Soldiers in the Mist Read online

  However, the lieutenant did not fire. He touched the wound on his cheek once and then began climbing up to the hidden chimney. Crossman, to distract their attacker, drew his Tranter and stuck his hand out only, firing blindly up at the rocks above. Five shots went singing up into the pass without a hope of hitting the ambusher. A single shot whistled down by way of reply, but accurate enough to have the sergeant whip his arm back to the safety of the boulder.

  He fitted the Tranter with another loaded cylinder, risked two more shots over the top of the boulder without looking, then waited.

  It seemed forever until he heard Lieutenant Dalton-James use his weapon, the sound of the firing coming from high up to the far left. Crossman waited until he heard a reply shot from their man, then he left the cover of the boulder and began to scramble up the slope. He could see Dalton-James up on a rock shelf, aiming at the gap between the face and the needle.

  Crossman fired into that gap too, hoping to hit the attacker by chance.

  Two shots now hummed over his head. Crossman decided the man had indeed been using a rifle before, but now that he was being attacked on two sides he had drawn his revolver.

  Desperately Crossman clawed his way up the incline, his race to get to the man similar to that of an animal charging down a hunter who is taking careful aim. The sergeant could see part of their target’s body now, as the figure leaned against the edge of the rock face, to get support for a better shot.

  Then Dalton-James fired again and the figure fell backwards with a shout.

  ‘Hit him!’ cried the lieutenant, triumphantly. ‘Got him, by God!’

  Sergeant Crossman continued his race up the incline to the track above. There was an angry growl from the lieutenant’s victim, then the man appeared again. He was concentrating on Dalton-James now. Crossman only had a narrow side-view of half the man’s torso. Gasping for breath, the sergeant took quick aim and fired twice. His target fell away with a groan and a firearm went clattering down the hillside.

  The man drooped forward, staggering, using a carbine as a walking stick to steady himself. Then he raised this weapon one-armed, pointing at Crossman. Without hesitating, Dalton-James, who had full view of their attacker now, shot him in the chest. There was a gargled scream, then the man slumped forward and fell down the gap between the rocks, following the path his pistol had taken just a few moments earlier. He landed in a crumpled heap at the bottom of a narrow gully.

  Both Crossman and Dalton-James scrambled down from the hillside after the body. The lieutenant, being closer, reached it first. He turned the figure over and let out a gasp. Crossman, coming up behind him, stared hard. Clearly Dalton-James knew who it was, though Crossman had never seen the man before.

  By the time Crossman got to them, Dalton-James had opened the overcoat of his victim. There was a fatal wound over the man’s heart. It was not the bloody hole in his chest which drew Crossman’s attention though. It was the uniform he was wearing beneath the greatcoat.

  It was that of a British infantry officer.

  ‘Captain Charles Barker,’ murmured Dalton-James, stepping back with a pale face. ‘We’ve murdered one of our own officers.’

  ‘He was trying to kill us, don’t forget,’ reminded Crossman, though he too was appalled by what they had done. ‘He fired on us first.’

  ‘He may have thought we were Russians. We’re not exactly displaying regimental insignia, are we?’

  That was true. The pair of them were dressed like Tartars.

  Yet there had been no challenge from the captain either. Nor any call for surrender when he had them pinned down. He must have heard exchanges in English between the two when the fight was in progress. Why had he not called out at that point, asked them who they were? No, something was not quite right about this situation. Dalton-James was keeping something back too. He seemed more than shocked on seeing it was this particular captain.

  ‘Is the captain a friend of your family? How do you know him?’

  Dalton-James straightened his back and turned on Crossman with cold and angry eyes. He had his revolver in his hand and clearly no longer needed to be intimidated by the sergeant. They had equal status now. It was simply a matter of who fired and killed the other first.

  Crossman was not about to be bullied. ‘I asked you a question, sir, which you will please answer. You know this man we have killed. How do you know him? Is he a friend or simply an acquaintance? Remember, I have orders to kill you and I will do it, though it costs me my own life.’

  ‘You never stop, do you, sergeant? You’re like some nasty little terrier, snapping at my ankles. Insubordination means nothing to you.’

  However, Dalton-James lowered his pistol and stared at the corpse.

  Dalton-James continued. ‘I hardly know the fellow. I’ve spoken to him once only before in my life. This is the officer who ordered me to take those papers to Mackenzies Farm,’ he said, quietly. ‘He said he was replacing Major Lovelace. I was pleased about that. I do not like Major Lovelace.’

  ‘What?’ said Crossman, taken aback. ‘What do you mean, replacing Major Lovelace?’

  ‘I don’t know what I mean. All I know is this officer came to my quarters late yesterday afternoon and said he had been sent by General Buller. I was to take the papers to the farm and put them in the hands of a Sardinian general. Those were my orders from a superior officer. I had no reason to doubt them.’

  ‘You didn’t check with Major Lovelace or General Buller?’

  Dalton-James looked unsure of himself for the first time since this business had started.

  ‘There was no reason why I should. Although we hadn’t spoken before, I’d seen Captain Barker in the camp. He’s no Russian in disguise. Besides,’ confessed the lieutenant, ‘the idea of a field assignment – a fox hunt – greatly appealed to me. I’m stuck behind the lines while you and that peloton of yours go roaming over the countryside having all the fun.’

  ‘And risking our lives. But was that it? You saw your chance to get in on the action at last and couldn’t wait to take it? Not even just to check with General Buller?’

  ‘After all,’ confided the lieutenant, nodding ruefully, ‘General Buller might have changed his mind and forbidden me to go – he might have decided in the meantime that you or Lovelace should do it, and I would have missed out again, wouldn’t I?’

  Crossman decided he believed the lieutenant’s story.

  He stretched out his hand. ‘Give me your pistol, sir.’

  ‘What?’ Dalton-James stepped back. ‘Not this time, sergeant.’

  ‘Give it to me and I will take you in. We’ll go to General Buller together. If your story is true, you have nothing to fear from me. I was sent to kill a traitor. If what you are saying is true, then that traitor lies dead at our feet.

  ‘However, there is still some small element of doubt in my mind and I would be grateful if you would hand over your weapon. Otherwise we are back at a stalemate again.’

  Dalton-James stared at the sergeant for a good few minutes, then passed the pistol to him. He rubbed his broken wrist thoughtfully before testing the hole in his cheek with his tongue. Finally, he sighed.

  ‘I’m no chess player, sergeant. I hate the game. Give me a good rubber of whist any time.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Stalemate. It’s a chess term. You obviously play chess.’

  ‘Like a one-legged man runs a race,’ replied Crossman, smiling. ‘Come on, sir, let’s get this mess sorted out so we can revert to our former roles. I do not like having to threaten one of Her Majesty’s commissioned officers, any more than you like being held prisoner by a common sergeant. Let’s cover this bastard with rocks and then get back to camp.’

  When they were half-way through their task, the Bashi-Bazouk, Yusuf Ali, turned up to assist them. Crossman was glad of the Turk’s company on the way back to their lines. It meant that Dalton-James remained silent. Despite having shared a dangerous time together, the two British men had very little t
o say to one another that was not contentious.

  ‘How you kill the officer?’ asked Ali, simply out of idle curiosity. ‘You cut his throat?’

  ‘We shot him,’ replied Crossman. ‘Through the heart.’

  The Bashi-Bazouk gave a noncommital grunt. It really did not matter to him. He asked no further questions. If the sergeant had deemed it necessary to kill a captain in the British Army, that was fine with Yusuf Ali. So far as he was concerned, the sergeant was to be trusted in all things.

  5

  When Crossman and Lieutenant Dalton-James got back to Kadikoi village, there was an open-air church service in progress. There were rows of men standing in silence before a makeshift altar consisting of a door on two upright barrels covered with a cloth. Out in front a priest was intoning, assisted by a drummer boy in his role as an altar lad.

  Anxious to impart their news to General Buller, they looked to see if he was among the congregation. He was there, but right up at the front, standing with Mrs Durham and her quartermaster husband.

  Next to Lavinia Durham was the young widow of a common soldier who had been killed at Balaclava. She was a small, pretty woman with bright eyes. Even before her husband had died she had built herself a reputation. Whether the reputation was deserved, Crossman had no idea. Molly Kennedy was known to enjoy flirting, but any more was supposition and hearsay. Mrs Durham had taken Molly Kennedy under her wing and she was now the quartermaster’s wife’s constant companion.

  Mary Seacole, the West Indian lady who ran the refuge she called the British Hotel, was also there, sharing a hymn book with Dr James Barry, a medical officer. The eucharist was in progress. Brigadier-General Buller and others were about to take the sacraments.

  Catching sight of the two men from the back row, however, was the figure of Major Lovelace. He came over to them and guided them with his hand to a place out of earshot of the congregation. They stood in the mud not far from the spot where the 93rd Sutherland Highlanders had held their line against four squadrons of Russian hussars just a few days previously.

  ‘Lieutenant? Sergeant? You have a serious look about you both. Do you have something to tell me?’

  Lieutenant Dalton-James said, ‘It seems I am under close arrest. The sergeant here has taken it upon himself to relieve me of my side arm and will not release me until someone in authority assures him that I am not a Russian spy. I have recently narrowly escaped assassination by the sergeant, but some tender spot within his rough exterior is responsible for my survival.’

  Lovelace, who had been staring at the wound on Dalton-James’s cheek, was thoroughly taken aback. ‘What?’

  Crossman continued the story. ‘You sent me out to assassinate a man who was to be in a certain place at a certain time. That man proved to be Lieutenant Dalton-James. He should, if I had carried out my mission to the letter, be lying dead in the dirt of Mackenzies Farm. However, I failed in my duty, and here he is, standing before you.’

  ‘You shot the lieutenant in the face, but the wound proved not to be fatal?’ murmured Lovelace, entirely bewildered.

  ‘No, I broke his wrist. Someone else is responsible for the hole in the lieutenant’s cheek.’

  Lovelace shook his head as if he were being bothered by flies.

  ‘You are the traitor?’ whispered Lovelace, turning to Dalton-James. ‘I don’t believe it.’

  ‘Fortunately,’ said Dalton-James, his hands clasped behind his back, ‘in his heart of hearts, neither did Sergeant Crossman, or I should indeed be meat for the Crimean crows. Sir, do you know of a Captain Charles Barker . . .?’

  Dalton-James gave the name of the captain’s regiment and its commanding officer.

  ‘I have heard of him. I’ve seen him around the camp.’

  ‘Captain Barker came to me with papers, saying General Buller had sent him. He said I was to take these papers to Mackenzies Farm, to a Sardinian general who would relieve me of them at precisely six o’clock on the following morning. Barker intimated that he was taking over from you as head of clandestine operations in the Crimea.’

  ‘Good Lord!’ cried Lovelace. ‘He’s our man then.’

  ‘Correction, sir,’ Crossman said, ‘he was our man. We shot him dead out in the hills. He attacked us on our way in to camp and we were forced to kill him. We have buried the body under a pile of rocks.’

  Things were beginning to click into place in Lovelace’s mind now. He stood there for a good five minutes in silence, thinking things over. Finally, his eyes narrowed and he spoke again.

  ‘Let me try this on you both. This Captain Barker somehow got wind of the fact that he would be in grave danger taking the documents to the farm himself. So he pretended to be my replacement, coupled it with a sense of urgency and secrecy, and sent the lieutenant with the papers instead. To make sure the lieutenant did not return, he followed at a safe distance, waiting to see what would happen. When he saw Sergeant Crossman capture you, he knew he had to kill you both and retrieve the papers, which of course had not been delivered to his Russian masters. I think that fits the scenario quite nicely.’

  ‘So,’ said Crossman gravely, ‘I am not to be allowed to shoot Lieutenant Dalton-James on this occasion?’

  ‘I’m afraid not, sergeant,’ said Lovelace, joining in with Crossman’s warped sense of humour. ‘It is a great shame, but you will have to wait until the lieutenant decides to sell more secrets to the Russians, and then perhaps we’ll give you another go.’

  Dalton-James rubbed his broken wrist. ‘I fail to see any drollery in this situation. I have been wounded twice – most painful of which is my wrist, caused by the sergeant’s zeal in protecting himself.’

  Crossman handed the lieutenant back his pistol.

  ‘I do apologise for that, sir, but I’m afraid you would have shot me had I permitted you to fire your revolver.’

  ‘You’re damn right I would. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Major Lovelace, I shall seek medical advice.’

  He saluted and then walked off over the mud towards Kadikoi hospital: a small house which had been taken over for the purpose.

  Major Lovelace watched the lieutenant go and then said, ‘Say nothing of this to anyone, Sergeant Crossman.’ He stared at the bruise made by the Russian rifle butt on Crossman’s jaw. ‘You should get that nasty thing looked at too, sergeant. Did the lieutenant do that?’

  ‘No, sir. If he had, there would be a few similar marks on his own face.’

  ‘I’m sure you’re right. Now, about this traitor . . .’

  Crossman looked at the major in such a way as to cause the other to add, ‘What?’

  ‘Nothing, sir – except that the lieutenant and I – at one time . . .’ Crossman was hesitant to say what was on his mind, but then decided nothing could be gained by keeping it back. ‘We thought you might be the traitor, sir. You are the one who ordered confidentiality. It would have been easy for you to have set everything in motion, to cover your own tracks.’

  An expression of intense anger swept across the major’s face like a dark squall over sea.

  ‘You have my word that I am not – the word of an officer and a gentleman.’

  ‘I do beg your pardon, sir, but that very same description fits a captain buried under some rocks on the other side of the Woronzoff Road,’ replied Crossman, stubbornly.

  The major stared, his eyes still sparkling with annoyance, then his brow cleared at last.

  ‘I suppose you have every right to question me, sergeant. I thought we trusted one another now, but it seems I still have to win that privilege. If you wish, we can go to General Buller and speak with him on the matter. Perhaps we ought to take Lieutenant Dalton-James along with us. He probably harbours the same suspicions as yourself. I’ll go over to the hospital now – you join us in an hour.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Crossman saluted smartly. Then he said, by way of an afterthought, ‘We have chosen a very untrustworthy occupation, sir. Nothing personal.’

  The major smiled grimly. ‘I should h
ave said that. You’re learning fast, sergeant. In an hour then.’

  Before they finally parted, Crossman asked, ‘Did Yusuf Ali warn you about the Russian 4th Army Corps?’

  ‘Yes, he did. I forgot to thank you for that, sergeant. As far as I’m concerned it was well done.’

  ‘As far as you’re concerned?’

  ‘And General Buller, I should have added. Lord Raglan, however, seems to attach little significance to it. When he found out it was one of our own spies, and not a Russian deserter, who was responsible for the information, he dismissed it. I imagine his words were, “If I have to learn these things from skulkers, I’d rather not learn them at all.” But General Buller is pleased with you. You rise every day in his estimation.’

  ‘Thank you, sir.’

  At that moment the guns began pounding along the siege line a few miles away. Picquets would be sniping at each other on both sides. Captain Goodlake of the Coldstream Guards would be leading his hand-picked marksmen through the gullies and ravines beyond the Sapouné Ridge. Russian sharpshooters were picking their targets from amongst British and French gunners. Men were being crippled. Men were dying somewhere nearby.

  In contrast to the noise of the guns, bells tolled in Sebastopol. This otherwise pleasant sound was treated with suspicion by the British forces. The bells had pealed loudly on the day the Russians had launched their last offensive, in order to bolster the courage of their troops. It was unlikely, however, that the Russians were attacking so soon after their probing offensive on the heights near the Inkerman ruins.

  It was common knowledge that Lord Raglan, the commander-in-chief of the British forces himself, had remarked to an officer of the Engineers, when advised to strengthen his forces near Inkerman, ‘Nonsense! They will never dare come that way again.’ Not that the general had visited the area in question, nor did he intend to. General Canrobert, the French commander-in-chief, probably knew better than Lord Raglan what were the strengths and weaknesses of the post-road which came out of Chernaya Valley, though his responsibility was for the Chersonese Uplands.