A New Kind of War

‘What’s the matter?’

‘Nothing’s the matter. But I just remembered that you were going to reveal all. And you haven’t actually said very much – have you?’

Fred let the unspoilt German countryside slide past them for a few moments while he collected his thoughts.

But then, in spite of his orders, he was tempted to take another route to his own destination.

‘What do you think you’ve been doing?’ It would be dummy4

interesting to find out how much this clever boy had worked out. ‘Not just since I’ve been around – before that?’

‘What have I been doing – or we?’ Audley slowed even more, down almost to walking pace, craning his neck forward.

‘Why are you slowing down?’

‘There’s a checkpoint hereabouts. It won’t hold us up, because they know me perfectly well . . . That’s funny

–’

‘What’s funny?’

‘The MPs are there – but they’re not checking – see?’

Audley followed his own curiosity for a moment.

‘There’s a DP camp nearby they keep watch on ... But it looks like anyone can use this road today –’ He sniffed and shrugged. ‘Oh well... I told you, anyway: officially ... we hunt for items of interest. Though, as far as I’m concerned, it’s a bit bloody late to find out just how good old Jerry’s tanks were. But I go through the motions, as my old troop-sergeant used to say. . .’

He accelerated ‘. . . God rest his black and shrivelled soul – like his black and shrivelled body – ’ He gave Fred a sidelong look ‘ – you know how you come out of a brewed-up Cromwell – ? About the size of a bloody chimpanzee, actually –’

‘But what have you actually been doing?’

dummy4

‘Ah . . . well, among other things, I’ve done a bit of scouting round the Teutoburg Forest, to see if any Roman artefacts have turned up here and there in the last few years, with the bombing and all that, as per my orders.’ Audley sat back as comfortably as he could in the confined space. ‘Not that there is anything here.

Because the Romans never settled here – or hereabouts: they just got massacred. And the local lads . . . alias the Cherusci, and the Chauci, and the Chattii, who were the German equivalent of the Sioux and the Black Feet and the other Red Indians . . . they all carried off the loot, rejoicing, just like the Indians did after General Custer had stood his Last Stand. So there wouldn’t be anything, would there?’ Another shrug. ‘All the good Roman stuff will have surfaced over on the other side of the Rhine – ’

‘Don’t play games with me, David.’

‘I’m not playing games. It’s the truth, Fred.’ Knowing at last that he was playing some sort of game, Audley played it innocently and well. ‘Those Germans in the picture I showed you – the picture I showed you when I thought you didn’t know what was happening . . .

they operated in Roman Germany, not here. But when we arrived back there in March, after we were pulled out of that Greek raid of ours, we did fuck-all most of the time. At least, I did. Because I was on transport.

And every time I got hold of a decent car, some senior dummy4

bastard took it off me. Like the egregious Crocodile did with my French car, for example. Which is why I ended up with this little dodge-’em – ‘ he caught his tongue quickly as he felt Major Fattorini stiffen beside him. ’All-right- all-right- all-right! So ... we were after the Jerries in the picture: is that what you want me to say?‘

‘You could start in Greece, David.’

‘ In Greece? God – that was the scene of our first debacle – ’ Audley swung the wheel to avoid an old woman in black who was pulling a cart round a heap of rubble regardless of him: they were on the edge of a ruined town now. ‘But you were there yourself, damn it!’

‘But what were we after?’ The lying ‘we’ had a distinctly bitter taste. But he had to keep the upper hand.

Audley took a breath. ‘I don’t see why I should tell you what you already know – and better than I do, too.’

‘Tell me, all the same. If you want the rest of it, David.’

‘Oh . . . shit!’ But the boy craned his neck again as they turned out of the ruins. ‘That’s another one – ? I think the MPs are all on strike today –’

‘ Tell me!’

‘Okay, okay! Clinton was trying to bring out one of his own men, is what I think now. Although all I knew dummy4

then was that we had to get him alive – and we didn’t.’

He looked at Fred. ‘Is that it?’

‘It is.’ After the stick, it was time for a carrot. ‘And that put him back almost three months, David.’

‘It did?’ Audley seized on the information eagerly.