Vagabond (62 page)

He was wrapped in a cloak of his own making, and his sense of reality had drifted away. It was a challenge Danny Curnow faced, and challenges were for health and exertion, and satisfaction . . . at home, in Caen, no challenges existed, and nothing awaited him.

‘You’ll be allowed to go back to your own ground, but the burden will crush you. You went on a journey with the hopes of your organisation ringing in your ears, but you’ll return with nothing. No assault rifles, no machine-guns, no sniper gear or mortars, no military explosive. You’ll have nothing to show for the trip – and nothing to show for the money. They cleaned out the coffers so you could buy the hardware you claimed you needed. A star kid went with you, a looker, and now she’s dead. Last, you gave men’s work to two kids who died while you were far away and safe. I’m getting there.’

He heard the coughing and the sloshing of water. He knew that, very soon, the man would emerge, close to breaking.

‘Every move you made was failure, Malachy, and that will be the rumour spread on the mountain. We can do that effectively, past masters at it. Slip the gossip in, stir the dirt. Who was the tout who gave the tip? Why was a high-profile fighter, hands-on with the weapons, allowed back, and what deal had he done? Where was the money? Why was it paid over before the weapons had been delivered and who has the numbered account where it’s banked? What happened to a girl, with an education, who’s found in a flea pit in a red-light district of Prague? How did Riordan, the strong family man, get the scratches on his face – and what split his lip? It comes down to this, Malachy. Who’s going to believe you? Why were you not arrested? Where’s the money? What’s the situation with the girl? Tongues flapping. Cold-shouldered, backs turned, earth still high on the graves of the kids who died when you weren’t there. Who will believe you? I’m telling you. No one. Were you yourself the tout? We can feed that into the community. You’ll be ignored, discredited, then investigated, and when you’re isolated they’ll kill you – sentence of death for betrayal. Talk your way back to trust? I don’t think so. The burden’s already there, but we’ll hike it. If it helps, this wasn’t on our original game plan, but I was stuck with my boss at a bus stop, after a bit of history tourism, and it seemed a good way to screw you. Nothing personal.’

He played the big card. That was his way, proven in old times. The weapon would not have protected him, and he would not have used it. He had never taken a life and only fired on a range. He had seen Riordan with the rifle in the moment after Simonov had snatched at it and expected him still to have it. He would make his gesture, it would be answered, and the battle would be won. He had no doubt of it. He savoured, for a moment, the feel of the pistol in his hand. Squat and compact, comfortable, offering reassurance . . . He was Danny Curnow, who had been Vagabond, and did not need reassurance. He threw it forward. The pistol cannoned into the sloping roof of the steps going down into the bunker, then splashed into the water. The sound echoed up at him.

He used a voice that was casual and confident: ‘I’ve no quarrel with you, Malachy, and the proof is that I’ve thrown down to you the personal weapon I was issued with. I don’t have another. You’re safe to come out, and the circus has moved on, just you and me left. Come on up, Malachy.’

Danny Curnow wanted him snapped like a brittle twig. Not gunned down in an ambush and facing the tributes of martyrdom – the part of the graveyard reserved for heroes, where the fresh flowers were. He wanted him isolated, fearful, held in a meld of contempt and mistrust. It was the way it would end. Even the men on the mountain, the faithful followers and the kids, would find the war impossible to prosecute further.

‘I’m waiting, Malachy. We’re two of a kind, both fucked and no future. Let’s talk.’

There was a surge of movement below. Vindicated. He had shown, he reckoned, all of the skills that the man who had the Vagabond call-sign would have known, and it would be appreciated: terse praise from Matthew Bentinick, and a glass down at the Dickens Bar when he got home. He heard the squelching approach from the bottom steps and the heavy splash of water. Then he was hit.

It was a blow to his chest.

A shape pushed past him, a shadow. It stopped over him. There was the swing of a weapon and his chin was hit, gratuitous, and the shadow was gone. Still numb. In shock. Not in the plan. Not suggested by him or agreed by Bentinick . . . A great weakness enveloped Danny Curnow and was across his body. He tried to feel where the blow had struck but couldn’t find it, only the wet. The blunder of running boots became quieter and peace settled on him.

Ralph Exton heard the shot. He knew the sound of a rifle. In the fields, at winter, round the ‘royal’ village, they used shotguns to bring down pheasants that were barely old enough to get airborne. In the woodlands, surrounded by the
Private
and
Keep Out
signs, men culled deer at dawn with rifles. He cringed, and the cold clawed at him. He had no light and his arms were tight around him.
Fuck me . . . Just another day in the office . . . Fuck me
. He might have been near to moving. He had gained enough courage to think about getting up, groping round him, heading anywhere that might get him clear, but there had been the shot.

He hugged himself, hoped for comfort but failed to find it. He didn’t dare to move.

They slept well. Many had drunk a good quantity of the house red, and the bags were packed. The world of shock and horror, courage under fire and of ‘doing the job right’ seemed of small relevance. A return to normality awaited them.

The house below Dusty was quiet. If Christine were to visit him it would be later. Lisette was already asleep, and snoring gently. He was sitting on Desperate’s bed. He wouldn’t have been there in the old days at Gough when each of the senior NCOs had had a cubbyhole to call their own where privacy was fiercely preserved. If he had, he would have been out on his ear. There were no photographs of her on the bedside table, but she was all around. Barely a space on the wall for the new picture to hang. Which almost settled the matter. He thought it was the end of the road for their friendship: he would wave his man off, wishing him well, and might see the flash of blonde hair streaming from her ponytail. He’d wave as they drove away, the pictures to be delivered to them at a later date – miles away, if either of them had a pinch of common sense. He should phone, shouldn’t he? He should ring Desperate. Well, he would but not yet. For the moment, in the room with the paintings, he sat on the bed and remembered their times together, deaths, and hardships, stretched nerves and peace of a sort: fine times, but harsh. His mobile was in his hand. He’d talk about the new work coming early in the morning and how Desperate should get himself to Honfleur and . . .

He should have lain still.

When his radio call-sign was Vagabond, and when he was Desperate with Dusty behind him, the drills were fixed in his mind. The darkness clawed round him and the numbness had given way to pain. The weakness was more easily reckoned, and old rules were forgotten. About the only thing he remembered from the clinical courses run by the medics was the Golden Hour. And, more vaguely, the Platinum Ten. None of it, blurred and hard to hold onto, seemed relevant. There was no one behind him and the enemy was long gone. Platinum Ten was about the emergency first aid that could be provided by the battlefield medical team, who would sweep in by Black Hawk or Chinook, an Apache riding gunship above them to suppress the bad guys’ fire. The Golden Hour was the crucial time – so the lecturers said – between injury and receiving expert attention. It would not come in ten minutes or an hour. The forest around him was quiet again, except for the wind and the owl that mounted a vigil over him. The bird was close, on a low branch: he couldn’t see it but its call was persistent – he was an intruder on its territory, he thought, and it wanted him gone. He should have lain still and waited for help, but hadn’t believed it would come. He had crawled a little way from the steps, then came to a birch tree that blocked him. He had used his strength, the little he had, to bypass it, and had begun to crawl again. There was no hope of help.

He was as isolated as they would have been on the dunes, the shingle and the wide sands. No medics there. He had a better understanding of their situation than ever before. He crawled, an animal’s instinct. He moved, didn’t know where to.

Chapter 20

He had come to a halt. Hadn’t the strength to go further. He’d gone some 150 paces from the entry steps to the bunker. There was a low wall that might once have been the edge of a parking compound, and he rested against it. He managed to get his back upright, then sagged.

He was far beyond Platinum Ten and probably the Golden Hour. He had done what he could. But he couldn’t stop the bleeding in his chest.

What he had achieved was a poor response to the ‘sucking’ of the chest wound. That had been the instructor’s word, and the same science would have been employed to save lives on the battle coasts seven decades before, with few medics on hand. It was an open wound that sucked in air as his lungs heaved; he carried no occlusive dressing, no steriliser and no sanitised paper smeared with petroleum jelly. He’d heard once, from the battlefield surgeon who’d talked to them, that a driving licence would do the job. There had been a hesitant chuckle from that audience of experienced military men who were doing time in the Province – they were never alone, always had back-up close.

A driving licence could be wedged across an entry wound and the sucking of the cavity
might
hold it in place. It was bloody hard in darkness, with exhaustion setting in. He scrabbled his wallet from a zipped-up pocket. It fell clear; so did his phone. He had to scuffle to find the wallet, then pulled out the card. He clamped it on to the wound, and had his hand over it.

More of the briefing came back to him, but it slid. He was so tired . . . Five critical features to be checked and they were the first five letters of the alphabet. A was for Airway, and it was mostly clear, but blood was coming from his mouth and coughing hurt. B was Breathing, which was ragged and there were bubbling sounds from his lungs. C was Circulation, and the bleeding was internal. D was Disability/Deformity, which would have been a broken spine but the bullet hadn’t hit bone or ligament. And E was for Exposure. A carer would have looked for the exit wound, treated it and tried to maintain a degree of cleanliness, but it was behind him, far down his back, and he couldn’t reach it. The list of letters was about all he knew and, living in Caen, he had little call to know more – but the boys on the beaches wouldn’t have known that much, and the medics wouldn’t have reached them. Some would have had sand in their wounds, and more would have drowned when the tide came in later that day.

There was something he should do, but coherence slipped and he lost the thread.

Danny Curnow barely swam. He hung on but the water was around him and soon it would lap over him, covering his mouth, nose and eyes. Then he would see nothing but the darkness that was now around him. A few people were watching him, he was sure. Matthew Bentinick was there, and didn’t encourage Vagabond to keep fighting. No: Bentinick stood tall and austere in his office clothes, watched him and took time off only to load more tobacco into his pipe. There was no criticism and no praise. Near to Bentinick, Gaby Davies had the posture of a young woman who had achieved a position of authority and was not prepared to let it slide: loose-fitting jeans, old trainers, feet apart, hands on hips, back straight in a shapeless anorak. The wind whipped her short dark hair but her eyes pierced him and would not be deflected. She was power. Dusty Miller was there – funny, that. Dusty didn’t seem to recognise him. He was near to Bentinick and Gaby but wasn’t focusing on his Vagabond. Danny heard himself call, ‘Hey, Dusty, Desperate here, right in front of you, need a heave up. Not in a very good state . . .’ But he didn’t come. Neither did Karol Pilar, nor Malachy Riordan . . . And he saw fair hair, tugged by the wind off the sea, and heard a voice with a soft, guttural accent talk about ‘commitment’.

Nobody came into the water and nobody took his wrist. He was sinking. More faces watched him, from the crypt of the church of St Cyril and St Methodius. They were surrounded and condemned, gazing at him.

Danny Curnow might have slept – but the ringing was too loud. He cursed it: he couldn’t sleep if a bell rang so close to his face. He grappled for it. It persisted. The phone was what he had forgotten after the blow to his chest. He scrabbled among leaves and saw its dull light but couldn’t reach it. It rang, teasing him.

Dusty stood by the window, his curtains wide. He could see across the yacht basin towards the old buildings of Caen. Christine slept a little noisily behind him, and he felt good. He actually felt blessed, as he always did when Christine came to him. She’d stay till nearly dawn, then would slip on her robe and tiptoe away. Of course her mother knew, but it was the ritual of the house. It might have been the same long ago when a young German officer had visited a back bedroom – perhaps with a view of the cliffs he would die defending – and shagged the teenage daughter. Because he felt blessed he had the phone to his ear.