A New Kind of War (15 page)

It was curious, thought Fred. Because Audley had just said a lot. And yet somehow he hadn’t said anything at all.

‘Yes.’ The ghost of Audley’s smile lingered. ‘So officially—
officially
—
we’re into our minor specializations: tanks for me, chemical warfare for the Crocodile, radar for the Alligator, communications and cyphers for Amos … and so on … So you’ll probably get non-metallic mines, or something—or whatever the Royal Engineers are into. But all pretty small beer, really. And the Yanks and the Russians don’t worry about us too much, because they reckon we’re a bunch of drunken amateurs and loonies, trying to avoid boring regimental duty—or Far Eastern postings, fighting mosquitoes and uncomfortably heroic Japanese, and suchlike … Loonies led by the Chief Lunatic himself, Colonel Augustus Colbourne. Because he’s our best cover, by God!’

They were precisely back to the moment when Amos de Souza had first detached him from Audley, in the company office.

Audley nodded, as though he had caught Fred’s thought. ‘He
is
a looney, you know.’ Nod. ‘Bloody clever with it, admittedly. Would have been a King’s Counsel long since, if there hadn’t been a war, for sure by now: Mr Augustus Colbourne, KC …
Sir
Augustus Colbourne—
Mr Justice
Colbourne—
Lord
Colbourne—Amos says he was absolutely brilliant in court, even as a fledgling barrister … But quite mad, nevertheless.’

Fred could only remember the stark naked Colonel Colbourne, variously sunburned and white, and hairy, but utterly unconcerned. But then another memory surfaced. ‘Where did he get his DSO?’

Audley gave him a sly look. ‘Oh … that was a good one, apparently: 8th Army, Desert Rats, ’42—rallying the ranks at Alam Haifa, or somewhere. Amos says that if he’d been killed doing it, then it might have been a VC—he was only a captain at the time too.‘ The tousled head shook. ’Oh, he’s brave. But, for our purposes, he’s mad. Probably got too much sun in the desert, and it fried his brains.‘ The boy shrugged, and then gestured suddenly into the gloom around them. ’You know where we are—? Eh—?‘

That certainly was quite mad. ‘A … Roman fort, Amos said —’

‘A Roman fort—right!’ Audley nodded. ‘The Kaiser rebuilt a fort just like this, on the old Roman frontier line—not far from here at the Saalburg, back at the turn of the century, near Bad Homburg. So this German industrialist—one of Krupp’s subsidiary suppliers—
he
rebuilt another fort, on another original Roman site also on the
limes
, as they call it. And then he dedicated it to the Emperor Hadrian and Kaiser Wilhelm, right here. So we’re in the headquarters building of that fort right now—the “
principia”
—which is cold, and dark, and draughty, and generally unpleasant … instead of some agreeable American requisitioned premises, which Colonel Colbourne would certainly get, for the asking. Because he’s a great favourite with the Yanks, actually.’

Fred recalled his reception. ‘Because of his … pigs?’

‘Otto’s pigs. And other things.’ Nod. ‘And because he insists that we all behave with unfailing politeness to our allies.’ Smile. ‘Also, he has a rich American wife, wooed on the
Queen Mary
before the war.’

‘He doesn’t sound … too mad, David.’

‘No? Well … if I tell you that he believes he’s the reincarnation of Caesar Augustus—Julius Caesar’s nephew, who more or less invented the Roman Empire—? The first Roman emperor—?’ The smile became fixed. ‘Actually, he’s not really interested in Germany, A.D. 1945. It’s Roman
Germania
, A.D. 9, that he’s concerned with.’

He couldn’t be serious. ‘You’re not serious—? Are you?’

‘No.’ Audley scratched his head. ‘Just … half serious.’

‘Half serious?’ Suddenly Fred remembered Colbourne’s irrational enthusiasm for photography’s revelation of the ancient past. ‘How?’

‘How?’ Audley looked at him questioningly, and then at the doorway, and then came back to him. ‘We really ought to be joining the others now, don’t you think?’

Fred identified a mixture of hunger and despair in the young man’s expression, and knew that he shared the first, but not the second. ‘Of course. But just one thing, David —’

‘One thing—?’ A glint of hope now. ‘What d’you want to know?’

In victory … caution. ‘You said Colonel Colbourne was … “our best cover”, was it?’ He paused for a fraction of a second before popping the vital question again, but now confident that he would get the vital answer.

‘Oh—Christ, yes!’ Audley forestalled him. ‘Everybody knows that Gus Colbourne’s only interested in one thing! The Yanks know it—the bloody Russkis know it too, I shouldn’t wonder …
Every
bugger knows it, for sure! All he’s interested in is finding the long lost site of the battle of the Teutoburg Forest, where the Germans wiped out three Roman legions in the year A.D. 9—where General Varus came unstuck.’

‘What—?’ The young man’s bitter vehemence caught Fred unprepared in his moment of victory. ‘Varus—?’

‘Varus. Publius Quinctilius Varus—“
Varus, Fluch auf dich! Redde Legiones!”
, as Otto says … Although Varus did have the grace to fall on his sword when all was lost, unlike von Paulus at Stalingrad, Otto also says.’

Otto says
, like
Amos says
? With his mixture of German and Latin—
Damn you, Varus! Give me back my legions!
—
What did it mean? ‘Now you’ve lost me, David—Varus?’ But then a spark of light, if not light itself, illuminated the incoherence momentarily. ‘Wasn’t he the Roman General who—?’ The light flickered. ‘
That
Varus—?’

‘
That
Varus, uh-huh.‘ Audley nodded encouragingly. ’You know your Roman history, then?‘

The light guttered: any moment now it would go out, leaving him in a blind darkness inkier than before. ‘No.’ Everything Audley was saying was insane—‘
He believes he’s a reincarnation of Augustus Caesar
…
Everybody knows that Gus Colbourne’s only interested in one thing
…
“Give me back my legions, Varus!”
. And yet, on second thoughts, it wasn’t. Because Audley had tried to warn him, and Amos de Souza had echoed the warning in his own way … And, finally, Colonel Colbourne himself had rolled their warnings up in his own confided statement, which somehow seemed to confirm everything: ’
All my officers are mad, quite mad
.‘ ’No. But … ‘

‘But—?’ Audley seemed to have forgotten his hunger, together with his stutter and his simulated drunkenness. ‘Have you read
I, Claudius
?’

‘Who?’ The sharpness of the young man’s sidelong scrutiny sharpened Fred’s own wits, so that he instantly regretted the question.

‘It’s a book—by a chap named Graves. A poet, actually. But it isn’t a poetry book—you’ve heard of
him
—
?’ Audley was suddenly embarrassed.

‘Of course I’ve heard of him.
Robert
Graves.’ Fred shared the boy’s embarrassment. ‘And I know about Varus.’

‘Yes. So it’s all in there—in his book, I mean. About the Romans—about Varus getting the chop, eh?’ Audley relaxed again. ‘Sorry! But I keep imagining that you’re one of Caesar Augustus’s men—another Roman history expert in disguise, leading me on—one of his fellow loonies, recruited by him, like the Alligator. But you’re a Clinton recruit, of course—out of our little Greek encounter.’ The grin became lop-sided. ‘Silly of me. But put it down to hunger. So let’s go and eat, then.’ He pointed the way.

The Alligator
, thought Fred. And
The Crocodile
. And Colonel Caesar
Augustus
Colbourne. And now
Publius Quinctilius Varus
. It was all too much—just too damn much! ‘You still haven’t told me what we’re really doing, David.’

‘Haven’t I? Nor I have! Mmmm … that’s right—you were just asking me about Gus Colbourne—’ Audley looked past him and stopped.

‘Herr Hauptmann David, I can the meal delay no further.’ Otto bowed slightly to Fred. ‘Herr Major—’

‘No, Otto—not “I can the meal delay”. It has to be “I can
delay
the meal”, in that order.’

Otto shook his head. ‘I
cannot
the meal delay, I am telling you. The Colonel is come now, with Major Amos, at last.’ He fixed his good eye on Fred apologetically. ‘They have the United States Air Force hired. And I another pig must provide, in return.’

‘Okay, Otto. Tell them that Major Fattorini is just finishing his drink—okay?’ Audley waited until the German had bowed-and-scraped out into the darkness before turning back to Fred. ‘Poor old Otto! Out into the forest again, with his trusty rifle. And he says it isn’t so easy now, with other people hunting meat on the quiet. Not to mention dangerous, with all sorts of rough DPs still on the loose out there, he says … But there! Where was I? Colbourne, yes—“Gus” to the Yanks … “Der Kaiser” to Otto … and “Sir” to us. And “Caesar Augustus” to himself … Yes, well what he’s up to is no problem: he’s hell-bent on finding the actual site of the
Hermannsschlacht
—
or the
Varusschlacht
, if you prefer.’ He grinned at Fred. ‘The site of the battle in the Teutoburg Forest where Hermann’s Germans wiped out Varus’s Romans, in A.D. 9 or A.U.C. 762, if you prefer.’ Audley slipped his hand inside his battle-dress blouse. ‘What
we’re
after is somewhat different, in A.U.C. 2698 … or A.D. 1945, as you and I might put it.’ He handed a leather wallet to Fred. ‘Go on—open it.’

It wasn’t actually a wallet, it was just wallet-sized: two pieces of scuffed and dog-eared stiffened cardboard, rexine-covered, held together by two snap-open metal rings.

‘Our bible,’ said Audley. ‘You’ll get one of your own. I’m surprised Amos hasn’t given you one already. But then, of course it
is
supposed to be Top Secret—not for strangers or other ranks, or any lesser breeds, without the law—huh!’

Something in Audley’s voice diverted Fred for an instant.

The young man’s mouth had twisted again into its familiar shape, which suggested a mixture of youthful doubt and uncertainty unnaturally aged with wartime cynicism. ‘I was only thinking that Otto probably has his own private picture-gallery … Go on—open it, man!’

It
was
a picture gallery—

For an instant out of time and place and circumstances—out of wet summer, and wet Germany, and all present insanity—Fred was reminded of all the group photographs he had seen over the years of his life, on the walls of school and college and home: fading sepia pictures, sharper modern pictures … pictures in which his predecessors, or even his ancestors, or even he himself had figured—stiff and unreal, in well-pressed or crumpled civilian suiting; or stiff and unreal, in unmuddied sports gear before the match, with clean rugger ball, or wicket-keeping pads, or with hockey stick, and striped jerseys or immaculate whites; or in the smartest-of-all passing-out battle-dress of OCTU, which would not be cherished and remembered by all those in it because not all those in it—
that one grinning foolishly, and that one grimacing, and that one blurred
—
not all those were alive now, to grin or grimace, but were rotting in their graves, or off the beaches, or wherever new subalterns rotted, marked or unmarked—

But this was a gallery of
Germans
—

‘I always think Otto is the spit-and-image of Number 7,’ said Audley.

Some of them were in uniform, and some of them were in civilian clothes: smart, unsmart, handsome, ugly … But each one was numbered—

‘But he can’t be, of course.’

The numbers had been painted on crudely, across each chest, in white. And, since both the ‘7’ and the ‘17’ were unadorned by the continental mark, those numbers were of British origin, not German.

‘If you look closely, you’ll see that Number 7 has only got one arm,’ murmured Audley as Fred lifted the photograph closer to his eye in the uncertain light. ‘And, although Otto’s pretty-damn-clever, he’s not quite up to that—growing another arm … And also, if you turn on to the enlargements, the shape of the jaw is different, too.’

Fred delayed for a moment, as he ran his eye along the double row of mixed German military-civilian personnel, in search of a common denominator. Number 7’s right sleeve was indeed empty, and pinned under his number across his chest; and, for a fact, most of his uniformed comrades were more-or-less battered—legless, or armless, or hideously scarred … or merely old—

‘Come on.’ Audley held out his hand. ‘Amos’ll give you your own pictures in due course, Fred.’

Fred turned the group picture over, ignoring him. ‘Just a moment, David.’

Number 7, enlarged, certainly wasn’t Otto, he could see that. But somebody had done an amazingly good job of enlarging the group faces, he could see that too. It was like John Bradford had said: war had improved photography, as well as methods of navigation and surgery, and mass-murder.

‘Besides which, Number 7 is dead.’ Audley sighed. ‘Quite authentically dead. Which I know, because he was one of mine to research. And I don’t make mistakes.’ The familiar twist met Fred’s scrutiny. ‘We were rather unlucky there, as it happens.’

‘Unlucky?’

Audley shook his head. ‘Don’t make me go into details before dinner. It might put me off my food. Come on, for Christ’s sake, Fred!’ He held out his hand for the mock-wallet.

Fred folded the wallet up. Obviously there were enlargements of every one of the group, by the thickness of it. But he still kept hold of the collection. ‘What are they? War criminals?’

‘War criminals?’ Audley’s eyebrows lifted. ‘Good God, no! Perish the thought! We’re not … we’re not
policemen
, for God’s sake!’

Then what are they?
Who
are they?‘

‘Well … ’ Audley shrugged ‘ … really quite decent chaps, so far as I can make out. On the whole, I mean. That is, allowing for the fact that several of ’em were Nazi Party members. And all of ‘em are Germans, of course. Or
were
Germans—’ He stopped suddenly, cocking an eye at Fred. ‘You’re not one of those chaps who think the only good German is a dead one, are you?’