said the soot would make no difference in the dark. You called him a young lout, I remember. He was a family man, too. He was real choked about that.’
‘None of them were louts,’ said Pelling. ‘They were good chaps.’
‘But that Keats was a dodgy one. He’d done three years for duffing up a policeman at a Cup Final in 1936. Sergeant Manley was a bit nervous of Keats. Never gave him any dirty jobs or anything dangerous.’
‘Was Keats the Scots lad that tried to get back along the ditch?’
‘That’s him; short thickset bloke with bad teeth.’
‘It was a brave thing to do.’
‘Brave?’ said Wool. ‘He was trying to give himself up to old Ted. He was off to surrender, thought he was going to get killed.’
‘You think so?’
Keats put his rifle to rest against the broken stove and then crouched by the window waiting for a break in the mortar fire. He went over the windowsill so skilfully that few men saw him go.
Like a burglar, reflected Pelling, yes, like a burglar.
‘Rifle grenades, not mortars,’ said Wool. ‘You taught me the different sound of those. Like a champagne cork popping, the two-inch mortar, you said. Mind you, I’d never heard a bottle of champers pop at that time.’ He laughed to remember his youth. ‘And it was a Sherman tank, not a Churchill.’
‘What makes you think that Keats was trying to surrender?’
‘He was carrying a piece of bed-sheet. It was tucked into the front of his blouse. When the burial party got up to him next day they thought he must be an old one – you know, swollen up with the sun – but it was a sheet.’
‘Poor fellow.’
‘Yes. Kept us going all night, didn’t he. Screaming and carrying on. Mona or Rhona or something. He was probably only nicked at first, if he’d kept quiet he would have been all right perhaps. Stephens tried to shoot him once, you know. It was too dark.’
Why had Wool chosen to remember it like that? Had the new fashion in embittered war films and stories persuaded Wool to distort the reality of his memory in favour of the more fashionable rubbish of writers who had not been there? Wool had been a hero: young, pimply, foolish and brave.
‘I’d like to have a go,’ said Wool.
‘It’s up to the Colonel,’ said Lieutenant Steeple. No one had to ask what Wool was volunteering for.
‘By all means,’ said Pelling. Already the valleys were dark, and the last glimmer of sunlight lit the church on the mountaincrest facing them.
‘I’ll go out the front,’ said Wool. ‘That’s where they’ll least expect me. I’ll make towards the Sherman in front of us and then work round to the track, keeping well away from the house. I’ll see if I can spot Keats, too.’
Lieutenant Steeple said, ‘Sergeant Manley, we’ll put some phosphorus grenades into the wadi end of the track. Make a rumpus while the Corporal gets clear.’ To Wool he added, ‘Keats is probably done for, don’t take any risks to bring him back.’
Pelling said, ‘Corporal, if you are spotted, lie low. We’ll tickle them up to give you a chance. If you need to come back to us, come in on a line with the barn. We’ll be extra careful on that bearing.’
The dark was like playing Red Indians, too. He’d crept up on the bison in Mr Jones’s field. Sometimes he’d be within touching distance before it ran away bleating. When he got out of the army he’d go back to Gran’s. He liked it in the country; Bell Street was a dirty place, without grass or trees or anywhere that kids could play. When he had kids they would have the countryside to play in. They’d row out into the reeds, as he had done, and catch fish and help old Mr Jones herd the Jerseys and carry the milk.
Hold it, there’s the tank right ahead. A Sherman Firefly with Cindy Four painted on it in red letters, that’s the one. It was just like being a Red Indian, except that the ground was cold and damp and the cowboys were using two-inch mortars and Mark IVs. His bloody knee! There was a stink of ancient dung and fresh human excreta, but the wet grass had a smell that he liked. Careful of the wire.
What sort of job could he get in the country? None that would bring much money, but then one didn’t need so much money in the country. Gran would let him have the room in the loft and there’d be agricultural training courses for ex-servicemen. He’d asked the Education Officer. Now that he knew Wool was serious he’d promised to get the papers about it from Division.
‘Did you ever think about one of those security organizations?’ said Wool. ‘Still, you’re not as fast on your pins as you used to be. They’d probably not want a bloke as old as you are. You might prove a bit of a liability up against a gang of toughs using ammonia and pickaxe handles.’
‘That’s true,’ said Pelling.
‘The trouble is,’ said Wool, ‘a colonel: what training has he got for civvy street? I mean, I was a driver. I remustered from infantry. I could find my way around an engine, too, at one time. Nowadays, of course, least little thing and she goes back into the garage. The firm pay all the repair bills. But coming out a sergeant with my mechanical skill made me a more desirable employee than you.’
‘Very likely,’ said Pelling.
‘After all, you were just pointing at maps and giving orders. We were the people who actually did the work.’
‘That’s true.’
‘It is true, isn’t it? See, and in peacetime your good wages goes to chaps who do the real work.’ He heaved himself round in his seat and from a large carton in the rear seat he brought a Munchy bar and unwrapped it.
‘Like us?’ supplied Pelling.
Failing to find irony in Pelling’s impassive face, Wool broke the Munchy into four large pieces and offered the open wrapper to Pelling, who declined. Pelling knew that there would be cold meat and pickles waiting on the sideboard. Vaguely, he wondered what was on TV.
‘Ever go back to Italy?’ Wool asked.
‘Never,’ said Pelling.
‘Don’t like the Eyeties, eh? Yeah, I understand. I went back a couple of times. Package tour, very nice. Six cities in eighteen days. Just enough time to see the sights, not long enough to get bored. Course, I like the Eyetie food,’ he patted his stomach. ‘Perhaps it’s too oily for you, but I eat a lot of it: fettuccine alla panna, osso bucco, lasagne al forno. I’m quite an expert on the old cuisine Italiano. Mind you, you have to watch them with the women, they’ve got no respect for womanhood. My eldest was pestered by some waiter-type in Florence, but I didn’t have no nonsense. I reported him to the management and said I was a director of the firm that runs the tours – I’m not of course – and they sacked him.’
At least he went back, thought Pelling, he didn’t start four letters and finish none of them.
Pelling said, ‘So when you went out that night, you weren’t primarily trying to get the wounded fellow – Keats – back to the farmhouse?’
‘Your
