The Street Philosopher (33 page)

As usual, the atmosphere in the British Hotel was thick with tobacco smoke and the masculine hum of military conversation. Merriment and laughter, however, so often found in the hotel, were in short supply that night. Every soldier gathered there had the subdued, anxious manner that always prevailed in the ranks on the eve of a great attack. They clustered around the fireplace, sat at tables and perched upon the barrels and crates that stood about, nervously discussing what few details were known. The majority had just been retired from the forward positions, and would not be fighting that day; but every one of them had friends, cousins or brothers in the assaulting divisions.

Slowly, Kitson knelt by one of the crude wooden columns that stood along the length of the hotel’s main saloon, and wrung out a bloody flannel into a basin of water. In the past few hours, he had treated a long procession of cuts, sprains and dislocations, the results of soldiers being knocked down by exploding shells, or clipped by shrapnel. Such injuries, he had learned, indicated that the early stages of a major action were underway, with the heavy guns exchanging fire as a prelude to a large-scale infantry engagement. On this occasion, it had seemed that the initiative belonged to the Allies. The previous afternoon, they had bombarded Sebastopol with an unprecedented ferocity. Veils of fine grey dust had been shaken from the hotel’s rafters. Nothing, Kitson had thought, could possibly survive such a
concerted barrage. Sebastopol and everyone in it had surely been flattened.

Yet much of the talk he was hearing that night cast doubt upon this estimation. A party clad in the dark blue jackets and overalls of the Artillery Division were seated around one of the hotel’s largest tables, swigging hot port from tin mugs and devouring generous slabs of Mrs Seacole’s seed-cake. They had been working the thirteen-pound mortars throughout the bombardment, and had been so deafened by this task that they were virtually shouting at one another in their efforts to communicate. From their bellowed exchanges, Kitson and numerous others discovered that the order to cease firing had come too soon; that the mortars were not doing the damage expected of them; and that, most importantly of all, the advance of the infantry had been delayed for so long that any advantage the bombardment might have gained them was already lost.

‘They’ll have
rebuilt the bloody walls
!’ yelled one despondently, a greasy hand cupped over his ear in a futile attempt to amplify his comrades’ responses. ‘Only
earthworks
, ain’t they? He works damn fast, does the Russian!
Damn fast
!’

It took the emergence of the matron of the British Hotel, the benevolent ruler of this peaceful, cosy realm, through a door behind the long counter to lift the gloom that afflicted her clientele that night. Mrs Seacole was dressed for riding, a long cape covering her striped dress, and a capacious saddle-bag bursting with provisions slung over her shoulder. Upon her head was a wide-brimmed hat that sported a huge blue feather. Kitson realised that she was intending to embark on one of her mercy missions up to the plateau. Since they had left the
Medora
, she had undertaken these trips with greater frequency. She often proclaimed that she would not languish in the comfort of the hotel whilst the soldiers, her dear, brave sons, lay injured and needy at the front. Kitson, wary of whom he might encounter, had thus far declined to accompany her.

This stout, middle-aged mulatto lady was greeted with almost reverential warmth by the men assembled in the main saloon. They raised their cups, letting out weary cheers and
banging fists on tabletops; a number called out ‘Good evening to you, Mother Seacole’ with earnest courtesy. She beamed back at them, returning their hearty salutations, her teeth shining white against a complexion the colour of strong tea. With every eye upon her, she walked around the counter’s end, heading over to a table of regulars. In seconds they were all laughing uproariously, whilst the rest of the hotel’s occupants looked on with envy. Kitson watched as she patted the cheek of one of her younger patrons, making a tender remark that made him blush scarlet and his comrades heave with fresh amusement.

This was her way, and it was effective indeed. The ease with which she mixed with the fighting men, and the great and honest affection she showed them, brought them true respite from their burdens. Kitson’s admiration for her, for her open-hearted humanity, knew no limit. Her approach to the treatment of the wounded was expert, and very different from the clinical barbarity of so many of the male, Anglo-Saxon surgeons he had worked with at Balaclava harbour. This place, the British Hotel, was another source of wonderment. Mrs Seacole had summoned the building out of nowhere whilst Kitson still lay crippled in a hammock aboard the
Medora
. It had an improvised quality, the beams little more than stripped tree trunks, the counter fashioned from a portion of a ship’s hull, still with barnacles attached; but these disparate, unlikely parts, seemingly knitted together by the sheer force of Mrs Seacole’s will, formed a haven for those trapped in the Crimea.

Although she had taught him much during their time together, Kitson did not delude himself. He did not possess Mrs Seacole’s unparalleled ability to soothe her patients’ minds as well as their bodily afflictions, and would always remain her strange, nameless assistant. But he had thought of another way to repay the vast debt he owed her. Upon their return to England at the conclusion of the war, he had resolved to pen a grand account of this lady’s Crimean endeavours, detailing her achievements and thus sealing her fame. Public appetite for a tale of such genuine heroism would surely be huge. Mary Seacole would become a celebrated, emulated
person, known to all, loved by all–as she so richly deserved to be.

The main door creaked open behind Kitson, pulling him from these pleasant reflections. He turned, expecting another exhausted soldier to stagger in. Instead, he saw Miss Annabel Wade. She looked thinner, and was in a state of some anxiety, quickly taking in the smoky room. Kitson knew at once that he was the object of her search, but found that he was distinctly reluctant to approach her. He stood, his basin in his hands, waiting to be discovered.

Locating him, Miss Wade hurried to his side with evident relief. ‘Mr Kitson, thank the Lord. I had heard that you were a part of this … concern.’ She cast an uncertain glance around the hotel. ‘I only pray that I am not too late. Sir, you must come back to the camps with me, right away.’

Kitson felt as if he had been caught–apprehended. He had assumed that no one who knew him from before his injury was aware that he was at the British Hotel. It was most disturbing to discover otherwise. He set down the basin.

Miss Wade drew a breath. ‘It is Mr Styles. He is in the Crimea still.’

Kitson’s mind went blank; his limbs were tingling, bursting with an energy so intense and powerful it somehow prohibited any movement. He managed to shake his head. ‘Impossible.’

‘I’m afraid not. He has been seen.’

‘He was wounded, though, shortly before I was.’ Kitson crossed his arms, trying hard to gather his recollections. ‘Miss Wade, I was told that you accompanied us both down to Balaclava harbour that morning, and that we were due to be transported out on the
Charity
. I checked the patient logs as soon as I was able. There were a number of unnamed civilians aboard her when she sailed. Was not Styles among them?’

Miss Wade said that he was not, and recounted how, after staying out of sight for many weeks, the illustrator had recently started to appear again, his garb and bearing even more desperate than previously, wandering around the margins of the camp like a vengeful apparition. Some reports
had placed him close to the Boyces’ farmhouse, she said, and she feared for Mrs Boyce’s safety, given Mr Styles’ persistent, unnatural attachment to that young lady.

‘He is known to come out during the larger actions. Some saw him during the taking of the Quarries.’ Miss Wade shivered. ‘They say he is armed.’

Kitson frowned, his shock turning to anger. ‘I will not attempt to deceive you, Miss Wade. If Robert Styles’ mind remains as clouded as it was a few months ago, then he is dangerous indeed.’

‘But you are his one friend here, Mr Kitson, are you not? At the time of your injury, I gained the distinct impression that you had been attempting to restrain Mr Styles in his violent excesses. Can you not try to do the same now?’

Kitson did not answer. ‘What of Cracknell?’

Miss Wade snorted sarcastically. ‘Come, Mr Kitson, you know that gentleman far better than I. He vanished from the camps long ago. Those scabrous reports of his were beginning to make things difficult for him, I think–as were his wicked interferences in the Boyce household. No, he has been absent from all our lives for quite some time, thanks be to God.’

Before Kitson could say any more, a loud laugh close to his elbow told him that Mrs Seacole was approaching. A moment later she was with them, looking Miss Wade over with keen, friendly curiosity.

‘And who is this upstanding lady, Thomas?’ Her voice was deep and smooth, with a lilting Caribbean cadence.

Kitson made the introduction, briefly explaining the nature of Miss Wade’s work.

Mrs Seacole nodded cannily. ‘Yes, I have seen you round about, Miss Wade, doing good things up on the plateau, with the prettiest young creature by your side. Holding the men
transfixed
, she was!’

Miss Wade, although clearly on her guard, could not help but smile at this comment. ‘My companion, Mrs Madeleine Boyce.’

‘A fine beauty indeed, that one.’ Mrs Seacole gave a contented sigh. ‘Well, this is an honour for us, isn’t it,
Thomas? We don’t often get ladies in the British Hotel, and certainly not those from the proud Caledonian tribes. I am of Scottish ancestry myself, Miss Wade. Now, can I get you some refreshment, my dear? A pot of half-and-half, perhaps? Or a tot of shrub?’

Miss Wade was regarding her host doubtfully. ‘Thank you, Mrs Seacole, but I—’

‘How about a marrow pudding, then? Fresh up from the harbour this very afternoon! Are the marrow puddings not good, Toby?’ she asked a nearby corporal with crumbs in his beard.

‘Prime, Mother, prime,’ he replied appreciatively. ‘You’re a rare treasure, truly ye are.’ Miss Wade, however, could not be tempted.

Kitson, silent throughout this exchange, accepted his fate. He saw that he must do what his visitor asked of him. ‘Mrs Seacole,’ he broke in, ‘I believe that I shall accompany you to the plateau this morning.’

Mrs Seacole gave every sign of being pleasantly surprised by this decision; a moment later, though, she was asking him concernedly whether his poor chest was up to it. Turning to Miss Wade, she told the tale of how she had removed Thomas Kitson, the wounded orderly, from the quay at Balaclava and taken him to her base of operations aboard the
Medora
. There, she had nursed him back to health; and when she had taken up proprietorship of the British Hotel three months later, her orderly had chosen to go with her.

‘And now, having barely left this building in six long weeks, you wish to come up to the line,’ she pronounced heavily, her eyes on Kitson’s chest. ‘You must promise me that you will be careful, Thomas. That is still a grave wound indeed–you must let Nature do her work. We simply cannot have some passing excitement undoing all the progress that has been made.’

‘Certainly not, Mrs Seacole. I understand completely.’ Although the bleeding had stopped and he could move around normally with little discomfort, Kitson was all too aware of his continued fragility. He was coming to realise
that his ribs would never regain the strength they had before that night in the advance parallel.

‘I’m sure that young Master Cowan can hold the fort in our absence, wherever he’s got to. I suppose it is only right, Thomas, that you wish to help those most in need of it. He is quite adept, Miss Wade, with a mustard poultice and a length of lint!’ She adjusted her riding cape. ‘But there is another reason for this sudden change of heart, Thomas, is there not. Don’t deny it, my love, I can tell.’

Miss Wade was plainly impatient to be off, thinking only of getting back to the camps, back to Madeleine Boyce. Her fears regarding Styles were very real.

‘An old obligation, Mrs Seacole,’ Kitson said. ‘To a friend. It should not take long.’ He had no idea if this were true. Who could say what might await him back at the camps?

‘Someone you wish to save from destruction, I take it.’ Mrs Seacole’s jollity left her. Devoid of her usual happy animation, she seemed to age before him, the lines on her round face deepening in the soft oil-light of the hotel. ‘Very well, Thomas. I have been talking to my sons this past day. They firmly believe that the Russians will be ready for them when the dawn attack is sounded. I fear that we are on the brink of a great disaster, my dears; one that we are quite powerless to prevent. The coming day will be a truly terrible one for all.’

But then, quite suddenly, she recovered her habitual cheer, bidding the room an expansive farewell, telling the soldiers to take their ease and stay as long as they wished. In return, she received a robust chorus of good wishes, as well as stern instructions to keep herself safe, and leave getting shot at by the Ivans to those who were paid to put up with it. Adjusting her plumed hat and her saddle-bag, she opened the hotel’s door and strode out into the darkness, towards where the horses were tethered. Miss Wade was less than a step behind. Kitson pulled his jacket from the back of a chair and followed, closing the door after him.

The railway wagon reached the steepest part of the ascent to the camps. As the team of horses pulling it began to strain, the navvies walking beside the tracks started up a chant. They kept time with steady monotony, their low intonations punctuated by the crack of the driver’s whip. Cracknell, perched atop a pile of ammunition crates in the back of this crude, heavy cart, told himself to be patient: even without an engine, this was still the fastest route to the front. He listened to the creaking of the rope harnesses, and hoped that the fellow manning the brake had his wits about him, lest something gave way and they found themselves rolling back down towards Balaclava.

Behind the wagon, several dozen sailors were trudging across the sleepers, kept uncharacteristically quiet by the prospect of the morning ahead. These blue-jackets were to serve as storming parties, supporting the great mass of infantry; the scaling ladders they would carry into the assault hung from the wagon’s sides. Every man there had been assigned this duty after losing a lottery aboard his vessel, and one could tell this from just a single glance at their grim faces. Shooting down ladder-bearers was the obvious way to hinder an attack on a fortified position–as the Russians would surely be aware.

The skeletal remains of innumerable broken vehicles and cargo containers were heaped along the sides of the road, dimly visible in the gathering dawn. Lights from the supply
base at Kadikioi shone up ahead, catching from time to time on the eyes of feral dogs watching their progress from the cover of the surrounding meadows. The scent of wild flowers drifted over the wagon, carried on a breeze that brushed gently through the long grass. On the left, rising up to a sharp, dark line against the softening sky, was the Black Sea.

To the relief of all, the wagon finally made it on to the plateau. The railway track curved in towards the huts and barns of Kadikioi, and then ran straight on to the forward camps. Seeing the many hundreds of white tents, spread across the blue-grey fields like points of light on a rippling lake, brought cheer to the Tomahawk’s heart. He was positively itching for action. Balaclava, although greatly recovered from its ghastly winter, remained somewhat dull for a man accustomed to the front line. The most thrilling it got was the occasional afternoon’s horse racing staged by the cavalry at the nearby village of Karani. Much to his disgust, he had managed to miss the assaults of the previous week due to a bout of diarrhoea brought on by some suspect seafood. A decisive victory had been won at the Quarries. The significance of the operation was ably attested to by the numbers of injured brought down to the quay. Watching this bleak procession from his window, Cracknell had vowed that when the next column was made, he would be there.

The railway cart, by now a familiar sight, was largely ignored as it trundled by the endless tents and parading soldiers. A few blasts of artillery were heard–the rear batteries, Cracknell reckoned, grabbing the chance for a bit of early morning practice before the day’s labour got underway. He turned to where the plateau dipped down towards Sebastopol. From such a distance, the besieged port city and its fortifications looked like an ugly, disfiguring knot in the smooth grain of the landscape.

Half an hour later, the wagon reached the final stretch of track. The driver slowed it as much as he could; then the navvies strode around, swiftly untethering the horses and leading them away whilst the cart was still in motion. Cracknell climbed down, staggering a little as he dropped to the ground. Behind him, the wagon hit the buffer at the
track’s end with a loud clang. Men from the Quartermaster-General’s department were upon it immediately, distributing its cargo amongst their regimental counterparts. Cracknell spotted none other than the Quartermaster-General himself, directing the proceedings. A decidedly reptilian creature, responsible for much suffering in the Tomahawk’s book, he was also known to have an old family connection with Boyce. This man was the source, unwitting or otherwise, of whatever bait had been used to reel in Charles Norton–Cracknell was sure of it. And when this war had finally worn itself out, he had vowed that he would discover the details. He would use his prominence, his reputation, to expose them all.

Cracknell made for the old
Courier
tent, intending to retrieve the field glass he had left locked in his sea-chest. He wasn’t entirely sure what he would find. Shortly before he’d left the plateau, this worthy structure had been subjected to several attacks from those angered by his reports. It had been partly collapsed, the canvas slashed with an officer’s sword; and he could smell that someone, several people in fact, had relieved themselves on the top of his desk. He had already decided to leave for Balaclava, but these incidents only increased his determination to do so. The animosity of these people would only grow more intense, after all; the Tomahawk of the
Courier
was not about to soften either his views or their expression. How the hell could he? Lord Aberdeen’s disastrous government had fallen, it was true, but who had replaced him? Yet another aged aristocrat, Lord Palmerston this time, a man over seventy years old with poor hearing, poor eyesight and a famously belligerent temper. Cracknell’s feeling about ‘Pam’, as he was known, had been bad from the start; and sure enough, the bullying villain had since shown that he was set on continuing the war until some manner of British victory was achieved, regardless of the cost. He wanted Sebastopol, in short, and was pressuring Raglan to deliver it. This was the reason the army was to be thrown at the Great Redan that morning. Cracknell knew in his bones that this rather literal tactic would lead only to calamity. All he could do, though, as
ever, was observe what transpired and report it back to his readers.

Approaching the tent, he was surprised to see clear signs of habitation. Was it soldiers–renegade Turks perhaps? Or Tartar peasants? The Tomahawk adopted a fearless, commanding expression, pushed open the flaps and strode inside.

Robert Styles was sitting in the middle of the dirt floor, lit ghoulishly by the embers of a dying fire. A winding vine of smoke curled up and out through a ragged hole that had been sawn out of the tent’s roof. Cracknell’s writing desk had been pushed roughly to one side. Heaped upon it was a mass of drawings, some heavily worked up, others a mere handful of pencil strokes. They had been made on any available scraps of paper, over maps, newspapers and even pages of his own handwritten notes, left behind when he had gone to Balaclava. Their subject, of course, was the underbelly of the campaign: death, disease, emaciation and madness, rendered with horrible precision. Cracknell grimaced with distaste. They were like visions of the bloody Apocalypse.

All the other furniture, the stools, stoves and sea-chests, had been crammed unceremoniously into what had once been bed alcoves. There was no useable bedding in sight. It was clear from Styles’ appearance that he was sleeping on the ground like a man of the line. He was dressed in a stained green jacket that must once have belonged to a private from the Rifle Brigade. A black forage cap lay by his side, and an old greatcoat was draped around his shoulders. Mud crusted his clothes, and one of his legs was dark with dried blood. His beard was unkempt, matted and colourless, and he was painfully thin, his sun-tanned skin stretched tight over his bones. He was drawing, his wasted hand darting across the paper.

The senior correspondent stood in stunned silence. He remembered that he’d never quite got round to ascertaining that Styles had left the Crimea. His assumption had been that the illustrator was shipped out after being wounded that January–not unreasonable, he felt, considering that Madeleine and her friend had laid him out on the quay at
Balaclava. That the boy had vanished soon afterwards was deeply unfortunate, but hardly uncommon. Cracknell had asked O’Farrell to pass on his condolences to the family.

Kitson, on the other hand, he’d known about. Balaclava’s churning rumour-mill soon reported that his one-time junior was at work in Mrs Seacole’s British Hotel. This was a lamentable dereliction of duty–a desertion, in fact. It was also completely predictable. The art correspondent, unable to cope with the turmoil of battle, had removed himself to a safe distance, playing nurse to ease his guilty conscience. Contemptible, but there it was. This, though–this felt as if he’d arrived home from a lengthy trip abroad to discover that the forgotten fern in his window, which should have died quietly, had actually grown to a supernatural size, engulfing his entire house.

‘Mr Styles, what the devil are you doing here?’ Cracknell said abruptly, in a loud voice that held both humour and a note of confrontation.

The illustrator stopped work and looked up at him. He did not speak, or offer any expression, either of welcome or dislike, at the return of the Tomahawk. But Cracknell fancied that he could see something stir in those sunken eyes. A touch unnerved, the correspondent decided to use a more openly amicable approach. He went down on his haunches, and threw the butt of the cigarette he’d been smoking on the fire. It was fuelled, he now saw, with the stocks of dismantled Russian muskets, some of which were patterned with elaborate carvings.

‘How’s the leg?’ he asked with gruff warmth, forcing himself to look at Styles. His complexion had the texture of old cloth, with earth rubbed into its very fibre; Cracknell caught a whiff of old clothes and decaying gums. ‘A bit better, I hope? Upon my life, you’re as sun-browned as a bloody blue-jacket! Quite some change, young sir; quite some change.’

Styles did not reply. He went back to his sketch.

Casting his mind back to his last days on the plateau, Cracknell recalled the occasional sense that someone was moving around just outside, hovering on the edge of the
tent’s stone foundations. At the time, he had imagined it was some vengeful soldier trying to put the fear into him. Now he was beginning to think differently. ‘When did you move yourself in here?’

Still Styles said nothing.

Cracknell raised an eyebrow, and took a bundle of cigarettes from his pocket. ‘Well, I have been lodging in Balaclava these past few months–on
Courier
business, y’understand.’

The
London Courier
, in truth, had been a secondary reason for the Tomahawk’s relocation. Rather more prominent had been the issue of Madeleine Boyce and her husband. In the weeks after that memorable night in the
Courier
tent, they had grown rash, meeting in the Boyces’ farmhouse with greater regularity. There had been a series of abominably close shaves, Cracknell managing to leave literally a
single
second
before the cuckold made his entrance. He was perfectly happy to beat a rapid retreat every once in a while–he found it stimulating, in fact. Such situations, however, had been getting a little too frequent for comfort. He had started to feel that Madeleine was deliberately courting them. There was a marked carelessness in her treatment of their arrangements. ‘Now, Maddy, you’re quite certain that Nathaniel is on duty for the entire morning?’ he might ask. ‘Oh yes,’ she would reply airily; and then they would be interrupted, often whilst in full flight, by the sound of a booted foot upon the stoop.

She was becoming unbalanced. Her demands for declarations of his fidelity and unwavering passion grew yet more frequent and more desperate; and his responses, delivered as convincingly as ever, plainly no longer satisfied her. It was the awful tension of the siege, Cracknell had theorised. It was preying on her reason, leading her to desire, even to prompt, dramatic conclusions. But whatever the explanation, it was all growing somewhat perilous, for both of them. He had decided that it would be best if he removed himself from the camps, and from the Boyces, for an indefinite period of time. Madeleine had not taken this at all well, of course. Cracknell had managed to calm her only with elaborate plans of the escape they would make together when he returned
for her later in the campaign. They would go to southern Spain, he promised, to the orange-groves of Andalusia. There would be a pretty, sun-kissed villa with a view of the ocean, many thousands of miles beyond the reach of Nathaniel Boyce; there would be children, a family, a future filled with love and happiness. Eventually, tearfully, she had agreed to let him go.

Cracknell offered the bundle of cigarettes to Styles. Unexpectedly, the illustrator accepted, pulling out three of the crooked paper tubes. Two went in the pocket of his green jacket, the other in his mouth; he lit it, not sharing the match with Cracknell. ‘Have you been to Balaclava lately, Styles?’ There was no response. Cracknell lit his own cigarette. ‘You would find it much improved, my friend. Place is almost English in aspect, these days. Provisions of all sorts are in plentiful supply–including, quite unbelievably, winter clothing for the troops. Winter clothes, in June! They all say that they’re expecting their summer dress by Christmas. It would be amusing, would it not, if this idiocy had not consigned so many to their graves.’

Styles stayed quiet. Cigarette dangling from his lips, he started applying shade to a form which, even viewing it upside down, Cracknell could tell was a cadaver of some kind.

‘The Turks are gone as well, thank Christ. There are a number of shops now, a restaurant, a telegraph office–which is very useful for us, as you might imagine. I even saw a bloody
photographer
last month, taking views of the harbour. Fenton’s his name–they say he’s been up in the camps as well. Some competition for you artists there, eh, Styles!’ The illustrator did not react. Cracknell took the cigarette from between his lips and moved closer to the fire, sitting himself on the floor. ‘And would you credit it,’ he went on slyly, ‘I’ve also discovered a few whores at work amongst the cottages. Doing a brisk trade, of course. Why, I had to make my appointments days–nay, weeks in advance!’

This joking revelation had been intended to foster a bit of manly bonhomie between them, and perhaps elicit a knowing chuckle from his grimy companion–after all, he was a young man, was he not? The travails of the romping
gent, in Cracknell’s judgement, were of universal amusement to the male of the species, and especially to its hot-blooded youth. In this, however, as in so much else, Robert Styles was a disappointment to his sex. He breathed out a great cloud of smoke, those eyes now glinting with an unmistakable malevolence. He seemed to be gathering up his energy. Cracknell realised that Styles was preparing himself to speak, something he clearly hadn’t done in some time.