by John Harris
5
In the narrow cockpit of the leading machine, the Khaliti pilot studied the ground unrolling below him like a map.
The plain seemed empty at first, then he realised that outside the fortress of Hahdhdhah, there were two lines of men and several stationary lorries. Beyond them, lying back by the foothills near the village, there was another row of men who looked as though they might be Hejri horsemen.
He stared down at the horsemen as the machine banked. He had been told to look for green banners and there were no green banners there.
Then he saw a flutter of green on the tower of the fortress, whipping in the wind among the wreckage and the rubble. His hand reached for the switch of his radio to call his wing man.
‘I think the Hejris are inside,’ he said. ‘That’s a green flag on the tower, isn’t it?’
There was a crackle of static in his ear and the other pilot’s voice came back.
‘I see a green flag.’
‘That’s our mark then. Let’s go in.’
6
Fox watched the two jet planes calmly as they wheeled over the Urbida Hills.
‘Bit bloody late in the day, sir,’ he shouted up to Pentecost. ‘We could have done with them yesterday or the day before. I expect they’ve come to pay a bit of a tribute for what we’ve done.’
He was rather annoyed with the two aeroplanes for spoiling his ceremony. As he had seen Pentecost go up the stairs, he had raised his hand to where Bugler Owdi was standing in front of the Dharwas, his face shining with fervour, his instrument on his hip. As Pentecost had lowered the Sultanate flag, the notes had rung out, sweeter and purer than Owdi had ever managed in his life before, only to be drowned immediately by the approaching iron din of the planes.
From his position on the tower by the flagstaff, Pentecost had smiled at Fox’s little ceremony. Fox was always trying to work British ceremonial into the Khaliti army which, with its head-dresses and girdles, didn’t really take well to it. But it pleased Fox and he suspected also that it pleased Fauzan.
A pity the din had drowned Bugler Owdi’s tune, he thought. Bugler Owdi wasn’t the best bugler in the world, but even though he occasionally hit the wrong note, at least his fervour was strong, and he was at one with Fox in his love of ceremony and for once hadn’t made a mistake.
Owdi was lowering the instrument now and replacing it on his hip, his back straight, his head up, small and square, stern-faced as became a Dharwa bugler in front of a lot of half-baked Toweidas and Khaliti Civil Guards, and more than a little annoyed at the way the best thing he had ever done had been ruined.
The noise of the aircraft was growing louder now and Pentecost saw that they had banked above the Addowara Pass and were heading straight for the fortress. He could see two straight lines centred by dots and he assumed they were going to dip their wings over them.
Everyone was being uncommon sentimental today, he thought. Then, with a frown, he noticed that the noses of the machines were pointing directly at him and realised that the two aeroplanes, one behind the other, were not flying over the fort but were coming in, in a long slanting run which, continued to its end, would land them right alongside him on the tower.
At once, he knew what it meant. They had assumed that the green banner on the tower meant that Aziz’s troops were in control. Immediately, he began to lower the banner.
From below, Fox saw him hesitate and stare towards the Hejri horsemen to the south, and instinctively he knew what he was thinking. If he hauled down the banner, if any of the horsemen were hit, there would immediately be shouts of treachery and, standing outside the fortress as they were, there would be no hope for the survivors.
‘Sir, for Christ’s sake!’
Fox’s voice rose to a shriek as he saw Pentecost hurriedly raise the green flag again, then his ears were full of the iron sound of engines and he began to run for his life.
Fifteen
1
What went wrong?
The first thing that went through Fox’s mind as he cowered beneath the shower of debris was the thought, what went wrong? Everything had seemed so straightforward. Aziz was on their side. Wintle was waiting in the Dharwa Hills. There was to be no more killing. Yet, at the last moment the whole place had erupted in destruction.
He crouched in a tight ball, his arms over his head, his ears assailed by the shriek and clang of the explosions, aware of his body being struck by falling timbers and stones and a shower of pulverised dirt. Vaguely he was aware of the tower tilting slowly on the ruined remains of its broken supports, and the crash and quiver of the earth as it fell. Then, as he lifted his head, he saw vaguely through the pall of dust the open gate and all the people by the lorries flinging themselves to the ground, crumpling like wheat before a scythe, the Dharwa Scouts and the Civil Guards and the Toweida Levies lying in two long lines, with Zaid Fauzan, and Minto and Sergeant Chestnut still on their feet shaking their fists into the air. Beyond them, down the valley towards Hahdhdhah, the Zihouni horsemen were scattering wildly across the plain, their robes flapping as they rode.
Then the second batch of rockets arrived and Fox, just rising to his knees, flung himself down again, fully convinced by now of the most appalling treachery somewhere and the certainty that he couldn’t possibly survive.
But he did. For a while, his eyes were full of flaming light and his ears were hammered by the smack of the bombs, and his body was lifted from the ground in a series of jerks as the explosions occurred; then once more he was holding his head, deafened, half-blinded, stupefied by the clamour, trying to dig down into the ground with his fingers away from the shower of bricks, stones, rubble, splintered wood, flying fragments of matting, and pulverised dirt.
Gradually, as the ringing in his head died, he became aware that the din had stopped and that the air, a moment ago full of the iron sound of aeroplane engines, was still again, as though a vast man-made squall had passed swiftly over him and moved on, leaving him shaken, stupefied and shocked by the violence.
He rose to his knees, dust in his hair and eyes and between his teeth, his head ringing with the racket, his body pounded and assailed by debris and noise and blast. But he was alive, filthy with dirt, his hair matted with dust, his face caked with it, spitting it from his tongue as he tried to draw breath in what seemed the airless vacuum of the ruined fortress. Stumbling to his feet, he glanced through the gate and saw that the soldiers outside were also scrambling up unhurt and finding their lines again, and that the lorries remained where they were, overhung by the wailing of women and the shrieking of children, and the furious shouts of men. The planes had vanished, the sound fading to an iron-throated rumble as they disappeared over the Dharwa Range.
Then he turned. The courtyard of the fortress was a ruin. It had been a wreck before but now the tower lay tumbled in a heap of stones, its splintered timbers sticking out of the rubble like broken bones – stones and matting all flung in incredible confusion across the courtyard like a child’s pile of bricks scattered by an indifferent hand. Flames were licking at the matting and he saw the green banner lying on the stones, already alight.
He turned on unsteady legs, blinking and gasping for breath, seeking Pentecost. At first he thought he’d vanished, then he saw him lying among the stones some distance away. He seemed unhurt, only unconscious, like Fox his body layered with dust and small stones, his head to one side, his expression serene, flung headlong by the fall of the tower. Then, stumbling towards him, Fox saw that a shard of metal flying with snake swiftness through the air, had whipped away life. Across his feet, as though it had been laid there deliberately, was the crescent flag of Khalit.
Fox stared dry-eyed at him, feeling all the world’s pain. He bent awkwardly, stiffly, to twitch the flag across the small shape like a pall, then, stooping, his head still ringing, his legs and arms still trembling, he got his hands under the body and lifted it to his chest.
As he moved towards the gate, his feet stumbling over the sc
attered stones and the baulks of timber, Chestnut and Fauzan appeared, and immediately he saw the tears streaming down the leathery, lined face of the old zaid.
‘For God’s sake,’ Minto said, stumbling awkwardly behind on his crutches. ‘What happened? What went wrong?’
They stopped in front of Fox but he wouldn’t let them take the body from him and went on marching towards the lorries, his face expressionless, like a ghost with all the dust plastered across his features and clothes.
Then he became aware of the thud of hooves and a horseman swung across in front of him, flecks of foam flying as he hauled his mount back on its hind legs. Aziz’s brown face was twisted with fury.
‘Treachery!’ he hurled in English at Fox, and Fox stopped dead and lifted his own furious face.
‘Treachery be damned!’ he roared back, unconcerned whether Aziz could understand him or not. ‘He left the flag there when he saw them coming! So you’d know there wasn’t any treachery! I saw his face! I know what he was thinking! I’ve always known what he was thinking! I know what he was doing and why he was doing it! It was him or the rest of us! It was him or–!’
Fox stopped and then at last the tears filled his eyes so that he couldn’t see, swelling over and running down his face to make muddy runnels across the dust-caked skin.
Somehow Aziz seemed to understand exactly what he meant, and realising at last what Fox carried in his arms, his haggard face became tragic, every line and hollow looking as though he had lost a favourite son, his large eloquent eyes, like black velvet, agonised in his sorrow.
Another horseman appeared and now Fox saw that the Zihounis had drawn closer and that, running from the Urbida Hills were dozens of other men, some in robes, some in modern battledress, all flourishing rifles and yelping with rage.
Aziz gestured to his men, and Fox saw them whirl their horses and gallop away, to halt in a rigid line between the group by the lorries and the advancing men. The runners came to a standstill, and Fox saw the Zihounis lift their rifles. Though the men from the hills continued to shout, they made no attempt to advance.
‘Go,’ Aziz said brokenly over his shoulder. ‘Take him away. I gave my word. Take him from Hahdhdhah and bury him like a warrior.’
For a second, Fox stared at the old man. Aziz’s mouth was working with misery, the lines deeper than ever across his cheeks. Then he turned, stiff-legged as an automaton to one of the lorries.
There were women in there with children, and he stared at them with unparalleled ferocity, certain in his mind that there should be some gesture, some act of reverence.
‘Out!’ he said.
The women stared at him and began to protest.
‘Out!’ Fox roared. He turned furiously on Chestnut and Minto and Fauzan. ‘Get ’em out,’ he shouted. ‘Get the buggers out! Shove ’em in the other lorries! He’s having this one to himself! He’s going to ride out of Hahdhdhah as he should do!’
Fauzan rapped out a few words and the women scrambled down, frightened, and Fox, still holding the body, the blood dripping down his trousers, waited, unaware of its weight, only vaguely conscious of Minto and Chestnut pushing the women into the other vehicles. Then, with Fauzan’s help, he got the body into the lorry and laid it reverently down, still draped by the Khaliti flag.
Fauzan watched, his face twisted, his eyes full of tears, as Fox twitched the flag straight. Then without speaking, he lifted the tailboard of the lorry and shoved the steel pegs home. Fox straightened, aware of the stuffiness with the heat of the sun on the canvas top, and sat down near the cabin.
He sighed, drawing his breath as though it were painful, then he nodded to Fauzan, who was still watching over the tailboard.
‘Let’s go,’ he said.
2
‘What went wrong?’ Beebe shouted, noisy in his grief, unaware that the assassination of a stubborn secretive old man in Khaswe was the key to the puzzle. ‘For Christ’s sake, Aziz was letting ’em go! The whole goddam thing had been called off! All they had to do was march out!’
His misery was overwhelming. Until a few weeks before he hadn’t known Pentecost, and hadn’t even liked him very much when he had got to know him. Then in the days of the siege he had come first to admire him and finally to feel that he had no fault. He had a texture and finesse, it had seemed, that had been given to him by tradition and pride. The ancient deeds and responsibilities of his family were imprinted over his whole character, as if they were stamped indelibly about his person; and all his beliefs, all his actions, all his temperament stemmed from them, inherited with his small neat frame, his features and his long delicate hands. He was not a clever man outside the calls of his profession, and narrow in his views, but he had always believed that he belonged to a small group who were the only people who mattered. In return for their birthright of privilege they were held to their duty by the chronicles of their ancestors and, guided by their pride, they considered themselves separate from the rest of the world, so that emergencies and disasters made special demands on them because they felt they had so much more to give than normal beings. What he had had to do had always been crystal-clear to him and, bound by his duty, he had been father, mother and brother to his men.
At any other time, Beebe knew, men like him would have been paid by Pentecost to do his repairs. Yet Beebe knew who was the better man. Obsolete, old-world and faintly ridiculous with his stilted sense of right and wrong, Pentecost had seen danger as clearly as anyone but he had also seen duty as a greater impetus than fear and he had drawn on his past, as though the dead of his family had strengthened him, and had fought his bloody little battle with dignity and compassion. It had not been physical bravery that had borne him up but a different kind of courage plain, old-fashioned, out-dated honour.
In his grief, Beebe was stupefied, thinking again and again of Pentecost’s wife. What would she do now, he wondered wildly. How would she cope, with two kids to bring up? He’d have to find her, have to do what he could with all his power, if only to work out of his system some of the pity he felt.
Standing among the rocks, his grieving eyes were only vaguely aware of Wintle making arrangements to turn the column back on itself towards Dhafran, only barely conscious of men and machinery hurrying past towards the south, of the crunch of boots on stones, and the rumble of heavy tyres, and tired dusty faces as the Khaliti troops clumped back the way they had come. Then he saw Fox standing near him, holding a file of papers. He had recovered a little now, but his clothes were still torn and dirty, and his face was still covered with caked dust.
‘He kept a diary, Luke,’ he said.
‘Yeah.’ Beebe nodded numbly. ‘I know. He told me. He told me I’ve got to see his wife about it.’
‘He wasn’t after money,’ Fox went on. ‘Though God knows, he was like the rest of us and didn’t have much.’
‘Yeah.’ Beebe nodded again heavily, almost as though he were shaking off a blow. ‘I know what he wanted.’
‘Luke, I’ve read bits of it. I think it makes good reading.’ Fox paused and went on with a profound bitterness that was shocking. ‘Just the sort for the folks back home to enjoy when there’s nothing exciting on the telly.’
Somehow his last words got through to Beebe and he knew then what he had to do. He had to see Charlotte Pentecost first and foremost and, certainly for the time being, dedicate himself to making everything all right for her. Then he had to persuade her to get this diary published.
‘I’ll see that guy Gloag,’ he said. ‘He’ll help. He’s said he will.’
He took the diary from Fox, holding it reverently, and turned away to follow the marching men. Behind them, in a silence that was sorrowful and austere, Dharwa Scouts were piling rocks on a patch of disturbed earth, watched from the hillsides by the Khadari riflemen. Now that the fighting was over, one or two of the snipers had come down to see what was going on, and their headman, a short blunt-featured man with a heavy beard, his eyes almost hidden by the brown Khadari headcloth,
his body swathed with bandoleers of bullets, spoke to Wintle.
‘Have no fear, Reimabassi,’ he had said, rigid in his own cruel code of courage. ‘Where he lies will never be disturbed. He was a great warrior.’
3
What went wrong, Aziz asked himself as he rode north.
Behind him the Hejri – the Zihouni, the Hassi and the Dayati – and the Hawassi, the Tayur and the Dayi of the Deleimi nation, were in the fortress. They had forgotten his defiance and the way he had set one tribe against another in his determination to see the convoy of lorries safely off the plain, and they had rampaged through the ruins, uncertain whether to be elated that Toweida was Khusar country again or enraged because the fort which had symbolised their sacrifices had ended as a mere heap of rubble, its walls no longer even high enough to give shelter to a caravan traveller heading north.
Aziz sighed and settled in the saddle. Less than half a mile behind him, he knew, there was another man on a horse, moving cautiously in his footsteps, a thin-faced, fanatic-eyed man with a red Tayur cloak, a Garand rifle across his saddle. He had been there a long time now and Aziz had known of him the whole time. He had entered the Addowara Pass within a quarter of an hour of Aziz himself, moving warily, never closing the gap between them, yet never allowing it to grow greater.
Aziz knew why he was there. The black camel of Islam was approaching his door but, his heart shrivelled with misery, he was quite indifferent. He had done everything to ensure the safety of Pentecost. They had acted like brothers towards each other. And then – then – something had happened. The old man in Khaswe, who he saw, now that all the facts of the news had been pieced together, had been the keystone of all their elaborate plans, had died. Dead, Tafas had brought down the whole edifice. Aziz could not think of it without a stab at his heart. Some fool had made a mistake and all the things he had done to save Pentecost, all the things other people who loved and admired him had done, too, had rushed together, it seemed, as the elements of a storm rushed together, and destroyed them both. He had been destroyed by Pentecost as surely as he himself had destroyed Pentecost.
