Black August (41 page)

‘You be right,' said the woman. ‘Fair's fair, as I allus do say.'

The agitator sat down and Cattermole took his place. With feverish impatience Ann listened to his speech, for until they made some move she had no means of ascertaining if Kenyon was still among them and every now and then she shuddered at the thought that he might be lying murdered in a nearby ditch.

At last in a storm of applause Cattermole ceased speaking and then Kenyon was dragged down the bank. Her intense relief at finding him still alive was soon submerged in shuddering dismay as she saw them press the burning branch against his chest. Unable to bear it any longer she closed her eyes and rocked with misery, but when she opened them again the whole crowd were on their feet and struggling away up the far slope.

She had followed enough of Cattermole's speech to gather their intention, but she had little thought to spare for Shingle Street; Gregory would deal with an attack by such a rabble with horrible efficiency. Kenyon was all that mattered and she must keep as near to him as possible. With that one central fact dominating her distraught mind she crept after the farm people and, seeking all the cover she could from the sides of the road, followed them down to the coast.

At the turn of the road where it debouched from the trees and curved across the marsh, she remembered an old concrete pillbox and, finding it without difficulty, slipped inside. The long slit in the front of the musty little circular chamber commanded the village and its approach, so, from it, although the whole scene was shrouded in darkness, she was able to watch for the crisis which she felt was imminent.

The Redoubt was a quarter of a mile away but she heard Kenyon's shout that gave warning of the attack, and next moment the rapid tattoo that heralded the butchery. Stray bullets ripped through the branches overhead and a couple thudded on the little concrete fort, then the firing ceased abruptly. The stricken field was mercifully covered by night, but the dark curls clung damp about her temples at the thought that Kenyon must be somewhere among those panic-stricken, shouting people. Then there was a dull boom to seaward and in the flash of the following explosion she caught a glimpse of the Martello Tower.

For what seemed an interminable time she watched the shelling and then the silhouette of the village, black and sharp against the revealing searchlight, while little running figures gesticulated to one another. One by one the houses seemed to leap into a blinding sheet of flame as the projectiles struck them, and then disappear, so that the remnant of the burning hamlet began to take on the appearance of a row of black and jagged teeth which were being steadily extracted.

The gun took a new angle, and the shells fell nearer to the fields ahead where Ann believed Kenyon to be dead or wounded. She wrung her hands helplessly together, and at every fresh detonation a shudder shook her from head to toe. For hours it seemed she had been crouching there, sending up little muttered prayers that the holocaust should cease, but there was no indication of its speedy termination. The searchlight shifted to the
north but, owing to the shelving beach, she was spared the sight of that last desperate attempt of the survivors to seek safety; she only heard the renewed rattle of rifle and machine-gun fire and then a sudden silence.

For another quarter of an hour she watched, fearful that at any moment the fighting might break out again, then by the dancing light of the flames she saw figures moving freely about the wreck of the village and crawled from her shelter.

If Kenyon was dead she felt that it mattered little what happened any more, but if he was still alive she might yet be able to aid him so, taking a deep breath of the fresh night air, she set off towards the Redoubt.

The going was not easy in the darkness; deep ditches half-filled with water and stinking mud intersected the fields of long coarse grass and, having fallen once, cutting her hand badly on a rusty nail, she did the last hundred yards on hands and knees until she was among the victims of the righting.

Someone stumbled near her and she realised that others were seeking friends among the more seriously wounded who had been unable to crawl away. Then lights appeared a little distance to her left and she saw that a group of men were carrying those still living in rough stretchers towards the village. She stood up suddenly with fresh hope, feeling how senseless it was to stay there listening to those pathetic voices calling for the missing. In the darkness she would stand little chance of finding Kenyon, but if he was still alive he would be carried down to the beach with the others.

Trailing a group of stretcher-bearers she made her way down to the foreshore, and saw that two camps had already been formed. The farmers and the fisher-people were now mingled together and, a little apart, stood some fifty sailors from the ship. At the sight of the mutineers she drew back quickly with a sudden horrible memory of Crowder and Brisket, but they were busy about a bonfire that they had lit across which they were hoisting a spitted pig. Then she caught sight of Gregory hunched on the shingle, his arms tied behind his back.

Veronica was kneeling by him adjusting a rough bandage to his head, and a little way behind them sat Silas, also bound. Rudd was there too, some way away and half-obscured by the fringe of shadow. His hands were free, she noticed, but the bulging pistol holster which had always decorated his hip was
missing, and as the flame flickered for a second, lighting his face, she saw a miserable and hopeless expression upon it.

For a moment Ann thought of going to them, but her fears for Kenyon overcame every other impulse and she turned away towards the larger gathering. They too had heaped a fire and by it some men were busy dismembering a horse. Although she knew little of the situation Ann judged from this that the sailors were the masters in this partnership, and to placate their unsought allies had parted with this indifferent portion of their spoil rather than be compelled to drive them off.

Mud-stained and bedraggled as she was there was little chance of her being recognised as Kenyon's companion of earlier in the evening, so she threaded her way in among them to a spot some distance from the fire where the long line of wounded were being deposited. Some lay unnaturally still and silent, others were twisting and groaning in their pain, but she peered furtively at each in turn and came to the end of the row without finding Kenyon among them.

‘Happen you're looken' for a friend?' As the man behind her spoke she started guiltily, but his voice was sympathetic and kind, so recovering herself quickly she replied:

‘Not—not exactly—but I was wondering what happened to the tall man they caught up on the heath.'

‘Happen you be meanen' him that give the alarm. The officer chap; 'oodn't that be him they're a-setten' down now?'

He pointed a grimy finger towards the other end of the row and Ann recognised at once the long-limbed body which was being laid beside the others. The firelight caught the auburn curls, no longer smoothly-brushed but rumpled now and clotted with dried blood.

She hastened over to him, her new acquaintance following. ‘Is he—is he dead, d'you think?' she managed to stammer.

The man peered down at him. ‘It fare to me he'll live all right. They ‘oodn't trouble to bring him in else, but anyways these fellers be shooten' all the officers come mornen'.'

‘Are you certain; how do you know?' Ann's voice held a sudden sharp note, half-fear, half-challenging refusal to accept the statement.

‘Waren't you here ten minutes agone?' the man looked at her curiously. ‘The furrin' looken' sailor who fare to be the boss told all of we they meant to sail again come sun up, and after
that us ‘ooldn't have no more trouble with any o' they thievin' soldiers hereabouts,'

‘I see; then that settles it.' Ann hardly recognised her own voice, it came so strange and harsh although she strove to make it sound as natural as possible.

‘I be rare vexed for they,' said the man slowly, ‘but I reckon they'd have done the same to the others, come to that.'

Ann nodded, she was past all speech and could only visualise her wounded Kenyon, kindly Silas and the ever-defiant Gregory, being massacred upon the beach in the cold morning light.

As the man moved away she looked furtively after him and then stooped to Kenyon. Despite the blood she could find no wound upon his head, perhaps he had been thrown against another casualty; his arm had fallen from a sling and she replaced it quickly, noting the flesh wound in the shoulder that Veronica had bandaged. Apart from that he seemed to be unhurt and he was breathing regularly, so she guessed that the explosion from a shell burst had knocked him out.

Another man paused near to her, it was Rush, and suddenly fearful of being recognised she hastened away into the darkness of the beach, but a gruff voice brought her to a standstill: ‘Not this way, Missie; your supper's a-cookin' on the beach.'

A broad-shouldered sailor leaning on a rifle barrel barred her passage, so she turned away without protest, veering off towards the still smouldering houses, but another sentry farther along also turned her back and then she realised that they were posted in a circle guarding the approaches to the corral that held Gregory's fine collection of poultry and live stock, about which Kenyon had told her on the way from Orford. The idea flashed into her mind and out again, for it mattered little to her who secured this wretched provender. Her whole anxiety was centred in the prisoners, so she struggled across the now deserted fortifications and, gaining the open marsh, sat down to think.

As she rocked backwards and forwards, torn with a terrible distress, her natural urge was to risk discovery, but get back to Kenyon and remain with him, to face whatever the dawn should bring, yet all her sound practical common sense revolted at the thought of final surrender. Alone among the little band that had set out from London she remained free. Surely she could use her freedom in some way to help the others.

For half an hour she sat, her head in her hands, her brain
absolutely incapable of coherent thought, tired, miserable, dejected, unable to think of a single way in which she might bring them succour or relief, then like a thunderclap the words of the agitator in the dell: ‘Already the towns are organising,' came back to her.

She recalled the ensuing conversation, with its mention of the Mayor being back in Ipswich and the issuing of rations by the Greyshirts, word for word. If only she could get to Ipswich they would be sure to help her, and she might yet be able to save her friends.

No sooner had the thought come to her than she was on her feet, angry with herself for the time that she had already lost by not having grasped the full implication of the news before, yet moving cautiously, terrified that she might be stopped and questioned; for now she was quite convinced that upon the retention of her freedom hung their only hope.

Every shadow seemed a menace and every sound a threat. Even the grounding of a rifle butt or the calling of the sentries to each other caused her fresh alarm. With quick stealthy steps she headed inland until she had passed from the lingering glow into the darkness of the marshes.

The ground soon began to give her trouble. Uneven, boggy in places, or sown with Gregory's man-traps for the protection of the Martello Tower, which lay in ruins to seaward. Then, clear of the defensive belt at last, she ran up the slight incline only to pause breathlessly at the top visualising suddenly the tremendous task she had set herself.

Ipswich was sixteen miles away, she would never be able to do it after her journey with Kenyon and the strain to which she had been subject the previous night; yet she hurried on, assessing the chances as she went.

They had left Orford at seven-thirty, two hours at least must have been spent upon the way, another hour between their capture and the first attack on Shingle Street; that then would have been somewhere about ten-thirty. How long had it lasted, from start to finish? an hour perhaps. Then she had waited in the pillbox for a bit, hung about the bonfire on the shore looking for Kenyon among the wounded—and then wasted more time stupidly doing nothing. It must be twelve-thirty at the least, and sixteen miles would take her a good five hours. She could not hope to arrive in Ipswich before six o'clock.

Too late, she decided. Aeroplanes and cars could hardly be running again yet, so soldiers or police would have to rely on horses and bicycles. By such means it would take them a good two hours to get to Shingle Street and sunrise would be about six. Unless she could reach Ipswich by four o'clock they would arrive too late.

Suddenly a new plan came to her, the cross-country route. If she took that it would save her at least four miles, but it meant crossing the River Deben.

In normal times there was a ferry boat at Ramsholt and in an emergency the ferryman could be dragged out of bed, but would he still be at his house, Ann wondered. Perhaps, starving like the rest, he had wandered farther towards the coast or back into some town. She would never be able to swim the Deben—a quarter of a mile of water with treacherous muddy banks.

She paused for a moment by a solitary farmhouse, leaning against the low stone wall, breathless already from the pace at which she had come, and miserably undecided which road to take—the track leading north to Melton and Woodbridge or the lane to the left through Alderton to Ramsholt. Then, with the swift realisation that her only hope lay in taking a chance on being able to cross the river, she turned down the lane; to go by Woodbridge meant certain failure on account of time.

With that vital factor of time pressing upon her brain she broke into a run and covered the next half mile in seven minutes. Then she slackened into a breathless, shambling trot.

All question of what reception she was likely to meet with when she got to Ipswich, and if the authorities would be willing to undertake her friends' relief, had passed from her mind. The one thing that mattered was to get there at the earliest possible moment, for she had already convinced herself that, if she could only stay the course, troops, police and Greyshirts would be sent dashing to the rescue.