Winds of Eden (21 page)

‘I'm sorry for your problems, John.'

‘I didn't mean to pour my troubles out on you, but I don't want you tell anyone outside of Kut that I'm alive. I asked Maud for a divorce, so I doubt my death affected her. The best thing I can do is let her carry on living her life.'

‘Your family in England?'

‘If I survive the war they'll have a surprise, hopefully a pleasant one. If I die …' John shrugged.

‘And Major Reid?'

‘We heard he's alive. Crabbe wrote to him about Harry. We thought he'd be in India.'

‘He's in Basra?'

‘Have you seen him?'

‘Only at a distance. He didn't see me, and I thought it best not to draw attention to myself by approaching him.'

‘For Furja and the children's sake.'

‘Harry entrusted me with their safe keeping.'

‘Harry had a lot of friends, Mitkhal. Friends who will see it as their duty to care for his wife and children. I'm not in a position to help while I remain cooped up here, but should I survive it will be a different matter.'

‘I will watch over them.'

‘How can you while you are here?'

‘They are with trusted friends who will not betray their whereabouts.'

‘They'll need money to live on.'

‘Harry left them enough.'

‘And the children's education?' John questioned.

‘Harry told me about the time he spent in an English boarding school. From what he said, I hardly think they would take his Arab children.'

‘You're probably right, Mitkhal, but things may be different after the war.'

‘Different enough for the British to allow the Arabs to govern their own country?'

‘We can all hope and that goes for the British soldiers as well. None of us want to be here.'

‘Hope is not enough to live on.'

‘No it isn't.' John pulled his strong box from under his bed and unlocked it. He removed two small parcels and handed the smallest to Mitkhal. ‘There's an amulet in there Furja gave me. It contains the words of the prophet '

‘You must keep it.' Mitkhal handed it back to him. ‘It would be bad luck to return it to Furja while you are alive.'

John took it. ‘This,' he gave Mitkhal the second box. ‘Contains gold and pearls Harry gave me as a wedding present. He said he won them gambling.'

‘You doubted him?'

‘No. Please, give them to Furja. Anything could happen here and I don't want to hand the enemy anything of value.'

Mitkhal shook his head. ‘You are a doctor. You could exchange these with a Turk for drugs that might save a man's life.'

‘I didn't think of that.' John replaced it in the box.

‘The relief column could arrive tomorrow …'

John interrupted Mitkhal. ‘And be decimated by the Turks.'

Mitkhal realised there was no point in trying to reassure John. ‘It could,' he agreed.

Chapter Twenty-one

Ali Gharbi, evening Thursday 6th January 1916

‘The Western Front looked chaotic but there was always an underlying thread of organisation hidden within the madness. Things always came together whenever we had a show with the Hun. This feels different,' Boris picked up the mug of tea his bearer had brought him. ‘The guns the Sussex Territorials hauled on the boats yesterday morning looked as though they'd been taken from a museum commemorating the Indian mutiny. Where are the bombs, rifle grenades, range finders, Verey lights, periscopic rifles …'

‘In France,' Tim Levitt suggested.

Boris picked up his binoculars from the camping table set in front of the tent they shared with Tom Mason. ‘Fat lot of good they're doing there.' He scanned the munition boxes being carried up the gangplanks for recognisable markings.

‘What you have to remember is the War Office isn't running this show. The India Office is, and they have shallower pockets.'

‘That doesn't give them the right to palm us off with equipment Warren Hastings would have rejected as antiquated a century ago?'

‘Take my advice, Boris. Calm down, eat a cracknel, enjoy your tea and your last relaxing supper for a while, and stop trying to monitor what is and isn't being loaded on the steamers.'

‘Twelve months in India and you've become Indian Army to the core. Your entire life revolves around tea.' Boris was scathing.

‘If we're talking Indian Army we're talking tiffin, not tea.'

‘For the record, I hate cracknels. There's no taste to them. I'd give anything for a plate of macaroons.'

‘Wouldn't we all,' Tim agreed. ‘As for what awaits us upriver, I talked to a naval officer in the mess over breakfast this morning. He was upstream two days ago within four miles of Sheikh Saad. He said he didn't get as much as a sniff of a Turk. No sign of them or their trenches.'

‘Then he wasn't looking. I assure you they're there. My CO showed me the aerial recon photographs this morning,' Boris contradicted him. ‘He said no British sapper digs a slit trench like a Turk. They're there, and the Johnny Turks will all be squashed inside like a tin full of sardines, only with their heads and bayonets pointed up. Ready and waiting to slit the bellies of our horses as we jump over them.'

‘There's Tom leaving the supply tent. Bring cha for Captain Mason and extra biscuits,' Tim shouted to his bearer.

‘Why the thunderous face, Mason?' Boris asked when Tom joined them.

‘Did you know they've appointed only one Medical Officer to a brigade?'

‘Heard it in the briefing this afternoon. Problem is we don't have any more to go round,' Boris said.

Tim offered Tom the plate of biscuits.

Tom didn't even notice. ‘It's insanity for thirteen and a half thousand men to go into battle without medical cover and that's without taking into account the seven thousand or so in Kut – if we get through. The reports I've read suggest they're not in the best of shape …'

‘Which brigade have you been posted to?' Boris interrupted.

‘I haven't. I've been ordered to stay here, monitor supplies, and set up a hospital tent – if one arrives. Should we get, and I quote, “unforeseen seriously wounded”, I've been ordered to oversee their evacuation to Basra.'

‘I've heard command isn't expecting many casualties.' Tim helped himself to a cracknel.

‘With only two hundred and fifty hospital beds, no tents, no hospital ships, and only enough lint, bandages, and supplies for the aforementioned 250 beds, I hope they're right. Although I'd like to know what intelligence they're using to base their forecast.' Tom pulled up a camp chair and sat down.

Boris looked around to make sure there were no ranks listening in. ‘No doubt they'll soon pass on the order that no member of the force is to allow himself to get wounded.'

‘Have they told the Turks to use toy guns that fire corks?' Tom enquired acidly.

‘If they were communicating with the Turks we wouldn't be here enjoying this delightful Cooks' Tour courtesy of the War Office.'

Tim's bearer turned up with an extra mug for Tom and a fresh pot of tea.

‘And if the casualties aren't light?' Tom snapped.

‘May the Lord help us, although despite all the communications sent heavenwards from officers and rank and file, no celestial force has helped us so far in this sideshow.' Boris glanced back into the tent as his bearer picked up his kit bag. ‘All packed?'

‘All packed, Sahib. This is the last of your luggage.'

Boris glanced at his watch. ‘When you've loaded that into the hold, stay on board. We're due to sail in ten minutes, although given my experience of the timetable of this expedition that probably means an hour.'

‘Yes, Sahib.'

‘If they hitch any more barges to that steamer it'll take for ever for us to get upriver and by then it will be over,' Tim complained.

‘I doubt it. I have a feeling this particular show is going to last a while,' Boris left his chair when the whistle blew on the steamer. ‘Just look at the way the brigades have been bundled together.' He watched the men walk up the gangplank. ‘I doubt there's a platoon where everyone has a nodding acquaintance with their fellows, let alone one that trained together. But,' he raised his eyebrows, ‘what choice does Lieutenant General Aylmer have but to rush to the rescue when Townshend radioed out that his food and supplies will run out by mid-January.'

‘Will a week be enough to get him and command out of Kut?' Tim asked. When neither Boris nor Tom answered, he added, ‘Do we really know what we're up against?'

‘I know what command is telling us we're up against.' Boris who'd been briefed on the battle plans by his CO, replied. ‘There are approximately 4,500 Turks on the right bank at Sheikh Saad and 9,500 on the left. They were reinforced yesterday by 2,000 troops that the Turks pulled from the siege at Kut. In addition we've the usual rag-tag and bobtail horde of irregular Arabs that no one's even bothered to count to contend with. But … ' he gave a grim smile ‘… we have a secret weapon.'

‘We do?' Tim drew closer to Boris.

Boris lowered his voice. ‘We have a mashuf bridge built of native boats that will enable us to move swiftly from one bank to another and fight on both sides of the river.'

‘Given the bridges the engineers have built that I've seen, it would be quicker to swim across the river,' Tom declared.

A sergeant bellowed from the deck of the paddle steamer. His voice carried above the braying of the mules penned in to wait for a later transport and the cries of the bearers as they tossed kit bags on board.

‘Get a move on, you idle bastards. No time for dilly-dallying with men starving in Kut.'

Tom shook Boris's hand before turning to Tim. ‘Good luck. Both of you. This place is going to be as dull as ditchwater without you.'

‘With luck we'll break through Johnny Turk's lines and reach Kut in a day or two. Then all we'll have to do is send our chaps downstream and follow them. We could be back here by next weekend, so don't drink all the medicinal brandy,' Boris cautioned Tom.

‘Nice thought, Boris, but a little bird's told me that once we relieve Kut we'll be receiving further orders,' Tom warned.

‘Baghdad?' Tim whispered.

‘The powers that be think a victory there will make a nice headline for my cousin and all the other scribblers to send back home.'

‘We're a long way from Baghdad,' Tim mused.

‘Only a couple of hundred miles and some twenty or thirty thousand Turks.' Boris slapped Tom's back. ‘See you.'

‘Yes, see you,' Tom repeated. He watched Boris and Tim walk up the gangplank.

Kut al Amara, Friday 7th January 1916

‘Mitkhal, isn't it?' The brigadier rose to his feet when Crabbe ushered the Arab into his office shortly after dawn.

‘Yes, sir.'

‘Please, take a seat. You too, Crabbe. I knew Lieutenant Colonel Downe. I also know how highly he thought of you, Mitkhal. Major Crabbe said you're here to pick up Lieutenant Colonel Downe's horses.'

‘For his widow, sir.' Mitkhal was becoming increasingly adept at subverting the truth.

The brigadier addressed Crabbe. ‘They're in the Norfolks' stables?'

‘Colonel Perry put them there for safekeeping, sir,' Crabbe lied.

The brigadier sat forward in his chair and linked his fingers. ‘Then there'll be no problem releasing them into Lieutenant Colonel Downe's aide's care?'

‘None whatsoever, sir. Provided you give us a written order.'

‘I'll see to it.' The brigadier hesitated. ‘I take it you will be taking the horses downstream, Mitkhal?'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘To the Karun Valley?'

‘No, sir.'

‘Isn't that where Lieutenant Colonel Downe's widow resides with her father?'

‘No, sir.'

‘But she is downstream?'

‘As it isn't only the Turks who'd like to lay their hands on Lieutenant Colonel Downe's widow, I'd rather keep her exact whereabouts secret, sir.'

‘You're right to be cautious,' the brigadier agreed. ‘Can I assume she is south of Ali Gharbi?'

‘You can, sir,' Mitkhal acknowledged.

‘How do you propose to take out the horses? There are two of them?' the brigadier looked to Crabbe for confirmation.

‘Three, sir. I rode in here on my own horse,' Mitkhal answered. ‘I intend to take them out the way I came in. The boat that brought me here will set sail at sunset.'

‘You sailed here through the Turkish lines?'

‘Through the camp of Arab irregulars, sir.'

‘You came up the Tigris?'

‘The Shatt al-Hai.'

‘Through the marshes?'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘I've seen Lieutenant Colonel Downe's horses. Do you think you'll get them past the thieving Marsh Arabs?'

‘I can but try, sir.'

‘I have a proposition for you, Mitkhal. It's common knowledge that we are in contact with HQ Basra and the Relief Force by wireless. What isn't common knowledge yet, and I trust you not to repeat this, is that hostilities broke out this morning between Lieutenant General Aylmer's Relief Force and the Turks at Sheikh Saad. The Turks have pulled troops from the siege lines to engage our forces. Now would be a good time to attempt to sail down the Tigris, not the Shatt al-Hai, with your horses.'

‘I have no boat,' Mitkhal pointed out.

‘We have a mahaila large enough to take three horses.'

‘You'll give it to me?'

‘With pleasure. As for crew, you'll be accompanied by a British officer. There are certain … important documents we'd like to send downstream. Documents that cannot under any circumstances fall into the enemy's hand.'

‘You want me to carry them?'

‘The officer will, but we would appreciate you escorting him downstream.'

Mitkhal stared at the brigadier.

‘I realise what I'm asking you to do would almost certainly prove fatal should you fall into Turkish hands. I can't order you to accompany our …'

‘Spy?'

‘I won't lie to you. He'll be dressed in Arab clothes and, if caught by the Turks, shot. If Lieutenant Colonel Downe had lived …'

‘You would have ordered him, not me and your spy, to carry the documents downstream?'

‘I would have,' the brigadier conceded.

‘Just as you ordered him to leave Kut dressed as a native and spy on the Turkish positions the day he was captured and tortured.'

‘Tortured? The ghulam with him said he was killed when the first shots were fired.'

‘He was wrong, Brigadier.'

‘The Turks tortured Harry?' The colour drained from Crabbe's face.

‘They tortured him.' Mitkhal reiterated.

‘How do you know?'

‘I saw his body.' Mitkhal scraped his chair over the floor tiles as he rose. ‘I will escort your courier downstream, Brigadier, provided you find me a mahaila large enough to take the horses.'

‘When would you like to leave?'

‘Three hours before dawn tomorrow. Now, I'd like to see the horses.'