They all sat down. Dave said: ‘You’ve made a bad enemy, Lloyd.’
‘I didn’t have much choice.’
‘All the same, watch your back from now on.’
‘An argument about a girl,’ Lloyd said dismissively. ‘Happens a thousand times a day.’
As darkness fell, a handbell summoned them to a field kitchen. Lloyd got a bowl of thin stew, a slab of dry bread, and a big cup of red wine so harsh-tasting that he imagined it taking the enamel off his teeth. He dipped his bread in the wine, improving both.
When the food was gone he was still hungry, as usual. He said: ‘We’ll have a nice cup of tea, shall we?’
‘Aye,’ said Lenny. ‘Two lumps of sugar, please.’
They unrolled their thin blankets and prepared to sleep. Lloyd went in search of a latrine, found none, and relieved himself in a small orchard on the edge of the village. There was a three-quarter moon, and he could see the dusty leaves on olive trees that had survived the shelling.
As he buttoned up he heard a footstep. He turned around slowly – too slowly. By the time he saw Ilya’s face, the club was coming down on his head. He felt an agonizing pain and fell to the ground. Dazed, he looked up. Berezovsky held a short-barrelled revolver pointed at his head. Beside him, Ilya said: ‘Don’t move or you’ll be dead.’
Lloyd was terrified. Desperately he shook his head to clear it. This was insane. ‘Dead?’ he said incredulously. ‘And how will you explain the murder of a lieutenant?’
‘Murder?’ said Ilya. He smiled. ‘This is the front line. A stray bullet got you.’ He switched to English. ‘Jolly bad luck.’
Lloyd realized with despair that Ilya was right. When his body was found, it would look as if he had been killed in the battle.
What a way to die.
Ilya said to Berezovsky: ‘Finish him off.’
There was a bang.
Lloyd felt nothing. Was this death? Then Berezovsky crumpled and fell to the ground. At the same moment Lloyd realized that the shot had come from behind him. He turned, incredulous, to look. In the moonlight he saw Dave holding his stolen Luger. Relief swamped him like a tidal wave. He was alive!
Ilya, too, had seen Dave, and he ran like a startled rabbit.
Dave tracked him with the pistol for several seconds, and Lloyd willed him to shoot, but Ilya dodged frantically between the olive trees, like a rat in a maze, then disappeared into the darkness.
Dave lowered the gun.
Lloyd looked down at Berezovsky. He was not breathing. Lloyd said: ‘Thanks, Dave.’
‘I told you to watch your back.’
‘You watched it for me. But it’s a pity you didn’t get Ilya too. Now you’re in trouble with the NKVD.’
‘I wonder,’ said Dave. ‘Will Ilya want people to know that he got his sidekick killed in a squabble over a woman? Even the NKVD people are frightened of the NKVD. I think he’ll keep it quiet.’
Lloyd looked again at the body. ‘How do we explain this?’
‘You heard the man,’ Dave said. ‘This is the front line. No explanation needed.’
Lloyd nodded. Dave and Ilya were both right. No one would ask how Berezovsky had died. A stray bullet got him.
They walked away, leaving the body where it lay.
‘Jolly bad luck,’ said Dave.
Lloyd and Lenny spoke to Colonel Bobrov and complained that the attack on Saragossa was stalemated.
Bobrov was an older Russian with a cropped fuzz of white hair, nearing retirement and rigidly orthodox. In theory he was there only to help and advise the Spanish commanders. In practice the Russians called the shots.
‘We’re wasting time and energy on these little villages,’ Lloyd said, translating into German what Lenny and all the experienced men were saying. ‘Tanks are supposed to be armoured fists, used for deep penetration, striking far into enemy territory. The infantry should follow, mopping up and securing after the enemy has been scattered.’
Volodya was standing nearby, listening, and seemed by his expression to agree, though he said nothing.
‘Small strongpoints like this wretched one-horse town should not be allowed to delay the advance, but should be bypassed and dealt with later by a second line,’ Lloyd finished.
Bobrov looked shocked. ‘This is the theory of the discredited Marshal Tuchachevsky!’ he said in hushed tones. It was as if Lloyd had told a bishop to pray to Buddha.
‘So what?’ said Lloyd.
‘He has confessed to treason and espionage, and has been executed.’
Lloyd stared incredulously. ‘Are you telling me that the Spanish government cannot use modern tank tactics
