

  My Dear Watson

  Three words that told him there was no Thomas Patrick, no new colleague and friend.He found he was on his feet, doing a little jig, as if he had the knees of a man forty years younger.

  Tommy Patrick was the villain in Chicago who had created the Dancing Men code. Alberti and Kerckhoffs weren’t apiarists – they were cryptographers. And the code used in the article was one of the simplest in the annals of ciphers, yet his blithering idiot’s eyes had not recognized it, nor the clues that the article was a device to deliver a message to Watson. It was McCrae’s mention of Chicago that had caused the synapses in his brain to finally fire properly. To appreciate that Holmes was up to his old tricks.

  With shaking hands Watson set about ringing the other letters, until he had an entire missive from his old friend. He read through it, twice, and felt his eyes sting. He was tired, he supposed. Soon, his body would start protesting about his sprint through the hospital grounds and his impetuous dancing. It had been another long and eventful day and there was a lot more to do before the cloak of night allowed the war to restart in earnest. He blew his nose.

  After he had finished the code, he quickly wrote out the longest, most expensive telegram he had ever composed and went in search of Miss Pippery to send it for him. Anyone observing the man who bowled down the stone steps and burst out into the gloom of late afternoon might have thought he had taken some kind of stimulant, or found an elixir that could roll back biological time by a decade or two. There was a hint of weightlessness about Watson, as if the gravity around him had been turned down a notch or two. With nary a creak of the knees he bent and scooped up Cecil, de Griffon’s Jack Russell, and, with the dog yapping under his arm, he picked up the pace, aware he had to give his body some respect now, walked briskly to the transfusion tent.

  FORTY-FOUR

  Corporal Percy Lewis considered himself a lucky man. True, he was cold, his feet ached, his puttees were too tight, and rain was dripping off his steel helmet into the gap between collar and neck. Yet, guard duty was preferable to being ten miles to the east, where the men he had served with before being seconded to the BSGC were about to re-enter the front-line trenches for another four days of alternating boredom and fear. The only constant up there was discomfort, and it was of a different
magnitude from a cape that didn’t keep out all the water.

  Lewis had been lucky before. He had been sent home poorly from the four p.m. shift at the Connolly Pit when it fired. He’d only just reached home and was preparing to go and sleep off whatever was ailing him when there came a knocking at the door. Smoke was coming out of the shaft, the neighbours said. He had rushed to the pithead and the women were gathering for their terrible vigil. Of course, he’d volunteered for the rescue party, but it was three hours before the fires were put out and it was safe to send a cage down. There were three survivors. They buried the thirty-six dead in two communal trenches. His father and two brothers among them. He swore he would never go down a pit again. So he’d joined the army.

  He was also lucky to have survived the conflict for this long. Only a handful of his original Old Contemptibles had come through unscathed. Most of those who had landed with him at Le Havre existed only as faded faces in his mind’s eye, slowly merging into each other, to become one single entity. And now, just when there was talk of another big push coming, he had been taken out of the front line for guard duty. Perhaps it was his age: nearly forty. Maybe someone thought he’d done his bit, that one day his luck might just run out.

  The rain gave one last violent burst and then faded to nothing. Lewis gave a little shake to flick the water from his clothes.

  ‘Rider approaching!’ The voice came from above. Reggie Smillings, a Durham lad, also from a mining family.

  Lewis raised a hand to show he had heard and stepped out from the meagre shelter the stone-capped pillar had provided to position himself in the centre of the iron gates that gave access to the grounds of Burnt-Out Lodge.

  The rider came out of the thickening dusk and down the approach road at a steady trot, slowly resolving from a blurred, indistinct shape, to an officer on a horse, to a major on a rather fine steed. And not a young major, either. Certainly not one of those schoolboy officers, the one-pip wonders, who still needed help wiping their arses. Lewis felt a touch of butterflies, wondering what sending a senior member of the brass meant. Were they being recalled to go back to the front?