Rain (30 page)

He said it with a twinkle in his eye and she laughed. ‘No. No, I can promise you I’m not a journalist. I can’t write for toffee, I’m afraid. Do you think Mrs Chamberlain will mind me waiting here? Is she going to be back soon?’

‘Yeah, I reckon. Maybe only an hour probably. You can go and find her if you like. She’s just gone to the graveyard to take some flowers to Tom.’

‘No. I couldn’t possibly. She’ll want to be on her own.’

‘Not necessarily. I go along with her now and again. She likes the company. Go on, go. It’ll do her good. It’ll give her someone else to remember with.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yeah. I’m sure. You know how to get to the church?’

‘Yes. I remember from the funeral. Just left at the gate and about half a mile down the road.’

‘That’s the one. Should take you about ten minutes. She only left ten minutes ago herself. Go now and you’ll catch her.’

‘Thanks. Oh.’ She held out her hand. ‘I’m Cassie.’

He shook it. ‘Nice to meet you, Cassie. I’m Lee, Mrs Chamberlain’s gardener.’

‘And bodyguard too, by the sound of things.’

He grinned. ‘Yeah. You could say that. We’re all looking out for her, that’s all.’

‘I understand. I think that’s great. Tom would be grateful.’

‘I hope so. He was a good man. Never knew him that well meself. But he was in the top year at school when I was small and was always nice to me.’

‘Yes. He was nice to everybody. I’d best be off.’

‘See you in a bit then.’ But she was already walking back down the drive to the road.

As she walked she caught glimpses of the steeple through the hedgerows. Lazy, fluffy clouds hung in the sky, and some cows in a field watched her idly. With every step she lost her nervousness, and a glow came through her, spreading from the bottom of her back and reaching into her fingers.
Everything is going to be all right
.

Cassie lifted the latch of the mossy gate and walked into the churchyard. A rabbit started at her appearance and bolted down its hole beneath an old gravestone. Cassie paused, tugged up her jeans and ran a hand through her hair. She peered around the side of the church and saw Constance, who was standing at the foot of Tom’s grave, staring down at the headstone. Cassie walked towards her as if in a dream. Everything now seemed to make sense. She came closer and noticed that, even just two months on, Tom’s grave had started to blend in with the others. The turf was greener than that around it, and slightly raised, but the edges of the plot
were blurred, and soon the grave would look as if it had always been there. At the foot of the headstone was a bunch of blue wild flowers, and around it were some jam jars of other flowers: roses, tulips and a couple of poppies, their fragile, crêpe-paper petals waving slightly in the breeze.

Constance turned towards her and smiled, politely at first and then with delight. ‘Cassie! What are you doing here? What a surprise!’

Cassie gulped. They hugged, and she kissed Constance on both cheeks. She felt tiny and frail in her arms.
Not just yet
. She lied: ‘I was just passing through and thought I’d drop in. Lee said I would find you here.’

‘Well, what a lovely surprise.’ Constance looked down at the grave. ‘Tom would be so thrilled that you came. I’ve just been chatting a bit to him and making sure he’s looking smart. He always loved wild flowers.’

‘They’re lovely. I wish I’d brought some myself.’

‘Don’t be silly. It’s just wonderful you’re here.’ She looked away and spoke as if Cassie wasn’t there. ‘Sometimes I wonder how he’s doing, and I worry about him. But then I just come over here, where I know I’ll always find him. And even in the rain, or in the wind, or even when it’s night or a lovely day like today, it always feels as if he’s next to me when I come here, and every time I look at the gravestone I feel him there, grinning cheekily and telling me not to worry.’

Cassie found herself crying. She couldn’t find the strength to speak, and they stood there in silence. A cloud hid the sun for a moment, and when it reappeared she felt its rays on the back of her neck and saw their shadows flung over the grave.
Now is the time
.

In the evening the sun shot red over them, and in the turret Dusty traversed left to right, desperate to pick up any target. He had never felt so angry. The Scimitars were on the high ground giving overwatch. They had barma’d their way up in the afternoon. Cocked Pistol had been taken, and already the engineers’ diggers were filling the Hesco walls, turning it into a new PB. It had fallen without much of a fight in the end, and now the battle group held the entire area. There was no jubilation; immediately it came over the net that the final objective had been cleared everyone realized how tired they were, and a heavy, leaden exhaustion came over them all.

The boys were sitting in the lee of the wagon. No one spoke. Jessie cried a single tear which cleared a line down his dusty cheek and hung on his jaw, refusing to fall off. Trueman stood over him. He didn’t say anything.

In the turret were Dusty and O’Shea. Just as the sun dipped out of sight and evening started to sink into night, through the sight Dusty saw a pickup truck come to a halt outside a compound to the south. ‘Fuck, we got something,’ he shouted, and the others all stood up and looked back down the valley. Dusty watched the unfolding drama. From the compound two men came, supporting a third. Dusty started a running commentary. ‘Three enemy conducting casevac. Looks like a wounded fighter. He’s properly fucked. Black trousers. Looks like a white dish-dash wrapped around his stomach like a bandage. Lots of blood on it. Proper fucked.’

Trueman was on top of the turret now, scanning south with his binoculars. ‘Got ’em, Stardust. Good spot. Clear as day. Keep watching, keep watching.’

O’Shea babbled excitedly in the turret. ‘Can we engage? Can we engage? We’ve
PID
’d, clear as you like. We can just say we saw some weapons on them. Quickly, before they go.’ He turned to Dusty. ‘Come on, mate! Before they go!’

The fighters placed the wounded man in the back of the truck and went to get in the front. Dusty lined up the sights on them. ‘Lasing. One two fifty. I’ve got them.’ He flicked the gun to automatic and his finger stroked the trigger as he made some final, perfectionist tweaks to the elevation. He looked up to Trueman, who nodded, his face pitiless.

Again O’Shea jabbered: ‘Come on, Dusty. Fuck ’em up. We’ve got ’em, we’ve got ’em. Waste them, waste them. For the boss. Do it for the boss!’

Dusty flicked the selector switch back to safe. The gun stayed silent. The pickup drove off. Tired and with a weary calm, he said quietly, ‘No. No. The boss wouldn’t have wanted it. He wouldn’t have engaged. We don’t do that stuff.’

All events in this book are fictional, and its characters bear no resemblance to anyone living or dead. Loy Kabir and Shah Kalay are fictional too, though if they were to be put on a map of Helmand Province they would be somewhere between the towns of Musa Qala and Kajaki.

Real experience was, however, father to the fiction.

My sincere thanks to the many people without whose advice and encouragement this book could never have appeared. In particular I am grateful to Johnnie Standing for championing it when it was at its most fragile. My wonderful agent Annabel Merullo, Laura Williams and the team at Peters Fraser & Dunlop have been brilliant to work with. Tim Binding intervened decisively to steer the book when it was a bit rudderless; a crucial help for which I am indebted. Hugh Davis copy-edited the book with great delicacy and surgical precision. Jedge Lewin gave his hard-won and lightly borne Afghan medical expertise. At Penguin Random House Beatrix Mclntyre and Jess Jackson have been fantastic, and my great thanks to my editor Rowland White for his belief in the book, his inspiring enthusiasm and his sensitivity with the text.

I had the privilege in my Army career of serving with men and women from all across the Armed Forces. Great strength of character, innate human decency and selfless commitment were ubiquitous. I would, though, like to single out for special mention the Household Cavalry, the small part of the Army that I was fortunate enough to call home. I was welcomed into it by soldiers who have become lifelong friends. Every day I
think about the time I spent with Household Cavalrymen, the lessons that I learned alongside them and those I learned from them. It was an extraordinary education.

I want to pay tribute to the men and women of Her Majesty’s Armed Forces who served in Afghanistan.

I heard a country calling. Many others did too. So we went.

10-liner
. Document filled out upon the discovery of an
IED
or suspected device, consisting of ten serials such as location, time found, what kind of device it may be, to give the
REST
and the
ATO
the best possible information for when they come to investigate.

105
. 105-millimetre calibre artillery piece with a range of up to eleven miles.

2ic
.
Second in command
.

30 mil
. 30-millimetre calibre ammunition for the
Rarden
cannon, the main armament of a
Scimitar
.

.50 cal
. 0.5-inch calibre heavy machine gun. Fires bullets capable of tearing limbs off.

7.62 mm
. The calibre of the bullets fired by the
GPMG
.

9-liner
. Nine-serial document to be filled out to conduct a casualty evacuation by helicopter. Accompanied by a
MIST
.

A-10
. US Air Force close air support plane, often called by troops to assist in a firefight. The rasp of its 30 mm cannon is very distinctive.

AH
.
Attack helicopter.
Any helicopter, in Afghanistan typically an Apache, that provides fire support for ground troops.
See also
Ugly
.

Ally
. British army slang meaning ‘cool’.

ANA
.
Afghan National Army
.

Angel flight
. Flight sent to pick up a fatality and take him or her back to Camp
Bastion
. Less urgent than a
Casevac
, it usually took place about six hours after a death.

ANP
.
Afghan National Police
. The civil counterpart of the
ANA
and usually less well disciplined.

ANR
.
Active noise reduction
headphones used in
CVR(T)
s which block out engine noise, allowing the wearer to listen to the radio better.

AO
.
Area of operations.
The name given to the territory a group of soldiers is responsible for.

ATO
.
Ammunition technical officer
. Bomb disposal expert whose task it is, once an
IED
is discovered by a
REST
, to collect DNA evidence from it and then either remove or destroy it. Probably the most dangerous job in the Afghan conflict; this was reflected in their shockingly high casualty rates.

Bar armour
. A cage-like metal skirt fixed around a vehicle, intended to stop
RPG
s exploding on its skin and so prevent penetration.

Barma
. The name given to the process of sweeping a vulnerable area, comprising four soldiers moving in concert with
Vallons
. Became a blanket term for any activity with a
Vallon
.

Bastion
. Camp Bastion, the main UK base in Helmand and adjacent to the American Camp
Leatherneck
. Troops would arrive into Bastion by plane and typically spend a week there doing
RSOI
before deploying out to the bases in the rest of the province.

Battle group
. A unit formed around an infantry battalion or armoured regiment (as in the case of the King’s Dragoons) and commanded by a lieutenant colonel. The battalion/regiment also provides the HQ element of a battle group, which is typically furnished with three or four infantry companies or armoured squadrons, a battery of artillery, a troop of engineers and assorted other logistics, signals and medical personnel. In Afghanistan there were roughly eight hundred people in each battle group. The King’s Dragoons battle group is called
BG(NE) – Battle Group North East – and is based in the fictional town of Loy Kabir.

Bergen
. Army rucksack.

BFBS
.
British Forces Broadcasting Service
. In Afghanistan in the
FOB
s and
PB
s there were televisions with a handful of channels provided by
BFBS
, usually screening BBC shows and high-profile sports matches.

BFPO
.
British Forces Post Office
. The address for personnel on
Op Herrick
was BFPO 792.

BG
Tac
and
BG Main
.
Battle group tactical
is the commanding officer’s team deployed with him when he is on the ground, comprising operations officer and others.
Battle group main
runs the operation from the rear in a
FOB
, making sure logistics and casualty evacuation are in order.

BGHQ
.
Battle group headquarters
.

BGTI
.
Battle group thermal imaging
. Thermal sight in the turret of the
Scimitar
that can detect body heat up to five kilometres away. It provides great night surveillance capability and accuracy for the
Rarden
.

Bleed out
. For a casualty, normally a double or triple amputee, to die by catastrophic blood loss.

Bluey
. Light-blue letter that can be sent to and from troops. Divided into three segments, it folds up and can be licked closed by gum strips around its edges.
See also
E-bluey
.

Bod
. Army slang for ‘soldier’, usually a private.

Brimstone
. Callsign of the
REST
s.

BV
.
Boiling vessel
. Electric kettle inside every
CVR(T)
, holding about two litres of water.

Casevac
.
Casualty evacuation
. Used as both a noun and a verb.

Cat A
/
B
/
C
. Casualty categories. Cat A is the most serious, meaning life-threatening injuries, through to Cat C, which means walking wounded.

CBA
.
Combat body armour
. Flak jacket-style body armour, with a ceramic plate in front of the heart and a second one over the centre of the back. Replaced by the much better although much heavier
Osprey
. By 2009 the only personnel wearing
CBA
were
Scimitar
crews, as they could not manoeuvre in their cramped turrets with the more cumbersome
Osprey
.

CGS
.
Chief of the general staff
. The commander of the British Army.

Chalk
. A group of soldiers lined up and about to get on or off a helicopter or other transport.

Charlie Charlie One
. A radio message directed not to one specific callsign but to every callsign operating on that
Net
.

Chinook
. Twin-rotor helicopter, the workhorse of the UK helicopter fleet. Much loved by soldiers, it can carry supplies and/or up to thirty soldiers. Also used to carry a
MERT
. With the
GPMG
arguably the soldiers’ favourite piece of equipment.

Chippy
. Derogatory term for someone from a regiment which a soldier thinks is less professional than his own.

Civcas
.
Civilian casualties
.

Civvie/civi/civvy
. Different spellings of the abbreviation for
civilian
. ‘Civvies’ is also the nickname for civilian clothing.

Claymore
. An anti-personnel mine placed to defend a position, comprising a box filled with ball bearings. When detonated it scatters the ball bearings out with lethal and staggeringly violent force.

Clip
. To be ‘in clip’ means to be in a dreadful state. Used to describe someone particularly hungover, absolutely exhausted or very badly wounded.

Command wire
. The means by which a command-wire
IED
(CWIED) is triggered, usually a couple of hundred metres long and buried in the ground, connecting the device to the site where it is detonated. A large part of any
Barma
was directed to finding command wires, which were often very shallow or covered by just a sprinkling of sand.

Comms
.
Communications
.

Compound
. The generic building found in rural Afghanistan. Built of mud and pebbles, and very often with no electricity or running water, a typical compound is about the size of a tennis court, with a high perimeter wall enclosing a cluster of small buildings used to house a family and its livestock.

Contact
. A firefight, although troops could also have a ‘contact explosion’. Used both as a verb and a noun.

Crow/crowbag
. Novice, rookie. Typically applied to young officers and new recruits.

CSS
.
Combat service support
. Another name for logistics. In an
Orders Group
the
CSS
section would be delivered not by an officer but by a sergeant, and would detail the
Casevac
and resupply plans.

CVR(T)
.
Combat vehicle reconnaissance (tracked)
. A family of vehicles including the
Scimitar
,
Sultan
, Spartan, Samaritan and
Samson
which share the same chassis but have different top halves depending on what role they are designed for. Designed in the 1960s, many thought them obsolete, but they proved their worth time and again in Afghanistan, particularly the
Scimitar
with its intimidating and accurate
Rarden
cannon.

Cyalume
. A ‘glowstick’ that when snapped provides a degree of fluorescent light, normally enough to read by. Lasting for about four hours, they performed a plethora of functions, from route marking at night to makeshift room lighting.

D & V
.
Diarrhoea and vomiting
. A bout of mild dysentery that usually keeps a sufferer out of action and quarantined for a period of four to five days.

Daisy chain
. A collection of
IED
s joined together to detonate at the same time when triggered. Normally placed along a compound wall. Not as nice as it sounds.

DC
.
District centre
. The middle of a larger Afghan town, with its shops and bazaars.

Dicker
. A name, first coined in Northern Ireland, for an enemy scout who reports on friendly forces’ movements. Usually unarmed, they are very hard to spot and impossible to engage as to do so is a breach of rules of engagement.

Dish-dash
. Colloquial name given interchangeably to the scarf used as a shawl-like headdress and the robe-like garment worn by Afghan males. When worn by British troops, the scarf was known as a shemagh.

DSO
.
Distinguished Service Order
. A decoration awarded for outstanding command performance as opposed to an act of gallantry.

E-bluey
. A subscription email service for British personnel. Emails were printed out in Afghanistan and then sent on to addressees.

ECM
.
Electronic control measures
. Devices used to jam electronic signals that set off radio-controlled
IED
s (RCIEDs).

FAC
.
Forward air controller
. A soldier trained to talk to aircrew in order to direct their weaponry on enemy positions. Either junior officers or especially talented NCOs, they typically accompany the senior officer of a unit or sub-unit.

FFD
.
First field dressing
. Standard issue bandage. Capable of absorbing a lot of blood, every soldier in Afghanistan carried at least three or four.

Fire mission
. Task given to an artillery piece or mortar to provide support for troops in contact.

FLET
.
Forward line of enemy troops
. The line which if crossed by friendly forces would almost certainly generate a contact with the enemy.

FLOT
.
Forward line of own troops
. Friendly forces’ front line, denoting the limit of their sphere of influence.

FOB
.
Forward operating base
. Usually home to a
BGHQ
, there was one in every major town. Around it were several smaller satellites, known as
PB
s.

FOO
.
Forward observation officer
. Just like a
FAC
, but instead directing ground-based artillery and mortars. Usually sourced from the Royal Artillery, whereas FACs were from a variety of regiments.

Full screw
. A corporal.

Gimpy
.
See
GPMG
. Pronounced with a soft ‘g’.

Gleaming
. Army slang for ‘excellent’.

GMG
.
Grenade machine gun
. Mounted on the top of a
Mastiff
, and capable of firing bursts of grenades at targets with devastating effect. An excellent weapon.