by Ken Lussey
Bob must have dozed again. It was Petty Officer MacDonald who woke him. ‘Hello, I think we must be getting close.’
‘Where are we?’ said Bob.
‘We’ve passed Spean Bridge, sir, and are just approaching a place marked on the map as Lochy. The road crosses the Caledonian Canal here, and everything beyond it is what they call the Protected Area, where you need a special pass even if you live there. I think that explains the checkpoint. The good news is that the rain’s stopped and it looks like the sun might be trying to break through.’
The car was waved down by one of two military policemen standing at a barrier across the road. Bob wound down his window and showed his pass. ‘Hello, I’m Group Captain Sutherland from Military Intelligence Section 11 in Edinburgh, and these are my colleagues. We are expected at the Commando Basic Training Centre at Achnacarry.’
The corporal who had stopped them looked at the pass Bob had offered and consulted a list on a clipboard. ‘Yes, sir. Carry on.’ He saluted as the car passed under the now raised barrier.
They followed a road that wound its way north above the western shore of what Bob’s map revealed was Loch Lochy. Where the road descended towards a few houses clustered around the end of a bay that seemed to be full of boats, they came to metal gates on their left, guarded by more military policemen.
As they drove along the access road to Achnacarry, Bob caught a glimpse of a church in the woods to his right.
‘Good God, look at that!’ Petty Officer MacDonald pointed above them and to their left, where Bob could see strings of men in khaki swarming up a rock face.
After they had topped one last rise, Bob could see Achnacarry laid out in front of them. In the background was a fine-looking mansion that seemed to his eyes to be Victorian or earlier, while a little distance away some cottages and ancillary buildings lay either side of the road they were following. But most of what must have once been the parkland in front of Achnacarry Castle itself was now packed with numerous Nissen huts, set around a parade ground. Not for the first time Bob found himself wondering how much of Scotland’s beautiful countryside was being overrun by temporary wartime structures, erected in haste with little room for aesthetics. ‘I’m not sure Sergeant Bennett would approve of the additions the commandos have made to the castle,’ he said.
Petty Officer MacDonald laughed. ‘No, sir. I think if he had his way whoever invented Nissen huts would be taken out and strung up from the nearest tree.’
They had reached a pair of gates that led to a tree-lined drive, now also lined on one side with the semi-cylindrical Nissen huts. This turned right off the road they had been following to approach the castle itself. Again, they were stopped by military policemen before being allowed to pass under yet another barrier.
‘You know, with all this security, someone must have seen where Captain Bell went last night,’ said Bob.
‘Bloody hell!’ said Private Jenkins. ‘It looks like you might have a few more deaths to investigate, sir.’ Jenkins brought the car to a halt in the drive. To one side, opposite some of the Nissen huts, was a row of graves. Each was formed by an apparently freshly dug strip of earth, surrounded by a rectangle of rocks, and each had a wooden cross at the end furthest from the drive.
‘Those crosses have all got signs on,’ said Petty Officer MacDonald. ‘That nearest one says, “This man showed himself on the skyline”. Then there’s, “This man fired a 2-inch mortar under trees” and “This man advanced over the top of cover”.’
‘They’re not real, are they, sir?’ asked Private Jenkins. ‘That one says, “This man thought his camouflage perfect”.’
Despite the circumstances, Bob found it hard to suppress a smile. ‘I think you’re right, Taffy. I suspect they may be designed to make new trainees arriving at Achnacarry realise that it’s a pretty serious business here.’
Chapter Ten
Lieutenant Colonel White must have been warned of their approach, because he stood waiting for his visitors outside the front door of Achnacarry Castle with another officer and Sergeant Potter. The lieutenant colonel was a slightly portly man with an impressive row of medal ribbons, which Bob noted included a number from the Great War. ‘Good afternoon, Group Captain Sutherland, and welcome to Achnacarry. I see you were admiring the graves.’
‘They do have good shock value,’ said Bob, before introducing his men.
The second officer was introduced as the camp adjutant, Captain Sanderson.
‘We are bursting at the seams right now, Group Captain,’ said White. ‘Do you mind sharing a room with your lieutenant in the castle? We’ve also allocated a room for your two men and Sergeant Potter in the other ranks’ staff accommodation. I’d be happy to give you a tour of the centre if you like. Do you want a chance to settle in first?’
‘Would it be possible for us to meet later, Colonel?’ asked Bob. ‘I’d like to start immediately by looking at where Captain Bell’s body was found, and then dividing into two groups to walk back up both sides of the river to see if there’s any chance of finding where he was killed. The longer we leave it, the less chance there is of finding any worthwhile evidence that might still exist.’
If the colonel was affronted that his invitation had been rebuffed, he showed no sign of it. ‘Of course, sir. I can show you round whenever you like. I would be pleased, however, if you and the lieutenant would agree to be my guests later tonight for the best show that Achnacarry has to offer.’
Bob’s doubts must have shown on his face. Lieutenant Colonel White laughed. ‘Sorry, I could have phrased that better. We’ve got a night assault landing planned for tonight, down on Loch Lochy. It’s the highlight of what we do here and offers the most realistic training available anywhere in the world. I’d be pleased if the two of you could join me as observers.’
‘Yes, of course, we’d be delighted,’ said Bob.
It was agreed that Bob and his men would take their overnight bags to the accommodation assigned to them, then reassemble outside the castle’s front door.
Captain Sanderson led them through the busy camp. ‘How many men have you got here?’ asked Bob.
‘As far as trainees are concerned, sir, we’re at something over eight hundred other ranks and thirty officers at the moment, in four groups, though two of those groups are working closely together. We’ve also got a training centre staff of rather more than a hundred. It varies from month to month. At the moment two courses are overlapping for a few days, so until Monday we’ve got some of our latest arrivals in tents that we use as overspill accommodation, but that’s hardly ideal given what the men here go through. Things will ease up on Monday when two of the groups complete their courses and leave.’
As Bob looked around he got a sense of relentless activity. Wherever he looked there were men training. One group he could see was doing physical exercises that seemed to entail six men lifting logs between them. More men were clambering over an assault course on ropes and nets set high in the canopy of the trees above them. A little more distantly, he could hear the sound of gunfire coming from the south and the west. ‘They don’t come here for a rest cure, do they?’ he asked.
Captain Sanderson chuckled. ‘Don’t let anyone ever hear you asking that, sir,’ he said. ‘As well as what you can see we’ve got troops of men out rock climbing, on speed marches of up to 15 miles, and in the mountains fending for themselves for up to 36 hours at a time. We also train the men in weapons skills, using both allied and enemy weapons, in fieldcraft skills and living off the land, in unarmed combat, in small boat skills, in beach landings, and so on.’
‘Do you have a high drop-out rate?’ asked Bob.
‘Yes, we do,’ said Captain Sanderson. ‘Every man who comes here is a volunteer, is recommended by his unit, and has passed an interview. But this is the toughest training we can devise, and quite a number find that it’s not for them, or we find they are not for
us.’
‘What happens to them?’ asked Bob.
‘They are marked as “RTU”, sir. It means they are returned to their home unit, with no shame involved. They pack their bag and get on the next train south from Spean Bridge.’
‘Is that a walled garden?’ asked Bob, pointing to a structure they were approaching to the right of the path.
‘It is, sir,’ said Sanderson. ‘It’s not much used for its original purpose now. We don’t find much time to “dig for victory”, I’m afraid.’
Bob looked round to find Sergeant Potter behind them. ‘Where was Captain Bell’s body found, sergeant?’
‘Just down here, sir. There’s a footbridge across the River Arkaig about a quarter of a mile down from the castle. This is the place.’
‘That’s right,’ said Captain Sanderson. ‘Just upstream from here, we missed it in the trees, is what we call the toggle bridge. It’s a rope bridge made from the toggle-ropes that each man carries. We’ve got a few rites of passage here at Achnacarry and crossing the toggle bridge while explosives are being detonated in the water below is one of them. It’s even more challenging at night. A few months ago, we had an incident when five men fell from the bridge into the river. Two of them drowned and their bodies were later found in Loch Lochy. After that we hung a grapple net from the footbridge, which is anchored to the bed of the river. Anyone going into the water from the toggle bridge, or who drops in from the death slide for that matter, now stands a much better chance of getting themselves out, even when the river’s in spate.’
‘How was the captain’s body found?’ asked Bob.
Captain Sanderson said, ‘Most of what we do, we also do at night, because that’s when the men really need to be able to use their skills. In the early hours of this morning we had a group of men crossing the toggle bridge when one fell into the river. He was swept down to the grapple net, and climbed out, but then reported that he’d bumped into someone in the net. When we got the torches out, we found Captain Bell’s body.’
Bob turned to Sergeant Potter. ‘You told me that the medical officer had looked at Captain Bell’s body. What did he find?’
‘Yes, he did, sir,’ said Sergeant Potter. ‘He said that the cause of death was his being stabbed twice, once in an upwards direction into the stomach and once in the chest. The chest wound was deep enough to penetrate his heart, so was undoubtedly fatal. The medical officer also said that it looked like the captain had been bashed around by the river, and there were many other injuries on his body that seemed to have been caused after his death. That’s why we initially thought he’d died from a severe head wound.’
‘There are some rapids upstream, sir,’ said Captain Sanderson, ‘and the river’s running quite fast following a lot of recent rain.’
Bob chose to walk back along the southern bank of the river with Captain Sanderson and Petty Officer MacDonald, and asked Lieutenant Dixon, Sergeant Potter and Private Jenkins to cross the footbridge and take the far bank of the river. ‘Remember that we are looking for patches of beaten grass, blood, the captain’s uniform cap or binoculars, or anything else that might be significant. And let’s try to keep within sight of one-another.’ Sergeant Potter and Petty Officer MacDonald were each carrying a Sten gun, so Bob’s division of his forces ensured each team had one available, just in case.
Bob reflected that in other circumstances the riverside walk back to Achnacarry Castle might have been considered idyllic. He’d not asked what the ‘death slide’ referred to by Captain Sanderson was, and now found there was no need, as he could watch for himself as men climbed high up a tree on his side of the river. Each in turn looped a short length of rope over a much longer rope tightly strung between the top of the tree and the foot of another on the far side of the river. Holding the two ends of the short loop of rope, each man then launched himself into nothingness and slid down to the far side.
‘Do you fancy a try, sir?’ asked Captain Sanderson.
‘Even if we weren’t here for a more serious purpose, Captain, there is no way you would ever get me up on that,’ said Bob.
Just beyond the castle itself was the tail of a significant island.
Captain Sanderson said, ‘The main stream is on this side of the island, sir. The river on the other side of it is rather narrower. A little further up there’s a smaller island that’s close to this bank, with the main stream flowing around the far side of it. As the water funnels past between the tail of one island and the head of the other there are some quite turbulent rapids. That’s certainly the roughest stretch of water on the river. Given what was said about the injuries to Captain Bell’s body, I would guess that he entered the river upstream of that point, and then went through the rapids.’
‘Yes, that sounds likely,’ said Bob. They made their way past the smaller of the islands and reached a point at which the river turned sharply to the left. ‘Hello, what’s that?’
Captain Sanderson said, ‘It’s a weir, sir. I believe it was originally built in that dog-leg shape to give a head of water to power a sawmill that used to stand on this bank.’
They carried on until they were upstream of the weir and stood looking down at it. Bob could see Dixon and the others on the far bank. ‘Found anything yet?’ he shouted, above the sound of the water tumbling over the weir.
Bob couldn’t hear Dixon’s shouted reply and cupped his ear in a theatrical way. Bob could see Dixon shake his head in response.
‘This gives us a bit of a problem,’ said Bob. ‘If Captain Bell was killed or was put into the water downstream of here but above where he was found, then we’ve not been able to find any evidence of it on either bank. But if his body went into the water upstream from here, would it have made it over the weir or would it have been trapped there?’
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ said Captain Sanderson, ‘that’s well outside my areas of expertise.’
Bob saw a log of about a foot in girth and perhaps two feet in length caught up in tree roots on the river bank. He turned to Petty Officer MacDonald. ‘Andrew, as the naval man here, would you mind doing the honours? I’d like to see what happens when that log down there floats down to the weir.
The petty officer clambered down the bank and retrieved the log. Once back up the bank he held it by a branch that projected from one side and threw it, spinning end around end, out towards the centre of the river. They then watched as the floating log hit the top of the weir, and, after a brief pause, was pushed by the force of water behind it over the structure and into the flow heading downstream towards the island.
‘Well, it’s hardly scientific,’ said Bob, ‘and I suspect a floating log might behave differently to a floating body. But to my mind that suggests that Captain Bell could have been killed further upstream and we should carry on looking.’ Bob looked across the river, intending to wave to the others to continue the search. It was obvious that Lieutenant Dixon had understood the purpose of the floating log and that he had drawn the same conclusion as Bob when it went over the weir. He and the two men with him were moving further up the river bank.
Bob’s team reached the end of the river first, without finding anything of interest. At the point where the waters of Loch Arkaig flowed into the River Arkaig, the river was crossed by a long wooden road bridge, standing on four substantial stone supports sunk into the river bed between stone abutments. ‘That’s an impressive piece of engineering,’ said Bob.
‘Yes, it is, sir,’ said Captain Sanderson. ‘It’s called the White Bridge. It occurs to me that those on the other bank might need some help. They are now on the wrong side of a tributary of the River Arkaig called the Abhainn Chia-aig, which flows down into the glen over the Eas Chia-aig waterfalls and joins the main river just over there, close to the far end of the White Bridge. There’s a footbridge across the minor river only a few hundred yards north of the confluence, but it’s heavily wooded over there and they
might not realise that. If they cross the footbridge they can then follow the track that crosses the White Bridge. You can actually wade across the River Arkaig here, but I’m not sure I’d recommend it.’
‘We need to look at the bridge anyway,’ said Bob, ‘for the same reason we’ve been looking at the river banks. That will put us a lot closer to where they should emerge from the trees, and we can shout over to tell them about the footbridge.’
‘It looks like there’s a boat moored on the far side of that pier over there, sir,’ said Petty Officer MacDonald, pointing to a stone construction a couple of hundred yards along the south shore of Loch Arkaig.
‘You’ve got better eyesight than I have,’ said Bob, before realising how true that was.
‘There are ropes attached to the mooring rings on the top of the pier,’ said MacDonald, ‘They have to be from a boat. I could come under the White Bridge in it and pick Lieutenant Dixon and the others up from the far bank of the tributary.’
‘There shouldn’t be a need for that,’ said Bob, ‘but there’s no harm in you looking, just in case we need a backup plan.’
Bob walked across the White Bridge with Captain Sanderson, watching for the point on the shore where Lieutenant Dixon and the two men with him ought to emerge from the trees. They had still not done so by the time he reached the far end, and he paused for a moment, feeling for the first time a slight tinge of anxiety. He heard a shout from behind him and turned to see Petty Officer MacDonald standing on the stone jetty, gesturing urgently.
‘It looks like he’s found something,’ Bob said to Captain Sanderson. ‘Can you wait here and guide the others round? I’ll go and see what he’s found.’
As Bob walked onto the stone jetty, Petty Officer MacDonald called out, ‘I think we’ve found where Captain Bell was killed, sir.’
