Gallipoli Street (34 page)

The next morning a wail broke over the house as Peter Clarkson Murphy entered the world and no one gave him more cuddles than his aunt Pattie.

Beersheba, Palestine, 31 October 1917

It was the flies that got to him. On his food, his face, his ears, cloistered about the dead and annoying the horses, constant and clinging. After nearly two years in the Middle East he'd decided he'd never complain about the flies in Australia again, not after this. It had become a game to them to try and eat their food before a certain number of flies landed on it. Iggy held the record, managing to land only two in his mouth during lunch one day. Some of the men had given up on the ‘blowies' and ate them along with the food, figuring it all tasted about the same.

They were waiting for yet another battle, scattered about in small groups across the desert to deter attacks from the air. The horses were thirsty and Jack walked over to pat Tilley and reassure her, impatient to make a move as the punishing sun bore down on yet another dry, dusty afternoon. She pushed her head against him and he talked to her softly, her large eyes trusting as he ran his hand along the pelt of her nose.

A group passed nearby and they squinted and saw they were Turkish prisoners being led away.

Simmo immediately leapt up and began shouting, ‘Go back an fight yer bastards!' baring his backside and whistling loudly. They laughed and Jack shook his head as Simmo waved his bottom in the air. ‘Tell 'em Australia sent ya!'

Jack gave Tilley one last pat before settling back down and placing his hat over his eyes, moving off to his favourite place: Vera. How he missed her, the lightness of her smile, the everyday joy she exuded, the gentle way she had about her when someone needed nurturing. And her body. Oh how he missed that. He felt he could trace every curve in his mind's eye down to the last inch, although he supposed it was different now in parts. More rounded. He smiled at the thought, looking forward to finding out, then sighed. If he ever got out of this blasted desert. He couldn't seem to remember a time when he wasn't stinking and filthy, the dust in every inch of his clothing and person. Then again he supposed he should be thankful. He could be waist-deep in mud like the poor sods in France. He shuddered to think of living in those trenches.

Something else bothered him though, more than the flies and the dust and the heat. It had continued to grow since Gallipoli, the uneasy feeling that he'd changed here. He'd noticed it in some of the others too, even Iggy. They'd become truly hardened. Once upon a time the sight of a dead man would have turned his stomach, but now he barely noticed the corpses lining the fields of battle. The unthinkable act of burying a bayonet in a man's heart was everyday work. And he didn't even register the screams of the dying and wounded, blocking them out as expected noise.

Not that he enjoyed it. He hated it, all of it. And he hated what it had turned him into.

Problem was, he didn't know how he was ever going to turn back into himself again. Into Jack Murphy. He was ‘Lieutenant' or ‘Murph' or ‘cobber'. Jack Murphy was an ordinary man, not a digger. As much as he lived for the day, he didn't know how he would be able to handle going home. They wouldn't understand; how could they? Even Veronica, for all she had seen, would never have to live with becoming part of the killing. He felt unclean, like the stench of slaying men could never leave him now, sometimes gazing at the blood on his hands and feeling that it forever stained his skin. Only his brothers here understood, and he thanked God that Iggy was with him. Somehow, having a mate going through the same thing made him feel he could face home again.

It was hours later when he opened his eyes, surprised he'd managed to doze off for a while, and he watched Iggy thoughtfully stroking Ebony and staring out across to where they knew their usual division, the 1st, were fighting. He, Iggy and Simmo had been pulled in to the 4th Division two days ago and Jack wondered why they had been picked. With Simmo's recent promotion, perhaps General Chauvel felt he needed more experienced officers for this part of his attack. Jack laughed inwardly, thinking of Simmo's backside waving antics, wondering what Chauvel would make of that particular brand of leadership.

The signal came and Jack roused himself, mounting with the others as they re-formed the line, wondering why they were bothering as the afternoon wore on.

An hour and a half later they were still waiting as the horses flicked their tails, smelling the water in the nearby town of Beersheba. What was Chauvel up to? They had a great deal of faith in their Australian leader but this seemed a strange move. Why hold them there, waiting, so late in the day?

Then the instructions rang clear down the line. They were ordered to draw their bayonets like swords for a mounted charge. The Light Horse were to break through to Beersheba, secure the wells and take prisoners. On horseback. Jack exchanged glances with Iggy. It was unheard of for mounted cavalry to stay on horseback and charge and they knew Chauvel was taking a great gamble based on the faith he had in the abilities of his men.

Jack wondered if this was it. Was this the day he would die, here in this hated desert, a million miles from home, on a suicide charge towards a city of enemies, hoisting bayonets against machine guns?

Backs straightened along the line and they held their mounts firm, bracing themselves. Jack felt the sweat of his palms against the leather as the call came.

‘Go straight at it.'

They began at a trot, fanning out, then leapt forward and seized the only weapons they had, speed and surprise. Jack felt the fear flooding through him and harnessed it as determination, urging Tilley on and hoisting his makeshift sword. She flew across the desert next to Ebony, the need for water adding to her speed as the pounding of hooves beat a thundering drum in the burning afternoon light. Machine-gun fire met them and men and horses fell. Flashes of Gallipoli assaulted his memory, but he pushed the images of massacre out of his mind and forced himself to keep on riding. They were still falling but somehow less so. What was Johnny Turk up to? The trenches were near and he realised they were actually going to make it. It was a blur. His bayonet flashed and met flesh and Tilley swung about as they moved as one. He pushed through, Iggy still alongside, and they slashed and turned, watching the Turks scramble to recover from the shock of hundreds of Australians appearing out of the dust and bearing down on them at once, like giants towering above them, orange steel in the sun.

Some surrendered at once, others fought bravely, and soon the sudden chaos was just as suddenly over and the bewildered Turks had lost the stronghold of Beersheba at the hands of just a few hundred Australian Light Horsemen. Turkish losses were heavy and the Australians took over seven hundred prisoners with only thirty-one of their own dead.

But every number holds a precious life.

Jack found Iggy crying, pinned beneath Ebony. The once fastest horse in northern Sydney had taken a fatal shot from a Turkish bullet. Iggy's leg was crushed, but his tears of agony were for far more than the physical pain. Jack pulled him free and supported him as he struggled to pat his loyal mount one last time. When they turned, it was to see a stretcher pass by, Simmo's enormous form sprawled across it, stilled at last by the enemy's sword. They heard later he took on several men at once and was caught from behind.

The horses drank their fill as the ancient city gave in to the night, and slept in the hands of new rulers for the first time in centuries, while on her outskirts the shovels pierced the land and buried those who also slept, but would never wake.

Mick came but Tom chose to continue working with Iggy and the other wounded under the giant red cross marking the mobile hospital from the air. The sky was clear as usual and the sky turned a dusky pink, staining the dark into light as the day dawned on those who still survived this desert war.

Jack and Mick stood together, watching them hammer the white crosses above the fallen and thinking about their mate Simmo, who would never again entertain them or make them laugh, nor delight them with his amazing resourcefulness. The large man with his even larger heart was gone, along with so many others from home. Jack felt his sorrow border on desperation as he stared at the cross that held so few words for such a man. How he resented the fools who'd sent them all there, the men in boardrooms and mansions and castles who played with their lives, poring over their big maps then sipping their whisky from their crystal glasses. He felt a stab of grief and sent it straight to God as the bugler played the last post.
Please, let it
end
.

The burial over, they walked back together, the sun beginning to burn once again.

‘Jeez, I'm starving. What shall it be, bully beef or flies for breakfast?' Jack sighed.

‘Actually I've got high hopes for some eggs now we've taken the town. Saw some chickens running about this morning.'

‘As long as it wasn't human chicks you were looking at. They get a bit funny about their women around here, Casanova.'

Mick laughed. ‘Hey, I'll be too busy keeping Tom out of trouble to be sweet-talking in this town. I wonder if you can get arrested for being too friendly?'

‘Tomfoolery perhaps?'

Mick laughed again before squinting against the sun at an approaching plane.

‘What the hell…?'

The single German plane was low and flying towards the hospital and Mick and Jack watched in horror as the impossible happened.

People scattered as the bomb dropped and blew the red cross across the desert, sending debris flying in a massive black cloud. Men ran out of the conflagration, their bodies on fire as the plumes rose like the gates of hell behind them. His senses assaulted, Jack found himself, after almost three years of war, frozen in shock for the first time.

Mick took off at a sprint, screaming orders as he searched frantically for survivors in the chaos, however Jack still couldn't seem to move as he watched the appalling scene unfold, almost as if he were watching something make-believe. It was too terrible to be real as injured men tried to crawl away, their clothing and skin and hair in flames. Then he saw that one of them was Iggy and something clicked. He ran to pull him free and soon joined the others in a desperate race to stay the hand of death.

Then it was done. The dead lay and the living writhed and a terrible sound rent the air.

Jack turned to see his brothers-in-law lying in the morning sun, Mick screaming in pain not from his severely burned leg but for the charred form of his beloved brother, Tom, dead in his arms.

That afternoon the sun's final journey ended as it had begun: in burial. The desert had taken another life, the most unjust casualty of all, because this was a life that had been dedicated to saving others, in more ways than one. A man who made the intolerable duty of war bearable for all who knew him, salvaging their sanity along with limbs and lives. The one person who kept them going was now gone, and in their darkest hour, when they needed him the most.