Harkaway's Sixth Column (27 page)

The strange habits of the Italian army also began to appear as a red lorry was stopped, containing women from a brothel the Italians had set up. They also discovered General Barracca’s private caravan parked behind Guidotti’s headquarters, the whole ten tons of it, camouflaged and complete with bath and lavatory, together with large stocks of tinned fruit, tomatoes, brandy, wine, pasta, pate de foie gras, sandbags, batteries, shells and mortar bombs, while in the courtyard of the Bank of Italy it was discovered that two hundred thousand paper lire had been burned.

‘Christ,’ Gooch mourned, ‘what couldn’t I have done with that lot!’

Then it was discovered that three trucks which had been standing in the yard since they arrived were carrying twenty thousand Maria Theresa dollars nobody had known anything about, so Harkaway used them to hold a pay parade and solemnly handed one each to his delighted native soldiers.

By this time, the Italians were no longer trying to be military. There was no longer any drama, no strutting with medals, ribbons and boots. Morale had gone completely with defeat and they were utterly devoid of spirit, still streaming in from the outposts round the town, some brought in by Somalis armed with ancient weapons, some entirely on their own. Harkaway disarmed them all, his Somalis behaving impeccably. They called him
Odei-gi-Rer-ki
- the Old Man of the Tribe - and couldn’t do enough for him. Under their supervision, an extra barbed wire cage was hurriedly constructed by the Italians themselves, who then solemnly marched inside and took themselves prisoner.

Harkaway stared at them with contempt. ‘If I could only have had a week to train ‘em,’ he said. ‘I could have held this bloody place for a year with sixty baboons!’

The Somalis were no longer using the fascist salute that had been ordered and instead gave the graceful and courteous traditional greeting that was half a bow and half a wave. Harkaway’s Boys had long since learned to stick their thumbs up when they were pleased, in the manner of a good old-fashioned British swaddy, and Tully had taught his squads to shout ‘Balls to Mussolini!’ as they passed each other on the market square, something they did with great glee, wide grins splitting their black faces.

‘If you’re not careful,’ Harkaway said coldly, ‘you’ll have ‘em singing “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary”.’

It was a challenge, Tully had to admit, and within a few days they were. It was barely recognizable but it
was
‘Tipperary’ - just!

Every day now outside headquarters, there were zitherlike instruments to greet the Europeans as they arrived, and single-string violins and bamboo flutes moaning out discordant music. The Italian insignia which had graced the town had all gone, all the Roman eagles, all the fasces, all the muscular slogans, all except the broken column Guidotti had set up opposite the flagpole, because in a way that was a trophy of war and an indication of the Italian defeat.

‘Pity we can’t wear the bloody thing on our drum cloths,’ Harkaway said.

It was while he was studying it that Gooch arrived with a message from Tully.

‘He’s managed to contact Jijiga,’ he said. ‘He’s in touch with the South Africans. They’re asking when you can get Bidiyu. He wants to know what to reply.’

Harkaway smiled. ‘Tell ‘em,’ he said, ‘that we’ve already got it.’

‘For God’s sake,’ the general growled, ‘who is this bloody Sixth Column?’

His staff looked at each other, none of them able to offer anything that was in the slightest bit helpful, and the general threw up his hands in frustration. ‘And who’s this damn Colonel Harkaway? I’ve never heard of him. Any of you?’

Nobody had.

‘And who are the Free British? Good God! Free British! It sounds a bit spurious to me.’

‘There’s nothing spurious, sir,’ Charlton pointed out, ‘about the way he got his men over the mountains to hit Barracca’s column.’

The general had to admit the fact. ‘Could he be one of these white hunter types?’ he asked. ‘Some chap who’s been put in charge from Aden? There are a few with the South Africans. There’s even that renegade Austrian, with the name that sounds like Cami-knickers.’ The general smiled. ‘When he found a waterhole, the Springboks promptly christened it the Camisole.’

There were still no answers and he went on, bewildered. ‘The bloody man only seems to obey orders when it suits him,’ he said. ‘Are you sure he couldn’t have come down from Abyssinia, Charlie? One of Wingate’s men.
He’s
an odd character, if ever there was one. Is this chap one of his lieutenants? Harkaway sounds the phoney sort of name they like to give themselves.’ The general paused, then made up his mind. ‘Charlie, get over to Bidiyu and make contact. For God’s sake, let’s find out once and for all who they are and what they’re up to. And if this chap Harkaway’s
not
an officer, for God’s sake let’s make him one before anyone finds out. It looks so damn bad to have civilians doing the army’s job as well as we can do it ourselves.’

As Colonel Charlton prepared his car for the journey he heard someone cough behind him.

The two war correspondents, Wye and Russell, had arrived in Jijiga that morning, their faces plastered with the muddy masks of sweat and dust.

‘We’ve heard that Bidiyu’s fallen,’ Wye said. ‘To this Sixth Column lot.’

‘That’s right,’ Charlton agreed. ‘I’m just going along there to make contact.’

‘Mind if we come along, too?’

‘No trouble at all. Got your own car?’

‘We had,’ Wye said. ‘But the battery’s dead and the self-starter’s out of action, and we kept having to ask the lorries coming up behind to give us a push start. But then the rear spring gave on these bloody awful roads and the body started slipping sideways.’ He grinned. ‘We tried to ram it upright with a truck but it didn’t work. We’d be glad of a lift.’

Harkaway woke slowly. A warm breeze was coming through the open windows, stirring the netting curtains. Outside he could see palms and a few gum trees and could smell the wood smoke, the old smell of Africa. No matter where you went - even in the city - you had it with you always.

He turned his head to find Danny staring at him. She didn’t return his smile.

‘What’s up?’ he asked cheerfully. ‘Got the willies? We’re winning, you know. We’ve licked the Eyeties. The Boys are pleased. I’m here in old Twinkletoes’s very own bed. And you’re alongside me. What more can you ask?’

She didn’t answer at once because she had a feeling he was slipping away from her even before she’d managed to grasp him.

It was hard for her to understand. All her life despite occasional setbacks, she’d been supported by her belief in her Bible and the religious teaching she’d undergone so that she could fight back against despair, but suddenly she felt that this time it wouldn’t provide the answer.

‘What are you going to do next?’ she asked. ‘Haven’t we finished now?’

‘The war’s not over,’ he said briskly. ‘Even if it’s stopped in Bidiyu. I’m an Old Testament type myself and I believe in an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. The Italians have sown the wind; they’re entitled to reap the whirlwind.’

‘Aren’t we going to Mombasa? Or South Africa?’

Harkaway gave her his foxy grin. It seemed colder than ever. ‘I haven’t got Twinkletoes yet,’ he said.

‘Do you
have
to have him?’

‘The bastard said I’d go begging for mercy. I’ll just show him it doesn’t pay to say things like that about George Harkaway.’

‘Don’t push your luck too hard, George.’

‘You think it’s luck?’

‘No.’ But she hesitated as she replied because, in fact, she did. They
had
been lucky. Things had gone right all along the line.

He was obviously unimpressed by her warning. ‘He’s nothing but a piddling little Italian ice-cream salesman,’ he said. ‘My family have been soldiers since Pontius was a pilot.’

‘I guessed as much.’

He seemed pleased. ‘Does it show?’

There was a long silence, then he went on slowly. ‘My family,’ he admitted, ‘have been army for generations. My father was a general. And he wasn’t the first. My grandfather was one too. There were one or two others, too, in the last century. Famous ones.’

‘I’ve never heard the name.’

He laughed. ‘You don’t think I’d be stupid enough to enlist under my own name, do you? I’d have been spotted at once. I made it up. You ever heard of General MacDonald Tremayne?’

‘No.’

‘You wouldn’t, of course. He wasn’t one of the Twelve Apostles.’

It was insulting but she said nothing, beginning to feel a nagging worry for him inside her.

‘There’ve been Tremaynes in the army since the Civil War. It’s bred in the bone. What I know I didn’t learn at Sandhurst. I imbibed it with my mother’s milk. I heard it talked about over the dining table from the day I first started joining the family at meals. It’s not a profession with me. It’s an instinct.’

‘What happened, George?’ she asked gently. ‘You
were
an officer, weren’t you?’

Harkaway hesitated a moment then he nodded. ‘Once. They sacked me. I borrowed another chap’s car. I took it for a weekend when he was away on a course. He wouldn’t have known but I fell in with some friends and got a bit drunk and smashed it up. And unfortunately, he didn’t like me, so that “borrowing” became “stealing”. The police took a dim view of it, too, because he hadn’t intended it to be on the road and it wasn’t insured. I didn’t know, but it made no difference. I ended up in court. The army showed me the door.’

‘For that?’

‘Well,’ he admitted, ‘there was a bit more to it than that. There was a dud cheque, too. It was damn’ silly, really, because I could have had the money from my father if I’d asked. But I was young and a bit stupid. People are at that age. I once rode a motorbike down the corridor of the officers’ mess. Showing off.’ He paused, his mind far away. ‘Actually the bookie I gave the cheque to was pretty decent about it. He knew me and didn’t want to make an issue of it but when they started making enquiries after the car incident it all came out. I wasn’t cashiered. Family name and all that. But I had to leave, all the same. I enlisted again under an assumed name and asked to be posted out here.’ He frowned. ‘If I’d waited until the war broke out, I could have got a commission as easy as falling off a log in one of the other services. It was a bit of a mess.’

‘I’m sorry, George.’

His frown deepened. ‘It probably wouldn’t have happened if the bastard who owned the car hadn’t been a narrow-minded, mealy-mouthed, arsehole-creeper who went to church on Sundays. You can see why I don’t like ‘em much.’

She touched his arm, gently, affectionately. Despite her doubts, she had ended up in his bed. She had won him and she longed to keep him. ‘Don’t go, George,’ she begged.

‘I have to. It isn’t over until I’ve got Twinkletoes.’

Her eyes were tragic. ‘Do you even know where he is?’

‘He went north into Ethiopia.’

She stared at him for a long time, holding the sheet to her throat to hide her nakedness. ‘That’s farther away than ever from Mombasa or South Africa. Will Gooch and Paddy Tully go with you?’

‘They’re like me. They can’t stop.’

‘You’ve persuaded them?’

Harkaway shrugged and smiled. ‘They don’t take a lot of persuading,’ he said. ‘They’re neither of them very bright lights.’

‘You’re using them. You’ve used us all.’

‘Not you, my white-breasted Bronwen.’

‘What am I doing here then?’

She fell silent, realizing how far she’d moved from the moral atmosphere of the life she’d been brought up to live. She was behaving like a loose woman and enjoying it. Suddenly her life had blossomed and she’d come to realize that she needed love. Even her face had changed; the taut, bleak look that had once been there had gone.

She studied Harkaway as he went to the window, naked like herself, strong, muscular and confident. It was Harkaway who had shown her the way, but she had a suspicion that for the future their paths were going to diverge and that she’d have to look elsewhere for affection. Harkaway was too busy, too ambitious - probably, she had to admit, too ruthless - for her to make a life with him.

He swung round from the window. ‘Will you come with us?’ he asked.

She shook her head. ‘I’ve had enough of living rough. A woman needs a bit of comfort. Her make-up’s different.’

‘So’s her plumbing. And thank God for it.’

He approached the bed and grabbed for her. She pushed him away.

‘I’m your warrior lord,’ he laughed. ‘You’re my favourite wife!’

He snatched away the sheet and she screamed. Then he jumped on the bed and did a lopsided dance.

‘The magic of the east,’ he said. ‘I always used to wonder what it was that Rudolph Valentino had that I hadn’t got. My sister had pictures of him posted all over the inside of her wardrobe. Always with a bare chest. He was always being photographed only in his pants.’ He grinned at her.
‘I’m
not even wearing my pants.’

She was unable to avoid laughing at him and he knelt beside her and pushed her back on to the pillows.

‘They went for him in a big way,’ he said. ‘Lots of swooning. Lots of kissing. Like this.’ He kissed her fiercely, his hands moving over her body. ‘Net curtains just as we have here. A warm breeze. Balmy nights. And a bloody big bed,’ he yelled as he dived for her.

For a while she struggled against him, laughing and shrieking, then she stopped suddenly and melted in his arms. He bent over her, kissing her throat and breasts, until her breath came quickly.

‘Oh, George!’ she begged, her eyes moist with tears. ‘Don’t go away! Please don’t go away!’

But he did.

That afternoon, the Sixth Column lorries, together with a few extra they’d taken from the Italians in Bidiyu, roared out of town. To Harkaway’s Boys had now been added a few Ethiopians who until the day before had been wearing the uniform of the Italians.

Danny watched them go, an empty feeling in her breast. For weeks Harkaway had been her sun and her moon. Despite his autocratic manners, he’d come to mean more to her than anyone else in the whole of her life and now he was gone, and she had a feeling life would never be the same again.