“Semper Talis!” The words were clear now. “Semper Talis.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Aitken asked. “Is that German?”
“It means ‘Always the same’,” Flockhart said quietly. “It’s the motto of the Prussian Guards.” He lowered his voice. “It’s not bon, Aitken; it’s not bon at all.”
“Listen,” McKim said softly, “they’re singing now.” He held up his hand as the words lifted until they seemed to fill the air around them. Ramsay listened too, his hands twitching at the butt of his revolver but powerless to alter the effect the singing was having on his men.
“Lieb vaterland magst ruhig sein
Lieb vaterland, magst ruhig sein
Fest steht und treu die Wacht, die Wacht am Rhein
Fest steht und true die Wacht, die Wacht am Rhein!”
The German words were powerful. Shoulders that had been squared only a few moments before were drooping now. The German words, sung in confident tones and with military precision, seemed to enter their minds and dominate.
“Does anybody speak German?” Ramsay wondered. He was strangely unsurprised when Flockhart murmured a reply.
“It’s a popular German song,” Flockhart said. “They sung it in the Franco-Prussian war as well. Very patriotic of them.” He gave a slow translation as the Royals gathered round.
“Dear Fatherland put your mind at rest
Dear Fatherland put your mind at rest
Firm stands, and true, the Watch at the Rhine
Firm stands, and true, the Watch at the Rhine.”
Flockhart stopped translating. “That must be the Prussian Guards,” he said.
“Oh, aye?” McKim was first to recover. “Well, fuck them. We’re the Royal Scots; come on lads, these bastards can’t outfight us and I won’t let them outsing us either.” He faced the direction the singing had come from and began.
“Après la guerre finie,
Soldat Ecosse parti.”
He stopped, “Come on lads, join in.”
One by one the men joined their voices into a small chorus, infinitesimal compared to the thousand voice choir of the Prussians, but more defiant, more rousing and every bit as heartfelt.
“Mademoiselle in the family way,
Après la guerre finie.”
Ramsay had heard those words sung a hundred times and knew that, if he survived, he would hear them a hundred times again, but he knew that each time he would remember this battered band of Royal Scots, standing an unknown distance behind the front line shouting their identity in tuneless contempt for the enemy. He felt a surge of pride that he had never known before as he looked over his men, and knew he would do all he could to get them back home safely.
The image came to him again. She was lying on her back in the sun-sweet field, with her hair a golden halo around her head and her breasts bare and soft and utterly alluring. He relived the scene, as he had so often before, the scent of the grass mingling with her faint perfume, the sough of the breeze in the nearby trees adding to her soft moans.
He remembered the quietness of that day, the kiss of the sun on his naked back, the sight of the grass from ground level – stalks stretching away like a miniature forest. He remembered the look in the girl’s eyes, her trust and pleasure in his company.
“Shall we do that again?” she had asked and he had nodded.
“A hundred times more,” he said.
“Make it a thousand times more,” she had told him and put her hands around the back of his head to pull him close for a kiss.
She had tasted good. Sweet and young then, and the entire world before them with no thought of war or trouble on their horizons. Life had been good.
I’ll do my best to get them all back safely. Except you, Flockhart, you vicious bastard. You must never get back.
The singing died away and the men looked at each other, grinning through their fatigue; they were soldiers immersed in one of the bloodiest wars that had ever been fought but they were still men. As Ramsay looked at them he was struck by their extreme youth. With the exception of McKim, who was an elderly man with eyes as old as time and the attitude of a teenager, Cruickshank and Blackley who were in their mid-twenties, and Flockhart, whose age was indeterminate, he doubted if any of them had reached the age of majority; most would still be in their teens. This was a war of juggernauts and mechanised murder waged by children. Gone were the days of professional long service men who could count their service in decades. These men may have been at the front for months or mere weeks, but they had probably seen more horror than most old-time soldiers had experienced in a lifetime.
“Right, lads,” Ramsay said, suddenly humbled by his own men. “Let’s get away from here before the Prussians send out a company to see how many of us there are.”
“Let the bastards come …” McKim began, but Flockhart shut him up with a glare. “Don’t be bloody stupid, McKim. Do as the officer says.”
They moved on again, silent now as the night eased away. Ramsay listened for the sounds of Germans following them, but heard only the usual sounds of the front; the distant rumble of the guns, the closer occasional rattle of a machine gun and the low moan of wind through the wire.
The sudden staccato bark of musketry stopped them in their tracks; some of the men ducked or dived for cover. Ramsay flinched, but remained upright, he was an officer and could not be seen bobbing.
“That could be the Royals,” McKim said hopefully. “Maybe we should march to the sound of the guns, sir.”
“It could be Fritz fighting himself, for all we know,” Ramsay said. He guessed there would be many small parties of British soldiers making their way back after being cut off by the speed of the German advance.
“McKim could be right, sir. That could be another group of our boys,” Flockhart said. “Maybe we could team up with them. There’s safety in numbers.”
“More men might slow us down,” Ramsay said. “Let them attract the Huns. We might be able to get through a gap in the lines.”
Here I am again, explaining myself to the men. I should just give an order and expect it to be obeyed. I am their officer, for God’s sake, not their colleague.
“Come on, keep moving.”
“Bloody officer doesn’t care about the lads.”
“He’s scared to get involved, yellow bastard.”
Ramsay turned a deaf ear to the sotto voice comments. He would not be able to identify the culprits in the dark and even if he did, what could he do about it? Shoot them for mutiny? Sentence them to field punishment number one? He grunted, checked his revolver and tried to ignore the complaints. If British soldiers ever stopped grumbling there would be something seriously amiss.
They slogged on, occasionally swearing as they encountered tangles of rusty barbed wire, floundering into shell craters and halting with hammering hearts when flares threw their lurid glare onto the ground.
“Dawn’s coming soon,” Flockhart warned in a low tone. “And the boys are about done in.”
Ramsay nodded. He had heard their breathing becoming more ragged with each passing quarter hour, and knew they were stumbling more often than they had at the beginning of the night. “We’ll have to find somewhere to hide up for the day.” He peered into the pre-dawn dark; the landscape was a nightmare vista of craters and abandoned strongpoints, ripped sandbags and the skeletal stumps of shattered trees.
“There are plenty shell holes,” McKim suggested.
Ramsay opened his mouth to rebuke the corporal for subordination in speaking unasked, but they were at war, not on the parade ground. Instead, he said, “The boys deserve something better than that.” He looked over his shoulder. “If you know of anywhere, Sergeant, let us know.”
Flockhart stepped closer. “There is a ruined farmhouse about quarter of a mile away,” he said. “We fought over it during the Somme offensive.” He gave a small smile. “If there is anything left of it now.”
Ramsay nodded. “Lead on, Sergeant MacDuff.”
“Did you hear that?” came Cruickshank’s voice from the darkness. “That bloody officer still doesnae ken Flockhart’s name. They bloody officers are nae bloody use to anybody.”
Ramsay hid his smile and said nothing. He allowed Flockhart to step ahead and followed him into the stinking dark of the night.
CHAPTER FIVE
23 March 1918
The remains of the farmhouse were about a hundred yards east of the road to Albert, a crumbled shell of a place with waist-high walls gaping like the stumps of rotted teeth. Flockhart marched across the shambles, his shoulders squared like the soldier he most definitely was. “I remember this well,” he said, speaking almost conversationally. “We pushed the Hun out at the end of July and they came back in force that same night. It was to and fro for days.” He looked at Ramsay through wary eyes. “You were at the Somme, were you not, sir?”
Ramsay nodded, unthinking. “I was over the top with the first wave,” he said.
God! How well I remember that. The sheer volume of artillery was supposed to have pulverised the German positions so there was nothing left. We were told to sling our rifles, light our pipes and we could march all the way to Berlin, with any Germans that survived so demoralised by the shelling that they would be begging to surrender. Instead we marched into a blizzard of machine gun fire that decimated us before we had gone a hundred yards and cut our numbers by 75% before we even neared our first objective.
Flockhart narrowed his eyes. He looked at Ramsay musingly. “Maybe that was where I saw you before, sir. Were you with the Royals then?”
“I was,” Ramsay said. “Maybe we fought together then.”
For God’s sake, man, don’t you remember what happened? Don’t you remember where we met? It was in Midlothian, miles and bloody miles away from the Somme or anywhere else in bloody France.
He pointed to the ruins and quickly changed the subject. “Is there enough room in there for all of us?”
“There are wine cellars below,” Flockhart said. “We had to push out Fritz inch by inch. God, he is a tenacious bugger when he chooses.” He frowned. “I am sure I know your face, sir. I don’t think it was from the Somme though. I think it was before that?”
You’re getting too close, Flockhart. You will never see the British lines again, that I promise.
“I was at Loos with the 11th battalion,” Ramsay said quietly. “Not many came back.”
I never reached the Front though. Dysentery.
Flockhart nodded. “That was a bad show,” he agreed. He continued to study Ramsay, cocking his head to one side. “But I was not there, so I would not have seen you there, sir. No, no, it is something else, or somewhere else, if you don’t mind me saying so.”
“Let’s get the men settled in,” Ramsay said. “We can play guessing games later.”
“Yes, sir.” Flockhart stiffened at the implied rebuke. “Sorry, sir. I meant no disrespect.”
“Of course not, Sergeant,” Ramsay reminded Flockhart of their respective ranks. “Show me this sanctuary.”
Ramsay examined the ruins. The highest point of the remaining walls was only shoulder height. For a moment he wondered how even those had survived. He examined the place more closely. The house was built from heavy stone, now pitted with bullet scars and blackened with the marks of grenades and shells. Ramsay looked through the gaping hole that had once been a window. The interior was a mess of mud and tangled wire, small piles of smoke-charred rubble and the debris of battle. The courtyard was square and cobbled, empty save for scattered straw. “It looks safe enough,” he said and eased himself inside.
The interior smelled exactly the same as outside; lyddite and mud and the stench of the long dead. The Royals filed in one by one, holding their rifles in expectation of an attack, glancing skyward at the fading stars, listening for danger. Three of the exterior walls still stood, lower than the one by which they had entered, but a barrier between themselves and the outside world. There was a slight sense of security in here, or perhaps a sensation of claustrophobic confinement; Ramsay was not entirely sure which sensation was uppermost. He knew he would not care to be caught by the Germans in such a place, but it did supply shelter for his men and they needed that. He looked at them as they slumped in exhaustion, they were about done.
“The lads have had it,” Flockhart mirrored his thoughts. “They can’t go on much longer.”
Whatever the dangers of remaining in such a prominent place, Ramsay knew that his men were too exhausted to continue.
“This is as good a place as any,” he said. “We will keep a sentry posted in case Fritz gets too nosey.” He raised his voice, “Right, lads, we’ll bed down here for the day and move at dusk. If you have any iron rations left, this would be a good time to try them out.”
The men filed in slowly: Niven the tram driver, Aitken the soft-hearted man who was always first to help others, Mackay, very young, quiet and cautious, Turnbull who started at every sound and whose nerves were clearly fully stretched, Cruickshank, squat and muscular and always grousing … he watched his men come in. He had got to know them in the last few days and he was beginning to understand them a little; some he even liked.
“Keep silent, lads. Keep your heads down and your rifles handy. If Fritz gets nosey we will be out the back door and away.”
“There’s no bloody back door,” Cruickshank said.
“We’ll find one just for you,” Flockhart told him. “Keep a civil tongue in your head, Cruickshank.”
Ramsay did not make out Cruikshank’s muttered reply, but Flockhart’s returning snarl was testimony to its nature.
“Listen,” McKim raised a hand for silence. “Can you hear that?” He cocked his head to one side, then frowned and removed his helmet, handling the sharpened steel rim with extreme care. “It’s not artillery this time.”
Ramsay lifted his head above the low wall. “I can’t hear anything. You’re imagining things, McKim.”
“No I’m not, sir, with respect.” McKim’s furrowed his brows in thought. “It’s not a sound, sir. Wait.” He lay on the ground and placed his ear to the ground. “That’s it, sir. It’s not a sound, it’s a vibration. It’s like … there’s something coming, sir. Like a railway train or … an army, sir.”
Ramsay grunted cynically. “There are two armies nearby, McKim. Of course you will hear them.”
“Yes, sir,” McKim rose to his feet. “With respect, sir, I think they are closer now.”
Ramsay became aware of a slight trembling under his feet. He grunted, and peered through a gap in the battered wall. The trembling increased until it resembled a machine, a constant monotonous movement that irritated the mind and shook the loose stones from the top of the wall. It gradually became more audible until it was a throbbing sound that permeated every though.
“What the hell is that?” he asked
“It’s like an engine,” Aitken said.
“It’s marching feet,” McKim said flatly. “It’s thousands and thousands of marching feet.”
Ramsay reached for his binoculars and cursed as he realised they were gone, lost somewhere in the frantic struggle in the trenches or in the trudging misery of the retreat. Instead he peered into the steadily decreasing dark and wished that he had not.
At first he was not sure what he saw. It seemed like a moving wall, but as he focussed into the distance he realised that he was staring at the head of a dense column of men. They were on the far side of the farmhouse, marching slowly down the road to Albert and eventually Amiens, with their boots crunching in a terrible symphony. There was a trio of officers at the head and NCOs at regular intervals at each side of the column, ensuring the men kept in step and the pace remained constant.
“Jesus,” McKim breathed, “it’s the whole bloody German army.”
The head of the column passed them with the men marching in perfect step, looking neither to left or right as they moved in a disciplined silence.
“Is that the Prussian G
uards?” Aitken asked.
“Nah, they’re just Bavarian foot soldiers,” Turnbull said. “The Prussians are bigger.”
“They look big enough to me,” Cruickshank grumbled. He hawked and spat in the direction of the Germans. “Dirty Fritzy bastards.”
“Right, keep down and keep quiet,” Ramsay ordered. “Let’s hope they keep marching and don’t send a patrol out to inspect these ruins.”
“They’ve no reason to,” Flockhart said quietly. “They think they have won the war. Why should they stop chasing us just to look at a ruin on an ancient battlefield?”
One by one the Royals sank down from the wall and stretched on the ground. In the time-honoured tradition of the British soldier they could sleep in any circumstance, and the exertions of the night and previous day had drawn heavily on their stores of stamina and endurance. Ramsay watched them for a minute and wondered if he should try to sleep. He shook his head. Despite his physical exhaustion, he knew that he would not be able to calm his mind sufficiently to sleep. He huddled in the lee of the shattered building, the dawn salmon pink with gunfire and the columns of Germans marching past in a steady stream. Ramsay thought the sound was like the drumbeats of defeat.
The marching ended, to be replaced by the sound of hooves and the grind of wheels on the pave. Ramsay watched the slow progress of ambulances and ammunition wagons and wondered what was happening at the front.
“There’s plenty of them,” Flockhart said. “They have been marching past for hours now.”
“But the lads are still fighting.” Ramsay jerked his head sideways to the constant rumble of the guns. “So Fritz has not broken through yet.”
“He’s doing damned well, though,” McKim said. “Death and hell to every one of them.” He took off his helmet and began to sharpen the rim on the rough stonework of the wall. “We’ll get him back. You’ll see, sir, we’ll get him back.” There were tears of frustration in his eyes as he watched the Germans roll past. “If we ran at them, sir, we might disrupt them. We might catch them by surprise, like we did in the trench.”
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