The Horizon (1993)

by Reeman, Douglas

  A voice seemed to shriek in his skull. Tell them, for God’s sake. You can’t do it. Fate is against you. Next time there’ll be so many more depending on you.

  He was almost shocked to hear his own voice in this vast, quiet room. ‘I hope I can justify your faith, sir.’

  It was madness. He could almost hear Waring’s infuriating laugh, mingled with the cries and curses of hand-to-hand combat.

  Loftus showed no surprise. ‘I served under your father for a time. Not an easy man, if I may say so. But you – you’re like your brothers, especially David. I knew you’d accept.’

  The adjutant-general glanced meaningly at the clock above the painting of Trafalgar. Nelson had just fallen but the painter’s emphasis was on the scarlet-coated marines firing from the hammock nettings, while one of their sergeants ran to help the little admiral.

  ‘Your presentation will be at the end of the month, Blackwood. Make sure your new rank is in evidence on that day, won’t you?’

  He must leave here, if only to make himself realise what he had just done. From major to lieutenant-colonel at the stroke of a pen.

  The adjutant-general was saying, ‘The presentation will be at Eastney Barracks. I am afraid I shall be representing the colonel-in-chief.’

  Loftus said dryly, ‘Can’t be helped. The salmon season begins the day after. One can hardly expect His Majesty to miss that.’

  The adjutant-general glared at him and then said, ‘I did have doubts, Blackwood.’ He thrust out his hand. ‘But no longer.’

  It was over.

  There were two different redcaps in the reception area and one hurried towards him, his eyes brimming with eager curiosity.

  ‘Sir? The adjutant-general’s car is waiting for you.’

  It was starting already. He said, ‘I want to get to Waterloo, Corporal.’

  The redcap sounded indignant. ‘Oh, no, sir. I am instructed to tell you that the driver will take you straight home.’

  Home. It was a long time since he had thought of Hawks Hill as that.

  ‘Then thank you. It’ll make a change. I hope he can find the place in the dark.’

  The M.P. shook his head. ‘When you get to be the adjutant-general’s driver you’d better know such things, sir.’

  There was another surprise even as the long khaki staff car slid smoothly to the bottom of the steps. He heard footsteps on the tiled floor behind him and without turning he knew it was Wyke. It was this appointment of which he had been trying to warn him; his father had probably told him.

  Wyke seemed uncertain now, still testing the strength of their friendship and unsure of the proprieties of rank.

  ‘I just heard, sir! You’ve accepted!’

  As David had often said, it was like a family. Secrets were not possible for long. He shook Wyke’s hand warmly and then embraced him with all the affection of a brother.

  ‘It’s so good to see you, Christopher! You’ll never know.’

  Wyke seemed suddenly shy.

  ‘I wanted to ask you, sir, before anybody else shoved his oar in. I know it isn’t proper procedure . . .’

  Together they walked down the steps to the car. The light was already fading over London; the driver had the door open and his hand up in a stiff salute, and suddenly there was no more time.

  Jonathan said, ‘I would take it as an honour if you would be my adjutant. Is that what you wanted to ask?’

  Wyke’s face was one great grin. ‘Thank you, sir. Yes, it was!’

  ‘I’ll be receiving my orders soon now. There’ll be a lot to do.’

  The prospect did not seem to daunt Wyke.

  ‘See you on the thirty-first, sir. The champagne is on me!’

  He was still saluting as the car rolled away into the traffic.

  Harry Payne stood back and eyed Jonathan critically.

  ‘Tailor did a good job, sir. Just the ticket.’

  The last day in January was a perfect one, as if it, like the ceremony about to begin, had been planned to the last detail.

  It was strange, he thought: he felt far more at home at Eastney Barracks than at Hawks Hill. He had completed training here, and as a young subaltern had gone from here to join his first ship. It seemed like a lifetime ago.

  Below the window he could see the length and breadth of the parade ground, usually criss-crossed by marching squads and platoons of men, their efforts cursed or approved by motionless N.C.O.’s: drill with rifle and machine-gun, light artillery or merely the mysteries of fixing and unfixing bayonets with perfect timing.

  There was a guard of honour there now, for the adjutant-general, and the guard commander was moving slowly along each rank to make certain that nothing could be faulted. On the opposite side of the square the band was playing lively music of the sea. Beyond a painted rope the visitors stood closely packed, for warmth as much as anything, for the barracks faced the English Channel and the breeze was like a knife.

  There would be some familiar faces here today, but a lot would be missing. There was a new colonel commandant now, Roger Tarrier’s father having been sent to a grander appointment in Scotland on the admiral’s staff. Payne had been complaining about the award not being presented by H.M. the King as the Corps’ Colonel-in-Chief.

  They queue up at Buckingham Palace for next to nothing!’ he had said indignantly. ‘I expect most of the medals he hands out are picked out of a hat!’

  Jonathan watched uneasily as more visitors appeared. Perhaps the Palace might have been better, although not for Payne’s reasons. Here he would stand alone, unsupported by others who had faced death and probably viewed these ceremonies as far more harrowing. There were women too: officers’ wives, local dignitaries. The mess bills would be heavy after this.

  He leaned forward sharply so that his forehead banged against the cold glass.

  ‘Who are they?’

  Payne moved up beside him, hearing the edge in his tone and, worse, knowing what had taken his attention.

  He followed his glance and found a large group of marines standing apart from all the rest. There were nurses too, their blue and scarlet capes lifting slightly in the breeze, like the Union Flag that flew above the old square clock-tower.

  ‘They wanted to come, sir.’ His eye fell on the new rank, the crown and pip of lieutenant-colonel. Pity his brothers couldn’t be here today, or Titch for that matter.

  Jonathan tore his eyes from the group by the wall. Several were in wheelchairs, others on crutches. His men, to be left like this . . .

  Payne repeated, ‘They wanted to, sir. They don’t blame you for what happened.’ He wanted to add, They’re proud, that’s all. They want to share it with you. But it was useless, and he knew it.

  Another movement at the opposite side behind the band. It was the barracks adjutant, riding his magnificent white horse very slowly like a knight about to take part in a joust.

  Payne said gently, ‘Nearly time, sir. Starter’s orders.’

  Jonathan turned and said, ‘You should have been given something.’

  Payne smiled, relieved that he had not pursued the matter of the wounded spectators.

  ‘I can wait, sir.’

  When he looked out again the guard of honour had moved into open order, bayonets fixed, their officer with his drawn sword at the carry. People shifted and pointed, some waving to familiar faces.

  ‘I don’t know if I can go through with this.’ Only when he saw Payne glance at him did he realise he had spoken aloud.

  The door opened. ‘Ready, sir.’

  After the warmth of the room the cold bit into him like ice. At the top of the fine stone steps he looked straight across to the sea, today hardly moving but for a low, undulating swell. It was a view known to sailors down the centuries: Spithead and the Solent and the green hump of the Isle of Wight like an unfinished backdrop.

  Unexpectedly Payne saluted, his face expressionless.

  ‘Good luck, sir. You’ll be right as ninepence, you’ll see. Just remember, the l
ads’ll be looking to you today.’

  Then he was gone and Jonathan’s escort, a smart, young lieutenant who was probably still undergoing training, fell into step beside him.

  Unbeknown to Jonathan, he was glancing at him whenever he could, noting the flecks of grey in his dark hair, the tight crowsfeet about his eyes. Suffering, strain and anxiety were all there, but the lieutenant saw only the hero, who had been prepared to throw away his life to save men under fire. The man he would most like to be.

  ‘Band, ready!’ Jonathan saw the glitter of instruments, the buglers moistening their lips in readiness.

  ‘Guard of honour! Pre-sent . . . arms!’

  The rifles slapped out in salute, a faint cloud of blanco above the ranks as each gloved hand made the air ring to their crack. The bandmaster’s baton began to beat time, and as the massive figure of the adjutant-general strode into view, followed closely by Loftus and the new colonel commandant, ‘A Life On The Ocean Wave’ blared out and echoed from the old red brick walls as it had for so many years.

  Through the guard of honour Jonathan saw Sergeant-Major McCann, standing quite alone and rigidly at attention.

  His youthful escort whispered, ‘Right on time, sir!’

  Jonathan watched the general moving along the guard, pausing to speak to the officer-in-command and to a sergeant whose medals had caught his eye.

  ‘Ready, sir?’

  Jonathan gave a brief nod. It was happening so quickly it would soon be over. God, he thought, his escort was so nervous his teeth were chattering. Together they marched across the square, and as the band ceased playing and the guard were stood at ease, he could feel the silence like something physical, like the deafness he had experienced when Waring’s booby-trapped Bible had exploded.

  Major-General Loftus and the commandant were standing slightly behind the general, who was positioned on a carefully-painted white disc. Nothing had been left to chance. He saw Loftus’s bright blue stare and knew this was his idea: in the Corps there was no better way to reward gallantry and to show off the man he had chosen to command the new battalion.

  The adjutant-general returned his salute and peered closely at his uniform to make certain he was displaying his new rank. Then with great care he took a document from his pocket and put on a pair of small gold-rimmed spectacles. It made him seem slightly more human.

  Jonathan glanced at the men beyond the other barrier. Corporal Wakeford was one of those in wheelchairs. He had no legs, but was nodding and making what appeared to be cheerful comments as the general’s resonant tones carried easily to the spectators. There were others he had thought dead, and two who could have been at Hawks Hill, their bandaged eyes peering upwards as if they could see him.

  And around the corner of the wall Payne watched it all, and knew exactly what this public display was costing so private a man. Jonathan looked as pale as death, and Payne wanted to be there with him, in his place: aboard a ship, or on some bloody firestep with all hell showing its teeth.

  Then he recognised a familiar figure by one of the ornamental cannon. It was the hard man: the undisciplined machine-gunner Bert Langmaid, of all people.

  Payne joined him and murmured, ‘Thought you didn’t believe in this sort of stuff.’

  Langmaid glared at him. ‘I don’t, see? But ’e’s different. Not a bad un.’ He relented slightly. For a bleedin’ officer, that is!’

  The adjutant-general was coming to the end. Jonathan tried not to think of all the missing faces, so young in the flash of artillery fire.

  He had barely heard a word of the citation. Over and above the line of duty . . . With no thought for his own safety showed courage and heroism of the highest order . . .

  More faces moved towards the general and a leather box was being held out towards him.

  Some of the spectators pressed forward to see better, and as a gap appeared in the crowd directly opposite him, he recognised the bearded figure of Pitcairn, the village doctor. He was deeply moved, for although he had often attended the Blackwood family Pitcairn had never considered himself, or been considered, a friend to his father. And there was someone else with him. He blinked against the hard light. She was wearing the same green coat with the fur collar, and even at this distance he saw her emotion.

  Then, very slowly, she raised a small handkerchief. It was only for him, and said more than any spoken word or message could ever do.

  In the next second he was falling back two paces and saluting, the ribbon of the Distinguished Service Order about his neck.

  ‘Band – ready!’

  But in those few moments before they broke into another lively programme a single voice roared out from the crowd.

  ‘Good old Blackie!’

  The effect was immediate, and to him awful. Cheering and shouting rebounded across the parade ground, so that the bandmaster had to wait while some of his own men joined in.

  The adjutant-general said over the uproar, ‘See you in the mess, Herbert. Went rather well, apparently.’

  Major-General Loftus paused a moment longer. He said, ‘I told you, Blackwood. You’re the man for the job!’ He followed the general towards the stone stairway, others in his wake according to rank and status; then he paused and looked back, shading his eyes against the hard glare from the sea. He saw his new lieutenant-colonel walking amongst the wounded marines, and felt the pain like his own when one of them clapped Blackwood across the back.

  The girl in the green coat had disappeared. He had noticed the quick exchange at the close of the ceremony, the raised handkerchief like a signal. He was strangely pleased about it, whoever she was. Where he was going, and with the task ahead, Jonathan Blackwood would need all the help and all the comfort he could find.

  Twelve

  It was not until April that Jonathan Blackwood returned to Hawks Hill. During the intervening ten weeks the new battalion had been under canvas outside Salisbury where officers, N.C.O.’s and men had been put through every kind of training. The instructors for the most part were already veterans and knew exactly what it was like to be under fire, and the hard necessities of day-to-day survival.

  The battalion showed plenty of promise and Jonathan had made certain that everyone, high or low, had pulled his weight. Digging trenches and shoring them up with the primitive materials they might expect to find on the battlefield so that they would not collapse under the first bombardment, crossing tangled barbed-wire with ladders, duck-boards, or advancing in full kit and wearing the hated anti-gas respirators were all part of it. Other days were used for physical training, or long route marches over rough country until the marines had come to hate the instructors more than the enemy they were being trained to fight.

  It had been Jonathan’s first experience of the other conflict, the paper war which every senior officer was plagued by. But his adjutant, Captain Christopher Wyke, and his new second-in-command Major Ralph Vaughan had cut down the daily load considerably and given him time to acquaint himself with every squad, platoon and company of his command.

  Major-General Loftus had visited the training camp twice but had not interfered, although he had obviously had a hand in the choice of an army unit which was doing the same kind of exercises. A battalion of the East Surrey Regiment was usually ready to act as the enemy, and the tough rivalry and the confidence it bred helped a great deal, although Jonathan sometimes suspected that these men forgot what lay inevitably at the end of the mock battles and forced marches. Competition and comradeship had become the only object. The long casualty lists might have belonged to another world, a part of something unreal.

  On his final visit Loftus had hinted that a massive attack would begin sooner rather than later on the Western Front. The weather had improved, the flooded trenches and bogged-down roads – what remained of them – were almost passable.

  ‘Give your people a week’s leave. They’ve earned it.’ He had been climbing into his car at the time and had added in an almost matter-of-fact way, ‘Take some yo
urself. I hear you’ve been overdoing it lately.’ He could just as easily have said, ‘It may be the last chance you’ll get.’

  Jonathan had often recalled that bright, cold day at Eastney, over two months ago. To him it seemed yesterday. Her face in the crowd, the signal to him which had excluded everyone else. He had not seen her since; she had vanished with her father while he had been meeting some of the wounded marines, and might have been only another dream. He had wanted to call at her home, or at least speak to her father about her, but immediately he had rejected the idea. In a small village, in peace or war, there was always ready gossip. Just a simple visit could so easily compromise her position after he had gone.

  Why delude himself anyway, he thought angrily. She had been in love with David, who had known nothing about it. Why had she told him even that?

  On his return to Hawks Hill and after a restless night, he got up early and went for a walk, towards the dark copse where in childhood they had stalked dragons or fought pirates. He paused on the winding pathway and took several deep breaths. How good it felt and tasted. April in Hampshire: the distant trees enveloped in millions of buds so that they seemed shrouded in a fine green haze, and the hillside itself below the copse alive with a swaying sea of daffodils. He began to walk on but stopped as he heard the far-off twang of a cuckoo. He had already heard several: they were always early visitors to Hampshire.

  In the quiet morning, the familiar doubts suddenly assailed him again. He should have told Loftus, explained. And what would he have said? The question repeated itself over and over, and there was never any answer.

  He stared out over the peaceful countryside. Little had changed here for centuries. Would it ever be torn apart like the fields of Flanders?

  It was impossible, unimaginable; but over there, too, they must have thought it could never happen. Whole acres covered with shell craters, villages once like these obliterated from the map.