The Hill (4 page)

Three years in a desert. A tank instead of a horse. Wash your clothes in petrol. Sand. Back to that again, are we? Miles and miles of sweet — sand. Like a bloody nomad. Still homeless. How long can a man live in a desert and remain sane? Bert Mills digging a shallow grave and climbing into it stark naked and covering himself in sand. Can’t get away from it. Sand. In your eyes, food, up your nostrils. Sand. How many of us old-timers are sane? How about this lot here. The screws? Judging by the way they’re performing they’re all crazy. Sand-happy. There won’t be many of us in our right minds when this bloody war is over. When? Where will I be? Who will I be? I’ll be a stranger to Alice and the kids. I look different, think different, smell different.

They paraded us, dumped us on to boats like cattle, and dumped us over here. Then they moved the Free French, Poles, Aussies, Canadians and now the Yanks. To England. Crazy. They dumped us in a desert to rot. Alamein. Mersa Matru. Sidi Barani. Hellfire Pass. Tobruk. Derna. The green hills of Derna. Wadi this and Wadi that, Barce and the red earth and the stunted trees. It rained in Barce and I thought of home.

But we never stayed long in the green belt, always driven back to the sand and the flies, and stand by, and night patrols, and the heat, and waiting for letters from home and the odd leaves in Cairo if you hadn’t gambled your credits away playing shoot. A thousand wasted days and nothing to show for it and the kids growing up and trying to measure what they are and what they’re going to be from a smudged photograph.

I can’t recognise Alice’s voice from her letters. The children are happy in the country with Aunt Hilda. Don’t kid me, Alice — no one could be happy with that old cow. The bombing’s getting me down, but not to worry, dear. The war will be over one day. The rations are getting worse all the time but we mustn’t grumble. Who is this stranger trying to communicate with me? She was slim and her eyes were always laughing and she spoke her bloody mind. Who is this cosy plump woman who’s sent my two kids to Aunt Hilda? Mustn’t grumble — war will be over one day. What’s this bloody rubbish? Alice always grumbled, and she was right to grumble and yell for better conditions and a square deal. I’ll bloody shake her out of it when I get my hands on her.

The Hill shimmered in the heat.

Sand and scrub and an odd leave in Cairo — sitting bleary-eyed over a cold drink in a stinking cabaret with a bint who keeps yelling for drinks. All feeling flattened out of her by an army of men all hungry for any semblance of love.

The desert at sunset is beautiful, thought Roberts, and at dawn, when it’s cool and fresh and the colours make you gasp. Then it’s beautiful. But the other twenty-three hours it stinks.

Williams stopped in front of Roberts. “Well?”

Roberts thought, ‘Your legs are too skinny. That’s where you slip up. Your legs are too skinny.’

R.S.M. Wilson stepped forward and said to Roberts, “Pick up your kit.”

Roberts looked at him, and then at a jog-trot he collected all his kit again and placed it in a neat pile at his feet and then slammed to attention.

Williams moved along the line of prisoners and stopped and faced Stevens. He bent down and picked up a package of letters. He glanced at them and then held them under Stevens’s nose. “Love letters?”

Stevens swallowed nervously. “Sir, please — those are my wife’s.”

“Tell it to the Sergeant-Major.” Williams handed the letters to the R.S.M.

“Sir,” pleaded Stevens. “Those letters, sir — please — they ... ”

The R.S.M. scanned the letters. “I’ll tell you when to speak.”

Williams stopped in front of Bokumbo and disturbed his kit with the toe of his boot. Then he bent down swiftly and picked up some postcards and looked at them; then looked at Bokumbo. “So that’s the way your bloody mind works?” Bokumbo gaped at him. “So you’d contaminate His Majesty’s Prison with these fornicating pictures, would you?”

Bokumbo looked even more puzzled. “Sir — ?”

“Thought we’d let you keep them for pin-ups, I suppose,” snarled Williams. “You dirty, sewer-minded bloody animal.” Williams handed the postcards to the R.S.M.

Bokumbo was looking at the postcards. “Staff. Man. What’s this?”

“Tell the Sergeant-Major,” said Williams.

“Sergeant-Major, sir — ”

The R.S.M. glanced away from the photographs and glared at Bokumbo. “Shut up!”

Bokumbo opened his mouth to reply then changed his mind.

Williams stopped in front of Bartlett, sorted over his kit, then straightened up and held up for the R.S.M.’s inspection a Nazi flag. Then he turned and looked at Bartlett. “So you’re one of the Gestapo boys, are you?”

“Gave a couple of bottles of beer for that, Staff.”

“Did you now?”

“And a pair of good Aussie boots.”

The R.S.M. took the Nazi flag from Williams then moved to Bartlett. “What kind of a lunatic are you? You telling me, a prison officer, that you’ve thieved a pair of boots from our allies?”

“Didn’t thieve them, sir. I swapped a bottle of NAAFI gin for them.”

“That so? Now you’re telling me you’re head of a black market ring.”

“Aw no, sir.”

“Yes, sir!” yelled the R.S.M. “You’ve just confessed.” “Fair’s fair, sir. ’Ope you’ll let me sign for that flag. I want ter keep it.”

“Shut up,” said the R.S.M. as he walked away.

Williams sorted over McGrath’s kit, then straightened up and glared at McGrath. “What, no hashees? You must be slipping.”

“Nothing else, Staff?”

“No, sir.”

“Right.” The R.S.M. consulted his list. “Let’s have your names.”

“132. Private McGrath, sir.”

“736. Private Bokumbo, sir.”

“929. Private Stevens, sir.”

“824. Private Bartlett, sir.”

“421. Trooper Roberts, sir.”

The R.S.M. looked at Roberts for a good ten seconds. “Right. Now we know who we’ve got, don’t we.” He moved and faced Bokumbo, then held up the postcards in front of him. “What are you doing with these?”

Bokumbo stared at the postcards and his eyes widened in surprise. “Sir. I don’t know where they came from and that’s the truth.”

“They were in your kit.”

“I don’t get it.” He still looked puzzled, then suddenly his face split into a broad grin. “Willie, sir.”

“What’s that?”

“Willie. He’s my pal. Man. I bet he put those postcards in my kit.”

“So it was Willie, was it? He planted them on you?”

“That’s Willie, sir. He’s always dropping me in it.”

The R.S.M. lowered the postcards from under Bokumbo’s nose. “On your charge sheet it says you’re a thief. So you’ve no respect for other people’s property, eh?”

“I slip up this time.” Bokumbo was still grinning.

“You stole three bottles of whisky from your Sergeants’ Mess. Wasn’t very clever, was you?”

“No, sir.” Bokumbo was doing his best to refrain himself from laughing out loud.

“I suppose you were drunk.”

“Got pinched before I had a chance to get a good drink down, sir.”

“Daft as well as criminal?”

Bokumbo could hold his laughter back no longer. “Unlucky, sir,” he cackled.

“I make the jokes and here’s one,” said the R.S.M. “When you’ve served your sentence for theft, you’ll be arrested at the gates and charged with having in your possession four obscene photographs. Now start laughing.”

Bokumbo roared with laughter.

The R.S.M. waited until Bokumbo stopped laughing. “I could charge you with insolence. Bokumbo, you watch yourself.” He held up the postcards again. “I mean to get something else into that mind of yours before you leave here.”

“Sir,” protested Bokumbo. “Will you listen ... ”

“Wipe that grin away. I can forgive a man a thirst and I don’t expect everybody to be honest. But you’ve made a spectacle of your sewer mind. Bokumbo, I’ll be looking for you.”

Bokumbo stopped smiling. “Sir, I don’t carry trash like that around. I like the real thing.”

R.S.M. Wilson pointed his swagger stick at Bokumbo. “Another word out of you and you’re on a charge.”

Bokumbo shut his mouth tight.

The R.S.M. moved along the line of prisoners and stopped, facing Bartlett. “So you thieved Government property, eh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Ten motor vehicle tyres.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The Merchant Navy get themselves shot to hell transporting that stuff over here. So let’s hear what you did with it?”

“Flogged them, sir.”

“To the enemy?”

Bartlett grinned. “Aw no, sir. To a shower of Wogs.”

“Do you mean Egyptians or Arabs or what the hell do you mean?”

“Gyppos, sir.”

“Do you speak English, lad?”

“Egyptians, I mean, sir.”

“And they ain’t the enemy?”

“The Wogs, sir? ’Course not.”

“So you think they’re our friends? Sold them any guns so they can shoot us in the back, have you?”

“Now, would I do that, sir?”

“Yes. If you ever get the chance. How many times have you been inside now?”

Bartlett had to think before he answered. “This is me ninth go over the wall, sir.”

The R.S.M. looked disgusted. “You’re about due for your pension. What’s your other crimes apart from thieving?”

You old berk, thought Bartlett, having a right old go at me, ain’t you. But I’d better play it crafty. Shall I tell him the truth? Better, mate. He’s got it all there in black and bleeding white. All your crimes, darling, from the time you was caught pissing in the Major’s teapot. Bartlett cleared his throat. “ — Er — knocking off stuff, sir, and fings like that.”

“And what else?”

“Well, sir, er ... losing meself like.”

“Losing yourself?” yelled Wilson. “Can’t you find yourself in the dark, lad, or what?”

“They call it A.W.O.L., sir, don’t they? You know, going absent and fings like that.”

“Absent without leave, eh, Bartlett?”

“That’s it, sir. A day or two, a week ... ”

“When does this uncontrollable urge get the better of you, lad?”

“Well, sir. When I’ve ’ad a bit of trouble like, you know.”

Wilson said very quietly, “When was the last time you saw action?”

Here we go, thought Bartlett. The bastard’s on to me. But he still played for time. He wrinkled his brow in deep thought. “Action, sir? Now, let me see.”

“You’ve never seen any, Bartlett, have you?”

“Well, no, sir. Never sort of got around to it, ’ave I.”

“Another push was about due. So you got inside again, eh?”

Crafty bleeder, thought Bartlett, picking on me. When did you last see bleedin’ action? Boer bleedin’ war? Bet you’ve never seen none outside of your kip, up your bleedin’ spout, mate. Bartlett looked at Wilson. “Luck of the game, sir, ain’t it?”

Wilson nodded his head thoughtfully. “Let’s see how lucky you are this time. I’ll do my best to persuade you the front line’s a damn sight more comfortable than here.”

Bartlett couldn’t repress a faint grin.

“Think I can’t? Well, let’s see.” The R.S.M. moved on and stopped in front of McGrath. “Bartlett’s a dirty bloody coward, but I see that you’re a fighting man, McGrath.”

“Yes, sir,” said McGrath, looking at Wilson’s left ear. “You’re inside for assaulting three members of the Corps of Military Police.”

“Aye, sir.”

“Seen any other action apart from that?”

McGrath swivelled his eyes and looked directly at the R.S.M. now. His baby-blue eyes that looked so out of place in his battered face, narrowed and looked spiteful. “If you’re asking me, sir, if I’m a bloody coward, I’ve got the answer ... ”

“We soon find out if a man’s a coward. It’s easy proved.”

McGrath could very quickly weigh up a man. He prided himself on being a punch-up expert, and from experience he knew that it would take a good man to beat him. He quickly ran his eyes over Wilson. I’d be giving away nearly two stone, he thought, and the old slob is still tough. Big hands, those hands could hurt. He must be forty, nearer forty-five. He’s still in good shape, but he’d have to finish the job quick. His wind can’t be all that good and he’d be slow. Och. He’s too bloody old. I could do him, no trouble, and that other loud-mouthed bastard with him. Good shoulders, the other fella, but no weight in his legs and you need good anchors for heavy punching. I could do the pair of them before breakfast. They’ll no have me greetin’ this pair of base permanent, fly boys. “I didn’t flog tyres to the enemy or sell dirty postcards on the streets of Cairo, mister,” he said.

“No,” said Wilson. “I’ve got your crimes listed here.” He smacked McGrath’s crimesheet with his knuckles. “You got boozed up and tried to obstruct the police.”

“I didna like the way the Redcaps were handling a young fella, so I did some thumping myself.” That night’s work still rankled. It all started in the Mogador Cabaret. A clip joint, a stone’s throw from Cairo station and a right old dump it was too, thought McGrath. This belly dancer was trying to send the boys mad by shaking everything she’d got in the middle of the dance floor, when some fella threw an empty beer tin at her and soon enough the air was full of beer tins and then the fight started.