The Street Philosopher (26 page)

Kitson took a breath, looking up at the moon. Cracknell, he realised, was nowhere near the advance parallel that night; Styles was there alone. There was something about the way the illustrator held the rifle that alarmed him. He could not help but think that it was done with an ease brought about by usage. Styles had wielded a minié before. Had he not just claimed to have proved himself not only in the cave, when he smashed a rock into the skull of a boy-soldier, but also here in the advance parallel? It could not be avoided: Robert Styles, student of the Royal Academy, supposed illustrator for the
London Courier
magazine, had been fighting, and in all likelihood killing, alongside the enlisted men.

He decided to concentrate upon a modest goal. ‘Robert, let us leave this trench, at least–go somewhere warm and find some supper. You must be—’

‘And yet he mocks me still, whenever I see him. That bastard mocks
me
. That awful, rotten
bastard
.’ With each word, he hit the ice at his feet with the butt of the minié. ‘He thinks he can still lord it over me because of his grubby affair with Mrs Boyce. But how could I care about that now? I do not care. I have shown my courage out here. That
bastard
–I’ve shown my courage.’

Styles’ speech degenerated into an embittered, vicious mumbling. He struck at the broken ice with greater force, a shard disturbing the stiffening neck of the dead soldier, making his head jerk hideously.

‘Come, Robert,’ said Kitson with a forceful joviality he most definitely did not feel, ‘let us go back to the camps and have a tot of brandy. Haven’t you had enough of this mud, my friend?’

A shot sounded nearby, disturbing the still night air like an anvil tipped into a millpond. Kitson and Styles both turned abruptly. It had been fired from somewhere on the advance parallel, towards the Russian lines. Two more followed a second afterwards.

‘Who’s firing?’ demanded an officer’s voice from the direction of the forward battery. ‘Stand to, damn it, and name yourselves!’

‘Hopkins, sir, and Reid, pit number three!’

‘I see no attack! What the deuce are you shooting at, man?’

‘It’s Trodd, sir!’ The soldier sounded amazed. ‘’E’s gone over to the bloomin’ Ruskis! Made a run for it!’

‘Fire at will!’ came the reply, louder now. ‘Get that man! There are no bloody deserters in the 7th Fusiliers! Get him!’

The appearance of British soldiers, standing in their trenches or on the ramparts of the forward battery in order to take aim at their errant comrade, provoked a sudden explosion of musketry from the Russian fort. Kitson, crouched down with his hands over his head, saw to his horror that Styles was actually getting to his feet, looking out over the edge of the trench, cocking his rifle and bringing it up to his shoulder. Then, without hesitation, he fired, the sound stunningly loud; and missed, evidently, as he immediately tore open a cartridge, and unfastened the minié’s packing rod, preparing to reload.

Instinctively, Kitson lunged over, pulling hard at the base of Styles’ coat, causing the gunpowder to spill from the cartridge, down into the mud. The illustrator tried to kick his attacker away, only to have Kitson grip tightly on to his right leg. They staggered to one side, splashing through the shattered slush of the puddle, straying into a shallower section of the trench. Now out in the full glare of the moonlight, they were a clear target for the marksmen over in the Russian fort. Several musket-balls struck around them as the two men continued to struggle desperately with one another; then one sliced through Styles’ thigh, twisting him to the ground.

Kitson took two steps back. Styles, teeth gritted, clutched at his leg. His fingers grew black with blood. ‘Stay calm, Robert!’ Kitson instructed firmly. ‘Try to stay calm.’ He walked forward, bending down to haul the injured illustrator to cover. A thought came to him, startlingly clear:
that will get
him evacuated
.

The first musket-ball clipped Kitson’s side, whipping through his clothing and catching the base of his rib-cage. He fell forward, landing on his knees in the freezing water. His hands went to his wound; his body was soft and horribly ragged to the touch. There was no pain, nor could he tell which parts of what he felt were ripped fabric, and which were ripped flesh.

Another ball hit his back, cracking the shoulder-blade as it ricocheted away and shoving him to the bottom of the trench. The pain started to come now, intoxicatingly, dizzyingly intense, beyond any expression. Kitson found that he could no longer move, that his legs were gone, and his arms lay useless. His eyelids dipped down, then snapped back open, then dipped down again; above, the white moon shone on blankly. Styles was pulling himself, grimacing, into the shadow of the trench wall. There was more shooting, but the sounds grew distant, floating over faintly from a remote, nightmarish land.

So much for the grand adventure! To the four winds with the noble
patriotic enterprise! After the missed opportunities of the Alma, the
terrible butchery of Inkerman, and the myriad agonies of a disastrous
winter, this correspondent can state with absolute truth that
there are now not ten officers in any division who would not be
delighted at the chance of getting away from the Crimea.

Lord Raglan must carry much of the blame for this state of affairs.
He, and those wretched men who follow his example, carry themselves
about as if the disintegration of their army was, in truth, an
awful bore, and not worthy of their attention; much less as if it was
the direct result of their incompetence. Our old friend Colonel Boyce
is, of course, prominent amongst this number. They have their warm
houses, and their servants, and do not like to go out in bad weather
(although they have valises packed with greatcoats, fur hats and
numerous other items of sturdy winter clothing); whilst their men
stand out in the snow, all but abandoned by our wretched
Commissariat, trying to sew their boots back together with lengths
of their own hair.

The word in the camps, amongst both officers and the common
soldiers, is that Lord Raglan seems to take it precious easy. He is
not often seen amongst the men of the line–and during those rare
outings, the privates regard him with confusion, not having a clue
who he is, whilst the officers run away in order to avoid having to
salute him. Such is the feeling in the British Army as 1855 begins
its grim progress!

Cracknell took a swig of coffee and a long pull on his
cigarette, flicking the ash over the side of the bed on to the floor; then he drew a line under the text, and beneath wrote ‘
Forward camp of the Light Division, 23rd January 1855
’. Yawning hugely, he reached under the covers to scratch his crotch. The very top of the tent was touched with sunlight. His pocket-watch read six o’clock: the day was beginning. He finished the cigarette and swung his legs out of the cot, lowering his feet into his boots, which stood open and waiting on the floor.

The tent was wickedly cold. Frost laced the stones of the ruined shed in which it was pitched. Among the many things claimed by the great storm of the previous November had been the
Courier
team’s comfortable little hut. The winds had brought it down in a matter of minutes, exposing them to a screaming tornado of flying camp detritus. After gathering what they could catch of their fast-vanishing belongings, they had embarked upon an urgent search for shelter. It had led them to this dilapidated, roofless structure; soaked and shivering, they had crouched down gratefully in its filthy corners.

Once the storm had abated, Cracknell had slung a foraged standard-issue army tent over it, making what he considered to be a rather homely little place, with a sturdy stone perimeter that would offer some measure of protection from any further extremes of weather. Also, the foundations of the shed enabled them the luxury of private berths in what had once been livestock pens, each with a canvas curtain set across its entrance. But had he received any kind of thanks from his so-called colleagues for his ingenious labours? Of course he bloody well hadn’t–and neither of the useless, ungrateful rascals had spent more than a handful of nights in it.

Cracknell walked from his bed-alcove into the central area of the tent, looking to the small charcoal stove on which he had brewed his coffee. It had gone out. He kicked the thing over with a violent exclamation, scattering soot across the earth floor. Wrapping his fur coat (a recent acquisition, not overly greasy) around him, and putting a wool cap upon his head, the senior correspondent searched about for something to eat. All he could find was a small piece of military-issue
biscuit. In the middle of the tent was a crude writing desk fashioned from packing crates, its surface covered with his papers. Sitting at it, he nibbled on the rock-hard biscuit, took a soothing swallow of rum from his hip-flask, and surveyed the report he had just completed.

There were some fanciful sections, he had to admit; the occasional paragraph where a light patina of exaggeration, a laminose layer of drama, had been artfully applied. Throwing the biscuit into a corner and lighting another cigarette, he decided, as always, that this was unimportant. No names were involved, apart from those he sought to shame or disgrace. All kinds of people were talking, and saying all manner of things. And anyway, he thought with wry satisfaction, I have a reputation to encourage.

A couple of weeks earlier, O’Farrell had sent him a package from London. It had contained a long letter, the last few issues of the
Courier
, and a thick wad of cuttings from the rest of the British press. As Cracknell pored over them, he realised his reports from the front were proving somewhat incendiary–beyond anything he had previously heard about. The
Courier’
s circulation was soaring. Its offices were being deluged with letters of both the most expansive support and the severest censure. The impassioned debate inspired by the magazine’s Crimean coverage, Cracknell learned with immense gratification, had spread to the very highest level. As Lord Aberdeen’s government tottered before accusations of having mismanaged the war, radical members were quoting his words in Parliament (along with those of that weasel Russell of the
Times
) as part of their case against the Prime Minister and his Cabinet.

And these words were his, and his alone. Kitson had left him–had absconded to Balaclava to wander amongst the injured. This had been a harsh blow. He had always felt that it had been a mistake to send an art correspondent to cover a war, but with his guidance the fellow had been doing surprisingly well, easily surpassing his most optimistic expectations. Thomas Kitson had an undeniably powerful turn of phrase, and had seemed committed to his journalistic duty. He could not stay the course, though; he had let himself
become distracted, and his vision muddied by inappropriate compassion. Ability is nothing, the senior correspondent reflected, without a strong, disciplined mind.

Which brought one to Mr Styles. His drawings were an ongoing disaster, an unending, unvaried procession of mutilated horses and mouldering soldiers, all of which were quite unfit for publication. O’Farrell had been adamant that he stay, however, that he be properly supervised and made to produce something more becoming a professional magazine illustrator–to get some recompense, basically, from the
Courier’
s poor investment. Cracknell simply couldn’t be bothered to explain to him why this was a waste of time. He had more than enough of his own business to attend to. As far as he knew, Styles was still around the camps, entertaining himself in his customarily grisly fashion. Sooner or later, he reasoned, O’Farrell would give up and recall him.

Abandoned by his subordinates, Cracknell had thus stepped out from the shadow of the team to stand alone in the limelight. O’Farrell had been doubtful at first, but had soon warmed to this state of affairs and set about creating himself a celebrity. The Tory papers, Cracknell saw, had voiced an overweening hostility towards the reports of the
Courier’s
Crimean correspondent–a hostility which, as every true polemicist knew, could easily be turned to its target’s advantage. A month-old article from Blackwood’s had declared that this nameless personage
flings his censure about wildly and
without reason, stabbing left and right like a Malay under the influence
of opium, or a Red Indian on the warpath, with his bloodied
tomahawk ever at the ready
; and O’Farrell, in his clumsy fashion, had pounced. The next issue of his magazine had carried Cracknell’s report on the front page, as usual, but instead of being anonymous, it was attributed to ‘the justly-stabbing Malay’; and the most recent piece was given to ‘the honest Red Indian’. Both monikers had made Cracknell wince with embarrassment.

Sitting at the desk, he looked at his latest report thoughtfully, puffing on his cigarette, and then picked up his pen. At the bottom of the page he wrote, ‘The Tomahawk of the
Courier
’.

Well pleased with his labours, Cracknell decided to venture out. The flaps of the tent were stiff with frost. He had to force them apart, as if he were pushing his way out of a cardboard box. The cold seemed to close around his face, making it ache most unpleasantly. He considered turning around and going back inside, back to bed. Then he reminded himself that there was no food in the tent, and hardly any liquor. He had to forage.

The morning sky was a deep, smooth blue. Sunlight was breaking slowly over the cliffs, turning the tents that covered the plateau from dull grey to shining white. Bearded men wrapped in russet rags moved about in amongst them, dazed and shivering. Surveying the camp as he trudged by, Cracknell felt a profound sense of wrongness. This was not how a military camp should appear at the outset of the day. It was so deathly quiet. There were no bugles sounding the reveille or calling men to their early parades; there was no drilling, no saluting, no shouting at the cack-handed soldier who fumbles with his rifle. There was no clanking of pots, no hissing of butter in pans, no smoke from fires rising up between the dense rows of canvas points. Indeed, the only smoke to be seen came from the chimneys of the cottages given to the senior officers. And very snug little holdings they look too, he thought, turning himself in their direction.

In his now confirmed role as the messiah of Crimean discontent, Cracknell knew that he would be unwelcome at pretty much all of those cosy farmhouses. His fame had inevitably spread in the army camps as much as it had back in England. It had made him a good many enemies. Cracknell didn’t mind this in the least; he had always had enemies. The midnight shouts of abuse outside his tent, the threatening gestures and the efforts to impede his work all encouraged him. And he was openly celebrated, he found, amongst the aggrieved and the disillusioned. His arrival in a sympathetic hut or tent was often greeted with cheers, and he would be slapped on the back as he strolled about the camps–even as others swore in his face. There were officers among his friends, naturally, but few of these
ranked above major, and none had been graced with lodgings of stone and mortar.

Cracknell carried on towards the farmhouses regardless. Up on the Heights at that time of day, they were the only places where food was to be obtained. Furthermore, there was one house among them with which he had a more than passing acquaintance.

Boyce had been fortunate indeed after the carnage of Inkerman. The
Courier’
s charges against him, and its ill-fated attempt to have him brought to justice, sank without trace–as did the incriminating painting that Wray had stolen from the villa. Cracknell tried to plant a few seeds of inquiry, seeds that would not lead Codrington back to him, but none took root. In fact, much to his disgust, tales had quickly circulated instead of Boyce’s valiant conduct under a punishing fire; of his reckless but incredibly brave advance; of the inspiring manner with which he beat back the Russians, kept his companies together, and held his position against desperate odds until reinforced. Official recognition, however, had not been possible. The 99th Foot had lost more than one hundred and twenty private soldiers as a result of their commander’s foolhardy tactics. But there was much approving talk nonetheless, despite Cracknell’s best efforts to pre-empt or contradict it; and, before long, a rumour of a reward.

Sure enough, not five days later the undeserving blackguard was installed, along with Madeleine and his servants, in a solid, single-storey farmhouse on the southern edge of the Light Division’s camp. This building had weathered the great storm with scarcely the loss of a roof-tile. It had tidy, commodious rooms in which fires were kept roaring for many hours of the day, and hot meals were regularly served; and low, wide windows that had, on occasion, permitted the rapid escape of a rather broad-bottomed Irishman.

Cracknell’s intention as he walked towards Boyce’s farmhouse was thus to enter through the yard, slide open one of these windows (he had one at the back in mind) and see what victuals lay within easy reach. Madeleine, he knew, would not be around. Miss Wade liked to get her out early. He did not mind this absence in the least. That morning,
Cracknell found that he could contemplate a spot of theft with crafty pleasure, but the thought of having to make the declarations of eternal, undying love that had become a condition of Madeleine’s company (and the sole route into her undergarments) brought him only an oppressive sense of tedium.

A sentry was posted before the front door. Cracknell redirected himself slightly, affecting a casual demeanour. This soldier was a typically forlorn sight, his uniform in tatters, hugging his rifle close to him as if the wood might emit some warmth if it was squeezed hard enough. Seeing Cracknell, the mangy looking man unfolded his arms and started in his direction. The correspondent quickened his pace.

‘Sir!’ the soldier croaked. ‘Stand for a moment, sir, will you? Just a word, sir!’

The voice was oddly familiar. Cracknell stopped and turned. ‘How may I help you, soldier?’

‘Pardon my interruptin’, sir, but the Major told me all about you.’ The soldier was talking quickly, plainly a little agitated. ‘An’ I’ve ’eard others a-talkin’ since–’ bout ’ow you’re an awful enemy to all them what’ve left us out ’ere to rot–an’ to Boyce in partic’lar…’

Cracknell peered closely at the battered features, which were partly lost behind a patchy, colourless beard. ‘My apologies, soldier, but have we met before?’

‘D’you not remember, sir?’ For a second, the man feigned offence. ‘Ah well, s’pose there was plenty afoot that day. At the Alma, at the base of the ’ill, by the river. You crawled out of the waters like an ’arf-drowned cat. An’ you told us that Boyce was dead.’ There was accusation in his voice as he uttered this last statement, as if the correspondent, with this error, had somehow been responsible for preserving the Colonel’s life. ‘Dan Cregg’s the name.’