A New Kind of War

I’ll get you transport –Itea, was it?‘

The youth’s sudden confidence pricked Fred’s curiosity. ‘What’s so fine about it?’

‘Oh ... it was fine all along, actually.’ Audley grinned disarmingly.

‘It was?’ Fred’s curiosity overweighed his irritation.

‘Why?’

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The Brigadier will like you, even if my Colonel doesn’t.‘ The grin twisted. The Brigadier may not go much on coincidences, but he does love rich men. And bankers – merchant bankers . . . one merchant banker –good . . . two merchant bankers – you’ll brighten up a bad day for him, I shouldn’t wonder, by golly!’ He pointed through the trees. ‘Come on! You’re just what I need!’ He stepped out ahead of them. ‘ Two bloody bankers – !’ Kyriakos raised his shoulders eloquently, and rolled his eyes at Fred. But then he moved quickly after Audley. ‘But why – why does he like rich men?’

Fred accelerated after them. Five wasted years – three of boredom, one-and-a-half of discomfort and terror, plus an aggregation of odd months of other experiences, including disillusion and, during the last hour, more terror – those years ought to have inured him to anything the army could imagine for his further education. But Lieutenant Audley and his Brigadier were something beyond the ordinary lunacies.

‘Rich – men.’ panted Kyriakos, in Audley’s wake. Through the last scatter of trees Fred saw the ruins more clearly, and remembered what Kyriakos had said a lifetime earlier: this was the little monastery the Turks had smashed up, presumably in revenge for Markos Botsaris’ escape up that cliff just behind it. ‘Bankers – ?’

Kyriakos tried again, breathlessly. This was the sharp end of the operation, the sounds of which they had heard on the other side of that cliff, Fred saw at a glance. Not only were the soldiers here alert, and very different from the smokers and pissers down below, but there was a line of groundsheeted corpses, with their protruding dummy4

feet indicating their origin: three good pairs of army-issue boots, and then a dozen anonymous pairs, scuffed and pathetic – no . . .

there were two feet at the end, encased in jack-boots, or something like –

‘Bankers?’ Audley finally registered the question, but then dismissed it as a figure ducked out from a narrow monastic doorway. ‘ Amos! Is the Brigadier in there?’

‘He is, dear boy.’ The figure straightened up, and became a captain in a Very Famous Regiment who gazed past Audley at Fred and Kyriakos with mild astonishment. ‘Are these your prisoners? But, dear boy, they can’t be –they positively can’t be!’ The gaze, with one eyebrow delicately raised, flicked from Fred to Kyriakos, finally coming back to Fred. ‘He’s expecting a couple of desperadoes . . . But you’ve got a Sapper there . . . and I know that Sappers are notoriously eccentric . . . But this is preposterous –

quite preposterous!’ He returned to Audley, shaking his head.

‘He’s not at all pleased, I warn you, David, dear boy. I should run away if I were you –that’s what I’d do.’ His voice was quite conversational as he returned to Fred. ‘I admit that you look like one of ours . . . But are you?’

Before Fred could answer, or even open his mouth, Audley jumped in. ‘Of course he is! And you’re quite wrong, Amos: I’m just about to become quite p-p-p-pop-pop-pop –’

‘Pop-popular?’ The man’s eyes didn’t leave Fred. ‘I doubt it very much. But who am I to keep you from a posting to Burma?’ The eyes pinned Fred for another second, and then the languid captain smiled ruefully.

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‘It is evident that Mr Audley is not going to introduce us, captain.

So ... I am Amos de Souza, formerly of the Guards but now fallen upon hard times. But nonetheless at your service, captain.’

The man’s smile was as infectious as his good manners were comforting after the horrors of the last hour. ‘Fattorini – Brigade RE, Captain de Souza. Also fallen on hard times, apparently.’ He grinned at de Souza. ‘I wish I knew what was going on. Perhaps you can enlighten me?’

‘My dear fellow – I wish I could!’ The rueful smile twisted. Then de Souza frowned slightly and cocked his head. ‘Fattorini . . . not the banking Fattorinis, by any chance?’

Fred felt that he ought to be able to place the Guards de Souza, who had plainly been as anglicized over so many generations as the banking Fattorinis, and with blood that was even more blue.

But to his shame he couldn’t. ‘Yes, Captain de Souza.’

‘Ah!’ Captain de Souza didn’t bother to explain his own secret.

Instead he switched to Kyriakos. ‘And this gentleman?’

‘Michaelides – Captain.’ Kyriakos stopped there.

‘Yes?’ De Souza waited until he was sure nothing more was coming. ‘Regular Greek Army? Or National Guard?’ Suddenly Fred was aware of the seconds ticking away, as the Greek failed to rise to what was clearly intended as a provocation. Somewhere nearby Lieutenant Audley’s Brigadier must be fuming. And down the rocky path the RSM would be approaching those lorries and the slovenly Mendips like the wrath of God. And, without looking up, he knew those bloody birds would still be circling, waiting in vain dummy4

for the meal under those groundsheets which would now be denied them.

‘Neither, actually, old boy.’ Kyriakos drawled, packing all his years of British education into his accent. ‘Banking too, actually.’

‘Ah!’ Captain de Souza permitted himself a well-bred snigger.

‘Now I understand!’ He wagged a finger at Audley. ‘What a sly fellow you are – bagging a brace of bankers for the Brigadier! I really must stop underestimating you, David: you have the precious gift of luck which Napoloen Bonaparte admired so much, in preference to vulgar cleverness.’ He jerked his head towards the little arched doorway. ‘Go on, dear boy – go and take your gifts to him without delay. If you cheer him up we shall all be better