My Father, My Son Read online

  My Father, My Son

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Author’s Note

  Copyright

  My Father, My Son

  Sheelagh Kelly

  For Cecilia and Cyril Webster

  Chapter One

  Had he guessed she was going to bring such catastrophe he would never have touched her. He had just been through a war – catastrophic enough, without fretting over hypotheses. Besides, how could he foresee repercussions that lay eleven years hence? At this moment he was not even thinking about her. His prime concern was how to escape this oppressive South African climate.

  The sun was a crucible, tipping its molten metal down onto his shoulders. He and two other soldiers lounged in the meagre shade of a bell tent, trying to glean a little respite from its skin-sizzling heat. Beads of sweat evaporated at the moment of birth, leaving scales of salt to tighten and chafe the brow. Such temperature discouraged exertion. Only one of the men showed signs of movement; he was cleaning a rifle. His companions, eyes slitted against the glare of sun on the ranks of white canvas tents, were content to observe the Boer women and children who roamed the camp. So intense were the sun’s rays that they distorted the men’s vision; to their eyes, the more distant figures moved in a weird, gyrating fashion – like drunken belly dancers.

  Corporal Russ Hazelwood took off his pith helmet to rake his fingernails over an itching scalp. As often in times of war, his brown hair had been allowed to grow almost to collar length. When at his military best – even on civvy street – Russ was a strikingly dapper young man, always neatly pressed, hair trimmed regularly, moustache waxed to precision. He fingered the limp effort under his nose and gave a mental sigh. Trying to wax one’s moustache here was like trying to butter coals. This dusty bloody hole denied even the most elementary toilet. To one as fastidious as Russ it was purgatory. He licked the dust from his lips, keen blue eyes attending one particular figure who headed for the school building. ‘Ever fancied a nibble at one o’ them vrouws then, Pinner?’ The precursor to this remark had been an exchange on the private’s state of virginity and how on earth he was going to lose it when he was stuck out here in this annex of Hades.

  Private Pinner gave a bark, as much to show his distaste of this suggestion as to dislodge the coating of South African dust from his throat. ‘I’d rather stay pure, thank you very much for the kind proposition, Corp.’

  The corporal’s voice was coaxing. ‘It’d be a magnificent initiation though, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Aye – like joining the bloody Freemasons,’ muttered the private, gnawing on a pencil which a moment ago had been scribbling a letter home. ‘Talk about “on pain of death”.’

  ‘Oh, look at that one, Pinner!’ crooned Hazelwood, wearing the impish grin that was a regular visitor. ‘She’s all woman. Can’t you just feel them muscly thighs squeezing you?’ It was said that the stuff they put in your tea was meant to stop you feeling the urge. It didn’t, Russ could vouch for that.

  The young private issued another bark and, begging the corporal to desist with this subject, addressed himself to the third man. ‘Christ, doesn’t this fella think of anything but his nuts, Sarg? He must’ve been on about it for the past half-hour.’

  ‘Why d’you think we call him Filbert?’ The rag in Sergeant Jack Daw’s hand caressed the barrel of the rifle. Twenty-eight years ago he had been christened Stanley but no one ever called him that. The reply was given without looking up. There was little room in the sergeant’s vocabulary for small talk; this was only the second contribution he had made in fifteen minutes.

  Pinner, who had hitherto linked the pseudonym with the corporal’s surname, now grinned his understanding. Reaching a thumb and two fingers into his flap pocket he withdrew a deformed stub of cigarette and lit it.

  ‘You’re a fine one to hang labels on folk,’ grumbled Hazelwood, then turned back to the private. ‘Look at the way he’s fondling that rifle – you’d think he was making love to it.’

  He and Sergeant Daw had known each other most of their lives, came from the same city, the same street. ‘He’s pretendin’ it’s a nice plump Boer maiden.’ He gave Daw a nudge. ‘Come on, Sarg, admit it – you really fancy one.’

  Sergeant Daw glanced up briefly to survey the inmates under his protection. The lids which veiled his pale grey eyes had a permanent droop to them, lending him a look of arrogance. His mousy hair, sheared by his own razor to a point well above his ears, was invisible beneath his hat at the moment. The tip of his nose was of squashed appearance – as if in childhood it had been so used to pressing against toyshop windows that now it had become a permanent feature – and the mouth under the moustache often emitted bad odours, for Daw had never visited a dentist after being terrified by one as a youngster. His voice was gruff and, like the others, held a Yorkshire accent. ‘You don’t imagine I’ve come through a bleedin’ war just to commit suicide, do you, Corporal?’ A sideways glance of near-contempt for his questioner. ‘The blink of an eyelash from one o’ them would disembowel you.’

  The corporal replaced his hat at a rakish tilt, rested his chin on one of his knees and, with fingers laced round a putteed shin, mused, ‘Oh, I don’t know… I like a big woman – something to get your teeth into.’

  ‘Big?’ exploded the private. ‘I’ll say so! One of ’em hung her drawers out to dry the other day, when she went back to unpeg ’em she found three hundred squatters’d moved in.’

  ‘Oh! Fancy a music-hall career, do we, Pinner?’ Corporal Hazelwood’s chin came up from his knee, face mocking. ‘Well, let’s see how bleedin’ funny you can be when you’re mucking them latrines out.’

  ‘Aw, have a heart, Corp! I was only tryin’ to give you good advice.’

  ‘Hah! Did you catch that, Sar’nt Daw?’ spluttered Hazelwood. ‘Him just out o’ babby’s frocks giving me advice…’

  ‘What I meant was, I don’t want to see my dear Corporal gettin’ himself badly mauled by one o’ them girls. It isn’t worth it, is it, Sarg? Another three or four weeks an’ you’ll be back to your wife an’ getting all the hows-yer-father you want.’

  The sergeant’s dour face cracked then. ‘Not from his missus he won’t, Pinner. Why d’you think he’s always talking about it? Them as can – do, them as can’t – talk about it. Poor Filbert’ll be lucky if she even lets him out to the pub – now that’s what I really miss,’ he announced before Hazelwood could object to this slander. ‘My mind is set on a much higher plain than the corporal’s. The minute these size elevens land on English
soil they’re off to take me to the nearest Sam Smith’s house – none o’ that southern piss, I’m straight onto a northbound train. By, I can just feel that pint slitherin’ down me throat like melted velvet.’ Only now did he pause in the cleaning of the rifle to savour the proposed experience, shuddering with delight.

  His two companions made noises of attunement, then the corporal issued a warning grunt, ‘CO’s coming.’

  The sergeant shoved the Mauser behind him into the tent, the private plunged his cigarette into the dust and all clambered to attention as the officer strolled towards them between the neat rows of bell tents, his boots hidden behind a cloud of dust.

  There was minimal recognition of the salute. After he had passed, the three were about to assume their previous roles when the officer spun, ‘Sar’nt!’ snapped his fingers and jabbed another at a group of internees amongst whom a squabble had broken out.

  ‘No bloody peace for the wicked… is there, Pinner lad?’ The sergeant flicked his head at the spot the officer had indicated. The sour-faced private seized a Lee Enfield and tramped off to sort out the disturbance, whilst Sergeant Daw and Corporal Hazelwood resettled their lean rears on the ground.

  Daw retrieved the Mauser and, snapping its barrel into place, studied the assembled effect with pride. After picking it off a dead Boer he had secreted it amongst his kit, itching but not daring to use the superior weapon for fear of having his prize confiscated. But he would use it when he got home, if only for bagging pigeons in Knavesmire Wood. Daw was fascinated by guns and weaponry. To him there was something much more stimulating about stroking a trigger than feeling a woman – but try explaining that to Russ – women were all the same, guns were unique. His fingers travelled the warm steel as he pondered on the craftsmanship, then raising it to his cheek squinted along the barrel, setting his sights on the distant figure of the camp superintendent.

  Hazelwood’s pleasantly pitched voice broke in on his thoughts. ‘How’re you going to get that home without havin’ it whipped, then?’

  Sergeant Daw lowered the weapon and bound it reverently in a scarf which his wife had sent him a few weeks ago – by her reckoning if it was Christmas then he must need a scarf. ‘If you’re hoping to smuggle your little trophy out the same way, forget it. I doubt that’d fit in my pack even if I’d want it there.’

  ‘What little trophy would that be, Sarg?’ It was said with carefree lilt and the expression barely flinched, but Hazelwood had become wary.

  The sergeant, finished with his labour of love, turned to lock knowing eyes with the narrowed ones of his subordinate. Little pink rivers dissected his caked cheeks where the act of squinting had produced moisture. ‘Come on, Filbert, don’t sell me rubber pokers, we both know what I’m talking about. Going to apply to have her put on the strength, are we?’ This was the first reference he had ever made to Hazelwood’s indiscretion. He did so now mainly because he didn’t want the corporal to think he had got away with it.

  I might have known your big ears would be flapping, thought Russ, but merely gazed into the middle distance and pulled a face. ‘Christ, don’t them latrines hum? They could set up their own choir – Comical Kruger and the Cape Colony Crappers.’

  ‘Rachel’ll hang you up by your moustaches if she finds out.’

  The corporal’s stomach performed a tippletail. ‘An’ how is she gonna find out?’

  ‘Oh, given up pleading the innocent, have we? Well, stand easy, there’s only me that knows… though personally speaking and confidentially between ourselves, Russell lad, I think you’re a bit of a cheating bastard.’

  Russ tossed a pebble at a lizard that basked on one of the rocks which were dotted about, using it as a scapegoat for Daw. It peeved him that this creature could sit there quite calmly without bursting into flames; he had damaged his own rear by doing likewise before gaining experience of the terrain. Employing one of these rocks as a seat was akin to perching one’s buttocks on a hot griddle. At his silence, Daw said, ‘All right, suit your bloody self. I was only giving you chance to cleanse yourself of your sins before we go home.’

  An unrepentant laugh from Hazelwood. ‘Now who’s doing the kidding? You just want to hear all my exploits ’cause you’d like to be doing them yourself but haven’t the nerve.’

  ‘Cobblers,’ replied the sergeant and rose abruptly, stirring up the parched ground.

  ‘Deary me, I’ve upset him,’ said the corporal rashly.

  ‘Don’t overestimate our friendship, Filbert!’ warned the other.

  Realizing his stupidity, Russ made an overdue attempt at mitigation. ‘Ah, it’s all right for you – you don’t have the same needs…’ He heaved a sigh. ‘Anyway, what does it matter? It’s all over now. In a few weeks we’ll be back in old Eboracum an’ this’ll be forgotten.’

  ‘Obviously it will by you,’ retorted Daw coldly. Sometimes he found Hazelwood’s preoccupation with women nauseating.

  ‘How long have you known about it?’

  ‘It?’ Daw looked at the sky as if thinking. ‘That depends which “it” we’re referring to. It number one, or it number two.’

  Russ’ heart sank. ‘So, you know about… as well?’

  ‘Yes, I know about…’ Daw rolled his hand in exaggerated fashion, ‘as well. How long? Oh, since the sound of lustful boots woke me from my slumber. Two years or so.’

  Right from the beginning. Russ felt queasy. ‘Have you told…’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said the sergeant testily. ‘I won’t be reporting you.’ Scornful eyes looked down at the other. ‘Anyway, what exactly are you supposed to be doing, Corporal?’

  Relief caused the other to stretch and grin. ‘I thought I might be permitted a short breather, Sarg, after being so industrious this morning.’

  ‘As industrious as a dead sloth – well, Corporal, you seem to have formed such an affection for the Kaffirs you can go help ’em clean out the bog.’ When Hazelwood grimaced but did not stir he bent forward and thrust his face into the other. ‘I said mooove, Corporal!’

  The tremendous heat and the difference in rank superseded the friendship. Corporal Hazelwood swore to himself and hauled his bottom from the flap of canvas that had shielded it from the red-hot dust. Standing, he was four inches shorter than the other man – though Daw was exceptionally tall. Even so, it often made Russ feel infantile in the sergeant’s presence. He was the same age as Jack, but looked younger – felt younger, the way Daw treated him.

  He lingered as the sergeant ambled away, cursing Daw and the whole caboodle. Oh! to feel the wind ripping across Knavesmire, forcing itself into his lungs and making his eyes water. Even on a hot day it never seemed robbed of breath. Not so here: any breeze was quickly suffocated at birth for having the gall to oppose the omnipotent sun. The mere effort of inhaling produced a steel band around his ribs. An absent hand touched his side – his brain still far away. For that moment his mind burst with the greenness of his hometown, the brilliant reds, pinks and blues of an Ebor meeting, the flurry of breeze through the jockeys’ silks… then once more it dissolved into the dusty reality of Orange River. Everything here was one colour – khaki. Faces washed this morning had, by midday, taken on the sickly pall. One could not move without stirring up clouds of choking dust, coating everything – uniform, eyebrows, lungs. Walking slowly helped to avoid this, but sometimes a brisk march was needed to relieve the stifling tedium of camp life. Such irony, to escape the Boer bullet and to face two new potential killers in peacetime – to be stifled by dust or stifled by boredom. Russ straightened his helmet. It deterred sunstroke but tended to compress the skull into one’s shoulders, feeling, in this heat, like a half-barrel under the khaki linen. Reaching a hand over his shoulder he tugged at the collar of his tunic, trying to induce a draught between the sweat-drenched garment and his skin. But all this did was to fan his own stench at his nostrils and, once released, the tunic clung again at spine and armpit.

  He was about to move off, when his narrowed eyes settled
on a figure by the perimeter of the camp. Slowly, he came to attention as the black woman beckoned to him. When she moved elegantly down a road mapped out by gleaming white stones, he followed. As ever, the roll of the prominent buttocks beneath the shift stirred him. Be damned to the sergeant’s opinion, he must press his hands to that one more time…

  She had disappeared behind a group of acacias. The shade of the helmet’s peak hid his furtive glance to right and left before he, too, slipped around the sun-scorched bushes. Her face was sombre as, downing weapon, his dusty arms encircled her. ‘I am told you leave tomorrow.’ She spoke in the broken English learnt from the Women’s Relief Committee who had come here to alleviate the Boers’ distress.

  Russ hesitated, then nodded and tried to pull her body into his, but she resisted, moving her face away. ‘Why you not tell me?’

  He did not press his suit, but continued to hold her arms. ‘I didn’t want to upset you.’

  It was obvious he had – her lips formed a petulant thrust. ‘Why must you go?’

  ‘The war’s over.’ In actuality it had been over for many months, only the camps lingered on. ‘I have to go home.’

  ‘You have won the war. You could take a piece of the land your leaders give away and make your home here.’

  He performed his attractive smile, blue eyes fond. ‘A nice thought, me lass.’ Normally he would see her face light up whenever he called her his lass; today it remained unmoved. ‘But I’m a regular soldier, I have to go where the Army sends me.’ Only half the truth: with his stint almost at an end Russ didn’t intend signing on for a further term. He and Rachel had decided – or rather, his wife had decided – that by the end of this spell they should have enough saved to invest in a small business. Naturally, the money had not all come from his Army pay – Rachel had been left a nice amount in her mother’s will.

  ‘So… you go away and forget me,’ accused the woman.

  ‘Forget you?’ It was delivered in amazed tone. He held her at arms’ length, bending at the knee in order to see into her lowered face. ‘How could I forget someone as dear to me as you are?’ At least part of that was honest; he would never forget her. This thing they had was the most – the only – daring exploit he had known in all his twenty-eight years, including his armed service. Russ had always been the kind who played it safe, who did as he was told, who followed the rules – how could he forget the one time he had dared to sling his leg over the imaginary barbed-wire fence marked ‘Forbidden’?