‘Didn’t anyone ask questions when you turned up here?’ Dampier asked.
‘No, sir.’ Clutterbuck was looking distinctly uneasy now. ‘When we went to 97 MU, we told ’em we was attached to 86 Repair Unit but ’ad lost touch, so they supplied us. When we’d tapped them a bit, we went to 86 Repair Unit and told them we belonged to 97 MU. We drew rations and petrol, and people brought vehicles in for repair. We even actually did a few. I worked on Lancias afore the war and, as a lot of vehicles comin’ in was captured Lancias, people thought ’ighly of me.’ He seemed proud of his work. ‘I once did one for a brigadier and ’e slipped me a few bottles of wine to show ’is appreciation.’
Dampier was all for collaring the brass to set an example to the lower orders and he pounced at once. ‘What was his name?’
Clutterbuck backed away. ‘Oh, I couldn’t tell you that, sir,’ he said. ‘What you might call business ethics.’
‘Honour among thieves, I’d call it,’ Dampier growled. ‘Go on.’
‘We wasn’t never involved in drugs, sir.’
‘How about stolen weapons?’
‘I think Dow and Raye ’ad a go at it. They took ’em back to Cairo and the Egyptians ran ’em southwards aboard feluccas. They carry fifty foot of sail and can outrun any of the launches of the Gyppos’ Inland Water Transport Board. I never got in on that, though. They wouldn’t let me.’ It seemed it was only pure chance and the greed of his companions that had prevented Clutterbuck becoming even more deeply involved.
‘They wasn’t the only ones,’ he went on. ‘After every advance every bloody Arab in the desert was in the arms game. If there was minefields they used their wives to walk ahead of ’em. I once saw three of ’em outside Zuq, every one of ’em with a stolen Lee Enfield, all pointed up with metal and studded wi’ jewels like they do wi’ their guns. Gold bands round the barrels an’ stocks an’ the butt plates replaced wi’ silverwork. They even ’ad ’and-carved bullets. Special for killin’ important people, they said. After all, the police was at it as well, wasn’t they? Not just the Gyppo police neither. One of ’em was an orficer in the Special Investigation Branch.’
‘And what about those spare engines in there with their serial numbers filed off?’
Clutterbuck sighed. ‘There was six originally. But Dow an’ Raye loaded four of ’em up and set off for Cairo with a pile o’ spare parts an’ tools. Dow’s got two taxis an’ ’e needs to keep ’em runnin’. An’ it’s ’eavens ’ard for civvie outfits to get spares.’
‘It’s also heavens hard for the chaps at the front to get them.’
‘Yeh – well.’ Clutterbuck gestured heavily. ‘After all, there’s more than one REME major in Cairo and Alex what does up civvie cars cheap. You can buy ’em cheap, too, when they can’t get spares, then all you ’ave to do is refit ’em an’ sell ’em at a good profit. There’s fellers back in the Delta makin’ thousands. Raye changed ’is cash into gold an’ ’ad it made into bangles for his girlfriend. She’s a walkin’ bloody bank account.’
It finally emerged that Clutterbuck’s involvement in the garage business had not been entirely honest even before the war because in those days he had been engaged in changing the colours and removing the serial numbers of stolen cars.
As he grew more and more convinced that he’d been left to hold the baby, Clutterbuck came up with still more evidence. 38 Light Aid Duties was only a small part of a larger organization which encompassed British soldiers – NCOs and officers included – Egyptians, Maltese, Greeks, Jews and Syrians, with a headquarters in the Sharia Marika Nazli, near Cairo Main Station.
‘They said they was comin’ back to load everythin’ up,’ Clutterbuck said gloomily.
Dampier gave him an icy look. ‘I don’t think they’ll make it,’ he said. ‘So, for the moment, we’ll have you in the car. And don’t try to bolt because we’re armed. We’ll load the lorries with the stores and the tents, Mr Rafferty. Micklethwaite can drive my car, you and I will drive the fifteen-hundredweights and Corporal Clinch the Bedford.’
Micklethwaite looked surprised but he realized he was seeing a bit of real army life which would stand him in good stead when he came to write the book he’d been planning ever since his arrival in the Middle East. ‘Right,’ he said briskly.
Clutterbuck was looking alarmed. ‘’Ow about Dow an’ Raye?’
‘When they return,’ Dampier said, ‘—if they return – they’ll find their little nest deserted and bolt straight back east where, by that time, thanks to the miracle of radio, the Military Police will be looking for them. I don’t see any alternative, do you? They certainly won’t wander far. It’s a big desert and it’s very hot and thirsty.’
Chapter 4
Continuing west into a blaze of orange, Dampier’s party were guided by white tapes through a large minefield to the east of Sofi. As they moved on, they left the cinder-coloured plains behind them and struck red sand which sent up coils like angry flames round the wheels, and they began to notice that the wind had risen. Within an hour the desert was blotted out by rolling clouds of crimson dust fine as flour that got into their eyes and ears and ground between their teeth. Everything was covered with it and it seemed as if the lorry was being lashed by purple streamers under a livid sky. The visibility was only a few yards now, with the sun blotted out, the oppressive murk deepening to a dull orange then paling to a dusky yellow as the wind slackened.
Muffling their faces against the wind, they got their heads down and, as it grew worse, Dampier decided
