The Guns of El Kebir (Simon Fonthill Series)

by John Wilcox

  She gave her wan smile. ‘And so it proved. You see, earlier in the desert, when we were still quite near to Kassassin and George had to conceal his identity, he did not wear his glasses and I realised that he was myopic. So when he came rushing into the hut and lunged across me to get the rope to finish me off, I was able to knock his glasses off and then jump on them. He was at a disadvantage immediately – you will remember that his spectacle lenses were very thick – and hysterical with rage. He groped for my throat to strangle me but I struggled and was able to use the fork to . . . to . . . to my advantage.’

  The silence returned, with none of the men able or willing to break it. The day was windless and seemed at its hottest. It was as though a dry woollen blanket had wrapped itself around them all.

  Alice continued, but now her voice was very low. ‘I jabbed the fork into his throat very hard,’ she said, ‘and twisted it, and I suppose I . . . sort of . . . tore out his windpipe.’ Her voice dropped to a whisper. ‘You see, I was fighting for my life and was desperate. He made a terrible gurgling noise and his blood gushed everywhere. It was quite . . . quite . . . disgusting.’ Slowly she put her head into her hands and then broke into a series of convulsive sobs.

  All three men rose to go to her but Covington was the nearest and the others sank down again as he took her in his arms. ‘My brave girl,’ he murmured, ‘my dear brave girl. You could do nothing else. He deserved to die. You had no choice. You were very, very brave.’ He continued to hold her, rocking her to and fro, as Simon and Jenkins looked at each other and then slowly rose to their feet and walked away.

  They stood for a moment in the centre of the village, outside the hut where George had died. For once, even Jenkins could think of nothing to say. ‘I suppose,’ said Simon eventually, ‘we had better remove the bloody man. We don’t want Alice upset even more.’

  Jenkins nodded glumly and they turned towards the hut, but found, to their surprise, that the villagers had already removed George’s body and, presumably, buried him with his accomplices. Simon summoned the headman again and presented him with one of the camels, which was accepted with eager gratitude. Shortly afterwards, three of the women from the village produced cotton garments of impeccable cleanliness and indicated that Alice should change into them. They led her away to help her do so. It was as though they were trying to make up for the terrible way they knew she had been treated in their little community – or perhaps they feared reprisals.

  Simon did his best to avoid Covington, but in Alice’s absence, the Colonel sought him out. ‘Why did you follow me, Fonthill?’ he asked.

  Immediately Simon was on the defensive. ‘General Wolseley asked me to do so,’ he said. ‘He felt that you should not go alone and that it would endanger Alice’s life to send soldiers with you. We have been passing as Bedawi with some success for a while now, so it was obvious that we had the best chance of helping, should you need it.’

  ‘Well I damn well didn’t need it.’ Simon found it disconcerting to look into Covington’s only eye, of well-remembered china blue. Now, it was watering slightly, whether from emotion or the strain of the harsh sunlight, he would never know. ‘I had the matter well under control and would have killed those three Arabs within minutes. There was no need to come blundering after me. I don’t need nannies and am well capable of looking after my wife without your so-called help, thank you very much.’

  Simon flushed. A succession of conflicting emotions flashed through his brain: anger at Covington’s sheer unreasonableness, and jealousy at having once again seen Alice in close and intimate contact with the man who was her husband. Listening to Alice tell her story, reflecting her courage, fear and despair, he had longed to rush across and take her in his arms and comfort her; tell her how much he loved her frailty and admired her pluck. But, of course, it was Covington who assumed that role – and who had the right to assume it.

  He controlled himself. ‘It didn’t look to me that you had the situation under control, Covington,’ he said. ‘But it’s of no account now. Alice is safe and that is all that matters. Look, the General is probably going to launch his attack tomorrow night and he has asked me to be back in time to take part. No doubt he will wish you to be involved too. If Al . . . Mrs Covington is up to pressing on, we could arrive at Kassassin in time. We have extra camels to spell the others. But we should move soon.’

  ‘Tomorrow night, you say?’ Covington eased his eye patch and continued, as though musing to himself: ‘A night attack will be damned difficult to carry out, but Wolseley knows what he is doing. Of course I must be in the attack. Alice will ride with me. She is my wife, and anyway, I am sure she will wish to leave this disgusting place behind pretty quickly.’

  And so she did. They were mounted and moving out within the half-hour, with the Egyptians standing mute as though with embarrassment at what had happened within their village, watching them ride away.

  Chapter 20

  Their journey back was uneventful. Covington was persuaded to lead his charger and mount one of the spare camels, with the result that they were able to make good time. Mostly they rode in silence, with Simon scouting a little way ahead and Jenkins bringing up the rear. They arrived at Kassassin in late afternoon to find that the camp had been considerably extended and was now bustling with the preparations for the great attack on the Egyptian stronghold.

  ‘I think the correspondents have all come up,’ Covington called to Alice. ‘Can you make your way to their compound? The liaison officer will find you a tent and I will come and see you as soon as I have reported to the General.’

  She nodded, and Covington gave her a perfunctory kiss on the cheek, then, still ignoring Simon and Jenkins, rode away. Simon watched him go, and after asking Jenkins to look after the animals, fell in alongside Alice. They rode in uncomfortable silence for a while before she reached out to touch his arm.

  ‘Simon,’ she said, her eyes brimming with tears. ‘I am so sorry. I . . .’ She broke off and turned her head away.

  He gave the back of her head a sad smile. ‘So am I. Don’t worry. It can’t be helped. I just want you to know that you are the bravest girl in all the world and that I shall always love you. But I will never speak of it again.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Will you go back down the line to Ismailia now?’

  She looked at him with tearstained cheeks and eyes that were now wide. ‘Thank you for saying that, my dearest,’ she said. ‘I shall always remember it. And,’ she reached across and touched his arm, ‘you know that I shall always love you, too. Nothing has changed.’

  They rode in silence again. Then Alice summoned up a brave smile. ‘Go back to Ismailia? Good God, no. I shall cover the battle, whatever bloody Wolseley says. I have not suffered all that for nothing. I still have a job to do. Ralph is going to plead for me with the General. But whatever he says, I shall stay somehow.’

  Simon shook his head. ‘Alice,’ he said, ‘you are incorrigible.’

  They found the young captain who was the correspondents’ liaison officer and whose jaw dropped when he saw Alice. However, he was persuaded to find her a bivouac tent and a bedroll so that she could rest awhile. Simon left her there and made for the General’s tent, crossing with Covington on the way.

  ‘General wants to see you,’ said the Colonel. ‘Probably wants to give you a bloody medal for saving my wife.’ Leaving the sneer hanging in the air, he rode on. Simon did not reply.

  Wolseley was sitting at his table, dictating orders and surrounded by his senior officers. He waved Simon in. ‘Well done, Fonthill,’ he said. ‘Glad that the miserable business has been cleared up. I haven’t got time to hear much about it but you should know that I have decided to let Mrs Covington stay and report the show. She has shown such amazing pluck that I can’t find it in my heart to send her back down the lines.’

  Simon smiled. ‘Thank you, sir. I know she will be delighted.’

  ‘Right, now to business. Now that the 1st Royal Irish Fusiliers have come up, I am rea
dy to have a go at the enemy, and I intend to advance during the night and attack at first light. Now listen carefully.’

  Gone was the languor that had characterised much of Wolseley’s behaviour during the build-up at the little forward post. His good eye was now aglow and he seemed to be bursting with energy. It was clear that he knew what he wanted to do and how he wanted to do it. He was a man who clearly had found release at the prospect of battle at last.

  ‘Although we are moving forward in a straight line across a plain,’ the General continued, ‘marching a whole army in the dark as one unit is a devilishly difficult thing to do. My idea is to be in position to attack just before first light, so I can’t afford to have sections wandering off into the bloody desert like lost cattle. If we are caught in the open at sun-up, those guns will mow us down. The whole attack is to be silent, with no preliminary bombardment. I want to catch the Egyptians when they’re half asleep.’

  Simon nodded in comprehension. It was an audacious idea and perhaps the only way to nullify the threat of the guns of el Kebir. But could it be done without alerting the enemy? Sounds carried for hundreds of yards in the still night air of the desert. How could you move thousands of men, with their clunking equipment, forward in line for six miles in darkness without the line being broken and some sound, at least, escaping to betray their presence? It was almost asking the impossible. But Wolseley was continuing.

  ‘Now, navigation is to be by the stars, and one of the navy’s best navigators, Lieutenant Rawson, will give direction roughly from the centre. But you, Fonthill, and your Welshman must know this bit of the desert now like the back of your hand, so I want you to go forward and guide from the left ahead of the Highland Division.’ Simon suppressed a smile at the thought of Jenkins guiding anyone anywhere. ‘You were with the Jocks at Majuba – the Gordons, weren’t they?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ He marvelled at Wolseley’s memory for detail. The mark of a good general?

  ‘Excellent. Well, you should feel at home, and being Welsh, your man should be able to communicate well with ’em.’ The officers surrounding the General’s table chortled at the joke. Simon summoned a smile.

  ‘The battle plan is to break in at dawn with my two infantry divisions, but with the artillery, about forty guns, advancing behind the foot divisions ready to support the attack as soon as surprise is lost. We shall go in with the bayonet. No rounds in the rifles. Each division will move with one brigade forward, the other in reserve a thousand yards behind. Now, the frontage of each assaulting brigade is to be a thousand yards, with an interval of about twelve hundred yards between the inner flanks of each division. Your lot, the Highlanders on the left, should leave a gap of about two thousand yards from the railway.’

  ‘Are you leaving that open, sir?’

  ‘Not quite. I haven’t got infantry to fill it, but it’s rising ground there and I am putting in two squadrons of the 19th Hussars to watch it. The Indian Brigade will push forward south of the canal, with a naval gun coming up on the railway later, but never mind those. Your job is to ensure that the Jocks don’t go blundering into the railway and the canal on the left, or into General Graham’s brigade on the right. It’s a sort of sheepdog role. Appropriate, I should think, for a chap from the Brecon Beacons. Eh. What?’

  Once again a low murmur of laughter filled the tent. Looking around briefly, Simon could not help but feel how incongruous the little gathering would appear to an uninformed observer: a middle-aged general, surrounded by his senior officers, most of them of a similar age, carefully briefing a young Arab, covered in the dust of the desert, with the plans for his intended battle.

  He smiled again and gulped. ‘Most appropriate, sir. I shall try not to bark.’

  Wolseley chuckled. ‘Jolly good. Now, when the attack starts, I don’t want you to lead it. Let the Jocks go through. You have won enough glory on this campaign. Is that understood?’

  ‘Quite so, sir. But I would like to attack with them.’

  ‘Very well. Does you credit. Ah, one more thing. Colonel Covington has patrolled this bit of desert almost as much as you. He will act as guide for the division on your right. But we shall all take our main direction from Lieutenant Rawson. Any questions?’

  ‘What if the stars are obscured?’

  ‘We go by compass bearing, of course. Due west.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  ‘Right, Fonthill. Go and get some rest. We march shortly after one a.m. and we shall want you ahead before then, of course. Good luck.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  Simon left the General’s tent, his head whirling. If it was a clear night, then good, but that meant that the enemy would be able to see them from a distance. If visibility was poor, then they should be able to approach quite near to the enemy trenches and guns – if, that is, the whole army had not strayed all over the desert. He sighed. He hoped to God that there were a few other good sheepdogs with compasses to help him!

  Resisting the urge to make one last visit to Alice to ensure that she was comfortably housed, Simon made for the field hospital. He was relieved to find that Ahmed was sitting up in his cot, heavily bandaged but smiling.

  ‘I am flattered by all attention,’ he said. ‘Three five two has already been but has gone now to do, he says, something important. He tell me about the lady, et cetera. I am glad that she is really safe now.’

  Simon smiled back. ‘Thank you. I must say, we missed you on that journey, but Ahmed, I am glad that you are not going to be with us for the big battle. That would not be easy for you.’

  Ahmed frowned. ‘No. But I think it has to be done, this big fight. Otherwise this silly man Arabi will continue to muck up country. Egypt needs stability, quietness, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, to rebuild country. I just hope not too many killed.’

  ‘Absolutely right, old chap.’ They shook hands and Simon slipped away, his thoughts on the coming battle.

  Jenkins was not at their tent, and Simon crept inside hoping to steal a few moments’ rest, but the bustle of activity in the camp made sleep impossible. Over the preceding week, Kassassin had grown into a tented city about half a mile from north to south and some three miles deep, with streets swarming with a multi-ethnic, colourful collection of fighting men from the Empire: kilted Highlanders, red-coated infantry of the line, pipe-clayed marines, tall guardsmen, blue jackets of the naval brigade, turbaned Indian cavalry and sepoys, dour artillerymen, swaggering cavalrymen and camp followers of every description. Now everyone was preparing to go into battle, and Simon strolled through the lines, fascinated to see an army stripping down to move and fight. Round the commissariat stores parties of men from each regiment were drawing the rations to be carried in the haversacks – a hundred rounds of ammunition per man and two days’ basic rations, with water bottles filled with tea. The regimental transports were being loaded to carry two days’ full rations and thirty rounds of reserve ammunition for each man. Line by line, the long rows of tents were falling to the ground and were being rolled up and stowed away so that the village was now a vast expanse of stamped-down sand, with soldiers scurrying everywhere, laughing and joking now that the long waiting in the heat and flies was over.

  Jenkins returned just after dusk saying that he had been ‘for a little stroll, like’, but he brought back sufficient provisions for them to eat well. Simon briefed him on the task ahead and, predictably, the Welshman’s face fell.

  ‘Oh noo, bach sir,’ he said. ‘I ’ave trouble findin’ me way to the pub even. I’m not leadin’ no army through the dark, thank you very much. I’ll ’ave to stay by you, see.’

  ‘Of course.’

  Then they too had to break down their tent, and change out of their Arab clothing into trousers, shirts and European wide-brimmed hats – there was no worse fate than being brought down by ‘friendly fire’ – then Jenkins was dispatched once again to find lungers to fit to their Martini-Henrys. Wolseley had given orders that there was to be no firing when the attack was
launched. Indeed, no rifles were to be loaded; it was to be bayonets only at first light.

  Shortly after six p.m., the troops took up their assault formations on the sand hills outside the camp, falling in by posts rammed into the ground by the Royal Engineers. There were no bugle calls, shouted orders or waving lanterns. Everything was muted. It was as if a ghost army was being assembled for the darkest of journeys. Then came anticlimax, for the men were ordered to pile arms, lie down and rest until the order for the advance was given at one a.m. This vast host – some fourteen thousand men – accordingly lay down on the sand and did its best to go to sleep.

  Predictably, the sky was overcast and only the north star and the great bear were to be glimpsed occasionally through the cloud cover. Simon strode along his front but saw no sign of the navigating officer, and was relieved to find that a handful of officers were being ranged out in a loose line behind him to act as communicating links between him and the division behind. Even so, the responsibility being thrust upon him was heavy, for he could see very little in front of him and he was forced to hold up his compass a few inches from his eyes to take in its message. At least the worry helped to divert his mind from the dull glint of steel that tipped the long barrel of his rifle. Bayonet fighting was for gung-ho warriors, not for him. For the first time for years, Simon felt beads of perspiration form on his forehead at the prospect of hand-to-hand fighting. He remembered the searing pain of a Zulu assegai as it penetrated his shoulder (he had been told years before that you felt no such pain in the excitement of battle – not true!), and the noise it made as the warrior twisted it to pull it out. In fact, they called the spear iklwa after the sucking sound it made on withdrawal. He shook his head to clear the memory. There would be no fighting at all unless he kept his mind concentrated on his compass and the way ahead. He looked to his right, but of course, Covington was too far away to be seen. He turned left and regarded Jenkins. The little man was quiet. That was significant in itself.